MIA > Archive > M. Philips Price
From International Press Correspondence, Vol. 2 No. 117, 27 December 1922, pp. 994–995.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for the Marxists’ Internet Archive.
Public Domain: Marxists Internet Archive (2021). You may freely copy, distribute, display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet Archive” as your source.
Dec. 20th, 22
Over a hundred years ago Rousseau said about the classic land of parliamentary democracy, that its citizens were free once every seven years during the few minutes, when they were recording their votes for the nominees of one or other of the two political caucuses. I do not know whether it was for this reason or for any other, but it was certainly true for a long time that in England a general election came rather to be associated with something akin to a horse-race or to some other national sport, which has always been a popular institution in England. This remark does not, of course, apply to Scotland, where, it seems, the austere influence of the Presbyterian Church has caused the inhabitants to treat election days, as if they were second editions of Sunday. But throughout all the south of the British Isles the general election was concerned more with personalities than with politics, more with the private life and individual character of the parliamentary candidates than with the political programs of the parties, to which they belonged.
And yet no one could help observing that in the general election, which has just taken place, a new element was introduced into the contest. Up till now the parliamentary stage has been monopolized by the two great historic parties of England, the Liberals and the Conservatives, or, as they were known a hundred years ago, the Whigs and the Tories. Originally they represented very distinct political principles, because they were the popular mouthpieces of two great economic interests, which at that time dominated the life of England. They were these of the agrarian aristocracy and those of the mercantile capitalists and traders. But as time went on, the economic interests of these two classes began to merge on many important questions and this was especially the case, wherever these two parties and the interests, which they represent, were faced with the new element in political life in England today, namely organized Labor.
I well remember elections in England in the days before the war. In the town, for which I was Labor candidate in this recent election, it was usual for the Liberal candidate to get in for one election by the lavish expenditure of money and by the promises of orders for the factories, so that the workers would be kept in employment. After he had been in for a term of years and had secured for himself the title of “Sir” or had perhaps bought for himself a seat in the House of Lords, it would be generally regarded that it was time for the Conservatives to have a go, and so the candidate of this party would get in and remain in, till he had gotten a judgeship or some other public emolument.
On this occasion however, this particular constituency, the city of Gloucester, presented a very different spectacle. The city is divided into two parts; one is industrial and contains a large population of workers, living by work in the docks, on the river and canal transport services, in a big railway and carriage works, in timber yards and on the railway lines; the other part is a residential one round the cathedral, where live the big bourgeoisie who have connections with the landowning aristocracy of the county, the petty bourgeoisie and small shopkeepers and their personal attendants, immediately dependent upon them for a livelihood. The big bourgeoisie had enormous influence upon the casual and unskilled laborers of this quarter of the city through their control over the administrative apparatus of the local government. They were able to give work on the municipal undertakings to those who promised to vote for the Liberal or Conservative. As Labor has not got its nominees on the municipal executive, the unskilled laborer is afraid that if the Labor candidate gets in, he will lose his work. But in addition to this the ecclesiastical authorities in an old town, like Gloucester, have great influence on the course of a political campaign and this influence was put unconditionally at the disposal of the big bourgeoisie. They are the controllers of large charitable funds, which were left by religiously-minded persons many hundreds of years ago, and these funds are now used to dole out blankets at Christmas and coals during the winter to all those, who will agree to support and work for the Liberal or Conservative candidates at the general election.
In fact the whole of the economic apparatus of the local authority, of the Church and of the big bourgeoisie was put in the scale against any party, which would dare to challenge the existing order of society and to preach the principles of Socialism. And this was the situation, which I found when I arrived in Gloucester two weeks before the general election last month.
It provided comment on the real nature of British parliamentary democracy, which is, in fact, nothing else than the instrument for enabling the big bourgeoisie to remain in possession of their economic power.
It is characteristic of the change which has come over England since the war that the nomination for the first time of a Labor candidate in a provincial centre, like Gloucester, to challenge the century-old supremacy of the two classical parties, should have led to an election campaign, unprecedented in the history of the city and to the failure of the Labor candidate to get elected by the narrow margin of 51 votes on a total poll of over 21,000! And what happened in Gloucester is, I think, fairly characteristic for what happened on an average throughout the rest of England. Organised and skilled labor rallied to the candidate, who uncompromisingly stood for Socialist principles, who demanded nationalisation of the key industries of the country, who demanded immediate recognition of Soviet Russia, who defended the principles of the Russian Revolution and who demanded that a clean sweep be made with the Versailles Treaty and the policy of indemnities! Nor is it difficult to see why this is so. One in six of the organized workers were unemployed and were living on doles amounting to twenty shillings a week, on which they had to keep their wives and families. Many of them had been from eighteen months to two years unemployed and were beginning to get demoralised and to lose their skill, which they had acquired after years of training. The ex-soldiers also were to a large extent tramping the streets looking for work, and among them there was a feeling of disillusionment and a feeling that the promises, which had been made to them, were never intended for fulfillment. A general feeling of unhappiness and depression pervaded them and it was one of the most interesting symptoms of the state of England today to see those, who four years ago would have howled down any candidate, who had even suggested that the military intervention against the Russian Soviet Republic was a crime, or that the Versailles Treaty was not the last word of wisdom, now whole-heartedly declaring their support of the Labor candidate. For instance on the polling day in Gloucester a number of ex-Service men came out and walked the Streets with their war medals on their breasts and with placards, on which were written; “Vote for the Labor candidate, who will see to it that you are never used again as capitalist canon-fodder.”
All references to Soviet Russia at meetings in the working class quarters of the city met with much sympathetic applause, especially when it was pointed out that the policy of the British government in sabotaging the granting of trading credits to Russia at the instance of Tsarist bondholders, was partly responsible for the unemployment from with they were suffering. They even began to feel instinctively the breakdown of the capitalist system and to understand something of the need for production for use and not for profit, which lies at the bottom of Socialism. And this too in a city, where Socialistic theory lias never been heard of until a few years ago and then only from the mouths of itinerant preachers. For the English working man is entirely ignorant of economic theories and can only be made to speculate, if he is given a practical problem connected with everyday life. The subtle propaganda of the British bourgeois press, which has been brought to such a pitch of perfection by the oldest and most cunning capitalist class in the world, and which aims at diverting the attention of the working class from essential issues to superficialities, is largely responsible for. Nevertheless the extraordinary rally of organised Labor to the Labor candidates, that took place throughout all England Was the best proof that many of these traditions of British labor are becoming things of the past. In Gloucester, in fact, on election day the whole of the slum areas in the neighbourhood of the cathedral were decked out in red flags and banners and processions of women and children paraded the streets singing Socialist songs. Such a thing was absolutely unknown in the days before the war.
On the other hand the big bourgeoisie and the landowning aristocracy of the countryside with their retainers presented a solid phalanx, supporting the Conservative party. This of course was natural and nothing else could be expected. The decisive factor in the election was the petit bourgeoisie and its immediate dependents among the unskilled and unorganised workers. These people have suffered no less than organised labor from unemployment, wage cuts and from the general disillusionment of the years, following upon the war. But this has not up till now had the effect of drawing them over to Labor. They have had for many years the poison of chauvinist propaganda pumped into them by the Northcliffe press. They have been taught to look upon the troubles of England, as being due to a deep-seated conspiracy, concocted by the Russian Bolsheviks in alliance with the German Kaiser! Such is the depth of political degradation, to which some of the petit bourgeoisie has sunk, that the writer in one of his meetings at Gloucester was actually asked whether it was true that he had acted during the war as the liaison officer between Lenin and the Kaiser!!! To reach these people and to clear their minds of the Northcliffe poison requires time and the few weeks of the election were too short to achieve this. The petit bourgeoisie and its dependants, like shop-assistants and small craftsmen, are not organised in any union and so can only be got at by house to house visiting. This is what the Conservatives and Liberals have done for years past, ever since this class was given votes in the middle of last century, and they accompany their visits with the usual doles from the charitable organisations of the Church or with promises of work from the municipality. But the Labor Party and Communism can only fight these insidious influences by steady propaganda and, when this is done between now and the next election, there is no doubt that it will be possible to neutralise the petit bourgeoisie and to secure the active support of the unorganised workers that are dependent for their livelihood upon this class. As it is at present, they are the cause of the great conservative victory in England today, but the enormous rise of the votes given to Labor and the doubling of the Labor members of parliament in the new House of Commons is the best proof that the foundations of the new British government are built on sand.
Last updated on 3 January 2021