WHEN NOT RIGHT, FIGHT!

Evening Post, Volume CIV, Issue 3, 4 July 1922, Page 6

WHEN NOT RIGHT, FIGHT!

All the talk about majority and minority rights does not prevent the dissatisfied section—majority or minority—from appealing to force when the law does not give them their desire. The acceptance or rejection of the Irish Constitution is clearly a case for majority decision; yet the Republican minority, which would have shouted majority rights from the housetop had the electors voted their way,' can only reply with blood-letting melodrama when counted out by the overwhelming vote of the people. The majority right to accept a Constitution is not more unassailable than the minority right to accept, work, yet the strikers in the Herrin district (U.S.A.) use the force ■of their numbers to murder free workers; and thus place the majority dictation at Herrin on a par .with the minority dictation in Ireland. If this sort of thing goes on, any excuse will be sufficient excuse to go out murdering, and the murderers will even parade their crimes in the light of heroics. The Herrin strikers, it is cabled,. " continue to smile, cynically over the affair, stating that they have no regrets, and that the strike-breakers. got what they deserved. The laxity of the local officials, who are making little effort to bring the murderers to justice, is''causing increasing indignation throughout M;he country." When the right to strike is extended into a right to prevent others working, the challenge to society is definite; and society will soon find a means of opposing private force with superior counter-force. -'.'\