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THE NEWEST ANARCHISM 233
tional congress at Paris, then in 1891 at Brussels, again
in 1893 at Zurich, and finally at London in 1896.
The anarchists that returned to Paris from the London
congress were not slow in taking their revenge.
They had already threatened in London to take the workers
of the Latin countries out of the socialist movement,
but no one apparently had given much heed to their remarks.
In reality, however, they were in a position to
carry out their threats, and the insults which they felt
they had just
suffered at the hands of the socialists
made them more determined than ever to induce the
unions to declare war on the socialist parties of France,
Italy, Spain, and Holland. Plans were also laid for the
building up of a trade-union International based largely
on the principles and tactics of what they now called
"revolutionary syndicalism."
The year before (1895) the General Confederation of
Labor had been launched at Limoges. Except for its
declaration in favor of the general strike as a revolutionary
weapon, the congress developed no new syndicalist
doctrines. It was at Tours, in 1896, that the
French unions, dominated by the anarchists, declared
they would no longer concern themselves with reforms ;
they would abandon childish efforts at amelioration and
;
instead they would constitute themselves into a conscious
fighting minority that was to lead the working
class with no further delay into open rebellion. In their
opinion, it was time to begin the bitter, implacable fight
that was not to end until the working class had freed itself
from wage slavery. The State was not worth conquering,
parliaments were inherently corrupt, and, therefore,
political action was futile. Other means, more
direct and revolutionary, must be employed to destroy
capitalism. As the very existence of society depends