"The politicians in the Socialist Party, who want offices in the government, fight the I. W. W. because we have no place in our ranks for them, and if our idea prevails, it will crowd them out and destroy their influence as 'saviors of the working class.' These politicians cater for votes to the middle class--to business men, farm owners and other small labor skinners--while the I. W. W. appeals only to wage-workers, and allows none but actual wage-workers to join our ranks. The Socialists can never get a majority of votes for a working class programme (if they had such a programme) because the majority of voters are middle class, since about ten million male wage-workers are disfranchised (being foreigners or floaters without long enough residence in one place to have votes). But the wage-workers are a big majority of the whole people, and produce nearly all wealth, so when they organize as the I. W. W. proposes, the working class will control the country, and with similar organizations in other countries will control the world. Foreigners, women, children and other non-voters at elections, have equal rights in the union, and take part in its activities, regardless of nationality, age, sex, or any other consideration except that they are wage-workers with common interests in opposition to those of the employers."
It may come as a surprise to the reader to hear that at the 1917 St. Louis Convention of the Socialist Party the anti-sabotage and anti-direct action plank of the Constitution was dropped. The "International Socialist Review," May, 1917, page 669, commenting on the removal of the clause, says: