5
working people, through its Labour Unions, can take possession of all the means of production, mines, houses, the land; in short, of all the economic factors.
2.—THE COURSE OF THE GENERAL STRIKE.
By considering the reports and observations made from General Strikes which have broken out heretofore, we can draw a picture of the course of a SOCIAL GENERAL STRIKE.
After the necessary time of propaganda, after the masses and organisations have been made familiar with the idea, as soon as the circumstances are favourable, all Labour Unions (which are certainly the best fitted for propagating this idea) declare the General Strike in their branches. The non-organised workers are soon carried along; the movement broadens and quickly spreads over the whole country, generalising itself, and becomes the General Strike of the proletariat. We saw this in Belgium in April, 1902, when 350,000 men laid down their tools upon the request of the Labour Unions.
Modern industry, with its extremely specialised labour division and complications, is but poorly adapted to oppose a General Strike caused by a minority, for the strike will completely wreck the whole system necessary for the management of production, and vital to the life of modern society.
The most necessary products are often made in such a manner that they not only go through twenty or thirty hands in the same factory, but often pass from one factory to another in order to be completed. The raw material for the manufacture of these articles often comes from distant places, and railroads, mails, and telegraphs are vital to production. Now, if it happens that one wheel of this enormous mechanism of society stops, the whole of this particular industry is laid idle.
If all the coal miners would go on strike, in a few days all coal yards would be empty, and all railroad transportation would be interrupted. All smelteries and foundries, all steam engines, all factories and electrical works would be forced to lie idle. The gas works, which would be without coal, would have to close down, and with them hundreds of gas motors, and those machines and machine tools operated by them. After sunset an entire city would be in darkness, because no electric light and no gas would be obtainable.
This great success could readily be gained in a few days, or a few weeks at the most, by a strike of the coal miners, who by experience are familiar with mass strikes, and certainly would have to be dealt with in the future struggle. The railroad employees are also an important factor in the Labour movement. They would certainly not wait to strike until all the coal was gone, but would join in at the beginning, if it were a matter of importance. In all plants work is interrupted through the strike of a minority, which forces the rest to lie idle, partly by its hostile attitude towards them, and partly by open threats to injure them.
As soon as the bakers and butchers quit working, the General Strike will be felt much more intensely, and it will probably be the
