The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1920-02-14
Shall Chaos or Reconstruction
in Europe Follow the Great
World War?
DANGER IN GENERAL UNREST
Practically Universal Feeling of Dis
content Will Grow Unless the
Causes Which Gave II Birth
Are Removed.
Article VII.
ey FRANK coMERFoRD.

BY FRANK coMERFoRD.
A specter haHnts Europe. 1t is the
ghost of unrest. When / started out
to interview unrest in Europe | did
not give my ear to the idle theoriSt
who always knows all about every
thing. but never from direct expert
ence with it, nor did | go to the agta-
tor who breaches unrest in red words
Neither did | seek out the type of IA
natical labor leader, who is eager for
trouble, who is trying to mobilize un-
rest and marshal it under the banner
of Revolution. l passed by the place
hunting, time-serving politician. ! WAS
not interested in platitudes and prom
Uses
| sought knowledge of unrest from
those who knew it from contact with it,
those who were part and parcel of it,
/ went TO the man in the street, the
average man. / talked with the
sweaty, dirty coal miner at the mouth
of the shaft. he had just come from
his day in the darkness deep in the
ground | visited the man who works
in the mills. | listened to the rough
speech of the teamSter. / went TO fac
tories and talked with men between
the two whistles which mark the time
of the noon meal. They munched al
black bread, ate cheese or sausage
gulped tea. coffee or cheap, diluted red
vine spent time with the idle, the
| idle by choice as well as those without
work through no fault of their own
Only yesterday many, yes, most OF
| these men were in khaki;- now, back
| on the job in overalls. they were think
| ing Their speech was troubled. Dis
| content looked out from their eyes. !!
could feel it. They talked it. but never
as unrest, always protest.
Unrest Must Be Quoted
Their state of mind is the problem.
| Unrest is epidemic; it is militant.
/ There is little of pacifism in it. 1t is
i real. ii is not without cause. To get
4 close TO the cause of this disease which
threatens revolution, one must know
and understand what is going on in
Il .he inindS of the men we are looking
10 and depending upon to do the
worlds work. 1t doesn't take a
prophet to understand that If heed is
not given to the things Irritating them
and Il remedy is not found for the irri
tation. serious trouble will follow
While war is hell, it has at leas
the restraint 'of discipline. A revolu
| - g =
mob madness, terrorism, fanatical
brutal cruel and merciless. Ono,
started. it would spread like wildfire
The world would be swept from III
senses. The fire would run its courS'
: until stopped because there was moth
ing left to burn Who dares picture tn
. state in which it would leave tn
world? In this day, when the nerve
of the world are on edge. when COLI
and hunger irritate, one shudders whel
he thinks of the fate of civilization
if unrest is not checked before it ex
piodes in passion and wrath.
Unrest existed before the war. 1t wa
an acorn then, it is an oak now. BE
fore the war men were complaining
md justly complaining, about their lo
The difference now is that four year
IN the trenches have caused them t
:. stop complaining and act. Soldierin
taught them much. They learned c
The greatness of force.
; Back of their present tendency [
] act is the grown grievance and I'll
var lesson. Before the war they con
alained; today they demand. 1t is il
eresting. to examine unrest in II
:; complaint stage, as these men knew
;, before 1914.
70 These plain, ordinary average me
Al nave always been intensely human
S. gfev loved their wives and childre
d fho. lived for their homes, they fe
keenly their responsibility for the ha
ainess oftheir loved ones. They ha,
1 nut one thing to give. Before the ";
they gave it unsparingly-it was the
:, labor. Their one source of income W:
the pay envelope. With their wag,
they had to buy shoes, Clothes foo
brought into the world. and for Il
women they had chosen to be the mot
ers Of those children.
Home" Before All.
- Home, Sweet Home" is the int
i national anthem. 1t is the heart sol
of the average man. The club pia
no part in his life. From his home
goes to work, and from work he 90
home. Shanties and tenements q
not homes. These men have alwa
protested against the ugly shacks
which they We're compelled to hou
their loved ones. They bit their Ii
in jobleSs days when their childr
went to bed hungry. Resentme
grew in their hearts when they S;
how poorly dressed their wives Il
children were. They muttered ours
when their children were forced to
to work. They wanted to give tn
cbiI1pop baftor oI,,oo ton +I,o,