Workmen's advocate. (New Haven, Conn.) 1883-1891, 1889-09-28
SOCIALISM OR NATloNALlsM ?

natured as you can be under the circum.
stances.
SOCIALISM OR NATlONAllSM
The following extracts from five let
tiers exchanged between an adherent of
Nationalism and an old Socialist may
prove interesting to our readers. We
submit them to-day without comment,
expecting that they will elicit timely
criticism, and reserving for future is
sue the expression of such views as we
may personally entertain upon the sub
ject.-ED.
Nationalist to SOcidliSt-"I am instruct
ed by this Club to take measures looking
to the formation of a similar club III
your city, where, it is believed, there is
good material for strong and inhuen-
tial organization. Your name has been
given to me as one whose earnest and
intelligent interest in the burning uues-
ton of our day may induce him to help
us in the work now before u.s. Trust
ing, therefore, that your convictions may
allow you to give the Nationalist move
ment the aid of your valuable co-opera-
ton, | beg to inquire whether you
would be willing to join IN the forma-
ton of club in your city, and to fur
nish me with the names of such other
persons, men and women, as you may
Judge suitable. Very respectfully, etc.
IN. B.-The Nationalist platform is
printed on the back of this"
Socialist to NotiOnaliSt-"ln reply to
your kind invitation, allow me to state
that | am unwilling to embark on a new
road. 1. e., to relinquish Socialism for
Nationalism. AS to furnishing you
with Names etc, am hardly able to
give any, since almost all my political
connections are with working men and
women within the ranks of Labor. The
conversion Of the cultured and conser.
vative classes has never been an article
of my faith, because, in the words of
Karl Marx, The emancipation of the
working classes must be achieved by the
working classes themselves Yours,
ETC."
~ to ST reply to yours of the =,
not for the purpose of pressing the in
vitation contained in mine of the -,
to which yours is an answer, but be-
cause as a Socialist | feel | may not
leave unanswered the views you seem to
impute to Socialism, and which, to my
knowledge, are mistaken.
you declare your 'unwillingness to re-
linquish Socialism for Nationalism.' Con-
sdering that Nationalism is Socialism,
your position would be that you prefer
the name to the thing. Socialist philoso-
ply teaches us, on the contrary, to olsen
gage ourselves of vanity; to aspire after
the thing and not the shador; and
when the thing is no less than the re-
demption of the human race, to take
hold of whatever instrument presents
itself that may accomplish its Social
ism's) ideal. So long as Socialist can
not but admit that Nationalism upholds
every vital principle he upholds, he can
not claim that to aid Nationalism would
be to relinquish Socialism.
"You declare your inability to fur
nsh me with names favorable to Ma
tonalism, on the ground that all your
connections are with workingmen and
women within the ranks of labor and
that it is no article of your faith to look
for the conversion of the cultured and
conservative classes, and you quote in
your support the well known but gen.
orally misquoted phrase from kar
Marx In this again your position If
hostile to Socialism, and to the express
teachings of the very man you seem tt
believe IN.
"Karl Marx, Ferdinand Lassalle and
the rest of Socialist philosophers have
ever maintained that all labor that soci
ETY. needs is labor and honorable. They
have denied that only the manual il
labor. They have again and again In
sisted upon the sacrednes5 and brother
hood of oil labor, upon die Arbeit unt
die WiSsenschaft and they never PLACED
labor, because cultured, out of the ranks
of labor. Their language is one which
cannot be twisted into an assertion tina
the cultured classes are not wanted
or are useless, or are outside the ranks
of labor. From what class, pray you
came Marx and Lassalle? From wha
class is the Russian nobleman, Sergiui
E. Schevitsch, or Laurence Gronlund
or Walter Vrooman, in this country
or Liebknecht, Bebel, or ViereCs, whC
are fighting for Socialism and the rights
of man in Germany!
Views like those you express 1t Ii
that have kept Socialism back in Amer
lea and it is the sound, humane, scien
tiiiC creed of Socialism that NatlOnallsn
upholds, consecrating all useful worl
alike, and the rights of man as man
conscious that a lasting success is i'm
possible, where only the 'workmen' IN
the sense in which you use it, are con
cerned, without taking into account thu
workmen from the cultured classes al
we'll.
THE article of your creed, allow me II
state it frankly, is not Socialism at all
1t is class pref udice. The sun that is t.
rise cannot shine on that. Nor is you
o.nol clnrol by. tho .unrlkin nmpn an.