A Liar on Socialism
It has for long been the custom to sneer at lawyers because of their readiness to undertake the dirty work of those able to pay. The more hopeless the case of a client the greater is the credit due to the lawyer who wins it, and many a practitioner has reached the front rank of his profession through the renown gained in a few cases where, by smart practice, he has spragged the wheels of the legal machinery and cheated justice.
To succeed, the lawyer must abandon principle and ignore truth, unless either will help to win his case. When he sums up a case he utilises anything and everything in the English language that will belittle the evidence against him or make his own case more imposing. Ridicule is one of his chief weapons, and misrepresentation, if neatly concealed, is perfectly justifiable according to prevailing ethics.
It is not surprising, therefore, that many lawyers, trained in this way, find no difficulty in transferring their energies to the political arena and winning distinction and position. The number of professional politicians who hold official positions in the Government, and who are, or have been, lawyers proves the value of legal training to the ambitious politician.
Some people (Mr. H. G. Wells is one of them) seem to think that because there are so many lawyers in the House of Commons, they rule the country. A very little thought will show this to be erroneous. Access to the House can only be obtained upon the approval of a constituency, and each constituency, notwithstanding that it is composed chiefly of workers, only approves of candidates who run in capitalist interests. Consequently the lawyer who turns politician still serves the capitalist class. In his new capacity, however, he does work for which the capitalist has become unsuited, or is too indolent to perform.
In the legal profession, as in every other, competition is exceedingly keen, and many try the short cuts to success, but only succeed in covering themselves with ridicule. Many become quite desperate in their schemes and methods when they see the rich prizes won by their brethren. The field will only admit of a limited number ; the orthodox parties are already overcrowded, and new aspirants must find new ways in which to serve “King Capital.”
One of these ways—which is exceedingly thorny, by the way—is to “expose” Socialism.
A barrister-at-law, by name Mr. Joseph Hurst, has met with some success in this direction, because he has up till now managed to elude Socialists. But his pamphlet “Socialism, What It Is and How to Meet It,” has at last come our way. That this review is belated calls for no apology, as, apart from a deliberate lie in the body of the work which needs refuting, the pamphlet is scarcely worthy of notice.
Under the heading “What It Is” Mr. Hurst carefully informs us that when he speaks of Socialism he means by that term what Socialists mean by it, and says “I propose to confine myself to definitions and statements of Socialists themselves.” After this he takes the “immediate reforms” of the late S.D.F. one by one. His criticisms are equally as absurd as the “immediate reforms” that suggest them, though not he, but the late S.D.F., is chiefly to blame for that : it is difficult to make dignified and sensible discussion out of ridiculous proposals.
Quoting one definition of Socialism as follows: “A system of society based upon the common ownership, and democratic control, of all the means and instruments of producing wealth, by, and in the interests of, the whole community,” our author proceeds to enlarge upon it by stating that it means “Ownership in individuals, whether of land, or money, or houses, or goods, or business, or trade, is to go.” Nevertheless, he does not attempt to show that such going will be detrimental to the interests of the working class, which forms, approximately, seven-eights of the total population—a numerical preponderance which would enable them to abolish any social institutions which they considered unnecessary or harmful to their interests as a class.
At present the workers have no interest in any of the things Mr. Hurst is afraid will have to go. Consequently, a change from the present capitalist system to a system where the workers would actually own all the means of wealth production and distribution, far from being detrimental to their interests, would emancipate them from capitalist slavery and give them control of the wealth they produce, the robbery of which, by the master class, is the cause of working-class poverty.
Of course, Mr. Hurst has no remedy for poverty. Lawyer that he is, he ignores the condition of the workers, his only concern being to fight Socialism, because it threatens the class he serves. He, therefore, proceeds to inform his masters how to meet it. “Tell it abroad and everywhere,” he says, “what Socialism is, what its doctrines are, what it proposes in practice.” If the Socialist were ignorant of what “lawyer” stands for, he might welcome such a method.
But if the Socialists suspected for one moment that this particular lawyer was about to play into their hands, a perusal of the remaining pages of the pamphlet would disabuse their minds, for they would find nothing but evasion and misrepresentation—the lawyer’s idea of telling it abroad, what it is.
Mr. Hurst refers to Karl Marx as “a celebrated Socialist writer,” ignoring entirely the scientific character of his work, and instead, crediting him with a utopianism that is still preached by so-called advanced Socialists like Bellamy, Shaw, and Wells. He says, “Marx proposes that time occupied by labour shall be the sole measure of payment, without regard to the ability of the worker.”
Where the stupid proposals of the late S.D.F. are concerned the work and the page are carefully indicated, but when our lawyer author is misrepresenting Karl Marx not even the name of the work is given. The reason is obvious to those intimate with the works of Marx. Nowhere in his extensive writings could such a statement be found. Not only so : Marx never wasted a line or a word on Utopian rubbish of that kind. He left all that nonsense to confusionists and cranks. The statement that Marx proposed such fatuous rot is a “first-class lie.”
Marx had no time to waste on “Stories of the Years to Come,” “Life in the Year Two Thousand,” or similar dreamy and imaginative pictures of the future. He was only concerned with placing Socialism on a scientific basis; with showing the changing material conditions that made for social change and revolution ; with revealing the class division in capitalist society ; with tracing the development due to machinery ; with the spreading of Socialist knowledge, and with pointing out the increasing antagonism of the two classes, which can only end in the recognition by the working class of the fact that the common ownership and democratic control of all the means of producing wealth can alone free them, from capitalist slavery.
Marx needs no defenders ; all that is needed is a Socialist Party to introduce him to the workers. Let those who have read the first-class lie of Mr. Hurst turn to the works of Marx, when they will discover the reason why no critic has been able to controvert him. He has assailed capitalism with such force and directness that its defenders dare not meet the attack honestly for fear of the publicity it would give to the works of Marx, and to the futility of their own puny efforts.
The Socialist Party takes its stand on the scientific works of Marx. In all the debates that have taken place between us and the opponents of Socialism the Marxian and only true Socialist philosophy has easily triumphed, as the reports will adequately prove. The attitude of critics like Mr. Hurst—who can only attack by misrepresentation and lies—speaks volumes in its favour and recommends it strongly to the workers.
The Socialist philosophy threatens the very existence of the system that gives a small class in society ownership and control of all the means of wealth production, and imposes on the working class the most hideous and degraded form of slavery the world has ever known. Luxury and idleness are the lot of the ruling class. Socialism threatens their position, yet with all their wealth, their science, and the intellects prostituted to their interests, they can only meet: Socialism with lies—or silence.
F. F.