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This text uses the DIV1 element to represent the Chapter. Profile DescriptionCreated: By James Connolly (1868-1916) Date range: 1898-1916.Use of languageLanguage: [EN] The text is in English, apart from a few words.Language: [FR] Three words in French in a conventional expression.Language: [LA] Two words are in Latin in a conventional phrase, twowords in a title and two other words in a phrase.Language: [GA] Two words are in Irish.Language: [DE] Two words are in German in a title and one other word.Revision History
- (2010-04-21) Beatrix Frber (ed.)
I first met James Connolly in the year 1910on one of his visits to Belfast to engage in Socialist propaganda, soonafter his return from America. I was at that time a member of theIndependent Labour Party, which had many branches in the city ofBelfast, and was actively engaged in Socialist propaganda work. I knewlittle of James Connolly and his work at this stage, as we were nurtured on the British brand of Socialist propaganda, and all theliterature we read, as well as all our speakers were imported from GreatBritain.
I had been introduced to the faith by some of myfriends, who like myself worked in Messrs. Harland & Wolff's shipyard,and although my mind, like most teen-agers at the time, was concentratedon sport to the exclusion of almost every other consideration, I wasinduced to take home and read Robert Blatchford's MerryEngland and Britain for the British, and I waskept judiciously supplied with pamphlets on various aspects of theSocialist movement until I became quite interested in the subject, andshortly afterwards did not object to the description of Socialist beingapplied to myself, although at the time, in the circumstances andparticularly in the environment this was quite a momentous decision tomake. I soon became a frequent attender at Socialist meetings and foundmyself taking the chairas we described itat street cornermeetings, and introducing the speaker to the audience, which invariablywas not large in those days if one excluded periods of stress or theSunday afternoon meetings at the Custom House steps, where a large crowdwas attracted by the variety of oratorical fare offered, from thevending of quack medicine p.182
It is quite true I had heard James Connolly and his worksdiscussed, and an odd copy of his magazine The Harp,which was published during his sojourn in America, (1903-10), had falleninto my hands. As it expressed Socialism in a different way, I wassufficiently interested, when he appeared in person, to listen toanything he had to say, and secure copies of his writings from theeasily read and easily assimilated Socialism Made Easyand the Axe to the Root to his more ambitious Labour In Irish History, and the Reconquest ofIreland, both of which latter books particularly opened up avista before me of which I was but dimly conscious.
Prior toseeing him and meeting him, and hearing him speak, I had conjured up apicture of him in my mind, which actual contact with him proved to be anillusion. I had conceived of himmy imagination had undoubtedlybeen coloured by the visits of some oratorical gladiators I had heardfrom Great Britainas being tall, commanding, and as the advancenotices said of him, a silver-tongued orator. I found him, however, tobe the opposite of my mental picture;short, squat, unpretentious, with a distinctive even if with a slightlyraucous p.183
My mindwas, accordingly, attuned to his message a year later in 1911, when hecame North to settle in Belfast, and later became District Organiser ofthe Irish Transport and General Workers' Union. Meantime, I hadconsidered myself sufficiently conversant with Socialist philosophy andtrade unionism to mount the rostrum at the various street cornermeetings and lecture my fellow citizens on the errors of their politicaland economic ways. I was also ready to embrace all of the invitationsextended to me by Connolly to assist him in addressing meetings ofdockers and mill workers whom he was organising into the Union at thistime.
His permanent advent to our City meant that we had two mainpolitical Socialist organisations where one had mainly held sway, i.e.,the Socialist Party of Ireland and the British organisation, theIndependent Labour Party, of which I was a member, and of which JamesKeir Hardie, M.P., was one of its leading figures. Connolly'sorganisation was Marxist and nationalist in outlook, while theIndependent Labour Party was reformist and pseudo-internationalist.Obviously the latter in such an environment as Belfast was the morepopular organisation, although Connolly, being on the spot and engaging in active propaganda, was attracting a number of the more thoughtfulelements of the Socialist movement p.184
This is the backgroundagainst which Connolly and a few of us kept alive and engaged in activepropaganda work, an Irish based political organisation, having as ourdual purpose the spread of Socialise ideals and the securing of HomeRule for the country. It had been the practice during my membership ofthe I.L.P. if we were interrogated at question time regarding ourattitude to Home Rule, to reply that a person could hold whatever viewshe liked on that question and still be a Socialist, but I rememberConnolly advising me, as I was invariably the Chairman at all themeetings, at this stage, that if we were asked our views on thisquestion that we had to be brutally blunt about the matter, andcategorically state that we favoured the granting of Home Rule toIreland, and that it was entirely inconsistent with the principles ofSocialism to deny such a right to Ireland, or any other countrystruggling to be freed from the rule of their conquerors. We henceforthnailed our colours to the mast, and whatever part of the City we heldforth in, there was no dissembling on this vital but highly unpopularmatter in some quarters of such a city as Belfast.
Laying aside all questions of personality,personal ambitions and personal jealousies as being accidental andunessential, it may be truthfully asserted that one point of divergenceis that the I.L.P. in Belfast believes that the Socialist movement inIreland must perforce remain a dues-paying organic part of the BritishSocialist movement, or else forfeit its title to be considered a part ofInternational Socialism, whereas the Socialist Party of Irelandmaintains that the relations between Socialism in Ireland and in GreatBritain should be based upon comradeship and mutual assistance and notupon dues-paying, should be fraternal and not organic, and shouldoperate by exchange of literature and speakers rather than by attemptsto treat as one, two peoples of whom one has for 700 years nurtured anunending martyrdom rather than admit the unity or surrender its nationalidentity. The Socialist Party of Ireland considers itself the onlyinternational Party in Ireland since its conception of Internationalismis that of a free federation of free peoples, whereas that of theBelfast branches of the I.L.P. seems scarcely distinguishable fromImperialism, the merging of subjugated peoples p.187
This article of Connolly's evoked areply from William Walker, who was and had been the chief spokesman ofthe I.L.P. in the North of Ireland for many years. Before dealing withWalker's reply, it might be well to say a few words about the type ofman he was. A joiner by trade, at the material time he was the TradeUnion representative of the Joiners for Belfast. He was a highlyintelligent man. In appearance he would have passed for one of theprofessional classes, was a brilliant and gifted speaker, wasuniversally popular with the citizens as well as the workers, and wasgenerally held in very high esteem. He had been a Poor Law Guardian, aCity Councillor, and had contested North Belfast as candidate of theBritish Labour Party on several occasions, and had also, unsuccessfully,contested an election in Leith Burgh, Scotland, as a Labour Partycandidate. In addition, he had been a member of the Executive of theBritish Labour Party, and was a former President of and also a regularDelegate to the Irish Trade Union Congress. He, however, had the disadvantage of his upbringing and environment, and while as Connollyreminds him during this controversy he was guilty when a candidate forNorth Belfast of the most egregious offences a Socialist could commit ingiving an undertaking to the Belfast Protestant p.188
However, we better let him speak for himself. He describes Connolly'sbrand of Socialism in these words For if what hepreaches therein be Socialism then surely he has a monopoly of the brandhe adumbrates. I hold no brief for Belfast, but past bigotry aside, wehave moved fast towards municipal Socialism, leaving not merely theother cities of Ireland far behind but giving the lead to many cities inEngland and Scotland. We collectively own and control our gas works,water works, harbour works, markets, tramways, electricity, museums, artgalleries, etc., whilst we municipally cater for bowlers, cricketers,footballers, lovers of band music (having organised a Police Band), andour works department do an enormous amount of time andcontract work within the municipality. With the above in operation,we in Belfast have no need to be ashamed of being compared in municipalmanagement with any city in the Kingdom.
Referring to Connolly's remark on the relationship that should existbetween the Irish and British Socialist movements, he comments:That the S.P.I. want the Trade Unionists of Ireland tocease to contribute dues to [British] amalgamated Unions.That the co-operative movement should cease its p.189
Walker alsocited Scotland as a nation seeking, academically at least, legislativeindependence, which in the earlier years started a Scottish LabourParty, and continues For years that Partyappealed in vain to the workers with the result that in 1909 theScottish societies agreed to affiliate with the British Labour Party andtheir national organisations, whilst the delegates to the Portsmouth[Labour Party] Conference (theoretically Home Rulers)unanimously adopted this policy.
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