UNITED LABOR PARTY

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 10713, 23 December 1912, Page 3

UNITED LABOR PARTY

COX DUCTED BY THE DOMINION v.\ BCUI iVE-CO 11 CIL. V'Tho muster Canierence ot the United Labour Party voted to make no paper its» special or gun, but to proride official news and comments to any paper promising to regularly publish the same. The paper is not responsible for this column and the party assumes no responsibility for any T utterances of the paper except for its [ own official utterances in this departJ ment. 0 SOCIAL DISEASE. Poverty was for a long timo regarded as a direct infliction upon the |.>eor plo by t]io will of the Creator. Whole | . libraries have been written to persuade the people to be grateful for j being poor. 3 It was afterwards held to he a mis- ? fortune, a thing to be regretted, to 5 be escaped from if possible; but nevertheless the fixed and 1 condition of the masses of the people. . It is coming to be held as a disease subject, to hospital care, yielding road- > ily to scientific treatment. When plant life is smitten with dis-. j ease there is feeble growth, inferior I products, a degenerate re-nr<->dii"f-' These things are characteristic of disease. Where these things are found in plant life, diseased conditions nre immediately affirmed. i Tuberculosis, typhoid, cancer I of the disorders of the human body, J results of exhaustion, or of infection, | mean in the same way loss of j Strength, inferior capacity, inferior service and degeneracy in the off- | spiring. , But there is a social life as well a» ' an individual one. There is social health. There is both social health ' and social disease. The life of the ' oomumnity may become disordered, crippjed, void of productive capacity, given to vice. The social life as well as the individual life may reproduce degeneracy. Whatever produces such results is a disease. These things in plant life, in individual life, and is social life are but the symptoms of some disorder. It is no longer understood that poverty is a^ divine visitation or an inexplicable calamity. It is a social dis-.! ease, as much so as is tuberculosis ■ among men and animals or blight in a 1 gai'den of plants or flowers. ' Social liygenic will eliminate the ' disease. Scientific treatment will lead the way to recovery. Plague and infection were once held to he the visitation of Providence, Now we know they are the products 'of ignorance and of neglect, and that where they appear it is the worst of blasphemy to depend upon religious ceremonials, to relieve the disorders, while the victims of these disorders | neglect or refuse to adopt scientific j methods of treatment. j It was once held that religion could be established in' the thought of the race only by the demonstration of some authority or power sufficient to set aside the laws of nature. It- is now known that real religion is not manifest by a denial of th<s law or hy any effort to reverse its processes. Real religion i,s shown in the revela- 1 tion of the law and in the complet- j est obedience to itg requirements. j There is not one problem left un- i solved involved in the matter of the 1 production of sufficient wealth. A i mere fraction of the community, pro- I perly equipped, scientifically trained j and set to the task could provide an ; abundance for all. If all were to be so trained and given opportunities , for such employment, incomes could i bo enormously increased, hours of I labor greatly shortened, and intellectual and social pursuits be placed within the reach of all. The world does not need to know ■ any more than it does know in order to make an end of tuberculosis, diph- [ thoria, and typhoid. All it needs to ' dp is to do well as it knows. j The world does not need to know a J single thing which is not already ' known in order to make an end of-the 1 social disease' called poverty. All that ig needed is to do tho things alreav known, already demonstrated and susceptible of proof to the satisfaction of any rationally minded human being. J

•Tuberculosis is not the visitation of God.' It is fast becoming the prime of the individual and of society. Poverty is not the visitation of God., It is rapidly coming to be a crime of the individual and of society. To attribute either to. the providence- of God or to the helplessness of man is not an expression of religions sentiment. it is the utterance of the worst tif pla-spbemies. A DOMINION AGREEMENT. The'slaughtermen right throughout New Zealand are cancelling their registration and the employing companies are in session to-day in Christchurch. A single agreement, fwill covet- the whole of-the Dominion, so that wben t"be matter Is settled for ally group •of ..workers so employed anywhere in New Zealand it will be settled for them,all. • That Is the- wav.it ■.should bo all industries. The "Dominion" is quite concerned lest the Commonwealth Court shall be so rp.constn'c+cd that the recent decision retaining sectional H"-;>rd.« within the Commonwealth shall be made an end of. It is to the advantage oF all employers and employees who intend to deal , fairly with" each other that the whole country shall bo put under the sa'mo. condition!?. Only those who exnect to profit by taking advaiifa&e r f local 'conditions as airainst th<> comnm-d jro-vl 0 f hoth employer!-! aJic] emnloyees throughout

the country can continue to support local awards as against national ones. POLITICAL VOUCHRES WANTED. Mr W. T. Young, «ecrotary of the Seamen's Urtion. said in court the othor day. "All our vouches for tho last ten years are in our office now," and tho magistrate replied, "I wish, everyone who camo into court could say that." Good idea! How would it work if politicians were required to give and receive receipts for services rendered in compliance with election pledges. The vouchers o! same of the politicians would be mighty interesting reading, and the volumo of business shown bv some of them would not require a large set of books in which -o keep tho citric" THE MASS MEETING CONFER ENCE *, called by the secretary of the Federation of Labor to meet in the "Maoriland Worker" office on January 21st ' has failed to receive any very marked response among any of the unions, and in not a single instance has any : chartered body allied to the United Party responded favorably. The proposals submitted in these columns) and acted on by various unions in Auckland, Christchurch, and elsewhere to the effect that wliatevei conference is to be heM seeking to brine together trades unions now separated from each other by the disruptive tactics of the Federation of Labor should be held in Wellington during Easter Week. This suggestion lias received no response whatever, and the requests repeatedly made, that the business actually to bo transacted shall be de-finite-ly stated in order that it may be discussed., has not been taken kindly. the enemies of arbitration FIXING ARBITRATION. Sneerg at' arbitration and insinuations utterly at variance with the facts as related to the trades unions in favor of arbitration still come from the "Maoriland Worker" office, while the friends of arbitration are asked to gather at the very place where they ! are treated with contempt, to confer with the enemies of arbitration as to what shall be asked for in the nature of amendments to the Arbitration Act. "Won't you come and see lis, snu-.l the spiders to the {lies? We have certain suggestions which we would like to make concerning your conduct. Tt would add materially to our foodstuffs if you would act on outadvice." MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS. The District Labor Councils are taking action throughout New Zealand in tho nomination of candidates for the municipal elections. Work is already going forward in all tho principal centres and in many of the smaller towm', looking to an active campaign for tho election to office of United Labor Party candidates in all of the municipalities.

•The Wellington District" Labor Cbv.ncU will bo the .first of all these bodies to qualify for f charter from the Dominion Executive' Council. Bojririti inrr with January 21st, that body will be composed exclusively of delegates from tho Dominion executive of the United Labor Party. ADMITS THE LIT. Mr Webb, president of tho Federat;on of Labor, is reported to have said i" Cliristclviirch in n public .u'dre-«s that while it (tho "Federation") had created n .split it was the only true representative of organised Labor, and had (lone more in four years than tho old organisations had done in fifteen. So it is admitted,. by the president of the federation that that body M come into existence by tbe adoption of disruptive tactics. Aa to its having done more in four years than tho old organisations had done in fifteen is a. prescription which' will need to be "shaken before taken." A RECORD OF PROGRESS During the fifteen years prior to the disruption of the national body through tho secession of tho Miners' Union, the membership of the trades unions in New Zealand had enormous--Ily increased. Tho conditions of labor had been greatly improved, and larg* numbers of workers never bofore organised in this country were brought successfully into trades organisations. GREAT ACTIVITY—BAD RECORD. The Federation of Labor has not made an enviable record in the num ber of new organisations which it has created. It has not made an enviable record in tho number of national federations of trades which it has created. It has certainly not made an enI viable record in any increase in th> membership of the unions which have boon influenced by it. v !!. has not been able to improve conditions of labor or to protect tho in!crests of the workers by its disruptive tactiea as effectively a a coui 1 have been done by maintain'np; r lid arity in tho Dominion organisations | and hv holding the strike in reserve as a weapon only of last resort. If. Inuj sown dissension in. all the unions Tt ha.s crippled those which it could not capture. Tt ha.s broken into pieces organisations which it could not control. It has led local organipfitions into trouble, has deserted them in the middle of a figh,t; and in all these particulars it hn« accomplished more in four vears than any 'rational organisation has ever ncoomI pliahed in a century. Onlv rational | organisation.-) wotiM "not Wst of tho record.