The Red Conspiracy Part 14

"It is the historic mission of the working cla.s.s to do away with capitalism. The army of production must be organized, not only for the every-day struggle with the capitalists, but also to carry on production when capitalism shall have been overthrown. By organizing industrially we are forming a structure of the new society within the sh.e.l.l of the old."

Giovannitti, editor of the New York City Italian Socialist publication, "Il Proletario," one of the official Socialist organs enumerated in the "Proceedings[9] of the 1910 National Congress of the Socialist Party,"

writing in the April 5, 1913, edition of his paper, says:

"The aim of the Socialists and of the Syndicalists is precisely that of dispossessing the middle cla.s.s by transferring property to the working cla.s.s.

"We shall take possession of the industries for three very simple reasons: because we need them, because we desire them, and because we have the power to take them.

"Whether it is just or unjust, moral or immoral, it is no concern to us. We shall waste no time whatever in providing the validity of our legal t.i.tles, yet, if it will be necessary, after the dispossession will have been accomplished, we shall engage a couple of lawyers and judges to adjust the contracts and to render the act perfectly legal and respectable. So, too, if it will be necessary, we shall find a couple of most learned bishops to sanctify it.

These matters can always be arranged--all that is strong and powerful becomes in time just and moral--and for this reason, we Syndicalists maintain that the social revolution is not a question of necessity and justice, but of necessity and strength."

"The New Unionism," by Tridon, on page 112, informs us that Arturo Giovannitti was, in turn, a minter, a bookkeeper, a theological student, a mission preacher and a tramp. Ettor, in "Industrial Unionism," page 15, speaking of the I. W. W. principles of morality, says:

"New conceptions of Right and Wrong must generate and permeate the workers. We must look on conduct and actions that advance the social and economic position of the working cla.s.s as Right, ethically, legally, religiously, socially and by every other measurement. That conduct and those actions which aid, help to maintain and give comfort to the capitalist cla.s.s, we must consider as Wrong by every standard."

"The New Unionism," page 104, gives us Vincent St. John's statement of the methods and tactics employed by the I. W. W., of which he has been a prominent leader:

"As a revolutionary organization the Industrial Workers of the World aims to use any and all tactics that will get the results sought with the least expenditure of time and energy. The tactics used are determined solely by the power of the organization to make good in their use. The question of 'right' and 'wrong' does not concern us. No terms made with an employer are final. All peace so long as the wage system lasts is but an armed truce. At any favorable opportunity the struggle for more control of industry is renewed....

"The organization does not allow any part to enter into time contracts with the employers. It aims where strikes are used, to paralyze all branches of the industry involved, when the employers can least afford a cessation of work--during the busy season and when there are rush orders to be filled."

In the Socialist Labor Party paper, "Weekly People," New York, February 10, 1912, the following article by Arthur Giovannitti shows the part that the I. W. W. is expected to take in bringing about the Marxian rebellion through the instrumentality of a general strike:

"The future of Socialism lies only in the general strike, not merely a quiet political strike, but one that once started should go fatally to its end, i.e., armed insurrection, and the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions.... The task of revolution is not to construct the new society, but to demolish the old one, and, therefore, its first aim should be at the complete destruction of the existing state, so as to render it absolutely powerless to react and re-establish itself.... The I. W. W. must develop itself as the new legislature and the new executive body of the land, undermine the existing one, and gradually absorb the functions of the state until it can entirely substantiate it through the only means it has, the revolution."

On May 1, 1919, plans for a nation-wide strike on July 4th were disclosed by I. W. W. orators at a ma.s.s meeting in the workingmen's hall, 119 South Throop Street, Chicago. It was Simms, a colored man, who gave the details of the strike plan:

"The workmen will lay down their tools on July 4th, and on the morning of July 5th not one will take them up again....

"It will be the opening of the social revolution. Moreover, not one workman will take up his tools again until every prisoner of the workers now incarcerated in the capitalistic prisons is released."

"The One Big Union Monthly," March 1, 1919, page 22, declares:

"Socialism rears new inst.i.tutions. It weaves a new fabric for our social life. In Russia it is the Soviets; in America it is the One Big Union. This fabric is proletarian only. Within its limits the Socialist Revolutionist halts. This new organism--this One Big Union--may, or may not seek Democracy. Democracy is merely a method of governing. If that method leads to Socialist goals it will be followed. Otherwise, we will seek further for our avenue. But the great end is proletarianism. It is the social owners.h.i.+p of the means of production. It is the creation of a society where all cla.s.ses will be melted into one, and where the cla.s.s war will soften into an all-race proletarianism."

Another I. W. W. publication, "The Evolution of Industrial Democracy,"

page 40, speaking of government after the "Wobblies" get into power, goes still further:

"Government, as now understood will disappear--there being no servile cla.s.s to be held in subjection--but in its place will be an administration of affairs."

Relative to property rights in the future, "The Evolution of Industrial Democracy," page 39, informs us:

"Rights of inheritance would disappear with the right to hold private property in the lands, tools and machinery of production.

Any acc.u.mulation by the individual that might be used for exploitation would pa.s.s to the collectivity at the death of the holder. Society would be the heir of the individual and, vice versa, the individuals would be the heirs of society. The right to freely function at the machines and enjoy the social value of his toil would guarantee the worker a full competence."

As regards compensation for work in accordance with the I. W. W. plan, we are told on page 39:

"Compensation in the industries would necessarily be upon the basis of the 'man-day'--the average production of an average man in an average day when working under average conditions--and in those industries not of an actual productive nature, such as 'public service,' etc., the man-day must prevail there also (being based upon the average production of all the industries served) for the reason that no man could be induced to serve for less than that average--to do so being to confess himself an inferior being--and to compel him to serve for less would be to set up a new slavery, which the moral sense of the new community could not endure."

Giovannitti, in "Il Proletario," New York, April 5, 1913, gives a lesson in sabotage to the Italian Socialists and members of the I. W. W.:

"We are not yet sufficiently strong to restore them [i.e., the instruments of production] to ourselves, it is true, but it is also true that we cannot allow any opportunity to escape of reaping any advantage from them.

"Thus, if to-morrow we shall be justified in wrenching from capitalism all the industries, why, when it is a question of life or death for us to win or to lose a strike, is it not just to remove a screw, derange a wheel, break a thread, or commit, in any way whatever, an act of sabotage on a machine which otherwise would become the very beginning of our defeat in the hands of the scabs?

"We cannot understand how it is still possible while we have a right to all the produce of our work, we have not an entire right to a part of it."

Other ill.u.s.trations of sabotage may be of interest to the reader. The following one is taken from the Chicago "Syndicalist," February 15, 1913:

"A few drops of sulphuric acid placed on top of a pile of woolen or cotton goods never stops going down.

"Two decks of cards in a grain separator cover the screen and cause the grain to vanish out of the blower.

"A piece of iron dropped in a crucible full of gla.s.s will eat through it. Crucibles are made of graphite and cost $40.

"A handful of salt in paint will allow a good-looking job for a day or two, but when dry will fall off in sheets.

"Maclay Hoyne, Chicago's district attorney, is a.n.a.lyzing a spontaneous fire powder that allows the user to be miles away when it breaks forth.

"Castor oil capsules dissolved in varnish destroy the ability of the latter to dry. The job must be washed down and started all over again.

"The suffragettes of England have significantly notified their opponents that a fire in every s.h.i.+re was the way the word was flashed in days gone by."

Pages 40 to 48 of "The New Unionism," by Tridon, furnish us with some more barbarous examples of sabotage:

"We may distinguish three forms of sabotage:

"1. Active sabotage which consists in the damaging of goods or machinery.

"2. Open-mouthed sabotage, beneficial to the ultimate consumer, and which consists in exposing or defeating fraudulent commercial practices.

"3. Obstructionism or pa.s.sive sabotage, which consists in carrying out orders literally, regardless of consequences.

"If you are an engineer you can, with two cents' worth of powdered stone or a pinch of sand, stall your machine, cause a loss of time or make expensive repairs necessary. If you are a joiner or woodworker, what is simpler than to ruin furniture without your boss noticing it, and thereby drive his customers away? A garment worker can easily spoil a suit or a bolt of cloth; if you are working in a department store, a few spots on a fabric cause it to be sold for next to nothing; a grocery clerk, by packing up goods carelessly, brings about a smashup; in the woolen or the haberdashery trade a few drops of acid on the goods you are wrapping will make a customer furious ... an agricultural laborer may sow bad seed in wheat fields," etc.

"With two cents' worth of a certain stuff, used by one who knows, a locomotive can be made absolutely useless."

"The first thing to do before going out on strike is to cripple all the machinery. Then the contest is even between employer and worker, for the cessation of work really stops all life in the capitalists' camp. Are bakery workers planning to go on strike? Let them pour in the ovens a few pints of petroleum or of any other greasy or pungent matter. After that, soldiers or scabs may come and bake bread. The smell will not come out of the tiles for three months. Is a strike in sight in steel mills? Pour sand or emery into the oil cups."

"The electrical industry is one of the most important industries, as an interruption in the current means a lack of light and power in factories; it also means a reduction in the means of transportation and a stoppage of the telegraph and telephone systems. How can the power be cut off? By the curtailing in the mine the output of the coal necessary for feeding the machinery or stopping the coal cars on their way to the electrical plants. If the fuel reaches its destination what is simpler than to set the pockets on fire and have the coal burn in the yards instead of the furnaces? It is child's play to put out of work the elevators and other automatic devices which carry coal to the fire room. To put boilers out of order use explosives or silicates or a plain gla.s.s bottle which thrown on the glowing coals hinders the combustion and clogs up the smoke exhausts. You can also use acids to corrode boiler tubes; acid fumes will ruin cylinders and piston rods. A small quant.i.ty of some corrosive substance, a handful of emery will be the end of oil cups. When it comes to dynamos or transformers, short circuits and inversion of poles can be easily managed.

Underground cables can be destroyed by fire, water or explosives,"

etc.

"The New Unionism," the book from which the above quotations were taken and which was purchased by the author of "The Red Conspiracy" at the I.

W. W. headquarters, 1001 West Madison Street, Chicago, in the latter part of the spring of 1919, also informs us on page 123:

"As far as sabotage is concerned, all the I. W. W. speakers and the I. W. W. press countenance it although they steadily warn the workers against the indiscriminate and unsocial use of that weapon of warfare."