Golden Age, September 27, 1922
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Sept 27,1922, Vol. Ill, Na 79
■SB Published every other lfj£l week at 18 Concord Street, Brooklyn, N. Y., U. S. A.
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VOL. 8 WEDNESDAY, BKPTBMBEB. 27, 1022 Wo. D
CONTENTS of the GOLDEN AGE
LABOR AND ECONOMICS
An Imaginary Visit Downtown----------------------- . . 809
Not for Poor People -------------——.........
Conditions in Georgia --------
FINANCE—COMMERCE—TRANSPORTATION
Mr. Drummond's Transportation Plan ----------—.
An Apostrophe to Usury ..
POLITICAL—DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN
Beyond the Indus, Part I 803
Governmental Complica
tions
Famines in India
Taxes in India
Industrial Possibilities ....808
Pro and Con _____
Parties a Failure
Political Money-Blessers ..814
Business Men in Congress 814 \v i id Beasts ........................814
What to Do ...........
Interdependence of Nations .......... 822
AGRICULTURE AND HUSBANDRY Agriculture in India
SCIENCE AND INVENTION Vacuum Tube Amplifier
Too Much Rain ....
ROME AND HEALTH How to Keep Well ........816 Effect of Thought
Fresh Air and Sunshine 817 i'owrr of Bight, Heat and Poise of the Human Body 818 Electricity ........ .
Poise Is Perfection ..........819 Principles of Poise
RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY
Mr. Bryan and the Clergy 822
How Long Would Christ
Last? ________________________________823
Did He Baptize the Dog? 823
Liberty and Love Forever 824
The Wise and. Otherwise 825
Catechhm for young
Children
His Satanic Majesty the Devil 826
Satanic Social Order
Christianity and the Bible 828
In Parables
“This Gospel” ......
The Great Apostasy
False Teachings
Studies in the “Harp of
God"831
Published every other Wednesday at IB Concord Street, Brooklyn, N. Y, . . . . TI. S, A. by WOODWORTH, HEDGINGS and MARTIN CLAYTON .J. WOODWORTH.......Editor
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Golden Age
Volume III Brooklyn, N. Y., Wednesday, Sept. 27, 1922 Number 7t
Beyond the Indus (Part i)
THE word India simply means “Beyond the Indus,” the river at the western boundary of" the country. India is a triangle, washed on two sides by the sea. Its length, north to south, is 2,000 miles; and its greatest width is 1,800 miles.
Two millenniums ago the armies of Alexander the Great, ruler of Greece, invaded India. But India is a long way from Greece, and the soldiers who had conquered the world for Alexander did not wish to go farther away from home. Alexander wanted to go on, but lifter a few days’ parley saw that he could not do it without a revolt, and reluctantly turned back. In the middle ages the Mohammedans overran the country, and there are 66,000,000 Mohammedans in India at this day.
The problem of giving India a just, humane, uplifting government is the greatest governmental problem ever undertaken by man. It is so much more difficult than Britain’s Irish problem; or Mexico’s peon problem, or the United States’ Negro or Philippine problem, that all of them, and a dozen more to boot, are not worthy of comparison. The reason is that India is not a unit in any direction. It is disunited racially, lingually, religiously, industrially, socially. It is in an abyss of poverty beyond the ability of any mind to comprehend .that has not come into actual contact with India itself. And the problem is not getting easier of solution. Indeed, it grows harder year by year; for India is going to ruin in more ways than any other country, and has a less distance to go.
Imagine a land in which the people cannot afford to have separate homes; but family groups of thirty to fifty individuals live in one house, built around a quadrangle. In these dwellings are women whose only view of life is that of the court upon which the rooms of women always face. There is no furniture. The sanitary arrangements are unspeakable. The buildings are so rickety that they can barely stand. The walls and the floors swarm with vermin. In millions of these homes, food is to be had but once a day. Cholera and plague are rife. Tn the cities the industrial workers sleep fifteen to twenty in a single room, in a stifling atmosphere and in an intolerable stench. A single window or door provides what ventilation there is.
In the country as a whole the rainfall is the heaviest in the world; yet, at times, there are hundreds of square miles of scorching plains without a tree, and so dry that the earth cracks. Leprosy and fever stalk hand-in-hand with hunger within the villages, while cobras and other poisonous serpents lie in wait to catch the unwary, or even invade the villages themselves. Four million people die of fever in India annually. One woman out of every six is a widow, and considered of ill-omen. She is denied suitable clothing, her jewelry is broken, her head is shaved, and she is virtually a prisoner for life. Even if not a widow, she may not take a railway journey except in a closed compartment with drawm blinds. If a woman of rank, she drives to the station in a closed carriage and passes from the carriage to the train through an artificial passageway of sheets held up by servants. She has nothing to say about whom she should marry. The marriage contract is arranged through brokers. To be the parent of a large family of girls is a disgrace; for a daughter is considered a calamity.
Governmental Complications
IMAGINE the difficulties of trying to rule over a state that for centuries was administered by 700 separate and distinct governments, all bearing rule at the same time in aa many adjoining states, and each with different customs handed down for generations. In these states forty languages and nearly four times that number of dialects are in use. Seventy of
the native states, inhabited by an average of a million people each, are governed by their native rulers much as they have been for hun-. dreds and in some instances thousands of years. The problems of governing such a people as a whole must involve the wise direction of these lesser rulers.
Imagine the difficulties of trying to rule over 315,000,000 people, only six percent of whom can read and write, and of whom twenty percent are Pariahs who may not even use the public roads because they pollute others at sixty-four feet; and these 315,000,000 people are divided into 2,300 major and many more minor castes, with such an infinite variety of rules respecting pollutions and purifications that foreigners never get to understand them fully.
A family of one caste may not mingle with those of another. A Pariah is considered untouchable and may never rise above that state. The average wage is three cents a day for all classes. Any kind of dead animal is the basis for a family feast among those who are of the untouchables. Clothes are washed by pounding them on a rock.
Here is a land which has more than 30,000,-000 gods, or demons, each' requiring acts of penance or self-inflicted torture on the part of the worshiper. Each devotee is supposed to wear on his forehead the mark of his god, which determines his caste and his standing in the caste. The devil is worshiped because he is the strongest of gods; smallpox is deified.
Women are never mentioned in conversations between men. It is an insult to speak to a man about his wife. The forty million child-widows are never permitted to view even the tops of the trees. Their whole lives are spent indoors. It is a life dishonor to reach the age of twelve years without being married. Public prostitutes are attached to the temples of worship, for the convenience of the heathen clergy and their friends.
In one section a marriage ceremony requires three days; in another a whiff from a pipe suffices. In one section the women wear skirts and in another trousers. There are districts where hunting and even warfare are still carried on with bows and arrows; and if there are not enough complications in governing the Hindus there are 66,000,000 fighting Mohammedans, with all the idiosyncrasies for which Mohammedans are famous.
Speaking in general terms, there is only one European in India to each 2,000 population. It is perfectly obvious that the only legitimate excuse a European has for being there is an unselfish desire to help the natives arrange for themselves that form of government which will be for their greatest benefit. Besides these Europeans (only 168,000 in the whole land) there are 16,000,000 natives who have some education and who under the direction of Europeans are engaged in professional and administrative work. These millions are more easily directed than the overwhelming masses engaged in agriculture, all of whom are chronically on the verge of starvation.
It is obvious that one of the things most needed in India is education; and it seems a great pity that in a land where the taxes can be wrung from the people only at the cost of the deaths of large numbers of them that so much money should be spent for other things and so little for the education that would help to relieve the whole horrible situation.
In the United States it is said that out of every dollar raised for taxation something like ninety-three cents goes to pay the cost of wars that are past or wars that we hope to get into in the future. But we do spend one cent of the dollar for education; and to that extent, or, we may say, in that proportion, this is a civilized nation. Indeed, some have even termed this a Christian nation, largely, we presume, because of the sums we spend for such good purposes. India does not do quite so well in the education of the masses; it has too many other ways for its money. It collects a total revenue of $617,000,000 and pays out $1,838,338 for education — less than one-third cent per one dollar. Ninety percent of the girls and eighty percent of the boys receive no education at all.
The income of the average American has been computed at exactly forty times the income of the average Hindu, but the Viceroy of India is not content with one fortieth of the income of the President of the United States. Not on your life! The President gets $75,000 per year, and the Viceroy gets $83,500, plua
'1 »I
many allowances and presents from native rulers—which make the job much sought after. Christian Viceroys in heathen India have to be well paid.
Then the Viceroy must have assistants, somewhat like the President’s cabinet. Each member of the President’s cabinet receives a salary of $12,000 per year, but a member of the Viceroy’s council receives considerably more than twice that amount each. When these arguments reach the ears of the Hindu heathen, they become very convincing evidence that Christianity is a paying proposition, that pays even better in heathendom than it does in Christendom.
The press of India seems to be in about the same condition as the press of the United States, i. e., afraid to tell the truth on any subject for fear of getting into trouble. In the year 1910 the Viceroy and his council (these make all the laws for India) put through a Press Act, calculated to take away all remaining freedom of the press in India; and the law seems to have accomplished, just what was expected of it by the liberty-loving British Empire. Since its enactment penalties have been levied on some 350 presses, 500 publications have been suppressed, and 300 newspapers have been bonded in large amounts. The press may publish the most violent attacks upon the natives, but nothing seriously criticizing the European interlopers.
On account of its poverty India cannot afford much in the way of instruction by movies, although there are said to be 168 motion-picture houses, at which all classes of films are shown. The poor Hindus are like everybody else—seeking something of change, something that will make them forget their unhappy lot. They revel in the American films displaying the daredevil feats of cowboys on the American plains.
Famines in India
OF COURSE everybody knows or should know that there is no agricultural land that does not produce enough food to care for its population if there were some way by which all of the food raised could be devoted to feeding all that need it. But no such way has been found. When the great famine of 1921-1922 visited China, and millions died for want of food, Chinese big business was exporting eggs and other foodstuffs in great quan-
tities. Does it not seem a pity that there waa not some power in China strong enough and -good enough to buy those eggs or commandeer , them and distribute them among the starving? Now if the Chinese government had had a V starving army instead of just plain common ordinary everyday folk, not an egg would have moved until the army was cared for. -7
So it is in India. The country raises food enough. One cannot judge otherwise from the : facts; for in the year 1899-1900, when India ' was in the throes of one of its greatest famines, it exported over $60,000,000 worth of <grain, and during the famine year of 1917-1918 the exports of foodstuffs were 7,000,000 tons, amounting in value to $247,179,360.
Students of Indian affairs claim that in the last great famine, in one year, the deaths from starvation and from plague caused by insuffi- , cient food amounted to 40,000,000 people; and they lay this loss directly to the World War, ' which swept India of foodstuffs. Does it not seem a pity that India does not have a government strong enough and good enough to prevent the export of foods when it knows that such shipments mean the death of millions f Granting that the civilization of Europe is • beautiful, brotherly, generous and “Christian,” is it sufficiently so to justify the killing of 40,- ;
000,000 Hindus by starvation in order that it may flourish in those arts of war and bloodshed to which it is chiefly devoted and to which it has given and still gives practically all of its ; income I .
The London Times can hardly be classed as a sentimental journal, but it published the following from its Bombay correspondent; and there is a world of pathos in the simple recital of the facts attendant upon one of the greatest dramas of misery ever staged on this planet. The dispatch said:
“India having been swept bare of foodstuffs to meet the exigencies of the war, the people feel that the home government is lukewarm in releasing supplies from outside, and regret particularly that the shipping controller is maintaining high freights on fat and rice from Burma. These severe sufferings are superimposed on the devastating influenza and cholera epidemics.”
Taxes in India
Ti IE money paid in for taxes in India would 4 do a great deal to alleviate the miseries of its people; for $617,000,000 is a great ,sum of '|g| money. In India, it would prevent 40,000^000 people from starving, and leave over a third of the sum for distribution expenses, education, etc. Of course the government would have to cut down its expenditure of $213,911,500 for military purposes and $72,344,500 for strategic railroads; but would it not be worth while when people are starving? Starving people cannot eat armed soldiers or railroad tracks. It might be necessary to give the Viceroy a cut in his wages of $83,500 per year, with a slice off from the councilors’ wages of $27,000 each per year. The jobs would be good ones at very much less wages, and the best of Viceroys or councilors is not worth much to a man that is starving to death.
Much of the money collected for taxes in India really belongs to the people themselves. Thus, the $113,432,000 land-tax, the $17,764,000 from forests and the $19,571,500 from salt are all for the use of things which pertain to the Hindus as a people from time immemorial. What a pity that only $1,838,338 of all these
amounts finds it way back to the people in the form of expenditures for education!
Some of the money assessed for taxes plainly
’ belongs to the devil. In no other category can we place the $15,281,000 derived from the British Government opium monopoly, and the $60,766,550 derived from the sale of liquor. America is much more pious. We do not license the sale of liquor here; that is, we do not do so any more. We would be doing it—most certainly we would—but the ones that would have voted for the continued reign of John Barleycorn in our midst were busy drinking French wines when the Prohibition Amendment to the Constitution was passed, and the Supreme Court, in the exercise of rights not granted to it by the Constitution, has not yet decided that the Constitution is unconstitutional, though there are some who surmise that it may do so some. day.
Sir William Digby has published statistics showing that the transport of India’s foods from the interior to the coast by means of the numerous railway lines and thence to the ends of the earth has so worked against the interest of the people that famines are increasing in frequency and intensity. He shows that in past centuries there was the number of famines indicated :
CENTURY EAMINM
Fourteenth
Fifteenth
Sixteenth
Seventeenth
Eighteenth (prior to to British Rule) .....r
Eighteenth (subsequent to British rule)
Nineteenth (first quarter)
Nineteenth (second and third quarters)
Nineteenth (fourth quarter) ....................18
Tables of data which are of information as showing that India’s famines are not due to overpopulation are provided in the following statistics:
POPULATION
COUNTRY - PER SQ. MILS
Belgium
England and Wales ..................618
Holland
Japan
Germany
Italy ............................*.293
Austria
China
India
COUNTRY
BIRTH RATI per 1000 POPULATION
China
Russia
Servia
Hungary . . .
Roumania
Bulgaria .
Germany
Mexico
Chile
India
Famines in India are not caused chiefly by failure of rains; for India has the heaviest rainfall in the world. The real cause of the famines is the same as in China—the need oil a government strong enough and good enough to tree India’s food supplies for India’s people.
Historians claim that it was from the taxes raised in India that the full costs were paid of Britain’s first Afghan war of 1839-1840; the Persian war of 1856; the Abyssinian war of 1866-1868; the Perak expedition of 1875; the second Afghan war of 1878-1880; the Egyptian war of 1878-1880; and the Soudan war of 18851886. It is hard to see why people who are starving to death, or who are always on the edge of starvation, should have to pay these bills.
Professor Radhakamal Mukerjee has published a table showing the percentages which
various classes of Hindus for food and other items:
spend respectively
4)
Food .........
Clothing ......
Medicine ......
Education .....
Luxuries ......
Religion and
Social Ceremonies
Ori
95.4
4.0
0.0
0.0
0.0
0.6
94.0
3.0
1.0
0.0
0.0
2.0
,8 <■ a u S.
83.5
12.0
1.5
0.0
1.0
2.0
79.0
11.0
5.0
0.0
1.0
4.0
it
5s
COM
77.7
9.0
5.9
1.0
1.4
5.0
d>
74.0
4.7
8.0
3.3
2.0
8.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
India are devoted to opium culture. The “Christian” government of India is directly back of this monopoly, and stands sponsor for the 18,- t 000 licensed opium dens that are destroying the people of India, because it clears some $15,000,000 annually from the traffic.
Slavery in India
COOLIES in the tea gardens of India seem -to be treated about on a par . with the treatment of American citizens in the convict camps • of the South, as far as we can judge. That is> . they are treated as slaves, and all just rights as human beings are denied them.
A case has come to our attention where some
Commenting on this table a writer has well said:
“Work, hunger, lingering death—these are the milestones on the tragic path of the life of the workingman in India. Enveloped in an engrossing mist of poverty he goes through life as in a nightmare. From birth to death he rises before dawn hungry, works all day long with but little to eat, and at night he goes to bed hungry again. His constant companions are hunger and thirst, debt and degradation, sorrow, suffering and sickness, unclean clothes and unsanitary homes. His only Consolation in life is the hope of relief in death.”
One of the causes of India’s poverty is that out of a total population of 318,132,537, according to the latest census returns available, 4,500,000 are what are termed in India mendicants or holy men, but what in America we would probably designate as religious bums or pious tramps. These go on pilgrimages from one “shrine” to another, begging their way from the poor people along the route.
Agriculture in India .
INDIA produces one-tenth of the world’s wheat, one-fifth of its cotton, and one-third of its tea, tobacco, rice, cattle, and cane sugar. The crop-yielding area is 198,500,000 acres, 54,000,000 of which are in rice and 14,000,000 in cotton. The irrigated area is 37,000,000 acres, but much more irrigation is necessary to properly distribute the water supplies. Some of the irrigation projects of India pay their promoters the full cost in dividends every four years. It seems a pity, after they have paid for themselves a few times, not to do the generous thing and let the poor Hindus have them as a gift.
More than 200,000 acres of the best land in five thousand coolies during the war had their costs of living doubled and their wages raised only ten percent. They desired to return to the mainland from the port on the Brahmapootra River where they were employed. Access to the boat was refused them and there was some disorder, but no one seriously injured. That night the camp of these refugees was entered by armed men who assaulted men, women, and children with the butt ends of their rifles. This unexpected attack, following upon the weakened conditions of the people due to insufficient food, is supposed to have been responsible for the cholera epidemic which followed.
It has been often observed that cholera, the bubonic plague, or the “flu,” frequently follows special drains upon the vitality of the halfstarved Hindus, and that those reasonably well fed are immune. It was the shortage of food in India during the winter of 1917-1918 that caused the 6,000,000 deaths from “flu.” For a while they were dying in Bombay at the rate of 5,000 per week. About one-third of the “flu” ■ deaths of the world took place in India.
Those that have knowledge’ of the matter claim that there are at least 100,000,000 of India’s population who are chronically underfed,’ and that 60,000,000 of these must be content v with one meal per day.
The high cost of living, due to the World War, has caused much unrest among the Mo-hammcdans. One of the rules of the Mohammedan clergy is that the dead shall be buried in unused shrouds, as otherwise they will not . land hereafter in the special place which is to j be occupied by those who have observed the ' rules. The lower-class Mohammedans are compelled to bury their dead in used garments-— /da
i-
in dread of what it means to the departed and to themselves for the sacrilege committed. Poor things! What a blessing it would be to them if they could but know the truth that these poor heathen have merely gone to sleep; and are now quietly and unconsciously awaiting the blessings which are to be brought to them and to all through Messiah’s kingdom, now at the doors.
Industrial Possibilities
INDIA has been styled and is generally admitted to be “the prize of empire”; i. e., it has the greatest natural possibilities of any country on earth. It lies in a commanding position on the trade routes of the world and is one of the greatest, if not the greatest, reservoir of raw materials on the planet. It has a sixth of the world’s population.
India could have the greatest metallurgical works in the world; for it has vast coal fields and billions of tons of iron ore, lying on the surface, which can be loaded on cars at less than a dollar a ton. It is one of the greatest producers of manganese, and has inexhaustible riches of gold, silver, copper, tin, antimony, lead, platinum, bismuth, tungsten, graphite, mica, asbestos, gypsum, chromite, clay, alum, petroleum, agate, sapphires, diamonds, and rubies. It has ivory in large quantities, and untouched sources of vast power in the great rivers which rise in the Himalayas and find their way into the Indian Ocean.
Two thousand years before the beginning of the Christian era the beautiful muslins of India’s hand-looms were used in Egypt as winding sheets for the mummies of the Pharaohs. Before the traders of Northern Europe ever found their way around the Cape of Good Hope, India's silks, brocades, carpets, woodwork, ivories, silverware and brassware were sought after and admired throughout the breadth of Asia, Northern Africa and Eastern and Southeastern Europe. Today India has nothing left but agriculture and a few cotton and jute factories.
For a time after British occupation India sent the products of her looms to England, where they commanded fancy prices; but the invention and use of labor-saving machinery soon changed this. In a little while England was importing India’s cotton and sending back cotton piece-goods -to India cheaper than the Hindus could make them. The natural result was that the Hindus bought the cheaper goods, and their own weaving industry collapsed.
Without specific information as to how it was . done, the Hindus claim that they have been discriminated against by legislation which has deprived them of their industries, and that at the same time they have been given inadequate aid in obtaining the education 'without which they can never regain their former position among the industrial peoples of the world.
They claim that at the present time the markets of India are swamped with articles of European manufacture, which are beyond the powers of the Hindu people to purchase, and ■which, without machinery, they cannot make for themselves. They say, too, that if they could revive their ancient industries on the basis of modern science, and could for a time retain in their land the grains which they have raised, they could do away with want and misery and make India a second Garden of Eden — indeed, make it a place where, ultimately, many times more of European products could be absorbed than is now possible. Paupers are poor customers.
That British statesmen see the possibilities of India is plain from the following remarkable declaration by Lord Curzon:
“India is so important that without her the Empire could not continue to exist. But for India Lord Beaconsfield would not have bought the shares in the Suez Canal; and but for the Suez Canal we should not be in Egypt. But for India we should not have been able to incarcerate the mighty spirit of Napoleon in the rocky prison of St. Helena, nor should we have acquired predominant position in Mesopotamia, nor have controlled the Persian Gulf. India started us on that career of territorial conquest which was arrested only by the snowy ramparts of the Himalayas, and which converted us from a small island with trading and maritime interests into the greatest land power in the world. Consider what would happen were we to lose India and were some other power to take our place. We should lose its splendid and unfailing markets, shut against us by hostile tariffs; we should lose what is the principal, indeed, almost the only formidable element in our fighting strength. Our influence in Asia would quickly disappear; we should not long retain the posts and coaling stations which dot the ocean highways with the British flag; Australia would be much more open to attack; our colonies would cut themselves off from a dying trunk, and we should sink into a third-rate power, an object of shame to ourselves and of derision to the rest of mankind.”
An Imaginary Visit Down Town with the Working-man’s Wife
By Mrs. E. J. Price
WE WILL suppose that by some extraordinary'chance a kind motherly woman pays a visit to the mother of three small children, and informs her that she will care for the children while the mother takes an afternoon off, away from all her household cares and worries.
The afternoon is bright and sunny; so the young mother decides to take in the sights of the many department-store windows.
She has not walked a great distance before she notices a number of people gathered in front of one of the windows of an electric store. After investigation she finds out that the demonstrator inside the store window is about to display the very latest model in electric washing-machines. She decides to wait and see the demonstration. She views with a measure of incredulity the ease and comfort with which a large family washing can be completed independent of human energy. She walks away, thinking of the one-day-a-week task which keeps her bending over her washboard. She cannot even indulge in the luxury of the thought that some day she may be able to afford such a machine.
After walking a short distance, she reads an announcement in one of the department-store windows to the effect,/Be sure to see the ideal kitchen in the basement.' She resolves to see the exhibition..
On arriving* there, she finds the ideal kitchen scientifically arranged, and completely furnished with all the latest electrical appliances which save the housewife time and energy. She is enraptured at the electric stove, with its many labor-saving devices, and its high oven ‘which eliminates so much stooping. But alas, she knows that she must be content with the stove she has at home.
Her attention is next drawn to the electric dish-washer. As she marvels at the simplicity and rapidity of dish-washing accomplished by this labor-saving device, she thinks of the pile of dishes she washes each day and of the valuable time that is spent on this one task alone. Surely the electric dish-washer would be a blessing in her home. But she realizes that her circumstances permit only the bare necessities of life.
Laid out on the table is a complete canning outfit of numerous little devices which help to make canning a pleasure for the housewife. She meditates. What is more gratifying to the average housewife than, when early fail seta in, to go down into her cellar and view with satisfaction the tempting array of jars of preserves, luscious jams, and vegetables ready for the winter's use! But too often these same jars represent hours of strenuous labor, due to the fact that the housewife did not have the necessary utensils to work with. Truly she thinks this canning outfit wonderful for those who can afford it.
After taking in the many details of the ideal kitchen, she passes on to another department, where she has the pleasure of seeing the electric vacuum-sweeper demonstrated, and with consternation views with what simplicity the dirty, trodden rug can be revived to look like new. She thinks what a boon this electric vacuum-sweeper would be in her home compared with her daily tiresome task of sweeping with a corn-broom. But again she realizes that these luxuries are not for her. • -
IS
NOT FOR POOR PEOPLE
A few circles away she watches with close attention the electric sewing-machine exhibited with its many beneficial advantages and truly considers it a great saver of time and human energy. She thinks of the many hours she spends treadling her old-fashioned sewing-machine after she has done a good day’s work and put her little ones to bed. But again she passes on with no hope of having a new machine of her own.
On her way out her attention is drawn to the flower section. The inborn love of the beauties of nature is strong within her, although she rarely has the pleasure of feasting her eyes upon them. She thinks: <rWhat a treat it would be to be able to take home half a dozen roses.” But she realizes that the amount of money necessary for such a treat would buy a pair of much-needed stockings for her boy.
With varied feelings she walks home, pre- . pares the evening meal, and at the supper-table relates to her family the experiences of the day. After getting her little children tucked into bed, she draws her chair up to the fire, closes her eyes, and indulges in a mental vi-. sion of the home of the more fortunate house-' wife who is in the position to hire sufficient help and to assign each servant to special duties, so as to keep her home methodically managed and cleanly, and who, through having the necessary capital at her command, is enabled to install all these beneficial appliances, and thereby decrease her staff and her household expenses considerably. This housewife realizes that in the electrical appliance she has an ever-willing and obedient servant that knows no set hours and rarely has a grievance.
The young mother ponders: Why be so? Why are these beneficent only within the reach of women who
should it blessings too often
have the least need of them—women who are quite able to pay the price for human energy to accomplish whatever task they want done? Why should the young mother who is burdened with the care of a small family, and who has to manage her home independently of help, be denied the opportunity of benefiting through all these blessings that have come to mankind within recent years? Surely if any one was meant to benefit by these appliances, it was the mother of small children who has numerous calls on her energy during the child-bearing and child-rearing period of her life.
In ages past poets and composers have written and sung the praises of mother, her unselfish love, her ever-ready and keen sense of sympathy for those in trouble and sorrow. But somehow it seemed that before they_coul<l bring a vivid picture of “Mother” to the eye, they had to depict her in the following phraseology: “Her brow that’s all wrinkled and furrowed with care,” or “The silver hairs that shine among the gold,” etc. Alas I Today we find that mankind in general has done little to help to keep these wrinkles and silver hairs away. In fact, we generally find that mother has to grow into these characteristics before she is fully appreciated.
Let us all hope that ere long mother will have all her cares and sorrows taken away, that she will soon share in the blessings that will be showered on mankind when Jesus takes unto Himself His great power and reigns in equity, when men “shall build houses, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them. They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat; for as the days of a tree are the days of my people, and mine elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands.”(Isaiah 65:21, 22) Then, God’s blessings will not be limited to the favored few — to those who by birth, environment or chance, have all earth’s good« things poured into their laps.
Conditions in Georgia Ry o. w. waidrip
-4
CONDITIONS in this part of the country are deplorable, and admitted to be so even by- the city newspapers. Russell County is in bankruptcy; many others in this vicinity are on the verge of bankruptcy, according to reports. In our little city there has been a good number of business houses that have gone into bankruptcy this year, and business is practically dead in this part of the country. The Eagle and Phenix cotton mills here, which employ about 2,000, are running four days per week at wages as low as before the war. The Perkins Hosiery mill, which employs about •1,000 when running, is shut down. There are twelve or fifteen cotton mills here and all of them have reduced wages back to the pre-war scale, and at the same time house rent is as high as it was during the war and in many cases higher. The men who own and rent houses are members of the different big churches in this city, or at least the majority of them are.
Concerning morality, I believe this city is worse off than any place of its size in the state of’Georgia. We have Camp Benning just eight miles below the city and our streets are throng- ’ ed with soldiers and officers. Morals are at a low ebb. The crime wave here is terrible. Recently the city court record showed 107 cases in one week. It will average ninety cases per week the year around. In the face of all this crime the churches that were recently preaching war have been running protracted meetings ; and all the time crime increases.
I am convinced we are living in the end of the gospel age and in the dawn of the Golden Age, when the true bride class shall soon become united to the Groom or Lord and Head, and see Him as He is, and share' His love through all eternity; in blessing and lifting up 19 tile poor world of mankind to the original condition of father Adam before he transgressed the divine law.
Thank God for His vengeance on all institutions of error, and unrighteousness worldwide. The signs that our dear Lord said would come at the end of the age have come just as He predicted, and all that He said would happen is just as sure to come to pass. The nations are assembled and are taking counsel together against the Lord; but all the navies, all the armies, all the dollars, all the men, and all the women taking counsel against the Lord shall utterly fail; for God will have them in derision.
on any trunk, store, bank, or dwelling-plae^ nor on anything we have if only the truth were understood by the poor groaning creation. It would put a lot of men out of work-—the kind they are now doing—but they could, under the right kind of government, be placed in more useful occupations of production for the necessities of life, instead of being a burden on the people as they are now. It would not be long before the world would have an abundance of supplies of all kinds, and people would thus have fewer hours to work; their leisure time they could devote to the study of the divine plan of the ages.
-J. How the poor world needs the truth I but . they shall have it in due time. How sweet the ' real truth is; it will clean up any man or wo-• man if only he or she will read it and give heed to it. We would not need a jail, or police force, ’ or armies, or navies, nor even a lock and key
They will have to swallow the seven volumes of “Scripture Studies,” whether they like to or not. These studies are the medicine that they need, and the seven doses taken according to directions will cure any case—it matters not how sick the patient may be.
Mr. Drummond’s Transportation Plan
Questions by E. L. Robinson Answers by B. J. Drummond
Mb. B. J. Drummond writes with such evident sincerity in his article, “Solving the Railroad Problem by the Golden Rule,” that I accept his offer to answer questions to obtain further information. I would be pleased to see my questions answered categorically in The Golden Age. [Mr. Robinson’s questions and Mr. Drummond’s replies thereto follow in order.—Ed.]
Page 240, Column 1, paragraph 3, he says: “Both parties are not guiltless; . . . transportation systems can be made to serve more adequately the public whose creatures they are.”
Question: If both parties who now operate the roads are guilty of hampering transportation, why should not the public take possession of its creatures (the roads) and operate them in the interest of the public?
Answer: The “Public” had control of the carriers for a period of twenty-six months with the result that the writer, along with thousands of others who used the service provided, were more than ready to welcome the return of the roads to private operation. The fastening upon
. the carriers of the “National Agreements” covering working conditions is only a fair sample of what might be expected were political influence dominant. The casual shipper cannot possibly appreciate what the daily user of transportation was obliged to contend with.
Page 240, Column 1, Subhead, “Unselfishness Requisite.”
^Question: How will the proposed plan promote the required unselfishness?
Answer: Unselfishness would naturally follow any plan wherein the success of any one group is dependent upon the cooperation of the other two. It must be borne in mind that the net amount subject to distribution pro-rata is that which remains after deducting from gross revenue the total expenses exclusive of compensation. There is a natural desire on the part of money, brains and brawn to increase gross revenue and decrease expense in order that a larger amount may be available for distribution.
Page 240, Column 2, paragraph 2: “Brawn cannot be side-tracked in the matter of compensation. It is entitled to receive fair consideration at the hands of money and brains.”
Question: Does this imply that money and brains will work as colleagues in fixing the compensation of brawn?
Answer: They do not fix the compensation of brawn, nor does a combination of any two elements fix compensation of the third. The compensation is fixed by economic conditions as indicated in the answer to query 2. The United States Department of Labor is suggested as a possible medium for fixing the value of the various classes of brains and brawn from which to determine the amount of stock to be issued to each individual comprising the several-groups. To illustrate: Male stenographers for instance are capable of earning $1500 a year whether they serve a railroad, a jobber, a manufacturer, or a lawyer. This is equivalent to a return of five and one-half percent on approximately $28,000; hence each male stenographer would receive 280 shares of-stock at par value of $100 each as representing his contribution to the business.
Page 241, column 2, paragraph 2.
Question: How much water is included in the $18,900,000,000 money capital proposed?
Answer: This sum representing money capital invested in the American Bailroad is a tentative figure given out by the Interstate Commerce Commission as the value on which rates are to be made so as to produce, as near as may be, five and one-half percent on such value. The Commission states this value does not include any water; same having been squeezed out in the process of valuation on which the Commission’s Engineers have been at work for more than five years last past.
Question: Does the brawn capitalization recognize the brain required in the manual operation of the roads? .
Answer: It does to the extent that they are necessary to carry out and execute the orders of management. A crossing flagman who did not possess sufficient brains to wave the warning signal at the approach of a train certainly could not be intrusted with that responsibility; and yet it is not his brains that are being compensated, but his ability to give the signal. His compensation is measured by his “stock value.” One with only sufficient ability to flag a crossing for a railroad is in the same class as one who acts as a “chambermaid” in a livery stable. Such ability would probably command compensation of about $700 a year, equal to five and one-half percent on about $13,000; therefore such an one would be assigned 130 shares of stock.
Question: If so, what portion is for brain ' ' and what portion for brawn?
Ansiver: See foregoing. .;
Question: If part of the brawn capital is ’ for brain, is it capitalized on a par value with managerial brain? <
Answer: See foregoing.
Page 211, column 2, paragraph 3. This paragraph provides for the redemption of surplus 4 money capital at a premium of two percent । plus accrued dividends. It also provides for dis- j missal of surplus brain and brawn and cancel- I lation of their capital on payment of two dol- M
lars per share (a discount of ninety-eight per- | cent) and nothing said about accrued divi- | dends. This is proposed for times of depression to save transportation the burden of over- i capitalization. ‘
Question: Does this not give money capital the full value of its investment and throw sur- .A plus brain and brawn on the scrap heap with
two dollars per share in their pockets in a time
of depression?
Answer : It is conceded that whenever mon- ; ey, brains, or brawn, are found unnecessary and dispensed with, then they each receive two -dollars per share plus accrued dividends. If, . ,.l
in time of depression, brains and brawn are
dispensed with and thrown out of employment
with, say $260, as in the case of the crossing
watchman cited in answer to query above,
which is two dollars per share on 130 shares,
he would have that much to go on while the
investor whose $13,000 was returned would
likewise receive $260 to carry him over until
he could re-invest his money. During times of
depression he would probably have to accept less than five and one-half percent or might hot be able to get more than savings bank rates.
Question: Does it not place brain and * brawn at a disadvantage to reinvest their ex- > pert knowledge of railroad work in lines.where
it will be of little value and at a time of de-
pression?
Answer: Brain and brawn are not at any ? greater disadvantage than money. During depressed times it is often more easy to sell one’s ~ talent or labor than to safely invest money at " compensatory rates. .
Page 242, paragraph 1 and 2.
Question: Does not the capitalization of brain and brawn cheapen men to a dollar val- 2 uet To illustrate: I once employed a Negro '
Massa; but befoh de wah I fetched $1500 on volved?
whom I jokingly asked: 'What are you worth, Uncle Mack?” His reply was: “Don’t know now, de block.”
Answer: If it is conceded that capitalizing one’s ability or brawn on the basis of what they are capable of earning in the world’s market is reducing men to a dollar value, then they are reduced to the dollar value. We are all worth what we are capable of earning. One would not think of compensating a mechanic fifty dollars a day for doing the labor of repairing a “Tin Lizzie”; yet many executives are capable of commanding much more than that. Why? For the same reason-that a skilled carpenter is worth more than the saw-and-ham-mer kind.
' Question: Does this plan fix a price of so
much* per head on the white railroad worker? Answer: See answer above.
Page 243, column 1, paragraph 1.
Question: In a 3, 3, 3 directorate is it not likely that brains and money capital will act in collusion as at present to hold brawn in subjection?
Answer: No more than brains and brawn might endeavor to corral money; each is compensated according to the value of his investment, no more, no less. Their interests are common.
Question: Will not the unequal compensation be a continual cause of strife in the directorate?
Answer: The compensation is not unequal; each receives five and one-half percent on the amount invested whether it be money, brains, or brawn, and neither can increase that rate without the others sharing at the same rate; likewise if the net revenue shrinks below that figure each class shares at the same rate.
Question: Would not the spirit of democ-
818 '*
racy be better served by a percentage of representation based upon the human element in-
Answer: No; for the compensation is not determined by the numbers involved. The money may be owned by few or many. The brains capital may be confined to a few, yet in value exceed the capitalization of either money or brawn. Likewise on account of highly skilled brawn workers a few might represent an in-vestment in excess of either money or brains.
Page 243, column 2, paragraph 3.
Question: Is it an equitable distribution of net earnings to allow the same compensation to money capital which performs no service, as to brain and brawn’s capitalized expert knowledge to which they add service in time and labor?
Answer: Money is as necessary to the successful operation of the business as is expert knowledge or skilled brawn. Many a brainy investor has gone to a pauper’s grave for lack of money capital. Money therefore performs a very necessary service. Brain and brawn workers have the opportunity of investing their surplus money in the business and thus draw dividends both as brain or brawn “investors” and money “investors” too.
Question: How would Jesus of Nazareth distribute the net earnings among those who had contributed to the transportation service?
Answer: I am not prepared to intelligently answer this question, except to state that I believe that Jesus of Nazareth would have made a distribution based on equity. I am sure that He would have adopted a method that would render an equal return to money, brains, and brawn, but the three working in harmony would have to earn it. If there were a loss, the three classes would also have to share it equally.
Pro and Con By l. d. names
Mr. Wilson still leads the Democrat party,” says a headline. The tendency is away from the Harding camp. Democrats and progressive Republicans are in favor. Yet we could not think of Mr. Wilson as leader. His espionage act, his private wars, his deportation and conscription acts, his daylight saving scheme, his league, his trip to Europe, his secret confab with the pope, his presents, etc., etc., preclude the idea.
Yet the people are forgetful. They are easily diverted and divided. They are conservative and trustful. Many are unread and unthoughtful. Thousands do not know that Democrat means Republican, and vice versa. They do not know that the real work of the old parties is to serve private interests and keep the people divided on tariff issues that no statesman can fathom. Mr. Wilson may be the leader, but evidently he is still headed for the Wilhelm-Czar Nicholas camp.
Parties a Failure
CEASE ye from man whose life is in his nostrils” says the Prophet. Political parties are a stupendous failure. Renegade republics have no more lease of existence than have the musty monarchies. Who could really believe in the Democratic party, so often in power, and as often derelict and unsatisfactory? Who could actually believe in the Republican party, which had all the say from the sixties to the eighties? These two parties representing the same idea of government, but nursing political ambitions, oppositions and hatreds instead of working for the greatest good, may expect rejection at the hands of the voters. The Democratic party is gone, let us hope, never to return. And its twin brother in corruption bids fair to go with it. “Be patient, therefore, brethren.”
Political Money-Blessers
RE CENT LY a “fortune teller” passed through and displayed great powers for blessing money. He could bless a roll so that it would prosper in the thing wherein it was invested and accomplish all that could be desired. One man got his two hundred blessed, and a woman had her fifteen hundred so conjured that like the widow’s oil it would never play out. The blesser merely passed the money over his head and behind his back and through his hair to impart the philosopher’s touch and the buying power. Thereafter, success would attend all investments, and everything that the money touched would turn to wealth. Then the roll, handed back, was not to be opened until a certain day at a certain hour.
But to spoil it all and to take the joy out of life one of the blessed got over-anxious and opened her package in the wrong place, and found only a roll of blank paper. But the blesser had passed on in his search for still others to bless and enrich.
Politicians and office-seekers work on the same principle. Promises are made from year to year, and the years merge into the dim past, and promises pile up like national debts. The people forget until the next April fool spellbinder comes along with his mouth disease,
and his magic of words to bind their faculties until the next election. Then they begin, to reflect that they have been stung once more. But again they forget until the next fool-stinger comes along. .
Business Men in Congress
rpi IE capitalistic press suggests that “men like -L the Hills and the Schwabs and the Garys” should be sent to Congress. The Fricks and the Rockefellers should be included. With such men in Congress steel strikes and railroad strikes could be abolished by simply compelling men to work until they fell dead, and then compel a new crew. The historic Homestead riots and the Colorado Avar on miners and their helpless families could have been avoided on similar lines. '
Doubtless quite a lot of operators, et-al., in Mingo County, West Virginia, could be depended upon—if elected to Congress—to banish traitorous coal diggers from the earth, if need be, to cleanse the sacred coal fields, and establish prison discipline, and thus prevent common intercourse between folks who have no respected rights under the capitalistic sun.
Then there is Governor Allen, the great Kansas Industrial Court legislator. Would capital ever get anywhere without him? Laws that work one way—laws to curb and compel miners to dig coal and keep the public warm and keep up dividends, though the said public neither employs, nor digs — are the limit to date. We should have a Congress of this type of men at once, if we are fools enough to want anarchy!
Wild Beasts
FROM the divine viewpoint human governments in their political and religious aspects resemble wild creatures—lions, bears, leopards —deformed and unnamable beasts. Imagine a monster, an evil beast with four great heads, two large wings, a powerful sponge-like maw and a great tail. Picture these heads one in Washington, one in New York, one in Paris, and one in London. These heads represent intelligence, brute force, controlling power. The large wings are the masses of voters and henchmen arrayed and flopping, the one wing called Democrat and the other Republican. The ,1 tail represents hypocrisy and counterfeit Christianity and lies in Rome. The great maw
JMt '' *■
Bsptbmbbb 27, 1922
or stomach is universal and represents finances, property and slaves.
The heads are harmonious. Their purpose is to control the wings, to keep them flopping in opposite directions, but never allowing them to rise and fly. During this operation the great stomach is absorbing everything. The wings, demoralized,. have no other purpose than to flop from side to side, from high tariff to low tariff, and from war to peace, and vice versa, as the heads in the interest of their great stomach may direct. The tail, though it tries to wag
GOLDEN AGE
the heads, has no other function to perform than to wiggle the heads’ approval and keep the wings flopping, but to discourage any attempts to fly.
This, in brief, is a faint outline of beastly-institutions as they exist today. This is Plutocracy, alias Democracy. This is a deformed and unnamable wild beast. The world of mankind is enmeshed by it. But we are glad to know that God has promised that He "will cause the evil beasts to cease out of the land.” —Ezeldel 34: 25.
What To Do
EPEAL the present railroad law enacted by command of fiscal agents, wholly for the purpose of looting the U. S. Treasury, also robbing the producer and the consumer by nearly prohibitive rates.
The absolute and immediate payment of our national debt by certificate issues and further issues of such government certificates based upon the entire wealth of the nation, as is necessary to meet promptly the county, municipal and farm obligations and those for paved roads on a twenty-five-year basis, four percent of the principal to be paid each year until the twentyfifth year, when the debt would be fully liquidated and without interest, save a nominal tax for handling. This would eliminate all premeditated panics, such as the present, brought about by the interlocking of the Farm Loan and the Federal Reserve Banks, wholly in order to starve the farmers of the Northwest who were organizing, and also organized labor, into submission.
In addition to furnishing immediate and ample finances, the above would immediately eliminate a debt of four hundred billion, of which ’Ohio’s share is six hundred million and which now requires fifty cents of each dollar paid in taxes to meet the annual interest charge in Ohio alone. To those who wish the tax burden removed, there is but one alternative, if bankruptcy is to be averted: Elect Congressmen upon a specific platform to liquidate the debt immediately, also a Governor and a Legislature that will remove fifty percent of the state employes and stop unnecessary expenditure. The assurance of peace and disarmament, not by any Four-Power Pact, or Alliance, but a ref-
By E. E. Cassel
erendum vote upon all wars except hasty invasion, thus throttling war propangandists and profiteers who have purchased, in a large measure, the policy of the big daily press and other mediums deemed necessary to keep the truth of national and international questions from the people, thus making the formation of a correct opinion impossible and, therefore, destroying the intelligent right of suffrage. The immediate and permanent repeal of conscription.
The collection of eleven billion dollars loaned to Europe and the prosecution of government officials and other common thieves holding mil-lions of government money on war contracts not produced. A protective tariff which will assure cost and a reasonable profit to the producer and to the extent that it will curb the five packers now securing beef from South America, to the ruination of beef production here and without due consideration of the price they are asking the consumer.
A bonus to the soldiers who were forced to leave home and forced to fight in a foreign war, and a resumption of the excess-profit tax, which will more than pay the bonus.
In conclusion, it is pertinent to say that there can be no help for the producer nor for the rank-and-file consumer except through Congress and by thorough action in conjunction with a Governor and Legislature upon these issues. This is a fact well known to the money oligarchy that now controls legislation and even the courts.
Organized capital is bitterly opposed to the enacting of any portion of the program I have outlined.
An Apostrophe to Usury By George Colwell
OTHOU Usury, high and mighty, great and powerful; thou innocent-looking, many headed monster! In what country art thou not supreme ? What trust art thou not the head of ? No business is transacted without thee. Thy word is law. Thy devouring heads have many strange shapes ■— interest, dividends, rentals and profits; while taxes and customs duties are much of thine own. All these and many more go to appease thy gluttonous appetite.
The foolish church, weak and deceived, lies prostrate at thy feet, begging and obtaining from thee a small portion of thine ill-gotten gain.
Even the missionaries in foreign lands have kind words for thee. Why should they not? For thou suppliest much of their daily needs.
Thou hast, too, a loyal priesthood, thy “Wall Street” gang. Surely thou must acknowledge that they sacrifice many victims upon thine unholy altar, that others of thine ignoble breed, more favored by thee, may the richer be.
Since when, old Usury, didst thou coin thy new name “Interest”? For I’ve searched the Bible through and through, and nowhere is the new word given. Thou knewest that interest, no matter how low the rate, is usury. Yet thou hast made the world believe that as “Interest” thou art ‘not Usury at all. O thou two-faced, many-headed rascal, full well thou knewest that usury was condemned! (Leviticus25: 36; Psalm 15:5; Matthew 5: 42) How soon shall they find thee out? ,
How strange, O Usury, that our great ones, both Jews and Christians, have lost confidence long ago in God and His prophets, and are now humbly praying unto thee, Great Usury, and to thy “profits,” saying, “Give us this day our daily bread.” And thine evil system, generous to the few, surely gives it them. The nations in distress called unto thee, saying, “Deliver us from evil,” and in thine evil presence have issued war bonds, victory bonds, more bonds and more
bonds. And it was thy “percent” that brought I results; for thou knowest how to reach the ... hearts of all thy worshipers. The war was a ; great boom to thee, 0 Usury. 0 thy hypnotic power! How we fall to thee! Even Socialists | are numbered among thine own. U
Everyone knows full well that if a man today really has honest “hard luck” and has not even ' wasted his substance in riotous living as did the prodigal, there is no such thing by thy mighty system as forgiveness or setting him up again, even though he has done his best. He must sacrifice his last bit of goods to thee. Our lawmakers, clever boys, thy obedient servants, see . to this. 0 thou accursed Usury! It is through thee and thee alone that millions go starving in the midst of plenty; for thy wealth (reserved capital) must keep doubling and doubling as the years roll by and our Usury dues must bo met though all else fails. ‘
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