Arizona republican., 1913-04-10
ASSOCIATED PRESS DIsPATcHl


 BRUSSELS. April 9.-The first active move in preparation for a great general strike to enforce the grant of manhood suffrage in Bel gium was made today by the send ing out of the country of many of the children of three or four hund red thousand workers who will lay down their toO.s on Monday. April II, at the bidding of the socialist party. l. is expected that the train service will cease or be greatly inn peded after Sunday. as the wives and daughters Of hundreds of workmen with the little ones of their own families or their neighbors. are cross ing the frontiers on every train to place the children safely in neutral states
 11,000 offers of provisional homes have been received by the directing committee of the strike 5000 of these are from France, 40O0 from Holland, and 1000 from Germany. The strike has been decided on by the Belgium socialist party as the
 
 government give to Belgium a system of manhood suffrage instead of the system of plural voting now in prac- tice.
 The success or on-success will be of consequence to the world at large for if it succeeds it will dem onstrate the practicability of the strike as a political weapon. Previous attempts at political, as distinguished from economic strikes invariably ended in failure, and notably in Spain and France. the opinion is held generally that d political strike is impossible.
 The Belgium movement appears to have been planned with extraordinary skill and care. The workers are de- termined and have full faith in the justice of their cause. The resources at their disposal are considerable and they have the practical. though un l official support of the liberals, none | the less vigorous from being indirect. The proprietor of d liberal news paper, Petit Bleu. has promised for mally to pay s2O.OO0 to the weekly strike fund as long as the movement l l hold out for six weeks.
 The government is faced with d possible economic catastrophe for an 1 industrial country like Belgium, which has occupied itself chiefly in making arrangements to repress dis order which the socialists deride as they are determined the strike will i be peaceful. Socialist chiefs Emile Vender Aide, and Edouard Anseele 1 affirm that any violence that may occur will be provoked by the gov | ernment and not by them. It is understood that all gendarmes will be called upon as we'll as the civi guards and several classes of troops are mobilized to guard the railroads Large coal orders placed in England and Germany insure constant sup ply of fuel state the railroads
 The primary cause of the move ment is to defeat the liberal ano socialist coalition at the pariamen tary elections in 1912 The socialis congress, specially summoned on Jun 90 of that year, decided to mall use of a general strike if all othe means of obtaining manhood suffrag failed. Before reSOrtlng to Una measure, general suffrage bill wa introduced in parliament by the so cialists, supported by the liberals This was refused all consideration , by the clerical majority. and a gen eral strike was voted for April IA. Steps have been taken on all side 1 to settle matters The burgomaster of the nine principal cities were re ceived by the premier who. while de claring that no government worth the name would allow Itself to b intimidated by threats of a mob, sai ii the menace of a general StriI - were removed he would be dispose i 10 talk