It happened also that numerous ministerial posts have been held by men who in their youth were influential members of the Socialist party, such as MM. Briand, Viviani, Millerand and Breton; or else who belonged to a group of Socialist reformers, such as MM. Augag neur, Painleve, Godart and Metin. Doubtless Socialists who become ministers are not always Socialist ministers; nevertheless their in the Cabinet calmed to a great dept., and aversion which the middle-clncv., geoisie) felt at the very name of Sec.
But what it behooves us to loll life of the two radical parties with: most active or the most strongly un-_ all. To the very last, the Organize S. and Organized Radicals did all they prevent the huge catastrophe thrum: whole world. The former used an ±.:_ ence with the government to math= the latter invited their in the same cause. But their their appeals, their meetings woke r on the other side of the Rhine. jar murdered, on 31 July 1914, after Inr_-., steps for the maintenance of peace mi.: lost all hope of success. At his finted..1 ized Socialists and Organized Radial pointed by the listlessness of the Ge-r.. cial Democracy, disgusted by the bria lation of the neutrality of Belgium ar burg, realizing that for France and of nations this was a question of : death, proclaimed themselves ready to uttermost co-operation to the defend nation. They accepted the °Sacred ti tree amidst general enthusiasm at the 4 Aug. 1914 of the Chamber of Depanb thus agreed to a two-fold rapprochmr to a two-fold collaboration; first Ma • selves, second, with the Bourgeois par. Jouhaux became a member of the Nw:n. lief Committee which comprised men n. opinion: Herve, the fierce anti-r.:: preached war to ,excess in his organ Li. Sociak (later La Victoire).
On 28 Aug. 1914, in defiance of 6. which forbade members of the party Z pate in a ((bourgeois° ministry, MIL .f and Sembat were appointed to the If,-; National Defense, in order, it was pare the general levy and to make cer the country be told the truth. The km named minister without portfolio, de Minister of Public Works; later on If Thomas was allowed to accept the uri-: taryship of andMunitions. it came in time the Ministry of Munitkm a new organism arose; this was the Committee (Comite d'action) mutt= September, and comprised the Perarer: ministrative Commission, the Socialimr liament, the directors and managers of fie, the delegates of the Federation of representatives of the Confederation : the Workmen's Co-operative Savo strove to impose a single directive entire working class of France.
It has been active in relieving the irk' the prisoners, the refugees, the soldier:!' ing to the laboring class, in sending tbr; papers, food, clothes, in finding "Foil unemployed, in assisting the families of getting information about the dead missing, in protecting them against creased cost of living. It had spe_rt.' end of 1915, 82,840 francs ($16,568). end of 1916, 210,000 francs ($42,000) In the meantime, the Socialist i urged the government to put a stop actionary and clerical campaign and i; bold fiscal policy in accordance with th imes ; they presented on nd taxes, asked that the monopolies of , insurance and hydraulic power should to state, the abolition of the censor tuushment for the speculations of the ontractors, etc. In the departmental and nal councils the Socialists elected ad he municipalization of public utilities; in fixed Departmental Commissions, in the is Labor Committee, the representatives workmen's syndicates discussed with the ntatives of the employers' associations problems created by the war or the solu which was rendered urgent by it, as ganization of the labor market, alien s, apprenticeship, terms offered to the Id women employed in the war factories. this may be called the outer life of arties ; their inner life was more com d. It is a law of human nature, that in group, however small, there should be it Centre (moderate conservatives), and Centre (liberals). Unanimity is but an ion, a case of unstable equilibrium. Di ces of opinions and nature often aggra by personal dislikes and jealousies soon havoc of it. It is therefore not to be Ted at, if the war lasting beyond all fore fissures showed and increased in the bloc tuted primarily by the political and eco al labor groups. They still agree not to up the International Congress a second that the right of peoples to dispose of elves and to choose their nationality be pf the bases of the future peace, on the ession of secret diplomacy, on the limita )f armaments, on compulsory arbitration .tle international conflicts, on the restora of the independence of Belgium, Poland any country annexed by a larger state st its own free will. Let us add that no as advised sabotage in the factories, nor tion from the army, no one even proposed rry to the trenches the discussions at home. apart from these, there are numerous .s provoking dissension, many of them non to both the Organized Socialists and )rganized Radicals. Let us begin by these: Who bears the responsibility of beginning war? The majority agree that it rests with Austro-German aggression. The minority, out denying this undeniable fact, are of that the responsibility rests with all Tnments and capitalists who are always r to conquer and annex. (2) The question Alsace-Lorraine, ever the stumbling-block good understanding between France and many, appears to the majority as capable ()lotion only by the restitution to France of erntories wrenched from her by main force. knecht and Bebel, in 1871, protested against act of violence, say the majority; they do say what the lot of the immigrants is to be; minority think that the inhabitants should :onsulted, but say nothing of those who left country in order to escape German domina t; a tribunal by arbitration, the composition which is not made known, is to solve the stion. (3) Is the common danger to put a morary stop to the class struggle? Doubt ; the necessity of defending the fatherland for a time cast into the background this ss struggle, which is one of the very founda ns of the Marxist doctrine. It is evident, too, that in many minds a reaction has taken place, setting up the humanitarian and fraternal prin ciples which were those of the French Socialists in 1848 the ideal of justice which Proudhon as well as Louis Blanc strove to realize and which Benoit Molon, Foumiere and the Revue Socialiste have never ceased to defend. It is
natural enough that M. Longuet, Marx's grand son, should be one of the chiefs of the minority whose Left Centre proclaims that the class struggle is that sacred union is but a delusion, that it is high time to denounce it as it has never been properly observed by the reactionary parties. The majority, though con fessing that it ought to be better applied, cry out: ."France first! Let us begin by saving our invaded country. The strife between capi tal and labor can be taken up when the Germans are no more at Noyon.° Logically, the minor ity have asked the "control,' that is to say, the exclusion or resignation of those who in the press, as Herve, or in the Cabinet, as Albert Thomas, have urged or practised an active and unbroken collaboration with the government of National Defense. But the discussion of these severe motions has been put off to calmer times. (4) Must war be pursued up to complete vic tory? The minority do not like to hear "Ger, man cruelty° mentioned, they protest against the expression to see it through,*—they disapprove of a political and economical crushing of Germany. One of its chiefs urged England not to vote compulsory military serv ice. They repeat and approve the words of the German deputy Haase: °There shall be neither victors nor vanquished.° They con sider the destruction of Prussian militarism as a lure, for war has never killed war. They foretell that all Europe shall be ruined through exhaustion and they ask immediate peace nego tiations. The majority is committed to the Allies victory and ask the government to hasten it by energetic measures; but, in order that this war may be the last, they believe that Ger man imperialism must disappear and that the damages it has wrought should be retrieved at the cost of its upholders. (5) This brings us to the most ticklish question, which has raised most passion and anger: the renewal of international intercourse, or, to state it more correctly, of intercourse between the nations at war. Stating that both Frenchmen and Ger mans have voted at the election of the Pope and have worked in common in assemblies of bankers and merchants, the minority believe that the renewal of intercourse should be im mediate and some of its members have acted accordingly. As early as November 1914 a conference was held at Copenhagen, to which were invited representatives of the different national sections; the confederation did not reply to the invitation. The organized party's answer was a refusal. This reflected the opinion of the majority. But the International Socialist Bureau was urged by the minority to call a regular session. It had been transferred from Brussels to The Hague, but the Secretary General, Mr. Huysmans, was opposed to a ses sion which, owing to the reciprocal feelings of the English, French and Belgians on the one side and of the Austro-Germans on the other, could only degenerate into a .general fight and might compromise the very existence of the International Congress. Mr. Vanderwelde, the president of the executive commission, had seen his country too much plundered, laid waste and outraged to be in any hurry to reach out his hand to former comrades who had perhaps been among the despoilers of Belgium and who, in any case, had raised no protest against the ferocious treatment inflicted upon his com patriots. Against these demands for a full session, the majority urged meetings to which only the Socialists of the Allied and neutral countries should be invited. At the meeting held in London (14 Feb. 1915) only delegates from Great Britain, Belgium, France and Rus sia were present and they decided unanimously to see the war through to complete victory. Then the Italian Marxist Socialists, who had remained obstinately hostile to the intervention of their country in the war, arranged with the Socialists of a neutral country, Switzerland, to call forth at Zimmerwald (5 Sept. 1915) another meeting to which the official parties of France and Germany were not invited. There were 35 delegates, among whom Mr. Merheim of the Metal Federation and M. Bour deron of the Cask Federation (Federation du Tonneau), a member also of the 12th section of the Socialist Federation of the Seine. There they met German delegates and signed with them a manifest and a declaration warning the groups against the "so-called national and nationalist socialism. The meeting ap pointed an international socialist committee to meet at Berne and take up the work which the bureau at The Hague had declined to do. At the Confederation meeting of 15 Aug. 1915, M. Bourderon's motion: "This war is not our war," was beaten by 81 votes against 27, with 10 delegates not voting. At the National Con gress of one French organized party (25-29 Dec. 1915) a resolution of this same Bourderon similar to that of Zimmerwald was disapproved by 2,736 votes to 76, with 102 delegates not voting. Then the majority, condemning all endeavors to create irregular international or ganizations, stated the conditions under which the renewal of intercourse with the Austro Germans might take place: Disavowal of im perialism and a policy of conquest; recognition of the right of peoples to dispose of themselves; protest against the violations of international law, of neutralities guaranteed by Europe. If the Germans were willing, not only in words, but in deeds, to adopt these principles, it de pended on them alone to shorten the delays after which intercourse with them might be renewed. The discussion, however, was far from being ended. It was resumed with heat. The fact that Karl Liebknecht had "liberated his by breaking from imperialist socialism, that the war was lagging, that physi cal and moral sufferings were increasing, en larged the number of chances of those who wished for the return of peace and the ultra pacifists renewed their efforts.