The general strike threatened by the General Confedera- tion of
Labour in consequence of the attitude of the Govern- ment towards the French Anti-Militarist Labour Party has proved a complete failure. A minority of the compositors, coerced by the Confederation, struck work ; but beyond the non-appearance of half-a-dozen unimportant newspapers, no inconvenience was caused to the Parisian public, and no demonstrations have taken place. The decision of the Government not to suppress the Confederation, but to proceed against its leaders individually, has so far been justified by results. The Act under which the Confederation was established would have allowed it to be reconstituted under another name. As matters stand, the Government have refused to give the Confederation an advertisement, and have exposed its inherent weakness. The Paris correspondent of the 7't?l/es in an interesting despatch which appears in Tuesday's issne prints a striking communication from a leading Socialist, who dissociates himself and his colleagues from the "reckless anarchists of the General Confederation of Labour" and the "internationalists of the absurd type of M. Herve." The correspondent further asserts that the bulk of the French working classes are not members of Trade-Unions, and have no representatives whatever in the Confederation. "It does not represent a tithe of the working men of France ; and owing to its organisation, which gives the same representation to the smallest unions as to the most powerful organisations, it is the minority of a minority which has been endeavouring to terrorise the labouring classes on the one hand, and on the other to use their assumed authority as the leaders of the French proletariat for revolutionary ends."
