The Battle Hymn of Cooperation

Next time you pop into your local co-op sing this song while you wait for your divi.

Battle Hymn of Cooperation

Oh, we are a mighty army, though we bear no sword and gun,
We’re enlisted ’till the struggle for cooperation’s won,
And beneath our banner blazoned “One for all and all for one,"
Consumers marching on!

Chorus:
Come and let us work together
Come and let us work together
Come and let us work together
Consumers marching on!

It was long ago in Rochdale that our cause saw first the light,
We were sadly few in numbers but our principles were right,
But today we count our millions as we girt ourselves to fight:

Consumers marching on!
Chorus

Oh, the world today is suffering filled with poverty and pain,
And the day has come for freedom from the curse of private gain,
For all may live in comfort ’neath Cooperation’s reign.

Consumers marching on!
Chorus

Oh we know our scheme is righteous and we know our cause is just;
For upon the brotherhood of man we firmly base our trust:
Let us strive to win the victory, for win we can and must.

Consumers marching on!
Chorus

Elizabeth Mead  and Carl Ferguson, 1932

I confess that i have not previously known about this little known song which like the more popular Solidarity Forever is based upon the Battle Hymn of the Republic.

If only we could substitute that word "consumers" for "communists" !

The Socialist A.B.C. by Alex Glasgow

We may not accept it as 100% politically correct but it brings a smile

When that I was a little tiny boy

Me daddy said to me
'The time has come, me bonny, bonny bairn

To learn your ABC'
Now daddy was a Lodge Chairman

In the coalfields of the Tyne

And that ABC was different
From the Enid Blyton kind

He sang A is for Alienation that made me the man that I am

and B's for the Boss who's a bastard, a bourgeois who don't give a damn

C is for Capitalism, the boss's reactionary creed

and D's for Dictatorship, laddie, but the best proletarian breed

E is for Exploitation, that the workers have suffered so long

and F is for old Ludwig Feuerbach, the first one to see it was
wrong

G is for all Gerrymanderers, like Lord Muck and Sir Whatsisname
and H is the Hell that they'll go to, when the workers have
kindled the flame
I is for Imperialism, and America's kind is the worst
and J is for sweet Jingoism, that the Tories all think of first
K is for good old Keir Hardie, who fought out the working class fight

and L is for Vladimir Lenin, who showed him the Left was all right

M is of course for Karl Marx, the daddy and the mammy of them all
and N is for Nationalisation, without it we'd crumble and fall
O is for Overproduction that capitalist economy brings

and P is for Private Property, the greatest of all of the sins

Q is for the Quid pro quo, that we'll deal out so well and so soon
when R for Revolution is shouted and the Red Flag becomes the
top tune

S is for sad Stalinism, that gave us all such a bad name

and T is for Trotsky the hero, who had to take all of the blame
U's for the Union of workers, the Union will stand to the end
and V is for Vodka, yes, Vodka, the one drink that don't bring the bends
W is for all Willing workers, and that's where the memory fades

for X, Y and Z, me dear daddy said, will be written on the street
barricades

But now that I'm not a little tiny boy

Me daddy says to me

Please try to forget the things I said

Especially the ABC
For daddy's no longer a Union man

And he's had to change his plea

His alphabet is different now

Since they made him a Labour MP

http://www.wolvestuc.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=279&Itemid=63&showall=1