I STRAIGHT TALK

Maoriland Worker, Volume 10, Issue 447, 1 October 1919, Page 4

I STRAIGHT TALK

In a "Post" editorial article dealing with Mr. Dalziell's book, "The Truth of Life," which, was r,er Capitalism viewed in The Worker and reference is naado to Syndicalism, "greedy capitalism and and revengeful syndicalism." This betrays a state of mind that is hard to understand. The •Tc"t. : -' writer is the rnc?f conservative of his Kind in this country; ho is an almost perfect specimen of what we call the mid-Victorian mind. His idea that all he was taught to believe is true has all the force of a fanati-cally-held faith. He dreads change as change; regards it as wrong. He quotes Mr. Dalziell as describing both gx-eedy capitalism and revengeful syndicalism as equally a waste of power. No one will quarrel with the adjective "greedy" aa applied to capitalism, but it is by no means certain that "revengeful is a correct description of syndicalism. In any case, even if it be granted that some syndicalists are animated by feelings of revenge, it should not be forgotten that greedy capitalism begot the revengeful syndicalism, and that in the nature of things when greedy capitalism disappear_s, revengeful _,}_.<:. i.alisia will i:_--i no reason for exist en... Has ihe "Post" wriL.r ever slur, the ma'.ter from this point of view, and can he square his appreciation of Mr. Dalziell's book with his own failure to do anything to do away with "greedy capitalism"? The Worker, be it understood, does not advocate syndicalism. Syndicalism ignores community rights, and never gripped the imagination of the Labor movement in British lands. At the same time, a school of thinkers calling themselves Guild Socialists, took up the root idea of syndicalism—that is, the control of industry by the men engaged in.' that industry—and brought it into ha.mony with community rights hy advocating natioiual guilds, which will carry out the industrial work of the nafion for the good ot the community as a whole. The Guild idea would do away alike with the waste of power of greedy capitalism and any movement of Labor animated solely by revenge. At the same time, it should be clearly understood by the "Post" writer and all other opponents ol Labor that feelings of revenge are not at the root of tbe Labor movement, do not enter 'into the Labor movement al all. The Labor movement :>col;;'- lo convrrl. the capitalist, and is willing to regard him ;v.i a man and a brother the moment, he repents of his vicious mode oi." life, discards his greed, and signifies his desire lo become a useful worker and member of society. Any revengeful feelings workers may have, while being perhaps natural, are not fostered or approved by the men and women who have the good of Labor at heart. Revenge may be, as Bacon described it, a wild kind of justice, but Labor seek;, no reprisals, does not call for a blood offering on the part of the capitalist. It is most important that this should be understood. Labor wages the Class War, not for the sake of war, but for the sake of justice. When justice reigns on the earth, the Class War, the greedy capitalism and revengeful syndicalism (if it exists) will be impossible. This fact _<..__n_ .o iv:-,.-_._,ped the notice v;' the •'PosL'' mid-Victorian p___lo_oi-__-r, who cannot get away from the ideas of his fathers, which are all wrong. » * * * War, although a calamity to the human race, a scandal to earth and he_.ven, and a mockery Profi. and of civilisation, is a and Loss profitable _nierpn_e. oi .far. Ihis explains its staying power. It is true that its profits, as a rule, are the perquisite of the victors; that is to say, the profit-mongcring class of the victors. It was a common thing to read in the papers that war had to be paid for. In this respect the war was Lke any commodity, from our daily b_-e_.d to the labor of man. held to be a commodity by many economists because it is bought and sold—dirt cheap, too —on the open market. The people who saw nothing strange in the fact that war has to be paid for —in cash —are the same kind of human beings who regard Socialism as a beautiful dream, impossible of realisation until men become angels, when, of course, it will not be necessary. They regard war, however, ag a necessary evil, and do not express any reaentment at having to pay for it bath in blood and money. The Budget shows how costly a thing war is, and also how profitable it is—to those who financed it. For peace purposes the Treasurer sets aside one million— half for public works, and half for land and buildings for educational purposes. People interested in education arc asking for much more thau half a million —but they will not get it. Cn the other hand, the men who _u_nced the war will get interest on these huge sums: Expeditionary force, £8,775,000; compensation and allowances to soldiers, £6,050,000; discharged soldiers' settlement, £13,500,----000; land for soldier settlement, £2,000,000. This amounts to £29,----325,000 for war, against a beggarly million for peace. Which clearly shows that war pays better than peace. Nearly all of this war money has been borrowed —New Zealand being a very poor country as a State, although it has some wealthy citizens, and consequently everybody in the Dominion who'works for a living will have to provide the interest, which, like the principal, is purely a product of labor. Paying interest or taking interest is wholly wrong at any time, but to pay interest on money borrowed for war purposes is the height of insanity and a direct incentive to war. Capitalism is so thorough a system of grab that it makes profit out of both life and death. Unlovely and unbeautiful in life, in death the profitmonger and his profits are not divided. Let the Mad World have a lucid Interval, i -ptidiate" war debts' and the League of Nations could be turned into a Comic Opera. The coal-owners still stand in the way of the proper organisation of the coal industry for the benefit Keeping of the community. The r.-.nl Dear, impudence of these profU-monser.s 1« onJy erjiiaUort hy their lust for gain, Mr. \V, Pry or, then' secretary, who scr... __a useful j.MJM_O@ waAUwox. In tiw.

community, but gets more than any collier earns, writes to the Prime Minister complaining that the miners will not accept the owners' offers, and declaring that the owners have done everything that could be reasonably expected of them, having due regard to their own interests and the interests of the public. The interests of th. i-."b!ie i_ r:ood. t .p old public, which Ihe "Post"' declares i:- : tho "umpire" in disputes between Labor and the exploiter of Labor, generally referred to as Capital. How the owners look on the interests of the public may be seen by their own statement that they are prepared to "offer a further bonus, which would increase the earnings of the mine-workers of the Dominion by £125,000 to £150,000 a year, and would necessitate the raising of the price of coal by 2/- to 3/- a ton." This means (hat. the owners, with due regard to their own interests, which they place first, cannot give the miners a bonus unless the public pays for it. Along with this constitutional method of settling the dispute are advised, and the miners charged, in anticipation of refusal jto adopt them, with penalising th_ j community. Tho fact i_; u_:.i. I'.ie. owner-; p-.ialii-t the co--;'u!_ity y 'V .nsJ-iing on rii-ii-hr. the mines ,-olely to serve their own interest... They tax the labor of the miners to provide profits for themselves, and naturally neither the public nor the miners get the consideration they deserve. If the public is content to be an umpire, instead of insisting on the mines being run not for the benefit, cf shareholders, but for the good of the community, the public education in the hard school of experience may lead to taking sides with the miners in the demand for State OAvnership of the mines along with control by the men who know how to work them, and are prepared to do so in the best interests ol the community, so long as thcommunity sees that justice is done to them. V. * * * The education of Dr. William T. . Hornaday, trustee of tho American Defence Society, has »jylecfetl been neglected. This Jv ducat-ion. may sound strange in view of the title of this official, signifying a college education; but il must be remembered that, much of what lr-; caii'-'d education in colleges is ignorant knowledge. At any rate, this doctor does not seem to understand the nature of Labor and capital. He says, in a nonsensical statement anent Bolshevism, quoted in a local daily, that capital is just as necessary -to labor as labor is to capital. This is not true. The fact is that without labor—the daily labor that feeds and clothes and houses the world —all the capital in existence would be quite useless. There are men worth millions to-day . What would their millions be worth if labor did not bring forth its fruits? Suppose the laborer refused to work and food could not be procured, the even with capital world be able to exist only a few days longer —if even that —than the wage slave. Capital is useful to man only so long as the laborer keeps on working. Let him refuse to work and the magic power of capital is gone. Capital will not feed a man or clothe him or house iiiiii _-.i-t.i-. .\o ruj.i.l.r v.-'i;:,:. form the capiUii t_.L_..'. it i, : . usel_.o to its owner if it cannot command labor. But if everything that h. known as capital \vc-_. to di.a.p_e;__and man had nothing but the labor of his hands to serve him, he need not starve. Put a capitalist on a.j_._ert island with all his capital and what could he do with it? Nothing at ail that won Id help him to live. He would have to find his daily bread by laboring for it. He would be in the position of primitive man. But if "capital" were to disappear, mankind to-day would not be in the position of primitive man. They could make shift to exist without capital, and without going back to the state of the cave- ' dweller. This will sound like a fairy tale to Dr. William T. Hornaday, trustee of the American Defence Society, but it is very much truer than his silly idea that capital is as necessary to labor as labor is to capital. -„ * ■_ * At the moment of The Worker going to press, news comes to. hand that makes it appear that A Revolt the British Revolution, ox a which has been going • Revolution, on for a century, by means of constitutional and direct action, approaches a climax. It is idle to talk about the right or wrong of Direct Action. Direct action is a fact, and has to be faced and recognised. It is an effect of a cause, and, moreover, as an industrial weapon intelligently used, has an end in view. Mr. Lloyd George, whose hopeless failure to carry out his election pledges has lost him and his Government not only the confidence of the majority of the elector-., but the determined hostility of Industrial Labor, declares that the strike of the railwaymen was engineered by a ' small body of. men seeking to exploit Labor for subversive ends. This is thc political cant of a political quack, who is a bigger menace to tho peace of the country than any other one man in the political and industrial camps of Britain. Direct Action has been forced on the workers by him and his Government, which allows a small body of men to exploit Labor for profit, and by a supine and foolish community that allows a Government that cannot govern to misma,nage the country's affairs so abominably that Labor can see no hope of securing justice by means regarded as lawful and constitutional. "The newspapers are in practical unanimity in considering that the men received a fair offer," states the cables. Of course. The newspapers represent the moneyed interests and the political mandarins who run the country for their own benefit. Our local Press, which knows nothing about the position except what is cabled through by anti-Labor agencies, declares that bad as tho prospect is. it is a relief to feel that the- _tniggle v/i.l i'.o f.iial, meaning, of course, that the workers will be defeated, and Law and Order that keeps Capital on the back of Labor will triumph. That is by no means cerlain. Even if, by using the military, Labor is, for thf: time being, subdued, Labor wilt come again, and again, md afraln until the Trump ot _Pooa_ tt .accessary. ,_-_.; - —<*-