Montana labor news., 1938-09-01

ence telt In practical activities.
AS citizens we should reaffirm our
faith in democracy. For democracy
alone guarantees the liberty of the
human spirit and, by placing respon-
sibility on the individual, promotes
character and develops human per-
sonality. In the realm of industrial
relations, the basic idea of demo-
cracy finds expression in the organi-
cation of labor for collective dealing
with employers. For employers of
the great mass of industrial workers
today are no longer individuals, as
were the employers of a century ago,
but large companies or corporations.
In such circumstances there can be
no genuine negotiation unless it be
collective negotiation; no genuinely
free contract unless it be a collective
contract. Labor, therefore, must be
organized az a necessary factor in
the extension of democratic pro-
cesses in American life. The respon-
sible heads of some of our greatest
industries, who have entered into
collective bargaining relations with
their employees, have exhibited in
dustrial craftsmanship. On the other
hand, it is regrettable that some have
used the misdeeds of labor organiza-
tons as an excuse for obscuring the
major issue of democratic industrial
relations. Labor, like the employer,
must accept the obligations that go
with the democratic process, taking
care that the affairs of its own Or
CARNATIONS are Economically and
responsibly conducted.
During industrial conflict, unethi-
cal and unjustifiable methods On the
part of all parties too frequently pre-
vail. In the public interest as well
as their own, labor and employers
should discontinue ~resorting to vio-
lence, racketeering, autocratic meth
DDS, internal dissension, refusal to
participate in genuine collective bar
gaining, breaking of contracts, the
use of industrial spies, and mislead-
ing propaganda. Organization and
legislation alone will avail little if
the right spirit be absent. The
Church as a fellowship of the spirit
dare never forget or cease to empha-
size this fact.
Religious and Civil Liberties
Liberty is one and indivisible. We
cannot have freedom in one sphere
and deny it in another. In the world
today the right of labor to have a
voice in determining the conditions
of its work, and the right of the
Church to have a voice in deter
mining the conditions of its worship,
stand or fall together. Under dicta-
torships, whether of the Right or Of
the Left, it is not alone the freedom
of labor to organize Independently
of the employer and of the State
which has been denied, but also free
speech, free press, freedom of
assemblage, and freedom of worship.
Concerned as we are for demo-
cracy, we must also be concerned
for peace. For war is the enemy of
democracy. If war should come, we
would stand to lose in life and liber-
ties all our hard-won gains. We
must therefore unite in opposing in
creased ornaments, CONSUMPTION and
industrial mobilization; in supporting
all measures for removing the basic
economic causes of war; and in
building a cooperative world-order.
Ominous as is the condition of the
world, we would conclude this mes
sage in the words Of the Oxford
World Conference of Churches: 1--WE
are troubled yet we do not despair.
Our hope is anchored in the living
God. In His Name we set our
hands, as the servants of God and
in Him Of one another, to the task