Month: August 2016

Anarchist Beginnings

Ross Winn, “A Vision of Anarchy” (1895)

August 29, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
Anarchy: A social theory which regards the union of order with the absence of all direct government of man by man as the political ideal; absolute individual liberty. – Century Dictionary Every man, they say, has a religion; my religion is Anarchism. In contemplating the future I see it radiant with the sunlight of universal liberty. I catch a vision of the days to come—the curtain rises upon a grand scene; I see before me a glorious panorama. The hideous nightmare of government—the subjection of man to man—is gone, and I hear the happy sound of many voices of men […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Brother, “What Anarchism Is” (1895)

August 29, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
WHAT ANARCHISM IS Chicago, Ill. Editor Railway Conductor: A correspondent writing from Fort Dodge, Iowa, finds much comfort in your editorial expression of the sentiment (certainly not peculiar to yourself) that: “He is no true friend of labor who argues that inasmuch as wrong has been done, wrong in return is justifiable.” He is. nevertheless, much cast down in spirit by an outcropping of anarchism he seems to have discovered in some fraternal correspondence criticising the methods of politicians and corporations of capital working together, manipulating the functions of what your correspondent emphatically styles “our government.” He says: The influx […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Henry Addis, “Why I am an Anarchist” (1896)

August 29, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
We find ourselves in a world of conflicting ideas, and every person who has individuality enough developed to be more, in human life, than a domestic animal or lifeless machine, must align himself with others who hold the same opinions, whether he will or not, and then he is in the view of others, and perhaps in his own view, labeled with the name of the idea he holds. So we find that nearly every person is labeled, and some persons have a number of labels. Finding that we must be something—must hold to certain ideas and work for certain […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Voltairine de Cleyre, “Why I Am an Anarchist” (1897)

August 29, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
(A lecture delivered in Hammond, Ind.) IT was suggested to me by those who were the means of securing me this opportunity of addressing you, that probably the most easy and natural way for me to explain Anarchism would be for me to give the reasons why I myself am an Anarchist. I am not sure that they were altogether right in the matter, because in giving the reasons why I am an Anarchist, I may perhaps infuse too much of my own personality into the subject, giving reasons sufficient unto myself, but which cool reflection might convince me were […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Elbert Hubbard, “I Am an Anarkist (The Better Part)” (1899)

August 29, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
I AM an Anarkist. All good men are Anarkists. All cultured, kindly men all gentle men; all just men are Anarkists. Jesus was an Anarkist. A Monarkist is one who believes a monark should govern. A Plutokrat believes in the rule of the rich. A Demokrat holds that the majority should dictate. An Aristokrat thinks only the wise should decide; while an Anarkist does not believe in government at all. Richard Croker is a Monarkist; Mark Hanna a Plutokrat; Cleveland a Demokrat; Cabot Lodge an Aristokrat; William Penn, Henry D. Thoreau, Bronson Alcott and Walt Whitman were Anarkists. An Anarkist […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Albert Libertad, “Liberty” (1908)

August 29, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
Many think that it is a simple dispute over words that makes some declare themselves libertarians and others anarchist. I have an entirely different opinion. I am an anarchist and I hold to the label not for the sake of a vain garnishing of words, but because it means a philosophy, a different method than that of the libertarian. The libertarian, as the word indicates, is an adorer of liberty. For him, it is the beginning and end of all things. To become a cult of liberty, to write its name on all the walls, to erect statues illuminating the […]
Anarchist Beginnings

John Henry Mackay, “Anarchy” (1888)

August 29, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
Ever reviled, accursed, ne’er understood, Thou art the grisly terror of our age. “Wreck of all order,” cry the multitude, “Art thou, and war and murder’s endless rage.” O, let them cry. To them that ne’er have striven The truth that lies behind a word to find, To them the word’s right meaning was not given. They shall continue blind among the blind. But thou, O word, so clear, so strong, so pure, Thou sayest all which I for goal have taken. I give thee to the future! Thine secure When each at least unto himself shall waken. Comes it […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Emma Goldman, “Anarchism: What it Really Stands For” (1911)

August 29, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
ANARCHISM: WHAT IT REALLY STANDS FOR Emma Goldman Ever reviled, accursed, ne’er understood, Thou art the grisly terror of our age. “Wreck of all order,” cry the multitude, “Art thou, and war and murder’s endless rage.” O, let them cry. To them that ne’er have striven The truth that lies behind a word to find, To them the word’s right meaning was not given. They shall continue blind among the blind. But thou, O word, so clear, so strong, so pure, Thou sayest all which I for goal have taken. I give thee to the future! Thine secure When each […]
anarchist individualism

E. Armand, “A Little Manual for the Anarchist Individualist” (1911/1934)

August 29, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
Petit Manuel anarchiste individualiste I Etre anarchiste c’est nier l’autorité et rejeter son corollaire économique : l’exploitation. Et cela dans tous les domaines où s’exerce l’activité humaine. L’anarchiste veut vivre sans dieux ni maîtres ; sans patrons ni directeurs ; alégal, sans lois comme sans préjugés ; amoral, sans obligations comme sans morale collective. Il veut vivre librement, vivre sa conception personnelle de la vie. En son for intérieur, il est toujours un asocial, un réfractaire, un en dehors, un en-marge, un à-côté, un inadapté. Et pour obligé qu’il soit de vivre dans une société dont la constitution répugne à […]
Anarchist Beginnings

Edward Carpenter, “Non-Governmental Society” (1911)

August 29, 2016 Shawn P. Wilbur
Most people agree nowadays in the view that the growth of bureaucracy and officialism in the modern State is a serious evil, and that the extension of Government interference and the multiplication of Laws are a great danger. We all know that the institution of the Law and the Courts actually creates and gives rise to huge masses of evil—bribery, blackmail, perjury, spying and lying, wrongful accusation, useless and deliberate suffering and cruelty; that it publicly sanctions and organises violence, even in extreme forms; that it quite directly and deliberately supports vast and obvious wrongs in Society—as for instance land-monopoly; […]