The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1926-07-17
New Days in Old England-The General Strike

| strike orders issued there were many
who were convinced that the right
wing leaders were out to deliberately
betray the workers by sabotaging the
strike in order to discredit the general
strike as weapon once and for all.
And whether they started out with
that intention or not, this was what
they did. Even during the strike,
Thomas, one Of its leaders, made pub
lie speeches decrying the general
strike. Snowden was silent and the
Webbs, Shaws and other highbinders
whose names have been associated
with the British labor movement for
generations were silent as the tomb.
Their inspiring messages to labor in
its hour of trial were never delivered
while the columns of the British Ca
zette were black with screaming ex-
hortations from the Asquiths, Greys
and Samuels of the Liberal wing of
| British capitalism, as well as from
the Churchills, Balfours and Baldwins
Of the Tory wing.
The strike was called of suddenly
on May IL. On the evening of May IL
l walked around Southampton picking
conversation with various people,
mostly workers. The general attitude
was that I'VE will see thegrass grow
ing on the streets of this city before
we surrender" And they meant it.
Anybody who knows the desperate
condition under which the great mass
Of British workers live would be sur
prised, not at this determination to
/ go down with the ship" if need be,
but at the marvellous patience they
have displayed. But then not so very
long ago at that, British workers were
sentenced to penal servitude ON a con-
vict ship for humbly petitioning for
an increase in wages!
Pickets stood sullenly at the gates
of the White Star line dock. There
were few policemen there. Any
body could pass by the police by sim
ply saying he had booked a passage on
q u0 uOChb WGIC uGStIlcu,
excepting officers and volunteers"
some with Oxford bags, supposed to be
young dukes, lords. etc. They spent
more of the time amusing themselves
in the first-class cabins of the palatial
liners where they were housed and
fed. The gentleman with the reced-
ing chin that the creator of Andy
Gump predicts will be the future 100
per cent Americana would look like
hero in a western moving picture
compared to those semi-animate
chunks of protoplasm who were sacri-
ficing their beauty sleep to save the
empire.
AS one of those floating castles that
the war for democracy delivered into
the hands of the White Star line was
trying to leave the docks the Oxford
bag handles with wrist watches and
silk handkerchiefs flying from their
cloat sleeves cut pretty picture as
cameras clicked, going thru the forms
Of releasing hawsers and other chores
connected with this task. They han
died the stout cables as gingerly as a
Chinaman would fondle his chopsticks.
If the husky stevedore who barked
angrily at them had halitosis, those
parasites would not have been more
loath to get within reach of his breath.
After their pictures were taken, for
use in the government propaganda,
the handles spent the rest of the time
sticking their glossy hair and smoking
cigarettes. The ship carried no :
freight, except what she carried from
the United States on previous trip.
It was tieup all right, and the bosses