90 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE COMMON ENEMY 91 seas of the class struggle they drifted on finally to find refuge in the opposite camps of pro Allyism and pro Germanism. The latter assumed different forms in different countries: in this country it finally assumed the form of pacifism thus bringing an alien element into the anti war propaganda of two other Socialist groups: those who believed that this war was a fight between two groups of capitalists and nothing more and those who believed that notwithstanding the fact that there was something more to it, the exigencies of an independent working class policy demanded opposition to war at this juncture. The presence of this alien element in the anti war propaganda of the Socialists of this country has greatly complicated the situation, to the great disadvantage of that propaganda; and has produced some curious manifestations of anti war feeling among which may be counted the curious indifference to the fight for democracy of which Norman Angell speaks.
Of course, a considerable part of the seeming indifference which Norman Angell has observed is not really indifference, but a belief that questions of democracy are not involved, since the war is merely a fight between two contending groups of the same capitalist class. But a considerable part of it is not really indifference in quite another sense and for quite another reason: It must be stated frankly and unequivocally, in the interest of veracity and in the interest of a proper working class policy which should help us tide over the great crisis, that some of this indifference is merely a mask worn quite uncçnsciously at times for a desire that the forces of Feudalism and Autocracy should prevail.
And we needn be shocked at the idea. Capitalist Liberalism has served the working class so ill that it has hardly any cause for complaint when some workers or their well wishers for here, again, it is mostly the case of theorists intellectuals in the labor movement are ready to take sides against it in its hour of need.
This does not mean that these people love the Kaiser or his Militarism. It is simply a recrudescence of the old idea more or less consciously present that the working class ought to make common cause with Feudalism against the common enemyCapitalism. To the unsophisticated among them this idea presents itself in the form of a variation of the proverb which the Irish have about their relation to England, thus: Capitalism difficulty is the worker opportunity. While the sophisticated and philosophizing glance with Carlyle into the immense Industrial Ages, as yet all inorganic, and in quite pulpy condition, requiring desperately to harden themselves into some organism, and with Carlyle and many others believe that Feudalism, or what there remains of it, is destined to bring about order out of the capitalistic chaos, by hardening the industrial pulp and fashioning it into some kind of a Soziales Koenigthum, of which Rodbertus once dreamed and which Bismarck was to bring about.
It would be tedious as well as profitless to follow the windings of this current of thought in our midst with anything like a detailed examination. thought it important to call attention to his phenomenon in order to help clarify a considerably muddled situation. But there is no neecssity for going into details. Nor has the time yet come for a full and comprehensive study of the subject. shall therefore cite only a few of its expressions, proving its presence, illustrating its way of sizing up the problem in hand, and conclusively demonstrating its close affinity with similar currents which have thwarted the progress of the Labor Movement in the past.
Six months after the great war broke out Dr. Thomas Hall wrote an article in the New Review in defense of the German Socialists position in lining up behind the German Government. The key note of the article is that this is a fight of the principle of social organization against individualism, and that it is therefore meet and proper that Socialists should be found on the side of the social force as against its individualistic opponents. The German city Dr. Hall informs us, among other things is in many respects more democratically governed than is the American city. It has a measure of home rule only a few of American cities have obtained. It is an experiment in municipal social organization of remarkable success, and the German cities are the foremost organizations of the world. Moreover, the