list Party of Great Britain have
for years been demanding recognition. Even the appeals for help from
their fellow-Socialists in Russia have left them cold. "We would
suggest," ran one such appeal--

1. That the British Labour Party issue an official protest against
the Soviet Government's inhuman treatment of its political
opponents in general and the political prisoners in particular.

2. That meetings of protest should be organized in the industrial
towns of Great Britain.

3. That the British Labour Party make an official representation to
the Soviet Government directly, urging the latter to put a stop to
the persecutions of the Socialists in Russia.[745]

And it was of this regime that Mr. Lansbury wrote:

Whatever their faults, the Communist leaders of Russia have hitched
their wagon to a star--the star of love, brotherhood,
comradeship.[746]

The callous indifference displayed by British Socialists, with the
honourable exception of the Social Democratic Federation,[747] towards
the crimes of the Bolsheviks offers indeed a painful contrast to the
attitude of the other Socialists of Europe. At the conference of the
Labour and Socialist International at Hamburg in May 1923, a resolution
was passed condemning the persecution by the Soviet Government. When the
resolution was put to the congress, 196 voted for, 2 against it, and 39,
including the 30 British delegates, abstained.

I ask, then: Why should the Socialists of Great Britain be
differentiated from the Bolsheviks of Russia? In every question of
importance they have always lent them their support. In the great war on
Christianity they have acted as the advance guard by the institution of
Socialist Sunday-schools, from which all religious teaching is excluded.
Socialists are very anxious to disassociate these from the "Proletarian"
Sunday-schools which teach atheism. But from ignoring the existence of
God to denying it is but a step; moreover, it will be noticed that the
Socialists have never issued any protests against the blasphemies of the
Proletarian schools. The real attitude of the Socialist Party towards
religion may perhaps be gauged by the notice, reproduced on page 341,
which once appeared in its official organ the _Daily Herald_, of which
Mr. Lansbury, widely advertised as a fervent Christian, was once editor
and is now managing director.

It was to the party controlling this organ that 7