Introduction
The Situation-Its cause and cure
The American workingman who arouses himself from the customary state of indifference characterizing workingmen and gazes about him in a critical mood, must be struck by the great inequalities in the conditions of the beings surrounding him. 
	On the one hand, he sees vast masses of workers working long hours, often at the most dangerous and unhealthy occupations, and getting in return hardly the scantiest of the necessities of life. He sees this starving, slaving mass of workers afflicted with the terrible social scourges of the unemployment, crime, prostitution, lunacy, consumption, and all the other forms of social, mental and physical degeneracy which are the inseperable companions of poverty. 
	On the other hand, he sees a comparitively small number of idle rich revelling in all the luxuries that modern society can produce. Though they do nothing useful for society, society pours its vast treasures into their laps, and they squander this wealth in every way that their depraved and sated appetites can suggest. The monkey dinners, dog suppers, pig luncheons, hiring of noblemen for servants, buying of princes for husbands and cartloads of valuable art treasures for notoriety, and the thousand and one other insane methods of the American aristocracy to flaunt its wealth are too well known to need recapitulation here. Our observing workers must indeed conclude that something is radically wrong in a society that produces such extremes of poverty and wealth, and toil and idleness. 
	SOME FAKE CAUSES AND QUACK REMEDIES
	His inquiries as to the cause of these inequality are met by a shower of answers from retainers of the rich. He is told that they are due to the trusts, the tariff, to the fact that the workers don't "save", that they "drink", that they are unfit to survive in the great social struggle for the survival of the fittest from which the rich have emerged as victors, etc., etc. But even the slightest examination of these answers will show their superficiality and inability to explain the great inequaliies in our modern society. 
	Poverty with its terrible co-evils and wealth with its luxuries are not caused by the trusts or the tariff. They are to be found in all the industrial countries alike, whether they have trusts or tariff or not. 
	Neither are they caused by the workers "squandering" their wages in "drink" and the rich "saving up". A few years ago it was shown that the yearly wages of the antharicite coal miners amounted to $40.00 less than the coast of the actual necessities of life. It has been recently calculated that the street railway workers of Chicago recieve wages enough to buy only two-thirds of the necessities of life. The same is true, of every category of workers. Even if the workers spent not a cent for drink they couldn't "save," as they would still want for prime, necessities. And even if a worker expended nothing of the two dollars per day average wages he received, and "saved" it all for 2,000 years, his savings at the end of that time would amount to but a fraction of the fabulous sums amassed by American multi-millionaires „in a few years while revelling in luxury. To say that the workers. are poor because they "drink" and don't "save" is absurd.
	The argument that the rich are rich because they are capable and the poor are poor because they are incapable is belied every- where. Thousands of wealthy stockholders are drawing dividends from industries they have never even seen — let alone to know any- thing of them or their operation. A goodly share of this interest- drawing aristocracy — if not the majority — is composed of perverts and mental degenerates of various types, such as the Thaw and McCprmiek heirs of malodorous renown. To say that these de- generates and the mediocre balance of the aristocracy occupy their present positions of affluence because of their superior capacities is to insult common intelligence.
	THE TRUE CAUSE AND ITS CUKE.
	The fallacies of the various other orthodox explanations for the social inequalities and their terrible effects will at once be apparent to the intelligent inquiring worker. He must seek deeper for the true explanation. He will find it in the wages system, which is the foundation institution of modern society.
	The Wages System. — The means whereby society gains its livelihood: the shops, mills, mines, railroads, etc., ate owned by the comparatively few individuals. The rest of society, in order to work in the industries and procure a living, must secure the permission of these individuals. As the number of applicants for jobs is far greater than the needs of the industries; there is such competition for the available positions that those who secure them are, in return for the privilege to earn a living, forced to give up to the owners of the industries the lion's share (in the United States four-fifths) of the abundant products the highly develops machinery enables them to produce. The owners of the industries take advantage of their strategic position and steal the greater portion of the workers' product, giving them, in the shape of wages, barely enough to live on.
	The wages system of robbery is responsible for the great extremes of poverty and wealth to be found in modern society. It has existed ever since the very beginning of industrialism and its effects grow worse daily. Every invention of a labor-saving device, bv increasing the army of the. unemployed and making the com- petition for jobs keener, enables the owners of the industries to more thoroughly exploit their slaves. Thus the wages system has the effect of making inventions of labor-saving devices curses to the bulk of society, instead of blessings as they should be.
	The Revolution. — The wages system is the most brazen and gigantic robbery evei perpetrated since the world began. So disastrous are its consequences on the vast armies of slaves within its toils that it is threatening the very existence of society. If society is even to be perpetuated — to say nothing of being organized upon an equitable basis — the wages system must be abolished. The thieves at present in control of the industries must be stripped of their booty, and society so reorganized that every individual shall have free access to the social means of production. This social reorganization will be a revolution. Only after such a revolution will the great inequalities of modern society disappear.
	THE MEANS TO THE REVOLUTION. 
	The Class Struggle. — For years progressive workers have realized the necessity for this revolution. They have also realized that it must be brought about by the workers themselves.
	The wages system has divided the immense bulk of society into two classes (he capitalist class and the working class. The interests of these two classes are radically opposed to each other. It is the interest of the capitalist class to rob the workers of as much of their product as possible and the interest of the workers to prevent this robbery as far as they can. A guerrilla warfare — known as the class struggle and evidenced by the many strikes, working class political eruptions and the many acts of oppression committed by capitalists upon their workers — constantly goes on between these opposing classes. The capitalists, who are heartlessness and cupidity personified, being the dominant class of society and the shapers of its institutions, have organized the whole fabric of society with a view to keeping the working class in slavery. It is, therefore, evident that if the workers are to become free it must be through their own efforts and directly against those of the capitalists. Hence the revolutionary slogan, "The emancipation of the workers must be wroughl by the workers themselves."
	Rejection of Political Action and Acceptance of Direct Action.—
It goes without saying, that for the workers to overthrow capitalism they must be thoroughly organized to exert their combined might. Ever since the inception of the revolutionary idea the necessity for this organization has been realized by progressive workingmen and they have expended untold efforts to brineg it about.
	These efforts have been almost entirely directed into the building of working class political parties to capture the State— it being believed that with such a party in control of the State, the latter would be used to expropriate the capitalists. The Socialist parties in the various countries have been laboriously built with this idea in view. But of late years, among revolutionists, there has been a pronounced revolution against this program. Working class political action is rapidly coming to be recognized as even worse than useless. It is being superseded by the direct action* of the labor unions.
	This rejection of political action and acceptance of direct action has been caused by the failure of the former and the success of the latter. Working class political parties, in spite of the great efforts spent upon them, have been distinct failures, while, on the otherr hand, labor unions, though often despised and considered as interlopers by revolutionists, have been pronounced successes. For a long time, practically unnoticed, they went on all over the world winning the most substantial victories for the working class. It was only the continued failure of political action that led revolutionists to study them and to make a dispassionate comparison of their achievements, possibilities, structure, etc., with those of the working- class political party. The result of this study is the growing rejection of political action and the rapid development of the revolutionary labor unions, or Syndicalist movement, which is attracting the attebtion of the whole world.
	In the following pages the various phases of this new movement, designed to free the working class, will be discussed.

	SYNDICALISM
	I. THE GOAL OF SYNDICALISM.[1]
	The Syndicalist movement is a labor union movement, which, in addition to fighting the every-day battles of the working class, intends to overthrow capitalism and reorganize society in such a manner that exploitation of man by man through the wages system shall cease. The latter phase of this triple task— the establishment of a society worthy of the human race — is the real goal of Syndicalism and the end for which all its efforts are finally spent. Consequently, an understanding of the manner in which the new society shall be organized is a matter of first importance to Syn- dicalists and they have given it much thought.
	THE OPERATION OF THE INDUSTRIES.
	Anti-Statism.— At this early date, though many of the minor details of the organization plan of the new society can only be guessed at, many of its larger outlines are fairly clear. One of these is that there will be no State. The Syndicalist sees in the State only an instrument of oppression and a bungling administrator of industry, and proposes to exclude it from the future society. He sees no need for any general supervising governmental body, and intends that the workers in each industry shall manage the affairs of their particular industry; the miners shall manage the mines; the railroaders manage the railroads, and so on through all the lines of human activity.
	Current Syndicalist Theory. — Just how the workers shall be organized to manage their industries has been a matter of much speculation. The current Syndicalist theory is that the labor unions in the various industries will each take over the management of their particular industry; that "the fighting groups of today will be the producing and distributing groups of tomorrow."
	This theory, while based on the correct principles, that the State is incompetent to administer industry, and that the most competent bodies possible to do so are the workers actually engaged in the industries, is in all probability incorrect in itself. There are other organizations of workers, overlooked by the formulators of the above theory, that are far more competenl to carry on industry than are the labor unions. These are the shop organizations of modern industry.
	Shop Organizations. — By the shop organization of an industry is meant the producing organization of workers in that industry. It includes every worker in that industry, whatever his function may be. All industries, including the professions, etc., have such shop organizations more or less well developed. To carry on production of any kind without a shop organization is impossible.
	The superiority of these shop organizations to the labor unions for the administration of industry is manifest. They have been especially constructed to carry on production in all its phases, and are daily doing so; while labor unions are simply fighting organizations of workers, knowing, as such, nothing about the operation of industry. These shop organizations will not perish with the fall of capitalism, but, barring some initial confusion, due to the revolution, will continue on in much their present shape into the future society. To try to replace these highly developed and especially constructed producing organizations by the labor unions — which have been built for an entirely different purpose — would be as foolish as unnecessary. There will be no need to change the fighting groups of today into the producing and distributing groups of tomorrow." These producing and distributing organizations already exist. The labor unions will serve a very different purpose in the future society, as will be shown later.
	Autonomy of Shop Organizations. — In the future society the shop organizations will be perfectly autonomous — each automatically regulating its own affairs and requiring no interference from without. The producing force of society will be composed of autonomous units — each industry constituting a unit. The beginnings of this industrial autonomy are seen in the more highly monopolized industries of today. These industries are becoming automatic in their operation. Chance and arbitrary industrial dictatorship are being eliminated from them. The whole industrial process is becoming a matter of obeying facts and figures. In a monopolized industry the national demand for its product flows inevitably to it and it regulates its production automatically to conform to this demand. In the future society all industries will be monopolized and each will regulate its production according to the demands placed upon it by the rest of society. The relations between the various industries will be simply the filling of each other's orders for commodities.[2]
	This principle of autonomy will extend to the component parts of the various industries, as arbitrariness in an industry is as detrimental as between industries. This principle is also being more and more recognized and accepted in modem industry. The recent breaking up of the Harriman railroad system into five autonomous sub-systems is proof of this.
	As the activities of the autonomous shop organizations will extend over all social production, including education, medicine, criminology, etc., there will be no need for a general supervising body to administer industry — be it the State or the labor unions. And as there will be no slave class in society and no ownership in the social means of livelihood, the State will have lost the only other reasons for its existence— the keeping of the working class in subjection and the regulation of the quarrels between the owners. of the industries.
	Initiative.— The statist, while admitting, perhaps, that a certain amount of autonomy is necessary between the industries and also between then component parts, and that, to a certain extent, they will automatically regulate themselves, will, nevertheless insist that very many instances occur in which these autonomous bodies are incapable of carrying on the multiple functions of society, and that they must submit to legislative bodies. He will pose the question of initiative: "Who, in the new society, will decide on the adoption of far-reaching measures, such as the creation of new industries, reorganizing of old ones, adoption of new industrial processes, etc., which will affect all society?" And he himself will quickly answer: "The majority of the representatives of all society in the government."
	But this conclusion is entirely fallacious and at variance with the laws of modern production, as the following typical example taken from modern industry, will show: Suppose steel costs $10.00 per ton to produce and a new process is invented, by which steel can b« produced for $8.00 per ton. The question of the adoption of this new process— surely one affecting all society — is merely a question of whether or not it will pay interest on the cost of its installation. IT IS PURELY A MATTER OF FIGURES AND IS SETTLED IN THE STEEL INDUSTRY ALONE. SOCIETY AS A WHOLE IS NOT CONSULTED. THE STEEL INDUSTRY DICTATES TO THE REST OF SOCIETY IN MATTERS PERTAINING TO THE STEEL INDUSTRY. And this is perfectly logical, even from an idealist standpoint, as it is manifest that the workers in the steel industry are the most competent of all society to decide on matters relating to the steel industry.
	There is nothing democratic in this procedure; but it is that of modern industry. And it has been so successful in the development of the industries under capitalism that it is very unlikely it will be changed in the future society. And why should it be? Suppose for instance, the scientifically organized medical fraternity, from experience and figures at hand, decided that a certain hygenic measure, such, for example, as vaccination, to be necessary for society's welfare, would it be logical for a rational society to submit such a proposition to a referendum vote of a lot of shoemakers, steel' workers, farmers, etc, who know nothing about it, or to a government of their representatives equally ignorant? Such a procedure would be ridiculous. Even under capitalism the incompetence of governments to decide such questions is being recognized, and the decisions of specialists of various kinds are being more and more taken as the basis of laws regulating their particular social functions. In the future society these decisions, coming from thoroughly organized specialists — doctors, educators, etc. — "who then will have no interest to bilk their fellow beings, as they now have — will be the social laws themselves governing these matters, even as the decision of the steel industry is now social law in matters pertaining to the production of steel. This undemocratic principle will be applied to all the industries.
	The fear that one industry might impose arbitrary measures upon the rest of society is groundless, as the same impulses for the improvement of the industries, though in a different lunn, will exist then, as now. In the unlikely event of such arbitrariness Oil the part of one industry, the use of direct action tactics on l In part of the other industries would soon make it .reasonable again
	Selection of Foremen, Superintendents, Etc. — In the future Syndicalist society the ordinarily unscientific custom of majority rule will be just about eliminated. It will be superseded by the rule of facts and figures. Not only will the industries be operated in the undemocratic manner above outlined; but, the responsible positions in them will be filled in a manner all at variance with democratic principles. The foremen, superintendents, etc., will be chosen on the score of their fitness; by examination, instead of 1 on the score of their ability to secure the support of an ignorant majority, through their oratorical powers, good looks, influence, or what not, as is the ordinary democratic procedure. Syndicalism and democracy based on suffrage do not mix.
	DIVISION OF THE SOCIAL PRODUCT.
	The question of the system for the division of the social pro- duct in the new society has not been the subject of much discussion by Syndicalists. However, they very generally accept the Anarchist formula: "From each according to his ability; to each according to his needs." They will abolish all ownership in the social means of livelihood and make them free for each to take what he needs.
	They believe that when all are free to help themselves from the all-sufficing products of society they will no more misuse their opportunity than people now misuse the many enterprises under capitalism — streets, roads, bridges, libraries, parks, etc, —which are managed according to the Anarchistic principle of each taking what he needs. The prevailing code of ethics will prevent would-be idlers from taking advantage of this system.
	Syndicalists generally repudiate the Socialist formula: "To each the full social value of his labor" and its accompanying wages system of labor checks. They assert, with justice, that it is impos- sible to def inline the full value 1 - that individual workers give to society, and that if this is tried it will mean the perpetuation o£ social aristocracies.[3]

II. THE GENERAL STRIKE.
	Some Syndicalist Ethics.— The Syndicalist is characterized by the harmony that exists between his theories and his tactics. He realizes that the capitalist class is his mortal enemy, that it must be overthrown, the wages system abolished and the new society he has outlined established, if he is to live; and he is proceeding to the accomplishment of these tasks with unparalleled directness. He allows nothing to swerve him from his course and lead him in an indirection.
	The Syndicalist knows that capitalism is organized robbery and he consistently considers and treats capitalists as thieves plying in their trade. He knows they have no more "right" to the wealth they have amassed than a burglar has to his loot, and the idea of expropriating them without remuneration seems as natural to him as for tht footpad's victim to take back his stolen property with- out paying the footpad for it. From long experience he has learned that the so-called legal and inalienable "rights" of man are but pretenses with which to deceive workingmen; that in reality "rights" are only enjoyed by those capable of enforcing them. He knows that in modern society, as in all ages, might is right, and that the capitalists hold the industries they have stolen and daily perpetrate the robbery of the wages system simply because they have the economic power to do so. He has fathomed the current systems of ethics and morals, and knows them to be just so many auxiliaries to the capitalist class. Consequently, he has cast them aside and has placed his relations with the capitalists upon a basis of naked power.
	In his choice of weapons to fight his capitalist enemies, the Syndicalist is no more careful to select those that are "fair," "just" or "civilized" than is a householder attacked in the night by a burglar. He knows he is engaged in a life and death struggle with an absolutely lawless and unscrupulous enemy, and considers his tactics only from the standpoint of their effectiveness. With him the end justifies the means. Whether his tactics be "legal" and "moral," or not, does not concern him, so long as they are effective. He knows that the laws, as well as the current code of morals, are made by his mortal enemies, and considers himself about as much bound by them as a householder would himself by regulations regarding burglary adopted by an association oi housebreakers. Consequently, he ignores them insofar as he is able and it suits his purposes. He proposes to develop, regardless of capitalist conceptions of "legality," "fairness," "right, etc., a greater power than his capitalist enemies have; and then to wrest from them by force the industries they have stolen from him by force and duplicity, and to put an end forever to the wages system. He proposes to bring about the revolution by the general strike.
	The General Strike Theory.— By the term "general strike," used in a revolutionary sense, is meant the period of more or less general cessation of labor by the workers, during which period, the workers, by disorganizing the mechanism of capitalist society, will expose its weakness and their own strength; whereupon, perceiving themselves possessed of the power to do so, they will seize control of the social means of production and proceed to operate them in their own interest, instead of in the interest of a handfuf of parasites, as heretofore. The general strike is the first stage of the revolution proper.
	There is nothing strained or abnormal in the general strike theory, neither in the supposition that the workers can so disorganize capitalist society as to be able to seize the industries, nor in the supposition that they will do so once they realize thev have the power. Both conclusions flow naturally from the everyday experiences of the workers. 
	The power of the workers to disorganize and paralyze the delicately adjusted capitalist society and the inability of the capitalists to cope with this power are shown by every large strike conducted by modern methods. This has been even more clearly demonstrated than usual by the recent great strikes in England. The two-day strike of the railroaders paralyzed England and the frantic capitalist class hastily brought it to a close. The recent strike of the coal miners was even more effective —the capitalists frankly acknowledging that England faced the most desperate situation in its whole career. If the English capitalist class was in such desperate straits during these strikes of single categories of servative workers, what condition would it be in before a strike of a revolutionary working class? It would be helpless and would have to accept any conditions the worker saw fit to impose upon it.
	The everyday tactics of the workers strongly indicate the truth of the conclusion that they will expropriate the capitalists as soon as they learn they have the power to do so. In their daily strikes they pit their strength against that of their employers and wring from them whatever concessions they can. They don't remain long content with these concessions, and as soon as they are able they proceed to win more. They are insatiable, and, when the general strike proves their ability to do so, they will have no scruples against expropriating the capitalists. This expropriation will seem the more natural to them then, as they will be fortified by the syndicalist conception that the capitalists are thieves and have no "right" to their property.
	The partial strike of today, in which a comparatively few workers disorganize an industry and force concessions from their employers, is but a miniature of the general strike of the future, in which the whole working class will disorganize all the industries and force the whole capitalist class to give up its ownership of them. 
	The General Strike and the Armed Forces.—Once the general strike is an active operation, the greatest obstacle to its success will be the armed forces of capitalism—soldiers, police, detectives etc. This formidable force will be used energetically by the capitalists to break the general strike. The Syndicalists have given much study to the problem presented by this force and have found the solution for it. Their proposed tactics are very different from those used by rebels in former revolutions. They are not going to mass themselves and allow themselves to be slaughtered by capitalism's trained murderers in the orthodox way. Theirs is a safer more effective and more modern method. They are going to defeat the armed forces by disorganizing and demoralizing them.
	A fruitful source of this disorganization will be the extreme difficulty the armed forces will experience in securing supplies and transportation. Modern armies, to be effective, must have immense arsenals, powder works and other industrial establishments behind them to furnish them their supplies of ammunition, arms food and clothing. They also must have the railroads constantly at their disposal for transportation. When the general strike has hailed these industries the army will be stricken with paralysis. Another source of disorganization will be the division of the armed forces into minute detachments to guard the many beleaguered gates of capitalism. The strikers, or revolutionists, will be everywhere, and will everywhere seize or disable whatever capitalist property they can lay their hands on. To protect this property the armed forces will have to be divided into a myriad of guards and scattered along the thousands of miles of railroads and around the many public buildings, bridges, factories, etc. The wealthy capitalists themselves will also need generous guards. The most important industries, such as transportation, mining, etc., will have to bo operated in some manner. To do this will require many thousands more of soldiers and police.
	The result will be that the armed forces will be minutely subdivided, and through the loss of the solidarity and discipline, from whence they derive their strength, they will cease to be a fighting organization. They will degenerate into a mass of armed individuals scattered far and wide over the country.[4] These individuals can be easily overwhelmed and disarmed, or what is more likely, as they will be mostly workingmen and in sympathy with the general strike, induced to join the ranks of their striking fellow workers. Once the disorganization of the armed forces is complete the revolutionists will seize the unprotected industries and proceed to reorganize society.
	Syndicalists in every country are already actively preparing this disorganization of the armed forces by carrying on a double educational campaign amongst the workers. On the one hand, they are destroying their illusions about the sacredness of capitalist property and encouraging them to seize this property wherever they have the opportunity. On the other, they are teaching working class soldiers not to shoot their brothers and sisters who are in revolt, but, if need be, to shoot their own officers and to desert the army when the crucial moment arrives. This double propaganda of contempt for capitalist property "rights," and anti- militarism, are inseparable from the propagation of the general strike.[5]
	OBJECTIONS.
	Preliminary Organization. — A favorite objection of the opponents of the general strike theory (mostly Socialists) is that the success of the general strike implies such a degree of preliminary organisation and discipline on the part of the workers that, were they possessed of it, they wouldn't need to strike in order to enforce their demands.
	Preliminary organization unquestionably aids very materially to the success of strikes, but all great strikes — which differ only in degree from the general strike — prove to us that this preliminary organization by no means has to be as thorough as the objectors insist. They show us that vast masses of unorganized workers can be readily provoked into revolt by the contagious example of a few, and, also, that these workers, once on strike, are in a few days easily and effectively organized — though for years previous untold efforts have been expended to organize them. They prove that, to a very large extent, great strikes break out spontaneously and, also, that they spontaneously produce the organization so essential to their success. The Lawrence strike of textile workers is a typical instance of a successful strike without preliminary organization. The 24,000 strikers, of twenty nationalities, at the opening of the strike had hardly a fragment of organization; a couple of weeks later they were thoroughly organized. 
	In all probability, the general strike, at least in its incipient stages, will follow the course that any number of modern great strikes have taken. Only a small part of the workers will be organized; this organized fraction, under some strong stimulus, will provoke a great strike; vast masses of unorganized workers, seeing an opportunity to better their conditions and caught in the general contagion of revolt, will join the strike, organizing themselves meanwhile; the strike will spread; society will be paralyzed, and the revolutionary workers, perceiving their power, will proceed to put an end to capitalism.
	The success of the general strike does not necessitate the voluntary striking of every worker. Modern industry is so delicately adjusted, and the division of labor so complete, that if the bulk of the workers in a few of the so-called strategic industries— transportation, coal mining, steel making, etc.— quit work, the rest of the workers would be forced to do likewise through lack of materials and markets for their products. No doubt, the workers forced to quit thus, who would be mostly unorganized, unskilled and the oppressed of the oppressed, would readily fall in with the program of the revolutionists once the general strike Was well under way.
	The objection that universal preliminary organization is necessary to the success of the general strike is a shallow one. It serves as a convenient excuse for designing politicians and labor leaders to keep labor unions from striking.
	Starvation.— The general strike will not be broken by the workers being starved into submission, as is often objected. The general strike will be so devastating in its effects that it can last only a few days, during which period, if need be, the workers, accustomed as they are to starvation, and sustained by the enthusiasm of the revolution, could live on the most meager rations. To get these rations, the Syndicalists intend to confiscate, as far as possible, all provisions found in the cities. They will also encourage the numerous poor farmers, tenants and agricultural wage workers to cast their fortunes with them, to revolt against the State, their landlords and employers, and to seize the land they occupy. Until production is normally resumed, the Syndicalists will trade to these farmers the amassed wealth of the cities for their food stuffs. More than one revolution has been starved out by the farmers refusing to part with their products in exchange for worthless paper money. The Syndicalists have learned this lesson well and intend to give the farmers the substantial commodities they desire in exchange for their products. The army will be so busy protecting capitalist property, and so permeated with rebellion that it will be at once incapable and unwilling to prevent this method of provisioning the revolution.
	Bloodshed.— Another favorite objection of ultra legal and peaceful Socialists is that the general strike would cause bloodshed.
	This is probably true, as every great strike is accompanied by violence. Every forward pace humanity has taken has been gained at the cost of untold suffering and loss of life, and the accomplishment of the revolution will probably be no exception. But the prospect of bloodshed does not frighten the Syndicalist worker, as it does the parlor Socialist. He is too much accustomed to risking himself in the murderous industries and on the hellish battlefields in the niggardly service of his masters, to set much value on his life. He will gladly risk it once, if necessary, in his own behalf. He has no sentimental regards for what may happen to his enemies during the general strike. He leaves them to worry over that detail.
	The Syndicalist knows that the general strike will be a success, and the timid fears of its opponents will never turn him from it, any more than will their arguments that it is an "illegal," "unfair" and "uncivilized" weapon.

[1] "Syndicalism" is the French term for labor unionism. It is derived from the word "syndicat," or local labor union. To distinguish themselves from conservative unionists, French rebel unionists call themselves revolutionary Syndicalists. The former are known as conservative Syndicalists. In foreign usage the French meaning of the term Syndicalism has been modified. It is applied solely to the revolutionary labor union movement.
[2] C. G. T. convention, Amiens, 1906.
[3] For the fundamental idea of this paragraph — the automatic operation of industry — the authors are indebted to J. A. Jones of New York.
[4]This is no far-fetched theory. It is justified by every modern great strike. The big French railroad strike of 1910 is typical. Thousands Of soldiers were used as strike breakers, and thousands more scattered along the railroads to guard them. Many more were used in ones and twos, to guard the bridges, public buildings, etc, in Paris and other cities.
[5]The student is recommended to read Arnold Roller's excellent 10-cent pamphlet, "The Social General Strike," procurable from George Bauer, P. O. Box 171, New York City.