Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1919-08-01
Let's All Go To Work.
From The Country Gentleman.


world, whether civilized or savage, healthy
or invalid, strong or weak, able or idiotic.
whether white, black, brown, red or yellow
they all owe their hundred dollars apiece.
1t is safe to say that they do not have
the money to pay the Indebtedness. 1t
is equally safe to say that the money does
not exist for paying this debt, but that it
will have to be earned by goods produced
as the result of labor, in the form of food,
clothing, houses, fuel, furniture, iron. steel
and the thousand and one other commodi-
ties whereby we live and sustain our
civilization.
There is no other way of paying this
debt. We may as well understand exactly
what has happened and approximately
how we are situated. The plain fact of
the business is that the world has been
running behind while men have been en-
Gagged in the gentle art of killing one an
other and blowing up their neighbors'
Improvements. For this reason there is
not enough food in the world to meet its
needs. Already the demand for housing
is too sharp to be satisfied. Our transpor-
tation facilities have been worn out faster
than they have been rebuilt. Our supply
of clothing is running down. We are get
ting lean at the waist and out at the
elbows, and generally in an unkempt con-
dition. We ought to 60 to work about as
quickly and about as effectively as possible.
But what do we see ? We see the cotton
farmers organizing to reduce acreage and
production in order to sustain war prices,
organizing that they may make more in
proportion, not as the world is supplied
but as it is unsupplied. We see workmen
all over the world striking for higher wages
and shorter hours-two realizations that
are entirely inconsistent.
Lobor argues that the cost of living has
increased more than the rate of pay, but
it does not seem to realize that the remedy
lies not in shorter hours but in increased
production. Labor seems to be doing moth
ing to make itself more effective, but. like
the cotton farmer. is after more money and
less work.
WHEN MONEY BECOMES WORTHLESS.
But this will never solve our problem.
Russia has shown us that men live upon
bread, not upon wages that money is
good only in proportion to the supply of
actual commodities that can be bought
with it; and that when production stops
money becomes worthless and men starve
and freeze REGARDLESS of the rate of wages,
the amount of money in their pockets or
the length of the working day.
The business of the cotton farmer is to
grow cotton, not to restrict its output to
the world S distress. The business of labor
is to produce goods, exacting, to be sure. a
fair wage and decent living conditions
but in it all and through it all to do bust
ness. If every man is going to hang back
and strike on his job we shall all 60 to
the bowwows together, and that right
speedily too.
Our debt will not amount to much if we
will all stop quarreling and 90 to work but il
is enough to smash us unless we do work it
off by increased production. 1t amounts
to about two hundred and fifty dollars per
inhabitant for the United States but it
can all be paid in ten years and we be the
better for the struggle, provided we 90 at
it and not try to cancel the obligation by
n,oLind focao of nna ounfhar
The sooner we all realize that nothing is
to be made out of war and that every one
of us must help to pay the bills, the better it
will be for us as individuals and as peo-
pie The well-to-do complain that things
cost so much they cannot afford to 60
ahead. Certainly; that is the inevitable
result of war, and we shall pay the debt
by this very same increased cost of things (;
there is no other way. The laborer con-
tends that despite his best efforts and all
the striking the cost of living advances
faster than his pay. Certainly; and that
is the way in which the labOrer will
help to pay his portion of the cost of
the war and from this there is no escape
We all will do well just now to heed the
economists dictum that despite indemni-
ties, reprisals and damages, trade relations
and favored nations" clauses there is n
ultimate escape from the fact that each
people will be Obliged in the long run. in
one way or another. to pay its own war
cost and that each one of us after his
own fashion will be obliged to stand some
share of the fiddlers bill.
Conditions are so abnormal now and each
of us finds himself working under such
handicaps that we all assume that some
body must be getting rich out of it. where
as there is far greater likelihood. if we
getting poor together. We are rather busy
just now looking for the fellow that is
making too much money in order that we
may prosecute him and put him in jail as
he deserves. Very well; there is an oc-
casional man of this kind and let him be
hunted out and fully prosecuted. He de
serves it and it is good for him. The
trouble with us is that we are just coming
out of a carnival of destruction. and ouI
crops. houses and clothing have been neg
lected for some four years now. Where
| fore we starve and shiver a bit.
1t is not more money but more goods
that we need. 1t is not shorter hours OF
labor but more effective work that is neces-
sary to relief. Il is not continuance Of
our orgies that will remove the dark
brown taste" Of the morning after" but
it is a good bath and hard days work.
Wherefore let every farmer produce all
he is able to, for the world needs ii. Let
the carpenter and plumber work long days
and honest days that everybody may have
better houses. and let all men everywhere
| eaa how much not how little can be &C.