Morris Hillquit Quotes

Any member of the party who … advocates crime, sabotage, or other methods of violence as a weapon of the working class to aid in its emancipation, shall be expelled from membership of the party.

When we, the Workers, all demand: “What are we fighting for?’… Then, then we’ll end that stupid crime, that devil’s madness--War.

A struggle must go on until the workers of the world organize as a class, take possession of the Earth and the machinery of production, and abolish the wage system.

Am I allowed to suggest that we owe much to these stubborn and sectarian people, those indefatigable strikers who take over our factories and bring disorder to our streets, these obstinate creatures who ceaselessly fought for reforms while fantasizing of the Revolution, these Marxists who, marching against the current of History, disturbed the complacent sleep of capitalism? … Communism is dead. Let us rejoice.

If the workers took a notion they could stop all speeding trains; every ship upon the ocean they can tie with mighty chains.

It is we the workers who built these palaces and cities here in Spain and in America and everywhere. We, the workers, can build others to take their place. And better ones! We are not in the least afraid of ruins.

What shall the workers do? Sit idly by and see the vast resources of nature and the human mind be utilized and monopolized for the benefit of the comparative few? No. The laborers must learn to think and act, and soon, too, that only by the power of organization, and common concert of action, can either their manhood be maintained, their rights to life (work to sustain it) be recognized, and liberty and rights secured.

In Russia the workers are powerless, kept in spiritual as well as physical bondage. The American workers are free to take up the fight, free to act, to read, to publish, to discuss, to instruct themselves, to combine in unions, to assemble in meeting, to strike. Hence it is only here [America] that the fight for peace can begin…. The [solution] consists in mass-actions of American workers against capitalist power. If they should proceed to wrench the decision on policy from big capital, the most essential step to deter the threat of atomic war would be made

It was the spirit of the workers that was dangerous. They are always marching and singing. The tired, gray crowds ebbing and flowing perpetually into the mills had waked and opened their months to sing.

Workers of the world unite!

Workers! Leave the Socialist Party. It is your enemy and ours.

It is essential that there be organization of labor…. Capital organizes and therefore labor must organize.

The Socialists are no fomenters of strikes; they know too well that a strike is a two-edged weapon, wounding the proletariat more deeply and more grievously than the capitalist. But, when the strike is declared, they take their part in the fight. They organize and assist the workers, protecting them against the snares of the police and the brutality of the military, and giving them such moral and material support as is in their power

The picket line is the best place to train organizers. One day on the picket line is where a man makes his commitment. The longer on the picket line, the stronger the commitment. A lot of workers think they make their commitment by walking off the job when nobody sees them. But you get a guy to walk off the field when his boss is watching and, in front of the other guys, throw down his tools and march right to the picket line, that is the guy who makes our strike. The picket line is a beautiful thing because it makes a man more human.

… if the proletariat is to achieve victory, all the workers, irrespective of nationality, must be united. Clearly, the demolition of national barriers and close unity between the Russian, Georgian, Armenian, Polish, Jewish and other proletarians is a necessary condition for the victory of the proletariat of all Russia.

In some cases non-violence requires more militancy than violence.

We believe in loving our brothers regardless of race, color or creed and we believe in showing this love by working for better conditions immediately and the ultimate owning by the workers of their means of production.

We are with you in this work. Workingmen must form a party of their own, take charge of the government, dispose gilded fraud, and put honest toil in power.

Before the war there were many who were more or less ignorant of the international labor movement but who nevertheless turned to it for salvation when the threat of war arose. They hoped that the workers would never permit a war.

If I ever thought it necessary, if I thought a combination of laborers were doing wrong, I would apply for an injunction against them just as quickly as against so many capitalists.

The labor question is the same the world over, and laborers of the world should clasp hands for their common wealth.

The strongest form of fight against the capitalist class is the strike. Strikes are necessary, ever again, against the capitalists’ tendency to increase their profits by lowering wages and increase the hours or the intensity of work.

It was their orderly mass picketing and parading that swung the strike into public notice. No strike of this size ever had such parades. No strike of this size had ever had such picket lines. They sweep out the three strike halls two by two. They stream down the streets gathering volume as they go until there are thousands of people in the parade. As they go they sing and shout. Flags go with them. Women and children, young girls, old ladies, grandmothers, all shouting and singing together. Who will ever forget them who has seen them out on the picket line early in the morning in dark groups that look like swarming bees? The lines of pickets, the constant file of people was an exciting thing. It became contagious. Picketing became Passaic's favorite game. Children played at picketing. They picketed their schools. They picketed their homes. Children came out after school to go on the picket line.

The strike weapon is overboard, not only for the duration of the war, but after the war too.

The strike is the weapon of the oppressed, of men capable of appreciating justice and having the courage to resist wrong and contend for principle. The nation had for its cornerstone a strike.