Page:The General Strike (Haywood, ca 1911).pdf/29

Rh When we have thrown aside all humbug and cant, we are bound to admire the greatness of the scheme that has been thought out. We workers who have organized our petty strikes, and found nine out of ten of the strikers wavering and timidly wondering if they were quite justified in so upsetting the work-a-day world; we who have sometimes, in a strike, known a comrade to break a window or seen a policeman's bludgeon answered by a well-aimed bottle, and then have had to listen to the apologies of the labor leaders and the timid among the strikers, who declare that such actions are confined to hooligans and outsiders; we who have seen this lack of boldness can understand at once that we have much to learn from the master-class in these matters. In following their purpose, they have recognized at once that property is a detail. Even in its most beautiful form it must be removed if it stands in the way of their plans which must be carried through.

Thus Europe is strewn with ruins of towns and villages, and thousands of corpses, and all this destruction has been brought about by scientifically conceived instruments, carefully prepared for that sole purpose during many years of labor. Indeed it would seem that these politicians have the boldness to think and plan on a scale that we workers may well envy. I do not say let us imitate them, for their brutality is too great, but as we shall presently see, our cause is greater than theirs, and our plans must be drawn up with, at least, equal courage.

Let us not forget, however, that while we give credit to the upper class for their boldness in thinking out their plan, we cannot allow that they come within our definition of brave men, for their action falls far short. It is the workers who build and man their ships, their guns; and who manufacture their explosives and the whole of the engines of war. It is they who lead dreary lives to make these marvels of destruction possible. It is the workers who submit themselves in their thousands to be