Omaha daily bee., 1921-08-13
Love and Lab0r'S LaW
Industry's Greatest Problems Can
Be Solved by Applying Christ's Rule

byteran New Era magazine as stating that the
vital need of the times is to bring harmony and
good will into the ranks Of employers and en-
ployes. Il have done my best" writes Secre-
tary Davis, "to urge the spirit of conciliaton in
industry since coming into Office here" He adds
that he is glad for such able and broad-mnded
assistance as is being rendered by the Presby-
| terian church. There cannot be- writes Secre-
tary Davis, "too many such workers in a field
so important to the welfare of the country"
Secretary Davis sent this message in response
to the information that the Presbyterian church
was working along an avowed declaration con-
corning labor and social problems. The Presby-
terian magazine prints his statement as a fore
word to Labor day message written by DR..
John Mcdowell secretary of the Presbyterian
board OF home missions, and announced to the
church through its official medium.
DR.. McDowelps message is entitled Indus
try's Challenge to the Church." In it he says:
Industry is suffering today primarily from
the lack of an adequate dynamic to drive out of
the heart of the individual and the heart of the
corporation and heart of the labor union the
devil of self-nterest, that power which separates
man from man and is the source of most of our
present industrial conflicts and disorders. In
this hour of imperative challenge the churches
must not ask for another leader than Jesus
Christ. Experience has confirmed the faith of
| Jesus Christ in love as working principle not
only for individual life and social life, but for
all life.
| Love, and only love, will make industry
work together for good; nothing else will.
Everything else has failed. Law has failed, edu-
cation has failed, science has failed, organization
| has failed, labor unions have failed, employers
| associations have failed. In word, every form
of industrial organization based on force sell
| fishness has failed Love, and love alone,
solve our industrial problems and usher in
cd 0fs scIp ,a1 md hocA1
on industrial justice.
Love will insist that mans daily work
shall be recognized his divine calling, his
vocation; that the place of the workman in the
organic union of both the church and state be
fully and gratefully acknowledged; that living
wage be secured for the laborer while he is fit
to work, so that he may be able to live decent
and Christian life and have good home; that
adequate provision be made for the laborcr when
he is aged otherwise unfit to work SO that
| the veterans of labor may be saved the stigma
of pauperism, and that there may be some final
court of appeal with adequate power in corncc-
ton with all industrial disputes.
Love will insist that it is impossible not to
be concerned with the conditions under which
men live and work. Love will demand that
man must do days work for days pay and
that man should get all he earns and earn all
he gets. Love will contend that the fruits of
industry must be guaranteed alike to employer,
employe and consumer. Love will solve the
three greatest problems in ndustry-namely, i'll
creased efficiency in production, increased equity
in distribution, increased satisfaction in work.
Love will put no shackles on the American
worker, whether he works with his hands or
with his head or with his heart. 1t will insist
that there is no room in this country for either
the tyranny of employers association or the
tyranny of labor union the tyranny of a
consumers association.
"On1y on such a basis can we have industrial
democracy in this land. Love will insist that it
must never be forgotten that it is not theories
alone which are involved in the industrial situa-
ton, but men and women and children; not
workshops alone or statistics or laws, but the
home the church, the nation, humanity. and /
that however it is done men must be able to
make their lives worth living and that the means
whereby decent moral life, life in harmony
with their origin and the standards OF Jesus
Christ, may be assured. In word, love will
insist that all who are living and able to work
shall be able to live by their work. The New
Testament makes it clear that the law oi love
governs the whole of life. 1t defines our relation
to men not only in the home and in the church,
but in industry, in commerce and in politics.
The church must insist that no man is soundly
converted who fails to understand and obey the
law of love. Conversion is something more than
change in religious sentiments. 1t involves
change in the ruling ideas as well as in the SEN
sibilties. The danger that specifically threatens
society at this moment is not the refined unbeliet
of scientific agnosticism, but the coarse ma
teralism that has saturated the life of the masses
and left them without any restraint other than
that of the direct force of law as asserted by the
policemans baton or the soldiers gun. TO exalt
Christ in the fulness of His Gospel is to meet
the worlds need of a Saviour from selhshness
which is the taproot of all individual and collec-
tive sin Commercial expansion demands the
brotherhood of nations. Democracy has made
the law of love a necessity and Christianity
reality.
"The practical question, after all, facing us
today is this: How shall l treat my brother,
who is associated with me in industry as my
employer or my empoye or my customer! Let
the Rev. J. Henry Jowett, DID. former pastor
of the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian church, an
swer for us:
"T find my own problems settled, at any rate
in spirit and principle, and settled with great
celerity when bring them into the light of the |
everlasting Fatherhood of God. For me, it set
ties the question as to whether the factory laws
should be amended in England When the light |
of the Divine Fatherhood fell upon the little !
children going to their work at 5 in the morn
ing, for me the question was settled. l had no
difficulty with an eight-hour bill for miners when |
brought the question to the everlasting Father.
The problem of old age pensions for the desti..
tute and honorable poor was speedily disposed OF |
when let the light of the everlasting Fatherhood
shine upon it. The claims of the cotters in the |
highlands of Scotland, crushed by the heartless-
ness of certain landed proprietors, seemed IN
evitable just when brought them into the in.
terpreting rays of the everlasting Fatherhood.' |
"When love rules brotherhood will prevail, |
and where brotherhood prevails weakness be- |
comes common burden and its service com.
mon tribute Selhshness asks: How small |
wages can be paid and get the work done? |
Brotherhood asks: How large wages can be