Page:Solomon Abramovich Lozovsky - The World's Trade Union Movement (1924).pdf/21

 Rh sending statistics to each other, an international post-office box, or anything but an international labor union. It lacked the characteristic of a real labor international; that is, the domination of interests of the class as a whole over the interests of separate parts of the international.

Besides the International Secretariat of Trades Unions, there were international units of trade unions—or internationals—by industries: The International Textile Union, the Metal Workers Union, The Wood Workers Union; the Barbers' Union; the Cap Makers' Union, the Needle Trades, etc., over twenty international unions, which could be more correctly called a semblance of international unity than real unity. In fact we cannot remember one time in the international labor movement before the war where any industrial international played a leading role in the international struggle, where the unions would take concurrent action in different countries.

Therefore, if we look at these internationals from the point of view of those problems which an international in general should solve, we must openly state that no such international in fact existed. They were organizations which called themselves "internationals." They had stationery with their names upon it, but they were only indications of the necessity of militant internationals, which they themselves were not. The existence of these internationals proved the necessity of creating real international units. Their weakness characterized the degrees of the development of these international connections—otherwise the degrees of the development of the working class movement of the world.

Again, if we wish to get a clear understanding of those causes which led up to the disintegration of the labor movement of the world with the beginning of the war, let us see what these labor organizations represented, and what were the connections between them.

Only after we carefully acquaint ourselves with these organizations, will we understand why 1914 was the year of the complete disintegration, demoralization and disorganization of the international labor movement. The competition between international capitalist groups before the war, was reflected in the industrial international unions, and with the coming of the war, came out more boldly. After the international Congress of Metal Workers in 1914, one of the former delegates at that Congress, Merrheim, at that time a revolutionary syndicalist, stated in an article that at that Congress the competition between the British and German metallurgy showed itself.

The labor movement of that period, although officially connected in international unity, in fact was filled with national prejudices, national separatism, and national interests. The questions of "fatherland" were superior to the interests of the working class, and the question of "de-