Out
of the Ghetto
Joe Jacobs, London: Phoenix Press, 1991 (originally published in
1977)
It might seem curious to be reviewing a book that was posthumously
published more than twenty years ago. Curiouser still, that in this
age of the dismissal of the working class as a force for change this
book deals exclusively with working class, predominately Jewish, life
in the East End of London in the years between the first and second
world wars. Such scepticism is entirely misplaced, because the book
is a fascinating chronicle of working class existence in that period
and is something of a socialist classic.
Joe Jacobs was born in 1913 in the East End of London. He lived
and worked in London and was involved in socialist organizations his
entire life. Joe was a member of the Young Communist League, before
he joined the adult party from which he was expelled not once but
twice (no easy matter). He was later one of those who helped to found
the libertarian socialist organization Solidarity (the UK not the US
version), and after being expelled from that, was a founder of the
network Echanges et Mouvement in 1975.
To be honest the book is a slow read. Not because the language is
difficult to read or the subject matter is dull; on the contrary, the
book is straightforward and written in plain English, unlike much
left reportage, but it is a thorough book. I read slowly because the
wealth of detail threatened to overwhelm me, and I was afraid I would
miss something important!
Born to Russian-Jewish immigrants in 1913 Joe endured terrible
poverty and personal hardships while growing up. His father died a
year after he was born and the family was constantly short of money.
When Joe was 12, he lost an eye due to a medical problem. An elder
sister was lost to TB in squalid circumstances and other family
members existed in equally dire circumstances.
Yet despite these situations politics also seemed a constant.
Through his father's first wife, Joe had an elder brother he never
met, who returned to Russia to take part in the Revolution. Dave had
been a Bolshevik supporter, but later joined the "Workers Opposition"
and eventually left Russia to live in Paris. Other snapshots of
family and friends who drifted in and out of the East End socialist
and political milieu are described in detail throughout the book.
Joe's own introduction to politics came in 1925 when he was 12 and
stumbled across a demonstration in support of the Jewish Bakers'
Union. Joe described his feeling as akin to a drug addict's first
fix: "I was elated . . . most certainly something had entered my
bloodstream." Joe's also described being "profoundly affected" by the
General Strike in 1926, especially after witnessing mounted police
attacking a crowd with sticks.
But it was in the Communist Party that Joe was to earn his
political stripes. He was a loose contact of the party, before
joining the YCL. and later the adult party. It was to become the
centre of his life. Joe vividly describes the tremendous variety of
activities and organizations in which the Communist Party was
involved. It is hard for those of us active today, particularly in
North America to imagine the kind of influence the CP wielded.
Significant also is the way he viewed the party. Several references
to Trotsky and oppositionists are mentioned yet Joe refused to even
read their words: "Might as well ask a Catholic to read Maria Sopes,
when the Church had said he must not." He accepted the party's belief
that they were traitors, and even the Moscow trials, although they
were harder to swallow. But after all they had confessed hadn't
they?
Yet Joe was often considered a trouble maker in his branch.
Throughout the latter part of the book, he paints a picture of the
struggle in the branch between those who wanted to work through the
trade unions and those who looked to alternative organizations and
street work to advance the party's message, each brandishing Marx and
Lenin to support their positions. Joe was a supporter of the latter
group and was labelled an ultra-leftist by his colleagues.
No account of life in the East End in the 30's would be complete
without a mention of the "Battle of Cable Street." The announcement
by Oswald Mosley and his British Union of Fascists that they would
march through Cable Street on Sunday, October 3 and the efforts to
prevent it have become the stuff of (C P) legend. The Fascist
movement in Britain, while it never gained the influence that it
achieved in continental Europe was certainly growing. Mosley's march
was a provocation. Yet, despite the wave of popular indignation, and
later CP accounts, the Communist Party initially decided to press on
with their already announced demonstration for solidarity with Spain
at Trafalgar Square on the same day. A letter from a CP leader to Joe
stated that if "Mosley decides to march let him." Organizing around
the slogan They Shall not Pass' was deemed to be a stunt! When
it became evident that the people of the East End were going to
resist Mosley whatever the CP's position the party switched gears.
Mosley never got to Cable Street. The Metropolitan police, watching
the massive display of force and resistance called off the
demonstration and Mosley was forced away. Joe rightly commented that
it was a defeat for Mosley courtesy of "Jews and Gentile alike."
But Joe's connection to the CP was soon to be severed. A little
over a year after the events of Cable Street, Joe was expelled from
the party. In 1951 he rejoined the party and although welcomed with
open arms, he was expelled again within a year.
Many accounts of working class activists come down to us via
autobiography, but all too often the accounts are written by those
who, in their youth, "were socialists too." Often their writings have
the ring of hollow justification of their current activities. Happily
Joe Jacobs' book does not bear this stamp. The main problem is that
it ends too soon. Joe's untimely death in 1977 prevented him from
writing, as he had planned to do, about more of his own past. Out of
the Ghetto deserves a wide readership.
From the ending of 'Out of the Ghetto'
"I am aware of the "ego-ethno-social- centrism" of
any attempt to describe experience. This is not an exercise in
"writing" History, only a witness account of what I and my friends
were doing in a place which was a melting pot of political and other
social activity. We radiated the results of our handling of events
and influences which came into our lives in this unique place.
I am not deliberately seeking to influence anyone toward an
acceptance of my ideas, although these ideas to influence an
unavoidably selective and incomplete account. With hindsight, you and
I can make up our own minds about what is interesting, relevant or
significant. Many of the problems we faced still exist. The story
ends at the outbreak of World War Two, when I was only 26 years old.
The next forty years transformed my ideas in a constantly changing
world. To "Keep Your Head" simply means keeping up with these changes
without getting too confused, or worse still completely lost.
Survival is not only about physically keeping your head. It is also
about the quality of survival. Is survival acceptable if it can only
be secured at any cost to integrity and self-respect?"
N. F.
Originally published in Red & Black Notes #7, Winter
1999
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