JOHN BURNS

*THE WORKER*

Brisbane September 29, 1894.

SPEECH BY JOHN BURNS.

The Man who told the South Railway Strikers to “put a little devil into the Fight.”

The following is taken from a speech delivered by John Burns in the trial of four Social-Democrats for seditious conspiracy in April, 1885, heard at the Central Criminal Sessions, at the Old Bailey, London, before Mr. Justice Case:--

My Lords and gentlemen of the Jury: As an unemployed worker and a Social-Democrat. I am placed in a somewhat peculiar position in this case. I expected when I was of the age of 16 or 17 that, at some time of my life, I should be brought face to face with the authorities for vindicating the class to which I belong. I have from my earliest infancy been in contact with poverty of the worst possible description. I may tell you, my Lord, that I went to work in a factory at the early age of ten years, and toiled there until five months when I left my workshop to stand as parliamentary candidate for the western division of Nottingham.

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Against this system of society, I frankly confess I am a rebel, because society has out lawed me. I have protested against this state of society by which at present one-and-a-half millions of our fellow countrymen, adult males, are starving – starving because they have not work to do. I have very strong feelings upon this matter of the unemployed, particularly on the day in question, when we were brought face to face with men who for month after month had trod the street in search of work,with men who I knew were honest.

Whose only crime was that they let the idler enjoy that which the producer alone should have – not loafers and thieves – but the real unemployed of our nation city. Talk about strong language; I contend my language was mild when you consider the usage they have received, and that the patience, under severe provocation, displayed by the writers is almost Slavish and cowardly.

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It is not my intention to lay before this court any more reasons for my conduct on this particular occasion; but if you want to remove the cause of seditious speeches you must prevent us from having to hear, as we hear to-day, of hungry, poverty-stricken men, who from no fault of theirs are compelled to be out of work, who are fit subjects for revolutionary appeals. If you want to remove a seditious agitation, as it is called, you must remove not the effect but the cause of such agitation, by bringing about in this disorganised system of society some change – as you were told by the witness Condon, who is compelled to accept starvation wages, and who cannot in his trade get work for more than five months out of the twelve. We are not responsible for the riots. It is society that is responsible and instead of the Attorney – General drawing up indictments against society, which is responsible for neglecting the means at its command. I have not one single word of regret to utter for the part I have taken in this agitation. Some of the phrases that are attributed to me in the indictment are proved to have been used by other men. And if my language was strong, the occasion demanded strong language.

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I say we cannot have in England to-day millions living on the verge of pauperism without gross discontent. I am inclined to predict that unless the Government adopt our proposals, if society does not recognise the claims of the workers to a greater share of the comforts and necessaries of life. Well – fed men never revolt. Poverty striken men have all to gain and nothing to lose by riot and revolution.

There is a time I take it – and such is the present, a time of exceptional depression – when it is necessary for men, particularly for the working classes, to speak out in strong language as to the demands of their fellows; and I contend it would be immoral, cowardly, and criminal to the worst degree if I, having what little power to interpret the wishes of my fellow workers, were not to use every public occasion for ventilating the grievances of those who, through no fault of their own, are unable to ventilate themselves.

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On February 8^th a meeting was convened, and we put before the workers legitimate proposals, and singular to say that meeting has had a decided effect upon the local government board. Before the riots they could not admit that there was any exceptional distress, and I am sorry to say that it seems to be characteristic of the Government and the governing classes to be influenced only by fear at least, Mr. Gladstone, Lord Randolph Churchill and Mr. Chamberlain say that their governments are not susceptible to reason or appeals, unless the Hyde Park railings are pulled down and the club windows smashed. It shows at least that the riots had a good effect upon the Local Government Board in the direction we indicated. It also made the landlords and capitalists surrender to the Mansion House Fund some of the proceeds of their past robbery in the shape of charity.

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That meeting of February 8^th called the attention of the people of Great Britain to this fact – that below the upper and middle strata of society there were millions of people leading hard, degraded lives – men who are forced to live as they do, but who would, if possible, work and live virtuous lives – men who through the unequal distribution of wealth are consigned to the criminal classes, and women into the enormous army of prostitutes, whom we see in the large cities. And as an artisan I cannot see poor puny babes sucking empty breasts, and honest men walking the streets for months at a time – I cannot hear of women of the working class being compelled to resort to prostitution to earn a livelihood – I cannot see these things without being moved, not only to strong language. But to strong action if necessary. My language on this occasion was the language of a man anxious to obtain some system where, by a peaceful change, this poverty could be removed. The Social Democrate who advocate them changes are the true policemen and true guardians of law and order, by preventing poverty and not by removing the causes. And when the Attorney General says we incited to riots I say that the same system is to blame. It prompts men to thieve, and it prompts women of the working class to resort to dishonest acts, by not giving all a fair start in life and not giving them an opportunity to get work. Sacred human lives, that have been and are degraded and blighted by the present system of Capitalism?

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“I am prepared to stand by what I said on that day. If I go to prison (as I think very doubtful) I shall serve my causes as well inside a prison as out. The word prison has no particular terror for me. Through the present system of society life has lost all its charm, and a hungry man said truly (as Isaiah said in the Holy Book) that there was a time in the history of our lives when it was better to die in prison or better to die fighting than die starving.”