The Washington times., 1933-01-05

have become convinced that there is something wrong
with the longer and uger word it is accurate, but it
is negative; it may be putting the cart before the horse
What's Normal?
When was about IL enthusiastic engineer rebuked
for talking about wireless telegraphy To say wire
less, he explained assume that the new method
was only variation of the old, that teegraphy with
wires was the normal thing and teegraphy without wires
was merely passing novelty He said it like call
ing an automobile (that the word used them
"horseless carriage" Similarly to keep talking of
unemployment suggests that employment is the normal
and natural thing. Perhaps it isn't.
When w. S. Gilbert wrote about the felon not engaged
In his employment he meant mot busy at his chosen
work in the world" he did not that the burglar
habitually worked for someone else and drew wages
It is in the second sense that we now the word and
1t IS in that sense-of getting job and wage from
someone ese that employment may not be the natural
universal and eternal thing we assume it to be.
Some Ways Out
There are dozens of ways in which escape en-
pGyment and sti live and be happy You remember the
Old story OF the Engshman who said "Of course
to say what in America you have leisure class, to
which an American answered, ooh, yes have; but
call them tramps Being tramp is, for people,
agreeable way of escaping employment. Being the
dole is another And dozens of schemes being aired
all of which that millions of will not be at
work in the future they will consume, but not produce
About million men formerly "unemployedeD are now
working in shops and on FARMS trading their product
for the product of Others They not employed by
anyone they employ themselves. If the dispersal of
great manufacturing ceners could be accomplished
factories placed in the midst of FARMS might
work Tor themselves half year. IN the factory half
year, and from employment to self-drected work.
without too much friction. And there other ways
Work Is Wanted
My point is that all assume that IL million men
must return to shops and factories forever Temporarily
this is true because want the kind of prosperity
had 1929 but there may be other in the future
for II million men, which make them happy and
give them work to do which is probably fundamental
Of happiness, without giving them employment.
Before the Civil War, the majority of Americans were
not employed since they lived farms and worked for
themselves I do not know whether they lived better
than we do or happy we have been at times.
Go back few hundred years and employment had forms
totally different from own ranging from slavery to
apprenticeship. And thought that those forms of work.
ing divnely ordered and eternal It begins to ap
pear that they were wrong.
Two Defeatsts r..
They were, in fact, Republican pessimists; when
plague starvation threatened, they sure
nothing could be done and that everything would be all
right if enough people died and left everything to time
The other kind of pessmist, the Communist kind, is
equally convinced that nothing can be done and every
thing will be all right if down and scrap the whole
system Neither quite intelligent at this time
Something DONE slowly and with infinite pain; and
the old system was not scraped but wore itself out
The ultimate object at this moment to make life pos
sble and agreeable in this country Getting jobs is only
method the only know. But Justice Brandeis
said "We must let our minds be bold" Possibly
find another way to ourselves do not think that
adding IL million to the number of farmers now in
trouble is the way But have little (somewhat shat
tered) faith in what the human mind can conceive.
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