Los Angeles herald. [microfilm reel] (Los Angeles [Calif.]) 1900-1911, 1907-09-19
Population of Los Angeles 100000
SOCIALISTS SOLDERING

HI NDER the caption Socialism
Growing Sober the New York
~ Evening Post recently published
an analytic editorial dealing with the
international congress at Stuttgart.
The writer declares that the practical
spirit which made itself manifest in
the resolutions adopted by some nine
hundred delegates from all the six con-
tinents, is not an entirely new phe-
nomenon in the Socialist movement,
for it is no paradox to say that both
the recent triumphs and recent de-
feats of the party have served to en-
dow its leaders with a sense of re-
sponsibility that we are not accus-
toned to associate with the utterances
of the extreme collectivist partisan.
On the one hand, the writer con-
tinues. If Socialists feel convinced, as
Eduard Bernstein declared at Stuff
CART, that their world parliaments
were becoming increasingly the arbi-
tiers of the casting vote,'' the pressure
Of practical considerations would act
in the direction of wise self-restraint
On the other hand, if the German
Social Democrats, as frankly avowed
by Bebel. have learned from this years
reichstag elections that the spirit of
nationality cannot be antagonized
without serious consequences, that,
too, would be a powerful argument
for moderation. Evidently the Social
lists are discovering that like every
other party or creed they must take
public feeling seriously into account
OF the questions which the Stuttgart
congress took under consideration, the
four most important were anti-mili-
tarism, colonization, and freedom of
emigration and immigration, and the
policy that should govern the relations
of Socialists as a political party
toward the labor unions. The question
of anti-militarism was of acutest
Importance to the French Socialists,
Herveism, as the movement is called
in France, after it's most uncompro-
missing exponent, teaches that it is the
duty of the working class to make war
impossible by all means in their power
= refusal to serve in the army,
INSTRUMENTATION, armed strike. and, in
case of the actual declaration of hos
tilities, by armed insurrection.
The anti-militarist agitation has
placed the French Socialist leaders in
parliament in an extremely difficult
position. M. Jaures has. dared neither
.,;4 h.
latter's powerful following, nor, for
obvious reasons, openly to embrace his
views. His attempts at compromise
have not been conspicuously successful,
and the congress of French Socialists
which met two weeks ago at Nancy
adopted a resolution which is conceded
to have signified a placatory triumph
for the anti-militarists. II see," a
French paper makes an honest citizen
say, that Jaures has rejected Nerves
views" Yes" replies his neighbor,
with open arms"
Herveism, at Stuttgart, was bitterly
assailed by the German and English
Socialists. Herve, with the terrible logic
of the fanatic, demanded of Bebel what
the German Social-Democrats would do
If war were declared between Germany
and France, and the French Socialists
should rise in Instruction. Bebel did
not reply. But when Herve asked
again, For whom shall we, then, be
fighting?" the Belgian leader, Wander
velde, responded, For the king of
Prussiai" The congress thought so,
too. 1t passed a resolution calling
upon Socialists to exert their influence
to prevent war, ut-significantly-i
war did exist, to labor for the re-es-
tablishment of peace; a declaration
which any middle class congress might
have adopted.
In the matter Of emigration and
immigration the Australian and Amer
lean delegates argued for a policy
of restriction. Socialists though they
were, they could not escape the limita-
tions of their environment, which in
Australia calls aloud for an "all white
Australia, and in San Francisco, Bell
ingham and Vancouver invokes the
danger of yellow peril. The congress
declared against the importation of
foreign laborers "as strike breakers"
a formula which the restrictionists
could accept with perfect good grace
on the principle that exclusion by any
other name is just as sweet.
Only on the question of colonization
did the radicals carry the congress.
Colonialism was condemned in toto, but
only by a bare majority of nineteen,
and after commission had reported
in favor of a moderate declaration on
the subject.