Papurau Newydd Cymru

Chwiliwch 15 miliwn o erthyglau papurau newydd Cymru

Cuddio Rhestr Erthyglau

9 erthygl ar y dudalen hon

ANOTHER 1,000 BY EASTER I

Newyddion
Dyfynnu
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ANOTHER 1,000 BY EASTER I Merthyr I.L.P. Launches Big Forward Effort. j. Tom Richardson's Fine Appeal The Crusade for. the enrolment of 1,000 new members of the I.L.P. in Merthyr was definitely launched at Sunday's Rink meeting, at which the speaker was our Comrade Tom Richardson, M.P. Before the-meeting started our volunteers watched the entrance, and every non-member at- tending was handed a membership blank. That was .the sowing of the seed, it was irrigated by the initiation of the new order of procedure of a local comrade being staged before the prin- cipal speaker to forward the membership cam- paign. The honour of giving the start to the movement fell to Comrade W. Harris; that is if we forget that the chairman, Councillor D. Perkins, got in his appeal in introducing Mr. Harris to the meeting. THE LOST OPPORTUNITY. I At all events Mr. Harris made excellent use of Lord Lansdowne's letter in his appeal to all sympathisers to get inside of the branch, by pointing out what a splendid use could have been made of the opportunity the publication of that letter presented if the' Democratic body of opinion in the country had been properly organ- ised. Instead of a solid mobile, organised opinion we had hundreds of pacifist and Socialist organisations, and this had led to the frittering away of this as of other, opportunities. Before advantage could be taken of opportunities the great body of Democratic opinion would have to be thoroughly organised, and it was in the reali- sation of this fundamental fact that the cam- paign for a thousand members b" v Easter, 1918, had been undertaken locally. If there were critics of the I. L.P. present he suggested that they would be able to criticise better from within than from without; and that criticism would be really welcome if it helped to make our organi- sation a better one. Mr. Harris told his audi- ence frankly that we had increased the monthly subscription from 6d. to 1/ but when he had explained that fid. of this was allocated to the fund being builded up for the erection of the Hardie Memorial Hall everybody seemed to think that the shilling was a better sum than the six- pence. THE LIBEL OF THE TRUCE. I Mr. Richardson decided after hearing the appeal that this new subject was more import- ant than his advertised one of Current Poli- tics," and straightway he decided to make his address an appeal in favour of our new move- ment. And a powerful one it proved. He re- minded us thaT the British public had been asked to believe that for the past 4 three years and four months we had had no party politics in this country. We were or so we were told by news- paper editors, faithless politicians and so-called statesmen, that we were living under a party truce. In reply to that libel he wanted to de- clare definitely that instead of- giere, being a party truce, and no party politics, that the forces of reaction, of privilege and of monopoly, not only in the world of politics, but in the realms of finance and industrial organisation, had been playing party politics as from the 4th of August, 1914, with a subtlety, a, cunning and a skill, and with a measure of success unparalleled in his- tory. Until British Democracy recognised that fundamental fact he was not hopeful that we were going to be equal to the emergencies of the very trying times that confronted us. Not- withstanding the alleged party truce; notwith- standing the fact that the Labour Party as a political entity—in a. moment of weakness and with an absence' of vision that was tragic in the extreme, not only committed political suicide, but robbed the nation and the State of possible services, which it might otherwise have rendered had it remained independent and untrammelled; notwithstanding these things lie asked his audi- tors to do the I.L.P. the elementary justice of remembering that the I.L.P. not only refused to be a party to that betrayal, but incessantly, in- season and out-of-season, we had been ever put- ting forth our best effort to educate and inform the mind of the British Democracy as to the evils which were being perpetuated in the name of the party truoe and non-party politics. THE REAL ENEMIES. I If the British., Democracy did not awake to the fact that so long as Capital and finance was to remain a private possession of men who knew no party politics, who knew no n-ationalitv,, who in peace-time and in war-time exacted the maxi- mum of toll, poverty and sacrifice from the com- mon people of this and of all other countries, then the outlook was black indeed: The last three years and four months had not only esta- blished the soundness of the economics of Social- ism but have also proved that in the realms of human relationships Socialism was the only hope of the world. (Cheers.) It was because Social- ism was the only hope of the world. (Cheers.) It was because Socialism satisfied man's body, mind and soul that he was warranted in appeal- ing to those s'till outside of the I.L.P. to get in- side and give to Socialism that dynamic which would enthrone those principles of justice which Socialism represented and which to-day com- manded not only the sympathy, but the adher- ence and 'obedience of the biggest minds, the best hearts and the stoutest souls in the commu- nity. (Cheers.) If we were given that dynamic he ventured to prophecy that within ten years Socialism would he the dominant influence in British politics. (Cheers.) At. the doors the forms given out on entry were collected, and a total of 32 names were then and there received as desiring entrance.

The Evolution of Exchange.

"lhe Minstrelsey of Peace.".

I Pontypridd Notes.

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