500 THE CLASS STRUGGLE EDITORIALS 501 Spargo, Simons and Private Kopelin One of the American export industries that were created by the war is the sending of missions to Europe. Formerly it was American Dollar diplomacy, the extravagances of our millionaire diplomats, that made the famous. Today all Europe is speaking of the activity of those ambassadors of the American people who are being chosen from the unshaken and absolutely reliable labor leaders and renegade Socialists. There was first of all the Russian mission with the of Lennon and the ExSocialist Russel as the representatives of American labor. To be sure, this was an official mission and therefore of a somewhat different character than those that were to follow. Then came the Mission to France, England and Italy, led by the of patternmaker Wilson, which was followed in June by a delegation of the Social Democratic League of America consisting of Simons, John Spargo, Charles Edward Russel, Louis Kopelin, Professor Herron and the mine worker Howat. In August, Gompers with two other missions bearing the label of the of started for Europe, the one to visit England and France, the other to visit Italy. Furthermore the one socialist and the two openly anti socialist deputations will then visit the Interallied Labor Conference that is scheduled to take place on the 17th, 18th, and 19th of September, in London.
abortive meetings on the lower East Side of New York and in Brownsville we here in America heard very little of this new creation. Statements and declarations, to be sure, were published en masse, here and abroad. It need hardly be emphasized therefore, that this league cannot finance this mission, which, if we may judge from its personnel, is a pretty expensive one, from its own treasury. Somewhere there must be a rich uncle.
According to its own statements, the work of this commission consists in the task of holding the European Socialist Parties in line for the war. In other words, it is to convert to its own point of view, the British Labor Party which stands for a peace by negotiations with an overwhemling majority, the majority of the French party expressed the same sentiment in the adoption of a resolution by Lorriot with 1544 against 1172 votes; the Italian Socialist Party that stands, as it has always stood since the very first day of the war, most decidedly for a speedy peace. We fear, John Spargo will be little more successful in Europe than he was in St. Louis, where, in spite of absolute freedom of speech and movement, in spite of his then unimpaired standing in the party, he finally succeeded in uniting five whole votes upon his resolution, his own included. The only harm that these gentlemen could possibly do in Europe is the transmission of falsified news and the creation of wrong impressions. And much as we regret to say it, we do not doubt for a moment that this will be done. For what else can be the purpose when Spargo says, according to a cable from the London Times, that his party will not disturb the Allies in their fight against autocracy, until victory has been gained by the Allies. What and where is this party of which John Spargo speaks? The National Party concerning which they maintain such a peculiar silence in Europe?
Or perhaps the Social Democratic League that paper organization with William Engilsh Walling as National and Emanuel Haldeman Julius as Acting Assistant Secretary? This commission, conceived in fraud, and dedicated to a lie, can have but one purpose the deception of the European proletariat. But in this it will fail, for the French and English and Italian Socialists of the International groups are no more to be deceived as to the charAmong all of these subsidized missions we are mainly interested in the one that does business under the firm name of the Social Democratic League. This League which has its headquarters in Girard, Kansas, in the New Appeal (formerly the super revolutionary Appeal to Reason) the official organ of this baker dozen of commanding generals, is not a new organization.
It came into being last summer when the still born, National Party, a pure and simple middle class reform party, was first ushered into the world, because these gentlemen felt the necessity of some kind of an organization that would give them some sort of standing within the Socialist International. Beyond a few