SocialismWorld War

THE CLAS STRUGGLE Devoted to International Socialism Published by The Socialist Publication Society, 115 Worth St. City Issued Every Two Months 25 a Copy; 50 a Year Editors: LOUIS BOUDIN, LOUIS FRAINA, LUDWIG LORE Vol. MAY JUNE, 1917 No. THE TASK BEFORE US The world war found the Socialists in a deplorable state of mental unpreparedness, and they were, therefore, quite unequal to the task of coping with the tremendous issues which it brought forward for immediate and radical solution. The questions to which an instant and categorical answer was demanded were not, indeed, new or unfamiliar to Socialists. On the contrary, they were intimately related to the fundamentals of Socialist philosophy and action, to questions, moreover, upon which the Socialist movement seemed to be in almost unanimous agreement the questions of the international character of the Socialist movement and its opposition to war. But the war, like all great crises, served to reveal the latent weaknesses and defects of the Socialist movement as it then was. Its inexorable demands for instant and radical action revealed the fact that during the peace era that preceded it, the Socialist movement slurred over difficulties instead of solving them; that in order to save the formal unity of the movement agreement on fundamentals was assumed rather than obtained. Mere formal unanimity thus achieved was not only useless in the face of a serious crisis, but served to aggravate it greatly by creating confusion in many minds that would otherwise have been clear, palsying hands that would otherwise have been vigorous, and producing an atmosphere of betrayal where only disagreement existed.
Now, the problen which we have long evaded can no longer be shirked. Even the tremendous price which we have already