TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE MINERS CONFERENCE.
WE wonder whether the miners realize how immensely they will gain in public sympathy if they allow the nation to hear and understand their position through having it openly stated—i.c., to hear it in a free Confer- ence between the miners, the mine-owners, and the Government. The short debate between Mr. Lloyd George and Mr. Smillie on Thursday, February 20th, cleared away many misunderstandings and presented the miners' case in a much more favourable shape than it was presented before ; and with so able an interpreter as Mr. Smillie that case could not but be furthered by still more light being thrown upon it. Mr. Smillie, if he will pardon us for what may look like, but is not intended for, flattery, appears to have an almost ideal manner in arguing heated points. He is very tenacious, but he is also very reason- able, and never theatrical, or sentimental, or hectoring, or over-zealous. Even when dealing with the perils to life and limb of the miner's calling—when treading ground where the temptation to exaggeration and to the overemphasizing of the pathetic appeal would have been easy and in a sense pardonable—he was never betrayed into a false step or an undignified word. His manner was in the widest sense well-bred, and that of one who understood perfectly how to do that very difficult thing, combine close and eager argument with gentlemanliness and good feeling towards your opposite. The miners' case is not going to lose anything by his advocacy. In spite of Mr. Lloyd George's skilful handling of the discussion, of his seriousness, of the entire absence of any irritability or high temper, and of his evident desire to reason fairly and not to use the language of cajolery or of menace, we cannot help envying the miners the exponent of their argument. His quick eye for a point, his reasonableness, and therefore his per- suasiveness, are great assets. But though Mr. Smillie's conduct of the discussion with the Primo Minister makes so profound, and in a sense so favourable, an impression upon us, and though it has improved the position, or at any rate has made the atmo- sphere in which the controversy has to be settled far less liable to explosion and far wholesomer, we must not be supposed to have been converted to the miners' side or to consider that the miners have freed themselves from the accusation of acting as monopolists and as men determined, like so many monopolists, to have their full pound of flesh and to " damn the consequences." The hesitation as to accepting the full inquiryinto the miners' demands by a Statutory Commission, and the insistence on better terms for ex-miner soldiers than those which are or can be given to the ordinary man, are blots upon the case of the miners which even Mr. Smillie cannot cover or explain. There remains only half concealed behind his skilful exposition the arrogant, self-regarding, monopolist, aristocratic tone on the part of a section of his followers which has given the miners that name for selfishness, and indifference to anything but personal considerations, that unques- tionably attaches to their calling in the minds not merely of " bloated capitalists " or of the " hard-hearted pro- fessionals and men of the middle class "—battening on inflated salaries of 1300 a year—but of the mass of the workers. These hold that though many miners answered their country's call as nobly and as quickly as any in the land and did splendid service on many a stricken field, the miners as a whole and as a trade and calling showed less patriotism in action than their fellow-citizens, and cannot altogether escape the accusation of having used the position of privilege which they enjoyed to further their personal interests. This was not a cnme, or if it was the miners were by no means the only criminals, but it does not con- fer a right to ask for special consideration. In fine, the miners, whether rightly or wrongly we shall not attempt to decide on the present occasion, suffer under the suspicion of " profiteering "—i.e., of making the nation's necessity their opportunity to further their own selfish interests. Though Mr. Smillie spoke strongly against " profiteering," he. did nothing to clear the miners from the indictment preferred against them on this. head. While dealing with Mr. Smillie's personality and powers of action in the present crisis them is a special point upon which we must say something, though it is a matter very difficult to deal with tactfully and with complete discretion. Many people indeed will no doubt think it is a case where silence would have been best. We are, however, on the whole so strongly in favour of openness and publicity that, in spite of " Ignotus's " virtual plea for "pussy-footing" which is to be found in another column, we shall run the risk of speaking out. Notwithstanding Mr. Smillie's reputa- tion as a man who has never professed to be a moderate or a devotee of compromise, but rather an advocate of " Thorough " and of a complete revolution in our indus- trial system, he gives us the impression of being in the position of the man who is being pushed on by the more extreme men behind him—the men who know much less of the true facts of the case than he does, who are far less able to judge than he is of the possibilities, and who yet have for the time got the ear of the majority of the miners, and so cannot be directly and openly defied by the nominal leader of the official organization. If we diagnose it rightly, the situation is one of the most delicate and difficult, we had almost said the most tragic, con- ceivable, and Mr. Smillie would deserve the open sympathy of all right-minded men—except for the fact that such open sympathy would be specially dreaded by him just now as most injurious to his influence with his followers. All we shall venture to do is to remind Mr. Smillie that, though he is right in handling the situation very carefully and in a way which will not lay him open to the charge of timidity—of being unable to seize a great opportunity and turn it to the profit of the miners, and generally of not being bold enough and enterprising enough—he must not in his desire to keep his hold upon the extremist leaders and their followers ruin the cause of the miners. He must not, like the father of Irish "Bulls," sacrifice the whole in order to preserve a part. A leader must be patient and watchful, and must recognize that there are very strict limits to his authority, and that he can easily " ruin all " by refusing to " represent " his followers as well as to lead them. But in spite of this, he must also never forget that you cannot do more than ruin a cause, and that it may be better to risk ruining it by refusing to lead in the wrong.direction than by heading the rush over the edge of the abyss. There is nothing more humiliating, more useless, more pathetic, than the sentiment of the melancholy man in the story discovered hanging about outside a home while the mob pillaged, burnt, killed, and destroyed. When a bystander recognized him and asked him what he was doing and why he was present at such an orgy of crime, he could only reply.: " I am their leader, and so I am obliged to follow them." There is no plucking victory out of defeat by such action as that. It is nothing but the most poignant and most pitiful example of a fact which, strange to say, the majority of mankind will not realize—that you cannot be worse than beaten, and that to lose the whole necessarily involves the loss of every part. After all, there is a reserve fund of reasonableness, common-sense, and above all a sense of duty and responsibility, somewhere in all men's minds, and if it is boldly and wisely appealed to the appeal will generally be successful. It is astonishing how true leadership will justify itself, and how even the most wayward, difficult, and grumbling of followers will respond to a clear lead. If we turn from Mr. Smillie and the difficulties of leader- ship to the miners' case as he represented it, the argument for inquiry becomes absolutely unanswerable. When all the " trimmings " are removed—we do not mean to speak cynically or slightingly of the miners, but it is better not be mealy-mouthed—it is evident that the essential points are a demand for a large increase of wages and at the same time a decrease in the working hours. Lord Cromer used to say that the first thing to be done when a scheme of reform good per se—and any proposal to give men more wages and more leisure must by that—was to ask two questions : (1) How much will IV cost ? (2) Where is the money to come from ? The miners answer the first by saying that with a properly organized industry the net cost need not be materially increased or the product decreased, for the two things are the same. Mr. Smillie holds no doubt that even if it would cost more to do what he demaxidB; it must be doni because of the
special perils of mining and the arduous nature of under- ground • work. [The extra peril we admit, but we shall be surprised if the vital statistics show the coal-miners to be engaged in an unhealthy or even a specially unhygienic trade.] Therefore the miner has a right to demand a privileged position. But as a matter of fact, says Mr.
Smillie; if you will only carbonize your coal at the pit's mouth, produce electric heat and energy in bulk, distribute by wire and cable, and sell the by-products which you now literally send up the chimney—which you squander in de- filing the pure air of heaven and in killing the sunshine—you will not find you have given the miner too much. Here we admit that Mr. Smillie " is talking "—and talking for immediate investigation. If the facts are as stated, Mr.
Smillie's contention is of great weight. We are inclined to think that they are as stated, and for the past six years and more we have urged that no bituminous coal should be allowed to be burnt before it had been treated and converted into what we termed a glorified coke by the re- moval of the valuable by-products. But, says Mr. Smillie, to get this done properly you must nationalize the industry. To that we reply : " But are you not begging the question ? You assume that the Government could run the coal- mining industry with success. We, alas I see no sort of prospect of success. If they cannot, as it has been proved they cannot, manage so simple a job as the telephones with success, what hope is there of their being able to work the mines even as well as they are worked now, and that in many cases is not a thing to be specially proud of ? " Here, then, are two distinct points at issue. (1) Are the possibilities of preventing waste and improving product by better organizing and a change of system as great as alleged? (2) Is the proposal to nationalize the mines the right way to work the new system, granted that the case for a new system is made out ? Surely the only reasonable answer here is : " Let us run and find out." We must look before we leap. We must inquire.
But Mr. Smillie, as we gather, goes further and says : "Even if our hopes as to greater product together with higher wages and shorter hours are proved groundless, we still demand higher wages and shorter hours. We meet your question : Where is the money to come from ? ' with perfect ease. Out of the huge profits of the mine- owners, whether in bloated dividends or in unnecessary royalties and way-leaves." But do these huge profits exist, save in quite exceptional cases ? Are they not like the huge and bloated wages alleged to be earned by miners —the cases of men making £400 a year and of families in which the joint income is at the rate of £1,200 ? Mr. Smillie says that these are mere freaks, and that we must look to the average remuneration. We agree. But how are we going to say whether the facts are as stated by Mr. Smillie, or by the mine-owners, or the Government, or the consumers, public and private, domestic and industrial, without inquiry? The fact is, whatever portion of this tremendous subject we explore we always in the end reach the same conclusion—the need, the urgent need, for inquiry. Unless we are willing as a nation to run the risk of acting like the Gadarene swine and running violently down a steep place and being choked in the sea, we must have investigation before we act, and understand what we are in for if we agree to the miners' demands and let the State take on the burden .of running the industry.
Remember, we have no desire whatever to smother the miners under a heap of Blue Books and White Papers, Reports and Notes of Evidence tendered. We have an open mind on the whole subject. For example, we have not forgotten the old maxim that the best manure for a field is often a hi:h rent. We can conceive that being
obliged to pay the ers more and ask less hours of them might force the owners to be more efficient organizers. We do not know that it will be so. We should like this and a dozen allied problems investigated. What we do know is that we cannot as a nation allow the miners to answer to the old plea " Strike but hear us "—" We will strike but we will not hear you." Rather struggle to the death than endure a tyranny such as that
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