The Commonwealth. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1911-1914, 1913-04-11
Lawyers and Lawyers


lied Their Socialist Party"
with the capitalist press as faithful
|allies. a meeting was heralded to take
place at the Temple Of Music in Ia
coma the night of March % to organ
/ ize a local of the yellow skeeter
fleet" In an attempt to get out a
crowd a fake rumor was started and
rolled onward by the everready press
that J. SHtt Wilson Of California was
to address the netting. About hun
bred people turned out but there was
no Wilson.
Senator Peder Jensen made a short
talk and told them that he did not
think there was any real division eX-
oept in their minds. Attorney Howard
Wright was chairman and Joseph Gil
bert of Seattle did the talking He
made much of the fact that the card
membership in the party in this state
had decreased since last year. He
was very careful to avoid explaining
that the party membership always de-
creases just after a presidential cam
paign when so many short lived cam
paign locals" are organized and then
die when the election is over. As a
sample of this we will point to Che
halls where Gilbert's own kind are the
king pins and had chance to demon
strate their tendencies Chehalis
swelled it's membership to an average
of over fifty members during the cam
paign year-big enough to give them
two delegates to the last state conven-
ton. Both of these Chehalis dele
gates signed up, after the convention
when, presto change, the report of
Chehalis local for February showed
only fourteen paid-up members. 1t
would not do for Gilbert to point out
such things; it would take the wind
out of his argument. Here is a sample
of Gilbert's argument:
In the first part of his talk he told
about himself being one of the pio-
neers in the party in this state; then
later on in his talk he wanted to show
how those who are now doing work
in the party had become "standpat-
ters," fulfilled their mission-in short,
outlived their usefulness and should
make way for the progressive" "con-
structive" element with the varnish
brush. To illustrate this he said that
those who built the foundation of a
building should not be expected to
continue their activities when others
were better fitted to put the finishing
touches on the structure. He must
have believed that he was thus put
ting he kibosh on the present organi-
cation of the party; but in reality he
was putting the kibosh on himself
He gave further ample demonstration
of that fact when the reds" in the
meeting (and there quite a number)
peppered him with questions. When
he could not answer a question he
would make some flippant remark to
DIIIlS OuJ tAlC applause VI IllC SOllOH
boosters and thus try to squelch the
questioner. For instance, he was
asked where this constructive" work
we hear so much about, was going to
be done, on the political field or on
the industrial field, since we see CAPT
talism developed out of feudalism
through constructive processes on the
industrial field. He replied that such
"a question was like asking which was
first, the chicken or the egg" Take
that as an answer, you mutt. You
have no business to ask such silly
question. 1t is getting too close to
our boosted Constructive principles"
They had seven names already on
their application for a charter from
their brand new Chairman" secretary,
and they claimed twenty-six more
when they collected the cards; less
all told than the regular paid-up mem
bership of the expelled local No 2.
But we must remember that they had
the assistance of the capitalist press
which had already well spread the
lie that the convention had split when
in fact only a few scales of bark had
peeled off.
A COMRADE WHO WAS THERE.