Social Unrest in the 
 United States 
 
 By 
 
 HARRY F. WARD 
 
 ISSUED BY 
 
 The Methodist Federation for Social Service 
 
 150 Fifth Avenue, New York City 
 
 PRICE, FIVE CENTS 
 
Social Unrest in the United States 
 
 By Harry F. Ward 
 
 The Corrected Stenographic Report of an Address at the 
 Methodist Preachers' Meeting of New York City, 
 March S4, ipiQ, Together with a Letter 
 on the Russian Situation 
 
 It is not possible at the present time to gage with accuracy 
 the extent of social unrest in the United States. The data 
 is not to be obtained, not even by committees of politicians 
 who have suddenly discovered a new way to spend the 
 people's money and at the same time to commend them- 
 selves both to the passions of the populace and the interests 
 of those who control our economic life. What is possible 
 is to point out the existence of certain definite currents 
 and also their direction; and that is what I shall attempt 
 to do. 
 
 In the first place I would analyze very briefly the 
 forces of social unrest. First in the world of labor : On 
 the surface there are, as usual, a number of strikes. That 
 is inevitable in the demobilization both of the army and of 
 war industries. It is inevitable also because the attitudes 
 and policies of the War Labor Board enabled labor to 
 gain some ground during the war which certain leaders of 
 capital are now determined to take away from them. But 
 there is more to these present strikes than either of these 
 causes would indicate. A few days ago the Secretary of 
 the Department of Labor, addressing the conference of 
 Mayors and Governors, declared that the strikes of Pater- 
 son, Lawrence, Butte and Seattle were revolutionary in 
 their purpose and conduct — revolutionary in their political 
 sense— that they meant an attempt to change the form of 
 government in the United States. When Mr. John Fitch, 
 the industrial investigator of the Survey Magazine, went 
 to the office of the Department of Labor to ask for evi- 
 dence in the case, he got none that seemed to him to be 
 adequate. The chief piece of evidence was a quotation 
 from the Union Labor Record of the City of Seattle, 
 which said: "If the strike continues labor may feel led 
 to avoid public suffering by reopening more and more 
 activities under its own management. And that is why we 
 say that we are starting on a road that leads no one 
 knows where." In it you will observe the proposal is not 
 to take the industries from those who now own them, but 
 to open more industries "under its own management," 
 which labor is now doing to some extent in Seattle through 
 co-operative organization. 
 
 But there is something new about these strikes; some- 
 thing which the Secretary of Labor cannot perhaps quite 
 understand in view of his philosophy and affiliations. And 
 what that is in the first place seems to me to be a new 
 morale on the part of labor. It is significant that in each of 
 these four strikes there has been comparatively little vio- 
 lence. In Paterson the police said it was the quietest 
 strike ever known. In Lawrence, despite the most brutal 
 provocation on the part of the police, there 1ms been no 
 serious violence on the side of the workers. In Butte, 
 despite the fact that the strike was under I. W. W. leader- 
 ship, and that the soldiers were brought in, pickets 
 organized in squads under the control of discharged sol- 
 diers in uniform, maintained what was almost perfect 
 order. In Seattle the strikers organized a company of 
 police from their own ranks, composed of about 250 sol- 
 diers and sailors in uniform. These men were sent out to 
 maintain order without clubs or weapons. Their motto 
 
 3 
 
was "Order Without Force." They were sent to guard 
 any property which might possibly be molested ; they were 
 sent to disperse crowds which gathered and even to secure 
 the adjournment of meetings within halls lest they might 
 become the occasion for disturbance. As a result, at least 
 in part, of this policy there were fewer arrests in Seattle 
 during the general strike than in any corresponding ordin- 
 ary period of time. 
 
 What does this mean, this new sense of restraint and 
 responsibility? Does it mean that as a result of the mobili- 
 zation of the army the workers have caught the spirit and 
 the method of marching men who can act with restraint 
 and in order? Or does it mean that behind this new 
 morale there is something more significant? Is it the 
 glimpse of a larger purpose than has yet possessed labor 
 in this country? And is it the sobering influence of that 
 larger purpose which is producing this new morale? 
 
 There are some evidences of this larger purpose. They 
 appear both in the political realm and in the economic field. 
 On the side of politics there is the spontaneous organiza- 
 tion of labor parties in a number of centers, particularly 
 in Chicago and in New York, for the first time in the history 
 of organized labor in this country. It is a direct breaking 
 away from one of the dominant and controlling policies of its 
 president. A large part of the membership of the American 
 Federation of Labor is now organizing itself into a labor 
 party to secure economic change through political action. 
 They have borrowed the principles of their platform very 
 largely from that famous document on the new social 
 order put out by the Labor Party of Great Britain. Their 
 measures they have adapted to American conditions. But 
 the most significant thing about it is that they propose a 
 party of "brain and hand"; they endeavor to join together 
 all those in this country who are willing to contribute by 
 labor of brain or hand to the social welfare. 
 
 From now on you cannot properly define labor in this 
 country as simply the workers of the factories, the shops, 
 the mills and the mines. The term labor now in this 
 country has the significance it has long had in Europe; it 
 is now to include the whole productive energy of the work- 
 ing population of this country expressed in every form. 
 
 On the economic side there are some indications again of 
 a new purpose. A little while ago the labor forces in 
 Chicago proposed, and I think voted for, a general strike 
 of one day's duration in order, they said, to let the world 
 know "that we are going to lay off for one day from 
 making profits for the bosses." It is just an indication, that 
 is all, that suddenly they had come to a concept that there 
 was something more fundamental to be done than simply to 
 get better wages and shorter hours. But the most significant 
 thing is that proposal recently made to the United States 
 Government in behalf of the most conservative and strong- 
 est organized group of workers in the country, the four 
 Railway Brotherhoods, allied with the Federation of the 
 trades engaged in the mechanical work on the railroads. 
 The proposal was that the United States Government, hav- 
 ing acquired the railroads, should turn them over to a 
 labor corporation to be composed of all those actually 
 engaged in railway work and management, from the gen- 
 eral superintendent to the lowest errand boy. This labor 
 corporation would thus enter into partnership with the 
 United States Government; the Government to furnish 
 credit and capital, the capital of the working corporation 
 to be its operating ability, and the net proceeds to be 
 divided on a definite scheme of equality set forth in the 
 proposition. 
 
 Now leaving aside altogether the technique of the pro- 
 posal;' here is the significant thing, as Miss Marot has 
 pointed out in her recent analysis of the labor situation 
 in this country.i that for the first time we have a great 
 body of labor in this country recognizing and willing to 
 assume responsibility for operation. It marks altogether a 
 new step; a fundamental, radical change in the attitude, 
 
 ^The Dial. Feb. 22, 1919. 
 
 4 
 
purpose and policy of the labor movement in the United 
 States.2 
 
 Is this new consciousness revolutionary? In part it comes 
 from across the water. It marks the fact that just as the 
 war ended the isolation of the American nation, so has it 
 ended the isolation of the American Labor movement. 
 American Labor has been behind all other labor move- 
 ments in the world in fundamental economic thinking, 
 partly because of the economic circumstances under which 
 it has been developing and operating, and partly because 
 it has been held back by reactionary leadership. But the 
 fundamental ideals and purposes which have been moving 
 the ranks of industrial producers in Europe are now enter- 
 ing into the consciousness and plans and purposes of the 
 workers of the United States. Is this new consciousness 
 and purpose in any sense revolutionary? 
 
 A little while ago the Solicitor General of the Post Office 
 department informed a Senate Committee that the labor 
 and radical movement in this country was now revolution- 
 ary, that it was proposing to overthrow by violence the 
 Government of the United States. He offered in evidence 
 a large number of papers which he had taken out of the 
 mails since the Armistice was signed. Now to anybody who 
 is not familiar with the phraseology of certain irresponsible 
 papers, representing especially the Syndicalists and the 
 Left Wing of the Socialist movement, it would be easy to 
 draw such a conclusion from the evidence he offered. But 
 when you take the representative organs of the labor and 
 radical movement of the country, instead of finding them 
 to be more violent since the war, I find them to be more 
 sober. There are certain very grave tendencies in some 
 of the more irresponsible radical publications. I will give 
 you three or four quotations from some journals and you 
 can form your own estimate. I think you will find that 
 these are typical of certain tendencies. First from the 
 journal of a trade union, whose editor is a church mem- 
 ber and worker of long standing: 
 
 "// European conditions reach America, the cause that 
 produced them there will produce them here; if Big Busi- 
 ness thinks we have sent out boys to Europe to make the 
 world safe for Democracy and later they start a high- 
 handed game that out-kaisers the kaiser here, grand sur- 
 prises await them. We are not going to give up what we 
 have gained, and if Bolshevism or I. W. W.-ism, or any 
 other 'ism' breaks loose, the lords of high finance, we fear, 
 will pay the price. . . . We are bound with red tape so 
 tightly that to get action many times we must break some 
 law, or let the opposing forces beat us to it." 
 
 Observe the impatience of legal restraint. 
 
 Now from The American Bolshevik, apparently an in- 
 dividually owned publication, which contains the Manifesto 
 of the Left Wing of the Socialist Party of America, un- 
 signed, so names and number unknown. Their program 
 demands among other things : 
 
 "The party must teach, propagate and agitate exclusively 
 for the overthrow of Capitalism, and the establishment of 
 Socialism through a Proletarian Dictatorship." 
 
 From Canada comes word that at a recent convention in 
 the West, representatives of 16 unions voted to secede 
 from the American Federation of Labor and work for the 
 Dictatorship of the Proletariat. 
 
 There is no evidence that such statements represent any 
 considerable tendency. 
 
 Here is what The Seattle Union Record says about the 
 General Strike: 
 
 "// by revolution is meant violence, forcible taking of 
 property, the killing or maiming of men, surely no group 
 of workers dreamed of such action. But if by revolution 
 is meant that a Great Change is coming over the face of 
 
 "^The executive body of the United Mine Workers is drafting a bill 
 calling for a five-day week, a six-hour day, wage increases and the 
 nationalization of the coal mines. 
 
 5 
 
the world, which will transform our method of carrying 
 on industry, and will go deep into the very sources of our 
 lives, to bring joy and freedom in place of heaviness and 
 fear — then we do believe in such a Great Change and that 
 our general strike was one very definite step towards it. 
 . . . Some day, when the workers have learned to manage, 
 they will begin managing. It may come all at once or a 
 little at a time. It may come through peace and order, or 
 through chaos and disorder. In a country like ours, we 
 hope for it to come with peace and order, decently, step by 
 step. But how it comes will depend not only on the work- 
 irs, but mainly on the attitude of the business world." 
 
 And now from the I. W. W. It has recently started a 
 new magazine, "The One Big Union Monthly," and here 
 is an article on "The Red Tidal Wave," from which I 
 quote : 
 
 "The world will soon find out that the great economic 
 revolution cannot be accomplished through an armed attack 
 by revolting mobs who occupy government buildings and 
 shoot down the officials of the old regime. . . . Unemploy- 
 ment and capitalist repression in various countries may 
 drive hungry and desperate masses to revolts, and drive 
 them up against the machine guns, but the I. W. W. is not 
 doing it. We are too busy educating and organizing to 
 save mankind from disaster, to engage in street work of 
 that kind. In some countries these revolting, desperate 
 masses may come out victorious, and establish a rule of 
 their own, like the' Russian Bolsheviki, only to find that 
 they will have to keep on running society on private owner- 
 ship basis, until industrial organization of the workers is 
 so far advanced, that it can take over the responsibility." 
 
 From another article concerning aims and purposes: 
 
 "Our aim is not to establish a political dictatorship 
 of the proletariat supported by force of arms, but to 
 remodel the world in such a manner that there shall be 
 nobody to be dictator over. We intend to make everybody 
 a worker of some kind or other, thereby removing con- 
 flicting class interests and the necessity for dictatorship." 
 
 The New York I. W. W. organ, The Rebel Worker, 
 recently announced: 
 
 "With the abolition of private ownership we are prepared 
 to so classify the production that textile workers will pro- 
 duce enough to clothe the whole population of the United 
 States by the use of only 50 per cent, of the present labor 
 power, both brain and physical. . . . We are relying on 
 the most intelligent element among the workers for suc- 
 cess. The mob element will swing the way the intelligent 
 element concentrates and directs the mass action. . . . 
 The bottom stratum will have to be educated by the class- 
 conscious, organized workers until they acquire the average 
 intelligence of the workers of the New Era, the Industrial 
 Democracy." 
 
 "The Textile Workers of the Industrial Workers of the 
 World are organizing technical boards of each subdivision 
 — woolen, silk, cotton, linen, and so forth. We call upon 
 former members, as well as new members who have expe- 
 rience in office work and executive ability, also all others 
 who are workers, to assist us in this work. {By workers 
 we mean all those with experience in any connection with 
 the industry, except corporation boards of directors and 
 stockholders.)" 
 
 These are evidences of a sense of responsibility for indus- 
 trial organization. I would not over-estimate the tenden- 
 cies evidenced by these quotations, but at least they exist. 
 
 We will leave the labor movement there and just for a 
 moment roughly sketch the position and attitude of big 
 business men. Here again you can find some indications 
 of a new spirit and purpose. One section talks of endeav- 
 oring to give workers much better conditions. For exam- 
 ple, there are certain leading employing interests in this 
 country trying to reverse the economic law that wages 
 always rise after prices and fall before them, by so con- 
 
 6 
 
trolling the market, beginning with steel, that prices shall 
 go down before wages. Certain employing interests are 
 also attempting to develop measures of joint co-operation — 
 the beginnings of a benevolent kind of industrial democ- 
 racy. Over against that there is a determined attempt on 
 the part of another group, to now push the fight with 
 organized labor to the conclusion, to have it out once for 
 all. 
 
 Here and there, among a few men there is evidence of a 
 more fundamental spirit and purpose. There are some 
 men in the world of big business who have begun to realize 
 that what is needed to get us out of this situation without 
 trouble, is to develop a kind of economic democracy in 
 which the workers will be able to have some creative oppor- 
 tunity in industry. That is the most significant thing ap- 
 pearing in the big business world today. It is not to be 
 found in expansive after-dinner speeches under the influ- 
 ence of good food and bad liquor in which gentlemen indi- 
 cate that there is going to be a new world tomorrow in 
 which the worker is going to control. Such statements as 
 that, when they are compared with what those gentlemen 
 have actually in operation in their own industrial plants, 
 remind me of the resolutions occasionally passed by church 
 bodies. They are evidently intended to be carried into 
 efifect after the death of those who pass them. But when 
 you talk with the men who are actually managing the tech- 
 nique of industry, you will find not infrequently a man 
 who realizes that we must now have such changes as vvill 
 make labor a real working partner in the whole productive 
 process. 
 
 We now pass to another significant group of forces. It 
 is the rural interests. Whatever industrial change comes 
 about in the United States will, of course, have to reckon 
 with our large rural population. That rural population has 
 changed since most of you men lived on the farm. It is 
 changing in two ways. In the first place, there is the spread 
 of tenant farming, over 50 per cent, in Kansas, so that the 
 Governor has to recommend a new constitution which 
 would change the whole attitude of the State towards land 
 taxation and ownership. This means a concentration of 
 ownership of farm lands, which is proceeding side by 
 side with the concentration of ownership of capital in the 
 cities. That concentration of farm ownership and increase 
 of tenant farming means that a larger part of those who 
 now work the farms are being pushed slowly down, like 
 the industrial workers in the cities, to lower standards of 
 living, and are coming more and more to be aware that 
 they depend for economic life upon absentee owners and 
 forces controlling the disposition of the product of the 
 farms. Therefore you are beginning to see, out of this 
 economic situation, the inevitable result. 
 
 The rural life movement has overcome to a large extent 
 the mental isolation of the farm group. Also they are 
 being taught co-operative organization. What did the milk 
 producers do here a few weeks ago, and what are the cotton 
 growers of the South now doing in deliberately controlling 
 the direction of their labor power and its output? But 
 more significant still is the organization of the Non- 
 partisan League in the Northwest; an organization which 
 has already reached about 300,000 members in thirteen 
 states, with one of the best devised and most perfect work- 
 ing pieces of political machinery yet appearing in cur 
 history, controlling absolutely the legislature of North 
 Dakota, cutting itself loose from the denomination of a 
 press controlled by business interests and_ running sixty 
 newsnapers of its own, including three dailies. 
 
 It is from that State that there has come the most states- 
 man-like utterance that I have yet seen from any American 
 public official concerning Bolshevism. The governor of 
 that State recently said : "Here in North Dakota we believe 
 that the best protection against rebellion is to assist rather 
 than to retard evolution, and in this State it is the intention 
 to remove discontent and nrevent disorder by removing 
 the legitimate complaints of the people instead of trying 
 to stamp out just grievances." In that State they have 
 
 7 
 
developed a program which includes a large amount of 
 state ownership, affecting grain elevators, mills and banks. 
 It is a part of the program of the Non-Partisan League 
 to seek alliance with the forces of labor in the cities. In 
 North Dakota they have already put through some very 
 good protective labor legislation. 
 
 The political possibility of an alliance between the farm- 
 ers and the city workers is not so significant as the fact 
 that here is a political force working for economic change, 
 which is organized on the occupational basis. Nobody can 
 belong to the Non-Partisan League who is not a farmer. 
 That is the thing to reckon with out there in North Dakota 
 — a change in the fundamental conception of the basis of 
 political action. It is fundamentally a class movement — sl 
 movement of the working class on the farms— and it is 
 reaching out and trying to join hands with the movement 
 of the working class in the cities, which, in turn, is trying 
 to include the brain workers. Remember that they have 
 been feeling the power of big business. They have been 
 denied halls to meet in. Their organizers have been run 
 out of town and arrested on trumped-up charges; also do 
 not forget that in that working class on the farms there is 
 a pretty large sprinkling of college people. The workers 
 of both brain and hand are on the farms and if you want 
 to know what they are going to do in social change in this 
 country, watch North Dakota! 
 
 Now what about the "intellectuals"— the "intelligentsia"— 
 as they call them in Europe. What part are they to play in 
 this social situation? They are, I believe, the strongest 
 element in the middle class in the United States. They are 
 altogether different from the intellectuals of Europe in two 
 or three very important particulars. They are not very 
 far removed from the soil — the professional workers of 
 this country — the teachers and lawyers, the preachers and 
 physicians, the social service workers and engineers. It is 
 because our trained minds are not far removed from 
 manual labor, and because so many of them are engaged in 
 productive industry that they are distinct from the intel- 
 lectual class in Europe. Furthermore, this intellectual 
 group has a lot of fundamental religion. They are still, 
 most of them, the embodiment of the religious idealism of 
 the American churches. 
 
 \Vith this equipment what are the "intellectuals" going to 
 do in this time of unrest and world change? Already, like 
 the farmers, they have begun to feel the pinch of economic 
 power squeezing a little bit on the standards of living for 
 their children. Their religious idealism has also led many 
 of them to analyze our present economic organization. 
 They have been taught by economic and political scientists 
 the inefficiency and weaknesses in the present method of 
 economy. On moral grounds they have come to see some 
 of its fundamental inequalities. One thing that is moving 
 them powerfully now is the sense of outrage at the profits 
 that have been made out of this war — not, mark you, a 
 sense of outrage against particular individuals, but a sense 
 of outrage at a method of organization which could pro- 
 duce this result out of such a tragedy. 
 
 Unless I miss my guess, this sense of moral outrage is 
 going to move the intellectual people of this country to 
 seek and find their way through to some other method of 
 economic organization. They have been and are at present 
 "as sheep scattered abroad without a shepherd," because of 
 the_ fact that the necessary limitations upon speech and 
 action during the war have in very definite and specific 
 instances been used as a weapon of economic suppression 
 and proscription and to prevent the discussion of funda- 
 mental social issues. But now the intellectual life of this 
 country is beginning to recover itself. Here is an appeal 
 from a Committee of Forty-eight to the intellectuals and 
 liberals of this country, calling them to this standard : 
 
 "The future belongs not to the inheritors and manipu- 
 lators of great wealth, hut to the men and women who live 
 by their work of hand or brain and know by hard experi- 
 ence the needs and aspiration of the common life. 
 
 8 
 
"It is the purpose of the Committee of Forty-Eight to 
 summon from all parts of the country the leaders of its 
 liberal thought and of its forward-looking citizens, to meet 
 in conference. We hope that out of this assemblage of the 
 hitherto scattered forces of Americanism will come a flex- 
 ible statement of principles and methods that will permit 
 effective co-operation with organized Labor and Agricul- 
 tural workers in the tasks of social reconstruction. . . . 
 All minds are awake today as seldom before, all hearts are 
 astir with hopes and open to large purposes; but these 
 minds will shrivel once more into their grooves, these 
 hopes will lose their glow, if we miss this chance to organ- 
 ise the liberal intelligence of America into coherent voice 
 and form. It may be the final opportunity of our genera- 
 tion." 
 
 The question now arises, what are the forces of social 
 unrest aiming at? Is it possible to determine their direc- 
 tion? There are indications of a common purpose to so 
 reorganize the machinery of society as to make it fit in 
 better with the fundamental religious ideals of humanity. 
 To put this thing in one sentence, the currents of social 
 change are moving towards complete economic democracy. 
 They are carrying forward the principles of political de- 
 mocracy which have done so much for the development 
 of mankind into another region. These principles have 
 furnished us with the best type of government which 
 humanity has yet seen, but now, to find their fulfillment, 
 they must be carried over from the political realm into 
 the every-day working life of hurnanity. They are now 
 to be applied to our economic organization. 
 
 It is easier to state this purpose negatively than positively. 
 It seeks to abolish poverty and economic serfdom ; to 
 destroy the iniquities and inequalities of the profit or price 
 system, to give human energy in industry as in brain labor 
 a higher goal than the making of money. It is not simply 
 the coming of another class to power, it is the distribution 
 of power in a wider way through the whole of human 
 society. It is more than that. It is a change in the funda- 
 mental values of our social organization, so that hereafter 
 the thing that shall count most in social organization shall 
 be productive service and not the acquisition of possessions ; 
 so that hereafter the development of humanity and not the 
 production of goods shall be the highest aim and goal of 
 human endeavor. 
 
 This is one of the greatest changes that humanity has 
 ever seen. It is comparable to that great change which 
 occurred when our political democracy was born. But it 
 goes farther. It is more fundamental because it reaches 
 down into the very roots of society: into the relationship 
 of man to the resources of the earth by which we live m 
 time and space, and also into the relationship of individu- 
 als to each other in social organization. If I were again 
 to define this great change in a sentence, it would be 
 this ; that the will of humanity is now seeking to organize 
 a form of human society which will provide the means 
 for the fullest development of all the people and will 
 require from all the people the utmost contribution of 
 service to the common life. This goal is dimly seen as 
 yet, like some far-off mountain peak. It gets defined 
 sharper and clearer only as we move toward it in our slow 
 progress. 
 
 Now concerning that goal there is no occasion for argu- 
 ment in a Methodist preachers' meeting. But the question 
 of whether the goal is obtainable and when it is obtainable, 
 depends entirely upon the choice of method. The question 
 of method in social progress is just as fundamental econom- 
 ically and spiritually as is the question of goal Now m 
 Europe there has, for years, been a discussion as to 
 whether social reconstruction was to be brought about in 
 the political field by state socialism or in the economic field 
 by the actual democratic organization of the productive 
 forces themselves. They began in Europe with the political 
 method which our workers are now adopting. They are 
 
 9 
 
now swinging back towards industrial organization. The 
 choice of methods is still more fundamental. On the one 
 hand there is the method of evolution through political 
 democracy and the gradual application of its principles by 
 discussion and experiment to the common economic life. 
 On the other hand is the method of violent upheaval and 
 overthrow; what has been technically called "the dictator- 
 ship of the proletariat." 
 
 I have wondered, not infrequently, what people meant by 
 Bolshevism. Of course the most common use is to fling it 
 in denunciation of any man whose argument you cannot 
 meet, or to hurl it as an epithet at the head of a man whom 
 you desire to discredit. But there are definite meanings to 
 Bolshevism, and one of the first things to do is to define 
 it and know what you are talking about when you use the 
 term. I pick up the morning paper and I find this defini- 
 tion from the Christian Herald, which goes to the root of 
 the matter in some important particulars: 
 
 "Not the sudden violence of passion let loose, but organ- 
 ized violence, violence deliberately adopted as the most 
 effective way of righting social wrongs, that is the essential 
 spirit of Bolshevism. 
 
 "Kill, burn — wipe the whole slate hare — begin civilisation 
 over again — that is the terrible slogan the Bolshevists are 
 passing from country to country today." 
 
 The latter part of that definition is totally unfair. That is 
 the slogan only of the anarchists, who were driven out of 
 the socialist movement in Europe years ago and have recently 
 been suppressed by the Bolshevists in Russia. The first 
 part of the definition comes a great deal nearer being cor- 
 rect. Bolshevism uses the theory, propounded by Karl 
 Marx, that capitalistic society would go on to a great 
 cataclysm and climax in which the proletariat would out- 
 number all others, and then, because they were in the 
 majority, would establish, ad interim, a dictatorship of the 
 proletariat, using it to create a form of organization in 
 which there would be no class war because there would 
 be no classes, but all would be a great brotherhood of 
 co-operative producers. To this has been added the pro- 
 posal that, since there is a military civilization, when the 
 proletariat establish their dictatorship, they shall arm them- 
 selves and disarm the burgeoisie in order to prevent a 
 counter revolution from overthrowing the will of the 
 majority. That was the purpose and plan of the Bol- 
 sheviki and Sparticides. 
 
 In this country I do not find yet anywhere, in any pub- 
 lication, the dictatorship of the proletariat accompanied by 
 that doctrine of arming the proletariat and disarming the 
 bourgeoisie. I find simply the theory of political dictator- 
 ship by the majority for the time being, in order to estab- 
 lish finally a class-less society and complete economic de- 
 mocracy. Now I do not think I need to say to anybody who 
 has ever read my books or followed my discussions any- 
 where, that with that theory in both aspects I totally dis- 
 agree. I have always disagreed with it, I have fought it 
 not in the security of middle class audiences, but in labor 
 and socialist halls in this country, face to face with the 
 men who proclaim it; and I expect to keep on fighting it 
 as long as I have the power. 
 
 One reason why I totally opposed universal military train- 
 ing, one of the reasons why I insist that the Christian 
 Church is failing now to do its duty by not setting^ the 
 world afire for disarmament is because of the manifest 
 fact that should present economic conditions continue, and 
 then you arm the people and train them, you are simply 
 playing into their hands and giving them the weapons by 
 which they will presently overthrow the present govern- 
 ment. How many Cssars and Czars do you have to see 
 come down to learn in this country that our future progress 
 lies in taking away the weapons from the hands of the 
 people and destroyina; them, and then letting us have the 
 settlement of the social question on the basis of reason? 
 
 10 
 
The next thing I have to say is this : that not only am I 
 opposed to that theory of the dictatorship of the proletariat 
 which proposes to uphold it by force of arms, but I am 
 opposed to the theory itself. I have no use for dictatorship 
 in any way, either in government or industry or church. I 
 have been preaching and writing democracy now for 
 twenty years and I am not going to change my principles 
 over night. Furthermore I am against the theory and 
 practice of dictatorship by the proletariat not only because 
 1 believe it to be unethical, but also because I believe it to 
 be unscientific. You cannot carry out the change to eco- 
 nomic democracy that way, for the simple reason that you 
 cannot control economic prodviction efficiently in the transi- 
 tional stage by means of one class alone. You have to have 
 the co-operation of everybody that knows how to manage 
 industry if you are going to democratize it. They have 
 found out that much in Russia. 
 
 Then there comes the final question as what is likely 
 to happen in this country. Here, of all countries in the 
 woj-ld, social and economic change ought to be worked 
 out by the established processes of law and order and 
 political democracy. The change to economic democracy 
 is going to involve, before we get through with it, some very 
 serious modifications in our form of political government. It 
 will involve, in my judgment no modifications of its funda- 
 mental principles. This government of ours rests upon 
 the theory that it is not only the right but the duty of men 
 to alter or abolish the form of government if it does not 
 live up to the principles on which the republic was founded. 
 A good many people seem very ignorant of that fact today. 
 The only safe expression for the present determined will 
 to secure economic democracy lies in the fact that we do 
 permit in this country changes in our form of government 
 in order to make it express more fully the fundamental 
 principles. And if the right of discussion to that end 
 could be established in this country we would not be 
 troubled here with Bolshevism very long. 
 
 The next question then is this : what is going to happen 
 in the event that present tendencies go on? Let me 
 describe those tendencies as they are now seen by a 
 group of people who want social and political change; who 
 want it without violence, who want it by the established 
 processes of law, order and political machinery. In the 
 first place, by the fortunes of war, a number of the most 
 influential men who stand for that point of view in this 
 country are now in jail. In the second place the agencies 
 of the state created to protect the country in time of war 
 have been carried over unofficially in some places in an 
 attempt to destroy the radical labor movement in time of 
 peace. There is, for example, the perpetuation of that 
 voluntary war time organization of the Department of 
 Justice which was disbanded officially, but which is now 
 being maintained in some states by private money for 
 private purposes. There is extreme brutality evidenced in 
 the conduct of officials in some recent strikes. That is 
 not unfamiliar in this country. What is more sinister is 
 this : there is an immediate proposal of machine guns the 
 minute that any labor disturbance shows its head. 
 
 We are troubled just now of course by having to discuss 
 a very dangerous situation with the psychology of war still 
 upon us. Also, there is still left over a good deal of the 
 unexpended animosity of war, now directed against those 
 who disagree with each other concerning this issue. There 
 is also still left over a great deal of the war-time fear 
 and it makes the people afraid that their property interests 
 are in danger, so that they discuss this situation in passion 
 and not with reason. What is worse, there is the spirit 
 of violence made manifest continually in intemperate lan- 
 guage and writing, so that the whole atmosphere of force 
 tends to develop. 
 
 I foresaw this thing during the war, I foretold it, and 
 endeavored, during the war, to get a discussion of the 
 social issues among certain groups of people in order that 
 this thing might be guarded against. 
 
 11 
 
Now there are three ways for the will of the people to 
 express itself. One way is through political action; an- 
 other through economic organization and the third is with 
 the mailed fist. Political action for some time has been 
 circumscribed in this country. Socialists have found it 
 difficult to find a hall to meet in. What is happening to 
 economic action ? Read the laws that have been introduced 
 in some of the western legislatures, like that which was 
 reported out of the Senate Committee which forbids not 
 only the carrying of the red flag or attending any meeting 
 or making any statement in speech or in writing that 
 tends to overthrow the United States Government, but 
 also declares that a general strike is a revolutionary offence 
 against the United States Government. That was the doc- 
 trine which was proclaimed and acclaimed by the American 
 Defense Society concerning the Seattle strike. 
 
 I have not time to argue that proposition on its merits. 
 It has long been an axiom with economists that a general 
 strike was revolutionary in its economic application, but 
 whether in its political application or not depends, in my 
 judgment, altogether on the way we approach the indus- 
 trial situation in this country. If the masses of the peo- 
 ple are bent on social change and become convinced that 
 they cannot get adequate expression politically ; if they 
 are convinced they cannot get the opportunity to change 
 economic organization by peaceful means, what form will 
 their determination take? 
 
 To that question history has given only one answer and 
 there never will be but one. Certain forces have been try- 
 ing for a long time to build a dam across the popular will 
 all over the world; now the popular will has risen to flood 
 tide. To continue to obstruct it will turn the flood loose 
 over all the fields of life. It is time to stop and think 
 soberly about this question. If the will of the people is 
 able to formulate itself by public discussion and economic 
 experimentation, the path of change will be the path of 
 orderly progress. 
 
 In my judgment the prevailing tone of the radicals is 
 now a sober one. They have been sobered by what they 
 have been witnessing in Russia and Germany. If the vio- 
 lent tactics and talk of the privileged classes continues it is 
 a direct incitement to the spirit of anger and violence 
 from below. There are, in my judgment, four groups in 
 this country who are spreading Bolshevism. The first is 
 a few revolutionary agitators who can easily be dealt with 
 under proper methods of law and order and political dis- 
 cussion. The next is those officials who are illegally ob- 
 structing the proper expression of the people's will in free 
 discussion and who are misdirecting the agencies of justice 
 in the interests of one of the parties to the industrial con- 
 flict. The third is the agencies, both public and private, 
 who are controlling the sources of information in certain 
 interests and are thereby distorting the moral judgment 
 of this country, which is sound if it can get the facts_ to 
 act upon. The final group is those who are responsible 
 for public utterance, who use epithets when they ought to 
 use arguments and denunciation when they ought to use 
 reason. These are the groups promoting the menace of 
 Bolshevism in this country. 
 
 Let the people who are in power take warning from the 
 course of history I Let them remove the causes of injustice 
 and they will remove the expression of injustice! And 
 let the middle class of this country insist that the issue 
 of economic change be settled not in the field of physical 
 force, but in the field of reason and political discussion. 
 If the middle class will organize themselves they can, in 
 my judgment, determine the shaping of the issue and the 
 outcome of it, in so far as this nation is concerned, and 
 also a good deal of the rest of the world. 
 
 I ask. in conclusion, what of the church and what of 
 religion? What will be its part? I call your attention to 
 the fact that the Methodist churches are made up mostlv 
 of the rural peoDle and the middle class which can decide 
 the situation rightly or wrongly. What responsibility then 
 
 12 
 
has the chureh concerning that discussion? Two or three 
 things are suggested. 
 
 It is suggested that we must balance the scales impar- 
 tially, and absolutely condemn the wrong on both sides. 
 Of course that is a part of our prophetic duty — to convince 
 the world of sin. But that is not all of it. That will let 
 us off altogether easily and cheaply. There is here some- 
 thing more than moral dereliction on the part of the people 
 on both sides. There are some fundamental iniquities in 
 the economic organization itself which must be removed, 
 and it is for the brains of the church to analyze these 
 iniquities, to single them out and then make the conscience 
 of the church see them and react to them. That is our 
 duty. 
 
 Then it is said that we must proclaim the fundamental 
 principles of the new order. Certainly we must. We have 
 been trying to do that for some little time. We have, for 
 example, declared both as the Methodist Church and the 
 Federal Council of Churches that we stand "for the fullest 
 possible co-operative organization of industry and also of 
 the natural resources upon which industry depends." That 
 was purposely made a general statement in order that the 
 conscience of the church should come to accept the general 
 principle. But we cannot stop now with general prin- 
 ciples. The world is forming a new order and if we have 
 any message we must outline the elements of a Christian 
 social order ; we must make them clear and plain for the 
 people to see and understand and follow. This means that 
 we must begin to define the co-operative control of indus- 
 try and natural resources. It means that we must begin 
 the fullest discussion among ourselves of the fundamental 
 elements of the new social order. It means not only the 
 widest possible discussion, but very careful experimenta- 
 tion. 
 
 It is said also that it is the business of the church to 
 create the atmosphere in which the new order may develop. 
 But there is needed something more than atmosphere. It 
 is power that is wanted. The dynamic of the new order 
 now appearing is human energy in many forms. Its high- 
 est form appeared in Jesus, manifesting the divine energy. 
 The spirit of Jesus is not yet much manifest in any of the 
 new movements. The church professes to have that spirit 
 in its care and keeping. Its obligation now is to impart 
 it to humanity in order that the life which is the heart of 
 the universe may flow into these human energies, that they 
 may be moved by love and not by hate, by service and not 
 by gain. 
 
 If the church does not accomplish that who then shall 
 do it? And without that spiritual dynamic there will be 
 no new world, but humanity will exhaust itself in intensive 
 conflict and die finally in a desert waste. Life the world 
 wants, and One came crying, "I am come that they might 
 have life — and that have it more abundantly." If we have 
 that life in our keeping nsw we must pour it into the heart 
 of humanity in this crucial time of toiling and striving. 
 And here and there I see that life bursting out anew in 
 the church today. The one thing that gives me heart in 
 these dark days when the forces of reaction gather, is this : 
 that whenever there is a movement of repression in the 
 world, there always develops in the providence of God 
 the spirit of the missionary and the martyr. I feel this 
 spirit among the younger people of the church for whom 
 perhaps I may say one word here in this presence. I sense 
 it also in the presence of Simeons who have long waited 
 for the coming of the Lord. There are old and young 
 who have caught a new vision that has made the Gospel 
 more real to them, the ministry worth while, and the 
 Christian Church something that they can work through. 
 It has made life itself a new enterprise for them to know 
 that in the teachings of Tesus are the principles of the 
 new order, and in the spirit of Jesus is its vital power. 
 His spirit moves them and the vision that has come to 
 them they will follow at any cost. They are not to be 
 deterred ; they have chosen to follow Jesus to the end. 
 And whether their passion for a new world shall finally 
 
 13 
 
find expression within the church or somewhere else, it is 
 for the leaders of the church to determine. 
 
 At the end of the meeting at which the above address was 
 given, one or two questions came on the Russian situation. 
 Time did not permit of a detailed answer, and after the 
 meeting the following letter was received, the answer to 
 which is also given: 
 
 New York City, March 24, 1919. 
 
 Mr. Harry F. Ward, 
 
 Union Theological Seminary, 
 Broadway and 122nd Street, 
 New York City. 
 Dear Mr. Ward : 
 
 With a view to correcting a certain misunderstanding 
 which we believe exists as the result of your recent pub- 
 lication in the Social Service Bulletin of matter concern- 
 ing the Bolshevik rule in Russia, the undersigned take the 
 liberty of asking you for a brief statement of your personal 
 attitude toward the movement known as "Bolshevism." 
 
 We believe that such a statement will do much to clear 
 the air in the present controversy. 
 
 F. Ernest Johnson 
 Fred Winslow Adams 
 Halford E. Luccock 
 
 R. E. DiFFENDORFER 
 
 i Edward T. Devine 
 
 Worth M. Tippy 
 George A. Coe 
 Ralph B. Urmy 
 J. Lewis Hancock 
 Ralph W. Sockman 
 
 To Messrs. Johnson, Adams, Luccock, Diffendorfer, Devine, 
 Tippy, Coe, Urmy, Hancock and Sockman: 
 
 I am glad to comply with your request for a statement 
 concerning my attitude on the Russian situation and par- 
 ticularly upon the unanswered questions raised in our 
 Bulletin. This publication, you will remember, is merely 
 an Information Service going to people who have been 
 specially trained to use and weigh evidence and form 
 their own judgments upon it. 
 
 The reports that the economic revolution in Russia has 
 been accompanied by a Reign of Terror and by sexual 
 bestiality have properly aroused the moral indignation of 
 our people. I am convinced from the evidence that these 
 reports are in part true and in part exaggerations, rumors 
 and forgeries, spread in the first instance by those who 
 wish to restore the old regime in Russia. The Decree on 
 the Nationalization of Women is a case in point. Reliable 
 American testimony affirms that in Russia it was never 
 attributed to any but local Anarchist groups and even then 
 is a forgery. I am also convinced that, like the French 
 Revolution, the economic Revolution in Russia has been 
 accompanied by anarchistic murder, theft and rapine, also 
 by deliberate and merciless extermination of those who 
 challenged it. I do not find it possible at the present time 
 to determine the exact degree and location of responsibility 
 for these horrors. They must be judged against the 
 Russian background of historic brutality and the environ- 
 ment of civil war. It is credibly said that every party in 
 Russia practices violence. I believe that much of it could 
 have been prevented by wise diplomacy on the part of the 
 Allies. 
 
 What is even more important morally than the excesses 
 of revolutionary days is the fundamental political, eco- 
 nomic and sex theory of the Bolsheviki. Neither the 
 exact meaning nor practical operation of the Soviet decree 
 on marriage and divorce is clear. It is, of course, axio- 
 matic in social ethics that sex purity must be maintained. 
 It is especially clear that the development of the spiritual 
 elements of monogamous family life is essential to social 
 progress. 
 
 The theory of economic revolution by the dictatorship 
 of the proletariat maintained by force of arms or other- 
 wise is one with which I totally disagree. It leads in- 
 
 14 
 
o rigorous and brutal repression of political oppo- 
 d other economic classes. The method of expro- 
 11 in Russia has apparently varied from equitable 
 compensation to the most brutal injustice. This must be 
 judged against the background of the origin and adminis- 
 tration of Russia's capital wealth by its ruling classes. Of 
 course I have no sympathy with the policy of matching 
 injustice with injustice. Two wrongs never yet made one 
 right. The fact must be faced, however, that wherever the 
 common people suffer from injustice and become con- 
 vinced that political expression and organization and pro- 
 paganda for peaceful economic change are denied them, 
 they will inevitably turn to the destructive policy of prole- 
 tarian dictatorship. Those countries which permit freedom 
 of political discussion and organization, and which will 
 now seek strenuously to remove both the fact and the 
 causes of economic injustice have little to fear from 
 Bolshevism. 
 
 What the world particularly needs to know is the prac- 
 tical capacities of the soviet form of political organization 
 and of the mass control of production. In both cases 
 some constructive achievements are in evidence, as is also 
 the fact that the acceptance of economic responsibility and 
 relations with the rest of the world would seriously modify 
 both practice and theory. The methods of communal 
 Russia would never fit our western world, but they might 
 modify at some points our individualism as that quality 
 would, in turn, correct the extremes of Russian corrimunism. 
 
 Concerning the question of religion, I object vigorously 
 to the decree which forbids the teachings of religious doc- 
 trines in all educational institutions in which general sub- 
 jects are taught. I am somewhat familiar with such agnos- 
 tic materialism as characterizes many of the leaders of the 
 Russian revolutionary government. I have found it nearly 
 always accompanied by an idealistic passion for human 
 brotherhood which could be led to co-operate with a 
 socialized religion, and in most cases could be developed 
 into a clearly religious consciousness. The judgment of 
 some religious workers from Russia confirms my experi- 
 ence. They also report the masses beginning again to 
 crowd the churches. Here is a challenge to the Christian 
 spirit. Should Christians merely denounce men and move- 
 ments which, coming out of darkness and oppression to 
 seek a high goal, blunder into folly and crime? Or, like 
 Jesus, with condemnation for their wrong doing and wrong 
 thinking, but with vast sympathy for them as human beings, 
 should His followers endeavor to help them toward the 
 light? 
 
 There lies in the Russian movement a still deeper chal- 
 lenge to organized religion. This movement shares with 
 other organized movements comprising millions of men 
 and women the ideal of a form of human society in which 
 every individual will be accorded the means of develop- 
 ment and all will be expected to contribute to the common 
 welfare their productive energy, in socially useful labor 
 of hand or brain, according to their ability. I believe this 
 ideal thus broadly stated to be an expression and in part the 
 creation of Christian social ethics. I do not agree with the 
 Russian definition of this ideal; it is the first blundering 
 attempt to give it organized expression on a national scale. 
 Like political democracy, economic democracy has to find 
 its way by experiment. But this attempt to organize a 
 society on the basis : "To all according to their needs ; from 
 all according to their ability," no matter how blundering it 
 may be, flings a thundering challenge to our churches. 
 Where are they going to stand in relation to this great 
 Christian ideal that is now dimly moving' the common peo- 
 ples oi the earth ? What are they going to do to give 
 this ideal its true definition and application? 
 
 You are at liberty to make any use you please of this 
 letter. 
 
 Very cordially, 
 
 HARRY F. WARD. 
 
 16