Old Missoula

Eugene Debs Speaks in Missoula – 9/8/1923

DEBS SAYS SOCIAL SYSTEM HAS SERVED HISTORIC PURPOSE

Speaker Addresses Crowded House at Harnois Theater Last Evening.

“I am of the minority which believes that the social system in which we live has fulfilled its historic mission, executed the mandate of history,” said Eugene V. Debs at the Harnois theater last night, “and that the time is near at hand when society must be reorganized upon a new foundation.”

Mr. Debs, who addressed an enthusiastic audience at the theater, is making a 40-day tour in the interests of strengthening the Socialist party. The theater was jammed to capacity, and tremendous applause greeted the aged speaker several times during his speech.

The program was presided over by James L. Wallace, who first introduced Otto Branstetter, executive secretary of the Socialist party. Mr. Branstetter made a short talk, in which he referred to the Debs tour as one designed to rebuild and strengthen the Socialist party.

Debs Takes Floor at 9:15.

As Mr. Debs took his place on the stage, he was presented with two bouquets of flowers, one carried by Laurine Reno and the other by Arnold Helding. These were placed in vases on the flag-decorated table. Mr. Debs took the floor at 9:15. His speech follows, in part:

“The system in which we live today, called the capitalist system, evolved from the feudalism of the middle ages; and this system has about fulfilled itself. Now upon every hand we behold the unerring signs of change; centralization and combination based upon co-operation are the master forces of this age, and they are steadily paving the way to the new social order, steadily evolving from the present competitive chaos.

We Live in Land of Plenty.

“I think we are all agreed that we live in a very highly favored land, a land of fabulous resources, inexhaustible supplies of raw materials, the most marvelous productive machinery in the world, millions of workers, skilled and unskilled, ready to apply their labor to that machinery to produce an abundance for every man, woman and child. And if there are still vast numbers of our people who are victims of poverty, whose life is a continuous struggle all the way from youth to age until at last death comes to the rescue, stills their aching heart and lulls them to dreamless sleep – if there are still great numbers who are not properly housed and clothed and fed, it cannot be charged to the Almighty.

“Observe that the simple, individual tool with which your grandfathers and great-grandfathers worked has long since been touched by the magic wand of invention; and as if by magic it has become a marvelous machine. Every cog, every wheel, every lever, every spring in it proclaims it a social agency that came not to enslave but to emancipate the workers of the world. Observe that not only has the tool been socialized, but production has also become socialized. Long ago the worker had to cast aside his little individual tool with which he employed himself and worked early and late to produce just enough to satisfy his mere physical wants. He had to desert that little shop and suffer himself to be recruited into groups and regiments and armies of hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of workers.

Industry Has Been Socialized

“Work has been subdivided and specialized; and now the workers of this nation and of all the nations of the earth work together socially upon an ever-increasing scale. They work with social tools, and they produce wealth in increasing abundance by their social labor. But the evolution is not yet complete for while the tool has been socialized and production has been socialized, the ownership of those great social agencies is still vested in the individual.

“And here we have the fundamental contradiction inherent in capitalistic society highly developed; social production of wealth upon the one hand, and upon the other the individual appropriation of the social product. This accounts for the fact that we have upon the one hand the multi-millionaires and upon the other hand great masses of impoverished workers.

“Let me call your attention to the fact this evening – it’s a matter of vital importance to you – you can think as well as work. This great problem will not be solved by violence. That is one of the many reasons I am opposed to violence, and the capitalist system, because I am opposed to violence, and the capitalist system is based upon violence and breeds violence and makes violence inevitable. You can no more solve this great labor problem, the problem of all mankind, by violence than you can solve a problem in Euclid with a policeman’s club.

Workers Are Majority.

“I am appealing to the workers to realize first of all that they are in the majority. By the workers I mean those of brain as well as brawn. Every human being who is useful to society, in whatever capacity, industrially or professionally, belongs to what I call the working class.

“It is only the exploiters and the parasites that we want to get rid of, they who produce nothing and have all, while the workers produce all and have nothing. I call upon you to realize – as you will if you give it just one instant’s intelligent thought – that you are in the majority. You are the people.

“To awaken the unthinking, to have them begin to realize what may be done by the power of organized effort! It is a perfectly simple proposition. A child can understand it. We suffer less than two per cent of our people to own and control this nation’s industries, the means of our common life; and these are our economic masters and our political rulers. They are not in the least serviceable to society.

Advocates Industrial Union.

“Now the thing that is of supreme importance to the workers is that they shall organize, industrially and politically; develop their power in both fields, the maximum power; and bring it into action every day of the year. I am advocating the industrial union as against the craft union. There are a good many labor leaders in this country who can be dispensed with. They have the workers divided into thousands of more or less ineffective craft unions, pitted against one another, and used by their employers against one another.

“We propose change through education, through organization, through the appeal to the conscience, the heart, the intellect, the soul of the people; and they are increasing day by day. In due course of time this minority, this social minority will be transformed into the conquering majority. It will sweep into power. It will seize the reins of government; and then it will transfer the title of those national industries to the people, already organized collectively in their industrial organization. Then we will have the industrial democracy for the first time in history, the self-government of the people; not a master, nor a slave, but emancipated human beings who will work and work with joy, and express themselves in their work.

“I am opposed to war. I object to bloodshed. I would not take the life of a human being to save my own. I regard human life as infinitely sacred. I am opposed therefore to the system that ruthlessly sacrifices human life in the most barbarous manner possible. But I want to tell you that if I did believe in war, if it were my conviction that bloodshed were necessary, I should be sufficiently honest to insist upon shedding my share of that blood. I would not remain in the rear, wave flags and yell for blood, and push the young men of the country to be slaughtered and sacrificed for my profit and glory, I would not do that.”

Social Service Big Thing.

“The Russian movement, which is one of violence,” said Mr. Debs in an interview with a Missoulian reporter yesterday, “will not succeed in its present form, because of the lack of education. The workers do not know enough about co-operation and government to take charge.

“The English movement, on the other hand, is one of education and is bound to succeed. I am opposed to violence. When the workers take over the industries and government by violence they merely form another dictatorship.

“Our purpose is to educate the workers to the point where they will be able to control and know what they are doing. Then we hope to own socially the industries which are socially used and let those that are used individually be owned individually.

Great Incentive for Work.

“Some persons say that there will be no incentive for the people to work. I think there will be the greatest incentive there is for work. It will be the incentive of social service.

“We hope to raise the intellect of the working class to the point where they can forget the idea of pecuniary or material remuneration. Then we will have a working class that can take charge of the machinery of society and run it successfully.

“Co-operation is taking the place of competition. We produce surplus goods and must find a foreign market for them. The nation that has no armed forces to protect that market is lost, under the present system.

Present System Must Be Discarded.

“Nations are becoming closely interwoven. It is time that the system of national competition as well as individual competition be put aside. We believe that by producing enough to keep ourselves happy and comfortable and doing away with the useless parasite, we can establish international relations which will obviate war. Without the quest for foreign markets and the desire of one nation or one individual to obtain an advantage over another there will be no cause for conflict.

“The big thing is to teach everyone to think of his service to humanity and not of individual or selfish gains. When that is accomplished we will have a happy world community.”

Debs was arrested and convicted of espionage after giving an anti-war speech in 1918. He was on the 1920 presidential ballot while inside prison. The speech he made at his trial is considered one of the classic statements ever given in a court. Below is a link to a dramatic enactment of that speech:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SK8PjNr17Dc

https://www.newspapers.com/image/352298472