ive and radical workingmen have always carried on their activities in the old unions, thus giving those bodies the benefit of their boundless enthusiasm, idealism, and energy. They have never been very seriously afflicted with the dual unionism which has wrought havoc to the American labor movement. G. D. H. Cole says: "From the time of the dock strike of 1889 onwards the trade unions were to a considerable extent captured by the Socialists, and the resolutions at trade union congresses reflected, clearly, the aspirations of Fabianism and the Independent Labor Party."[1]
But this natural and effective policy of the militants working within the organized masses underwent a serious crisis with the development among revolutionaries of a clear-cut program of industrial unionism, beginning about 1905. The new movement, influenced to a considerable extent by the American I. W. W., took a sharply dualistic turn, many active spirits advocating the wholesale destruction of the old unions and the creation of new ones. The situation came to a head at a conference of some 200 militant unionists held in Manchester on November 26th, 1910. Two factions were present, the first consisting of trade unionists, led by Tom Mann, who were for staying within the old organizations and developing them into industrial unions, and the second, consisting of I. W. W. and S. L. P. delegates, who advocated quitting the trade unions and starting the labor movement afresh on "scientific" lines. After much debate the first faction carried the day, and the movement of British revolutionaries was definitely committed to the policy of working within the old unions to bring about their amalgamation into industrial organizations.
The Manchester conference was one of the most important gatherings ever held by workingmen in Great Britain. This was because of the great peril of dualism which it averted. It marked a turning point for the British labor movement. Had it decided, as did the similar conference of American
- ↑ "An Introduction to Trade Unionism," P. 97.
