Australian Socialist League, Sydney 1888.
Source: Commonweal, London, April 28, 1888, pp.134-5
Transcribed: by Graham Seaman
Last updated January 2024.
COMRADES, —
Seeing that the Commonweal is the organ of our parent society in England, we its offshoot in Australia would fain bring ourselves under the notice of our Old World comrades through its columns, and so I pen the following at the request of the members of the Australian Socialist League.
On May 4th, 1887, seven comrades — A. M. Potter, W. H. MacNamara, H. Hickman, J. Chandler, R. Luxton, T. Peters, and J. E. Anderton — met together for the purpose of forming the League. Potter and MacNamara drafted the Platform, which they submitted for debate on May 11th. For several Sundays after that the League continued the debates; but as the Jubilee insanity overtook some of the citizens of Sydney, we let the debates drop for awhile, for the purpose of attending open-air meetings and taking advantage of the popular excitement to bring our cause prominently before the public.
About this time John Norton, the Australian Labour delegate to Europe, returned to Sydney and had a grand reception in the Town Hall given him by the labourers of N.S.W. I expect most of your readers have, like myself and others out here, read his speech at the Paris Congress. The opinion we formed of him from that speech was that he was a Socialist; to our surprise, however, we found that he had gone renegade, and denied being a Socialist in the following terms: Socialism is all very well in Europe, where the workers are ground under the heel of despots, but it is impracticable in sunny Australia. MacNamara, who is a member of the School of Arts Debating Club, challenged him to stick to his Parisian utterances, when he was debating that question in the club, but he declined.
Just before the Jubilee a Republican movement was set on foot, to frustrate the royalists in their attempt to make Australians appear to grovel toroyalty, in which movement we took a prominent part, and received our just rewards. We having frustrated the royalists in their attempt to cram royalty down our throats, H. Parkes, the Premier of N.S.W., determined to frustrate us in our attempt to spread our Socialist and republican views; so he, like that lover of gold in the Bible, issued a decree to the lessees of all theatres in Sydney, ordering them on pain of heavy fines and the non-granting of new licences, to close their theatres against all Socialist, republican, and freethought lectures. This took place just before their failure to pass a loyal resolution at the ever famous Exhibition meeting in the old Exhibition building, Prince Alfred's Park, Sydney. The manner in which that meeting was called was as follows. The University footballers and students first received instructions to attend at seven o'clock; the Naval Brigade were given a password and instructed to attend in plain clothes at 7.15; the whole of the police force of Sydney came next, with Sydney's professional prizefighters and detectives, at 7.20. Then came the law-and-order party, the Orange Lodges, with half the Permanent Artillery in plain clothes, at 7.25, the remaining half holding themselves in readiness with loaded rifles to shoot down their fellow-citizens at the bidding of Parkes or some other despot. But in spite of all these precautions, the national sentiment was strong enough to turn this packed meeting into a howling throng of men, who, within fifteen minutes of the doors being thrown open, held full possession of the building, and again the royalist meeting was a failure.
On August 20th, the founders of the League met to consider the advisability of bringing it into public notice again by announcing its inauguration. A public meeting was called for August 26th; the attendance was not very large, but included three reporters from the daily papers. After reading over the principles and rules of the League, McNamara moved, "That we hold public debates every Sunday evening, the said debates to be free to all comers, for the purpose of educating the public on the great social questions of the day;" Pilter seconded, and it was carried unanimously. The Sydney daily papers for the next day devoted a short space in their advertising sheets to abusing our principles, and calling us all kinds of nice names. On August 28th we held our first debate on Socialism, and McNamara opened. We have continued to hold debates every Sunday evening up to the present date. The most important subjects discussed during that period were: "Socialism in Relation to Christian Socialism," "Land Nationalisation on Henry George's Principle", "Land Nationalisation on a Socialistic Principle," "Biology and Evolution," "Socialism versus Anarchy," "Modern Republicanism," "The Chinese Question," "Payment of Members," "The Great Political Lie, or, Free Trade and Protection Shams Exposed," and many other interesting subjects, which bearing on Australia alone would have less interest for your readers.
On November 6th, a meeting was called to protest against the hanging of the Chicago martyrs, at which McNamara moved, Pilter seconded, and Anderton supported, "That we Socialists, Anarchists, Republicans, Democrats, and other lovers of liberty assembled together this evening, offer our solemn and sincere protest against the hanging of those seven labour agitators (so-called Anarchists) in Chicago, as no evidence of a confirmatory nature has been brought forward to prove that they threw or had any connection with the person who did throw the bomb at the Hay market meeting in that city, and so caused the deaths of several persons." The resolution was carried unanimously, the hall being crowded. Pilter gave a brief description of the case. On the following Sunday a funeral service was held in memory of the four who were hung and the one who was murdered on the Friday before. McNamara gave a very touching and appropriate recitation, after which Pilter fully described the agitation with which the men had been connected.
Every Sunday afternoon since the League started, McNamara, Anderton, and other members have delivered addresses in the Peoples' Domain, on Social Problems. Born Australians as a rule are too fond of taking a trip down their beautiful harbour, or attending a dancing saloon in the cool of the evening, to take any interest in their future or that of their children. When anything new comes out, such as the Republican movement during the Jubilee, they will flock to it like a lot of sheep, and after two or three months you will not be able to get an audience of more than two or three hundred. They sink into a state of apathy from which it would take some startling event, such as a Naval Defence Bill being foisted upon them, or the Governor asking for his salary to be raised instead of lowered, to wake them up. The Republican movement, of which I have spoken, has resulted in a Republican League with a platform on the State Socialistic principle, and several Socialists among its prime movers, so we are satisfied it is not taking example by those bogus Republics, America and France; but popular favour seems to go more toward our own out-and-out teaching. We are sorely in need of a few able and energetic agitators here, who would soon alter the smallness of our numbers; however, with our little organ, the Radical, we are making ourselves heard. The Radical is to be enlarged, which will make it the same size as the Commonweal, and so still further help our movement. Our principal opponent out here is ex-Parson Joe Symes, who attacks us and our teaching in the Liberator, but never gives us a show in reply. In becoming a "Freethinker" he only turned superstition upside down, and is as bigotted about the butt-end as he was about the top. We have some very good and active speakers and propagandists, but are mostly hand-to-mouth workers, and so cannot do as much as we would like in the way of going about and forming branches. But until we can get the men we want we shall do all we can with the men we have got.
The times here are very hard, and work is still becoming scarcer. Several thousands are already out of employ, and several thousands more are likely to be thrown out before our winter (May, June, and July) comes along. Female labour is very scarce, as most of the girls and women who follow that line are taking to the streets sooner than be governed in the despotic manner some of the employers treat them out here. New South Wales is commercially fast going down the hill. Of course, the manufacturing monopolists tell the people it is because we have not adopted Protection, and the importing monopolists tell them it is because their sister colony, Victoria, has adopted Protection and shut their goods out. But the Socialists, Republicans, and Land Nationaiisers, who will not keep their tongues still, are telling them the true cause, and they are already beginning to listen more than their rulers like. Meanwhile, the House of Representatives becomes more and more a mixture of gamblers, bankrupts, swindlers, Orangemen, and deadheads, and is usefully alienating the masses from law-'n'-order. Things are getting warm in that Macquarie Street refuge for abuses and stronghold of dishonesty, and I should not wonder if before this reaches you a free fight had occurred on "the floor of the House" and the police been called in to pull up law-makers for law-breaking. This kind of thing doesn't trouble the bourgeois, for he can go on money-getting all the same, and the worker stands it and suffers by it because he's a fool. If the workers of New South Wales woke from their apathy, they could soon sweep out the pestilent rubbish of privilege and corruption that oppresses them. To make them do this is what we are after, and hope to achieve; when it is done there will be no room for unemployment and misery in "Sunny New South Wales."
With fraternal greetings, J. E. Anderton.