Questions and Answers

Maoriland Worker, Volume 6, Issue 244, 20 October 1915, Page 2

Questions and Answers

The Prke of Butter CONSCRIPTION AND VOLUNTARYISM. Editor, "The Maoriland Worker," —Item.No. .1: Vow. does it,happen that as tlfO-workers' by.- their skill .in. Inventions constantly reduce the cost of labour (though wages may rise at the same time) that the price of the article produced always or nearly always rises. . In the old days the co9t of labour in producing butter must have been at least 3d. ft pound, and we could buy good, butter.for'6d. a pound. Now that the cost of labour by'the factory ay stem is under a penny per pound, we. pay Is. 6d. per pound. I think that labour in. inventing labour-saving machines to lower the cost of labour merely adds capital value to the land—am I right ? Our papers here are always trying to blind us by pretending that higher wages increase the cost of goods,. We know that to. bo false, as the- improved machinery is putting out goods at hundreds per cent fastefr rates, and consequently, at that much . lower JaIb'our cost,while- rise of wages.if- any 1 , is at rates of 10 per cent, or so. Item No. 2: What will be the result of this war on the sex question ; in Europe? Will immorally or polygamy'flourish as the result of the sex balance in"numbers beirig altered by the millions killed? Either result.will be nothing for Christian people to brag about. It will also affect us here;in the same way, but not to the same extent. (Legal polygamy is unthink* able,' of but actual-*s in Utah —i 9, possible).. Item No. 3:1 have hnd a couple of articles sent. to mc showing that ■Christianity and war won't mix. They Lire: "Christianity and War" by Dr. ! Salter, and "The Churches and the War"' by Leyton Richards, M.A. These learned men have just discovered what Socialists could see years ago. It is too late though now, I think, to raise that question. The war is on—l think everyone's interest now i 3 to preserve our' English system of government ac against the German system of militarism—our voluntaryism against thejr conscription. If we ado ; pt conscription and become as it were "Prtissianised" we might as well be under their flag at once, as we would bo equally, as wcjl off under ono flag as tho other. Voluntaryism or freedom is all wo have to fight, for now—as for "bur country," why, 75 per cent, of us haven't enough country,.to bo buried in—the landlords have got most of it now. : I would like to hear other comments on the situation. Our duty ; .as' members of society must conflict and overcome our'religious bias,, as. it-did in the case of the Catholic Lord Howard, who defeated the Catholic Armada for. ■.Protestant ..-. .. .".-.' A(3NO"STIC: . [Now,-Who will furnish "solidwers -to -'Agnostic's" questions ?—Ed.]