met in international conventions, whose conclusions were accepted by all constituent national organizations.
Commenting upon "The Collapse of the Second International," which is held to have taken place at the beginning of the World War, "The Revolutionary Age," March 22, 1919, says:
"Great demonstrations were held in every European country by Socialists protesting against their government's declarations of war, and mobilizations for war. And we know that these demonstrations were rendered impotent by the complete surrender of the Socialist parliamentary leaders and the official Socialist press, with their 'justification' of 'defensive wars' and the safeguarding of 'democracy.' "Why the sudden change of front? Why did the Socialist leaders in the parliaments of the belligerents vote the war credits? Why did not Moderate Socialism carry out the policy of the Basle Manifesto, namely; the converting of an imperialistic war into a civil war--into a proletarian revolution? Why did it either openly favor the war or adopt a policy of petty-bourgeois pacifism?"
At the conclusion of the World War Socialists and representatives of labor from many countries met at Berne, Switzerland, in what was known as the Berne Conference. This international Socialist conference was comparatively moderate in tendencies, while another Socialist congress, held shortly before it in Bolshevist Moscow, was far more radical.