Probably the most dog-eared book in my library is ‘The Keir Hardie calendar: A quotation from the writings and speeches of J. Keir Hardie for every day in the year’.
I bought it in a wonderful second-hand bookshop/cafe in Robin Hood’s Bay about 15 years ago (is it still there?). It was published and printed by the National Labour Press at 30 Blackfriars Street, Manchester. The book is undated, but I’m guessing it’s from the last years of the century before last.
There’s socialist gold dust on every page. As this is a time for giving, and my last column of the decade, here is Keir Hardie’s countdown to Christmas Day:
Today
There is all the difference in the world between a form of state socialism brought about by the exigencies of the moment, and a socialist state consciously evolved by a united people resolved on their own industrial freedom.
Eighteen
The revolution which the enemy fears is that which puts the proletariat in control of the state, and the way to that lies through political action, based upon the class conscious political action of the disinherited of all lands.
Nineteen
Socialism would give reality to the claim so often insisted upon from the Christian pulpit, and yet so universally belied by our everyday deeds: that the human race is a brotherhood.
Twenty
It should be the easiest thing in the world to make the owning of land dependent on occupancy and use. It saddens one to see a great continent, teeming with natural wealth, bled white by a horde of unscrupulous speculators.
Twenty-one
Men of principle and courage have only to live long enough to reap the reward of their consistency.
Twenty-two
The organisation and unification of the proletariat is not to be obtained by erratic movements, but by generating and developing the spirit of comradeship and association united to an intelligent grasp of existing conditions.
Twenty-three
Wherever I go I shall refuse to recognise distinctions of colour of skin or of race or creed. I shall see in all peoples my fellow men.
Twenty-four
No man can ever hope to guide and shape a political movement from without. The men who run the machine are masters of the situation.
Christmas Day
Christmas greetings to all who love their fellow men and are honestly working for the freedom of the race.