osition as a natural and satisfactory result of victory.

When I was in Moscow in the spring of this year the Russian Trades
Unions received a telegram from the Trades Union Congress at Amsterdam,
a telegram which admirably illustrated the impossibility of separating
judgment of the present position of the Unions from judgments of the
Russian revolution as a whole. It encouraged the Unions "in their
struggle" and promised support in that struggle. The Communists
immediately asked "What struggle? Against the capitalist system in
Russia which does not exist? Or against capitalist systems outside
Russia?" They said that either the telegram meant this latter only, or
it meant that its writers did not believe that there had been a social
revolution in Russia. The point is arguable. If one believes that
revolution is an impossibility, one can reason from that belief and say
that in spite of certain upheavals in Russia the fundamental arrangement
of society is the same there as in other countries, so that the position
of the Trade Unions there must be the same, and, as in other countries
they must be still engaged in augmenting the dinners of their members at
the expense of the dinners of the capitalists which, in the long run
(if that were possible) they would abolish. If, on the other hand,
one believes that social revolution has actually occurred, to speak of
Trades Unions continuing the struggle in which they conquered something
like three years ago, is to urge them to a sterile fanaticism which has
been neatly described by Professor Santayana as a redoubling of your
effort when you have forgotten your aim.

It 's probably true that the "aim" of the Trades Unions was more clearly
defined in Russia than elsewhere. In England during the greater part of
their history the Trades Unions have not been in conscious opposition
to the State. In Russia this position was forced on the Trades Unions
almost before they had time to get to work. They were born, so to speak,
with red flags in their hands. They grew up under circumstances of
extreme difficulty and persecution. From 1905 on they were in decided
opposition to the existing system, and were revolutionary rather than
merely mitigatory organizations.

Before 1905 they were little more than associations for mutual help,
very weak, spending most of their energies in self-preservation from the
police, and hiding their character as class organizations by electing
more or les