Evening star., 1925-10-18
Wastage of Men in American Industry
One of Great Economic Evils of Day

| placed labor. / was thinking OF our
abandoned farms, of Lloyd Georges
"ba ok to the-farm' movement and Of
Henry Ford's statement that the day
of the big cities is nearing it's end.
| ''Of course" / suggested, thou
sands Of these displaced laborers might
| then drift back to the farms. which
would be a good thing for them"
They most assuredly would not"
| Mr.. Stewart shot back with emphasis.
| And If they did 1t would not be
| good thing for them, for us or for
| the farms. There are too many peo-
| pie on the farms right now. There is
| no place where there is more human
wastage than the farms. Henry Ford
| says, / am told, the work of the aver
| age farmer could be compressed into
rs days If he would use modern labor
| saving machinery. / do not know
whether this is true. But | know it
as at least partly true. ] know this.
| that if the modern methods now used
| on Illinois farms were used every
where we could get rid of 100000
farm laborers right away. That
| would be a cut of so per cent. We
| don't want people drifting back to
| the farms. And they are not going
| to drift back. More are going to move
| into town"
And then | realized | was in the
presence of a rare specimen-an out
and-out defender of the city. Most
public men sing their songs to the
country and live in the city. This
man sings of the city and its glories.
City People All Right.
Don't you worry about people in the
city," he went on. 1T is in the city
that ideas are fertilized and ex
changed It was in the cities that
civilization was Graded and in which
! it must be continuously nourished for
marvellous futures yet to come We
need not have cities like our present
ones. We will have to put the town
planners to work, as they have done
In the Federated Malay States. to see
to it that streets are wide and clean
that the towns are properly zoned
and that there are plenty of parks
and sunlight"
Then, leaning forward, he said
earnestly:
And we must put machinery to
work for mankind. Work does not
hurt any man, but drudsery never
helped any man. We call these poor
beasts of burden who toll in dark and
filthy places under intolerable burdens
hunkies' and 'wops' We must take
these burdens from their backs. We
| must rehumaniZe them. They Will
cease to be 'wops' and 'hunkies.'
More Goods to Consume.
by increasing and cheapening pro
duction we will bring vast amounts OF
| our products within the reach of ali
| and thus create new industries and
expand others. Narrow minded labor
unions might fight the machines for
while, but the intelligent unions
already understand. Stupid capital
lists may draw back from the invest
ment in expensive machines. but they
will go down against the competition
of the wise ones who do not hesitate.
| People are fearful of the machines.
seeing in them the symbol of material
ism. But 1t is the machines which
will emancipate us from material
ism. Just as they will make more
work they will make more leisure for
all The leisure of the Greeks gave
| birth to the age of Pericles. That
leisure was made possible by human
slavery. But our leisure-leisure to
think, to enjoy art and music and
| books-Will be made possible not by
the slavery of men, but the slavery OF
machines"