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The Commoner
VOL. 22, NO. A
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The Coal Strike
Tho coal strike brings the. nation face to face
"With a vory serious problem. Tho situation in
tho industrial world is more unsatisfactory than
it has boon boforo since our nation was born.
Taking the world over, the industrial situation
is moro critical than at any time since the be
ginning of tho Christian era. What is the
trbublo? Why is it that there is increasing
class-consciousness that is, thinking in terms
of class instead of terms that include the whole
population, among tho mombers of the two great
groups known as tho capitalist group and tho
labor group? Why is it that tho mombers
of these two groups moro than ever before look
forward with a vague dread to what they regard
as an inevitable conflict?
Why is it that the big employers are trying
to crush organizations among employees and
why do tho employeos feel more than over be
fore that their only hope lies In an organization
strong enough to dictate terms to employers?
Tho main trouble is lack of the spirit of
brotherhood. Capital and labor are drifting
more and moro apart and in this growing an
tagonism the world confronts a real danger.
Nothing but the spirit of brotherhood can furn
ish a permanont remedy a spirit of brother
hood that will make each member of these two
groups recognize that ho is kin to each member
of tho other group. Sympathy is the world's
gr6at need and sympathy is the outgrowth of a
fooling of kinship, brother with brother.
But pormanent remedies require time; emer
gencies require immediate action. When- a
child, because of carelessness, breaks its arm
the bones must be set at once. Lessons in cau
'tion can be given after recovery. So, today, an
immediate remedy must bo found for the strike
that suspends one of the, chief industries of the
country.
About six hundred thousand mine worksrs are
out of employment; the employers call it a
strike, the mine workers call it a lockout. But
whether strike or lockout it affects the entire
nation. If the number of stockholders in all the
mines that are shut down is added to the num
ber of employees who have quit work, the total
number directly interested on both sides could
hardly exceed a million if it reaches that num
ber. Counting five to a family we would have
a total of five millions directly interested
pdcuniarly in the strike or lockout, whichever
it may bo. In other words, ninety-five per cent
of the people suffer while five per cent fight out
their differences. The inconvenience suffered by
tho ninety-five per cent will depend upon the
length of the strike. If, as we are told, the
country has only fifty-one day3 coal supply on
hand it will take less than two months to make
us a fuelless nation.
As the coal supply diminishes feeling will in
crease, food supplies will give out among the
miners and they will, like others, suffer from
lack of fuel. We cannot in times of industrial
peace calculate the exigencies of industrial war
any more than we can foresee at the beginning
of a war batween nations what may develop dur
ing its progress.
Is it not strange that an intelligent nation
like this should be helpless in such an emer
gency? Why have we not prepared for such a
contingency? Why have we no means to pre
vent strikes and lockouts? There are three
reasons; first, the big employers think they can
control the situation with an army.
The shut-down is not so serious to them as to
the employees; money can go longer than labor
without eating. Because capitalists can suspend
omployment till tho employeos are out of food
they have the advantage in the game of freeze
out. Society believes in obedience to law and
the employers capitalize, tho law-abiding senti
ment of tho country and use it as an asset.
The labor leaders rely upon organization
Knowing that without organization labor would
have been brought into a condition of involun
tary servitude, they very naturally overestimate
the sufficiency of organization in dealing with in
dustrial questions. They are rightfully opposed
to compulsory arbitration and they are over
suspicious of compulsory investigation for fear
the arbitration idea may creep in.
The general public, not being directly inter
ested on either side and being divided in its
sympathy between employer and employee hl
failed to insist upon its right to protection from
tho inconveniences that follow either lockout
or strike. It taltes some great emergency to rp
cure any important reform. Someone has mm
that the American people sleep till the eleventh
hour but that when they are aroused they can
do more in the noxt hour than any other people
can do in tho whole day. The eleventh hour
has come; It is time to wake up.
Neither capitalism backed by an army nor a
class government in the control of labor is suited
to our institutions. A "government of the peo
plo, by the people, and for tho people" is neither
a government by capitalists, nor by labor, nor
by farmers, nor by merchants, nor by any other
class; it is a government in which each individ
ual has an equal voice and in which a major
ity shall rule on each question that arises.
Fortunately, no one class has a majority and,
therefore, no one class can govern this country;
All classes ought to join together, each individ
ual acting according to his judgment and his
conscience. All ought to unite in securing leg
islation which will, so far as possible, prevent
lockouts or strikes by furnishing a substitute.
The treaty plan, embodied in the treaties be
tween this country and three-fourths of the
world and now endorsed by practically the
entire civilized world, would be just as useful
in preventing conflict between the classes in this
country as in preventing war between nations.
The issues that produce stril-.es and lockouts
are not nrivate issues they involve the entire
public. While the relations between capital and
labor rest on the first instance oh agreements be
tween the two classes, yet, in a larger sense,
capital and labor have invited the public to par
ticipate when they offer to furnish to the pub
lic so important a necessity as fuel and depend
on the public for the money that pays both em
ployers and omplovees. Surely the public has
a right to inquire the cause of a dispute before,
it consents to do without the article of mer
chandise furnished by those engaged in the dis
pute. A nermanent tribunal so made up as to rep
resent both sides, with additional members for
each investigation furnished by the two sides,
would protect all who have a right to be pror
tected. Investigation would bring the facts be
fore th neople and public sympathy could then
be intelligently given to the side whose cause
was just. A reservation of the right of inde
pendent action at the conclusion of 'the Investi
gation would entirely eliminate the idea of com
pulsory arbitration.
If this strike comnels legislation which will
nrevent strikes or lockouts in the future it will
be. worth the inconvenience that it costs. It is
to be hoped that the nation will profit by this
experience and, by aDnropriate action, proclaim
peace in the industrial world.
W. J. BRYAN.
"THE FREEDOM OF THE SEAS'
The doctrine of the "freedom of the seas" is
gaining new importance as the rum runners lay
claim to all the ocean outside of the three mile
limit. It will not take long to dispose of this
claim. Crime, exiled crom land, cannot build a
fortress on the waters. Whenever a rum-laden
vessel leaves the three mile limit on an unlaw
ful errand it raises the pirate flag and is under
the protection of no law. No civilized nation
will dare to lend its flae to whisky buccaneers
The rum-runner is a public enemy- an outlaw
and the vessel can be sunk and the liquor that
it carries diluted with salt water until the in
toxicating element reaches the maximum of one
half of one per cent.
Those who think that the world has turned
over the seas to those engaged in the liquor
traffic have another think coming. The. new
freedom of the seas is a mirage with alcohol
taking the place of the imaginary stretches of
f1 be tempting to those to whom the
United States has become a desert, but it is not
real; those who pursue it will but aggravate
their thrist with no opportunity to auencli it
W. J. BRYAN.
THE MIDDLEMEN'S PROFIT
On another page will be found a result nf n
survey made by the Department of Agr culture
covering the cost of retailing meat. The fi
urea present an interesting study. For instknip
to 1921 the cost of retailing meat in
creased. The middleman is the man who needs
watching. An entirely new scale of profits has
been adopted since pre-war days.
There ought to be a state commission in
every state to supplement the woi-k o u Fed
eral commission, and there should be a municipal
trade commission in every city to sunnwilf Jl
The Ship Subsidy
t-...- ""'j-i-'ub "loiKjjig, navitifr
ceeded in driving; the government out n J
shipping business, now ask for a subsidy ami If e
Republican leaders, committed to everv ?
bounty, subsidy, and privilege, respond ml, -?f
to the appeal.-This certainly oughj To Tve S7
Democrats an issue upon which they r-Ii ! !
solidly against this new form of plundor i!
will not be surprising if the agricultural m
again gets into action and defeats the Rchrm0C
of the Republican leaders. The RepubE
congressmen who are going- before aericult mS
districts for re-election will be a little cau E
about entering upon a -line of expenditure wZ
will be limited only by the capacity of the 1?
tional purse. "a
Bounties once given can never be withdrawn
with the consent of the industry aided- on X
contrary, the larger the industry grows t!
greater will be the clamor for more Si
perience has shown that an infant industry nrn
tected by the Republicans, differs entirely frZ"
the child to which the industry is likened A
child will become ashamed to- nurse and after
awhile will wean itself, but no protected or sub
sidized industry was ever known to emem
from the state of infancy or consent to wean
W. J. BRYAN
THE SOLDIERS' BONUS
A soldiers' bonus bill passed the House- it is
not expected to pass the Tenate in its present
form. It gave the Republican 'congressmen a
chance to say that their party had redeemed its
pledge to the soldiers. Nearly all the Demo
crats voted fop it, not because they favored the
plan adopted but because it was their only od
portunityto vote for ANY kind of bonus bill and
they preferred to vote for ANY bill rather than
far NO bill at all. The 'minority of the Ways
and Means Committee brought a stinging in
dictment against the Republican .majority and
showed how the money necessary could be raised
by a tax upon excess profits and largo incomes.
The bonus bill is an excellent illustration of
a policy described in an oft repeated story. A
retiring merchant in turning the business over
to his son told him how to be popular without
its costing anything-. "If anyone comes around
around for a subscription for the building of a
church," said the. father, "subscribe liberally
that will make you popular with the members
of the church; then fight he location mid you
will not have to pay the subscription."
Simple plan, isn't it? That is the difficulty
with the bonus bill; everybody favors it but its
supporters differ as to the method of raising the
money necessary they fight the location
, W. J. BRYAN.
THE TAIL STILL WIGGLING
Governor Edwards of New Jersey is back in
the lime light again. He vetoed four dry en
forcement laws passed by the New Jersey legis
lature. He objects to one of the laws declaring
a place a nuisance "where the liquor law is
HABITUALLY violated." He says that no prop
erty right or privilege seems to be safe against
assault by those who .think the enforcement of
the Eighteenth Amendment a panacea for all
ills. Well, the serpent is dead, even though its
tail may not have stopped wiggling.
Yes, anxious readers, It is true that the reserva
tion to the Four Power Treaty adopted by a voto
of NINETY to TWO is substantially tho same
reservation as made in each one of the Thirty
Treaties protecting the nation's right to decide
for itself questions of peace and war. When
that reservation was added the Four Power Pact
became almost identical with the Thirty Treaties.
Of course the Democrats could afford to endorse
a proposition so much like the Bryan Treaties
negotiated unjior President Wilson's administration.
A POOR ISSUE
Governor Cox quite naturally harks back to
1920 and wants to fight the League of Nations
over again; but that would bo suicidal. Would
he insist on Article 10? If so, we would be de
feated In advance; and suppose Article 10 was
dropped? -That would divide the Democratic
party.
The fight will bo made against KeP"bHc5
mistakes. There are plently of them. Among
the many the revenue Dili is the worst.
Cr
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