New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-04-22

did that night OF August a, 1914, alIer
it had declared war, was to take over
the British railroads and operate them
for the general welfare. The first thing
the French Government did when it
found itself forced into war was to take
over the French railroads of which it
was not already the possessor.
Both countries then awoke to the fact
that railroads were but beginning.
They must have government factories
and government business. Observe,
then, what that means. Government
energies from the cave wherein for so
many ages it has played the hermit
crab and becomes the greatest and most
powerful agency in all departments of
commerce. 1t takes over the wool bust
ness and the coal mining business, the
hay business and the leather business,
the zinc business and the indigo busi-
ness. 1t is a trader, manufacturer, a
carrier. With equal facility and sue
cess it keeps a saloon and operates a
steamship line.
When l left Great Britain a few
months ago the government had taken
over 1901 factories of different kinds.
But, you say, it will give them back.
Some of them-not all. 1t cannot pos
sibly retire from the business into which
it has entered. Because here is this
crushing and phenomenal debt it is pill
ing up, debt so far beyond all previous
conceptions of national Indebtedness
that it staggers imagination. To pay
the interest on this debt the government
must take to itself large share of the
profits in which Private Gain was for
merly allowed to wanton and revel 1t
has no choice; either this or ruin. For
if it attempts to meet that colossal in
terest charge by raising money in the
old way it plunges all the workers and
producers into poverty so profound
and so hopeless that civilization would
revolt and industry itself would event.
ually be wrecked.
In other words, what is ahead is bust
ness conducted for the Common Good
instead of business conducted for indi-
vidual ACKNOWLEDGEMENT. And there you
are. That is our case.
You can see this great change in full
swing in England; to-day you can see
the beginning of it in the United States.
What else mean these new plans of tax
alton that shall confscate all profits?
What else means this ready surrender
of our gains to the need of the nation
and this magnificent new spirit that
says nothing is worth thinking of, but
that our mother, the Republic, shall live
and her faith shall triumph?
So we shall see, not at one blow, but
steadily coming, the destruction of the
old system by which we manufactured
"gorged idleness and famished indus
try" billionaires and paupers, slums and
palaces, superfuity for the few and in
suficiency for the many. And anything
that will bring that about can applaud,
no matter what name it bears nor with
what sacrifices it comes.
Even war? you say. Yes, even war.
At the risk of causing the large, pale
lips of Pacifsm to culver with inexpres-
sible emotion, | aver that there are
worse things than war. take this war
at it's worst. | go through the sadly
silent streets of Paris. | see all these
sad-faced women in mourning. / think
about all the desolated homes they rep
resent. l stand in the trenches with the
brave poilus. see them go forth to a
charge, knowing that half of them will
never come back. 1t is terrible; no
words may say how terrible. And yet
still more terrible would have been the
fate of this world if despotism had over
whelmed it, faith and hope had passed
from it, liberty had persisted in it, there
had been for it no other power than the
mailed fist, no other code of morals but
gain, greed, and material success how
ever achieved, and no ideals but to grab
and to hold.
From the manifold and enduring hor-
rors of that pit of despair the world was