We hear a great deal these days about the rule of law". Everyone from Harold Wilson to Tory stalwart Lord Hailsham has been lecturing the working class on the need to stick to the rules as laid down by the Government and Parliament, the story. Unlike most other countriesTwo weeks ago the entire working class got a good look at what the rule of these gentlemen's law' actually involves-three building workers clapped in prison for the 'crime" of organising pickets and fighting for decent conditions in their industry.
There is nothing surprising in this, for the "law" is made by Parliament, which serves the interests of the ruling class, and is applied to ensure that capitalist rule sunot threatened. The rule of law is simply the rule of the capitalist class:
THE LAW-A BIG STICK This lesson has been hammered into the working class movement from the very moment of its birth. For the first century of its existence cen the simplest forms of trade union activity were suppressed under the law as "criminal conspiracics'. Only after a Jong and ferocious fight were some of these legal restrictions cased up. Even then trade union activity remained penned in by an iron ring of laws.
If this basic fact of working class life has seemed less obvious in recent years, it is only because the ruling class has tried, on the basis of an expanding capitalist cconomy, to make a deal with the trade union leadership to underwrite the rule of the capitalist class in exchange for a few material concessions. But that day is over. Capitalist society is in crisis, and even the small material gains granted to the working class in recent years now seem to the ruling class like too high a price to pay. The ruling class is going on the offensive and, as in the past, it can be expected to use the power of the law against the working class movement. For the law carries with it one powerful advantage the chtire leadership of ne working cass movement has always bowed down before the majesty of the law' fand this attitude has infected wide layers of the working class as a whole ). Thus the law is not only a big stick in the hands of the ruling: class, bet a stick which the trade union bureau to prohibit, and for which a trespasser can be crats are afraid to light hack against.
COMMON LAW According to legend, Britain is a country in which the law and the state are neutral', in which there are to political laws and no political prisoners. As with so many other treasured "principles' of the ruling class, these sometimes have to go by the board in the fight to maintain class rule. The struggle of the nationalist population in the north of Ireland has forced the British state to recognise the category of policical prisoner" in at least one corner of its domain.
The fact does remain, bowever, that a flick through the sarious Acts of Parliament currently in force would uncover relatisely few laws with an operly political purpose But ir would be wrone to conciude from this that the British state is poorly equipped to aunch a leeal attack on the worse class movement and deal powerful legal blows to any movement that attacks the basis of capitalist rule. Quite the opposite is true. The various Acts of Parliament tell only half certainly as far as criminal law is concerned— a great deal of English law does not exist in the form of written statutes' passed by Parliament at all, Rather it is "common law'a body of law that has grown up as custom and tradition over the centuries and exists only in the form of the written records of the judges who have at one time or another applied these traditional rules.
The importance of the 'common law is that it gives British judges a much bigger part in shaping the law than their counterparts in other countries. The courts always have the job of interpreting witlen laws, but under the The use of the conspiracy laws exposes most common law these powers are vastly multithere is no body that can be consulted as to the true intention of a particular law, and the only authority on such matters is the decisions of previous judges (and higher courts can ignore those "precedents" set by lower courts). This gives the highest court in the land the House of Lords the power to mace and re-make the common law virtually as it sees tit. All this gives English luw a tremendous degree of flexibility. Probably more than any other capitalist legal system, it can adjust itself quite precisely to the balance of power between the different social classes and the level of class struggle at a particular point in time. Like a 'crimes when the situation requires then, and just as dramatically whisk than away with the flick of a wrist when the moment of need las passed.
CONSPIRACY TO TRESPASS Let us take just one example of this process. A few years ago, when student occupations were rife, a number of back-bench Tory MPs were roused from their slumber to demand that these unwarranted attucks on Western civilization should be dealt with under the criminal law, Students occupying college buildings were trespassing: but under English law trespass, while unwii is not a crime: jt is a civil wrong which the courts can issue weits in the alleged "conspiracy was minimal. The sued, bul not a criminal offence which the state can punish.
Thus the demand of the day was for trespass to be made a criminal offence. But such a nove would lave involved certain difficultiesta bill would have bad to be rated and debated in Parliament, it would have received widespread pubbcity, Labour MPs under pressure from various quarters would have bad to take a stand on the proposed bill, and opponents would have bad an opportunity to urgnise astinst the enactment of such a law As it wus. no such bill was proposed.
In 1972 a number of students from Sierta Leone occupied tleir Enchassy in a political protest. They were promptly arrested and charged with "conspiracy to trespass" Now one of the pocolar leatures of the low of conspiracy, is lilal it can be a crime to conspire to do certain things wich are not themselves crimes However, for more thur 150 years E'nglish judges have held that 'conspiracy to trespass does not exist as a crime under the common law. But in July 1973 the House of Lords overtured this long-established view and ruled that such an offence did exist. So the capitalist state obtained a powerful legil weapon to use against political demonstrations without all the fuss, bother and upheaval of passing a new law through Parliament.
HIDDEN ARMOURY This example brings us directly to the law of conspiracy. 'Conspiracy" is a criminal offence under the common law. Of late it has become very popular with the ruling class, particularly in political cases. The three building workers jailed in Shrewsbury are only the latest victims.
clearly the powerful legal weapons which the plied -there are no clearly written rules to go by ruling class have hidden away in their armoury. ready for use in tile class atruggle. The following after the "Bloody Sunday" killings in Derry in are just some of the tremendous advantages the law of conspiracy offers the ruline class 1. A conspiracy charge can be used to make into a crime an action which would not be a crime by itsell. An agreement by two or more people to do an unlawful act, or to do a lawful act by unlawful seans", is a criminal conspiracy. case. If the defendants had actually been conThis definition can cover three types of acts: a. those which are crimes hy themselves; b. civil Wrongs such as trespass-which can be turned into crimes by the use of the conspiracy laws, e. the very broad categories of conspir aces to corrupt public morals" or to effect a public mischief Almost poy political action against Government policy could be declared illegal under this third beading. For exampie, all the big demonstrations and one-day strikes against the Industrial Relations Act could have been prosecuted us conspiracies to effect a public mischief by attempting to thwart the intentions of Parliament.
A WIDE NET 2. A conspiracy champe is often caster to Prose than a charge that something was scruly done, and it can be used to cast a wide net drawing in people whose insolvement right of peaceful picketing did not inchade the only basis that need exist for a conspiracy charge is char an agreemen was made to do something: nothing need actually have been done, nor even any practical preparations made. Moreover, there need not be any evidence of a formal understanding-the "aereement" can he implied in the actions of the alleged "conspirators", This aspect of the law stock of legal weupons which the ruling class is very saluable to the state in political cases, making almost any form of collective action in- movement. Each and every attack on picketing.
Asione judge put it during a political trial in the 1860's "So far as proof goes conspiracy is generally a matter three. If this i not done the ruliog class will of inference. le may he that the alleged consprators have wone a mujor victory: the most cleMS THES SPUN CAT IN A MEN C ponded: one may never hase heand the name of the other, and yor by the law they may be parties to the same common criminal agreement. Thus, in some of the Fensin cases tried in lois country, it frequently Jappered that-ose of the conspirators was in Amer Rica, the other in this country; that they had never seen each other; but that there were acts on both sides which led the jury to the inference. that they were engaged in eccomplishing the same common object; and_.the acts of one became evidenco against the other."
Individuals who had only remote unks with any unawim denvus codEd te charged with a crime by arguing that ther were part of an unstated agreement to carry out this activity, For example, it a demonstrution was broken up by the police and fighting broke out between police and demonstrators any orpaniser of the demonstration (even if ho was not present) and anyone on the demo (even if he took no part in the fighting and was not in any position of authority) could be charged with a conspiracy on the grounds that they were part of an unspoken agreementto fight the police. Something very like this was done to the organisers of the demonstration held in London 1972 3. A conspiracy charge can be used to impose a vicious sentence for a relatively mild offence because all common law offences can be punisbed by a jail sentence of any length. The most blatant example of this is the Shrewsbury victed of Intimidating workers to abstain from work they could only have received a maximum of three months in jail. But because they were convicted of conspiracy to do the mme thing, the judge could hand down sentences of three years, two years, and nine months.
LAW IN'FIGHTING SHAPE' After the miners strike the Home Secretary was deluged with demands for tougher laws on picketing. He replied that this wasn't necessary -the existing law was tough enough. For onco he wis telling the truth all that was needed were a few favourable court decisions to get the law in fighting shape It is this which the state has been busy tidying up mer the past year or so, The massive effort and expense they put into the Shrewsbury case was part of this plan. Only the day after the Shrewsbury verdicts, another part of the plan payed off: the House of Lords ruled that the richt to stop lorries to "peacefully persuade' the drivers not to cross the picket line. This decision (which now becomes binding on every court in the country makes picketing зито я заке The working class mosement must understand what such Lases invole -a new acchtion to t can use in its light against the trade union and other trade union activides must he fought with the maximum unity and determination by the movement as a whole At the present moment this means fighting to reverse the Shrewsbury verdicts and free the mentary form of trade union struggle can be branded "criminal, and every trade unionist threatened with imprisonment, We must not allow this to happen.
Brian Siocock
The announcement of the Shrewsbury sentences could not have been better timed to hinder an effective response - just two