The Connecticut labor news., 1923-11-03
A Helpful Duflook.

A Helpful Dutlook.
 Tn the main, however, think that the present generation has never seen more generally hopeful congress sional outlook. Men devoted to the interests of the masses of our people have been elected in such numbers that their will cannot be trampled under foot by any reactionary group.
 But 1t IS sheer foo1ishness to hold forth the hope that our social evils are to undergo rapid remedial adjust ment through the enactment of a multitude of laws To lead the peo- pie to believe that the pot of gold Is to be found at the foot of Legislative rainbow Is to court future disaster
 It IS true enough that in certain problems governmental action may be helpful, and even indispensable But the Capitol has no magic wand with. which to wave our people into tranquility and lasting happiness. The physician who helps us most : to-day is the one who teaches us how most to help ourselves --~.
 am persuaded that many per sons accept so readily the suggestions that their troubles can be cured by enactment of laws because it is SO easy to thus escape the necessity of themselves getting down to work
 The Easier Way.
 For example, it is much easier for industry to believe Congressman Blank when he promises law that will fRx everything than it is to get to work within the industry to do the necessary fixing. 1t is just so with the farmers. I have no doubt that thousands of farmers would believe the last good word had been spoken 6 Congress, in the next session, were to enact a law fixing the price of wheat at say $2.5o bushel, or what ever the price hxers think necessary.
 The organizing of farmers so that they may have an effective voice in determining the terms and conditions upon which the product of their toii shall be put upon the market is a l years to accomplish, while a law can be passed in few weeks, if every 1 thing goes well The difference is that one way is fundamentally right and the other is not. Does any one | suggest that wage earners should ask l that Congress fix their wages in pref | erence to the method of negotiation | and agreement with employers?
 Fears Bureaucracy.
 greatly fear a political bu- reaucracy. The portent of such great | machine is alarming. We have had | sufficient foretastei of it in our ex- perience with the machinery set up for the enforcement of the Volstead | act. We have observed it in the perfect flower of its development in Russia.
 We have more than an abundance of bureaucracy already. May we be | spared the infiction of tyrannies, great and small, that are inevitably | the concomitant of bulking govern mental machinery for the regu1ation of activities that are normally the f concern of world in which political politics as distinguished from indus trial politics has no understanding and no concern. -ss
 I am not frightened by appella- lions. Our own trade union movement has been called many names. Descrip- tons of my own position have run the gamut from extreme radical to extreme conservative. am con- cerned only with the true significance of things. I am not objecting to the possibility of state Socialism because of the sound of the term, but because of the actual consequences of the de-  And 1t is apparent that during the period that lies just ahead there will be many who will urge a program of state socialism and many who will listen with approval to such a pro-