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A Happy New Year

Author: James Connolly

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Electronic edition compiled by Benjamin Hazard

Funded by University College, Cork via The Writers of Ireland Project

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Extent of text: 1740 words

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Text ID Number: E900002-059

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Sources

Edition
1. Aindrias Ó Cathasaigh (ed.), James Connolly: The Lost Writings (London 1997).

Selected further reading
1. James Connolly and William Walker, The Connolly-Walker controversy on socialist unity in Ireland (Dublin 1911, repr. Cork 1986).
2. Robert Lynd, James Connolly: an appreciation, to James Connolly, Collected works (2 vols, October 1916, repr. Dublin 1987) i, pp. 495–507.
3. Lambert McKenna, The social teachings of James Connolly (Dublin 1920).
4. Desmond Ryan, James Connolly: his life, work and writings (Dublin 1924).
5. G. Schüller, James Connolly and Irish freedom: a marxist analysis (Chicago 1926, repr. Cork 1974).
6. Noelle Davis, Connolly of Ireland: patriot and socialist (Carnarvon 1946).
7. Richard M. Fox, James Connolly: the forerunner (Tralee 1946).
8. Desmond Ryan, Socialism and nationalism: a selection from the writings of James Connolly (Dublin 1948).
9. Desmond Ryan, 'James Connolly', in J. W. Boyle (ed.), Leaders and workers (Cork 1960, repr. 1978).
10. C. Desmond Greaves, The life and times of James Connolly (London 1961, repr. Berlin 1976).
11. François Bédarida, Le socialisme et la nation: James Connolly et l'Irlande (Paris 1965).
12. Joseph Deasy, James Connolly: his life and teachings (Dublin 1966).
13. James Connolly, Press poisoners in Ireland and other articles (Belfast 1968).
14. James Connolly, Yellow unions in Ireland and other articles (Belfast 1968).
15. Peter McKevitt, James Connolly (Dublin 1969).
16. Owen Dudley Edwards, The mind of an activist: James Connolly (Dublin 1981).
17. Derry Kelleher, Quotations from James Connolly: an anthology in three parts (2 vols Drogheda 1972).
18. Peter Berresford Ellis (ed.), James Connolly: selected writings edited with an introduction by P. Berresford Ellis (Harmondsworth 1973).
19. Samuel Levenson, James Connolly: a biography (London 1973).
20. James Connolly, Ireland upon the dissecting table: James Connolly on Ulster and Partition (Cork 1975).
21. Nora Connolly O'Brien, James Connolly: portrait of a rebel father (Dublin 1975).
22. E. Strauss, Irish nationalism and British democracy (Westport CT 1975).
23. Bernard Ransom, Connolly's Marxism (London 1980).
24. Communist Party of Ireland, Breaking the chains: selected writings of James Connolly on women (Belfast 1981).
25. Ruth Dudley Edwards, James Connolly (Dublin 1981).
26. Brian Kelly, James Connolly and the fight for an Irish Workers' Republic (Cleveland, OH 1982).
27. John F. Murphy, Implications of the Irish past: the socialist ideology of James Connolly from an historical perspective (unpubl. MA thesis, University of North Carolina at Charlotte 1983).
28. Anthony Lake, James Connolly: the development of his political ideology (unpubl. MA thesis, NUI Cork 1984).
29. Frederick Ryan, Socialism, democracy and the Church (Dublin 1984). With reviews of Connolly's 'Labour in Irish History' and Jaures' 'Studies in socialism'.
30. Connolly: the Polish aspects: a review of James Connolly's political and spiritual affinity with Józef Pilsudski, leader of the Polish Socialist Party, organiser of the Polish legions and founder of the Polish state (Belfast 1985).
31. X. T. Zagladina, James Connolly (Moscow 1985).
32. James Connolly and Daniel De Leon, The Connolly-De Leon Controversy: On wages, marriage and the Church (London 1986).
33. David Howell, A Lost Left: three studies in socialism and nationalism (Chicago 1986).
34. Priscilla Metscher, Republicanism and socialism in Ireland: a study of the relationship of politics and ideology from the United Irishmen to James Connolly, Bremer Beiträge zur Literatur- und Ideologiegeschichte 2 (Frankfurt-am-Main 1986).
35. Michael O'Riordan, General introduction, to James Connolly, Collected works (2 vols Dublin 1987) i, pp. ix–xvii.
36. Cathal O'Shannon, Introduction, to James Connolly, Collected works (2 vols Dublin 1987) i, 11–16.
37. Austen Morgan, James Connolly: a political biography (Manchester 1988).
38. Helen Clark, Sing a rebel song: the story of James Connolly, born Edinburgh 1868, executed Dublin 1916 (Edinburgh 1989).
39. Kieran Allen, The politics of James Connolly (London 1990).
40. Andy Johnston, James Larraggy and Edward McWilliams, Connolly: a Marxist analysis (Dublin 1990).
41. Lambert McKenna, The social teachings of James Connolly, by Lambert McKenna, ed. Thomas J. Morrissey (Dublin 1991).
42. Donnacha Ní Gabhann, The reality of Connolly: 1868-1916 (Dublin 1993).
43. William K. Anderson, James Connolly and the Irish left (Dublin 1994).
44. Proinsias Mac Aonghusa, What Connolly said: James Connolly's writings (Dublin 1994).
45. James L. Hyland, James Connolly: life and times (Dundalk 1997).
46. William McMullen, With James Connolly in Belfast (Belfast 2001).
47. Donal Nevin, James Connolly: a full life (Dublin 2005).

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Created: by James Connolly (1916)

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Revision History

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Corpus of Electronic Texts Edition: E900002-059

A Happy New Year: Author: James Connolly

p.191

A Happy New Year

1 January 1916

We should in this issue wish all our readers a 'Happy New Year'. We do so wish them. But such a wish rings better when it is accompanied by a belief that the wish may be realised, and at the present moment the signs of a Happy New Year are none too plentiful.

Over all the world the shadow of war lies heavy on the hearts of every lover of humankind. Over a great part of the world war itself is daily taking its toll, and the gashed and mangled limbs of many thousands are daily scattered abroad, an affront to the sight of God and man. In the British Empire, of which we are unluckily a part, the ruling class has taken the opportunity provided by the war to make a deadly onslaught upon all the rights and liberties acquired by labour in a century of struggling; and found the leaders of labour as a rule only too ready to yield to the attack and surrender the position they ought to have given their lives to hold. Were the war to end tomorrow the working class of these islands would be immediately launched into a bitter fight to resist the attempt of the capitalist class to make permanent all the concessions the too pliant trade union leaders have been swindled into conceding upon the plea of war emergencies. In addition, the whole system of industry has been moulded anew in many of its most important branches. Division of labour has been pushed to an extent hitherto undreamed of. Women have been harnessed to the wheels of production in places and at operations hitherto performed solely by men — and so harnessed with none of the rights with which men safeguarded their positions — and the whole industrial population has been made accustomed to browbeating and driving from those set in authority.

The civil rights of the people have gone, and the ruling class has succeeded in so familiarising the multitude with thoughts of slaughter and bloodshed that the killing of

p.192

Peace will send home millions of men; will dislocate all industry so that those millions will find little employment and will thus be compelled to compete fiercely for work at any price. The terrible taxation caused by the war will send up and keep up the price of everything, whilst the misery of the returned soldier looking for work will hammer down wages.

Nationally Ireland has seen herself betrayed by one set of politicians, her children bartered for sale as hired assassins in the service of her ancient and present enemy. The coming year may see her still linked to that enemy once more at peace with the world, and the 'Irish Nation' finally relegated to the mere status of a gallant tradition, as little useful politically as the Jacobite tradition is to Scotland. With England at peace that country will possess an army of at least one million men, veteran soldiers of the greatest war of all the ages, and when that time arrives the Irish question will trouble England as little as the rivalries of Lancashire and Yorkshire.

With an army of two veteran soldiers for every adult male in Ireland there will no longer be an Irish cause for any uneasiness to the rulers of the British Empire.

A happy new year! Ah, well! Our readers are, we hope, rebels in heart, and hence may rebel even at our own picture of the future. If that is so let us remind them that opportunities are for those who seize them, and that the coming year may be as bright as we choose to make it. We have sketched out the future as it awaits the slave who fears death more than slavery. For those who choose to advance to meet Fate determined to mould it to their purpose that future may be as bright as our picture is dark.