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1887 lines
163 KiB
XML
1887 lines
163 KiB
XML
<xml><<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> 30 <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>age <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rintout</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roducible Electronic Publishing can defeat censorshi<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> This file, its <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rintout, or co<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ies of either
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are to be co<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ied and given away, but NOT sold.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom, Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
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**** ****</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>Edited by E. Haldeman-Julius</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>THE BLACK INTERNATIONAL No. 14</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> ROME IS THE NATURAL ALLY OF ALL EXPLOITERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> by Jose<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>h McCabe</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> HALDEMAN-JULIUS PUBLICATIONS
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GIRARD -- : -- KANSAS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> **** ****</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> CHAPTER
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I A Picture of Life in a Catholic Country ....... 1</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> II Those Beautiful Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al Encyclicals ....... 7</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> III The Action Record of the Black International ....... 14</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> IV The Comedy of Christian Socialism ...... 20</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> V The Churches and Radical Injustice ........... 26</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> **** ****</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ter I</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> A PICTURE OF LIFE IN A CATHOLIC COUNTRY</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> A few weeks ago there came to me, by a subterranean route, a
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oignant letter from a man who has lived, in intimacy with the
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le, for many years in a Catholic country of Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e. The <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ress
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always refers to this country as a ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>y little land of democratic
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sym<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>athies and entirely Roman Catholic. Its virtual ruler is
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described as a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>articularly enlightened, u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>right, and humane
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statesman. You have <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>robably seen films of grou<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>s of its workers
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singing, laughing, and dancing merrily in a sunny world; though if
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you had not been misled by <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ress-references you would have detected
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signs of extreme <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>overty and would have seen that the gaiety is
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that of illiterate, densely ignorant men and women at, culturally,
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the lowest level of civilized life. In s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ite of disease,
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ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loitation, and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>overty they are "ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>y," in a sub-human way --
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until they begin to question the justice of the joint tyranny of
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Church and Dictator. But the bold bad man is quickly removed to a
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jail in which the vilest medieval torture is used today -- one
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American writer who is not anti-Catholic has described these
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tortures -- or to the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>urgatory of a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>enal colony.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
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Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
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1
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.
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THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The first letter I received told me that the land is entirely
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Fascist, which I knew; that all the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riests belong to the Fascist
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arty, which is also called Catholic Action and holds its meetings
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in the Churches, and that every boy or youth works in it. The local
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news<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ers <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>raise the Germans every day as well as the Italians. In
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the course of a recent editorial one said: "If God so wills it we
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must substitute the cross of the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Swastika</ent> for the cross of Christ."
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The British and American <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ers which were then assuring us that
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"the brave little <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le" would resist the German <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ressure which
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was being exerted on them did not quote this. A <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest, <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>raising
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<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Hitler</ent> in a sermon said that he was "a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ointed by God to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>unish the
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world for its irreligion." But my informant added a concrete little
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>icture which stimulated my a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>etite for further news.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> On the outskirts of the city a man -- not a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oor working man
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but an educated and comfortable man -- had a farm. His most
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valuable <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ig fell ill, and my friend suggested sending for a vet.
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Oh, no, what could a vet do against the Evil Eye? Next morning a
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solemn <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rocession made its way from the church to the sty. The
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest wore over his cassock and sur<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lice a richly embroidered
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shawl that is used in dealing with the devil. Altar-boys, one
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swinging a censer, walked on either side of him, and the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le,
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mumbling on their beads, walked behind. They fell on their knees
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round the sty while the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest waved the fumes of incense at the
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ig and recited his incantations. The <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ungent smoke got u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> the
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ig's nose, and it staggered to its feet; and the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le cried "A
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miracle." The <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest received his 100 eggs and 2 hens, but the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ig
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died next day. Seeing that it was going to die, the owner had sold
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it to the local butcher to be turned into food for the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le. He
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then quietly substituted another <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ig for it, and this wallowed in
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the same <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oisonous filth as its <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>redecessor; but there was now a
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bottle of holy water hanging from the roof of the sty to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotect
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it.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> I naturally wanted more of this for my readers, and I got it.
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Before I quote it let me ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lain. My informant would be ruined and
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>unished if he were traced, so I make certain details not as
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convenient as they might be for the Catholic detective. He is not
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a working man but a well-educated middle-class man of high
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character. The <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lace from which he writes is not a rural district
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but an old city of 30,000 <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le, well known to thousands of
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Americans and Britons, but they are either Catholics or they <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>refer
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to kee<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> their mouths closed. The country will doubtless be
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identified by some of my reader's, but I will say only that it is
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not at all considered the most backward in Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e, though the great
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majority of the workers are illiterate. It is solidly Catholic. The
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writer is absolutely reliable both in regard to first-hand
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knowledge and on conscientiousness, and I omit from the long
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account only a few <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assages that are relevant to my <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ur<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ose:</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> "A few year's ago this country made a Pact with the Vatican,
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and one notices more and more the growing <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower of the Church. At
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government ceremonies, which are often held out of doors here, the
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bisho<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> (who by the way has eight illegitimate children) leads the
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rocession in full regalia and gives the Fascist salute. A new law
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has been <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assed by which all schools must be of one sex, with the
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subtle idea of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>utting the secular schools out of action. This law
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a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lies even to infants' schools.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
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Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
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2
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THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> "I know the wife of a chemist whose husband is being
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threatened by the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riests with boycott as she refuses to attend
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mass. A man can have as many mistresses as he likes but it is a
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crime for a cou<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le to set u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> home together unless they are married.
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It is forbidden to let them a house. Civil marriage is done away
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with, and one can only marry in the church. There is much
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emigration to South America, and if a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson takes a letter from a
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest Saying that he is a good Catholic he can get a good job. Of
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courage, an offering for masses will always secure a good letter
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though one never goes to mass. ... A S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>anish friend of mine
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described the national system in a nutshell. He said it was as if
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the head of a family had a large box of gold heavily guarded and
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refused to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art with a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>enny of it though all the family were dying
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of hunger. A writer described this country as a huge <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rison ke<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t
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down by force. There is a state of misery here that you never could
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imagine. I ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ened to know well a skilled workman who has two
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weeks off work and two weeks on, and he earns 85 cents a day when
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working. But when he has <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>aid his dues to the Syndicate [the form
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of Trade Union im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed on Catholics by the Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al Encyclical and
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counts his two weeks idle his <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ay works out at 35 cents a day, and
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on this seven <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le must live. ... The cruel joke is that there is
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a law that no man must get less than 50 cents a day but the
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government themselves <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ay 20 cents. The usual wage of a workman is
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25 cents. So, being unable to live on that as he invariably has a
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big family he must send his children on the streets to beg. The
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streets are thronged with starving whining beggars, with little
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children with their stomachs swollen, and dro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ing blood in the
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streets in the last stages of starvation.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> "Pro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erty rights are very severe, and a man may 'Shoot on
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sight any who enters his <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erty. Lately on the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erty of the
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richest Englishman here two men were found s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eared to death. One
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was a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oor old man of 72 who was collecting a few sticks for his
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fire, and one a young fellow who had the audacity to use the
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erty as a short cut. No one took any notice. I just ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ened to
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hear of the incident as I lived near. All relations between the
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le are vicious, and there is none of that kindly feeling or
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sym<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>athy that one gets among the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oor in England. The rich have
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their houses barred and bolted and scarcely ever hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>. Their
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sur<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lus money goes to building <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rivate cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>els or at least
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enriching them; as there is one in every rich or middle-class
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house, or else the money goes directly to the Church. ... For every
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one who finds comfort there are 99 who only find terror and worry.
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My life as a R.C. was a horror. I lived in terror of sin, terror of
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confession, terror of sex, and the su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>reme terror was of death and
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hell. How often I lay shivering in bed thinking that this night I
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would surely die and be weighed in the scales of God, so
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gra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>hically described to me by the Catholic teachers. Other nights
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I lay listening, listening for the devil's cart, driven by headless
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horsemen and horses and conveying the children who did not say
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their <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rayers, and I <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ictured with what glee the devil would throw
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them into hell. As a farmer's cart <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assed rattling over the cobble
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stone's in my imagination I could hear the devil's chains rattling
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and thought it would sto<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> at our door and collect me. When day came
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I was braver and followed all the funerals to the cemetery to make
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the sign of the Cross over the Catholic graves and s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>it on the
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Protestant ones. I waited, trembling, for the ser<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ent to jum<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> out
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of my mouth after making what I thought was a bad communion.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
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Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
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3
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THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> "All hos<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>itals are in the hands of religious [monks and nuns]
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with no qualifications whatever and more often than not illiterate.
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I had occasion to go to the Red Cross the other day. The doctor was
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absent, and not one of the three nuns in charge could write a note
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for him. A trained nurse offered her services free to the hos<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ital
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but they refused as she was not a nun. A young girl whom I know,
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living with a man, was forced to have an o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eration without an
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anaesthetic in <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>unishment for her sin. She has been a nervous wreck
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ever since. I saw a sweet little girl of four die the other day.
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The <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest had advised them not to have a doctor as God had need of
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another little angel in heaven. A man was dying with T.B. and a
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foreign nurse begged to be allowed to give him a drug but the
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest forbade it, as it would be against the will of God. Man must
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suffer.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> "To me child labor is the most terrible crime here. They have
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little children from the age of seven onward as servants, and they
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sometimes <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ay them nothing. The <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arents are glad to get rid of them
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for their kee<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>. They usually slee<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> on the floor in the coal-bin and
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are often beaten. Someone once recommended to me a woman to do
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washing, and a well-dressed woman, armed with a stick, came along
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with a little boy of about ten. She was going to su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erintend while
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he did the washing. One never sees a child <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>laying on the streets,
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nor are there any <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arks or <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>laygrounds for them. The schools are
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free, but the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arents must <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rovide books, etc. and children without
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books are not allowed to enter: an order which excludes. all the
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oor. The teachers are unqualified. The soldiers get about half a
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cent a day and two meals of meat, but one can get exem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>tion by
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>aying, so the army is com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed of the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oor and under-nourished.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> "I ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ect you read in the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ers how our government was
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unanimously elected. It was such a farce. A notice a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eared in the
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ers saying: "Go and vote. Your vote won't count, but go and vote
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and show the world you are all with the government." They forgot to
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add: "If you don't vote you will lose your job." The government is
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>utting u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> a lot of show buildings while there is a terrible dearth
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of houses for the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le. Rents are high in com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arison with wages.
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The houses at $8 a month are one or two-roomed and usually without
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windows. I have seen a Seven-roomed house without windows. The
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houses are close together and no sun enters. It is usual after a
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rainy day -- and it often rains here -- to see all the bedding out
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on the street drying."</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The rest of the letter is too <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ersonal and might give more
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away than the writer su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oses. I will note only that revolt against
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this brutal system flickers u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> here and there but the s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>read of the
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fire is truculently <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>revented. There is actually a small
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Freethought Society in the town, but it meets in such secrecy that
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my informant has never been able to get in touch with it. The eyes,
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and ears of the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riests are everywhere, and if the economic wea<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>on
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does not intimidate the inci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ient rebel there is always the jail or
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the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>enal settlement. Ironically, some fled there from the trium<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>h
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of clerical Fascism elsewhere, and now they writhe in the shadow of
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an equal tyranny.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
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Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
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4
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.
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THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> But the above extracts, referring to many sides of life in a
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strictly Catholic city, will suffice for my <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ur<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ose. I do not
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su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ose that in America the a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologist ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lains the defects of his
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church, as he does in Britain, as due entirely to its Protestant
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environment. You should see Catholic life in a Catholic country, he
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is fond of saying. It must be difficult to use that <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>iece of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ious
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dece<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>tion in the United States. Folk down south are too near to
|
|
Mexico and u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> north too near to Quebec; while engineers and others
|
|
who have lived in Columbia, Bolivia, or Brazil tell funny stories.
|
|
Most <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le, however, know these foreign lands only from films
|
|
which conceal more than they show, and this little sketch of life
|
|
in a really Catholic city -- it is 90 <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ercent Catholic and 70
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ercent illiterate -- heavily rebukes the a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologist.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> I should like to follow it u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> with a sketch of life in Russia
|
|
before the Beasts of Berlin broke unto it. Sociologists generally
|
|
agree that one of the best tests of a civilization is the way it
|
|
treats its children; one ought to say, how it treats the children
|
|
of workers. Whatever faults some find in Russia or the Soviet Union
|
|
it is agreed by all ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erts on this side of its life that it gives
|
|
a better time to the children than any other country in the world.
|
|
Before the Revolution or the last war the children had as miserable
|
|
a time as in this Catholic country. One of the toughest <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roblems
|
|
the Soviet authorities had to solve was the reduction of juvenile
|
|
crime, and travelers in Tsarist Russia used to tell of child
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rostitutes of 13 soliciting o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>enly near the baths. Now Russia, and
|
|
es<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ecially Moscow, treat children as honored guests. They neither
|
|
beg nor work and they are <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oles removed from the cruelly-treated
|
|
starvelings, dri<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ing blood on the streets, of this Catholic city.
|
|
Instead of being excluded from schools because they have no shoes
|
|
-- which in Russia ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ens only in summer in the country -- the
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oorest have the same teaching and the same holidays and
|
|
entertainments as the children of the best <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>aid.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> But I am concerned here with the workers not with the
|
|
children, though the fact that vast numbers of them cannot feed the
|
|
large families which the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riests com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>el them to have is a
|
|
significant detail. A Catholic writer will tell you only, and
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roudly, that there is a minimum wage fixed by law. Here, from one
|
|
who has moved intimately among them for years -- I can vouch for
|
|
that -- is the truth. They are "the stinkers" as the Tsarist
|
|
aristocrats used to call the workers, the "clods" as rich folk
|
|
called them in medieval England. They may be killed for gathering
|
|
a little fallen wood on or taking a short cut through your estate.
|
|
It is a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>icture of com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rehensive injustice and ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loitation.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> But how far is this re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resentative of the condition of the
|
|
workers in Catholic countries generally? Let us try to ascertain
|
|
this on strict sociological lines. In which countries of the world
|
|
have the great majority of the workers, by general agreement, the
|
|
highest standard of living? I confine the com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arison to the great
|
|
majority, the regular worker's, because the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oorest are at much the
|
|
same level of life in all countries. If there is any difference
|
|
their condition is exce<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>tionally bad in such Catholic countries as
|
|
Poland (before the war), S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain, Portugal, and Brazil. In any case
|
|
we reach a sound verdict only if we com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>are the great mass of the
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le in different countries.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
5
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> It will surely be admitted that the highest standard of living
|
|
for the largest majority of the workers is enjoyed in the United
|
|
States, Soviet Russia, Great Britain, Denmark, Norway, Sweden,
|
|
Switzerland, <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rewar Germany, and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rewar France. I would <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut them in
|
|
that order but there is no need to go into that question. The <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oint
|
|
is that these are all countries in which the Church of Rome has no
|
|
influence on the status of the workers. The one-eighth Catholic
|
|
minority in America and France and the one-twenty-fifth minority in
|
|
Britain may hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> to sour certain as<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ects of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublic life by Sunday
|
|
Laws, Blue Laws, Marriage Laws, etc., but we should smile if they,
|
|
claimed to have any res<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>onsibility for the economic basis of the
|
|
standard of life of the workers. If this were the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lace to go more
|
|
fully into the question we might make a stronger case. While for
|
|
instance, the workers of the United States will be <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut by most
|
|
students -- some, who know the vast range of free services in
|
|
Russia might <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>refer the Soviet workers -- at the head of the list
|
|
it is very doubtful if we should find as high a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ortion of
|
|
Catholic workers -- Poles, Irish, Italians, Mexicans, etc. -- in
|
|
the higher as in the lower class of workers.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> But we must take it here on broad lines. The countries in
|
|
which the workers are best-off are those in which Catholicism is
|
|
not among the factors which determine the standard of living. At
|
|
the next level we should, still looking only to economic and social
|
|
well-being, <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut Holland -- many might <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut this at the higher level
|
|
-- Belgium, Hungary, Austria, Italy, Jugo-Slavia, Rumania, and
|
|
Bulgaria. The <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ortion of Catholic influence rises and the
|
|
standard of living falls. And at the lowest of three levels few
|
|
would hesitate to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain, Portugal, Poland, and the Latin-
|
|
American Re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublics generally. I have omitted Czecho-Slovakia only
|
|
because of its com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osite nature, but everybody knows that the
|
|
status of the workers was highest in Bohemia, lower in more
|
|
Catholic Moravia, and lowest in entirely Catholic Slovakia. Asia we
|
|
naturally leave out of com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arison.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> We might go further and cheek our conclusion by asking in
|
|
which countries and under what condition the status of the workers
|
|
has risen most ra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>idly in recent times and in which it has advanced
|
|
little or not at all. Russia takes first <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lace, and the character
|
|
of the u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lifting factors is well known. The least Catholic <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art of
|
|
Czecho-Slovakia and Denmark <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>robably come next. If we distinguish
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriods of betterment and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriods of reaction we have to assign a
|
|
notable advance to the S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>aniards and the Austrians under Socialism
|
|
and a notable reaction to the Italian workers during the last
|
|
twelve years and to those of Austria, S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain, Portugal, and Latin
|
|
America generally since they <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assed under the Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al-Fascist flag.
|
|
If the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resent Fascist-Catholic rulers (under Germany) of Belgium
|
|
and France were to survive and carry out their declared <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lans the
|
|
status of the workers there also would deteriorate.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> In fact, we come in the end to a very interesting and
|
|
significant contrast. The democracies -- the United States,
|
|
Britain, Czecho-Slovakia, Holland, Switzerland, Denmark, Norway,
|
|
and Sweden (all non-Catholic) -- will, when Nazism is destroyed,
|
|
resume their character and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rogress. The Vatican, on the other hand
|
|
seeks, whatever the issue of the war is, to retain control of
|
|
Belgium, France, Slovakia, Croatia, Italy, S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain, Portugal, and the</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
6
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>anish-American Re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublics and combine them in a Catholic League,
|
|
and it has <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rescribed their economic form in the solemn language of
|
|
a Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al Encyclical. What will that mean for the workers? Well, the
|
|
country of which I have given a descri<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>tion in this cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ter
|
|
declares that it has, in its loyalty to Rome. ado<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ted <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>recisely
|
|
this economic structure urged by the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent>. This fact is so
|
|
flagrantly o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed to what Catholic a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists in America say about
|
|
the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> and the workers that we must examine the matter
|
|
carefully.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ter II</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> THOSE BEAUTIFUL PAPAL ENCYCLICALS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> A learned <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofessor of religious views scribbled a marginal
|
|
note on a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>age of one of my books in which I had summed u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> vile
|
|
social condition of Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e in the last century, after 1500 year of
|
|
Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower. With the usual air of su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriority he wrote: "But the
|
|
Churches only took u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> social work at the end of the 19th Century."
|
|
Which was <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>recisely my com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>laint. For nearly 15 centuries the Roman
|
|
clergy had contem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lated without any serious interference with it,
|
|
a social order in which, a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art from it other vices, the great mass
|
|
of the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le, the workers, were treated with grave injustice and,
|
|
during most of the time with contem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t and cruelty.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> If an a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologist were to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lead that the clergy had so much to
|
|
do in looking after the immortal souls of men that you could not
|
|
ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ect them to study social conditions you would smile, if you know
|
|
the moral history of Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e, but you might grant the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lea a certain
|
|
amount of logic. But the Catholic a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologist does not, and dare not,
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut forward that very frail excuse. He says, on the contrary, that
|
|
the Church is, and always was, the friend, the very best friend, of
|
|
the workers. I hardly need to quote Catholic literature on that. It
|
|
is the su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>reme cham<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ion of justice and has always stood with its
|
|
flaming sword between the hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>less workers and the greedy. In a
|
|
moment we shall find the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> saying that very em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>hatically.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> As far as the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ast is concerned we will briefly run over the
|
|
record in the next cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ter, but two reflection's at once occur to
|
|
us. Must not this cham<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ionshi<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> of the cause of the workers have
|
|
been extraordinarily ineffective seeing that the workers themselves
|
|
had to ware a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rodigious fight in the last century against
|
|
injustices which had lasted for centuries? And is it not a Singular
|
|
thing that the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ronouncements of <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> on the subject which
|
|
Catholic a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists quote all belong to the last 50 years? With
|
|
great audacity they quote, when they call the Church the friend of
|
|
freedom and democracy, writers of nearly seven centuries ago like
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Thomas Aquinas</ent> (who defended slavery), but they do not seem to get
|
|
further back than <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent> when they seek <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roof of the
|
|
Church's interest in the workers. Everybody who knows anything
|
|
about socio-economic history knows that the great fight, the heroic
|
|
and bloody fight, the fight in which you hazarded your life or
|
|
liberty, for justice to the workers was, broadly, from about 1780
|
|
to 1880, yet the first favorable Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al declaration they quote is of
|
|
the year 1891.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
7
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Why dig u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> so much history, Catholics <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eevishly ask me? The
|
|
value of the Church today lies in its teaching today, and Catholic
|
|
writers fill books with the bold and sound declarations of the
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> from 1891 onward. The fight was still on, and the "great
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>" ranged himself on the side of the workers with such
|
|
utterances that he was called the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> of the Workers, even the
|
|
Socialist <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>, the author of the Magria Charta of Labor. I
|
|
remember the fuss well, having just then been a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ointed <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofessor
|
|
in a Catholic seminary. Radical <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ers were lyrical; reactionary
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ers were annoyed. But before you rush to a library for a
|
|
Catholic book to tell you all about this "Charter of Labor's
|
|
Rights" read the biogra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>hical notice of <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent> in the
|
|
Encyclo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>edia Britannica; and it is so sound that the Catholic
|
|
revisers -- to be <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olite -- of the latest edition of that work have
|
|
not ventured to alter it. The writer, Dr. <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Bryant</ent>, tell's how <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent>
|
|
startled the world with his radicalism in 1891 but adds that he
|
|
fell back into sheer reaction before he died. He says:</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> In 1902 the Sacred Congregation of Extraordinary
|
|
Ecclesiastical Affairs issued instructions concerning
|
|
Christian democracy in Italy, directing that the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ular
|
|
Christian movement which embraced in its <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rogram a number of
|
|
social reforms such as factory laws for children, old-age
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ensions, a minimum wage in agricultural industries, an eight
|
|
hour day, the revival of trade <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>gilds</ent>, and the encouragement of
|
|
Sunday rest, should divert its attention from all such things
|
|
as savored of novelty and devote its energies to the
|
|
restoration of the Tem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oral Power.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Did you ever find your attention called to that miserable
|
|
change of the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s social creed in any one of the very numerous
|
|
books and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>am<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>hlets written in America on the grand and ins<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>iring
|
|
call for justice of <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent>? You certainly did not. Catholic Truth
|
|
does not do such things. In science a man who made much of a
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assage from an earlier great scientist and did not mention that it
|
|
was retracted in his later years would be discredited. In the field
|
|
of sacred literature he is just clever.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> However, what was this bold and "magnificent" declaration of
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent>? It is contained in the encyclical (or to-all-the-
|
|
world) letter Rerum novarum -- these encyclicals are named from the
|
|
first two words of the latin text -- of the year 1891. You will
|
|
find it useful to consider the historical background. Some ten
|
|
years earlier the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> had struck a bargain with Bismarck. The
|
|
Catholic Church in Germany would enlist all its <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower in Bismarck's
|
|
fight against Socialism and for militarism if he would quit his
|
|
cam<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>aign against the Church itself. It did not make an atom of
|
|
difference to Social Democracy. At the German election of 1887 the
|
|
Socialists <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olled 763,128 votes: at the election of 1890 their vote
|
|
rose to 1,427,298. In 1890 the Socialist vote in Austria was
|
|
750,000, and it was about half a million in France. In other words,
|
|
the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olicy of sheer o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osition to Socialism had dismally failed.
|
|
Catholic workers were leaving the Church in millions because it
|
|
o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed justice to the workers.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
8
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> So <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent>, or his advisers -- he knew nothing about economic
|
|
matters, or indeed any other matters exce<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t Church stuff and the
|
|
Latin classics -- had the brilliant idea of taking the wind out of
|
|
the Socialist sails by a solemn statement of the attitude of the
|
|
Church to Labor questions which would dis<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lease the em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers and
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resumably win the admiration of the workers. The Encyclical was
|
|
translated into most languages, and even the secular <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ress hailed
|
|
it as a revolutionary <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ronouncement. It still shines in American
|
|
a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologetic literature. The Catholic will tell you that the Church
|
|
has formulated the Charter of the Rights of Labor in two great
|
|
encyclicals, <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>the Rerum Novarum</ent> of <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent> and the Quadragesimo
|
|
anno of the later (and the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resent) <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>. When you inquire,
|
|
however, you will find that the latter has not been translated into
|
|
English -- for reasons which you will understand <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resently -- but
|
|
the message of <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent> is (if you conceal his retraction of it)
|
|
written in letters of bronze on a block of granite.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Surely, you think, it must be really good. You shall judge for
|
|
yourself. I have just read it carefully through once more and made
|
|
a syno<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>sis of it, and, as a chea<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> translation is still available,
|
|
you can check my <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>recis of it.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> It o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ens with the reflection that something must be done to
|
|
im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rove the condition of the workers. The <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>gilds</ent>, which under the
|
|
lead of the Church so long <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotected them, were, the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> says,
|
|
"destroyed in the last century." As every student of such matters
|
|
knows that they died a natural death, or were (if there is question
|
|
of destruction) destroyed by the workers themselves in the 15th
|
|
Century, this is not a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>romising beginning. It gets worse. Owing to
|
|
the s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>read of irreligion the callous world of the 19th Century <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut
|
|
nothing in the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lace of these beneficent Catholic <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>gilds</ent>, and the
|
|
workers were left to be ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loited by "a small number of very rich
|
|
men," while "crafty agitators" led the workers by the nose in the
|
|
wrong direction. Socialism cannot be acce<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ted as a remedy because
|
|
it is itself unjust and futile. It denies the right of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rivate
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erty -- the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> seems to think that under Socialism you cannot
|
|
have your own books, car<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ets, or etchings -- and in this it is
|
|
immoral. It <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>reaches a class-war, which is wicked, wasteful,
|
|
whereas if em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers and workers were all religious (Catholics)
|
|
they would live in a beautiful atmos<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>here of brotherhood, and the
|
|
rich would give generous alms to the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oor. That is the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s idea
|
|
of the Middle Ages.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> About half the encyclical is taken u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> with moral <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>latitudes
|
|
and factual inaccuracies of this sort. The idea that the workers of
|
|
Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e were <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotected by <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>gilds</ent> until the French Revolution and that
|
|
from then until 1890 nothing was done for them would bring the
|
|
wrath of a teacher u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>on a so<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>homore. Unions of any kind were
|
|
truculently forbidden in all countries, Catholic and Protestant,
|
|
from the 16th Century until the 19th, but at least there was in
|
|
England, and not in Catholic lands, the crude and costly machinery
|
|
of Poor Relief. In England, moreover, the workers won the right of
|
|
union before 1830, and under <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Place</ent> and <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Owen</ent> (Atheists both) there
|
|
was a great develo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ment of Trade Unions. There was also a long
|
|
series of Factory Acts for the reduction of hours and the </<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
9
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotection of the workers, and by 1891 the leading States were
|
|
considering or inaugurating schemes of old-age <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ensions, widows'
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ensions, sick and unem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyment insurance, etc. The Kaiser
|
|
formulated this <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rogram for Germany and at once started work on it
|
|
in 1890.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> However, let us come to the "constructive" <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art of the great
|
|
Charter. If the workers realize that it is "no disgrace" to work if
|
|
you do not ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>en to "<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ossess the gifts of fortune," and if the
|
|
em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers "do not tax the workers beyond his strength" and "give
|
|
every one that which is just" this "thorny <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roblem of ca<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ital and
|
|
labor is well on the way to settlement. It takes a <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> to discover
|
|
things like that. For a moment the ca<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>italists get a jolt when the
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> says that "it is only by the labor of the working man that
|
|
States grow rich" but, needless to say, he does not <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ass on to
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Marx</ent>'s theory of sur<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lus value, of which he had <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>robably never
|
|
heard. It is just a clumsy way of saying that ca<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ital cannot
|
|
dis<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ense with labor. Then, after an excursus on the divine origin
|
|
of authority and the duty of the State to check em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers who
|
|
im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ose conditions which injure the morals, religion, or health --
|
|
as I said, Britain already had a whole code of laws checking such
|
|
em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers -- of the workers, the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> gets to concrete <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osals.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The "revolution" is su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed to be here. The <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> mentions the
|
|
strike as a wea<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>on of the workers and does not condemn it. He is
|
|
content to say that if the State were guided by religion it would
|
|
see that the grounds of strikes did not exist. Then we get the
|
|
"rights" of the workers. They must have a day's rest on Sunday (and
|
|
go to church), they must not be com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>elled to work such hours that
|
|
it "stu<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>efies their minds and wears out their bodies," and the
|
|
wages must be "sufficient to su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ort a frugal and well-behaved
|
|
working man." All this had been a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>latitude of Radical (and much
|
|
Liberal) as well as Socialist literature for several decades, and
|
|
the astonishment of the world that a <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> should <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>indorse</ent> the claim
|
|
of one day's rest in seven (which had been normal in Protestant
|
|
countries for three centuries) and that men should not be
|
|
overworked is really a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roof of its insincerity in its new
|
|
admiration of the Church of Rome. If there was any "revolution" it
|
|
was in the fact that the Roman Church had com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rehensively and
|
|
officially o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed the rights of the workers for more than 100
|
|
years, or since they had been clearly formulated on the eve of the
|
|
French Revolution, and now that it saw the workers deserting it in
|
|
millions it admitted the most elementary of those rights.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The American Catholic a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists on the social side Com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>letely
|
|
ignore these as<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ects of the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s deliverance. They surely know
|
|
that what he calls "crafty agitators" had been demanding these
|
|
rights for the workers for 100 years yet they re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resent the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> as
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>utting some <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofound new social wisdom before the world. They lay
|
|
no stress on the really revolutionary -- if it were clearly and
|
|
sincerely meant -- statement that "it is only by the labor of the
|
|
working man that States grow rich." Catholic social writers would
|
|
not dare to say that themselves in America today. It is the
|
|
essential basis of Bolshevism, the essential meaning of the hammer
|
|
and sickle. But I agree with them here that the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> meant no more
|
|
than that the miner <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roduces coal and the agricultural worker corn.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
10
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>Any other meaning is quite inconsistent with the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s -- indeed
|
|
all <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> -- settled social ethic that the division of the race
|
|
into masters (<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rivate em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers) and wage-earners is in accordance
|
|
with the divine will.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> As to the Sunday rest -- which, by the way, Britain, America,
|
|
Germany, etc., not only granted but sternly insisted on for
|
|
religious reasons -- the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofit of the Church itself is here too
|
|
clear for us to consider it disinterested. Of the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotest
|
|
against overwork also we take no notice. At the time when he wrote
|
|
this there had been a mighty and successful struggle for the
|
|
reduction of hours and the curtailment of the work of women and
|
|
children in Great Britain for 70 years and for a generation in
|
|
America, France, and Germany. It was Catholic countries like Italy,
|
|
S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain, and Portugal that needed the moralist, and neither then nor
|
|
at any, later date until Socialism became a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower did they carry
|
|
out any serious reform. In fact, the worst condition of labor,
|
|
es<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ecially child labor, continued to be found in Catholic South
|
|
Italy, S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain (exce<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t 1932-6), Portugal, and Poland right down to
|
|
the outbreak of the war.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The gem of the encyclical is said by the a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists to be the
|
|
demand for "a living wage." It is the minimum demand that any
|
|
reformer ever drew u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> because, obviously, the far greater question
|
|
is: What is a living wage? The <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>, in any case, did not use that
|
|
very familiar <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>hrase, and how any Catholic em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyer in the world
|
|
could object to what he did say is incom<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rehensible. In two
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assages the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> goes beyond the hoary old Church-<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>latitude that
|
|
in rewarding labor em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers must be "just" -- leaving it to them
|
|
to say what is just. The first short <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assage is said in one
|
|
"official" translation to be that the wage must <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rovide "the means
|
|
of living a tolerable and ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>y life." The word "ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>y" is here
|
|
arbitrarily inserted. The Latin text has no such word. The other
|
|
official translation is that the wage must suffice "to su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ort the
|
|
wage-earner in reasonable and frugal comfort," The word
|
|
"reasonable" again is a trick. The correct translation is: "The
|
|
wage must be enough to feed a frugal and well-behaved worker." What
|
|
a revolutionary sentiment in the year 1891!</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> In the next <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>aragra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>h the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> remembers that workers have
|
|
families to su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ort. He say's: "If the worker receives a wage on
|
|
which he can su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ort himself, his wife, and his children
|
|
becomingly, he will be able to save and to have a small ca<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ital."
|
|
He is to buy land (as that will kee<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> him out of Socialism). I have
|
|
em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>hasized the significant word in this <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assage, as the Catholic
|
|
translators again <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lay tricks with it. And if the reader finds my
|
|
translation of it ambiguous I re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ly that it is deliberately
|
|
ambiguous in the original. The Latin here is <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oor and unusual --
|
|
just for the sake of vagueness. As a matter of fact the official
|
|
clerical biogra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>her of <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent>, Msgr. T'Serelaes, says that the
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s references to a living wage led everywhere to stormy
|
|
dis<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>utes as to what <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>recisely he meant, and a Belgian archbisho<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>
|
|
wrote to Rome for a clarification of them. He got none. So we may
|
|
dismiss the gems of social wisdom of <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent> and the dishonest
|
|
comments of American a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists who tam<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>er with the text and
|
|
conceal the fact that through one of the Congregations of
|
|
Cardinals, of which the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> is the head, <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent> in 1902 recanted
|
|
his "Charter," and ordered Catholic workers to quit talking about
|
|
the rights of Labor!
|
|
Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
11
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> According to these a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent>'s "Immortal" utterance
|
|
remained the Roman standard on such matters until 1931, when Pius
|
|
XI, in the encyclical Quadragestme anno re-affirmed and develo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed
|
|
its teaching; and these two declarations are the wisest and
|
|
soundest of all counsels on the great issue of Ca<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ital and Labor.
|
|
But, as I have already said, while these a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists talk very
|
|
fulsomely about the encyclical of 1931 they, as far as I can
|
|
discover never translate it. There is certainly no translation
|
|
issued by the British Catholic authorities and I cannot trace any
|
|
in America, though the essential meaning of an "encyclical" letter
|
|
is that it is addressed to the whole Catholic world, and the
|
|
hierarchy in each country is to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublish a translation of it. Dr.
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Ryan</ent>, the Catholic oracle on social questions, translated all the
|
|
earlier encyclicals of Pius XI but did not touch this one.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> I ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lained in an earlier booklet why this "great" encyclical
|
|
is so scurvily treated by Catholics and was almost ignored by the
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ress. It tells Catholics that the cor<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>orative state -- Fascism, in
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lain English -- is the true model in economic matters and must be
|
|
enforced when the authorities are Catholics! I will again give a
|
|
faithful summary of it, but first let us get the true historical
|
|
framework.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> There was not, as the a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologist's claim, a continuity of Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olicy. There was exactly the o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osite. Not only did Rome, as I
|
|
have said, formally reverse its <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olicy, but that <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olicy had so
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ably failed that the three <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> who followed <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent> never
|
|
endorsed it. I have shown elsewhere that the Church of Rome
|
|
continued to lose to the Socialists. In Germany the Socialist vote,
|
|
which had risen to 1,427,298 in 1890 had increased to 2,107,076 by
|
|
1898; and it was chiefly in Germany that the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> had ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ected good
|
|
results from his encyclical. In France the number of Socialists
|
|
doubled between 1893 and 1900. In Austria the vote rose from
|
|
750,000 in 1890 to 1,041,948 in 1907. And Socialism began to s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>read
|
|
in Italy itself. The vote rose from 27,000 in 1892 to 175,000 in
|
|
1900. The Church, losing heavily, continued to denounce Socialism
|
|
and to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ermit local churches to ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriment in Christian Socialism,
|
|
as we shall see later. Then came the war, the Russian Revolution,
|
|
and the ra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>id s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>read of Atheistic Communism as well as Socialism,</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The des<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erate officials at the Vatican learned, however, as
|
|
time went on that the modern world was not necessarily committed to
|
|
radical and democratic <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rinci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>les. A very large <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ortion of the
|
|
middle class as well as the wealthy were alarmed at the threat to
|
|
"<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rivate enter<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rise," or the chance of making a fortune, and, while
|
|
these men had in the 19th Century <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rovided the backbone of the
|
|
anti-clerical <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arty everywhere, they now sought clerical as well as
|
|
conservative allies against Bolshevism. To win a good su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ort in
|
|
the working class they joined in the cry that Bolshevism set out to
|
|
destroy religion, and therefore threatened civilization, and their
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ress echoed the libels against and grossly misre<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resented Russia.
|
|
So there was formed the grand anti-Bolshevik alliance of ministers
|
|
and morons, bankers and bandits, journalists, and Jesuits all over
|
|
the world. The Vatican dro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed its coquetting with Russia and, as
|
|
we saw in the first series, entered into a brazen alliance with the
|
|
gangs of criminals who were the nucleus grou<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>s of the next
|
|
movement.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
12
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> So you know what to ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ect of an encyclical on the workers
|
|
com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed by the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resent aristocratic <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>, who was then Secretary
|
|
of State, in 1931. "Quadragesimo anno" means "in the fortieth year"
|
|
(since <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent>'s encyclical), and is really an amazing, suggestion of
|
|
continuity of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olicy. The <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> recalls the work of <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent>. There was
|
|
vast and increasing misery amongst the workers -- in the leading
|
|
countries they had, as a matter of fact, had their real wage
|
|
doubled or trebled in half a century -- and "the eyes of all were
|
|
turned to the Chair of Peter." <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> issued his marvelous encyclical,
|
|
which "owed nothing to either Liberalism or Socialism" -- its best
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oints were, we saw, <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>latitudes of benevolent Liberalism -- but was
|
|
ins<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ired by the genius of the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> and Catholic teaching. The world
|
|
was "stu<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>efied at the novelty of his teaching," which "overthrew
|
|
all the idols of Liberalism," and the message <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roduced the most
|
|
salutary fruits everywhere. These Liberals had done a little for
|
|
the workers, It is true, but it was the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s encyclical that the
|
|
workers had to thank for all the social legislation that was <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assed
|
|
after 1891 and for the full establishment of Trade Unions, which
|
|
the Liberals had o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> After devoting a quarter of the long letter to this childish
|
|
theme the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> says that he is going to develo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent>'s <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rinci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>les.
|
|
He does not even hint at the retraction. At great length he <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roves
|
|
that the right of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rivate ownershi<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> is based on moral <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rinci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>les,
|
|
so Socialism is immoral. "No good Catholic can be a good
|
|
Socialist." As to Communism it is beneath discussion. Ca<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ital and
|
|
Labor are equally indis<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ensable, and the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roduct must be "justly"
|
|
divided; but he does not go a ste<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> beyond <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> in defining what a
|
|
"just wage" is. The workers must have unions, but there must be no
|
|
class-war, and in view of the need for harmonious coo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eration a new
|
|
ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e of union or "syndicate" which has lately a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eared deserves
|
|
attention. There must be unions of both workers and em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers and
|
|
conferences of delegates from each side. The worker is quite free
|
|
to belong or not belong to the syndicate, but he has to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ay the
|
|
fees in any case. The <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>, who has the Italian model before him,
|
|
omits to say that if a worker does not join the union he will get
|
|
no labor-ticket. Strikes are forbidden, and if the two sides cannot
|
|
agree the government must intervene. But if they will all join the
|
|
Catholic Church and reform their morals the machine will march on
|
|
oiled wheels.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> In other words, <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Mussolini</ent>'s Cor<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>orative State is the ideal,
|
|
and from Slovakia to Peru the new Catholic countries are ado<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ting
|
|
it and ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ressly quoting this encyclical as the reason. Did or did
|
|
not the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> know that <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Mussolini</ent> devised this economic structure
|
|
sim<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ly in order to have both industrialists and workers in his
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower when the time came for war-industries and forced loans?
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Obtuse</ent> as the Vatican is in such matters the clergy must have knows
|
|
this, and must have known also that, while the industrialists
|
|
really suffered in the matter of forced loans to the government the
|
|
workers were enslaved and im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>overished. So now you know why, though
|
|
Catholic a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists in America insist that the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al encyclicals
|
|
are the grand Charters of Labor they are so very reticent about
|
|
this latest official utterance on the workers' rights.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
13
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ter III</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> THE ACTUAL RECORD OF THE BLACK INTERNATIONAL</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent>, we saw, o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ened his solemn <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ronouncement to the world
|
|
with a summary of social history which was as near to the truth as
|
|
Ca<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e Cod is to Tierra del Fuego. I do not for a moment suggest that
|
|
he knew this but felt it quite safe to give his fantastic version
|
|
of Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ean history to Catholics who are not allowed to read the
|
|
truth. Do not misunderstand me. A<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists and missionaries of the
|
|
Black International -- lots of them -- do lie. Many of them in
|
|
America who re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eat the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s words are com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>elled by their task to
|
|
read, and give in their writings sufficient <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roof that they have
|
|
read, ordinary ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ert works on the history of the struggle of the
|
|
workers in modern times. But you would not ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ect a <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> to have
|
|
leisure for that sort of thing. In fact if he knew the historical
|
|
truth he might not be able to write those sonorous and va<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>id
|
|
generalizations which Catholics mistake for dee<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> or ins<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ired
|
|
thought. In the next book we shall see some of these highly-
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oisoned gems of historical fiction from an earlier encyclical of
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent>. He writes history (and economics) like a devout nun. The
|
|
workers, we found him saying, were ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>y and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ros<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erous under the
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>gilds</ent>, which the Church had ins<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ired, until the French Revolution.
|
|
Then "irreligion" made the world of em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers callous and brutal.
|
|
Nothing was substituted for the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotection of the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>gilds</ent>, and. ...
|
|
Well there you are. That is why the workers of the last century
|
|
were so ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loited. You have only to bring back the em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers to the
|
|
true Church (as in that country which I described in the first
|
|
cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ter) and the world of Labor will take on the brightness and
|
|
warmth of a garden in s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ring.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Exce<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t for the howler about the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>gilds</ent> this is really what
|
|
Catholic a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists commonly say on the subject. The Church "broke
|
|
the fetters of the slave" and brought light and justice to the
|
|
workers of the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>agan world. In due time -- five or six centuries
|
|
later -- it created the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>gilds</ent> which s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>read a rich religious mantle
|
|
of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotection over the workers of Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e. Protestantism destroyed
|
|
the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotection -- the little difficulty about what ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ened in the
|
|
Catholic half of Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e may (and had better be) disregarded -- and
|
|
so the arrival of the Industrial Era found them the hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>less <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rey
|
|
of the ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loiters. The world must return to the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rinci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>les of the
|
|
Middle Ages when the workers were so ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>y.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The real record of the Church in relation to the workers can
|
|
be summed u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> even more shortly than that, for it is much nearer to
|
|
the truth to say that the Church was com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rehensively indifferent to
|
|
the condition of the workers from the time it won <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower until <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent>
|
|
wrote his "great" Charter of their Rights. That condition varied
|
|
with the economic develo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ment of Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e but until at least the
|
|
French Revolution it was one of galling subjection and
|
|
ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loitation, and the Church never condemned this. It is a long
|
|
story for a short cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ter, but I may <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oint out the fallacy or the
|
|
untruth of the chief statements on which the claim of the a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologist
|
|
is based. And if I have here to be very brief and rather dogmatic
|
|
it may be advisable to ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lain to some of my readers that I have
|
|
dealt with these <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oints and given the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>er authorities in several
|
|
of my Little Blue Books and in my True Story of the Roman Catholic
|
|
Church.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
14
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Catholic writers used to boast how the Church was communistic
|
|
and anti-rich from its infancy, but they have done their best
|
|
recently to make the word Communism stink in folk's nostrils so
|
|
they dro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> this argument. It would be as bad as boasting how
|
|
Catholic commercial travelers, or their medieval equivalent, used
|
|
to lock their wives in "girdles of chastity" when they set out on
|
|
their rounds. In any case it is false. The theory is based u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>on a
|
|
statement about one <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>articular church in Acts, which even many
|
|
theologians consider a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ious romance. <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Paul</ent>'s letters are the
|
|
earliest documents, and they reflect a division of classes, with
|
|
rich slave-owners and even im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erial officials. In fact Catholic
|
|
literature includes wealthy relatives of the Em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eror Ves<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>asian in
|
|
the Roman Church.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> More im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ortant is the claim about slavery; and let me say at
|
|
once that it is one of the most blatantly untruthful claims the
|
|
a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists make. No <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>, no Father of the Church, no body of
|
|
churchmen ever condemned slavery until the 18th Century. St.
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Augustine</ent>, the dominant oracle of western or Roman Christendom,
|
|
ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ressly defended it as of divine a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ointment (City of God, Book
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>XlX</ent>, eh. XV), and <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Thomas Aquinas</ent> and all the other Schoolmen
|
|
followed <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Augustine</ent>. There is not an ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ert work on the subject that
|
|
does not ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lain that the old ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e of slavery was destroyed by the
|
|
economic colla<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>se of the Roman Em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ire, and that before that time
|
|
Roman moralists and Em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erors had done a great deal for the slave.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> After the year 500 the workers of Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e are called in our
|
|
modern literature "serfs," but the reader is rarely warned that
|
|
still for centuries all literature was Latin, and there are not
|
|
different words in Latin for "slave" and "serf." The workers were
|
|
-- and the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> from 600 onward owned vast numbers of them -- just
|
|
servi as they had been under <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>aganism, and <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Vinogradov</ent>, one of the
|
|
best historical sociologists of recent times, says that they were
|
|
in law and fact, "slaves." They were bought and sold like cattle,
|
|
and no law <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotected them from cruelty. So the only real change
|
|
when the Roman Church came to dominate Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e in the 5th Century
|
|
was that, whereas in the Roman Em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ire, two workers out of three had
|
|
been free (See Darrow's Slavery in the Roman Em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ire), literate, and
|
|
almost <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>am<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ered, in the new Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e not one worker in ten was free
|
|
or literate or had a life of elementary comfort and decency.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> This "era of the serfs" lasted until the 12th or 13th Century,
|
|
when the majority were emanci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ated. Again there is no modern ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ert
|
|
who does not trace this emanci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ation to what we may broadly call
|
|
economic causes. The nobles sold freedom to immense bodies of serfs
|
|
so that they could go on the looting ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>editions of the Crusaders
|
|
or enjoy the more luxurious life which Arabs had taught Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e.
|
|
Kings emanci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ated bodies of serfs to hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> fight their rebellious
|
|
nobles: nobles emanci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ated them to fight the kings or other nobles.
|
|
Abbeys and bisho<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>s were, says the Catholic historian <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Muratori</ent>, the
|
|
last to emanci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ate them, saying that they must not "alienate Church
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erty." At the same time Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e was ra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>idly recovering
|
|
economically and far larger bodies of craftsman were required in
|
|
the towns (which, for the same reasons, now got charters of
|
|
liberty).</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
15
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The famous <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>gilds</ent> had begun long before this, and the Church,
|
|
instead of having ins<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ired them, tried for more than a century to
|
|
su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ress them. They seem to have been formed by the workers on the
|
|
model of the unions (colleges) of the old Greek and Roman workers,
|
|
traces of which survived. I have elsewhere quoted decrees from the
|
|
Ca<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>itularies of Charlemagne and later Church Councils showing how
|
|
drastically the Church condemned them. It could not su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ress so it
|
|
a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riated them, and for several centuries they certainly hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed
|
|
the workers. That is to say, the skilled workers. Writers on the
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>gilds</ent> (Gross, <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Walford</ent>, etc.) do not remind the reader that while in
|
|
the towns even the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rostitutes had <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>gilds</ent> and walked in the sacred
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rocessions (of course, the writers I have named do not tell this),
|
|
the agricultural workers, who were at least four-fifths of the
|
|
workers of Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e, had none or any other kind of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotection.
|
|
Further, every single real ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ert on any country in Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e during
|
|
this <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriod, the so-called Age of Chivalry, the best <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art of the
|
|
Middle Ages (1100 to 1400), agrees that the lords and landowners
|
|
regarded the workers as dirt under their feet, robbing and
|
|
torturing them barbarously. It was an age of wild license, of
|
|
fiendish cruelty, and you can imagine -- or read Eccardus for
|
|
Germany, <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Brissot</ent> for France, and <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Thorold Rogers</ent> or Traile for
|
|
England, the chief authorities on the workers -- how the unarmed
|
|
mass of the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le fared.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> All the leading historical ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erts on the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriod use the same
|
|
language as Professor A. <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Luchaire</ent>, the highest authority on France
|
|
in the 13th Century. He says (Social France at the Time of Phili<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e
|
|
Auguste) that "feudalism seemed to take a ferocious delight in
|
|
seeing flames consume burgher's house's and the villains [workers]
|
|
who lived in them" (<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>. 5); that the knight or noble "was almost
|
|
everywhere a brutal and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>illaging soldier" (<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>. 249); and that "the
|
|
noble had an untameable anti<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>athy to and a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofound contem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t of the
|
|
villain: that is, for the serf, <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>easant, laborer, citizen, or
|
|
burgher" (<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>. 271). Such was France, the most advanced country in
|
|
Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e, in what Catholics call the most beautiful <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art of the
|
|
Middle Ages; and every leading authority on Italy, England, or
|
|
Germany at the time gives exactly the same <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>icture. <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent>
|
|
had as naive an idea of the time as has the schoolma'am who talks
|
|
to her class about the beautiful Age of Chivalry and the Knights
|
|
Errant. And in our age of historical scholarshi<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> this sort of thing
|
|
is solemnly made the basis of a social argument by the s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>iritual
|
|
leaders of 200,000,000 folk and is most res<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ectfully treated by
|
|
editorial writers and essayists.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> It would be <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ertinent to show that while the workers who were
|
|
subject to the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> were thus as un<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotected from the brutality of
|
|
their "betters" as the slaves of old -- indeed less than the slaves
|
|
of Rome from the time of the Em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eror <ent type = 'person'>Hadrian</ent> -- and lived for the
|
|
most <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art (on the land) in sordid and brutalizing conditions, the
|
|
workers of Arab S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain, who cannot have been far short in number of
|
|
the workers of the whole of Christian Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e, were relatively ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>y
|
|
and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ros<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erous and generally educated. But I cannot enlarge on that
|
|
in this little sketch. Let me just say, on the strength of the
|
|
research and the general consensus of authorities in ancient Rome,
|
|
medieval Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e, and Arab S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain which I give in a dozen works, that
|
|
the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriod which the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> and his a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists choose as the Golden
|
|
Age of the workers was for them the blackest age, a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art from S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain,</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
16
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>between their good condition in the Roman Em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ire and the
|
|
im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rovements they have won in modern times. None but Catholic
|
|
a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists and a few American teachers of history who <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lay u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> to
|
|
them now write such trash about the Middle Ages. The <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriod had
|
|
great art, but four-fifth's of the workers, scattered outside the
|
|
cities, never even saw this.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> It is true that the condition of the growing body of
|
|
industrial workers became harder in some res<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ects after the
|
|
Reformation. The a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists make a ridiculous attem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t to connect
|
|
this with (at least in England) the su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ression of the monasteries,
|
|
the chief effect of which for the workers was that crowds of men
|
|
and women who had idly hung about the fat monasteries for food
|
|
instead of working for it had now the choice of working or
|
|
starving. In <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oint of fact Protestant England set u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> a system of
|
|
Poor Relief which, crude as it was -- like most government measures
|
|
300 years ago -- did discriminate to some extent between "sturdy
|
|
beggars" and the real needy.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> But the answer to any Catholic attem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t to make ca<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ital out of
|
|
the fact that, as trade and industry ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>anded, the lawyers, in the
|
|
interest of the rich, made the law harsher against the workers,
|
|
es<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ecially in regard to unions, is easily found when we com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>are
|
|
Catholic and Protestant countries. The three countries of Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e
|
|
which sank most notably from the best level of the Middle Ages
|
|
after the Reformation were beyond any question Catholic Italy,
|
|
S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain, and Portugal. There the lot of the worker fell to the level
|
|
at which we found it in the first cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ter and remained at that
|
|
level until our time. The exce<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>tions only strengthen my <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oint. When
|
|
anti-Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al statesmen took over Italy from the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> and his <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ets
|
|
at Na<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>les the status of the workers began to rise -- until
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Mussolini</ent> shared his <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower with the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>. In S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain and Portugal
|
|
also there were <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriods of anti-clerical Liberalism or (1932-6)
|
|
Socialism during which the condition of the workers was im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roved
|
|
and schools for their children were o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ened. Under the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resent
|
|
Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al-Fascist regime they have fallen back toward a condition of
|
|
ill-<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>aid illiterate serfdom. These are <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>latitude's of socio-
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olitical history.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> I have not s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>okes of France because it did not, like Italy,
|
|
S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain, and Portugal, build round itself a Chinese Wall to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotect
|
|
its Catholic <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ulation from the taint of non-Catholic influences.
|
|
It was o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>en to receive ideas from England, Holland, and Germany,
|
|
and it saw a considerable growth of ske<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ticism. Even its clergy
|
|
were remarkably inde<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>endent of Rome. Yet it remained <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>redominantly
|
|
Catholic, and it retained medieval vices (torture's, etc.) in
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ortion to its Catholicism. Here I have to notice only the
|
|
condition of the workers. There is no dis<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ute about it. A<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists
|
|
find a second Catholic Golden Age in the days of <ent type = 'person'><ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent> XIV</ent>: a
|
|
vicious, selfish, scandalous monarch who regarded the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le only
|
|
as a source of wealth for his corru<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t court, if you read French try
|
|
to see the documents in Martin's authoritative history relating to
|
|
the a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>alling condition of the agricultural workers when <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent> was
|
|
building his <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>alaces. <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Brissot</ent>, the chief French authority on the
|
|
history of the workers, shows that the wage even of the skilled
|
|
workers fell under <ent type = 'person'><ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent> XIV</ent> to about 38 cents a day (of 12 to 14
|
|
hours) and the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rice of food rose.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
17
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> But their condition on the eve of the Revolution is well
|
|
known, and it is equally well known -- in fact eagerly claimed by
|
|
a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists who know as little about the French Revolution as they
|
|
do about the Russian -- that anti-clericals educated the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>
|
|
to and ins<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ired that inauguration of the first attem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t in
|
|
Christendom to redeem and u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lift the workers. Peo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le will not
|
|
understand our own time unless they see that we still live in the
|
|
new age, an age of struggle against <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rivilege for freedom,
|
|
democracy, enlightenment, and justice to the workers, which o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ened
|
|
at the French Revolution; in a sense you might say the American
|
|
Revolution, since it was in some res<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ects more than <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olitical
|
|
though in just these res<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ects its roots were in French anti-Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al
|
|
literature.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> I ho<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e some day to write a worthy history of this <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriod.
|
|
Already for 150 years men and women, touched by the vision of a
|
|
wiser and juster social order, have fought for freedom, justice,
|
|
and enlightenment. A million of them have lost their lives in the
|
|
struggle, yet but for the rousing of Russia the race in most
|
|
countries would have lost all that it had won in those 150 years of
|
|
sweat and blood. Even now that victory is certain in the sense that
|
|
the nests of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>irates in Berlin, Rome, and Tokyo will be destroyed
|
|
the race makes no totalitarian war against them because so few
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le understand the struggle in all its range. The coalition of
|
|
the Roman Church with the bandits is concealed from the majority --
|
|
I just received a letter from a distinguished clergyman, no lover
|
|
of Rome, who writes that I will startle England if I can <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rove that
|
|
connection! -- whereas, if you know the whole <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriod, it is the
|
|
logical and almost inevitable <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olicy of the Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>acy. And with so
|
|
much hidden and the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ers<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ective distorted some of the leaders in
|
|
the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resent fight, men who mouth about freedom and democracy, ho<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e
|
|
to save the Roman Church from chastisement or loss of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower because
|
|
it will hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut kings back on their thrones, restore <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rivilege,
|
|
and cheek the as<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>irations of the workers.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> I have tried in all my works for the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ast ten years to get
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le to see the events of contem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>orary life in this historical
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ers<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ective, but I must here confine myself to the question of the
|
|
workers. The French Revolution <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roved a false dawn of the new age,
|
|
and when it and the com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>romise of the Na<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oleonic regime were
|
|
destroyed the fight had to begin again, under a dense cloud of
|
|
reaction. Let us say that the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriod from about 1830 to 1930 was
|
|
one of increasing victory for the worker's. The real wage in the
|
|
larger lndustrialized states was trebled. Universal free education
|
|
was won, and this meant at all events the erection of a ladder by
|
|
which the abler workers might ascend to a higher level. Immense
|
|
social services -- hygienic, medical, recreational, educative, and
|
|
financial -- were <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rovided. The right to unions was almost
|
|
com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>letely established. It all fell far short of the ideal, but let
|
|
us be just. That age which the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> blandly blames for all that is
|
|
wrong, which he re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resents as undoing the justice won for the
|
|
workers in earlier Catholic ages was one of the most <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rogressive
|
|
that the world had yet seen; for the workers of im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erial Rome had
|
|
not had to fight for such <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rivileges as they had.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
18
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Well, what share has the Church of Rome had in the victorious
|
|
struggle? Should we be far away from the historical truth if we
|
|
said, None? A<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists search the darker lanes of recent history
|
|
for some obscure <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest or layman -- generally in bad odor in his
|
|
Church at the time -- who dared to say a word for the im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rovement
|
|
of the condition of the workers, for the emanci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ation of the
|
|
Slaves, for justice to women, and so on. That neither the Vatican
|
|
nor any national branch of the Church joined in the great word
|
|
until the last decade of the 19th Century, when wholesale a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ostasy
|
|
of the workers alarmed the Black International, they have to grant.
|
|
But this thimble-rigging game of claiming the credit for "the
|
|
Church" when one man is honest and asking us to blame "not the
|
|
Church but the individual" when a hundred are dishonest begins to
|
|
be resented even by the Catholic laity.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> I made a broad examination of the mighty cam<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>aign for reform
|
|
-- which means to rid the world finally of medievalism -- during
|
|
the last 150 years in my recent 'How Freethinkers made Notable
|
|
Contributions to Civilization' (1938). I showed that in <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriods
|
|
when Catholics regarded Freethinkers as an insignificant and
|
|
negligible minority they <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rovided the great majority of the leaders
|
|
in every branch of the reform-movement. A Catholic survey of that
|
|
magnificent fight for man, the grandest of all e<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ics, naming all
|
|
Catholics in Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e or America who made any such notable
|
|
contribution would be a farce, yet all the time the Church was
|
|
boasting that it ruled a third of the white race. Even the men who
|
|
are claimed, like the Chartist leader in England Bronterre O'Brien,
|
|
were a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ostates in most cases.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Or take, as we have done before, the contrast of Catholic and
|
|
Protestant lands. In the first cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ter I distributed countries, as
|
|
they were before the war threw everything into confusion, into
|
|
three grou<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>s. I do not imagine that any student of social matters
|
|
will question the general distribution, and quarrels about the
|
|
exact <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osition of this or that country do not affect the
|
|
conclusion. The workers enjoy the best conditions where Catholicism
|
|
has no influence on <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublic life and the worst conditions where it
|
|
has its greatest influence. They are worst <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>aid and least <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotected
|
|
by law, and have the feeblest social services in the lands where
|
|
the ruling class <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofess docility to the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>. In Russia, where
|
|
Catholicism sim<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ly does not exist, the workers have the finest
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osition they ever had in history, and they were ra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>idly advancing,
|
|
when the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s war against them broke out, to a level higher than
|
|
is or ever was, found in any other civilization. Whether you agree
|
|
to that or no the broad truth remains; the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osition of the workers
|
|
rose in <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ortion as Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al influence fell. I wonder if there is
|
|
any normally-minded Catholic worker in America who will question my
|
|
distribution of the leading countries of the world according to the
|
|
status of the workers and the Catholic element in the country, or
|
|
will claim that his Church has anything to do with the high
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osition, from material and historical reasons, of the workers of
|
|
America. Yet these Catholic workers cannot o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>en one of their books
|
|
on social questions without reading that the two encyclicals I
|
|
analyzed show the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> as the beat friends of Labor.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
19
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> In other words, we have in this controversy, as in so many
|
|
others that concern the Church, all the facts on one side and all
|
|
the rhetoric on the other. The Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al encyclicals are not merely
|
|
rhetoric but <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>latitudinous rhetoric. That of <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent> in those
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assages of it which won most attention just took u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> and, with a
|
|
certain amount of vagueness, re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eated demands which had for decades
|
|
been considered elementary in serious discussions of such matters.
|
|
Was there, in fact, on the ca<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>italist side any res<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>onsible writer
|
|
who said that "overwork was just as long as you did not s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ecify the
|
|
hours for any industry" -- at that time the burning question, which
|
|
the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> carefully avoided, was the eight-hour day -- or who
|
|
questioned that the worker had a right to a decent wage as long as
|
|
you refused to say what in any industry a decent wage was? And the
|
|
second Encyclical officially took back the slight concessions --
|
|
already quietly withdrawn -- of the first because it <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut the
|
|
workers under a Cor<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>orative State, in which any demands of theirs
|
|
are finally settled by the em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyer's or the government. Both
|
|
encyclicals, moreover, lay heavy stress on something which is
|
|
anathema to every social student. They say that the rich justify
|
|
the larger share they take of the wealth <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roduced if they give
|
|
generously in charity to the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oor.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> If the a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologist falls back, as he usually does, u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>on the fact
|
|
that the Church has always sternly insisted on justice his case is
|
|
worse than ever. Such <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>reaching is, and always was, barren. There
|
|
is a Catholic church in New York which the Tammany leaders have
|
|
attended for the last 100 years, and the services and sermons have
|
|
s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oken of justice as often as they did in other cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>els. Under the
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s nose, in Italy, Catholic em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers made the vilest use, in
|
|
the sul<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>hur mines, of child labor that you would find anywhere in
|
|
Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e. Almost as sordid a use of child labor was made in the
|
|
tailoring business in Poland, and in agriculture and various
|
|
industries in S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain, Portugal, and South America. So it has been
|
|
for ages, though the em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers listened Sunday after Sunday to the
|
|
Catholic gos<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>el of justice. The ethic has been the same in all
|
|
ages; the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ractice has varied considerably, and the facts I have
|
|
given even in this short sketch show that the actual treatment of
|
|
the workers was always nearest to the ideal of justice where <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublic
|
|
life was influenced by those whom the Church denounced.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ter IV</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> THE COMEDY OF CHRISTIAN SOCIALISM</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> I have found it necessary at this <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oint to make a few
|
|
excursions into older history because it was im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ossible to ignore
|
|
the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s amazing statement that the workers enjoyed ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ier
|
|
conditions when the world was Catholic and that their modern
|
|
grievances are due to the colla<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>se of Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al authority over a large
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art of the earth. How Catholics tolerate such howlers and then
|
|
res<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ectfully read articles in their <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ress about the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofound wisdom
|
|
and sagacity of the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> is the one <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roblem of Church life I have
|
|
never mastered. But let me remind the reader that this discussion
|
|
of the status of the workers is <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art of a broader study of the
|
|
Roman Church which we are making. The starting-<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oint of it was:
|
|
What is the real nature of the Church of Rome, of the Black
|
|
International in <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>articular, that it should enter into alliance </<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
20
|
|
. THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>with the vilest forces of modern times? One of the difficulties of
|
|
the general <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublic in entertaining this is that for 40 years
|
|
Catholic a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologetic works in America have loudly boasted that their
|
|
Church has always been, and es<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ecially in Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al declarations during
|
|
the last half-century, the cham<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ion of Labor against greed. We have
|
|
seen that it was, on the contrary, always in alliance with wealth
|
|
and greed and is in its <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resent alliances merely <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ursuing its
|
|
normal <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olicy.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> I imagine that after the war, when Socialism and Communism
|
|
s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>read once more, what is left of the Catholic Church will to a
|
|
great extent turn to what is called Christian Socialism, and we may
|
|
glance at it. The movement was, of course, never Socialistic, and
|
|
in so far as it was ado<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ted in Catholic countries, it never used
|
|
the word Socialism. It was called Christian or Catholic Democracy
|
|
or Social Party, and its ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ress <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ur<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ose was to divert the workers
|
|
from Socialism, which <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent> condemned as em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>hatically in 1891 as
|
|
Pius XI did in 1931. The movement began in England in 1849 when
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le still distinguished between the state Socialism of <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Marx</ent>,
|
|
which then had few adherents in Britain, and other varieties such
|
|
as Robert <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Owen</ent>'s voluntary Socialism.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> This British movement, founded by two clergymen of the Church
|
|
of England, <ent type = 'person'>Charles Kingsley</ent> and F.D. <ent type = 'person'>Maurice</ent>, assisted by the
|
|
barrister (of the same Church) <ent type = 'person'>Ludlow</ent>, which borrowed the title
|
|
Socialism as it was loosely used by the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Owen</ent>ites, never had a large
|
|
body of adherents and did not last long. <ent type = 'person'>Ludlow</ent> admitted that its
|
|
chief aim was "to Christianize Socialism," or to show the workers
|
|
that they need not leave the Church because they demanded a
|
|
betterment of their condition. But it was a grou<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> of men and women
|
|
who very sincerely felt that something must be done for the workers
|
|
when the Chartist movement so sensationally colla<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>sed in 1848 and
|
|
it did render material services in education and in hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ing Trade
|
|
Unions and Coo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erative Societies. It was continued in the Guild of
|
|
St. Matthew, which was closely associated with the "High" or
|
|
Ritualist branch of the Church, and there was a less advanced
|
|
Christian Social Union.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> I once took the chair for a lecture by the Rev. Stewart
|
|
Headlam head of the Guild of St. Matthew, and the audience numbered
|
|
30 or 40. When we si<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed a whisky and soda together afterwards he
|
|
said that he had given this eloquent lecture on "The Brotherhood of
|
|
Men under the Fatherhood of God" a score of times and got almost no
|
|
res<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>onse. Why? I discreetly reminded him that the Church had taught
|
|
the Fatherhood of God just as dogmatically in the long ages of
|
|
tyranny and ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loitation and suggested that <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>s the em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers
|
|
reflected that since the Father condemned his children to an
|
|
eternal hell the little hell they gave their workers sometimes did
|
|
not matter much.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> I need not trace the echoes of this movement in the religious
|
|
world of America -- the Christian Labor Union of 1872, the Knights
|
|
of Labor, the Christian Social Union, etc. -- as Catholics were not
|
|
involved in them. It was in Germany, after 1870, that the movement
|
|
which we generally call Christian Socialism s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>read amongst the
|
|
Catholic worker's. It was, of course, not merely not Socialism but
|
|
the very o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osite of it, since the sole aim was to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>revent Catholic</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
21
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>workers from joining the Social Democrats. The whole movement, in
|
|
Britain, America, and Germany, rather reminds us of the clergymen
|
|
who try to kee<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> their young men and girls from wicked dance-halls
|
|
by arranging chaste dances or <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ing-<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ong games, with non-alcoholic
|
|
refreshments, in the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arish hall.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> It was more serious and more resolutely Catholic when it
|
|
s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>read to Austria. Its a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riation of the name Socialism was in
|
|
this case <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eculiarly ironical. Not only had it no sincere <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rogram
|
|
of im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rovement of the condition of the workers but it at first
|
|
consisted of violently anti-Socialist middle-class men, and it soon
|
|
absorbed the Conservative body of Catholics. The urban workers,
|
|
es<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ecially at Vienna, were too well read in social history to be
|
|
du<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed by the romantic version of the Church's attitude to Labor
|
|
that the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riests offered them and, as is well known, they <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assed
|
|
bodily to Socialism and in free elections won com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lete <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower over
|
|
Vienna and a few other towns year after year. It was <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>articularly
|
|
exas<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erating for the Church because the Austrian workers were so
|
|
well behaved that it was in this case im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ossible to fabricate
|
|
stories of "Red atrocities." I s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ent a week amongst them at the
|
|
time when the de<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ression and the mutilation of the country by
|
|
Versailles had brought u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>on Vienna such economic stringency that,
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olice-officials assured me, the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>atience of the workers was
|
|
strained to breaking <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oint. I saw 10,000 armed <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olice drawn across
|
|
a short section of the Ring between the rich inner city and an
|
|
industrial suburb. But not a clash occurred, though I verified that
|
|
half the workers suffered grave <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rivation.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> It was therefore the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olicy of the church to hold the ignorant
|
|
and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest-ridden agricultural workers, which would ensure its
|
|
control of the national government and so give it, in case of need,
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower over the Socialist munici<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al governments. The title
|
|
"Socialist" became farcical when the Catholic nobles and land-
|
|
owners were enlisted in the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arty and their influence over the
|
|
rural <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ulation secured, so we need not <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ay any attention to the
|
|
few ameliorative measures, such as agricultural coo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eratives, which
|
|
they <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assed. But the story, as it develo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed, is so characteristic
|
|
of Vatican strategy that it is vitally relevant to the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oint we
|
|
are. considering.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> In the stress of the terrible ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriences of 1918 and 1919 the
|
|
so-called Christian Socialists coo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erated amiably with the Social
|
|
Democrats in reconstituting the beggared Austrian state on a
|
|
democratic basis, and then for a time they became, with this
|
|
immense rural backing, the chief <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arty in the country. It was led
|
|
by a clerical <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofessor, Sei<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>el, whose <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osition was much the same
|
|
as that of Dr. <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Ryan</ent> in the American Church. But with the ca<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ture of
|
|
the national government by the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arty it suited the Vatican to
|
|
forget that churchmen must not interfere in <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olities -- as a matter
|
|
of fact the Church never sacrifices a single o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ortunity to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut a
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest at the head of a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olitical <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arty -- and Sel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>el became
|
|
Chancellor of the Austrian Re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublic and brought his <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arty back to
|
|
the old bitter hostility to the Social Democrats.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The situation that immediately ensued was falsely re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resented,
|
|
as all Socialist constructive work was in the world-<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ress and by
|
|
the Church, but historians of the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eriod have made it clear. While
|
|
the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> were blandly ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>laining that they o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed Socialism </<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
22
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>because it mould not work and they therefore acted in the interest
|
|
of the race Austria <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resented the s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ectacle of a bankru<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t and
|
|
totally inefficient national Catholic government, under a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest,
|
|
ke<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t alive by loans from the League of Nations -- or subsidies from
|
|
the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower which equally dreaded the success of the Socialists --
|
|
while Vienna, under its Socialist administration and refused any
|
|
share in the international loans to the country, did such s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lendid
|
|
work for the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le (es<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ecially in education and re-housing) that
|
|
an editorial in a Liberal London <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>er, the News-Chronicle
|
|
(February 12. 1935) <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ronounced it "as close to the ideal Platonic
|
|
Re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublic as the world has ever seen." I may recall that the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resent
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>, who re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resented the Vatican in Germany for 12 years, was
|
|
familiar with all this, yet in the encyclical Quadragesimo anno,
|
|
which he issued in the name of the late <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>, he dwelt on the
|
|
futility and danger to civilization of Socialism in the usual
|
|
Catholic manner.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Rome has only one effective answer in such cases, violence,
|
|
and in an earlier booklet of the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ast series I told what ha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ened.
|
|
The Christian Socialist government, led by the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest-ridden and
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>iously unscru<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ulous <ent type = 'person'>Dollfuss</ent>, allied itself with the Fascists and
|
|
destroyed Social Democracy. It was the time when <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Hitler</ent> was
|
|
su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed to leave Austria in <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Mussolini</ent>'s s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>here of influence, and
|
|
the Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al encyclical of 1931 ordered Catholics, in effect, to ado<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t
|
|
the cor<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>orative state. As <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Hitler</ent> made <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublic his real <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lans and his
|
|
growing <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower the Austrian Catholics s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lit, many joining the Nazi
|
|
Greater Germany movement; and, when the trium<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>h of the Nazis was
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut beyond question the head of the Austrian Church, Cardinal
|
|
Innitzer, threw off the mask and delivered the country to the Beast
|
|
of Berchtesgaden. The long, and heroic struggle of the Austrian
|
|
workers was over. They <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assed under the vile tyranny of the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s
|
|
ideal cor<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>orative state and the Gesta<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>o.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Not less instructive is the develo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ment in Italy. Socialism
|
|
began to grow ra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>idly in that country in the last decade of the
|
|
19th Century. The situation here was <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eculiar because the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent>
|
|
had, since the Italian government had taken over the Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al States,
|
|
forbidden Catholics to take any <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art in national <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oliticks. <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent>
|
|
XIII had <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ermitted them to enter munici<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al Polities and in 1905 the
|
|
sagacious Vatican was forced to acknowledge its blunder and remove
|
|
the ban altogether. <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> had, we saw, sourly ordered Italian
|
|
Catholics in 1902 to dro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> all concern about the living wage and
|
|
industrial betterment and concentrate on the recovery of the
|
|
Tem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oral Power. The removal of the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olitical ban reo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ened the
|
|
question of social activity, and a Peo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le's Party, a variant of
|
|
Christian Socialism, was established. Led by the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest <ent type = 'person'>Murri</ent>, it
|
|
was violently anti-Socialist -- see his work Battaglie d'Oggi --
|
|
but it a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ealed to the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le against a middle class which <ent type = 'person'>Murri</ent>
|
|
not unfairly re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resented as solidly o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed to the Church and had
|
|
to make increasing concessions to the demands for justice to the
|
|
workers. But <ent type = 'person'>Murri</ent>, though secretary to a cardinal, went on to
|
|
write in scathing terms about the higher Roman clergy themselves
|
|
and was excommunicated.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The ra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>id advance of Socialism and Communism after the war
|
|
com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>elled the Vatican to reconsider its attitude and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ermit a new
|
|
extension of the Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ular Party, or the Catholic Union of the Peo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le
|
|
of Italy. Women now had the franchise in Italy, and with their aid </<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
23
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
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|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>the union might <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rovide a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olitical counter<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oise to Socialism, It
|
|
could do this only by making concessions to the reform-<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rogram, and
|
|
under a new <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest-leader, <ent type = 'person'>Luigi Sturzo</ent>, it became less and less
|
|
ecclesiastical and more exigent in its demands for the workers.
|
|
Then came the rise of Fascism and the s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>irited fight of the
|
|
Fascists against the Socialists and Communists. Large numbers of
|
|
the Catholic <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arty joined the Fascists -- one of them was in
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Mussolini</ent>'s first cabinet -- since they understood that the
|
|
Church's <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rimary object was the destruction of Socialism, and
|
|
hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut the <ent type = 'person'>Duce</ent> on the throne. The Vatican followed its
|
|
usual <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olicy of having re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resentatives in both cam<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>s as long as the
|
|
issue was doubtful.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> <ent type = 'person'>Seldes</ent> describes the situation in his work 'The Vatican,'
|
|
which is so lenient to Rome that I at first mistook its author for
|
|
a Catholic. In 1922 and 1923 the Catholic <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>easants of the Union
|
|
cracked Fascist skulls even more than the Socialists and Communists
|
|
did in the daily fights. The struggle continued as fiercely as ever
|
|
although <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Mussolini</ent> seized <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower in 1922. We are again reminded of
|
|
the real usur<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ation of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower by <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Mussolini</ent> and <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Hitler</ent> who never won
|
|
more than a minority of the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le in free elections. Fascism in
|
|
Italy was far outnumbered by the Catholic, Liberal, Socialist, and
|
|
Communist o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osition. And we are equally reminded of the evil
|
|
wrought by the Vatican, <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Mussolini</ent> sent envoys to it with a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>romise
|
|
to make concessions to the Church if the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> would condemn the
|
|
Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ular Party. Alternatively he threatened Church <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erty if the
|
|
<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> did not. So in June 1923 the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> acted. Sturzo resigned his
|
|
leadershi<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> of the Party on the ground that <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riests must not
|
|
interfere in <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olitics and retired to a monastery. The Party lost
|
|
ground, and at the final reconciliation of <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Mussolini</ent> with the
|
|
Church and his rich reward of it for its services it was entirely
|
|
sacrificed. The workers of Italy, who had fought for their rights
|
|
for 140 years and sacrificed hundreds of thousands of lives <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>assed,
|
|
with the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s solemn blessing, into the ignoble slavery of the
|
|
Cor<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>orative State.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> It will now be a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arent why, in s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ite of the tragic features
|
|
of the story, I s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eak of the Comedy of Christian Socialism. or
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>revent its growth by luring workers to stay at a half-way house in
|
|
that direction, and in most forms it was bitterly o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed to
|
|
Socialism. This is so far acknowledged that in most forms it
|
|
avoided the title Socialist and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>referred Social Union or Christian
|
|
Democracy; but if any reader is inclined to suggest on that account
|
|
that I have no right to include these Catholic and Protestant
|
|
movements under the title Christian Socialism let him consult, for
|
|
instance, so authoritative a work as The Encyclo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>edia of the Social
|
|
Sciences.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> In s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eaking of comedy, however, I am thinking of the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olicy of
|
|
the Vatican in its occasional use of the movement. <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent>
|
|
discovers in the twentieth year of his <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ontificate that Liberalism
|
|
has ruined the excellent status of the workers which his Church had
|
|
secured. That is comic enough, as I ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lained it is still more
|
|
ridiculous in the eye of any serious student of such matters
|
|
because he knows that as long as the mass of the workers were
|
|
uneducated it was mainly left to middle-class Liberals to win the
|
|
first installments of justice for them. Even Socialist writers </<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
24
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>often call the middle half of the 19th Century the Age of the
|
|
Benevolent Bourgeois. Irony a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art, not only were great Socialist
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ioneers like <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Marx</ent>, Engels, and Lasalle, middle-class men but there
|
|
is a very honorable list of Liberals in the fight -- the fight
|
|
against the Conservatives and the Churches -- to liberate the
|
|
workers from their medieval bondage. In England for instance, it
|
|
was middle-class Liberals like <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Owen</ent>, <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Place</ent>, Bentham, Brougham, etc.
|
|
-- who won education, shorter hours, and less ghastly working
|
|
conditions for them.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> It was the rise of Socialism and the threat to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rivate
|
|
enter<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rise which caused the Liberals to raise the cry (as
|
|
shibboleth) that we must have "evolution not revolution" and
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ose reform by installments. In other words, they invented the
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rogram of moderate industrial reforms -- a living wage, shorter
|
|
hours, factory and worksho<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> ins<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ection, weekly rest and occasional
|
|
holidays, etc. -- which the Christian Socialists took over. What is
|
|
more amusing is that it was just this <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rogram which the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> took
|
|
over from the Liberals, whom he heavily censured for their
|
|
wickedness to the workers, in 1891. The three <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oints of his Charter
|
|
were common<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>laces of Liberal literature by that time, and the
|
|
better Liberals had got beyond them and were demanding or favoring
|
|
schemes of insurance, <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ensions, and so on.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> But the ignorance of the literature of the subject dis<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>layed
|
|
in these Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al Encyclicals is well known to students of these
|
|
matters. What is of more interest here is that American Catholic
|
|
a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists are still substantially in the stage of <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent> and
|
|
still quote his encyclical as a grand revolutionary utterance. The
|
|
whole "social welfare" movement of the American Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al Church has
|
|
the same aim as <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> had, to distract men from Socialism or to kee<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>
|
|
u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> the working-class membershi<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> of the Church, and, though some of
|
|
its writers go farther than others, if there is anything like an
|
|
agreed body of teaching endorsed by the bisho<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>s it certainly does
|
|
not go beyond advanced Liberalism. It is now quite common for
|
|
writers who are Liberals even in the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olitical sense to say that
|
|
the age of Lassez-faire is over and the state must interfere in the
|
|
interest of the workers, but <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> and American Catholic writers on
|
|
social questions talk as if they had not noticed the develo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ments
|
|
of the last quarter of a century.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The broad <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lea of the a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists, when they are confronting
|
|
the workers and not <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>reaching to their richer congregations, is
|
|
that the Church in its wisdom has established the truth midway,
|
|
between Liberalism and Socialism. I need not s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eak here of
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>Coughlin</ent>, who does not re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resent the Church and will be disowned
|
|
whenever it becomes ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>edient. The general <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osition is that
|
|
Liberalism does not go far enough while Socialism goes too far. It
|
|
enhances the comic as<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ect of the situation if you examine the
|
|
grounds on which they o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ose Socialism. With a dry medieval
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>edantry that must equally amuse the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofessor of ethics and the
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofessor of economics they <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rove by elaborate arguments that the
|
|
right of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rivate ownershi<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> is asserted by "natural moral law," of
|
|
which God is the author, so Socialists who deny it are sinful or
|
|
immoral. It is like chewing sawdust and has as much relation to the
|
|
actual <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roblems of life as have arguments for a flat earth. You
|
|
would hardly ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ect verbal camouflage of this sort to hide even
|
|
from a so<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>homore the fact that Rome really hates Socialism because </<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
25
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>freethinking generally accom<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>anies it and because the use of the
|
|
Church's international machinery to check the growth of Socialism
|
|
kee<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>s it in alliance with the rich, the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rivileged and the
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>owerful. The Catholic <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osition never was between Liberalism and
|
|
Socialism, but Rome found it ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>edient to let bodies of Catholics
|
|
take u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osition between Liberalism and com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lete reaction.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The irony is now com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lete. The Church swings back to reaction
|
|
under the im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ression that it is going to recover world-<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower and
|
|
leaves the American a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists looking very foolish as they still
|
|
chant the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>raises of the Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al Charters of Labor. It was <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ossible
|
|
to conceal from the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublic the way in which <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent> em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>hatically
|
|
withdrew his Charter of the Rights of the Workers. This was done in
|
|
a letter to the bisho<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>s and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riests of Italy, and the foreign
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ress, which had been enthusiastic about <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent>'s "revolutionary"
|
|
utterance in 1891, would offend Catholics if it noticed the
|
|
retraction of 1902. The same attem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t was made to kee<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> the American
|
|
(and British) <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublic unaware of the really revolutionary encyclical
|
|
of 1931, in which Catholic workers are told that they must join
|
|
syndicates or cor<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>orations which are overshadowed by cor<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>orations
|
|
of the em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers and drastically subject to the state, which will
|
|
not <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ermit strikes. I have read French and German translations of
|
|
this encyclical but found none in English, though the very idea of
|
|
an encyclical is that it is addressed to all nations and must be
|
|
translated into all their languages.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The wheel has turned full circle. For fourteen centuries the
|
|
Church was on the side of the masters and had nothing to say about
|
|
the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>itiful condition of the workers. Owing to the victory of
|
|
reaction over the French Revolution this lasted until the middle of
|
|
the 19th Century. Some of the Churches then began to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ose half-
|
|
measures to conciliate the workers, but the Church of Rome was the
|
|
last to <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>atronize even these half measures. At the end of the last
|
|
century, however, the Vatican began to wonder whether the
|
|
emanci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ation of the workers was not, like democracy, likely to be
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ermanent and it began to trim in such countries as it thought this
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofitable. The monstrous <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rogress of reaction and decay of
|
|
idealism in the last ten years have given it courage and it boldly
|
|
enjoins the Catholic world to run u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>irate-flag of the Fascist
|
|
state. One Catholic country after another obeys, but in America the
|
|
slick a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists conceal the Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al orders and continue to drone
|
|
that the Roman Church is, and always was, the angel with a flaming
|
|
sword that kee<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>s the greedy and the ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loiter out of their medieval
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>aradise.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ter V</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> THE CHURCHES AND RACIAL INJUSTICE</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Some day the students of the sociology-class will <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>uzzle over
|
|
this controversy of our time as to who hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed or who did not hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>
|
|
workers. They will read that before the end of the 19th Century
|
|
manhood suffrage or com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lete democracy was established nearly
|
|
everywhere, and that the workers were something like four-fifths of
|
|
the adult voting males. Why need anybody hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> them? <ent type = 'person'>Yon</ent> know the
|
|
answer. Broadly, they hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed themselves. The great advance of
|
|
social and labor legislation, of munici<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al services, etc., from </<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
26
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>1890 onward was due to their <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ressure. What <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Leo</ent> XIII</ent> said had no
|
|
more influence on the develo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ment than Emerson's essays and less
|
|
than <ent type = 'person'>Maeterlinck</ent>'s essays. It was not until the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> returned to
|
|
reaction that they had a real influence on contem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>orary life.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The conce<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>tion of the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> as a beneficent and highly
|
|
effective moral <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotecting "be weak from injustice is on a
|
|
level with the medieval myth of the knight-errant. I have read
|
|
large numbers of medieval chronicles and never came across the
|
|
figure of a knight-errant, a knight who even occasionally set out
|
|
from the castle to rescue the distressed and smite the cartiff.
|
|
Naturally it would be a left-handed com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>liment to their religion if
|
|
we had to say that one in a hundred of them did this, but all real
|
|
authorities on the Middle Ages seem to have found, like myself,
|
|
that the figure is a sheer myth largely founded on the silly
|
|
S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>anish fiction, which <ent type = 'person'>Cervantes</ent> caricatures in <ent type = 'person'>Don Quixote</ent>. As
|
|
Prof. <ent type = 'person'>Medley</ent> says in Traills' Social England, if a knight met a
|
|
maid un<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotected on the road he ra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed her; and I differ from the
|
|
learned <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofessor only in this that according to all the leading
|
|
authorities on woman in the Middle Ages she is not likely to have
|
|
waited to be ra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed. In fact, if I were malicious I would <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ress
|
|
further the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>arallel of the knight errant and the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>. According
|
|
to all the historians of the time the knight s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ent his days roaming
|
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the land, not to give hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>, but to acquire wealth in such ways. ...
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But I will not be tem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ted to any unkind things of the Church to
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which I once belonged and, stodgy as the work may be, let us return
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to the statement of facts.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> And just to com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lete the record we may glance at other victims
|
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of medieval o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ression and ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loitation who, being minorities,
|
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really needed a cham<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ion after the workers had become strong. This
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should not a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ly to women seeing that they are half the adult-race,
|
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but it does; and they had the greater claim on the assistance of
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the Roman Church from the fact that they have been through all the
|
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modern age of increasing ske<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ticism more loyal and more generous to
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the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riests than the men. It would seem too big a subject to engage
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u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>on at the tall-end of a booklet but we, may sim<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lify it. A
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cha<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ter in my How Freethinkers made Notable Contributions to
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Civilization sketches the fight against injustice to woman, which
|
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mean's far more than the refusal of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olitical rights, and shows
|
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that in America the leaders -- F. D'Arusmont, L. Mott, the <ent type = 'person'>Grimkes</ent>,
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A. Kelly, L. Coleman, M.J. Gage, L.M. Child. E. Rose, H. Gardener,
|
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C.C. Stanton, and S.B. Anthony were for the most <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art Deists (in
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the early stage) or Atheists, and that in any case there was not a
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Catholic amongst them. Priests jeered at their crusade. It was the
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same in England and Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e generally. I enlisted in the fight,
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lecturing and writing for the women, about 1900, and in the whole
|
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20 years never heard of a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest or even a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rominent Catholic woman
|
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who hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed. Once, near the end I was invited to address in London
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the Irish (<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>resumably Catholic) Women's Suffrage Society. I got no
|
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audience and was told that anyway it would not have meant more than
|
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half a dozen Catholic girls. I trust I am not misinformed but I was
|
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told that the one nominally Catholic woman in the movement, Mrs.
|
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Des<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ard, had left the Church.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
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Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
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27
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.
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THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Let us try the Jews. I read lately that there is a sort of
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circus-grou<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> going about America consisting of a Catholic <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>riest,
|
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a Protestant minister, and a Jewish rabbi telling from a common
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>latform how Christian's and Jews love each other. Adversity has
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made stranger bedfellows than this holy trinity. It is just a sign
|
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of a wintry age, for Churches. Jews, like the workers, have had to
|
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fight themselves for emanci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ation from the Christian tyranny and
|
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ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loitation which lasted from the Dark Age to our own time, and
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which the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>'s allies are restoring. There is a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ersistent
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statement in Catholic literature that the knights-errant of the
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Vatican always <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotected the Jews. From whom? Certainly not from
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the Moslem, who were most friendly with them, and not, until this
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erversity of human nature which we call Nazism began from the
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modern ske<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>tical states in which some Jews have grown rich and
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<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>owerful. I looked u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> the learned Catholic Encyclo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>edia and In
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su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ort of this statement of the a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists it quoted five <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent>.
|
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Look u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> what the Jews have to say about those five "cham<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ions" of
|
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their race in <ent type = 'person'>Graetz</ent>'s standard 'History of the Jews.' He shows
|
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that four of the five made great financial <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofit out of the Jews
|
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and the fifth was harsh and cruel to them but <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rotested against the
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infamous <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ular massacres of them.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> I have a long essay on Anti-Semitism in Christian times in No.
|
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2 of 'The A<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eal to Reason Library.' To sum it in a few lines, the
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Jews were from the 5th to the 11th Century des<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ised and badly
|
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treated in Christian countries as the murderers of Christ, while in
|
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Arab S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain, Sicily, and Persia they had com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lete freedom, exce<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t
|
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when fanatics got <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower, and made equal contribution with the Arabs
|
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to the culture and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ros<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erity of the great civilization. From 1100
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to 1500 they suffered such savage treatment in Christian countries
|
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that the number of victims of massacres is estimated to exceed a
|
|
million. The great oracle of the Middle Ages, the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Thomas Aquinas</ent>
|
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who is now said to have been so modern in sentiment -- we will
|
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consider that in the next book -- instructed, a Christian <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rincess
|
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that they were the "slaves" of Christians and it was not unjust to
|
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seize their wealth. The Reformation brought some im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rovement, but
|
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it was the growing ske<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ticism of countries like England, Holland,
|
|
and France that ins<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ired a more humane attitude. In short the
|
|
Church of Rome had idly contem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lated a monstrous cruel racial
|
|
injustice for 1400 years and has never given a clear moral lead to
|
|
its followers, as is am<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ly <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roved by the birth of modern Anti-
|
|
Semitism in Catholic Austria and the recurrence of <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ogroms in other
|
|
Catholic countries. It has been said in reference, to the colla<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>se
|
|
of civilization in the Dark Age: "The <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> finished what the Huns
|
|
had begun." We may say of the sufferings of the Jews in the last
|
|
ten years: The Huns finished what the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> began.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Finally, there is the question of the colored folk in America.
|
|
We have here a <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roblem the solution of which requires a delicate
|
|
balance of social sagacity and moral sentiment. When, during the
|
|
fifty years that the Roman Church in America has claimed to be a
|
|
moral <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower that could contribute materially, in fact uniquely, to
|
|
the national guidance have its leaders made a clear and categorical
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ronouncement on the Negro question, on which whole libraries were
|
|
written? Dubois and, other s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>okesmen of the colored Americans have
|
|
declared that Catholics are amongst the most stubborn of their
|
|
o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>onents. We may surely at least say that Catholics as a body, </<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
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|
28
|
|
.
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THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>clerical and lay, have shown and show no su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erior moral and
|
|
humanitarian feeling to others. They have insisted on the removal
|
|
of the colored folk from contact with them, often even in church,
|
|
just like others.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roblem of the colored <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>o<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ulation in the United States is
|
|
notoriously the sequel to one of the most monstrous racial crimes
|
|
of modern times. In that crime England came to take as active a
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art as Catholic countries, but it is just to take into account the
|
|
fact that it was drawn in by the vast <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rofit which S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ain and
|
|
Portugal, the originators of the traffic in African flesh and
|
|
blood, derived from it. This brought the question of black slavery
|
|
well within the s<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>here of Rome's moral jurisdiction and ke<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t it
|
|
there even after Britain and America had emanci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ated the slaves.
|
|
Where will you find the luminous wisdom, the austere and
|
|
uncom<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>romising idealism, of the Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>acy on that subject? It emerges
|
|
clearly from all the controversy on the subject that the crime had
|
|
two ecclesiastical roots a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>art from the greed of S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>anish and
|
|
Portuguese traders. The clergy decided that since the conversion of
|
|
the Amer-indian's was checked by the im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osition of forced labor it
|
|
was ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>edient (for the good of the Church) to em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loy Africans, and
|
|
that the cruelty and misery which this involved for the Africans
|
|
was com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ensated by the fact that it brought them into the Church
|
|
outside of which -- as the Church then taught -- there was no
|
|
salvation.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> A <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oint which is never made in the endless controversy on this
|
|
subject -- at least I have never found it mentioned exce<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>t by the
|
|
Rev. Dr. <ent type = 'person'>Agate</ent> in the Encyclo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>edia of Religion and Ethics -- is
|
|
that slavery was the more easily im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>osed u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>on the Africans because
|
|
the Church had never condemned it. Most writers on the subject
|
|
imagine a long interval between what they call ancient slavery and,
|
|
the beginning of the African slave-trade; some, in fact many,
|
|
su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ose that, through the efforts of the Church of Rome, slavery
|
|
had died with the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>agan Romans. There was, on the contrary, as Dr.
|
|
<ent type = 'person'>Agate</ent> shows, a continuous traffic in slaves. It was one of the
|
|
chief industries, in the west of England (in Irish slaves) in the
|
|
10th Century, and it flourished in north Italy until the middle of
|
|
the 15th Century, when the Turks destroyed the commerce of the
|
|
Venetians and the Genoese. The heirs of these, the S<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>anish and
|
|
Portuguese, merely transferred the traffic to the Atlantic. No
|
|
Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al or theological <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ronouncement forbade them. <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Thomas Aquinas</ent>
|
|
had, like <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Augustine</ent>, <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ut the seal of Catholic scholarshi<ent type = 'person'>p</ent> u<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>on it.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> As to the abolition of the traffic we never find the Roman
|
|
Church mentioned amongst the claimants of merit. It was not even a
|
|
moral <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roblem in Catholic lands until the French revolutionaries,
|
|
whom the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent> anathematized, condemned it in their colonies. The
|
|
moral guide of the universe failed to see what a Protestant
|
|
a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologist has called "the blackest crime of modern times." It was
|
|
only in the light of a ske<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>tical age that the <ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'><ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Po<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e</ent>s</ent> realized that
|
|
the brotherhood of man im<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lied that all men, white, black, and
|
|
yellow, Are brothers and had a right to freedom and a decent life.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> We might extend this inquiry over other fields. When did Rome
|
|
condemn that cruel and stultifying em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyment of children which
|
|
continued through Catholic ages and survives in full horror in
|
|
Catholic countries? Why is there not a word of rebuke of it in the </<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
29
|
|
.
|
|
THE CHURCH THE ENEMY OF THE WORKERS</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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|
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>wonderful Charters of the Rights of Labor? The <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>eo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le of half of
|
|
Euro<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e are virtually enslaved to Germany today, the whi<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>s of the
|
|
Gesta<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>o re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lacing the whi<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>s of the ancient galley-slave overseers.
|
|
What has Rome said about it? Ja<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>an astonishes the world by the
|
|
savagery of its treatment of the hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>less, and the Vatican enters
|
|
into closer di<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lomatic relations with it. But we will be content to
|
|
have made one <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oint clear. The Vatican has never hel<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ed the workers
|
|
because its natural alliance is with the ex<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loiters of the workers.
|
|
Its a<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ologists <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lead that it must look always to "the good of the
|
|
Church." Yes, just as the managers of a cor<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>oration assign as the
|
|
first <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rinci<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>le of all em<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>loyers to work for the good of the firm
|
|
-- for its advancement in wealth and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ower. So it has always been;
|
|
and if the line of Pa<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>al <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>olicy has shown some strange deviations
|
|
and meanderings in the last 50 years the cause is quite clearly
|
|
seen in the develo<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ment of contem<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>orary life. For the moment it is
|
|
back on the straight line. The cor<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>orative state makes and works a
|
|
serf under the feudal tyranny of masters and <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>astors.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> **** ****</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> Re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>roducible Electronic Publishing can defeat censorshi<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
|
<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The Bank of Wisdom is a collection of the most thoughtful,
|
|
scholarly and factual books. These com<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>uter books are re<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>rints of
|
|
su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ressed books and will cover American and world history; the
|
|
Biogra<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>hies and writings of famous <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ersons, and es<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ecially of our
|
|
nations Founding Fathers. They will include <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>hiloso<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>hy and
|
|
religion. all these subjects, and more, will be made available to
|
|
the <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ublic in electronic form, easily co<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ied and distributed, so
|
|
that America can again become what its Founders intended --</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The Free Market-<ent ty<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>e = '<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>erson'>Place</ent> of Ideas.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> **** ****</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
|
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> The Bank of Wisdom is always looking for more of these old,
|
|
hidden, su<ent type = 'person'>p</ent><ent type = 'person'>p</ent>ressed and forgotten books that contain needed facts
|
|
and information for today. If you have such books <ent type = 'person'>p</ent>lease contact
|
|
us, we need to give them back to America.</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>>
|
|
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<<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>> **** ****
|
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|
Bank of Wisdom
|
|
Box 926, <ent type = 'person'>Louis</ent>ville, KY 40201
|
|
30
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</<ent type = 'person'>p</ent>></xml> |