Workers' Liberty

Perhaps a better approach is to accept what Morris said about himself and look at what he wrote and did for the last thirteen years of his life. To do so is to conclude that Morris was a revolutionary socialist, and one who built on and developed Marxist politics.

In an article in Cassell’s Saturday Journal on 18 October 1890, Morris wrote: “It was Karl Marx, you know, who originated the present socialist movement; at least it is pretty certain that that movement would not have gathered the force it has done if there had been no Karl Marx to start it on scientific lines.” (Edward Thompson 1976 p.748)

In his debate with anarchists in Commonweal, (18 May 1889), he wrote: “I will begin by saying that I call myself a Communist, and have no wish to qualify that word by joining any other to it. The aim of Communism seems to me to be the complete equality of condition for all people; and anything in a Socialist direction which stops short of this is merely a compromise with the present condition of society, a halting-place on the road to the goal.” (Salmon 1994 p.414)

His conception of socialism was working class self-rule – and he even hinted at soviet-type bodies. In a lecture on What Socialists Want (6 November 1887) he wrote: “In the Society which we Socialists wish to see realised labour will be free: no man will have to find a master before he sets to work to produce wealth, a master who will not employ him unless he can take from him a portion of what he has produced: every man will be able to keep himself by his labour, and the combination of all these workers will supply those things which can only be used by the public, such as baths, libraries, schools, great public buildings, railways, roads, bridges, and the like. There will be no political parties squabbling incessantly as to who shall govern the country and doing nothing else; for the country will govern itself, and the village, municipal, and county councils will send delegates to meetings for dealing with matters common to all. The trades also will have councils which will organise each the labour which they understand and these again will meet when necessary to discuss matters common to all the trades: in short life and labour [will be organised] in the least wasteful manner, and the ordinary citizen will learn to understand at least some part of this organisation.” (Lemire 1969 p.231)

Beyond a short-lived workers’ state, Morris also had his own conception of life under Communism. In The Policy of the Socialist League (Commonweal, 9 June 1888), he wrote that: “The League holds that the necessary step to the realisation of this society is the abolition of monopoly in the means of production, which should be owned by no individual, but by the whole community, in order that the use of them may be free to all according to their capacity: this we believe would necessarily lead to the equality of condition above-mentioned, and the recognition of the maxim ‘from each according to his capacity, to each according to his needs’. (Salmon 1994 p.360)

In his novel News from Nowhere (1890) Morris recorded his own, idiosyncratic vision of the future after the abolition of classes. Whatever the details of his description – and he can certainly be criticised for his representation of women, for example – there is little doubt that he envisaged a society of freedom and equality. Such a vision – a rational grounded utopia, apparently so distant for us - is precisely what is needed today.

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