NEWS from 100 years ago: A WORLD FEDERATION OF PEOPLES?

A national conference of the Labour Party has just passed several resolutions about international relations. One resolution asserts the right to ‘equal opportunity’ for everybody in the world, ‘irrespective of colour, creed, sex, nationality or culture.’ Another resolution says that the working class should try to build a World Federation of Peoples to end capitalist exploitation and share wealth fairly. A third resolution is that ‘all Peoples’ have the right to govern themselves and not be governed by foreign powers. The British Empire is singled out as an oppressor; the conference calls for rights of self-government to be given to the subject peoples of Ireland, Egypt, India and South Africa. Another resolution calls for immediate disarmament and the end of conscription, passports and news censorship. One more resolution commits the Labour Party to rewriting the Treaty of Versailles ‘in accordance with Truth and Justice.’