The toiler. [volume] (Cleveland, Ohio) 1919-1922, 1921-05-28
A CURB FOR THE
WORKERS.
By WALTER T. JOHNSON.

Professor zechariah Chafee, Jr.,
Professor of Law in Harvard Uni.
versity, has written book called
Freedom Of Speech" have not
read the book, but I understand that
it is scholarly and accurate" It is
a sweeping indictment Of the things
perpetrated under the Espionage
Act" BY taking middle ground
between the two views that f1) free
dom Of speech may be ignored in
war time, and (2) all speech is free
and only action can be constrained,
the professor arrives at the conclu-
sion that the legislature and courts
went furthr than the law allows.
That is what legislatures and
courts do in times of crisis. Then, if
the country jogs along in the same
way after the crisis has passed, the
very excesses Of the government be-
come interviewer into the law Of the
land and we have 1precedents" for
passing and administering all sorts
Of laws quite remote from what
plain people would think could be
based on the constitution. Then,
when the next crisis comes along it
will be quite all right for them to
do 10 us what Woodrow Wilson and
Mitchell Palmer did.
If that were all, it would be
enough. The next thing for us to
know is that the war was not the
crisis under cover of which these
things were done to us. It was only
part of the crisis. The country has
not returned to normalcy. Today as
l write this, the newspapers carry
the news that William D. Haywood
and seventy-nine other I. w. WIS
who were convicted before Judge
Landis at Chicago in 1918 Of at
tempting to obstruct the govern
ment's prosecution Of the war, must
return to the Federal prison because
Of the Supreme Courts refusal to
review their convictions. The deci-
sions made during the war are being
upheld now. Or in other words, the
crisis is not over.
After the war was over the laws
were still being tightened. Red raids
were made. The crisis continued. 1t
is still with us. What is the crisis :?
Because of high prices, over-produc-
tion and unemployment there is un-
rest. That is the economic crisis.
Because of the seriousness of the
economic crisis and because of the
unrest among the workers, the gov
ernment feels that the ordinary laws
are not sufficient to deal with the
situation.
The economic crisis Is the result
Of the profit system. The govern
ment can not do away with the
crisis and the unrest which it causes
without doing away with the profit
system. It can no more do away
with the profit system than it can
run. industry without workers.
But the crisis is SO grave that
something must be done. The gov
ernment therefore tightens up the
laws and enforces them in such a
way as to cause professors of law
to open their eyes and write books
about it. a
Since the war, but during this
crisis, Communists have been tried
under apparently unconstitutional
laws administered in a very one
sided spirit, and jailed without the
usual opportunities for release on
bail. The Ben Gitlow, Harry Winitz-
ky, Jim Larkin, Ruthenberg and Fer
guson and the Georgian cases are
the result Of this crisis, of this
Tightening up Of laws.
Understanding the economic and
political causes of this campaign to
stamp out unrest by outlawing and
jailing working class leaders, we do
not express surprise. We do not write
q book to urge that lawS be more
legal and courts more judicial. We
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