Golden Age, February 18, 1920

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February

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VOX.CMB 1 WEDNESDAY. FSBRtLUtT IS, IPty Kentas* XI CONTENTS of tho GOLDEN AGE LABOX and ECONOMICS

Binding Man la Bundl«u..323 PrwWar OcdltioM ,.,,, ,33R

Middlu-ClnM Workers ------324 Knocking Out ths

Government Workers ........323 Foundation —..---------

SOCIAL and EDUCATIONAL

Ci tv Grtrbftve for Hogs—327 Schwab Not Pule Strtkea

England’s Child Stares......327 Living la New Tort.—

The Now Soioon....... .......223 Ou Reading Aloud

MANUFACTURING sad MINIKO Fuel Engineering .........331 m Blast-Furaaes

Cheaper 1 radium .— J3“l

FINANCE, COMMERCE. TRANSPORTATION Tbs Law of the Profits......333 public Utilities Treabled—334

Improved Highway Laws..234

POLITICAL DOMESTIC ind FOREIGN Fanners La Polities__________333 Anarchy—Common

Of Pvo/errM ? - -ITT

AGRICULTURE and HUSBANDRY

Beekeeping, A ProfaMioa..33F Diener's Giant Hybrids____340

l-Ittut Wheat Surrtvra......339 cSid.__L__J4S

Good Bye to the Horse.......340 An EarttUy Image..

■ SCIENCE sad INVENTION

Ufa of the Banri&na..--------__-------

TRAVEL end MISCELLANY

The Secondary Colors-------342 A Tragedy oC Lent Age... .343

HOUSEWIFERY sad HYGIENE

Twenty Millions for Medics 343 Mafijne and Adenoids and Osteopaths..343 Other Ml

RELIGION sad PHILOSOPHY

Ha> the Good Shepherd Juvenile Bible Study..__..34S

More Than Oue Fold 7.-345 Invocation to Liberty ——-34R

tc* Carrs a C^rr^UQ a Yus.

Make romlttsnces to TAs GoMsa Aye.

Golden Age =—=ssggg=gSMBa=a^g-^. Volume I . New York, Wednesday, February 18, 1920 Number 11

BINDING MEN IN BUNDLES

WE LIVE in a time when it seems as though almost everybody was in a union of some kind or trying to get into one, and the business and even the legislation of the world is becoming not so much a matter of dealing with individual problems as dealing with masses of men gathered together for the pursuit of some common object or objects which they have in view. ' To the true American there is something dangerous, something sinister, in the influence of lobbies at Washington or at other legislative centers. Once these lobbies were largely'of a personal nature, but this is rapidly changing. The first pronounced step in the way of what might be called a permanent corporate lobby at Washington was the location in that city of the general headquarters of the American Federation of Labor. More recently the Farmers of the country have also established permanent headquarters in the same city, and now comes the announcement that the representatives of Capital have decided to do the same thing.

It seems as though there is now only one great group at Washington that is not separately represented by a lobby, though perhaps that group is best represented by the Congress itself. We refer to the great middle classes who are ununiomzed. If Congress does not remember their interests in dealing with the representatives of Labor, Farmer and Capital, then they have no representation at all.

In Englknd,\where unionizing has gone much further th^n in the United States, a strenuous campaign is under way to organize the millions of clerks, bookkeepers, physicians, surgeons, dentists, newspaper men, ministers, lawyers, and others composing the middle classes, so that in the constant battle going on between Labor

and Capital they may not be forever and always the only real losers. The movement is meeting , with some success, though not as much as its '* friends hoped; for this class particularly dis- . likes to have its progress marked by the strife which has been inseparable from the forward steps of Capital and Labor. But the logic of ; events seems to be gradually pressing them into , the union ranks. They cannot hold out against the financial pressure which the high cost of > living is forcing upon them.

The wise man who knows just where the lines ■ of love and justice should be drawn in this mat- , ter of unionism should arise and bow; his where- I abouts is not generally known. It must be admitted that there are many employers who, no matter what their profits, never make a conces- . , sion in wages, or take any other step in the direction of the betterment of those of their fellow men who are working for them, until they are forced to do so, either by the men them- ; \

selves or by the public opinion of an aroused -and indignant people. There are plenty of employers who see nothing inconsistent in holding ? every employe down to the barest wages that will support life, while they themselves are rolling in every conceivable luxury. It is only in time of war or other national peril that such / “citizens” ever get anything like a comprehensive view of their proper relations to their fellow men; but as soon as the peril is over they go back to the same old selfish way of looking at things as far as the worker is concerned.

It does not appear to be sound wisdom to leave wages to the formula of begging, pleading and coaxing from men of such a stamp what they ought to be glad to give readily; and it is inevitable that in any place where aa many as

fifteen or twenty workers are employed they are liable to get together, sooner or later, and for their common good make such overtures as will protect them from the most glaring features of industrial injustice. A number of workers, associated together, can do for the whole what singly they would not be able to do for any. At the same time it is a violation of liberty to force anybody to join a union-

It is un-American for employers who are organized with other employers to discharge their employes for organizing themselves; and it is equally un-American for self-appointed committees of "business men"’ to get together, as they occasionally do, and railroad labor organizers out of town under the specious claim that they are thereby protecting America. Such protection of America will do far more harm in the end than it will do good. We have had too many "respectable” plug-hat mobs, and the people are getting thoroughly tired of them. We do not want extremists of either kind, Labor or Capital, in this country.

One of the charges that is frequently brought against unionism is that the members of labor unions do not live up to their bargains, but frequently disobey their own officers and violate their contracts by going on strike when they have agreed not to do so. Such instances frequently occur, and do the unions more harm than any other one thing. Any union which fails to carry out its contracts alienates public sentiment, and when any body of men in a republic forfeit the approval of their fellow citizens they have lost their case. The public cannot and should not look with favor upon any body of men that violate their contracts.

There is a limit, too, to the things that a labor union can properly demand. The limit to that demand is not all that can be forced from an ■unwilling employer. When workers get to the poirit^jvhere they demand for themselves the total receipts of business, regardless of the rights of others, the whole fabric of civilization will crumble unless they are made to see that the rights of others are as real as their own, and are hot to be lightly trified with or bartered away by any one.

On this point Mr. William B. Colver, of the Federal Trade Commission, at the annual convention of the National Coffee Roasters' Association, had this to say: ‘‘Organizations of groups of men for mutual benefit are proper and ( are to be encouraged np to the point where such organizations interfere with the general welfare and public interests; but all rights yield to the one dominant right—that of the general wel-fare. All organizations are useful so long as they function in and for the public interest.”

Noting that restless and reckless Labor makes Capital restless and reckless, some have proposed that labor unions should be required to incorporate themselves, so that their bargains ; could be enforced. Labor objects to this, hold- * *

ing that it would be subject to constant legal persecution by avaricious employers.- Never- j theless, the members of labor unions are not a separate class of people. They are a part of * the whole people and should be as ready as others to bear their fall share of the load.

Middle- Class Workers

OT only is the organization of middle-class „■* workers making progress in England, and r

in Germany, where it is said that the largest organization of office workers in the world (350,-000 members) has been perfected, but the same * thing seems to be going on in America, although not to the same extent as abroad. . The movement has spread to Spain, where newspaper men of Barcelona and Madrid formed unions, and affiliated with the printers, demanding monthly minimum wages amounting to $58.50. This does not look like much when compared with the wages now paid in America; but the cost of living in Spain can hardly be as great as it is here or the workers could not live on the wages desired, to say nothing of those they actually receive at .present. _

In this country some of the middle classes that have organized and affiliated with the American Federation of Labor are the News Writers of Boston (already mentioned in these columns), the Musicians, Actors, Insurance Agents, Stenographers and Bookkeepers of New York, the Technical Men of New York and Chicago, the Scientists and Specialists of Washington, the Teachers ’of Chicago and the Professors of Harvard. In connection with the latter movements Miss Helen Taft. Acting President of Bryn Mawr College, declared that sho wished that the professors of the whole country would go out on strike for higher wages, so as to wake up the people of the country to the

injustices they were then bearing. In New York City there is also a small teachers’ union, but it is estimated that only about 10% of the 23,000 public teachers in the city belong to it. Although there was a great deal of unrest among the teachers in the Fall of 1919 it was corrected somewhat in New York state by legislation that served as a partial remedy.

Occasionally the union organizers attempt the impossible. Efforts were made to organize the physicians in Greater New York; and at one time it was claimed that 200 physicians in the Bronx had affiliated themselves with the Aiw-ican Federation of Labor, so as to bring about union conditions for physicians employed by insurance companies and hospitals, and to fix union rates for physicians throughout the city. But the movement was unsuccessful, as were similar efforts in Brooklyn. The registered drug clerks, however, organized a union and went out on a strike for $50 weekly and an eighthour day, which they won.

Attempts were also made to organize the bank clerks and other clerks in the financial district, many of whom, when they work evenings, either one hour or five hours, receive no other compensation than the usual 75 cents or $1.00 "supper money’. The clerks wish a regular six-hour day, with a scale of wages for overtime, Sundays and holidays. But at the Christmas holidays of 1919 some Wall Street houses distributed as bonuses among their clerks amounts as high as $1100 apiece; and there is an argument against unionizing, in sneh a bonus, which the ablest spellbinder cannot effectively meet

Government Worker*

RYING to take an unbiased view of matters, it is not greatly to be wondered at that

many workers in various departments of the Government have been thoughtlessly led into embarrassing positions in the current of unionizing tfi&t has been sweeping over the land. The trouble really started when the American Federation of Labor, which had always previously refused to charter police unions. decided to do so at the annual convention held at Atlantic City, June 9-16, 1919. But it was at Boston that the "beans were spilled when the newly organized police union endeavored to try its strength. President Wilson described the strike as a "crime against civilization*’, which it turned out to be; and the Protestant Governor Coolidge, of Massachusetts, with great severity, we think, refused to take back any of the striking officex-s (most of them Roman Catholics), declaring that "to place the maintenance of the public security in the hands of a body of men who have attempted to destroy it would be to flout the sovereignty of the laws the people have made”. Massachusetts endorsed his stand.

But possibly the severe lesson in. Boston (where the new officers were granted the increased pay that the old officers desired) was necessary to check the tide that was then rising in other places. New York City was perilously near the same difficulty, but an agitation in the papers and increased pay for the patrolmen relieved the situation. In Buffalo also the efforts to form a police union were frustrated by giving the men an increase in pay before they got ready to demand it. In September there were thirtyseven American cities in which the police were unionized;but with the exception of Boston, Los Angeles, Portland (Ore.), Wheeling and Oklahoma City none of the cities were the largest in their respective states, and Wheeling and Oklahoma are both relatively small cities.

The matter came to a head effectively in Washington, D. C. There the District Commissioners took the position that they were quite willing for their men to organize, and that they approved of the principle of collective bargaining, but that they would not have on the force men combined or associated with any other labor organization. The police took the matter to court, asking for an injunction to prevent their discharge because of membership in the union.

The subject was threshed out in the Semite and in the course of the debate Senator Myers said: “Within two years we shall have a soviet government in this country unless something is done to check the movement for unionization. The police force of every city and town in the United States will be unionized and affiliated with the American Federation of Labor within sixty days if the police in the District of Columbia are permitted to unionize. The next stop will be to unionize the army and navy. and they will have just as much right as the police. Then the next step will be a soviet government.'*

There is a growing belief that Government employes must not become affiliated with other labor organizations if the integrity of the American system of government is to be preserved. Postmaster-General Burleson in his annual report has even requested Congress to repeal a - law passed in 1912 under which postal workers have understood and utilized the right to organize. The report states that one of the purposes of labor unions is to coerce the employer, and that when such employer is the Government such an association is aimed at the Government and is inconsistent with the performance of public service and is not a true American spirit.

The gathering together of Labor Forces, Capital Forces, Farmer Forces and now the possible * Middle-Class Forces all reminds us of the Lord's parable in regard to the end of the age, that it would be accompanied by a binding together of the tares, professed Christians, for the purpose of destroying them as tares—convincing them and everybody that they were not Christian, properly speaking; and proving, as we claim, that the only remedy for earth’s tangled affairs is the speedy coming of the Golden Age for which we have all so long prayed, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is done in heaven”. Then we shall see that all this gathering together of the elements of society into different bands was inevitable, and was divinely foreseen as a necessary preparation for the inauguration of that kingdom of peace, joy and divine blessing.

Pre-War Condition* By d. r. Pierce

OW many times we see articles in the daily press, reminders of the times preceding the

war, calling attention to the then cheap prices of necessities, and the variety and quantity of what are now regarded as luxuries. These include food, clothing, fuel, housing facilities, amusement and recreation, education and travel.

Many people are coming to be “stand-patters”, desiring to use all the machinery of religion, goverttn^nt and industry to return the world to the conditions prevailing in the pre-war days, not recognizing the totally unsatisfactory ends attained in those times, as well as now.

A cartoon recently appeared in a prominent daily, whicii if\printed by a so-called radical paper woulckhave brought down the calumny of the entire “conservative” press, as being intended to produce unrest. It had for a central figure an office worker seated at his desk, with a ball-and-chain attached to his ankle, with the terse suggestion that “whoever is satisfied with his present job, is like the person behind the prison bars, tied for life to a ball-and-chain”.

In Exodus 16:3 we read that the nation of Israel murmured at the action of the Lord in leading them out of Egypt, where they had plenty to eat and nothing to worry about, not remembering that they were on the way to the promised land, “flowing with milk and honey”. So also the people now who desire to return to the pre-war conditions, forget that we are on the way to the Golden Age and that no possible force can turn mankind back to the conditions that are now forever past

Knocking Out the Foundation*

ABOUT 30,000 Italians have left for home

• recently, and comparatively few have immigrated. Other nationalities are said to be planning to go to Europe or some other continent than America as soon as conditions for travel ease up. In spite of the fact that the dove of peace is looking for a place to roost on, the huge net after-war immigration shows no signs of materializing. Miners are giving up mining and going into work where they can make a good living for their families. Steel workers are getting out of the industry and into other lines. Farm laborers are quitting the farm. Lumber jacks no longer like the rough, hard life of the camps.

If the world war and the unrest of a pseudopeace are driving common labor from its task, or making work distasteful, from a sense of restricted liberty, who is going to do the hard manual labor of railroad building, foundation work, milling, or the farm? Common labor-must not be despised. Conditions in America have always hitherto been attractive to the hard workers of Europe, who-have felt that here was a chance to make good for themselves and their families. But now the news is going through Europe that this is not as good a place as it used to bo for poor men. Americans must beware not to knock out the foundation of their industrial structure.

A better acquaintance with the stranger within our gates brings out the fact that he possesses qualities as good as are to be found. A little of the brotherly appreciation that will characterize the Golden Age would go a long way now to oil the joints of the social machine*

|| SOCIAL AND EDUCATIONAL

k --------- ----------------------------------

City Garbage for Hoge

KKON, Ohio, lias had the usual expensive and unsatisfactory experience with the disposal of city garbage. In by-gone days the citi-zenesses burned or buried their scraps, left them out for the occasional itinerant private collector, or threw them into the back street. In 1916 the city started a reduction plant of twenty-five-tons-a-day capacity. The customary system wag to be followed of digesting the garbage with steam, drying it, running gasoline through it to recover the fats, and burning the dried residue. The collection was awarded to a private concern, the Akron Garbage Collection Company, and the operation ot‘ the plant to the Akron Garbage Disposal Company, which was paid $3.12 a ton for collecting garbage, and which paid the city $8'200 annual rental for the $116,000 plant. The city grew rapidly, and the company increased the daily capacity of the plant to forty-five tons.

The collection service never proved to be satisfactory, either to the citizenesses, or to the company; for it was conducted at a loss of about $£000 a year. The disposal company cleared about $1300 a year, making the net result of the operation to the companies a loss of some $3800, a discouraging outcome on disagreeable work done at groat effort. The garbage companies finally took advantage of a technicality to terminate their contract and end a losing venture; and the plant came back to the city, which paid nearly $100,000 for the contractor's invested interest in the plant and for the teams, trucks, barns and bins.

The plant was the source of bad odors that affected two residential sections of the rapidly growing city, and were liable to give more serious offense, as the river boulevard and further extensions approached and passed the location of the plant. A new plant was figured on of 100 tens capacity, with an outlay of $472,*300 and a net annual cost of nearly $35,000, with no tolling soon a city with the expansive capacity ot^Akrbn might again surround the plant— quite a serious affair to people that buy or rent homes only to breathe day and night the perfume of steamed garbage.

There is one garbage disposal plant that can be moved at will, and that is a herd of hogs. It has unlimited capacity, replaces itself, and can be sold at a profit, provided the garbage is obtainable at a cost, that leaves a margin on tho selling price of pork. So the oily fathers \ decided on the new style plant; and, as they were unwilling to undertake the responsibilities * connected with a Log farm, advertised for biis on die garbage, received two responsible hitls, and turned the city garbage over to the new plant under private ownership. Unfortunately there is no plant of half a million dollars' cost to be built; and so it is decided that this arrangement is only a temporary expedient, although thoroughly convenient, econoinieal and suited to the interests of tho common people, the taxpayers. Whether tho consideration of the practical impossibility of any substantial rake-off from the inexpensive hog proposition enters into the temporariness of the new idea, ia not stated, but it is well known that a politician has at leiwt some chance when there is a costly plant to be built and operated. However. for a while the Akron citizens are getting this valuable Ferric* for a reasonable price.

It is an old story, this of oppressing the helpless common people, but it mil soon come to an end forever nndor the gracious arrangements of the Golden Age: ’’for they [the people] shall cry unto the Lord because of the oppressor*, and he shall send them a Savior and a great One [Christ the Head of the government in the Golden Age], and he shall deliver tlienfL— Isaiah 19:20. .

England’s Child Slaves

IT IS useless to claim that a child laboring in a factory is anything less than a slave, either of conscienceless or poverty-stricken parents or certainly of the often heartless or brutal foremen or forewotueu in charge of the work of driving th*? lit th- oic-^ to got the pound of fk?sh that the law of profits requires. Children ought not tn be allowed, much less forced, to work in such an environment as the factory or mill. The child's place and right is in the sunshine, where it can exercise, work, and play until little muscles and nerves are strong and sturdy for the life-work before them.

But England has its cliild slaves by the thousands, and British investors are coining the life blood of little ones into dividends. Nobody cares; for does it not pay to work the weak little arms and fingers better than those of the grown-ups who demand more money! So in Manchester seven-year-old children labor ten hours a day for 11 cents; and boys and girls, that should at least be at school and getting a chance in life, are slaving ont their thirteen and fourteen-year-old brains and bodies for less than a dollar a week of forty or fifty hours. Of sunshine, green fields, good comfortable beds, and of the joy and gladness the dividends bring to a few rich kiddies, these thousands of children know nothing—and why should they, when they can so early become “useful” members of society and earn dividends for some one else!

The “great” city of Manchester boasts 6000 little workers of seven to fourteen years, including 1500 girls. Warrington has the distinction of having 700 child slaves. No mill city exists in England that cannot point with pride to its hundreds or thousands of these invaluable infant pillars of the industrial and social order. Giris work twenty-one hours a week for JI cents, or half a cent an hour. Others labor from 4:15 p. m. to 10 every night and fourteen hours Saturdays for 2S cents (with tea and sapper) for the week. Little boys of eight slave ten and one-half hours a day for 20 cents. They labor in all kinds of places—in Deansgate 650 deliver milk. 2051 run errands, 319 are in barber shops, 30 in pawn broker shops, and SS5 serve as spare-time household servants.

The fact that these children have been reduced to slavery is attributable largely to the greed of their parents. In most of the places where child slavery is practised, the parents earn ample wages, and there is no economic excuse for the ruining of the lives of the little ones to add ^shilling or two a week to the family income. But employers willingly cooperate in this destruction of coming manhood and womanhood, for how else could the management of businesses big and little make good a showing on aividtend day! Fortunately there are laws of ’Parliament which localities can lake advantage of, though the Town Council encounters powerful influences when it attempts to prevent any of this child slavery.

But the Golden Age is close at hand when such iniquities shall end. Now God is pictured as looking down upon earth and seeing these tilings and saying, ‘T looked, and there was none to help; and I wondered that there was none to uphold; therefore mine own arm [power] brought salvation unto me [from such evils]; and my fury [against such evildoers] it upheld me”. (Isaiah 63:5) Again, “He [Christ in the Golden Age] shall judge [rule over] the poor of the people, he shall save the children of the needy, and shall break in pieces the oppressor”. —Psalm 72:4.

The New Saloon

HE theory of some would-be philanthropists regarding the alcohol addict is much the same as that a person prohibited from stealing needs a substitute for stealing and that philanthropy or religion should furnish the substitute. This may explain the effort to supply the “kickless” saloon for the drinker.

In some respects this is true. The drinker that went to the saloon for good fellowship because he craved it will go somewhere else to find it. As there are no places worse than the saloon, he is obliged to go to some better place. Consequently he is to be found in the pool room, the men’s club, the street corner, the Y. ML C. A., or almost anywhere with other fellows be likes. By thousands he is joining the Knights of Columbus and other secret societies where the social instinct can be gratified and the inspiration of crowd psychology enjoyed.

The man who drank because he likes to get drunk is not going to a liquorless saloon. He may know where he can obtain, raisin, peach, prune or dried apple whiskey, and get a product which, though far inferior,satisfies an abnormal-appetite. Not the mahogany bar, the shiny brass foot-rail, nor the piles of shining glassware will tempt into the sacred precincts of the prohibition saloon the lover of alcohol for its own sake. That is not what he desires.

It is suggested that the new bar-room will furnish work for Y. M. C. A. assistants with whom might be associated “as a sort of lowbrow canteen worker” the former bartender. Inspirational work among saloon devotees is considered desirable by the advocates of the new' saloon; for, say they, “the bartender himself was usually a good practical psychologist of human nature, and not only prepared the favorite tipple for big customer but also with quick, 1 hough sometimes spurious sympathy furnished him with the mental comfort he needed”. It is not regarded well for those behind the new bar io wear a Y. Al. C. A. or other uniform, but ‘those who have charge must assume some of the nature and behavior of ordinary individuals and avoid the wearing of special dress or uniforms suggestive of inhibitions and prohibitions of certain aspects of society that have grown to be intolerant of the average individual’’.

It 5s hard work getting up a refined substitute for vice. The better way is to get the mind of alcohol's devotee on something better, not to remind him constantly, by a substitute, of what he has lost and still craves.

Schwab Not Panic Stricken

CHARLES >L SCHWAB, head of, the Bethlehem Steel Corporation, at a banquet in the Waldorf-Astoria recently made the following statement:

“A good many people these days are ‘seeing red’. Some talk as though the whole world is threatened with overturn by Bolshevism. I am not one of those who tall; or think that way. And particularly here in America, I have the greatest confidence in the sound and level-headed common sense of the American working man and of the American people. The more the Bolshevists talk and threaten destruction the more will onr people see through all the sophistry preached to them, and stand adamant for America continuing to be a land of Law, of order and of opportunity,”

Mr. Schwab is admittedly one of the wisest men in the United States, as he is one of the most successful, and in the above words we think lie has spoken not only with wisdom but with a moderation calculated to make some professional patriots stop and think. One of the greatest dangers in the United States today is the man who "sees red" and fans the unrest of thc^country into a flame by denying to his fellow citizens the commonest privileges of free speech, fr^ and free assembly. Such men should be Iciiked up immediately.

It nef‘dh >s 1’0r us to assure the readers of The Couje'n Ace that we are not “Bolshevist^1 —have^no leanings in that direction whatever. Although we bdieve in the coming kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, as do all professed Christians, yet we believe the Lord will have his own way of ushering in that kingdom; and we are certain it will not be by any acts of violence such as have been attributed to . the Bolshevists. With such men as Mr. Schwab expressing his confidence that the United States is in no danger whatever of Bolshevism (an opinion echoed by so able a journal as the New-York Worid) some of those who have so much to say about a coming red terror here in America make themselves ridiculous. If we ever do have a red terror here it will be directly due to having been induced by a needless and out-rageow? white terror, started for the purpose of concealing and retaining from the common people the profits of the world war.-

Living in New York

ROADWAY, big hotels, theaters, and beautiful churches are not all there is of New

York. Neither are the Riverside Drive apartment palaces representative of life in the big city. Noris a position in the lofty office buildings typical of jobs at which most New Yorkers work. For New York is a city of poor people; of human beings striving desperately against rapidly climbing prices and rentals and slowly creeping wage raises. He who would live in New York must exchange the genuine things of suburban, small city, village or country life, for the slightly stimulating environment of city contacts and a host of disadvantages.

Life in a village may seem dull enough; but it is bright beside the somber picture of the average worker's New York home painted by the Women’s Municipal League of the City of New York, in an investigation under the direction of the New York State Reconstruction Commission. We quote: ____

“In one block there were 1050 families, 105 white nd 335 colored. Rents were from $13 to $22 in the Phipps' houses (better houses built by a wealthy philanthropist), and from $3 to $14 in the old houses. The Phipps' houses can accommodate only a .email proportion of the people who would live there if they could. Many of their i the Phipps) tenants, it is true, find the rent bur-der^nmc, but by economizing on other necessities they manice to lire there in cteanlincw and decency. The character of the other houses varied with their owner?, but in general they were old. dark, dirty and not fit lor human'habitation? A high grade of cleanliness was not po.-fiihle in the best of them, and in the worst there was nrsctiruUr no sanitation. The cellars were damp aud full of rac£. the halls were not even lighted by gas jets, the four flat? on each floor were served by two toilets in the hall, the plumbing was old and often out of repair, 60 that the air was foul. The airshafts and the narrow court spaces between the rears of the tenements were littered with the waste and garbage which the tenants hud thrown out. Physicians attending cases of illness in the block traced them in many instances to this filth. Except in isolated cases, no great overcrowding of individual families woe found and little of the extreme poverty wliich the inexperienced investigator would expect to find in houses of this type. These were the homes of the general run of wage-earners in New York. They are possibly a little better oif with the high wa^es commanded by labor today, but their personal standard.’ had not risen, inasmuch as there were no better houses to lie had.”

A number of remedies are suggested by the Reconstruction Commission:

1. “Relaxation of restrictions upon building imposed by the tenement-house laws and building codes.” This would result in a little more building of a still inferior type. It is hard to keep the houses for the poor decent to live in, and unscrupulous builders and landlords would ba quick to make things worse at less cost to themselves it* granted the opportunity.

2. ''Raising a fund, by general subscription for new tenements.” Such a passing of the hat around savors of the begging methods of religious institutions, and would be likely to result in the minimum amount of funds.

3. ""Exempting certain types of buildings and mortgages thereon from taxation for a period long enough to encourage investors to put their money into them." It is partly the high taxation of this class of investments that has kept money out of building operations, and the opening of this door would doubtless accomplish something in the right direction. Er^n then, the high cost of building materials and labor stands as an almost impassable barrier to the employment of funds in building.

4. "State credits to encourage the erection of adequate accommodations for the lower-paid wage-earners.” This might be a first-class plan, yet it is "Socialism”.

5. ^ave die city buy up in advance cheap land in order to house the future population.’’ This plan possesses much merit and common sense, but unfortunately would "never do" here because it is. “Socialism”.

The plkin fact is that the poor and needy, to say nothin of the well-paid workers, are coming to a stone wall in the matter of housing accommodations; for there is not enough building going on to provide for the natural growth of population, and building was practically at a standstill during the two years of the war. Either people have got to stop being born, or something must be done in harmony with the law and the customs received from the fathers. The country debates and investigates, and does it over again, but fails to build houses- The authorities exorcise the flames, but do not call out the fire department. Meanwhile the people begin to feel like a fifteen-year-old still in his ten-year-old suit of clothes.

Some day, in the Golden Age, the nations will learn that when the people need something done the regular thing will be to go ahead and have it done. It is the essence and spirit of the law that the people be taken care of, and properly provided for, but it is as true today, as when spoken of certain classes that the Master spoke of two millenniums ago, '‘Full well ye reject the commandment of God. that ye may keep yrnir own tradition, . . . making the word of God of none, effect through your tradition which ye have delivered: and mnnv such like thing* do ye” — Mark?:*), 13. ' ’

On Reading Aloud

IT IS a deplorable fact that the custom of reading aloud has almost passed away and that with its passing, due to our modern habit of reading hurriedly and breathlessly to cover aS much ground as possible, the matter of an intelligent giving forth of the words read aloud and the matter of modulating the voice and the use of full tones where necessary, is fast becoming a lost art. In times gone by it was tho custom for a member of the family to rend aloud of an evening, and generally some work was selected that was a classic. In this way Htiy art of reading was acquired in its best estate, the various members of the family acting as critics, and at times harsh critics, especially when the paragraph read was not clear to them and they were a bit irritated because the meaning was not conveyed to them as they thought ir should have been. If this old custom of reading aloud was revived, what a profitable way It would be of spending the long winter evenings around the family fireside, provided the selection be au appropriate one, in harmony with truth and edifying to the listeners.

Few realize how much they actually lose by poor methods of speaking. There is no more .‘iTectnal way of improving one’s delivery than reading aloud the best authors.

MANUFACTURING AND MINING

Fuel Engineering

WITH the gradual consumption of the most valuable and most easily workable fuel deposits of Great Britain, and the encroachments made upon the coal areas of other countries, great engineers are givingmore attention to fuel problems, and with good results.

In England Sir Charles Parsons has worked out the details of a plan for boring twelve miles into the crust of the earth, at which depth it ia estimated a perpetual source of limitless power could be obtained. The time required to sink this hole has been estimated at about seventy years, although some engineers believe it could be'done in forty years.

Meantime, other British engineers are discussing means for making a better use than heretofore of the gases generated in blast-furnaces. For some time, in the most progressive steel works, the plan has been followed of cleaning these blast-furnace gases by electro-static processes, and it is proposed to utilize this method more extensively. Gases thus cleaned may be used direct in internal-combustion gasengines, not needing, therefore, to be burned under boilers with the great losses in economy and efficiency attendant upon their use in that manner. They can and should furnish all the power required for the operation of all the steel works machinery, and may even be used to provide power for adjacent factories. The researches into fuel economy are going further, and steps are under way for a study of the slag problem, to see whether or not some way can be devised to recover and utilize the now wasted heat contained in the molten slag that runs from the blast-furnace in connection with the flow of liquid metaL

’These steps in economy and conservation are steps in the right direction. If the Lord of glory valued the miraculously created fish and bread so highly at the time the five thousand were fed, and later when the four thousand were fed, as^to ipake arrangements so that none of the foo4 should be wasted (Matthew 14:15-21, 15: 32 -38; 16: 9,10), how reasonable and right it is for us humans, who can create nothing miraculously, but who are wholly dependent upon what he has created for us, to use wisely for ourselves, and economically on behalf of our children, the blessings which God has placed within our reach.

We believe that at some time during the Golden Age, probably just when it is most needed, a plan vill be put into operation like the Parsons plan or some other good plan which will settle the fuel and power problem for all time.

Cheaper Vanadium x ■

IT IS a benefit to humanity worth noting when an important raw material is produced at lower cost. A few years ago vanadium would have been spoken of as a rare element, interesting because of its chemical peculiarities and for making dyes and ink. Today it is of great importance in the industrial world; for a small amount added to steel makes the latter very tough. Vanadium steel is one of the prominent products of the steel industry.

Ten years ago the methods of getting the element from the ores of Peru were so inefficient as to extract only 36%. This was later raised to 75%; but now the electric furnace has been tried, and gets 92%. The concerns that have been producing vanadium are enabled to work over the immense slag piles, and get enough out of them to yield one company alone a profit of $3,000,000 a year for three years to come. The public would be more interested if the improvement led to a lower price; but, as there is little competition, the-benefits of progress are likely to be absorbed almost entirely by the manufacturers, who, of course, are entitled to it, if they choose to follow that policy. In days when every one but the profiteer feels the stress of the cost of living, the addition of an extra dividend of $11 a share is greatly appreciated by the stockholders.

But in the Golden Age it will not be so. Every advancement achieved will be hailed by all the people as for the benefit of all, and not for a few, however proper that may be now. The great men will be those that do most for the common people. The great news in the papers will be the items about things accomplished for “all of us7'. Money will not be the chief thing, nor evert gold; for it is written that “I [God] will make a man more precious than fine gold;

even a man than the golden wedge of Ophir [from which the Guest gold came]'7.—Isa. 13:12.

The Blast-Furnace

BLAST-FURNACE is always kept filled with iron-ore, coke and limestone. As the

coke is burned away and the limestone is melted in the hearth, the column above settles and fresh quantities are dumped into the top to maintain the supply. As the molten iron and slag run down into the hearth they separate, the lighter ftlag floating on the heavier iron.

Two tap boles are provided at different levels. From the lower of these the iron is drawn off into the pigbed or receiving ladle, while the slag is tapped into a tank of water know as a granulating pit, or into a slag ladle.

The air necessary for the combustion of the coke is forced into the furnace under a heavy pressure by powerful blowing engines. On the way to the furnace it is heated to an intense heat by being forced throught hot-blast stoves. This temperature, being added to the heat of combustion of the coke, adds greatly to the smelting power and decreases the fuel consump-? tion in the operation.

The gases resulting from the combustion of the coke are partially combustible and have a considerable fuel value. They are, therefore, drawn off from the top of the furnace, more or less perfectly cleaned and then bdrned, partly under the boilers to raise steam, and partly in the hot-blast stoves to heat the blast

A modern blast-furnace produces 400 tons of pig-iron every day, consuming 1300 tons of solid materials and 2000 tons of air in the process. There has been a change from the old-time rule-of-thumb plan of running a furnace to a method where everything is carefully weighed and all charges are mixed in accordance with calculations, based on chemical analysis of the raw ma-terials' and accurate calculation of the charges. If the slag is too silicious the pig-iron will be unsalable, while if it contains too much lime the iron ■will refuse to run from the furnace.

One of the most common ills of the blast-furnace is disorder arising from poor distribution, called scaffolding. Instead of descending uniformly the material adheres to one side mid builds out a pasty mass. Occasionally, parts - of this scaffold break off and fall to the hearth, deranging the working and damaging the quality of the product. A scaffold once formed tends to form again and become as bad as ever.

A slip in a blast-furnace is a sudden settling of the stock through a considerable distance, accompanied by a more or less violent puff of gas at the top. In some instances these slips are so serious as to throw out large amounts of lump ore, coke, etc., through the explosion doors especially provided for this purpose at the top of the furnace.

Other troubles to which the blast-furnace falls heir are freeze-ups in which the iron and slag set into a solid mass on the hearth, and which have to be opened by the oxygen blowpipe; steam explosions due to the water jackets leaking into the interior; break-outs and gas explosions; some of these are harrowing and frequently accompanied by loss of life. These blast-furnace troubles are not nearly as prevalent now as they once were.

The best method of casting is to tap the iron from the blast-furnace into a large receiving ladle, where it becomes thoroughly mixed into a homogeneous liquid. From this ladle it is poured into iron molds, which are carried on an endless belt. This method avoids the sand of the time-honored sand-casting method and secures perfect uniformity of composition.

The production of pig-iron, starting with nothing at the middle of the last century, has grown at the rate of 100% every decade, until now it is the largest single manufacturing industry (and the most spectacular), furnishing approximately one-fifth of the total freight traffic of the railroads.

The Scriptures show that even in the Golden Age certain lands of iron work will go on as usual, and this being so, pig-iron will be needed mid will probably always be produced, though we think not to the same extent as now. The statement reads, “They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more'’. —Isaiah 2:4.

During 1919, the production of pig iron in the United States (reduced by the steel strikes and coal strikes) averaged 34,000 tons per day. In 1918 the average output was 105,000 tons per day; in 1917 it was 104,500 tons; in 1916 it was 106,500 tons; in 1915 it was 81,000 tons; in 1914 it was 63,000 tons; in 1913 it was 84,000 tons.

FINANCE -COMMERCE-TRANSPORTATION~

The Law of the Profits

IT SEEMS to be the logic of the situation that under present conditions there is no escape from the profit system, although many lovers of their fellow men are working hard to devise some better plan. It is argued on behalf of the profit system that without the chance of making a profit there would be no capital available for any enterprise. It is pointed out that many large businesses have a false front and are kept up only by new capital and new men coming in; that many fail several times before they ultimately make good; that many concerns go on for years without making any profits; and that for every concern which remains in business thirty-three years the chances of failure are one to three. Three percent fail every year.

Those who have given the matter careful study call attention to the fact that the conspicuous successes in any line are relatively few, that the only time of great profit in any enterprise is in its inception, that there are hundreds of businesses like the canal business, carriage business, bicycle business, liquor business, sailingvessel business, etc., that have had a day of great prosperity followed by the almost total loss of all the capital invested in them because they have been superseded by something better. They point out that many a man has succeeded in a small business, only to branch out to ruin in a large one; and that the general rule is that a very small percentage one way or the other means success or failure. It is "well known, too, that while many holders of railroad securities have received excessive profits on their holdings there are others who have been rewarded very nieagerly for their investments and some have lost'tdl or nearly all that they invested.

On the other side of the question attention is called to the fact that labor takes a risk in industry; and that while capitalcanrecoveritself by investment in another business, labor has but its one life to ave, and if it makes a mistake and getSUnto the wrong line of work, or gets discharged suddenly, through no fault of its own, it is running a risk which is greater than that faced by any investment of capital

Labor knows that enormous unearned profits

have been made, not only during the world war, but before it It knows that in some cases these profits have come from adulteration of good::, * terrorism of competitors, private legislation, stock watering and just plain hogging. Instances are on record where, within the yean 1919, . $

three times as much money was piled up or distributed in profits as was paid out on the payroll This was in the cotton business. In ... another case brought to light, a concern wishing * to sell out offered their business for a fair price, ' $2,000,000; but when the Wall Street crowd sold it to the public in the form of stocks it went at * the price of $10,000,000. The workers in that business will have to earn the profits on the $10,000,000, or the usual howl will go up that wages must come down.

It is fortunate that the incomes from most large fortunes go back into business. Not all the businesses into which this surplus capital goes prove remunerative, however, but whether so or not the worker gets a return in the form of wages, and while the enterprise lasts, he gets something definite in place of the ever-present risk which the investor must face. But the inVester's profits in the long run are greater than his risks; else he would never take them.

Until the Lord readjusts the labor-capital problem, the present arrangement is doubtless as good as fallen man can devise. Communism is entirely impracticable, and is not sanctioned in the Scriptures when rightly understood. . A redistribution of the good things of life would be futile unless the good things continued to flow in from field and factory; and the spur of necessity, on the part of both capital and labor, seems essential in order to insure the continuance of that flow. It is very sad, however, that the workers in so many factories must perform narrowly prescribed rounds of duties, without ever seeing the stockholders for whom they work, Doubtless those employers are moving along right lines who are doing what lies in their power to make the working and social conditions of their employes as good as possible.

The Lord’s remedy for the capital-labor troubles in which the world is writhing is not force and more force, hate and more hate, but gener-

osity and more generosity, love and more love, in the endeavor to find the best possible balance between the interests of the nation, the community, self and the other fellow. Let us all try to take the other fellow's viewpoint as much as we can, while not forgetting our own, and resolve not to do an injustice to anybody. Thus each in his own corner can make a little start toward getting things ready for the Golden Age. Better to be ready for it when it comes than to have it find us unready and disposed to try to interfere with the arrangements of mutual love and justice which the Lord will enforce in his own good way in the new era now at our doors.

Improved Highway Laws

PENNSYLVANIA, once reputed to have had A the most unsatisfactory motor vehicle laws of any state in the union, has a new law which is now claimed to be one of the best. It protects the public, and the drivers as well, by requiring that all automobile drivers shall be in full use of both hands and have normal sight and hearing. Provision is made for the issuance of learner’s permits, and against the passing of street cars while receiving and discharging passengers. Moreover, physical proof of ownership, in the shape of the car, must be furnished at time of registration, thus making registration of stolen cars difficult. The law also makes it a criminal offense to deface factory numbers and to sell and transfer stolen automobiles. In practice the law is found to work well.

The care which is taken of the interests of the public in this country is truly remarkable in comparison with some of the customs abroad. In Paris, for example, if a person is run over on the street the one arrested is the one that was run over, the obstruction of traffic being the major offense. The same principle obtains in London, where the risk of crossing the street is placed entirely upon the pedestrian. The trafffcd^ws of Paris, and the customs of London, are probably survivals of the time when the common people were obliged to make way for the royalty, who were theoretically supposed to be the owners of everything and themselves to be aboVe alj law. In America we do not do things that way. Here the common people are the sovereigns, and the laws are made at their behest and in their interest.

Look, too, at the history of this nation. We ’are far from claiming that it is perfect: we can see much room for improvement in every direction, and are willing to admit that Americans can still learn some things from other parts of . the world — particularly from Great Britain; nevertheless no other nation on earth has such a history. We as Christians are opposed to war among truly Christian people; and yet we must acknowledge that some causes of war are more just than others, and of this more just class the wars of the United States seem to have been. :

The prosperity of this land is so phenomenal as to be the constant surprise of the world. The poor from all nations have become the wealthiest nation on earth. And, whatever may yet become true, under the changing conditions by which the trusts are obtaining so great a control, this land hitherto has certainly been well illustrated by the statue of "Liberty Enlightening the World” in the harbor of New York City —the work of Bartholdi. The great truth thus symbolized is appreciated by but few.

Public Utilities Troubled

IT IS no fun to own a public utility company like a gas-producing company, for example, and then have an unexpected war come on and boost the costs of making the gas away up near the price which, by law, the said public utility company must charge for its product. Some of the public utility companies in and about New York are now feeling the pinch, the costs for the oil, labor and coal used in each thousand feet of gas now running to about 60% of the selling price. Atop this, cast-iron pipe and steel pipe, of which large quantities are used in the gas business, now cost more than twice what they did in 1915, and the sheepskins used for meters cost two and a quarter times the price formerly paid for them.

Of interest to the gas companies is the ruling of the Court of Appeals that a law which was constitutional when it was passed becomes unconstitutional the moment it becomes confiscatory. We think this is a wise ruling, good common sense. At the same time, we have no doubt that these gas companies, which receive all their rights from the franchises given them by the people, should be limited to a very modest return upon their investments, and that the statements which they render in the effort to obtain higher rates should be scrutinized carefully to make sure that the facts are properly and truthfully represented.

POLITICAL-DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN

Farmers in Politics

SHOULD the farmers of the United Staten make common cause in politics they would be an irresistible power. Of the 4S,2S2,911 industrial population in 1917, 44%, or 19,070,843, are engaged in agriculture or animal husbandry, and are farmers. At the 191b Presidential election the voters numbered 18,256,743; and if the 44% ratio holds good, the number of farmer voters is over 8,000,000. This, if cast in a solid block, would carry any election. The farmers have it in their power to exercise complete control of the affairs of the country, and of nearly every state in the Union.

The universal cause of unrest—the high cost of living—has not left the farmer untouched. 'The agricultural Titan is waking up. because in his sleep things have gone against him. The rise in price of food products appeared to benefit the fanner unduly, but not so in fact, since the purchasing power of his products just about kept up with the cost of living. Ilie farmer feels the pinch as much as any one except the clerical classes; for while profiteers were permitted to ask almost any price the fanner was held to a Government-fixed price, and could not take advantage of the extraordinary opportunity for money-making afforded by the world war with its soaring prices.

Now that the war is over, the farmer is taking inventory to find who has been pincldng him, and he is inclined to think that it was done by labor, by the wealthy, by the railroads, and by Government prices. Especially he is inclined to think that when the big move to reduce the cost of living took place in 1919, he was the unfortunate victim; for the prices that tumbled were., the prices for farm products, and he saw vakils vanish to the amount of hundreds of millions of dollars. When pork dropped nearly half in price, the loss fell.on the farmer, at a time when furniture, bouse furnishings, clothing and otWer articles kept on up the hill, and retail butchers charged no less for pork chops. Ho figures that when sugar went up to seventeen cents, the benefit went to the profiteer and the refiner, and would not have risen if the farmer had been kept in mind. He naturally cannot see the equality-for-all when he was held to $2.26 a bushel for wheat, when the demand would have given him $5.00 wheat and enabled him to pile up a reserve such as the rich corporations heaped up by the billions of dollars during the war. Any worm is liable to turn; and the farmer has about decided that if the agitation for lower food prices is continued with further success, he may stop producing food that does not pay him to plant, raise less, and let the rest of the people look out for themselves, if they can get along without his cordial cooperation.

The fanner has decided to act. He has determined that 1920 shall signalize the formulation of a definite agricultural policy designed to give him a much greater influence in the management of American affairs. The little farmer organizations are rapidly amalgamating into the hugest units ever known in American politics. These immense associations are made up of millions of determined men, and, as stated by the president of one of them, "We shall elect a President to guide our policies in conjunction with a cabinet composed of farmers from every state' in the Union’*. '

At this juncture the farmer finds himself blessed with an unprecedented popularity. He is surrounded by politicians, telling him all his good qualities, predicting great things for him, and offering to guide his feet into ways that will save the industrial, economic, political and international situation—if only the farmer -will follow his sudden friends. The real object of the politicians is to break up the farmer movement into small units, and render it innocuous— anything to keep the farmers from achieving the unparalleled success just won by the united farmers of Canada.

Even though the politicians do tc*ll the farmers so, there is no question that the farm with its hard work and meager returns, with its nearness to nature and its enforced opportunities for reflection and meditation, creates the most conservative body of men in any nation. Many are the assurances to that effect:

“The failure of the industrial conference toaccompli?h :’.nv concrete thing necessary an offensive and defensive alliance between all constructive forces of the

country. In this crisis the fanner must get to the helm; and he must stay at the helm until the ship of state is brought safely into the haven of rest.”

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