- . * _- ] _ ; , I . ‘COFFEE . .*.-. ., RED . AN INDEPENDENTSOCIALIST REVIEW OF WHITE POLITICS LITERATURE,AND ART, BREAD *.&. BLUE EDITeZD BY FORBREAKFAST & AFTER DINNER Science 3 making, use less quantity. it beiag and Experience confirm A, R, ORAGE and HOLBROOK JACKSON 90 much stronger than . 0ne PENNY NP.660 ’ [New Series, Vol. I. No. I,] THURSDAY,MAY 2, 1907. [~~~~~$.$$$$OJI- ” _ ,. - . , . , promise of an improvement in the price of Consols. THE OUTLOOK, For the middle-classes, whose “ bitter cry ” the Oppo- Planning an Empire. sition. was bent on exploiting, there is the discrimina- . NOW that the incidental festivities dinings, tion of the Income Tax, with its relief for the smaller speeches, and entertainments by rival political orga- earned incomes. Yet this discrimination has been so nisations, which the newspapers appear to regard as contrived as not to scare wealthy Liberals, whose se- the most striking features of the Colonia1 Conference, cession-would deplete the war-chest of the party ; for are drawing to a close, it may be well to consider how the discrimination is effected- by takinig off and not by far that Conference has gone towards doing what it putting on, so that the immense tribute of rent and in- was intended to do. The task before the Conference, terest will continue to be appropriated without diminu- the task implicitly before us all, is nothing less than tion for the private use of a class., ‘At the same time the creation of a British Empire. At present, of the conditions of payment are. to be made more stringent -course, no such Empire exists. All that exists, either and harder of evasion, so that the Chancellor may hope legally or actually, is “ the United Kingdom of Great ‘to gain by stricter enforcement almost as much as he Britain and Ireland and its Colonies and Dependen- will lose by his small but well-advertised mercies. cies. ” Of these Colonies and Dependencies some are Meanwhile the working class, unrelieved of the “ taxes ruled bureaucratically from Downing Street, others are on‘ the people’s food,” at which the Liberals wax so self-governing, and are bound together only by a com- indignant when other people propose them, are to be mon allegiance to the Crown, by a faint and ill-defined placated by a. promise of old Age Pensions in thedis- suzerainty exercised over them by the Parliament in tant ‘future. And Mr. Asquith sets aside 1,500,000 which they are not represented, and by a certain sen- to- provide a ” nucleus ” for the purpose and to prove timent of unity, which a common tradition and (in the sincerity of Liberal intentions. We’ are ‘disposed most cases) a common language bring to them. We to regard this “ nucleus ” _as the cleverest thing in do not wish to underrate the importance of this senti- the Budget. That the Liberals have the- remotest in- ment, without which indeed permanent union would tention of granting pensions to the veterans of in- be impossible. But a sentiment too weak to find ex- dustry we do not for a moment believe. The dodge is pression in concrete organisation is not likely to be both cleverer and more economical than that.‘- We take , strong enough to outlast the wear and tear of centu- it that Mr. Asquith will continue to dole out additions ries. It seems clear that, if the Empire is not to go to the “ nucleus ” at the rate of a million a year until to pieces in the course of the next hundred years or such time as the party is prepared to face a General so, means must be found to bring its parts intocloser Election, and that the Government wil1 ‘then go to relation with bne another. This is a problem worthy the country with the cry that, if the people want pen- of far closer attention from Socialists than it has yet sions, they must not -interrupt the good work and received. For us the barren negation of the old Radi- must send Codlin, not Short, back to power to com- cal Little-Englandism is impossible. If we accept it plete it. we are false to all our traditions. If Imperial’ Federa- Broadening the Basis. - * tion is impracticable, the Federation of the World of But what will the Tories be doing the while? They which Marx and Lassalle dreamed must be even more will hardly, we imagine, tamely suffer the issue to be impracticable. If we cannot have a Parliament of the shifted -from a number of questions on which they are Empire, how can we hope for a Parliament of Man? quite likely to win, to a-single question on- which they If a man love not his brother whom he has seen, how would be almost certain to lose. ‘They will doubtless shall he love Humanity which he has not seen ? More- pledge themselves, not only to continue Mr. Asquith’s . over the predatory Internationalism of Capital will force policy in this matter, but to give it a new impetus by us into Imperialism, as it forced the older Socialists “ broadening the basis of taxation ” and so accelerat- into Internationalism. How helpless would a host of ing the day when the “ nucleus ” shall grow- to prac- small and romantic Nationalities prove when confron- ticable proportions. And, in doing this, they will be ted with all the powers and principalities of cosmo- laying a finger on the weak point in Mr. Asquith’s politan finance ! Only a Socialist Federation- a So- policy. - For the Liberals have no new sources of taxa- cialist Empire-could face them without flinching. tion to fall back upon. They dare not attack property; they cannot, in common decency, impose fresh import A Brixton Budget. duties. Even. in -a fat year like the present they can Seldom has there been a measure so characteristic put their hands upon no new source of revenue. What of its author as Mr. Asquith’s Budget. It is an un- are they to do when the lean years come?- They will , deniably clever performance, as safe, astute, and di- then be faced with a revived agitation in favour of plomatic as utter lack of sympathy and imagination Tariff Reform as a means. of raising revenue, strength- _ --- can make it. It is- carefully designed to please as ened by their failure to take off the existing food taxes. many sections of the -community as possible without How. many years' purchase would they give to Free exciting ‘the -apprehensions ‘of any. For “ the City ” . Y Trade under those conditions? All this only empha - . there is the reduction of the National Debt, with its sises the importance of keeping the Socialist fiscal _’ policy in the. forefront of our programme. We alone out of the rudest materials, broke all their enemies in can really .“ broaden the basis of taxation,” not by piece’s were armies of a democratic type-the army of juggling with import duties, -but- by. securing as much Cromwell and the- army of the first French Republic. as possible of that tribute of £6oo,ooo,ooo, which is annually paid, to the idle classes in the form of rent Woolwich and Retrenchment. and interest. A propaganda on these lines is espe- cially needed if we are to secure more recruits from the An incidental example of the. difficulties in which the middle class. For the hostility with which that class Labour movement involves itself by its tendency to regards Socialism is in great part due to the fact that, adopt the Liberal policy of “ retrenchment ” is af- when the governing class is forced by pressure from forded by the case of Woolwich. The industrial pros- below to pass Socialistic legislation, it generally con- peritv of Woolwich depends mainly upon the activitv of trives to throw the whole cost on the middle orders, work at the Arsenal, and the activity of work at the and then turns round and assures its victims that they Arsenal depends upon the public expenditure on arma- are being robbed in order to fatten the greedy and ments and military stores. While the South African idle working man. War was raging Woolwich was enjoying unparalleled Thus is the working part of the well-being. Since Vereeniging its fortunes have been community‘ divided-and ruled. If we can once bring declining, until now the “ economies ” of the Liberal home to the mind of the average middle class ratepayer Government have brought them down to starvation the fact that his grievances -(often- real enough) can be redressed by shifting taxation from his shoulders point. Nor can the Government hold out any pros- to the shoulders of- the possessors of large unearned in- pect that the process will stop ; indeed, the Prime comes, we shall find him-much more amenable to rea- Minister told the deputation which waited upon him that still more dismissals were in view. NOW, doubt- son on the theory and practice of Socialism. less it is very selfish and unenlightened of the poor Militarism and Anti-Militarism. Woolwich worker to object to being starved to make Mr. Haldane’s Army Bill has provoked many pro- a Liberal surplus. Doubtless he ought to think with tests from very various quarters, and from no quarter tender gratitude of the threepence which is to come have the protests been more vigorous than from the off the income tax of the doctor and the stockbroker. Labour Party. There is undoubtedly much in the But, perhaps, if our own wives and children were War Minister’s scheme which deserves condemnation, starving, if we had to choose between the workhouse general, and emigration to some distant colony, our own ap- yet we cannot think that Socialists have, in preciation of the beauties of Liberal finance might de- adequately thought out the problem involved.