Montana news. [volume] (Lewistown, Mont.) 1904-191?, 1906-02-07

mIade Ming says, we must
place the budren Of outlawry upon
the enemy" That is excellent in
theory, but in fact the enemy (the
capitalists control the law and will
constantly shape tito suit themselves
so that they will never become out
lawed. How then can we place the
brand of outlawry on them?
Comrade King says the peculiar
weapon of the socialist movement
is the idea" What is this idea?"
| take it that it is a belief that the
working class will establish the CO.
operative commonwealth, which will
be much more desirable system of
industry for us than the present cap
italist system. Now if we are to do
this we cannot at all use the ballot
according to the rule prescribed by
the constitution of the United
States and thus rise to power within
the law" Comrade King will agree
with me that the object of the social
ist movement is to establish a work
ing class democracy. Also | think
he will agree that the United States
constitution is peculiarly adapted to
conserve the capitalist system which
is directly opposed to socialism.
The constitution is the great bull
wark on which capitalism relies to
ward off all efforts against its life,
and above all it is not adopted for
the purposes of true working class
democracy. That constitution is
adapted for the uses of capitalism.
Socialism must throw il aside along
with private ownership and other
relics of an outgrown system of in
dustry.
II course of strict legality on
our part will compel the enemy
to outlaw and ALLEVIATE himself from
the support of the great mass of
following humanity, "Iwould like to
to be told why it has not done so
as result of conditions at Home
steak, Pana, Virden, Chicago, the
Occur d. Alenes, Victor. Telluride
and numerous other places. The
simple fact is that the class that has
the necessary power can make any
thing, no matter how atrocious, per-
fectly legal and constitutional, as
witness the legality" of the Cos
sacks raids on peacable working
men. Legality comes as a result
of power, and every act of capital
ism will be legal so long as the cap
italists have the might behind them.
The only way we can make their
acts illegal is to first obtain the pow
er to do so, and then having the
courage and intelligence to assert
that power.
! am not, however, one who wonld
advise a rash and unreasoning at
tempt at armed resistance to capi-
talism before we have the power to
make it reasonably certain that we
can be successful, and to have any
hope of success we must have what
Lincoln called the most men and
the most guns-that is the majority.
The enemy will certainly rebel
and become the outlaw when we
have obtained the majority, but we
can never take his word as to the
strength we have, as we would have
to do if we depended on the ballot
for our estimates. The only re-
source left us is to have a class con-
scious working class organization
which will instruct and drill the
worker to take and hold" and
this organization must be able TO
count its members and know when
they are in the majority, regardless
of the result that may be announced
from the capitalist ballot box.
A capitalist government will use
fattery, fraud or force as the oc-
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