Class Warrior The Selected Works of E. T. Kingsley

Published by AU Press for the Canadian Committee on Labour History.

“We hear much in these days of the right to live. At this very moment the great working class of the world do not possess that right. They only have the privilege; and this because they have no command over the means of life. The things the workers have to use in order to feed, clothe and shelter themselves, are the instruments used to dispossess that working class.”
  —E. T. Kingsley

In October 1890, Eugene T. Kingsley’s life changed irrevocably while working as a brakeman on the Northern Pacific Railway when he was injured in a fall between two rail cars. While recuperating in hospital after the amputation of both legs, he began reading the works of Karl Marx. Joining a popular socialist movement, his activism eventually brought him to Vancouver, B.C. where he founded the Socialist Party of Canada (SPC). Kingsley, known as a passionate orator, went on to become one of the most prominent socialist intellectuals of his day. Class Warrior is a collection of Kingsley’s writing and speeches that underscores his tremendous impact on Canadian political discourse.

About the Author/Editors

E. T. (Eugene Thornton) Kingsley was founder and leader of the Socialist Party of Canada (SPC). Benjamin Isitt is an historian, author, and legal scholar. Ravi Malhotra is a professor in the faculty of law at the University of Ottawa.

Table of Contents

1. Foreword
   E. T. Kingsley: Canadian Marxism’s “Old Man”
   Bryan D. Palmer
2. Introduction
   Re-evaluating the British Columbia School of Socialism: E. T. Kingsley, Disablement, and the “Impossiblist” Challenge to Industrial Capitalism in Western Canada
3. Part I: Selected Writings of E. T. Kingsley
   1. 1900   On Washington State’s Primary Law
   2. 1903   On Political Action
      On Reformism and Electoral “Fusion”
      On Trade Unions
   3. 1905   On the Single Tax
      On a Journey to Seattle
   4. 1906   On the Arrest of US Labour Leaders and State Power
   5. 1908   On the Socialist Movement and Travels across Canada
   6. 1909   On War
      On the Vancouver Free Speech Fight
   7. 1911   On Property
      On the Workers’ Awakening
      On Economic Organization
      On the Capitalist State
   8. 1914   On the Causes of the First World War
   9. 1916   On Carnage
   10. 1917   On Slavery and War
       On War Finance
       On the War Effort
   11. 1918   On the Bolshevik Revolution
       On Capitalism Getting Rich Quick
   12. 1919   On Control of the State by the Working Class
       On Reconstruction
       On Collaboration between Labour and Capital
       On Wealth
       On Gold
       On Class War
       On the Paris Peace Conference
       On Capitalist Civilization
   13. 1921   On the 1921 Canadian Parliamentary Election
4. Part II: Selected Speeches of E. T. Kingsley
   1. 1895   On the Aims of Socialism
   2. 1896   On Socialism and the Economy
   3. 1899   On American Imperialism in Cuba and the Philippines
   4. 1903   On the Labour Problem
      On the Political Organization of Miners in Cumberland
      On Stirring the Emotions of His Audience
      On Wages, Profit, and Capital
      On the 1903 British Columbia Election
   5. 1905   On the 1905 Russian Revolution
      On Workers and Rockefeller
      On the Mission of the Working Class
   6. 1906   On the Paris Commune
   7. 1908   On Labour and Its Economies
      On the Working Class Using Clubs If Necessary
      On Working-Class Political Power
   8. 1912   On the Vancouver Free Speech Fight
   9. 1913   On the Vancouver Island Miners’ Strike
   10. 1914   On the Komagata Maru Incident
   11. 1917   On Conscription
       On Working-Class Opposition to Conscription
       On Conscription and Wiping Out Ruling-Class Laws
       On the 1917 Conscription Election
   12. 1918   On the Formation of the Federated Labor Party
       On Laws
       On Reconstruction
       On the Armistice and Postwar Moment
       On Allied Intervention in the Russian Civil War
   13. 1919   On Lenin and Trotsky
       On the Belfast General Strike, Unemployment, and the Postwar Challenge to Capitalism
       On the Bolshevik Revolution
       On the One Big Union
       On the Class Struggle
       On the Machine
       On Capitalism
       On the Defeat of the Winnipeg General Strike
       On the Machinery of Slavery
       On Civilization
   14. 1920   On Mechanization of Production
       On the Paris Commune
       On the Collapse of Civilization
       On the Bankruptcy of the Capitalist System
5. Part III: The Genesis and Evolution of Slavery
   1. 1916   The Genesis and Evolution of Slavery: Showing How the Chattel Slaves of Pagan Times Have Been Transformed into the Capitalist Property of To-day
6. Part IV: On the World Situation
   1. 1919   On the World Situation
7. Appendix
8. Partial Record of E. T. Kingsley’s Public Speeches and Lectures
9. Kingsley’s Speeches
10. Index

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