"The Independent Labour Party is extremely indefinite in its tactics, and its leader, Keir Hardie, is a super-cunning Scot, whose demagogic tricks are not to be trusted for a minute. Although he is a poor devil of a Scottish coal miner, he has founded a big weekly, The Labour Leader, which could not have been established without considerable money, and he is getting this money from Tory or Liberal-Unionist, that is, anti-Gladstone and anti-Home Rule sources. There can be no doubt about this, and his notorious literary connections in London as well as direct reports and his political attitude confirm it. Consequently, owing to desertions by Irish and radical voters, he may very easily lose his seat in Parliament at the 1895 general elections and that would be a stroke of good luck — the man is the greatest obstacle at present. He appears in Parliament only on demagogic occasions, in order to cut a figure with phrases about the unemployed — without getting anything done — or to address imbecilities to the Queen on the occasion of the birth of a prince, which is infinitely banal and cheap in this country, and so forth. Otherwise there are very good elements both in the Social-Democratic Federation and in the Independent Labour Party, especially in the provinces, but they are scattered; yet they have at least managed to foil all the efforts of the leaders to incite the two organisations against each other."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Members of the Parliament of the United KingdomDemocratic socialistsPoliticians from ScotlandChristian socialistsLabor leaders
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Friedrich Engels, letter to Friedrich Adolph Sorge (November 10, 1894)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Keir_Hardie
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Keir Hardie
James Keir Hardie (15 August 1856 – 26 September 1915) was a Scottish trade unionist and politician. He was a founder of the Labour Party, and served as its first parliamentary leader from 1906 to 1908.
55 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Keir Hardie →
Related Quotes
"From his childhood onward this boy [the future Edward VIII] will be surrounded by sycophants and flatterers by the sc…"
"We are called upon at the beginning of the twentieth century to decide the question propounded in the Sermon on the M…"
"As a matter of hard, dry fact, from which there can be no getting away, there is more Labour legislation standing to …"
"For my own part I have always maintained that to claim for the Socialist movement that it is a "class" war dependent …"
"Nationalisation of land, mines, and railways was not necessarily of a definite Socialist character. In Germany they h…"
"“Their honesty,” said honest Keir Hardie, “is proverbial. They borrow and lend on word of mouth, and the repudiation …"
"There were those who still believed that women should remain the domestic drudges they had been all through the ages,…"
"They should remember that if wages were not so good as they should be, if the hours were long, and if the conditions …"
"They wanted to see in the House of Commons a strong Labour party, which would be able to compel the employer class an…"
"Women have no voice in making the laws which they are expected to obey. "What about Mrs. Pankhurst?" ejaculated one o…"