Committee Room,
Chiswick Town Hall,
Heathfield Terrace,
London W4 4JN
The
land the workers work upon, the machinery they use, and the articles
they make do not belong to the workers, but belong to the employers
who pay the wages. The difference between the value of the wealth the
workers produce and the value of the wages they receive back in
payment for their work represents a surplus of wealth which enables
the employers, who take it, to live without working.
The
Socialist Party is a political party of working men and women
organised together for the purpose of getting control of political
power in order to introduce socialism. Its Parliamentary candidates
are selected as fitting tools for the job. Its members control the
party throughout and determine, by majority decisions, the policy of
the organisation. This policy is set forth in all the literature the
party publishes. The party is, controlled entirely by its members and
is not at the beck and call of either a place-hunting individual or a
group of self-seekers. A party claiming
to be socialist, but with a list of reforms or “immediate demands,”
attracts reformers who are not socialists, and has a reformist and
not a socialist electorate behind it. Even if such a party obtains
political control it is useless for the purpose of furthering
socialism. While the Socialist Party is opposed to a reformist policy
the socialist delegate in Parliament or on a local council is not,
therefore, bound to vote against every particular measure. The
Socialist Party does not hold that the measures already taken or to
be taken by the capitalists are all of them bound to be useless or
harmful to the workers, or bound to impede progress towards
socialism.
The
Socialist Party holds that some of the measures brought forward by
the capitalists owing to economic developments or owing to conflicts
of interest between sections of the capitalists themselves can be
used as weapons in the class struggle by the workers and by the
socialist movement. That being the case, a socialist minority in
Parliament or on a local council would be required by the socialists
who sent them there to criticise from the socialist standpoint all
measures brought before them (pointing out their futility in
comparison with socialism and so forth), and to refrain from
supporting, bargaining or allying themselves with any party for
temporary ends, but at the same time would be required to vote for
particular measures where there is a clear gain to the workers and
the socialist movement in so doing. It may be added that such
measures are more likely to be put forward when Socialism is
imminent, and a frightened ruling class is striving to keep back the
flood by making concessions.
We
must emphasise that the object of the Socialist Party is the
establishment of socialism. This purpose, in an organisation based
solely upon the demand for socialism, and putting forward candidates
on that and nothing else, cannot be forgotten or submerged. Our
policy, our organisation, and all our activities are governed by that
objective. The question of voting for or against, or ignoring
measures introduced by non-socialist parties, does not and cannot
influence our policy towards the objective.
If
you are tired of the chains of slavery, join the party and thereby
give us your aid in the work of speeding out of existence the system
that oppresses us all.
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