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262 VIOLENCE AND THE LABOR MOVEMENT
Revolution," a collection of some articles that were originally
written for the New York Tribune, of "parliamentary
cretinism, a disorder which penetrates its unfortunate
victims with the solemn conviction that the
whole world, its history and future, are governed and
determined by a majority of votes in that particular
representative body which has the honor to count them
among its members, and that all and everything going on
outside the walls of their house— wars, revolutions, railway
constructing, colonizing of whole new continents,
California gold discoveries, Central American canals,
Russian armies, and whatever else may have some little
claim to influence upon the destinies of mankind — is
nothing compared with the incommensurable events hinging
upon the important question, whatever it
may be,
just at that moment occupying the attention of their
honorable house." (34)
No one can read this statement of Marx's without
realizing
its essential truthfulness. But it should not be
forgotten that Marx himself believed, and every prominent
socialist believes, that the control of the parliaments
of the world is essential to any movement that seeks to
transform the world. The powerlessness of parliaments
may be easily exaggerated. To say that they are incapable
of constructive work is to deny innumerable facts
Laws have both set up and destroyed indus-
of history.
tries. The action of parliaments has established gigantic
industries. The schools, the roads, the Panama Canal,
and a thousand other great operations known to us to-day
have been set going by parliaments. Tariff laws make
and destroy industries.
Prohibition laws have annihilated
industries, while legality, which is the peculiar product
of parliaments, has everything to do with the ownership
of property, of industry, and of the management of capi-