r Schwartkop, THE LASS STRUGGLE DEVOTED TO INTERNATIONAL SOCIALISM Vol. MAY JUNE, 1917 No. The Task Before Us The Emergency National Convention of the Socialist Party By BOUDIN The War and America By LOUIS FRAINA Majority Limitations and Minority Rights By FRIEDRICH ADLER (Vienna)
The Red Cross a...

THE CLASS STRUGGLE Vol. MAY JUNE, 1917 No. CONTENTS Page The Task Before Us. 14 22 33 The Russian Revolution and Its Significance.
By Bucharin The War and America. By Louis Fraina.
Majority Limitations and Minority Rights. By Friedrich Adler The Emergency National Convention of the Socialist Part...

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 ...

2 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE paid for this evasion will not absolve us from the task of undertaking their solution. They are pressing upon us. The old International is dead. And unless we are willing to give up all hope of creating a new International based upon the international solid...

4 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE President Wilson injunction to be neutral in thought. The action of the German Socialists in supporting the Kaiser government in this war was either openly approved by our official leadership, or else we were admonished not to disapprove of it on the plea o...

6 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE Socialist Congress of Copenhagen (1910) and Basle (1912. which declares that. In the event war should come notwithstanding the efforts of the Socialists to prevent it, then it becomes the duty of the Socialists to work for its speedy termination, and to use...

8 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE that or any other nation are equally interested. And on the other hand, separate action by the Socialists of the country involved threatens the very foundations of Socialist internationalism the very life blood of the Socialist movement. Both, the true inte...

10 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE 11 thereby offending our prospective customers. regard being had to the fact that as matters then stood the Central Empires were as likely to be our customer as the members of the Entente.
As long as our trade was not interfered with we remained neutral. W...

12 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE 13 rels which will immediately be patched up the moment the toiling masses should show any sign of revolt the erstwhile enemies uniting their energies in an effort to crush the real common enemy.
The question as to which is the deeper and more fundamental ...

14 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE 15 Our strategic power is great. Our course of action will influence profoundly the action of the whole international movement.
May we meet this task in a spirit worthy of the revolutionary character of Socialism!
Herein lies our task: to bring the needed ...

16 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE 17 tion had been rather peculiarly constituted. We had, on the one side, a primitive system of fragmentary, disorganized, small scale production, on the other, gigantic undertakings which frequently employed 15, 000 to 20, 000 laborers and employees. After...

18 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE 19 necessary to pay for all kinds of war manufacturies, all these the Czarist government attempted to cover by a promiscuous printing of paper money. This course was followed, naturally, by a steady depreciation in the value of paper money, until it was wo...

21 THE CLASS STRUGGLE 20 THE CLASS STRUGGLE come into power. The old, semi feudal, noble, landowning class is overthrown. In its place stand the new rulers, the modern, capitalist bourgeoisie.
But the second step will inevitably follow: the transformation of the fatherland of the Gutschkoff Milju...

22 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE 23 The War and America By Louis FRAINA The entry of American Capitalism into the war is the culmination of a process interesting in itself, and still more interesting as token of what is to come.
When the war burst upon the world, America and shall use the...

24 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE 25 very clear.
two and three hundred per cent. profit? Even an unselfish war for democracy must be made to pay in dollars and cents. Otherwise, what the good of it all?
Only a supreme novelist could adequately describe the emotions of this period; only a s...

THE CLASS STRUGGLE 27 26 THE CLASS STRUGGLE January, 1917.
Year, 1916.
Year, 1915.
Aug. to Dec. 31, 1914.
MERCHANDISE Credit Trade Balance (Excess Exports Imports of Exports. 613, 441, 020 241, 674, 851 371, 766, 169 5, 481, 423, 589 2, 391, 654, 335 3, 089, 769, 254 3, 554, 670, 847 1, 778, 596,...

28 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE 29 The statistics are not significant because of what they express in foreign trade alone. Trade in itself is not a cause of belligerency between nations to day. The statistics of trade must be considered in relation to a nation stage of economic developme...

THE CLASS STRUGGLE 31 30 THE CLASS STRUGGLE brutal State Socialism; and the fusion of bourgeois progressivism with Imperialism in the interests of general reaction.
All these factors have been developing rapidly and powerfully before the war, in this country and Europe; and the consequences of th...

32 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE 33 But woe to the Socialist movement in this country, and throughout the world, if it collapses as the movement collapsed in Europe, if it allies itself with Imperialism, or if it adopts a policy of empty protest!
Majority Limitations and Minority Rights B...

34 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE 35 of the community. All paths of thought and all efforts travel henceforth not from the individual to the mass but the other way around from the mass to the individual. The reversal of attitude is complete. On the basis of the solidarity of the community,...

36 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE 37 instrument, merely intended to preserve existing conditions as a sphere of activity. Class solidarity on the other hand is an instrument of offense which is supposed to contain the germs of a future society. It is not for us to investigate here which of...

THE CLASS STRUGGLE 39 38 THE CLASS STRUGGLE the front the common interests of the entire proletariat independently of all nationality. In the various stages of development which the struggle of the working class against the Bourgeoisie has to pass through, they always and everywhere represent the...

40 THE CLASS STRUGGLE 41 THE CLASS STRUGGLE to make clear this much: that the policy chosen cannot be attacked as a violation of party morality, for it did not violate social thinking, but on the contrary was the result of it. The unity of action was destroyed by the minority. Of course the major...

42 THE CLASS STRUGGLE THE CLASS STRUGGLE 43 is usual in such cases, the convention came upon us like some elemental force, in a haphazard and disorderly fashion, without any chance for a proper discussion by the membership of the work which it was to do, and, in many instances, without the member...

THE CLASS STRUGGLE 45 44 THE CLASS STRUGGLE The fact is that the formulation as well as the adoption of the so called majority report was the result of a series of political tricks and manoeuvers such as has seldom been seen before at a Socialist convention.
Leaving out minor differences of opini...