II
The temper of both sides was rising higher and higher, and the
neutrals made efforts to calm the dispute. Comrade Stankewitz,
Jimmie's cigar-store friend, cried out in his shrill eager voice: Vy
did we vant to git mixed up vit them European fights? Didn't we know
vat bankers and capitalists vere? Vat difference did it make to any
vorking man vether he vas robbed from Paris or Berlin? "Sure, I
know," said Stankewitz, "I vorked in both them cities, and I vas
every bit so hungry under Rothschild as I vas under the Kaiser."
Then Comrade Gerrity, organizer of the local, took his turn.
Whatever they did, said Gerrity, they must keep their neutrality in
this war; the one hope of the world just now was in the Socialist
movement--that it would preserve the international spirit, and point
a war-torn world back to peace. Especially just now in Local
Leesville they must keep their heads, for they were beginning the
most important move in their history, the establishment of a weekly
paper. Nothing must get in the way of that!
Yes, said Comrade Service, but they would have to determine the
policy of the paper, would they not? Were they going to protest
against injustice at home, and pay no attention to the most flagrant
act of international injustice in the history of the world? Was a
working man's paper to say nothing against the enslavement of the
working men of Europe by the Kaiser and his militarist crew? He, Dr.
Service, would wash his hands of such a paper.
And then the members of the local gazed at one another in dismay.
Every man and woman of them knew that the prosperous doctor had
headed the list of subscribers for the soon-to-be-born Leesville
Worker with the sum of five hundred dollars. The thought of losing
this munificent contribution brought consternation even to the
Germans!
But there was one member of the local whom no menace ever daunted.
He rose up now--lean, sallow almost to greenness, with black hair
falling into his eyes, and a cough that racked him at every other
sentence. Bill Murray was his name; "Wild Bill", the papers called
him. The red card he carried had been initialled by the secretaires
of some thirty locals all over the country. He had lost a couple of
toes under a tractor-plough in Kansas, and half a hand in a
tin-plate mill in Alleghany County; he had been clubbed insensible
in a strike in Chicago, and tarred and feathered in a free speech
fight in San Diego. And now he told the members of Local Leesville
what he thought of those tea-party revolutionists who pandered to
the respectability of a church-ridden community. "Wild Bill" had
watched the discussions over "Section Six", the provision in the
constitution of the party against sabotage and violence; the very
same persons who had been enthusiastic for that bit of middle-class
fakery were now trying to line up the local for the defence of the
British sea-power! What the hell difference did it make to any
working man whether or not the Kaiser got a railroad to Bagdad? Of
course, if a man had been to school in Britain, and had a British
wife, and felt himself a British gentleman--you could feel the
shudder that went through the gathering, for everyone knew that this
was Dr. Service--all right, let that man take the first ship across
the ocean and enlist; but let him not try to turn an American
Socialist local into a recruiting-agency for British landlords and
aristocrats.
This brought to his feet Comrade Norwood, the young lawyer who had
helped to put through "Section Six" in the National Convention of
the party. If there were people so keen against this Section, why
couldn't they get out of the party and form an organization of their
own?
"Because," answered Murray, "we prefer sabotage to striking!"
"In other words," continued Norwood, "you stay in the local, and by
a campaign of sneering and personalities you drive your opponents
out!"
"This is the first meeting for some months that we have had the
pleasure of seeing Comrade Norwood," said "Wild Bill", with venomous
placidity. "Perhaps he knew that we were to be asked to raise a
regiment for Kitchener!"
And then again Comrade Stankewitz was on his feet, with distress in
his thin, eager face. "Comrades, all this vill not get us anyvere!
There is but vun question ve have to answer, are ve
internationalists, or are ve not?"
"It seems to me," continued Norwood, "the question is, are we
anti-nationalists?"
"All right!" shrilled the little Jew. "I vill leave it so--I am an
anti-nationalist! Such must all Socialists be!"
"But I don't understand it so," declared the young lawyer. "It is
easy for some who belong to a race which has not had a country for
two thousand years--"
"And who's dealing in personalities now?" sneered "Wild Bill".
