Arthur Desmond - Philosophy

Philosophy

For those who want to see in Arthur Desmond a benevolent socialist — a man of the people who wrote in satire—they will find his writings, poetry and personal correspondence revealing the opposite. Culminating with the release of Might Is Right, Arthur Desmond's literary career consistently advocated open revolution against the government. Indeed, Desmond friends, future Australian Prime Minister Billy Hughes and John Andrews, would call him "the Poet of Revolution" and "poet, actuary and revolutionary". This observation is backed by another of Desmond’s Sydney friends, future New South Wales Premier Jack Lang, who remembered Desmond as "a real revolutionary".

The reality of Arthur Desmond’s philosophy and his abilities to promote it can be seen by the influence he exerted on his associates. One of these was the Australian poet Henry Lawson, who was the brother-in-law to the aforementioned future New South Wales Premier Jack Lang. After his friendship with Desmond, Lawson’s poetry took a truly radical turn. (Of Arthur Desmond, Prime Minister Billy Hughes would recall that "His command of scarifying language was appalling.... Poetry oozed out of him at every pore." Desmond certainly exerted some influence on Lawson, and one dubious critic has charged Henry Lawson with fascism, racism and even Nazism by drawing an outrageous comparison of his poetic sentiments to Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf. However more reputable scholars such as Manning Clarke and Colin Roderick have refuted such claims, pointing to Lawson's own unambiguous statement in print in the Albany Observer (Western Australia) from 1890: "Class, creed and nationality are words which should find no place in the vocabulary of the Australians, because these words are synonymous with everything that is hostile to peace and happiness in the world."

Throughout his time in Sydney, Arthur Desmond worked tirelessly to foment revolution with himself at its head. He was involved in something called the Active Service Brigade, where Desmond produced their journal, Justice for the Active Service Brigade, which was ultimately superseded by Desmond’s own journal, Hard Cash, subtitled "A magazine for finance, politics and religion."

In her book In Our Time: Socialism and the Rise of Labor, 1885 -1905, Verity Burgmann notes that the ASB has been described as "highly centralised and secretive" and that the organization "described itself as a ‘strictly disciplined organization’. The Declaration signed by each member promised to assist in electing the ASB’s Supreme Directing Council, ‘and when duly elected and installed to obey their lawful commands — without question.’" The Brigade’s objectives were thus stated: "For the Nation — Social Co-operation. For the Citizen — Emancipation from Poverty Conditions, Competitive Commercialism, Industrial Wage Slavery, Tyrannical Authority, and Mental Bondage."

Dr. Bob James writes: "Vance Marshall has claimed that ‘for six years… finger was traceable in every decisive movement associated with the working class." ‘Baarmutha’ reminisced: "In the early days of the political labor movement in this state, associated therewith as a molder of its platform and policy and tactics was a remarkable, spectacular character, Arthur Desmond, author of Might Is Right one of the greatest books ever written."

Those who have read the pages of Hard Cash or any of Desmond’s other writings during his time in Sydney, will understand why Arthur Desmond stepped on powerful toes. During a cabinet meeting Colonial Secretary George R. Dibbs is reported to have held up a copy of Hard Cash and paid Arthur Desmond a threatening compliment: "This thing has cost us £3,000,000. What is the detective force of this city doing?" With such high-level pressure being brought to bear, Sydney’s top cops went into immediate action to shut down Hard Cash and to put Arthur Desmond in prison.

Not being able to locate Desmond, and for some reason bypassing William Hughes and Jack Lang, who helped Desmond publish Hard Cash, the minions of the law decided to arrest news agents William McNamara and Samuel A. Rosa for a show trial that is now remembered as the Sydney Anarchy Trial of February 1894. Of particular import is that both McNamara and Rosa, faced with jail, steadfastly refused to name Arthur Desmond as the journal’s publisher, which is a lasting testimony to the kind of loyalty Desmond instilled in his admirers. An incensed Justice Minister Thomas Michael Slattery made sure they paid the price. At the conclusion of the trial Justice Foster handed down sentences of six months in Parramatta Gaol for McNamara, and gave Rosa three months.

The obsession to persecute Desmond seems to have fallen to New South Wales Police detective Jules Pierre Rochaix, whose relentless pursuit of Desmond brought him a promotion from a grateful government. But in the end Desmond still eluded Rochaix, whose face was rubbed into his failure when the 4 November 1893 edition of the Sydney Worker carried a front page caricature of Rochaix surrounded by his newsagent victims in the company of a shadowy Satan — who represented the shadowy editor of Hard Cash, meaning Arthur Desmond.

With McNamara and Rosa in jail, Hard Cash closed down, Arthur Desmond found other avenues to publish incitement against the government. To ferret out Desmond, Detective Rochaix targeted the Active Service Brigade and its journal, Justice. In this Rochaix again failed to get Desmond, although by June he had arrested five men in Desmond’s stead and Sydney had another anarchy trial on its hands.

The Sydney Anarchy Trial of June 1894 saw Henry Tregarthan Douglas, John Dwyer, printer William Mason, Thomas Dodd and printer’s assistant George MacNevin standing before Justice Sir George Long-Innes in the Central Criminal Court, Sydney. The charge was criminal libel, which arose from a single paragraph published in Justice on 21 April 1894. The trial lasted little more than a day and on 13 June, after only a thirty minute deliberation, the jury returned guilty verdicts for all defendants. Judge Long-Innes, saying that it was "not desirable to stir up class hatreds in the community," handed down terms of hard labor: Douglas, Dodd and Mason each received a nine-month sentence; Dwyer receiving six months and MacNevin one month. Long-Innes also ordered the prisoners sent to different prisons in an attempt to break up their association.

The notoriety of the anarchy trials was the reason behind the Australian Labor Party offering Arthur Desmond a seat in the New South Wales Parliament representing Durham in 1894. However, the revolutionary Desmond had no intention of serving in such a measly capacity and "… vehemently denounced those responsible for the canvass and absolutely refused to go for Parliamentary honors." Instead, Desmond put his energies into producing yet another journal in which he took aim at his arch-enemy Justice Minister Thomas Slattery. The Standard Bearer differed from Hard Cash in one major way: Desmond now openly flaunted his name as the journal’s editor.

Mark G. Hearn, after examining the few surviving copies of The Standard Bearer preserved in the Louis Philips Papers, writes that Desmond repeated "the same formula of bank bashing and anti-Semitism'." All Desmond accomplished with The Standard Bearer and Hard Kash was to harden the government’s resolve to bring him to justice.