Chapter II: William English Walling

If the Belgian strike is a world-event of the first magnitude for
the general public, it has a still greater significance for the
world’s ten or twenty million Socialists. The two wings of the
Socialist movement are equally interested; the reformers and
conciliators, because the strike aims at a purely political
reform, and involves co-operation with a part of the capitalists,
both in order to win success now and in order to get immediate use
out of the suffrage after it is won; the revolutionists and
advocates of class struggle because the strike forces a large loss
on many unwilling employers and gives training for later and more
aggressive strikes for the purpose of raising wages, cutting down
profits, and paving the way to social revolution.

These essential facts are being widely understood. Take, for
example, the following editorial paragraphs from the influential
and progressive, but by no means radical, _Chicago Tribune_:

“For years the thinkers of the movement in Europe were building
up theories about the ‘political mass strike.’ These theories
have now been put into practice in Belgium with remarkable
precision.

“The strike in Belgium is not a precipitated strike. For months
the Socialists of that country have been making preparations for
it. They have been collecting money, storing provisions, and,
what is even more important, educating the workingmen to their
theories, training them to respond to the strike call like
drilled soldiers. It is not an emotional, not an impulsive
strike, therefore, but a coolly thought out, shrewdly calculated
battle....

“As a result of this careful planning and training by the
leaders 400,000 workingmen responded to Socialist colors with
the precision of a trained army. The strike is both a battle and
military review. The Socialists now have a clear and adequate
view of their strength and numbers. The issue involved in this
strike, which is uniform as opposed to plural voting, may be
lost. The strike may even be called off by the Socialists
themselves after a week or so if the government does not yield
by that time. But the advantages which Socialism has gained by
this census of its army is incalculable. It knows how much of
the Belgian public is behind it and to what extent. This time
the general strike is used to combat a single abuse of the
government. In the future the same working masses may be
directed against the present régime as a whole. It is a strike
now. It may be a civil war or revolution the next time.”

But while the capitalistic _Tribune_ is so sympathetic and
optimistic, the leading labor union paper of this country, the
_United Mine Workers’ Journal_ has been highly sceptical and
pessimistic:

“The strikers say they are ready and have the means to hold out
six weeks.

“What if the other class should elect to hold out for twelve
weeks; that is, if the strike should become a ‘lock-out?’

“There is no doubt but that the class against whom they are
striking, the propertied class, who hold the unfair political
advantage over them, could store more per member than the
workers.

“We wish our brothers every success. Hope they will obtain what
is undoubtedly theirs by right. But, in our opinion, unless the
strike results in a test of force instead of passive endurance
(and this same is more than probable) the workers’ needs will
drive them back to their tasks before those who have been
enriched by their labor will consent to give up the political
advantages on which their economic advantages are based.”

Why this remarkable reversal of the opinions that might have been
expected? Why have some of the richest Liberals in Belgium
supported the strike?

The Belgians are striking for a right the French obtained in
1876—equal suffrage. Yet who are the chief beneficiaries of the
political democracy of France? The condition of the laborers is
about the same as in Belgium. The only difference is that in
France the industrial and urban capitalists now hold the balance
of power between the laborers on the one hand and the reactionary
agrarians, landlords and employing peasants on the other; while in
Belgium the latter classes, which control the Catholic Party, have
a Parliamentary majority over the laborers and urban middle
classes combined. The Belgium Liberals then have had everything to
win by a strike, which aims at establishing the French situation
in that country. As for the Socialists, equal suffrage would
undoubtedly have the effect of driving the Liberals and Catholics
together into the same government, as in Germany, thus making the
Socialists _the_ opposition party. It would also result ultimately
in whatever social and labor reforms the Liberals might feel it to
their interest to grant. But this is all.

This is why thoughtful Socialists the world over, including
several of the Belgian leaders (Vandervelde, Huysmans, De
Brouckère and Bertrand) have been so dubious about the strike.
They have seen that the burden of the contest will fall about
equally on employers and employes. But the Liberal employers are
playing for a splendid stake—Belgium; while the Socialists are
playing only for such incidental and secondary benefits as will
accrue to them from Liberal control of the country. Naturally they
have had far more dread of the costs and risks which the strike
involves.

But whether the strike was to be lost or won it has been clear
that it would interest the world’s millions of Socialists more
deeply than ever in the possibilities and the limitations of the
general strike.

All Socialists favor the political general strike, most Socialists
favor the general strike against war—including the conservatives
like Keir Hardie and Jean Jaurès. The moderate Swedes had an
economic general strike a few years ago and this form is favored
also by the majority of French and Italian labor unionists. And
now the British unionists are voting on the question whether they
will all quit work each day after eight hours—which would mean a
general lock-out, or practically a general strike.

Whether the Belgians win or lose will not affect the momentum of
the movement. If they win, general strikes for a few years will
take a predominantly political character, and we shall see the
general political strike resumed in Hungary within a few months
and doubtless declared in Prussia before many years. If they lose
these British, French and Italian movements toward economic
general strikes will have the field.

The historian of the future when writing of our generation will
have to give a central position—perhaps _the_ central position—to
the general strike.

-----

Footnote 1:

See THE SURVEY for October 5, 1912.

Footnote 2:

It is now reported that the opponents of the law, which goes
into effect August 1, have started an effort to secure the
19,535 signatures necessary for a petition to have the law
submitted to a referendum vote.

Footnote 3:

Drawn from a case record of the New York Charity Organization
Society.

Footnote 4:

Number based not on total number of cases but on scholarship,
conduct and attendance cases, respectively.

Footnote 5:

Most of the quotations here given are taken from Songs from the
Ghetto. By Morris Rosenfeld. Translated into prose by Leo
Wiener. Copeland & Day, Boston. 1898. Price $1.00.

Footnote 6:

Rosenfeld’s poetry in this respect is the antithesis of that of
Arturo Giovannitti. See THE SURVEY of November 2, 1912.

Footnote 7:

Pendulum.

Footnote 8:

I work and work and work—without end; I am busy and busy and
busy at all times.

Footnote 9:

The Counting—the forty-nine days of the Feast of the Seven
Weeks.

Footnote 10:

My Little Sister. By Elizabeth Robins. Dodd, Mead and Co. 344
pp. Price $1.25. By mail of THE SURVEY $1.37.

Footnote 11:

Of 478 defendants, fifty-three women are involved or implicated.
Of those, eighteen are found not guilty, are dismissed, or cases
are pending.

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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

● Typos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained.
● Used numbers for footnotes, placing them all at the end of the
last chapter.
● Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.