Part 19
But the Communists press on. They establish cells in the aircraft industry. They work industriously at fomenting trouble on the docks, especially in the ports--such as London, Liverpool, and Glasgow--through which most of the exports pass. Already the threat to block coal and power can be augmented with a threat to halt defense production and exports. It is improbable that the Communists are now powerful enough to carry their program to a triumphant conclusion. But they are on their way.
How do they work? Very much as they do elsewhere in Europe. In Britain, as in Germany or Italy or France, the Communists care very little about better pay or better working conditions for union members. Their objective is power, power that will enable them to push the interests of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. And, to repeat, they have learned that for them power in Britain is obtainable only through control of the unions and not through Parliament.
The Communists try to establish cells in every important factory in Britain. These cells maintain contact with the district secretary of the Communist Party, who knows from the cell exactly what sort of work the factory is doing. Little wonder that Soviet visitors are incurious about the details of British production when they are shown British factories. The information obviously is safely filed in Moscow.
When an industrial dispute develops in a factory, the Communists seek to widen the area of dispute and to involve as many unions as possible. They also do their best to bring the recognized non-Communist leaders of organized labor into disrepute. One method is to organize support for demands that the Communists know the management cannot accept. When a strike organized on this basis fails, the Communists point out to the union members that the leadership is weak and hint that a more "dynamic"--i.e., Communist--direction would benefit the union.
The Communist drive to break the power of the unions and thus to spread industrial discontent is assisted by the character of some union leaders. In many instances leaders are elected to hold their jobs for life, and after years of power they become dictatorial. It is a favorite Communist charge that the union bosses are "in" with the employers, and that as long as their jobs are safe they will do nothing to upset the present situation.
In the trade unions, as elsewhere in British society, the war alliance with the Soviet Union inspired sympathy with the people of Russia and admiration for their resistance to the Nazis. These sentiments altered under the impact of the cold war, and they altered faster at the top levels of the labor movement than anywhere else. The Trades Union Congress in 1948 attacked Communist activities in the unions in a pamphlet called _Defend Democracy_ and followed this with another pamphlet, _Tactics of Disruption_. In 1949 the TUC quitted the World Federation of Trade Unions, which is dominated by the Communists, and helped establish the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions. A year later the TUC barred Communists and fascists as delegates to the annual conference of Trades Councils.
Meanwhile, the leaders of the TUC strove to explain the true nature of the Communist challenge to free unions, and to emphasize the refusal of the Communists to accept democratic principles in the unions or anywhere else.
All this has had some effect, but not enough. The TUC has thus far failed to shake the average industrial worker out of his lethargy. Safe in the security arising from full employment and high wages, he does not take the Communist challenge seriously. And now that many of the basic objectives of the labor movement have been won, he does not work so hard to protect them as he did to win them.
In this atmosphere Communist successes are inevitable. For it is the members of a Communist cell in a union or a factory who are prepared to talk all night at a meeting, to vote solidly as a bloc in support of one Communist candidate while the non-Communists divide their votes among three or four candidates. In many cases the non-Communists will not even turn out to vote--it is too much trouble, especially when they can watch the "telly" or go to the dog races.
The official leadership of the unions faces a formidable task. It must first educate the rank and file on the true nature of Communism. After that, it must organize anti-Communist action in the unions. Here they encounter a real obstacle in the minds of the rank and file. In the past, reaction in Britain and elsewhere has lumped Communists, Socialists, and trade-unionists together. To many a unionist, anti-Communism seems, at first inspection, to be an employers' trick to break the solidarity of the working classes. Of course the Communists do all they can to popularize and spread this erroneous idea.
The Communists in Britain seem to have been moderately successful in establishing themselves as a national rather than an international force. When Frank Foulkes, the General President of the Electrical Trades Union and a member of the Communist Party, asserted: "This country means more to me than Russia and all the rest of the world put together," few challenged this obvious insincerity.
We must accept, then, that Communism within the trade unions is a far more serious threat to the welfare of Britain than Communism as a political party. It is on hand to exacerbate all the difficulties in the field of industrial relations which have arisen and will arise during a change from obsolete economic patterns to the new patterns by which Britain must live.
The introduction of automation--the use of machines to superintend the work of other machines--and of nuclear energy for industrial power are two of the principal adjustments that British industry must make. Each will involve labor layoffs and shifts in working population. These are important and difficult processes, and with the Communists on hand to paint them in the darkest colors there will have to be common sense, tolerance, and good will on the part of both management and labor. In particular, the rank and file of British industry must be made aware how important the changes are to the average worker and his family. There is little use in publishing pamphlets, however admirable, if the man for whom they are intended will not stir from in front of the television set.
A comparison of some of the long-range economic plans laid down by successive governments, Socialist and Tory, with the general attitude of the man in the street leads to the conclusion that, whereas government has been "thinking big," the governed have, in the main, been "thinking small." There is in Britain little recognition of or admiration for the truly impressive program for industrial use of nuclear energy. By 1965 Britain expects to have nineteen nuclear power stations in operation. These will be capable of generating between 5,000 and 6,000 megawatts, or about a third of the annual requirement for generating capacity. It is estimated that the operation of these nineteen stations can save the country eighteen million tons of coal each year.
In addition to this basic program, the Atomic Energy Authority will build six more reactors to produce plutonium for military purposes and power for civil purposes. The total cost of the basic program alone will be about £400,000,000 ($1,120,000,000) a year in the early 1960's.
The leaders of both Conservative and Labor parties believe that the program is vital to Britain. Indeed, the foresight, imagination, and ambition of the men at the top on both sides is one of the reasons why the British economy, despite all its present weaknesses and future difficulties, is a good bet to pull through. What is lacking is the ability of any leader or party to evoke from the country the energetic response necessary to meet and defeat the weaknesses and difficulties.
One instance of this lethargy on the part of either employers or the industrial working class is their failure to respond to wider educational advantages, especially in the field of technical knowledge. Recognizing the necessity for greater technical education, the government intends to spend £100,000,000 ($280,000,000) on technical education from 1956 to 1961. Will the government and the people get their money's worth in the present atmosphere?
Industrial research is on a much smaller scale in Britain than in the United States. For years British industries thought it was cheaper to buy patents abroad than to do their own research. As a result, British technicians were lured abroad. Even today many industries are indifferent if not openly hostile to the idea of "expensive" industrial research.
The attitude of the new working class to education, technical or otherwise, has been described earlier in this book. The boys, in the eyes of their parents, need no more schooling than that given them before they can leave school and go to work in the factory. The girls need a little more if they are to graduate into the ranks of clerical workers, but many girls, attracted by the independence offered by jobs in mill or factory, leave school with their brothers.
Let me sum up some conclusions about the British economy:
_The drive for exports is not a passing economic phase but a permanent condition. If wages and prices cannot be held down, Britain will be priced out of her markets, and the standard of living of the working class and of all other classes will fall._
_The ability of the country to meet the adjustments made necessary by the revolution in the sources of industrial power and by the introduction of new industrial techniques is gravely endangered by the restrictive practices of both employers and labor, by interunion bickering often arising from these practices, and by the prolonged and vicious Communist attack on the trade-union structure._
_Neither among the middle class nor among the working class is there sufficient awareness of the critical situation in which Britain finds herself._
This is a somber picture. It is relieved, I think, by our knowledge that the British are a surprising people. They are going through a period of change in their society and of adjustment to their society's place in the comity of nations. The very fact that they are changing argues for them. The Britain of 1938 could not exist in the modern world. The Britain of 1958 can be at the top.
Granted the indifference of the working class to politics and its fierce reaction against anything that seems to threaten its newly won ease, granted the middle class's penchant for the past, its out-worn ideas--these are still a great people, tough, energetic, at heart politically mature. And they believe in themselves perhaps more than they are willing to admit. Their character, more than coal or sea power or fortuitous geographical circumstances, made them great in the past. It can keep them great in the future.
XI. _The British Character and Some Influences_
_I am a great friend to public amusements, for they keep people from vice._
SAMUEL JOHNSON
_I have never been able to understand why pigeon-shooting at Hurlingham should be refined and polite while a rat-catching match in Whitechapel is low._
T.H. HUXLEY
Obviously there is great deal more to British society than political and economic problems, although a casual visitor might not think so. Visiting pundits find themselves immersed in the profundities of the Foreign Office or following the ideological gymnastics of Socialist intellectuals. Consequently, they depart firmly convinced that the British are a sober, rather solemn people. These islanders, as a matter of fact, are an exceptionally vigorous and boisterous lot and have been for centuries. Their interest in diplomacy, politics, and commerce is exceeded only by their devotion to cricket, beer, and horse racing. Nor should we allow the deadening background to bemuse us about the essential character of the British. The misty mournfulness of the English countryside, the bleak inhospitality of a Midland city, the eternal sameness of suburbia have failed to tame the incorrigible robustness of the national character.
To know the British today one must know not only their government and politics, their industry and commerce, but other aspects of life through which the national character is expressed. The press, the schools, the military services, sports and amusements, pubs and clubs all are part of the changing British world. Each has been affected by changes in the class structure. Each, in its way, is important to Americans and their understanding of Britain. Opinion about the United States in Britain is based largely on what Britons read in their newspapers. And, whether or not Americans admire the class distinctions inherent in the public-school system, perhaps a majority of the leaders with whom the United States will deal in the future will be products of that system.
THE PRESS:
THE THUNDERER AND THE TIN HORNS
A graduate of Smith, home from a stay in London, asked: "How can you read those London newspapers? Nothing but crime and sex--I couldn't find any news." Years ago Webb Miller, the great United Press correspondent, advised me: "Read _The Times_ every day, read all of it, if you want to know what is going on in this country and the world." Both Webb and the young lady from Smith were right: the British press contains some of what is best and a great deal of what is worst in daily journalism.
Most Americans and many Britons, when they speak of the press, mean the London daily and Sunday newspapers. The London papers concern us most because they are national newspapers circulating throughout Britain and influencing and reflecting opinion far beyond the boundaries of greater London. One newspaper published in the provinces, the _Manchester Guardian_, may be said to have national--indeed, world--standing. One of the most influential, interesting, and well-written newspapers, it can also assume on occasion a highly irritating unctuousness.
There are a large number of provincial newspapers--about a hundred morning and evening dailies and Sunday papers, and about eleven hundred weeklies. Many of them are read far more thoroughly than the London "national" paper that the provincial family also buys.
Not long ago a British cabinet minister who represents a constituency in the western Midlands told me his constituents "got their news from the BBC, their entertainment from the London dailies, and their political guidance from the principal newspaper in a near-by provincial city." Other politicians have referred to the same pattern.
Because most London daily and Sunday newspapers circulate all over the British isles, circulation figures are high by American standards. The _News of the World_, a Sunday newspaper that built its circulation on straight court reporting of the gamier aspects of British life, had a record circulation of about 8,000,000 copies. Recently its circulation has dropped slightly, a development that puzzles Fleet Street, for there is no lack of sex, crime, or sport--or interest in them--in Britain.
Of the London dailies, the largest in circulation is the _Daily Mirror_, a tabloid whose circulation average between January and June of 1955 was 4,725,122. The _Daily Express_, the bellwether of the Beaverbrook newspapers, had a circulation of just over 4,000,000 during the same period, and three other London dailies, the _Daily Mail_, the _Daily Telegraph_, and the _News Chronicle_, all boasted circulations of better than 1,000,000.
For every 1,000 Britons, 611 copies of the daily newspapers are sold each day. Compare this with the United States figure of 353 per 1,000. Britain is a good newspaper country, and the London press is lusty, uninhibited, and highly competitive.
American newspapermen working in London customarily divide the press between the popular newspapers, such as the _Daily Mirror_ and the _Daily Mail_, and the small-circulation papers, such as _The Times_ and the _Manchester Guardian_. The circulation of _The Times_ for January-June 1955 was 211,972 and for the _Guardian_ 156,154. Similarly, on Sundays there is a division between the _Sunday Times_ (606,346) and the _Observer_ (564,307) and such mass-circulation "Sundays" as the _Sunday Express_, the _Sunday Pictorial_, and the _People_.
The distinction is not based primarily on circulation. _The Times_ and the _Manchester Guardian_ and the _Daily Telegraph_ on weekdays and the _Sunday Times_ and the _Observer_ on Sundays print more news about politics, diplomacy, and world events than do the mass-circulation papers. They are responsible and they are well written. The _Daily Telegraph_, which has a circulation of over 2,000,000, is the only one in this group whose circulation is in the "popular" field. But it has given few hostages to fortune: its news columns contain a considerable number of solid foreign-news items as well as first-class domestic reporting.
The shortage of newsprint (the paper on which newspapers are printed) has curtailed the size of British papers since 1939. Almost all newsprint is imported, and with the balance of payments under pressure the expenditure of dollars for it has been restricted. But the situation has improved slowly and the London papers are fattening, although they remain thin by New York standards.
Considering this restriction, the responsible newspapers do a splendid job. Day in and day out the foreign news of _The Times_ maintains remarkably high standards of accuracy and insight. The anonymous reporters--articles by _Times_ men are signed "From Our Own Correspondent"--write lucidly and easily. _The Times_ has never accepted the theory that involved and complicated issues can be boiled down into a couple of hundred words with the nuances discarded. News is knowledge, and no one has yet found a way to make it easy to acquire knowledge.
But _The Times_, often called "_The Times_ newspaper," is a good deal more than a report on Britain and the world. It is an institution reflecting all British life. By reading its front page entirely devoted to classified advertising one can get a complete picture of upper-class and upper-middle-class Britain. In the left-hand columns are births, deaths, marriages, and memorial notices. If an American wants to understand how unstintingly the British upper classes gave their sons and brothers and fathers to the First World War, let him look at the memorial notices on the anniversary of the Battle of the Somme. If he wants to see how hard-pushed these same classes are today, let him read the painful, often pathetic admissions in the columns where jewelry, old diplomatic uniforms, and the other impedimenta of the class are offered for sale.
The editorials of _The Times_--the British call editorials "leaders" or "leading articles"--are, of course, one of the most important features in journalism. _The Times_ is independent politically, but it does its best to explain and expound the policies of the government of the day. Over the years since the war it has supported individual measures laid down by Conservative and Labor governments and it has assailed the policies of both the left and right when this has been conceived of as the duty of _The Times_. The editorial writing in _The Times_ often attains a peak of brilliance seldom achieved in any other newspaper. For a time, especially in the period before World War II, "The Thunderer," as it was once called, had become a whisperer. Recently _The Times_ has spoken on national and international issues with its old resonance and sharpness.
The influence of _The Times_ among politicians, civil servants, and diplomats is extraordinary. It is, I suppose, the one newspaper read thoroughly by all the foreign diplomats in London. As recently as the spring of 1956 an editorial in _The Times_ discussing a reconsideration of Britain's defense needs sent the German Ambassador scurrying to the Foreign Office to inquire whether the editorial reflected government policy. It did.
This influence is the result of _The Times_'s special position in British journalism. The editorial-writers and some of the reporters of _The Times_ often are told things that are hidden from other reporters. Also, they are members in good standing of that important, amorphous group, the Establishment, which exists at the center of British society; they know and are known by the politicians, the key civil servants, the ministers. Occasionally _The Times_ is used to test foreign or domestic reaction to a measure under consideration by the government. By discussing the measure in an editorial, _The Times_ will provoke in its letter columns a wider discussion into which various sections of public opinion, left, right, and center, will be drawn.
No other newspaper in the free world has a letter column comparable to that of _The Times_. The first letter may be a sharp analysis of government policy in Persia and the last the report by a Prime Minister that he has seen a rare bird on a walk through St. James's park. Some of the letter column's discussions touch on matters of national interest. Others deal with the Christian names given to children or the last time British troops carried their colors into action.
The _Manchester Guardian_, with a smaller circulation and a smaller foreign staff, still manages to make its influence felt far beyond Manchester. Its policies are those of the Liberal party and, as the Liberal Party is now in eclipse, the _Guardian_ brings to the discussion of national and international affairs a detached and refreshing sharpness. Where _The Times_ occasionally adopts the tone of a wise and indulgent father in its comments on the world, the _Guardian_ speaks with the accents of a worldly-wise nanny. When the _Guardian_ is aroused, its "leaders" can be corrosive and bitter. It is less likely to support the foreign policy of the government of the day than is _The Times_. Consequently, the _Guardian_ is liable to be more critical than _The Times_ in dealings with the United States and American foreign policy. (The Suez crisis was a notable exception.) But it is well informed about the United States, and so are its readers. In Alistair Cooke and Max Freedman the _Guardian_ has two of the best correspondents now writing in the United States for the British press. Their reports are long, detailed, and accurate, and Cooke, in particular, never forgets that what a foreign people sees in its theaters, reads in its magazines, and does on its vacations is also news to the readers at home.
Such great provincial newspapers as the _Yorkshire Post_ and the _Scotsman_ follow the conservative approach to news adopted by _The Times_, the _Manchester Guardian_, and the _Daily Telegraph_. With the responsible London dailies they serve the upper middle class and are its most outspoken mouthpieces in a period when, as we have seen, that class is being pressed by high taxation, the rising cost of living, and the simultaneous development of a new middle class and a prosperous working class. The _Sunday Times_, for instance, has devoted many columns to the plight of the professional man and his family, and all of these papers have reported at length on the appearance of associations and groups devoted to, or supposedly devoted to, the interests of the middle class and opposition to the unions that represent the new working class.