CONFIRMS SWING TO LABOUR PARTY
LONDON, June 5 -- The general swing throughout the country towards the Labour party was again confirmed by the Faversham by~ election results which were announced at noon today. With 24,749 votes, Terence Boston, the Labour party candidate defeated the Conservative candidate by a majority of 4,941.
In the last general elections, Labour. won this seat by only- 255 votes,
- The by-election was held to fill the place made vacant by, a death of Perey Wells, the Labour Member of Parliament.
An independent candidate did not get sufficient votes: to retain his deposit.
‘This is a great Labour victory and points the way to a further Labour victory in October," said the Faversham victor, "It is a clear notice to the Prime Minister and the Conservative party that they have lost the confidence of. the country. The sooner we-have'a “general election the better," a
“Todayts- results indicated a swing towards Labour of about 5,2%. If repeated nationally in the October general election it would signify a shift of many marginal seats from the Tories to.the Labour party, giving the latter a majority of | approximately 55 in the- Houseof: Commons .
The swing against the Tories could be transformed into a Labour landslide of the dimensions of 1945 if the Wilson leadership campaigned on a bold socialist policy based on implementation of Clause 4 <4 the clause in the Labour party conssitution committing the party to bringing about common ownership of the’ means of” production, distribution and ex FOANge«
“THE MEANING OF GOLDWATER'S CALIFORNIA VICTORY
By Joseph Hansen
The victory of Goldwater, the Arizona department store baron, over the head of the Rockefeller dynasty in the California Republican primaries “sowed panic within his own party and consternation in the world," Boris Kidel writes in the June ll issue of the liberal Paris weekly” LI EXPE OS. .
A good example of the "consternation" is provided by the almost eloquent editorial of the London Times: "Foreign onlookers can hardly remain undisturbed at the prospect of Sen. Goldwater's nomin-= ation, The sight of a major party endorsing and promoting a man so blatantly out of touch with reality, so wild in his foreign policy, so backward in his domestic ideas, and so inconsistent in his thinking, would be a serious blow to American prestige abroad, It would also set up tremendous and” perhaps fatal strains in the Republican party." This conservative daily concludes with a touch of perhaps deliberate flattery: "The.thought that he had the faintest chance of reaching the White House would be enough to shake faith in the maturity and stability of American politics,"
What has particularly alarmed Washington's NATO allies is Goldwater's "wild" foreign policy. His suggestion about using nuclear bombs as a cheap and effective weed-killer in South Vietnam drew shocked editorial comment throughout Europe, Goldwater's opposition to foreign "handouts" is likewise scarcely designed to please capitalists whose regimes require periodic trars* usions of dollars, They devoutly hope for more “maturity and stability" in American politics,
Just where, then, does Goldwater fit in? What are his chances? How can he affect the election and American imperialist policies?
First of all, it should be noted that Goldwater has been unusually successful in one thing; that is, playing the role of political villain, As in television wrestling spectacles, this is an essen-= tial ingredient in American capitalist politics. Besides enlivening _the show, it provides a source of stability to the two-party system. The liberals, the trade-union bureaucrats and the peripheral elements in tow to them, such as the Communist party, are provided with a contestant who must be defeated "at all costs," The vote of the workers, the farmers, the low-income groups is thus corralled, election after election, for the "lesser" of the two evil capitalist candidates,
Underlying this old routine are certain realitics that are little affected by the outcome of. the contest between the "hero" and the "villain," To cite but recent history, the liberal Truman -* won in an upset over the reactionary Dewey. Truman, however, opened: the McCarthyite era and plunged the U.S. into the Korean adventure,
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perhaps the most unpopular war the country ever engaged in. In the . next election the liberal Stevenson lost to Eisenhower, who, the. ..liberals freely predicted, would lead the U,S.. into disaster, THé. - General, however, fulfilled his campaign pledge to bring an end to | hostilities in’ ‘Korea, In the 1960 elections Kennedy played — the role of the liberal, This hero then carried out an invasion of Cuba, preparations for which had been begun by Eisenhower, and dragged. the U.S. into the dirty war in South Vietnam. a
If any lesson is to be drawn from this aspect of politics in” the U.S. it is that the candidate who wears the liberal trunks is somewhat more likely to engage in a "wild" foreign policy, It was . the liberal Wilson who took the U.S. into World War I, the liberal _ F.D,Roosevelt who took the country into World War ITI, "and the liberal Truman who dropped the first atom bombs on crowded cities, oo,
The truth is, of course, that American foreigh policy is not — determined by the campaign propaganda. of either of the two candidates of the capitalist twin-party system, It is determined by the. long-range interests of the giant corporations and the dynastic. families -that-—-own and control them, The men who come to the White House -are.pledged—-body, -soul .and -bank-. -aeeount -to-serve these ‘inter-~ ests, Whatever the experience does to their -souls.and bodies, -it™ does not injure their bank accounts.
Of course, differences within the ruling group affect' “the ultimate choice of top candidates in the tightly coritrolled Republi- Gan and Demdcratic machines. The interlocking marriages of family and industrial empires generally reduce the importance of such. divisions. Occasionally, however, a squabble flares up on sufficient scale to attract national attention. “Up to now these have been settled at one point or another by the Eastern block whose enormous commercial, industrial and financial power has long given it deci-— Sive voice in the affairs of the American capitalist class,
The Gleveland real-estate clique, for instance, sought to run Robert A, Taft, the most popular figure in the lower levels of the Republican machine, for the:White House in 1952, He had it won, too, But the top families decided they wanted Eisénhowever. Evén though it was not known what party Eisenhower belonged to until he decided to accept (the Democrats sought to get him as their candidate), ‘he easily won the Republican nomination, Eas‘vern power and money did it. Taft bitterly acknowledged the lesson.
Goldwater has been identified with the ultraréactionary | ‘vores min who have flocked to his banner. Consequently theré has been a. tendency to dismiss him as:nothing but a similar crackpot who, by some strange freak of American politics -- the "blunders" and "hesitations" of the Republican liberals -= has accijentally found himself in position to win the Republican nomination, .Goldwater's .. capitalist backers are overlooked. These are a powerful, “relatively. new grouping on the American social scene. —- the Texas oil, ‘barons and
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the Southwest manufacturers of war matériel who mushroomed during and following World War II. This grouping has not yet been integrated into the central ruling families, It is ready to engage in rather reckless policies and demagogy as it seeks the place in the American power structure to which it believes its billions entitle it to,
Will this outlying sector of the capitalist class succeed in foisting the candidacy of Goldwater on the Republican party against the will of the Eastern block? Or, like the group that backed Taft, will they end up with a fresh lesson in the power of Americats 60 ruling families and the incomparable corruption and venality of. the capitalist political machines in the U.S.? A movement is now underway to block Goldwater and give the nomination to the millionaire Governor Scranton of Pennsylvania, The progress of this campaign should quickly reveal whether Eastern capital considers the game worth the candle,
In estimating the seriousness of the Goldwater "menace," what is most: significant is not the nearness of the Arizona senator to capturing the nomination of the Republican party, but the satisfaction of the Eastern capitalist block over Johnson's performance and their evident desire to keep him in the White House,
It is true that Nelson Rockefeller is a member of these circles and perhaps holds a dissenting view (although he is more likely looking ahead to 1968), Rockefeller even goes so far as to indulge in office-seeking himself and not without success, This personal whim, however, which reduces politics to a pastime like stamp collecting, is evidently considered something of an extravagance in the social layer to which he belongs. It may even have interfered with smooth control of the Republican machine in face of the chal* : Tenge from Goldwater's backers, 7
Johnson, it appears, has won the heart of Wall Street, With unusual suppleness and political deftness, he proved himself to be their man. In foreign policy, he did it most convincingly through the coup dtétat in Brazil, With one blow, Johnson demonstrated what could be expected from him on a world scalo in conducting the affairs of American imperialism, The Manhattan sharks found it to their ~ taste,.
Johnsonts forcign policy,.as evidenced by his role in the Brazilian coup d'état, is worth pondering, In Latin America. it clearly rules out oven the most timid reforms edvocated by Kennedy in the “Alliance for Progress," It just as clearly signifies active efforts to overthrow any government, even one with the mild-~_ est venecr of liberalism, unless it breaks diplomatic relations with Cuba and joins in the> conspiracy to overthrow the Castro government, How curious, then, that the London Times, for instancc, fails to sce how "blatantly out of touch with roality® Johnson is and how "wild" is his foreign policy. If Kennedy was correct, Shen Johnson's foreign. policy promiscs the most violent social and political uphcave als,
On the domestic front, Johnson has likewise shown himself to be just the man Wall Street needs in the White House, He has proved himself more effective than Kennedy himself in vushing Kennedy's policy of offering minor legalistic. concessions to the civil-rights struggle, Like Kennedy, his obvious aim is to slow down , contain and eventually curb the Freedom Now movement,
The satisfaction of America's top industrial and financial tycoons with Johnson leads them to display a certain indifference to. the outcome of the Republican convention. While the nomination of Goldwater would give the electoral campaign tho decided appearance of a "no contest" spectacle and therefore make: still more glaring the political vacuum where the labor movement stands, it would also have its advantages from Wall Street's point of view.
The most obvious result would be to shift the electoral campaign to the right. Even more than Kennedy and Nixon in 1960. John- _ son and Goldwater. would argue over which can best fight the threat of "Communism." .The campaign would be the opposite of the-one in |. 1948 when. the Wallace candidacy compelled Truman to move far to the left in an attempt to outbid the Progressive party nominee for work= ing-class votes,
A more significant result, perhaps, would be the relative -. freedom-it -would- give Johnson to move more rapidly in advance of the election with preparations for any foreign adventures he projects, -such as aggression against Cuba and extension of the war in South... Vietnam. Committed to "anti-Communist" demagogy as a main plank, Goldwater: would scarcely attempt to outflank Johnson from the left, the way Eisenhower outflanked Stevenson by promising peace in Korea.
The ominous nature of Goldwater's rise thus. finds its most. immediate reflection inthe way it frees Johnson's hands,
On a different level, the progress of Goldwater toward. nomin= ation is of significance in * American politics, Besides representing powerful new regional capitalist interests, he voices the feelings of social forces that could become a hotbed for native fascism, . This current, long present in the United States, centered before World War II around such damagogues and political bosses as Huey Long, Mayor Hague and Father Coughlin. It is the American equivalent of the petty-bourgeois layers in Europe that were drawn to figures like Mussolini and Hitler, They are far from peculiar to the Republican party, They exist in the Democratic party, too, particularly in the South where they constitute a dangerous poten~ tial for a fascist movement Alabamats racist Governor George OC, Wallace, who has been ' "invading" the primaries in the North, offers a Democratic party version of the Goldwater type.
Goldwater's California success poses all the more urgently the need for the American labor movement to wake up, At the moment: the labor czars offer nothing but the perspective of backing Johnson.
In the whole political arena, the labor bureaucrats are obviously the ones most "blatantly out of touch with reality." Their default will become all the more glaring as the British labor movement, almost simultaneously with the American elections, prepares to kick out the Tories, A British labor victory could. have considerable effect in stirring up sentiment in the United States for organiza tion of the Labor party that has been talked about in union circles for twenty-five years and more,
The Negro people have given many indications of their readiness to support.a new political party that would struggle for their interests along with those of all the lower-income groups. The appearance of the Freedom Now party on the Michigan ballot is the latest example of this.
Among the socialists, the Trotskyist Socialist Workers party has been waging a vigorous campaign around the candidacies of Clifton DeBerry and Edward Shaw. The United States, however, lacks federal provisions for placing parties on the ballot, To get on the ballot, a party must meet the individual requirements of each of the fifty states, These have been deliberately set up in the majority of states in such a way as to virtually exclude new par=— ties, ina few states it is possible to get on the ballot at some cost anda great deal of effort. There is no certainty about it even..if all the requirements are met, since the Republicans and Democrats often reserve de facto veto power, On the other hand the Republicans and Democrats are automatically placed on the ballot,
: one of the peculiarities ™ of American politics, therefore, is the extreme difficulty of registering and measuring socialist senti-= ment. The effect is to give the United States the appearance of being one reactionary mass, This happens to be far from the case although the long years of McCarthyite witch-hunting, combined with prosperity based on preparing for war, have brought the revolutionary socialists unprecedented difficulties.
Their voice will be heard during the election campaign, however, as they present the only reasonable and realistic alternative to the suicidal perspective represented by the candidates of both the Republican and Democratic machines,