us for choice and therefore for criticism. It is not merely the general strike, it is even more the manner and spirit of its application.
At a socialist congress in 1891, great enthusiasm was roused by a resolution against the criminal stupidity of war as a means of settling disputes. A Dutch clergyman of great influence was the proposer. "Let us meet the first declaration of war by a general strike," was its purport. Let the workers of the world answer to a man by quietly laying down their tools. Let them reply to the great malefactors, "We work no longer to waste labor and human life, we will only work to save labor and to lengthen and enrich life."
One may gladly believe that somewhere beyond us, a strike may become holy in such a cause. But it is not this with which our average I. W. W. proposals have to do. The strike energy is urged to exercise itself at the heart of our economic activity for a specific purpose. It is not first for political advantages. It is the exclusive economic emphasis which makes the general strike a club for Anarchists rather than for Socialists. Many older Socialists favored the general strike for political ends, while they considered the general economic strike ridiculous. In the pamphlet just quoted the whole idea is that of the Syndicalist. Labor, it says, has now actually got the machinery of production in its own hands. It has only to educate itself to take it and run it. "Only make labor conscious of its possession and the battle is ours." There is a collection of syndicalist opinions on the general strike that appeared in their most im-
