July 11, 1902 Part II

DURING THE COURSE OF THE WEEK
The Annual Celebration
Party Socialists

I have been involved in all kinds of activities but I still wouldn’t have believed that the most enjoyable memory I’m going to take with me to the shaky days of old age could be found far away in the British Columbian archipelago. I took part in the pleasure trip from Nanaimo to Sointula and still haven’t quite returned to my normal, everyday self.

What a remarkable effect the power of brotherhood and community spirit has. You sit in a dirty cargo space of a boat or on the edge of a half-burnt tree stump, you listen to the speeches of the comrades with whom you are used to having everyday chats and your mind drifts away from the things that just seemed so important. The mind becomes solemn and thoughts rise to glide on wings you didn’t remember were there. How is this to be understood? Is there an intelligible explanation or must one be satisfied with high-sounding phrases with which one so often sees patriotism, poetry etc. being explained? Because I can clearly feel it in my spine, on my cheeks, in my eyes, I can feel it in my veins. What can it be?

It is electricity! Every human being is a powerful electric battery. Our will uses the strength of this battery to command our body, our engine. We know that if a weaker person surrenders under the will of someone with stronger electricity (hypnotically), the whole being of the weaker person goes under command of the “stronger self”. Their electric batteries become united. What else is the joint celebration of congenial spirit but the unification of electricity of tens and hundreds of people. Each and every one puts the electric currents of their excitement into one big current which is given to the use of the speaker, as his inspiration. The audience can get excited even about a speech with less content if it has enthusiasm and passion.

Be that as it may, it is a lot of fun and very enjoyable. It is the kind of co-operation which the KK strives for permanently. It is the foretaste of the eternal life where a single, small person can feel the infinity in himself. When we feel we are in harmony with our surroundings, be it in speeches, songs, work or everyday life, we will find a divine feeling. As long as we would be able to give the feeling the appreciation it deserves. We should always be searching for it and having found it should never let it go. This would bring the Kingdom of Heaven to us.

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*As opponents of capitalism we call ourselves socialists. We know, however, that unionists are also opponents of capitalism but won’t avow being socialists. On the other hand our program is built on total temperance, which the socialists belonging to the party do not support or accept in any way. In Europe, socialists are used to separating themselves from anarchists, because anarchists are revolutionaries while socialists support evolution. In spite of that, the American socialists are demanding a revolution explaining that it need not involve bloodshed and atrocity.

Now the American socialists -divided into to two arguing parties- are saying that religion has nothing to do with socialism.

Are we, the members of Kalevan Kansa [People of Kaleva, KK] socialists or not? In my opinion we are much more than socialists. The unions had importance as long as capitalists were an unorganized crowd battling each other. But as soon as the capitalists learned the power of getting organized from the workers and started merging into big corporations and trusts, the unions had had their day. Although the unions are able to keep the wages high and the working hours reasonable it will no longer be of any good. The trusts have other ways of plucking back what the unions are ensuring the workers. What use is there of a five dollar-wage, if living expenses are six?

The socialists are quite right in saying that stronger means are needed. If they had stepped forth in America ten years ago, without a doubt they would now be in power. But they too have opened their eyes too late. Ten years ago the capitalists were an arguing group that was kept in discipline through law and order just as anyone else. The flag of the great republic had not yet been stained in takeovers and nationwide megalomania had not yet intoxicated the free citizens protected by the social structure formed by Washington. But this too is over. Capitalism is now a well-organized power served by the judicial system, protected by militarism and worshipped by congress. From all over the United States we can hear workers crying that they cannot get justice at any price whenever they get into disputes with the rich and wealthy.

What we have seen happening in Finland in the last few years is now an everyday phenomenon in the United States as well: One court after the other delivers wrong verdicts in strike-cases. And since there are always plenty of those wretched people whose conscience can be bought, the ones looking after the interest of the workers can loose their freedom anytime. Just a few days ago in Fairmont, where all the coalmines are owned by Morgan, a seven-man committee sent by the United Mine Workers to awaken and organize the mineworkers of Fairmont, was arrested.

Morgan simply bribed a few hungry Italians who gave a false testimony on the account of whichthe agitators were arrested. When the translator in court was a henchman of Morgan’s and the judge was his brother-in-law you can guess what the ruling was. American socialists are indeed so naïve that they are thinking of achieving a revolution by legal means. What are legal means, for example a voting, worth, in a place where there is no longer justice?

You need not be a prophet to see that there are only two more options left for the United States: civil war or emperorship. And indeed the Seattle Times (a  newspaper owned by Jim Hill and Morgan) suggests that the law of the presidential election needs to be changed. In order to prevent the disturbance of business occurring every fourth year, the paper suggests, that the president be elected for a lifetime. The step to modern emperorship is not far away.

Unless I were able to see a new path for saving the American people from the slavery of money -the peaceful, slow but sure path of the KK- I would be ready to shout at the workers of America: throw away your strikes and political election speeches, get yourselves some arms and take your rights by force from the hands of the thieves and traitors.

Ahead of me, however, lies open a narrow road which leads to freedom and into the light. It is the path of Jesus of Nazareth and the path of other spiritual men, a path where no guns and cannons are needed. Battles are fought in darkness. But light takes away the causes of the arguments because the ones from the dark realize they are unarmed and flee.

The American socialists use the same weapons that capitalists already have in their hands to use against the socialists. The KK resorts to arms that the capitalists will shudder at. Let us not argue with the capitalists about owning the old society, let us rather build a new one where the capitalists and their henchmen will have no more space to live.

Let us stop selling our labour to the capitalists and we won’t have to argue about its price. And by showing others how easily the big question of our time can be solved, we do not have to bow and scrape before drunks and those blinded by priests, trying to get them to join our party. Instead we can choose whom we want to share freedom and harmony with us.

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