Sabotage - by Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
Originally published as SABOTAGE, THE CONSCIOUS WITHDRAWAL OF THE WORKERS' INDUSTRIAL EFFICIENCY, in October, 1916, by the IWW publishing bureau, in Cleveland, Ohio. It was later withdrawn from the IWW's official litearture. The pampahlet originally sold for 10 cents.
Disclaimer:
The following document is presented for historical purposes and in the interest of the freedom of speech. The IWW takes no official position on sabotage (i.e. the IWW neither condones nor condemns such actions). Workers who engage in some of the following forms of sabotage risk legal sanctions.
Elizabeth Gurley-Flynn's Introduction:
The interest in sabotage in the United States has developed lately on accoun... (From: IWW.org.)
Its Necessity In The Class War
I am not going to attempt to justify
sabotage on any moral ground. If the workers consider that
sabotage is necessary, that in itself makes sabotage moral. Its
necessity is its excuse for existence. And for us to discuss the
morality of sabotage would be as absurd as to discuss the
morality of the strike or the morality of the class struggle
itself. In order to understand sabotage or to accept it at all it
is necessary to accept the concept of class struggle. If you
believe that between the workers on the one side and their
employers on the other there is peace, there is harmony such as
exists between brothers, and that consequently whatever strikes
and lockouts occur are simply family squabbles;... (From: IWW.org.)
Boyd's Advice to Silk Mill Slaves
So it is with the quality.
Take the case of Frederic Sumner Boyd, in which we should all be
deeply interested because it is evident Frederic Sumner Boyd is
to be made "the goat" by the authorities in New Jersey. That is
to say, they want blood, they want one victim. If they can't get
anybody else they are determined they are going to get Boyd, in
order to serve a two-fold purpose to cow the workers of Paterson,
as they believe they can, and to put this thing, sabotage, into
the statutes, to make it an illegal thing to advocate or to
practice. Boyd said this: "If you go back to work and you find
scabs working alongside of you, you should put a little bit of
vinegar on the reed of the loom in orde... (From: IWW.org.)
Following The "Book of Rules"
Interfering with service may be done in another way. It may be
done, strange to say, sometimes by abiding by the rules, living
up to the law absolutely. Sometimes the law is almost as
inconvenient a thing for the capitalist as for a labor agitator.
For instance, on every railroad they have a book of rules, a nice
little book that they give to every employee, and in that book of
rules it tells how the engineer and the fireman must examine
every part of the engine before they take it out of the round
house. It tells how the brakeman should go the length and the
width of the train and examine every bit of machinery to be sure
it's in good shape. It tells how the stationmaster should do this
and the tel... (From: Anarchy Archives.)
"Used Sabotage, But Didn't Know What You Called It"
Sabotage is for the workingman an absolute necessity.
Therefore it is almost useless to argue about its effectiveness.
When men do a thing instinctively continually, year after year
and generation after generation, it means that that weapon has
some value to them. When the Boyd speech was made in Paterson,
immediately some of the socialists rushed to the newspapers to
protest. They called the attention of the authorities to the fact
that the speech was made. The secretary of the socialist party
and the organizer of the socialist party repudiated Boyd. That
precipitated the discussion into the strike committee as to
whether speeches on sabotage were to be permitted. We had tri... (From: IWW.org.)
