SOCIALISM AND LABOR IN AUSTRIA AND CZECHOSLOVAKIA

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This statement by Alexander Broz in the "New Europe" (No. 124) will explain why the Bohemians in the United States are an element that can be counted upon for law and order. As a prominent Czech Socialist deputy wrote, "Bolshevism seduces the suffering working classes into a policy that drives the whole nation to still greater misery and involves all classes in political extinction."

The Czechoslovak government by the stand it took against Bela Kun's invasion of Slovakia in July, 1919, by guarding against a general strike, by arresting the Bolshevik agitator Muna and Mme. Janishek, helped to bring about the failure, on June 15, of the Bolshevik rising in Vienna. This was an attempt to turn Austria into a Soviet state as had already been done in Hungary. It was all a part of Bela Kun's plan, and to be done with his money. The conspirators in Vienna were mostly Hungarian propagandists. Fortunately the troops of the garrison refused to be stampeded into joining the Bolsheviks. The Hungarian Bolshevik funds were siezed, including immense quantities of jewelry, and Bela Kun's agents were arrested. The fate of Central Europe had hung by a thread. Bolshevism might have spread to Italy and France if Bohemia had gone to pieces.

SOCIALISM IN AUSTRIA SINCE THE WAR

During the war, Austrian Socialism had even less opportunity to show any independence than German Socialism, being kept so absolutely under oppression. This oppression resulted in the extraordinary assassination of the Austrian Prime Minister, Count Stuergkh, by Friederich Adler, the leader of the militant branch of the Socialist Party. The majority Socialists, as in Germany, supported the government. Only the Left Wing, under young Adler, attempted to remain true to international pacifist

Socialism.

The insistent call for peace by the Socialists may have hastened the disintegration of Austria at the close of the war. There is no question but that the misery and hunger in Vinena and throughout Austria after the war, which was more extreme perhaps than in any other part of Europe, was responsible for the rise of Socialist conditions in Vienna which have led during the last year to the practical dictation by extra-governmental Socialist organizations. A condition of partial Communism exists in Vienna, including expropriation of houses for the poor, the dictating of measures by

meetings of the workingmen's associations, the cowing of the middle and upper classes by the Socialists. The attempt to establish a Bolshevik Communist rule in Austria by means of funds sent both directly from Russia by proxy-funds that were refused by Adler in the name of his party- and through funds and jewelry showered by Bela Kun, the Communist ruler of Hungary, in his attempt to repeat in Austria the successful uprising in Hungary, resulted in failure, through the vigilance of the authorities.

The situation in Austria is extremely serious and it is impossible to say how far the despotism of the Socialist Labor Party may go.

CHAPTER XI

Socialism and Labor in the Balkans *

There has been considerable Socialist activity throughout the Balkans, notwithstanding the abnormal destruction due to the war. The three principal national groups are the Serbian and Bulgarian and Roumanian, as Greek Socialism is negligible. In all three of these countries, the character of the Socialist movement is decidedly radical, much more so than in the neighboring Czecho-Slovak region of Bohemia, and Slovakia. This is shown by the adhesion of all three groups to the Zimmerwald and Kienthal programs, by their refusal to join the Second International Conferences, and by their adhesion to the Third (Moscow) International. The Roumanian Socialists, reorganized after the war, almost provoked a revolution at the time of the invasion of Hungary. In the political field, it is in Bulgaria that the Socialists, or, as they call themselves, the Social Democrats, have obtained the greatest power, electing a large number of deputies to the recent Parliament, notwithstanding the repressive measures of the government. The Socialist Party in Serbia is, since the war, rather disorganized. In Bulgaria, there are two sections to the party; one called the broad-minded, which supported the war and governmental positions, the latter called the narrow-minded, which endorsed the Zimmerwald Conference, and more than 1,000 of whose members were imprisoned. It was in May, 1919, that the radical section of the party broke away and called itself the Communist Party, adopting a program thoroughly in harmony with the Communist International.

During the last year the Serbian Socialist Party has been reorganized and has decided to join the Third (Moscow) International. It sent a delegate to attend the organization meeting in Moscow in December, 1919. In certain sections of the new Jugo-Slav State, especially Croatia, the Communist section of the Social Democrats have made great gains.

Bulgaria was also represented at that time by a delegate who gave to the Congress in his speech a verbatim reproduction of the Manifesto recently issued by the Bulgarian Socialists.

The Communist Party has gained steadily in Bulgaria since the close of the war. In the 1919 elections, notwithstanding the

* See Addendum, Part I.

very drastic opposition of the government, it gained a number of seats in Parliament. In fact, the Communist Socialists won forty-eight seats, the Moderate Socialists twenty-five seats, against the government block of 113. The Bolshevist propa

ganda in Bulgaria is extremely active.

CHAPTER XII

Labor and Socialism in Great Britain

The movement of the Socialist and Labor groups in Great Britain is extremely complicated and not easily to be traced in a few words. Its beginnings have already been referred to, down to the time when, almost contemporaneously with the formation of the Second International, a series of strikes in England gave a tremendous impetus to the movement. However, at that time British Socialism lacked unity and lacked able leaders. The gulf between the Socialists and the workmen was not yet bridged. Even as late as 1899, there was very little practical Socialism in charge of the labor movement. The Independent Labor Party was unimportant, at that time, notwithstanding the wonderful personality of its founder, Keir Hardie. The failure of the so-called Social Democratic Federation in the various elections emphasized the lack of political power of the Socialists. But a complete transformation took place during the succeeding years, so that when a labor party congress met at Belfast in 1907 almost all the delegates were workingmen.

In 1908 the old confederation changed its name to that of the Social Democratic Party. In 1911 the party coalesced with other organizations under the new name of the British Socialist Party. This party adopted the Marxian point of view but remained of very little influence in politics.

In 1903, a new party called the British Labor Party was formed, growing out of the action of the Trades Union Congress of 1899 and of the combined activity of Ramsay MacDonald and Arthur Henderson. This party quickly acquired great political influence, electing in 1910 as many as forty labor members to the Parliament.

In 1907 the Congress of the British Labor Party declared in favor of "the socialization of the means of production, distribution and exchange, to be controlled in a democratic state in the interest of the entire community, and the complete emancipation of labor from domination of capitalism and landlordism, with the establishment of social and economic equality between the sexes."

We have already called attention to the Fabian Society as an interesting group of intellectual Socialists who engaged in a very brilliant campaign of propaganda.

* See Addendum, Part I.