Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1922-12-01
Faith in Macdonald.

STATE ONIlGI.
Faith in Macdonald.
Pictures have frequently been drawn
in England of labor descending upor
the commonwealth armed to the teeth
and prepared to seize all property
everywhere. Macdonald's determined
stand against the communist organiza-
ton in England did much to weaken
the effect Of these pictures.
"The labor weapon against reaction
ary revolution" he said, "is not armed
force, but a strike with the govern
ment at it's head, such as happened in
Germany when Kapp marched into
Berlin" He was discussing possible
obstructionist tactics in the event that
his party really controlled parliament
and referred to the action of the Ger
man Socialist cabinet in March, 1920
with President Ebert at its head, in
leaving Berlin to the revolutionists but
issuing a call for general strike that
made the revolutionary position i'm
possible within less than week.
Macdonald has written and spoken
much concerning the probable tactics
and actions OF his party when it takes
over the reins of British Government,
a prospect no longer fantastic and by
many consideted almost certain within
n year or two
"a labor Hing's Speech" he said
in 1920, would regret the condition in
which the war has left Europe, the
failure of the work done since the
armisticc, our Russian policy, the
blockade and particularly the parlous
positions of the League Of Nations. 1t
would welcome our late enemies irto
the League and would try to enable the
League to reconsider its own constitu-
ton so that it become council of
peoples and not merely an executive
Of governments"
The Labor Party, he believes, would
be better equipped to conduct the
foreign office than the parties that
have been in control Of it in the past.
Particularly through his partys inter-
national conferences and connections,
he says, would it have clear picture
of negotiations with foreign countries
in the terms Of humanity and the real
interests involved, rather than in those
of misty documents and coded prin-
ciples.
Uses Beefeaters' Simile.
1.-THE foreign office" he says, "its
mind and methods, are in relation to
modern government what the gaudily
liveried beefeasters Of the Tower are to
the modern policeman"
The Labor Party's astounding vote
in the recent election would have been
much larger it is generally conceded,
but for the party's stand on the ques-
ton of capital levy. On this subject
Macdonald said in his book, "a Policy
for the Labor Party"
The capital that has been lost ow-
ing to the war still stands in our pri-
vate ledgers at old figures; none of us
own what we try to maintain that we
own, and it is in the interest of every
body severally and collectively that our
figures should approximate more near
ly than they do to the actual wealth
which we command. Upon these prin-
ciples of honest and real finance the
Labor Party stands when it proposes
to reduce debt by conscripting wealth
on scale adjusted to correspond with
ability to pay"
Macdonald was born in Lossiemouth
in 1866, and after completing his edu-
cation at board school went to Lon
don in 1888. For time he was clerk
and then a private secretary. In 1900
he became the Secretary of the Labor
Party O.. r. c. and in 1908 he was
returned to parliament from Leicester
The charge is thus frequently made
against him that he is not working
man himself, though aspiring to be a
labor leader.
Macdonald was an outspoken oppon-
ent Of the war from the very begin
ming. On Aug. 3, 1914, he made a
speech in the house of commons
criticising the policy of Sir Edward
Grey in bringing England into the war.
Worked to Bring War.
when Sir Edward Grey failed to
secure peace between Germany and
Russia" he said, "he worked delibe-
ratcly to involve us in the war, using
Belgium as his chief excuse"
He denounced the atrocity reports
that were spread early in the war, as
he had denounced atrocity reports in
the Bocr War.
In 1915, writing to a clergyman
who had taken him TO task for his at
tack upon Sir Edward Grey, he said:
Il believed and do so still that the
policies of Entente and Alliance were
wrong, that they had to issue in a
competition Of armaments and ulti-
matcly in war. l therefore did not see
the war, when it actually game, in that
aspiring simplicity of struggle be-
tween the blackest sin and the purest
virtue, and if that kind of mind is the
only one that can serve a country dur
ing a war, J. am sorry, but it is not