Sound recordings and transcriptions of interviews by Joan Smith of Harry McShane, Marxist activist... Reminiscences about John Maclean fifty years after his death. 2.12 (side 1); 2.13 (side 2), [c1972]
Reminiscences about John Maclean fifty years after his death. 2.12 (side 1); 2.13 (side 2), [c1972]
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[c1972]
Item
2.12 includes (transcript page numbers given in brackets): his powerful speech in 1910 attacking the idea that Lloyd George’s budget was a socialist one (1); his joining of the Social Democrat Federation in 1902 or 1903, the success of his classes on Marxist economics (2, 3-4); working with him on the joint committee of Social Democratic Party and provisionally formed British Socialist Party to arrange visit of Victor Grayson to Glasgow (3); his belief that the European social democratic movement was superior to the British one (4); his criticism of the Independent Labour Party and Ramsey MacDonald (4-5); his opposition to BSP leader Henry Hyndman’s policy of expanding the Royal Navy before the First World War (5); his campaign against the war after it broke out, leading to his arrest and imprisonment and consequent sacking from his teaching post in 1915 (6-9); agitation against rent rises and evictions in Glasgow (9-11); suppression of ‘Forward’, the ‘Vanguard’ and the ‘Worker’ papers and deportation of leading Clydeside shop stewards (11-12); arrest and imprisonment of Maclean for urging workers to oppose the war (12); his support for the Easter Rising of 1916 following his release (13); his advocacy of revolution in Britain after the Russian Revolution, leading to his imprisonment for five years (14-16); impact of his speech during his trial in which he denounced capitalism and supported the Glasgow shop stewards’ call for an armistice (16-18); other socialists imprisoned for speeches at this time (17-18); successful campaign for Maclean’s release just before polling day in December 1918 (19).
2.13 includes (transcript page numbers given in brackets): his aim to involve both the miners and the engineering workers in the revolutionary movement and his support for both industrial and political action (1-3); importance of his classes on Marxist economics (4-5); ‘Hands off Russia’ campaign against British military intervention against the Bolsheviks (5-7); break with British Socialist Party leadership by Maclean and McShane’s local branch (7); campaigning with Maclean in the west of Scotland in 1920 (8-9); campaigning for the unemployed and providing food and clothing for Maclean when he was in gaol (10); McShane’s break with Maclean over the latter’s advocacy of a Scottish communist party and his opposition to the Scottish unemployed movement affiliating to the National Unemployed Workers Movement (11-12); short-lived Scottish Workers Republican Party (13); separation from his wife (14-15); influence of free thought movement and anti-religious writings of Robert Blatchford (16-17); Maclean’s highland background (17-18); his comparatively small output of published writing and his explanatory, non-oratorical speaking style (19); demonstrations of the unemployed in Glasgow (19-21).
Brand: Philips C90.