The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1919-03-28


ten Especially for the American
Alliance for Labor and Democ-
racyD
Article |
When you read in the news dis
patches from day to day items about
the food shortage in Bosnia or Mo
ravia or some other remote corner
of Europe do not pass these by as
things of no particular concern to
this part of the world. Ponder
them and remember them, for they
have already the most grave and i'm
portant meaning for you and will
shortly have more.
They are symptoms of the most
tremendous crises in human history
and you and your country are al
ready involved in it.
They mean not merely that the
people in some town or village you
never heard of before are in want,
but that terrible famine threatens
millions and has begun to descend
upon still other millions.
The peace treaty will declare the
end of this wars actual fighting of
man against man. 1t will not end
the cares, responsibilities or huge
expenditures this country assumed
when it entered the war. No, nor
it's self denials nor its solemn duty
to mankind.
We have been slow in laying hold
of this fact. We shall have to come
to it now. We had all thought in
an easy, comfortable way that our
troubles were about over and with
the signing of the treaty we could
go back to the good, old conditions,
do business on the old terms, make
money and be happy.
Not This Year, Nor the Next
A large part of Europe is starv-
ing. We shall have to keep it alive,
1t is broken, PROSTATE and begin
ming to despair. We shall have to
set it again upon its feet. 1t is slip
ping upon the edge of chaos We
shall have to save it, if it is saved
at all.
For nearly five years agricultural
and other production has been
strangled by the war. The result
has struck US now. 1t is an utter
collapse of all the means and ma
chinery of life.
Over great areas of populous coun-
try there is next to nothing to eat;
there are no supplies of clothing;
medicine, seeds, shoes.
Even in countries where condi-
tions are the best, countries west Of
the Rhine, such as Belgium. Hol-
loand, much Of France, the distress
is acute. East of the Rhine it is
intolerable.
The records of mortality are like
those of some visitation in the Dark
Ages of some black plague.
Practically all Of Stlecia, Galicia,
Rumania and ell of Armenia, are
starving. In parts of Austria finn
inc is appalling. In Vienna only the
rich can get a sufficient amount of
food. In Constantinople the people
in February were dying faster than
they could be buried. In Germany
the present slender food stocks will
be exhausted in about two weeks
and what may happen then fills all
thinking men with ineXpressible
alarm.
Italy has worked through the win
ter on half rations, without coal and
with her industries largely paralyzed
in consequence. France, for reasons
shall explain hereafter, is in a
state of greatest economic peril. In
Russia millions have died this win
ter of starvation and of the epidem-
les that have resulted from under
nourishment. Poland and Bohemia
are in the direst want The lives
of the new governments hang form
day to day on the sheer question of
food.
The terrible possibilities that lurk
behind these conditions may be
gathered from what is going on in
Bulgaria. Starvation and despair
have ben followed by such chaos and
anarchy that mankind seems to have
returned to the lowest forms OF
savagery. Except where the Allied
troops are stationed there is nc
shadow of authority or order. Bands
of hunger maddened men roam
about numbering and pillaging
Terrible tortures sometimes attend
their searching for concealed food