Page:American Syndicalism (Brooks 1913).djvu/184

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172
AMERICAN SYNDICALISM

have been absent from Ireland's long struggle for self-rule. The I. W. W. will not escape this common destiny. It will attract to itself many extremely frail human creatures, but the movement as a whole is not to be condemned by these adherents or by the shabby device of using panicky terms like anarchist. To say that Syndicalism has strong anarchist tendencies is nevertheless strictly accurate. A rank, exuberant and rather wanton individualism has characterized our own variety of Syndicalism from the start.

In Europe intelligent Anarchists of the most pronounced type have been a part of the movement. In Spain (1908) they followed their leader Malatesta into the trade unions. Many of the French Syndicalists, like Pelloutier the founder, Delesalle, Pouget and Yvetot, glory in the anarchist name. Sorel, whom the academician, Paul Bourget, says is the most penetrating intelligence among Syndicalists, has neither hesitations nor concealments about this. He tells us plainly how great an event it was when Anarchists gained admission to the trade unions. "Historians," he tells us, "will one day recognize that this entrance was one of the greatest events which has happened in our time." In an eloquent passage he praises the work of the anarchist in the trade union, ending with the words. "They instructed labor that it need not blush for deeds of violence." I am fully aware how easy it is to take advantage of this scare word in order to make cheap points against the I. W. W. This pettiness may be avoided if we first state the truth. Anarchism, in its eviler aspects, is not in the least confined to