The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1873-09-20 00:00:00

A GENERAL STRIKE.
(From the Economist.

The Congress of the International at Geneva justly
attracts less attention than it did some years ago,
before the experiment of the Commune at Parts end
the quarrels among the leaders had occurred to throw
light upon the utter ignorance and folly of the party
and the weak bold which It has among the working
claims themselves. It is now perfectly evident that
the International only rallies to itself a weak section of
the working claws upon whom the vague promise of
some improvement in their condition has a certain effect,
though we doubt very much any general ardency of con-
elation among the bulk of the en-called adherents. The
' characterktic of the party is the adoption of the modest
economical heresies, bailed upon the most superficial ob.
Nervation of the complicated relations of industry, and
the Ideas are so vague that in the first attempt at ap-
plication their hollowness is discovered. Of this sort
Is the conception of • "general strike" which hes
figured so much in the Coupe= just held. The workmen
throughout the world may, this supposed, obtain their
own terms from capitalists by • simultensons strike on •
given day. The movement, It is recognised, mast be uni-
versal on account of the international character of trade,
but some of the Internationalists think it would answer
if it could be organised. The dbmadon all turned upon
the possibility of this orsationizil.it is amusing
to find that even &alight ht thedawn of •
conviction to the Internationalists t organization
was not possible; but it does not seem to have occurred
to anyone that the eonoeption of a general strike is in
reality self-contradictory. What it means is that all
, the various participstors in production shall stop pro-
ductlon on • certain day until they can settle what
their share in the produce will be. Bay that the capi-
talists, qua capitalists, Are to be excluded altogether
from the division, how are the shares to be adjusted.?
Who is to settle the relative shares of a collier and a
cotton-spinner' of a ploughman and an engraver, of •
scavenger and the captain of • mail steamer All the
various labourers in different countries must agree on
something before they can resume work again, and how is
an arrangement conceivable! The truth is that the ad-
justment is now effected by means of partial @bikes, or
threats to strike. A particular clam of workmen thinks
It is entitled to a larger share of general produce, and
strikes to obtain It; but, pro tonto, this is an injury
to all the rest of the world. As machinery and inven-
tion increase all may come in time to have higher real
wages than now, because the whole medusas will be
',ger ; but • general strike is inconceivable as a sub-
stitute, in the distribution of the gross produce, for
the higgling of the market by which that distribution
is now effected. The Internationalists seem to forget
that to organize the industry .of modem society so
as to produce the remits it does even for the poorest
labourer, is an immense achievement, and
that,
although better results are desirable, the difficultiee of
the problem are so great that no other conceivable
system for distributing the gross produce of labour on
a large scale has yet been suggested, which would not
ntrodnoe, in Nome form or other, the evils of slavery or
serfdom. The superiority in equity of the present
system over many other schemes suggested might also
be shown, but it is not useless to remember that the
strong footing it hae in the world depends not so much
upon choice as upon necessity.)