In every age it has been the tyrant, the oppressor and the exploiter who has wrapped himself in the cloak of patriotism, or religion, or both to deceive and overawe the people.
-Eugene Victor Debs
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Saturday January 2, 1915
From the Appeal to Reason: Editorials on the Rule of the Few, War and Profit
Today's edition of the Appeal to Reason reminds us that the Great War in Europe is a rich man's war and a poor man's fight:
Strange How the Few Rule the Great Mass
ONE OF THE STRANGE things of life, as that English historian an philosopher, Hume, has said, is the ease with which the few have always governed the many. It has always been the few who governed, always the few who dictated how the many should live, always the few who monopolized the good things of live. Half the world is today engaged in a bloody war, the results of which stagger the imagination; millions are facing one another with guns; millions are killing one another. The many are doing the fighting because the few ordered them to fight.
The few have always issued the orders, the many have always obeyed. Always it will be so under a system that allows one man's loss to be converted into another man's gain, as long as men are allowed to exploit other men's labor, as long as the skill, the energy, the brains and the genius of the world is used for the making of profits instead of for the making of a better world in which to live. Socialism is the only remedy. And Socialism is only possible through the education of the exploited many. When a majority of the people of the world understand Socialism then a majority of the people will rule and not before.
[paragraph break added]
"Don't be Discouraged. The Doctor Says You'll be Back on the Firing Line in a Week"
By Maurice Becker for The Masses of December 1914
More Editorials from the Appeal to Reason of Januarty 2, 1915:
Wash Reveals Facts Plutes Would Suppress
FRANK P. WALSH of the federal commission on industrial relations, is forcing revelation of many facts in the Colorado war that the masters would like to hide and that even the commission and the democratic administration wish had not been brought out in this way. Practically everything the APPEAL has charged concerning conditions in Colorado has been confirmed under oath. The facts had been kept from other investigators, who thus whitewashed the worst gang of cutthroat criminals the nation has ever known, but Walsh actually insisted on knowing the truth. All honor to him for it. He even confirms the APPEAL in his conclusion:
Conditions startling and dangerous exist in Colorado. Only a truce in a bitter industrial war exists there today. The calling off of the last strike was only an incident. That strike itself was simply an incident. Since 1876 these incidents have succeeded one another with, each time, increasing intensity. They will become more intense in the future, unless the people of the country are able to provide some fundamental justice.
Walsh is too honest to suit capitalism. That is why Rockefeller wishes his "foundation" to follow with a whitewashing investigation of the man who financed the foundation. That is why Wash is likely to lose his place. That is why the report he has succeeded in having mean something will be suppressed, as the white slave report and other things derogatory to the masters were suppressed before this. The necessary "fundamental justice" to end these things is the ending of private control of employment and the ushering in of Socialism.
[photograph added]
MADE IN THE U. S. of A.
A Few Things That Are Made in the U. S.
"MADE IN THE UNITED STATES" is a great cry. Let us see what it means. The wheat that is feeding the men who are doing the fighting in war-cursed Europe was "made in the United States." The cotton that is clothing the poor fellows in the tenches was "made in the United States." The powder and cartridges that are now being used by the belligerents of all the warring nations were "made in the United States." The new guns that are being put into service in Europe as more troops are called into action were "made in the United States."
But this isn't all. The unemployment that has made necessary soup kitchens and bread lines in all the big cities was "made in America." The poverty that is causing million of tenant farmers to starve, after having raised the biggest cotton crop in history, was "made in America." The helplessness of the Colorado miners, after having been tricked and imprisoned and shot, as they now shiver in the cold of winter, was "made in America." Capitalism is a great manufacturer of these things. Look closely at any evil you see in America, and you may know that they did it-you may see their label-"made in America."
[paragraph break added]
From The Masses of January 1915
Asleep Now, the People May Yet Awake
THE MOST TERRIBLE war of all time is now going on in Europe. Millions are being killed and their families left homeless. For a while it was "great news" and the newspapers featured it on their front pages and under flaming headlines. But as the war progressed the daily newspaper readers lost interest and now we find the most of the war news in the inside pages and the headlines are daily growing smaller. The people have got used to it and few read much of even what is printed.
Every winter the army of the unemployed grows larger, more people are hungry, more little children starve and freeze, more women "go wrong" in an effort to keep soul and body together, but you don't see much about it in the newspapers. It has become commonplace-people have got used to it.
Every year the owners of the machinery of production and distribution are growing bolder in their methods of robbing those who do all the work and produce all the wealth. Robbery of the workers is so common it is not "live news." The people have got used to it.
The common people, the working people, have got used to a good many things during the last hundred years, but they never seem to have gotten used to voting for their own interests. What a corking big news story it would make if the people should for just once forget their inherited prejudices and break away from old habits and customs, and vote for themselves just one time. They are beginning to do this in Oklahoma. Socialism is coming-people are getting used to it.
The Appeal on American Democracy
AMOS PINCHOT comes out in a lachrymose obituary, explaining why the "progressive" party died. The "progressive" party died because two capitalist parties are all that's ever necessary to fool the Dubbs.
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[.....]
ACCORDING to the republicans the democrats are a bunch of grafters, and according to the democrats the republicans are another bunch of grafters, and according to that they are all either grafters or liars, and the chances are they are both.
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THE constitution of the United States is a poor shelter to hide behind when the machine guns begin to bark.
SOURCE
Appeal to Reason
(Girard, Kansas)
-Jan 2, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
See also:
The Kansas City Labor History Tour
"Frank P. Walsh ‐ Labor's Tribune
Expanded from a talk given
October 17 and 24, 1992"
-by Judy Ancel, Director
The Institute for Labor Studies
pdf!http://cas.umkc.edu/...
IMAGES
World War I Christmas Cheer by Maurice Becker
http://dlib.nyu.edu/...
Frank P. Walsh from Harpers Weekly of Sept 27, 1913
(search: Frank P Walsh, & choose p.24)
http://books.google.com/...
The Unemployed and World War I, by Maurice Becker
http://dlib.nyu.edu/...
Appeal to Reason, Jan 2, 1915
http://www.newspapers.com/...
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"All the money you made will never buy back your soul."
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