Evening star., 1924-05-28
II.
BY EDWARD PRICE BELL,

BY EDWARD PRICE BELL.
Especial Dispatch to The Star and Chicago
Daily News. Copyright. 1924
ROME, May %. when we sup
pressed maniacal and disastrous
strikes in Italy, particularly in the
postal and other public utility services,
there was an outcry in some Quarters
that We were trampling upon liberty"
said Sig. Mussolini. in continuing his
discussion of the Fascist movement
and it's accomplishments in Italy.
Upon what liberty? If we were
trampling upon liberty, we were
trampling upon no liberty except that
of the labor agitators to overthrow the
state, to enslave the people, to destroy
industry and commerce. to threaten our
peninsula with famine and to wipe
out the priceless heritage of genera
tions of Italian valor, eliminating at
liberty fascismo is, verify, an enemy.
And let 1t be remembered. in con-
nection with all this, that when we
struck at the monstrous pretensions of
honest labor; we lifted up honest
labor's heart from the Alps to the
Ionian Sea.
1T is said that fascismo is aristo-
ization of high ethics and high culture.
But in what respect is the spirit OF a
people, of the common people, never
fiatter them - dissociated in SYM
pathy from high ethics and high cul-
ture? Fascismo's aristocracy is the
ariStocracy of the spirit, the aristoc-
racy of order, of law. against the
tumult of the instincts and of popular
passions. Charges against me and
against fascismo of hostility to the
workers are groteSque.
Fascismo's Attitude Toward Labor.
Work, Who works more than I.
with dozens of committees coming into
this room every day and with appeals
continually flung on my desk rejecting
the urgent needs of the 5000 COM
munes of Italy-appeals, by the way,
not for the liberty our opponents de-
clare our people have lost. but for aid
in improving the living conditions and
safeguarding the health of the masses.
Work l regard as the highest virtue or
man and as the most powerful mani
festation of the health of a people.
Italian workers were among the orig
inal Fascist, and today fascfsmo has
strong majority of them. together with
small bourgeoisie who are nearer TO the
working class than to what you call
the middle class. But l prefer that
fascismos attitude toward labor should
be deduced from it's conception OF the
state, which belongs to no one unless
to those who serve it; and the square-
cornered, firm, solid, unruff1ed ltaiian
worker serves his country no less than
does any one else" ...-
Your creed of liberty embraces the
economic field?"
81 am for the greatest economic
liberty. The strong state does not in
the least mean the state that wishes
Il h fs.F- al a NJ
self. On the contrary, am convinced
that the stronger the state the great
er is the effective liberty within
which the economic life develops.
Economic enterprise mas as mucn
need of liberty at home as of security
abroad"
Clearing the Ground.
"Tascismo has been destructive as
we'll as constructive"
"Oh, yes. II had a great fabric to
erect-the fabric of new Italy-and
the building site was badly numbered.
1t was numbered by the debris of So
cialistic and demagogic wrongs and
failures. Unwarranted privileges, cor
rupt politics, bolshevistic madness,
uneconomic laws, called for removal.
House rent ordinances were confis-
and opening before tens of thousands
of people the prospect of no roof to
cover their heads Radical laws and
regulations shielded strikers. Confis-
catory inheritance duties were dis
courag ging thrift and small property
and driving capital out of the coun-
try. All these dead weights, these
postwar deposits, fascismo swept
from the building site of Italian ma
tional life-not always, perhaps, do
ing its work too tenderly-before
commencing the erection of the new
state"
What are some of the constructive
achievements"
'Italy's budget balanced; war fet-
ters on liberty and property broken;
confiscatory land legislation scrap
ped; limited suffrage granted to wom-
en-: religion reintroduced into the
public schools; majority rule asserted
over coalescing minorities; tax dodg-
ers rounded up; paper circulation de-
increased; death duties abolished in
the interest of the family group; out
flow of Italian capital stopped; inflow
of foreign capital started: the Ira
appreciated; labor given the eight
hour day: value of government Sc
curities enhanced; railroad traffic aug
mented; strikes abolished and unem-
ployment reduced almost to the van
fishing point.
Effects OF Immigration Laws.
ITALY is tranquil. Italy is working.
The equal OF her stability is scarcely
to be found in Europe. Yet the Ita1-