The economic basis of society is changing more rapidly today than ever before in human history. This is an age of social evolution.
So much has been said and written of socialism by those who have no proper understanding of it and who have resorted to a wilful misrepresentation of its ideas, that it is not at all strange that a great number of people reject it and look upon those who advocate socialism as enemies. The evolution of the social organisation is a fact in nature. In the ceaseless process one state of society follows another in the sequence of succession. Socialism means the overthrow of capitalism, the abolition of wage-slavery, and the creation of the cooperative commonwealth. It means a social revolution which shall give to every worker economic freedom. The working class is the foundation of society. You are the producers of all value. All the wealth you see around you is the result of labour. Yet, do you own the wealth which you produce? No, you do not. You are the wealth-producers, but you live under wage slavery, in poverty and misery.
You are the fundamental power of society, and you don’t know it. You imagine that you are free, while in fact you are enslaved. The man who owns the tools of of your livelihood, the means of production, controls you. The class which owns the means of production, owns your very life. You elect the same political parties into power whose policies are to protect and advance the class interests of capitalism.. The politicians flatter you before the day of the election; after the election they forget you. Whenever and wherever organized labour is engaged in struggle against the powers of capitalism you will find both the same parties on the capitalist side, fighting against the working class. By voting for the parties of capitalism you help to perpetuate wage slavery, you strengthen the chains of misery. The political parties of capitalism are organised against you. It is for you to organise under the banner of socialism and the Socialist Party and fight the battles of your own emancipation
Think for yourselves. Be men and women who do their own thinking. Under the present system of society you are being robbed whether you receive higher or lower wages, because the wage system is based on legalised robbery. The millions of toilers slave and starve for the idle few who accumulate the stolen products of labour and lead a life of luxury. We want you to fight for the freedom of your own class and join the working class party, which is the Socialist Party.
The aim of the Socialist Party is for of the common ownership of all the means of production and distribution: namely, the land, mines, mills, factories, and productive machinery, for the purpose of operating industry in the interest of the whole people. Present society is based upon private property and is essentially coercive, with the function of the government being to protect the interests of the owning and ruling class, and to keep their victims in subjugation. When production becomes common property, government will be purely administrative, and will cease to be unjust and oppressive. The owning class in the present, as in all past ages, is necessarily the ruling class, and all legislation is enacted and interpreted in the interest of said class. Equality under the present system is simply a myth. The wage-worker whose employment is controlled by his industrial master ,and who in that relation is at the mercy of the master since we depend upon his arbitrary will for the opportunity to labour and support the family, is not on terms of political equality with the master. Political equality is rooted in economic freedom, and only when the means of production shall have become the common property of all, as they have been produced by all, are used by all, and are necessary to all, only then will political equality prevail and all men and women enjoy equal rights and equal opportunities. The Socialist Party proposes to establish industrial democracy, based upon cooperative industry. It should be understood that the party proposes to increase and not diminish the production of wealth. Rent, interest, and profit, three forms of exploitation, will be totally eliminated. Production will be carried forward for use and not for profit. The human trafficking — men women, and children — their purchase and sale upon a weekly or monthly instalment plan, will cease. The workday will be reduced in proportion to the progress of technology.
The Socialist Party is the only world political party in the world. Its fundamental principles are the same in all lands. The Socialist Party recognises no frontiers or borders. The nation in which we live embraces the working class of the world. Every worker everywhere is our brother and sister. Across the borders of all lands socialists clasp hands as comrades. The nationalism and patriotism which the ruling class of each nation is promotes, is the power which these give to capitalism to keep the workers of the world from uniting, and to throw them against each other in the struggles of contending capitalist interests for the control of the yet unexploited markets of the world, or the remaining sources of profit. The socialist movement, therefore, is a world movement. It knows of no conflicts of interests between the workers of one nation and the workers of another. It stands for the freedom of the workers of all nations; and, in so standing, it makes for the full freedom of all humanity.
The Socialist Party is the only party that stands for economic justice, and this is impossible in a system based upon exploitation. Political democracy and industrial despotism cannot co-exist. Socialism means that all those things upon which the people in common depend shall by the people in common be owned and administered. It means that the tools of employment shall belong to their creators and users; that all production shall be for the direct use of the producers; that the making of goods for profit shall come to an end; that we shall all be workers together; and that all opportunities shall be open and equal to all people.
The cause of the Socialist Party is and will be wholly educational. To arouse the consciousness of the workers to their economic interests as a class, to develop their capacity for clear thinking, to achieve their solidarity industrially and politically is to invest the working class with the inherent power it possesses to abolish the wage system and free itself from every form of servitude, and this is the mighty mission of the World Socialist Movement. We shall not compromise, nor shall we be diverted from the straight road to the cooperative commonwealth.
The Socialist Party is the only party that does not want a vote that is not intelligently cast. The popularity of a candidate is against him rather than for him in the Socialist Party. No vote is wanted on account of the personality of a candidate. It is the value of the socialist principle that is taught and emphasised, and if this is not understood and approved the vote is not wanted. Mere disgust with other candidates or their parties is not accepted by socialists as sufficient reason to encourage the voting of the Socialist Party. Such votes are unreliable, deceptive and misleading which are apt to desert at the very time they are most needed Any vote that is subject to the influence of personal considerations is so vacillating that it is of no use in the constructive work of a revolutionary political movement. Better united on the solid basis of principle, than thrown together on the shifting sands of personality. It is the case, not the face. Too many people are forever looking for some “great leader” to watch over and protect them. The Socialist Party makes principles paramount; the candidates are the last and least consideration. The supreme question is, “What are the principles?” and any interest in the delegates is about can he or she advance those principles.
The Socialist Party appeals to for fellow-workers for the realisation of its cooperative commonwealth. The Socialist Party is the party of the workers, who are on the right side of this worldwide struggle. The Socialist Party is the party of the present and of the immediate future. The Socialist Party stands for the abolition of the wage system, for the economic freedom as well as the political equality of the working class, knowing that without the former the latter is impossible. The Socialist Party stands for the common ownership of the means of wealth production and distribution and the operation of industry in the interest of all. The Socialist Party stands for industry of the people, by the people and for the people, that wealth may be produced for the use of all instead of for the profit of a few. The Socialist Party stands for a social order, in which every human being, in the full enjoyment of economic freedom, shall have full opportunity, in the best possible environment, to develop their best.
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