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Eugene V. Debs: 216 quotes29 likes

“In this country — the most favored beneath the bending skies — we have vast areas of the richest and most fertile soil, material resources in inexhaustible abundance, the most marvelous productive machinery on earth, and millions of eager workers ready to apply their labor to that machinery to produce in abundance for every man, woman, and child — and if there are still vast numbers of our people who are the victims of poverty and whose lives are an unceasing struggle all the way from youth to old age, until at last death comes to their rescue and lulls these hapless victims to dreamless sleep, it is not the fault of the Almighty: it cannot be charged to nature, but it is due entirely to the outgrown social system in which we live that ought to be abolished not only in the interest of the toiling masses but in the higher interest of all humanity…”

Eugene V. Debs

Federal Court statement (1918)

“The Man of Galilee, the Carpenter, the workingman who became the revolutionary agitator of his day soon found himself to be an undesirable citizen in the eyes of the ruling knaves and they had him crucified.”

Eugene V. Debs

The Canton, Ohio Speech, Anti-War Speech (1918)

“The capitalist class is represented by the Republican, Democratic, Populist and Prohibition parties, all of which stand for private ownership of the means of production, and the triumph of any one of which will mean continued wage-slavery to the working class.”

Eugene V. Debs

The Socialist Party and the Working Class (1904)

“Robert G. Ingersoll and Wendell Phillips were the two greatest orators of their time, and probably of all time. Their power sprang from their passion for freedom, for truth, for justice, for a world filled with light and with happy human beings. But for this divine passion neither would have scaled the sublime heights of immortal achievement. The sacred fire burned within them and when they were aroused it flashed from their eyes and rolled from their inspired lips in torrents of eloquence.”

Eugene V. Debs

The Secret of Efficient Expression (1911)

“What the workingmen of the country are profoundly interested in is the private ownership of the means of production and distribution, the enslaving and degrading wage-system in which they toil for a pittance at the pleasure of their masters and are bludgeoned, jailed or shot when they protest — this is the central, controlling, vital issue of the hour, and neither of the old party platforms has a word or even a hint about it.
As a rule, large capitalists are Republicans and small capitalists are Democrats, but workingmen must remember that they are all capitalists, and that the many small ones, like the fewer large ones, are all politically supporting their class interests, and this is always and everywhere the capitalist class.”

Eugene V. Debs

Outlook for Socialism in the United States (1900)

“Are we opposed to Prussian militarism? … We have been fighting it since the day the Socialist movement was born; and we are going to continue to fight it, day and night, until it is wiped from the face of the earth. Between us there is no truce—no compromise.”

Eugene V. Debs

The Canton, Ohio Speech, Anti-War Speech (1918)

“Had Ingersoll and Phillips devoted their lives to the practice of law for pay the divine fire within them would have burned to ashes and they would have died in mediocrity.”

Eugene V. Debs

The Secret of Efficient Expression (1911)

“Capitalism is dying and its extremities are already decomposing. The blotches upon the surface show that the blood no longer circulates. The time is near when the cadaver will have to be removed and the atmosphere purified.”

Eugene V. Debs

The Socialist Party and the Working Class (1904)

“I am opposing a social order in which it is possible for one man who does absolutely nothing that is useful to amass a fortune of hundreds of millions of dollars, while millions of men and women who work all the days of their lives secure barely enough for a wretched existence.”

Eugene V. Debs

&quot;Statement to the Court Upon Being Convicted of Violating the Sedition Act&quot; (18 September 1918) http://www.marxists.org/archive/debs/works/1918/court.htm <br class="br">Federal Court statement (1918)

“The political solidarity of the working class means the death of despotism, the birth of freedom, the sunrise of civilization.”

Eugene V. Debs

The Socialist Party and the Working Class (1904)

“Jesus was not divine because he was less human than his fellowmen but for the opposite reason that he was supremely human, and it is this of which his divinity consists, the fullness and perfection of him as an intellectual, moral and spiritual human being.”

Eugene V. Debs

Jesus, the Supreme Leader (1914)

“If I had the force to overthrow these despotic laws I would use it without an instant's hesitation or delay, but I haven't got it, and so I am law-abiding under protest - not from scruple - and bide my time.”

Eugene V. Debs

Sound Socialist Tactics (1912)

“I have no country to fight for; my country is the earth; I am a citizen of the world.”

Eugene V. Debs

&quot;When I Shall Fight,&quot; Appeal to Reason (11 September 1915) https://socialistworker.org/2004-1/500/500_06_Zinn.php

“When we are in partnership and have stopped clutching each other's throats, when we have stopped enslaving each other, we will stand together, hands clasped, and be friends. We will be comrades, we will be brothers, and we will begin the march to the grandest civilization the human race has ever known.”

Eugene V. Debs

The Issue (1908)

“We live in the capitalist system, so-called because its dominated b the capitalist class. In this system the capitalists are the rulers and the workers the subjects. The capitalists are in a decided minority and yet they rule because of the ignorance of the working class.”

Eugene V. Debs

Working Class Politics (1910)

“Wherever capitalism appears, in pursuit of its mission of exploitation, there will Socialism, fertilized by misery, watered by tears, and vitalized by agitation be also found, unfurling its class-struggle banner and proclaiming its mission of emancipation.”

Eugene V. Debs

&quot;The American Movement&quot; http://www.marxists.org/archive/debs/works/1898/america.htm (written 1898, first published 1908)

“The economic unity of the workers must first be effected before there can be any progress towards emancipation. The interests of the millions of wage workers are identical, regardless of nationality, creed, or sex, and if they will only open their eyes to this simple, self-evident fact, the greatest obstacle will have been overcome and the day of victory draw near.”

Eugene V. Debs

Working Class Politics (1910)

“The people are as capable of achieving their industrial freedom as they were to secure their political liberty, and both are necessary to a free nation.”

Eugene V. Debs

The Socialist Party and the Working Class (1904)

“Deny it as may the cunning capitalists who are clear-sighted enough to perceive it, or ignore it as may the torpid workers who are too blind and unthinking to see it, the struggle in which we are engaged today is a class struggle, and as the toiling millions come to see and understand it and rally to the political standard of their class, they will drive all capitalist parties of whatever name into the same party, and the class struggle will then be so clearly revealed that the hosts of labor will find their true place in the conflict and strike the united and decisive blow that will destroy slavery and achieve their full and final emancipation.”

Eugene V. Debs

The Socialist Party and the Working Class (1904)

“As a revolutionist I can have no respect for capitalist property laws, nor the least scruple about violating them. I hold all such laws to have been enacted through chicanry, fraud and corruption, with the sole end in view of dispossessing, robbing and enslaving the working class.”

Eugene V. Debs

Sound Socialist Tactics (1912)