A New Deal-Or a New Day
A New Deal—Or a New Day *|*HE world It at the crossroads. From now on we have k within our power to travel either forward or backward; to * rejuvenated Capitalism, or to Socialism. To...
...Join your unions, and build them up I Do nop permit yoursslvee to be divided on any issue I Fight with your united might for best 'wssible terms...
...The unions are working feverishly to get the masses in line...
...for before the Great Collapse of 1929, while Laissez-faire rode high, wide and handsome, it took bitter and often bloody struggle to win shorter hours...
...The self-interest of employers, exploiters, speculators,hanker...
...The workers did not earn enough — even at boom-time, Goofy-Era wages—to buy back what they made...
...Which way are we to go...
...Or will it be a battle for a New Day...
...Bat will it work...
...Unless...
...They want to continue the profit system...
...Is the brand of servitude to be forever burned upon the brow of those who do the world's useful work...
...But to what purpose...
...The eld days are dead beyond recall...
...Not that there was too much bread to eat, too much clothing to wear, too many goods to use...
...It bears within itself the seeds of its own destruction...
...To a modjned and somewhat controlled exploitation or to a planned collectivist society in which there will be regard for nothing but human welfare...
...Are the toiling masses ;o be forever doomed to a position of inferiority...
...For the first time in human history the choice of paths lies in our hands...
...One tremendous, inescapable fact stands, staring the world in the face: The incentive of self-interest Is -he lowest thing on earth...
...Which shall it be...
...They want to continue eat* ing their bread in the sweat of other men's faces...
...We worked ourselves into the streets and onto the brei dlines and the park benches...
...What the classical economists called Laissez-faire, what the forgotten Hoover called Rugged Individualism, and what Donald R. Richberg called Gold-plated Anarchy, is a system as extinct as the Roman Empire...
...The army of Labor ie on the march...
...Maybe it is...
...either we go back, or we do not...
...The system cannot survive...
...The organised labor movement realises its op* portunity...
...So this...
...something like a national plan, increased wages—following far behind increased prices, of course— and shortened hours, codes and more codes, and they, believe they will be able again- to ride the backs of the producers...
...BUT THEY ARE DOOMED TO DISAPPOINTMENT...
...They have the numbers, IF THEY UTILIZE THE OPPORTUNITY GIVEN THEM BY THE NEW DEAL, to build themselve* into a mighty force to meet the menace that faces them, and make a New World rather than a New Deal...
...They talk of a forty-hour week, as if that is a treat concession...
...The decision lies In our hands...
...We starved amidst plenty—indeed, we starved be* cause of plenty...
...A Washington correspondent of the Evening Post writes: "Charts mathematically indisputable have been prepared showing that in 1929, at the cr«st of our false wealth, there was only enough purchasing power to insure general employment for a thirty-four hour week...
...They want to be pro* tected in their profit-making, but they do not want to cease their profit-taking...
...Or to get the best possible deal for TODAY, and then to go on to a bettor world, in which the abundance and the wealth of the world will be a source of joy and not a calamity...
...Those who believe in Capitalism, but who are not totally blinded to the meaning of the events of the past four years, hope the system can be patched op, that with a concession here and a change there they may be able to go on...
...and if the Next Deal pulls us out, an* other and another...
...The keenest analyzers foresee that if forty houre n the beet obtainable now, there will be a temporary upturn, but the same undodgeable situation will etill be there...
...To a New Deal for the same old Capitalism, with the rules changed a little...
...be able to go on...
...Never did they have a greater opportunity, a graver rsponsibility to the future...
...Here it is on record...
...But do not for a single moment forget what comes next Will it be a mere 40-hour week, ¦ mere wage increase, a mere starting up of the machinery again, and then another collapse...
...indeed, in the key •teel industry it took something like an industrial convulsion to end the murderous 84-hour week...
...The system of unbridled competition, of Every Man for Himself and the Devil Take the Hindmost, can never return...
...The leas unenlightened of the capitalists believe that with the New Deal they can get by...
...They have the votes to win any New Deal they want at the elections...
...or to a world in which there will be place for no one but for useful men and women...
...Do the New Deslers wsnt a new deal, or do they want a change in the rules...
...They predict another slump within two yesrs and the same old fight all over again...
...And If profit-taking goes on we are due for a new collapse within a few years...
...UNLESS the masses get there first 1 Never were the people faced with a clearer issue...
...The rules of the union* are being changed to meet present conditions...
...The Gieat Collapse came about because the industrial system became so damned efficient that we created too much wealth...
...What will come next...
...So what...
...To wangle a little better conditions out of a systam that cannot live...
...not because of OVER* PRODUCTION, but because of UNDERCONSUMPTION...
Vol. 16 • July 1933 • No. 5
