Omaha daily bee., 1920-01-20
Public's Stand for Rights
In Fight Between Capital
And Labor Is A Good Sign
New Awakening Is Observed in All Organizations-A A
Demand for Justice and Square Deal Dominates
All Proposed Remedies for the Unrest In Indust-
rial Conditions

Nclc Dcltcl OH tndn ever Shake-
speare was, or Dickens or Thacker-
ay, or Cervantes, or Goethe. We're
securer; we have a new standing
and organization did it'll
College Mans Point.
| live in a college town. and al
about are college professors. They
complain bitterly of cold and hunger
and long hours of work and low
pay; | hear that their living condi-
tions are being investigated not only
by the government but by at least
one foundation. The union is the
| only remedy!
As | say, this tendency toward
group organizations has gone to
great lengths in our society. 1t has
been a powerful centrifugal inhu,
ence, disintegrating our life into
thousands of small, warning groups,
societies, factions-each seeking its
own advancement, its own security
regardless of anything else. This
has applied to both employers and
employees.
One reason why political life has
reached such low ebb in America
why politics attracts so poor a
quality OF leadership-is because
vital men who really want some
thing done feel surtr of getting it
through outside organizations than
through the indirect and cumbrous
machiner~ef politics.
In its essence this strong, crude
impulse toward a new public order
represents powerful reaction from
these disintegrating tendencies.
For years we were hammering
selfish capitalistic organizations
we are still at it-and now we are
hammering labor organizations. We
don't want either Gary or Gompers
to boss US; to control our lives or
force their will upon us.
We have had one or two recent
object lessons of stunning force.
The entire 100000 of US have
seen our business paralyzed, our
production cut off in the steel in
dustry because Gary and Gompers
could not agree. The 100000
of us have suffered still more acutely
because 100000 of us who are coal
miners stopped producing basic
necessity of life. There was never
demonstration Of group interest
before in America such an acute
against public interest. No wonder
the American giant is angry
blindly angry-and beats about in
a kind of berserkian rage-not at
all particular as to what heads he
hits, or how.
A New Sense Abroad.
II this rage, however, were the
only expression of the public inter-
est, the outlook would be dark in
deed. But it is not. While there
are powerful forces using the fine
burst of passion for new ideal"
for public rights" for 'law and
order' in America to serve their
own selfish interests-using it as
a smoke-screen to conceal their
own purposes-there is, it seems to
me. new sense abroad that law
and order must be based upon a
real understanding of the new con-
dltions and upon a solid foundation
Of Justice.
Never before has there been such
a number of inquiries from all sides
and by all kinds of organizations; or
such desire to get at the truth. We
have had government inquiries-one
commission now sittlng-which have
aroused unusual public interest. 1t is
nothing that the presidents first
commission failed; at least. it failed
dramatically, with the protagonists
of the opposing issues clearly re-
vealed.
On what may be called the side Of
the capitalists the awakening is
marked. The other day in the Office
OF one of the notable figures of Wall
Street-wllere one would least ex-
pect to find such sentiment-I saw
framed and hanging on the wall
this quotation from a speech by Mr..
Asquith, delivered in January Of last
year:
THE old system has broken down.
War was its final declaration of in
solvency. New factors are at work.
Science not only has said its last
words. but is fairly to be described
as still only lisping the alphabet of
anihilation.'
New Methods Devised.
Organizations such as chambers of
commerce and merchants associa-
tions have been working on the
problem. They all begin with the as
sumption that the old system is at
least cracking, if not, as Asquitn
says, broken down, and that new
must be devised to meet the
situation. | have before me. for ex-
ample, the report of the Merchants
association of New York. which at
tributes the difficulty to the greed
and blindness of both groups--labor
and capital--and suggests the follow
ing remedies, which are very differ
ent in tenor from those which would
have been recommended by similar
organization few years ago:
"The recognition by both employ
ers and employees that the determina-
ton to achieve national prosperity
rather than to enforce maximum
selfish returns should be the control
ling motive in industry.
THE establishment of recog-
nized and permanent method of con-
ference between the employer and
his employees.
The limitation Of the economic
law of supply and demand as ba-
sis of labor policy by the utilization
of more human doctrine"
The Chamber of Commerce Of the
United States has also made public
the careful report of a committee
which lays down IS principles of
industrial relations.H Among these
principles are the following:
The public interest requires ad-
justment of industrial relations by
peaceful methods.
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