The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1912-12-02
Newest Form of Labor Revolution;
"SvndicQIsn' --NQture of Doctrines

the members of which will be elected
by popular vote and controlled by the
initiative, referendum and recall;
these government boards will them
selves constitute a national governing
board which will be the final court of
appeals and Jurisdiction. Each man
will be compelled to enter one Of the
national industries, work his daily
stint, and be citizen, not of Ohio or
Indiana, but of this Union or that. We
will tolerate no drones in the hive.
Educating The Workers.
At the present moment Syndicansts
are everywhere busy at work carrying
out this program. Just now, their
greatest concern is to educate the
workers for the coming war. For this
their chief means is the strike: not
the old-fashioned strike for shorter
hours and more pay, but a new inven-
ton which they call the Irritation
strike" The effect of the irritation
strike is two-fold; it trains the wor-
kers to act together, disciplines them
in obedience, reveals the men or wom-
en- with power for leadership, stirs
their passions, deepens their class
consciousness, and increases their ha-
tired of the enemy; it cuts into the
profit and power of the boss and thus
weakens the enemy. While on strike
each union is supported by those
which remain at work and thus the
dream of every labor leader-the I'M
ion of the workers-will be realized.
After returning to work, which is a
move usually as unexpected as the
walkout, each Syndicalist is under in
struction to practice sabotage" Sa-
botage means to "cut down the profits
of the boss by any means that will
work" Usually passive lawless vio-
lence" is used; that is to say that the
worker secretly destroys the property
of the boss and does 1t in such a way
| that he will not get caught; perhaps
he falls with a box of cut-glass. or
pulls one screw from a. machine. or
drops a bale of silk into the water.
When all in shop or ON a boat are
doing this no individual can be held
| responsible and the profits of the boss
are cut into and that of course, weak
ems the enemy, for profit, as everyone
knows, is the backbone of capitalism.
Is "Direct Action"
From this it is plain that the diff
Terminating principle of Syndicalism
is Direct Action" That famous
phrase was first used by Pelloutier
while secretary of the French Fedora.
ton of Labor and means that the wor.
ker can come to the conclusion that
the slow, tedious and indirect methods
of politics are found wanting and that
the time has come for the working
class to act directly" The Syndical
list is labor rebel. he is not going to
waste his years toying with the game
of politics. No parleying, no compro
missing, no truce, but war to the death
is his shibboleth, and he is going to
appropriate capitalism, not by the
complex machinery Of laws and taxa
ton but by the sheer power Of his
hands.
1t is at this crucial point that Syn
dical1sm parts company from Social
ism; both have this in common, that
the workers can never receive the full
|
revolution in it's fundamental princi
pie society is shifted from the basis
of individual ownership and control tC
collective ownership and control, blu,
the Socialist would do this indirectly
and chiefly through political means
expecting that as the workers by unit
ed action at the ballot-boX gain contro
of the law-making and law-enforcinl
functions of the government they cal
gradually modify our constitutions
bases until the revolution has been eff
fected. And when that revolution /,
effected, expects the Socialist the in
dustries will not be owned by the op
eratives of the same but by all thu
people. He believes in industrial un
ionism as a means for educating ant
uniting the proletariat and as furnish
ing tool to it's hand, but he does no
believe that society can ever be O.
should ever be, wholly industrial.
The Socialist is also at loggerhead
with the Syndicalist in regard to tn.
Interpretation of government Like tn,
our government at present function
for and is wholly under the control o
the ruling class, but unlike the Syndi
calist, he does not hold that this i
the essence Of political government
Our political government is metho,
of collective control which, in its cor
temporary form, is the expression o
our industrial system, and is in tn
hands of capitalism because capital
ism controls our industrial system.
Hatred Not Preached.
The Socialist breaches the class
struggle but not personal hatred, h