Re: [Marxism] Anti-Imperialism and the IWW

["Calvin Broadbent" <calvinbroadbent@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Why then did Walter Nef, head of the I.W.W. Agricultural Worker's
Organization, say "We are against the war, but not organised and can do
nothing" (Patrick Renshaw *The Wobblies*, p. 329)? "Even 'Big Bill' Haywood
the angry and militant I.W.W. leader, had to back off: "I am at a loss as to
definite steps to be taken against the war". Finally, the I.W.W. decided to
duck the issue as much as possible. The word went out to white workers to
stick to local economic issues of higher wages, etc. and not oppose the
government. 'Organize now... for the postwar struggle should be the
watchword'" (Sakai, p. 68).

Sakai cites many examples of the I.W.W. sidelining political agitation
against WWI in favour of higher wage settlements and so on.

As for the I.W.W.'s being at the forefront of organizing black and Latino
workers, that is quite true. The English trade union movement also helped
organize Irish workers as the Irish contingent of a *British* movement.
Sakai argues that behind the I.W.W.'s revolutionary syndicalist organizing
of non-white workers, there was a high degree of narrow self-interest
involved. ("Leaving the Negro outside of your union makes him a potential,
if not an actual, scab, dangerous to the white workers" (Philip Foner
*History of the Labor Movement in the US* vol. IV, p. 124)).

"So that even in 1919, after two years of severe 'race riots' in the North
(armed attacks by white workers on African exile communities), the I.W.W.
kept insisting that there was "...no race problem. There is only a class
problem. the economic interests of all workers, be they white, black, brown
or yellow, are identical, and all are included in the I.W.W. It has one
program for the entire working class- "the abolition of the wage system"
(Foner, p. 127). The I.W.W.'s firm position of not fighting the lynch mobs,
of not opposing the colonial system, allowed them to unite with the racist
elements in the factories- and helped prepare the immigrant proletariat for
becoming loyal citizens of the Empire. It must never be forgotten that the
I.W.W. contained genuinely proletarian forces, some of whom could have been
led towards revolution" (Sakai, p. 69).

As for the critique of Sakai; I have read it before and was, unfortunately,
unimpressed.

LOUIS PROYECT WROTE:

> The IWW was far ahead of the rest of the left and the labor movement in
> organizing Black and Latino workers and opposing WWI. The IWW declined for
> other reasons. It was repressed brutally by the government on a nonstop
> basis.

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