ABSTRACT
While terrorism was running its tragic course, the socialists grew from a tiny sect into a world-wide movement. And, as terrorist acts were the expression of certain uncontrollably rebellious spirits, so cooperatives, trade unions, and labor parties arose in response to the conscious and constructive effort of the masses. As a matter of fact, the terrorist groups never exercised any considerable influence over the actual labor movement, except for a brief period in Spain and America. Indeed, they did not in the least understand that movement. The followers of Bakounin were largely young enthusiasts from the middle class, who were referred to scornfully at the time as “lawyers without cases, physicians without patients and knowledge, students of billiards, commercial travelers, and others.” ( 1 ) Yet it cannot be denied that violence has played, and still in a measure plays, a part in the labor movement. I mean the violence of sheer desperation. It rises and falls in direct relation to the lawlessness, the repression, and the tyranny of the governments. Furthermore, where labor organizations are weakest and the masses most ignorant and desperate, the very helplessness of the workers leads them into that violence. This is made clear enough by the historic fact that in the early days of the modern industrial system nearly every strike of the unorganized 126laborers was accompanied by riots, machine-breaking, and assaults upon men and property.
