The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1920-03-11


for following in the footsteps Of Is
hrst Lover Of the Poor were those who
cried out against the tenements, de-
handing for human beings the sun
shine and air cattlemen give their
stock. These unpopular ones were the
same who brought ice to keep milk
cool in the hot summer for the chill
dren of the slums; these were the
crusaders against child labor, the
protestants against compelling thelI
women who bear the children of the
race to work so many hours each day
that exhaustion marred and marked |
the physical and mental strength Oft
children.
So. it was that these redeemed,
freed children of Russia learned of
the cancer and feared 1t as much as
the thing they had escaped.
None Able to Check Disease.
They beheId old-school politicians
acting as doctors to sick civilization |
These doctors, miscalled statesmen, |
were agreed as to the cause of the dis
ease and that the symptoms threat |
ened death. Many prescriptions have
been given the patient, but none seem
to check the disease. These prescrip
tons had been various formulas of
government. the constitutional mon
archy, democracy, a republic. The
giving of these various treatments
failed to effect a cure. Civilization
continued to suffer. At times pain be-
came uncomfortable and the doctors gave
local anesthetics. These were the laws,
included under the general designation
Social Welfare Legislation" They
made the patient temporarily more
easy. They allayed pain that might
otherwise have produced commissions
Revolution.
And then these Russian people
studying the new world into which
they had so recently come, discovered
that many of these political doctors
were quacks, they were unreliable and
dishonest. They were more interested
in their own fortunes than the fate of
the patient. They imposed upon the
people who hired and trusted them.
Their time and thought was taken up
in holding their jobs, rather than in do
ing their work. That the schools of
| political medicine, called political par
ties, responsible for these doctors,
were diploma mills, graft rings. That
some of the people suspected these
physicians of being interested in keep
ing the patient sick and were not max
/ ing an honest effort to cure. 1t had
! even been rumored that there are peo-
pie in the world who make profit out
of poverty; that special privilege is
| the powerful profteer of our day.
Turned to Old Theory.
Plato had spoken about another
remedy way back in the fourth CEN
fury before Christ. SO had Marx. An
untried remedy-a theory. Its object
was to cure poverty. The Russians
! seeing that the remedies in common
4 use had failed, turned their thoughts
/ to this old remedy which had never
been tried. At least it had not failed
i this was in its favor. 1t was an ex
pertinent, to be sure but Nothing ven
tured. nothing gained" Many argued
that it could not more completely fai
than the prescriptions at present il
use.
And with the fall of imperialism
there came into Russia one who ha'
been eKiled For many years he hat
been a teacher and preacher of tn
untried remedy. Russia saw in hin
a savior. He came with message
He said that communism would keeI
them free. make them happy. The
| listened. they believed. They were a
little children, so great was thei
faith To them a promise was trutI
fulfilled, the word a covenant; and tn
promise was that peasants would hay
their own land, that working me
would be their own bosses. It was tn
word they had waited for. the realfza
ton of the dreams they had dreame
in the dark treadmill. The PrOphe
had come The new day awaite
| them. They rejoiced and cried Lon
: | live the new Messiah" No one sacr
, | legiously questioned the practicabilit
of the dream. Every one forgot tn
J | common, controlling instinct of man
| | seIfshness. Maybe in the intense ger
> eral selfishness individual selfishnes
| could not be seen.
, The man was Lenine-the messag
Communism.
S | Copyright. 1920. western Newspaper Unior
Food Smuggling in Germany.
Illicit trade in food, with its attend