Dyer Lum : Anarchist Writer for the Black International

Communal Anarchy

1886

A distinction has been sought between what has been termed “Mutualistic Anarchy” and communistic anarchy, but it is one we fail to recognize. Anarchy, or the total cessation of force government, is the fundamental principle upon which all our arguments are based. Communism is a question of administration in the future, and hence must be subordinate to and in accord with the principles of Anarchy and all of its logical deductions. Anarchy proclaims that sovereignty of the individual, the abrogation of all artificial inequalities, and the total cessation of coercion over a minority, even if that minority be a single individual. To secure this end it demands the abolition of the State. This involves the destruction of the privilege... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Economics of Anarchy, The

1890

“According to the etymology of the word, anarchy would mean absence of all government, of all political authority. *** Anarchy is nothing but self-government carried to its extremist limits, and the last step in the progress of human reason. *** Politics, as hitherto understood, would have no further raison d’être, and An-archy, that is to say, the disappearance of all political authority, would be the result of this transformation of human society in which all questions to be solved would have a purely economic character. Long ago J. B. Say advanced the opinion that the functions of the state should be reduced to the performance of police duties.{1} If so reduced there would be but one step needed to reach the An-archy of... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Economics of Anarchy, The : A Study of the Industrial Type

III. Free Land Volumes have been written upon the land question and the end is not yet, for that there is a land question is now indubitable. The complacent assumptions of earlier Economists, who were simply satisfied with debating how much of the burden of taxation should fall upon land, as the physiocrates in France; or later writers whom Malthus’ deductions called out, who hardly felt the need for justifying ownership in land as distinguished from chattels; as well as the labored defense of modern writers who have diligently sought for reasons; – have all been called into question. Throughout the whole century, from Godwin {16} down to the correspondent of the village weekly, from the man of intellect struggling with logic... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Fiction of Natural Rights, The

The very corner-stone of Anarchistic philosophy is often supposed to be a paraphrase of Herbert Spencer’s “First Principle” of equal freedom, that: “Every person has a natural right to do what he wills, provided that in the doing thereof he infringes not the equal rights of any other person.” Yet there lurks in the expression a fallacy that correct thought must repudiate, or we must carry with us a diagram explaining the meaning of the words we use. What are “natural rights?” In the middle ages school-men believed that they had solved a problem in physics by asserting that “nature abhors a vacuum”; but a very little study sufficed to convince thinkers that “the web of events... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

On Anarchy

I. What Is Anarchy. The statesman, intent on schemes to compromise principles and tide over clamorous demands for justice, says it is disorder and spoliation. New taxes are then levied to defend the state, to repress incendiary talk, and protect privileged prerogatives. Or false and surface issues are prepared to distract attention, to embroil citizens in partisan quarrels, and furnish new offices for the spoils-hunter. The people pay the bills and the statesman remains. The priest, intent on saving souls, and setting less value on temporal things--for others--says it is abolition of marriage, atheism, and draws a picture of a state wherein his voice would be derided, yet ever careful to bring no testimony to corroborate his dis... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

To Hell with Her

I know a woman (in the profane, rather than in the sacred sense of that verb). She was born in far Norseland, and the bloom on her cheeks vied with the aurora borealis, the one dazzling young fishermen by day as the other did by night. Radiant in beauty and health, an eidelweiss on the bleak snow-covered scenery, the natural instincts which burn even in polar regions had their way: she married early. She gave birth to six children. She is now thirty and in this land of liberty. Free, or a deserted wife to earn her own living by “taking in washing.” At first, like all honeymoons, everything went sweetly. But her husband with inborn continental instinct, was “master;” hence jars arose. Leaving her surviving chil... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Why I Am a Social Revolutionist

Before answering the inquiry propounded to me, it were well to first define terms. In one sense whoever desires a radical change in our social conditions, who advocates principles at utter variance with those now maintaining, may be said to be a Social Revolutionist; in this sense the Quakers were religious revolutionists. But the accepted meaning of the term does not embrace revolution and evolution as identical words, but ascribes to the former active resistance by overt acts to the powers that be. It is in this sense that the term is here used, and I at once proceed to give some of the chief reasons why I defend such a course and array myself with those who do not make the assertion of principle subordinate to the lines of legality as la... (From: TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

<< Last Entry in People Carl Levy	Current Entry in People Dyer Lum	Next Entry in People >> Rosa Luxemburg
All Nearby Items in People Levy, Carl Libertad, Albert Libertarian League Libertario Editorial Collective, El Lincoln, Patrick Linda Lanphear Lissagaray, Prosper-Olivier Lorulot, André Ludd, Apio Andie Nordgren Lum, Dyer - His career as a participant in the labor movement grew out of his reflections on the Pittsburgh riots during the 1877 railroad strike, but before Haymarket had swung over to the extreme left position of the anarchists and mutualists, impressed with the possibilities of cooperation in economics. Malato, Charles Makhno, Nestor - Nestor Makhno was the leader of a libertarian peasant and worker army and insurrection in the Ukraine which successfully fought Ukrainian nationalists, the Whites, the Bolsheviks and the bourgeoisie and put anarchism into practice in the years following the Russian Revolution. Malatesta, Errico - There have almost certainly been better anarchist writers, more skilled anarchist organizers, anarchists who have sacrificed more for their beliefs. Perhaps though, Malatesta is celebrated because he combined all of these so well, exemplifying thought expressed in deed... Mahé, André Maîtrejean, Rirette Magón, Ricardo Flores - ...an important and influential anarchist whose writings and activities had a crucial impact on the Mexican revolution. The Mexican Liberal Party, headed by Flores Magon, was closely implicated in the industrial strikes at Cananea and Orizaba. MacSimoin, Alan Mackay, John Henry MacDougall, A. Kent Luxemburg, Rosa

Dyer Lum : Anarchist Writer for the Black International

1839 — April 6, 1893

Entry 50

Public

Works

Communal Anarchy

Economics of Anarchy, The

Economics of Anarchy, The : A Study of the Industrial Type

Fiction of Natural Rights, The

On Anarchy

To Hell with Her

Why I Am a Social Revolutionist

Image Gallery of Dyer Lum

Quotes by Dyer Lum

Chronology

Links

Comments

Tags

Navigation