| <headline><p> <What Has Labor to Say Of the Proposals for> 
| <Peace? The Time Has Come for it to Act.> </p></headline>
| <p> It is an amazing thing that full as the cables are of 
| what the great newspapers and the puppet politicians 
| have said regarding the peace overtures made by Germany, 
| there has not been a single word indicative of how the 
| proposals have been regarded by the Labor Parties of the 
| Entente. </p>
| <p> Why is it that the Perth dailies are full of what the 
| <title="PRE lsquo POST rsquo"> London "Times" </title> and 
| the <title="PRE lsquo POST rsquo"> New York 
| "World" </title> has to say, but is eloquently silent 
| respecting the opinions of great Labor leaders? </p>
| <p> There was a conference convened by Samuel Gompers 
| held in London only a few weeks ago. That conference was 
| to discuss the question of peace.  Busy as the world is 
| it was not busy enough to enable us to know what were 
| the decisions arrived at.</p>
| <p> The time has come for Labor <mdash>-</mdash> the party 
| of the workaday people as Wilson called them <mdash>-</mdash>
| to make manifest what it is it considers as the 
| proper attitude to take up towards the questions of 
| peace and war. </p>
| <p> Why do the diplomats bang the door on Labor when 
| peace is being discussed?  And why is it that the Press 
| of Capitalism has no space for the expression of Labor's 
| views when the belligerents are face to face with a 
| proposition to stop the war? </p>
| <p> These questions naturally arise in our minds as we 
| read the extended references made each day to the latest 
| German suggestion for a peace conference.  Ever since 
| the war started a great section of the peoples within 
| the warring countries have hoped for the day when a 
| conference would be possible.  Despite all that has 
| happened they persist in the declaration that no 
| proposal for a conference should be lightly put 
| aside. </p>
| <p> In many respects the decision to refuse to negotiate 
| is very little different to the 1914 ultimatums which 
| precipitated the ghastly struggle.  The men who 
| unnecessarily prolong the war must share the culpability 
| of they who started it.  If ever we are to see 
| civilisation as a world fact the suggestion of settling 
| international disputes by massed battles on a shifting 
| front must be disowned.  It is not, let it be said in 
| passing, put aside by a refusal to negotiate because the 
| time is not ripe.  For such a proceeding the right time 
| is always. </p>
| <p> What is to be accomplished by battering humanity to 
| death on the anvil of the "knock-out blow"?  The 
| obliteration of the causes of war is not ensured by the 
| triumph of armies on the fields of blood.  Nowhere in 
| the literature of Labor's decisions can that dictum be 
| found.  The rule of right is not established on the 
| earth because one man or one group of men can handle the 
| sword more successfully than can others. </p>
| <p> That is why the newspapers have not any reports in 
| this week's war news setting out what Labor in Europe 
| and America has said upon the issue of peace.  The 
| reason is that Labor would not say the things the 
| newspapers wanted said.  It would be silent before it 
| would spit upon any suggestion that might call off the 
| dogs of war. </p>
| <p> What was it the German Chancellor outlined?  He 
| merely said that the Central Powers were prepared to 
| negotiate peace on the basis of Woodrow Wilson's 
| fourteen points of January last. Will some of the 
| war-junkers please tell us what is wrong with these fourteen 
| points?  Do they not in their entirety point the way to 
| an international of peoples?  They do!  And what is more 
| they do it in the only way that any Governmental 
| declaration has yet pointed to.  A peace founded on 
| things other than these fourteen points is but a treaty 
| of rulers; it is not a charter of humanity. </p>
| <p> It is easy for the men of passion to shout down the 
| voice of reason.  But it is not so very easy to swallow 
| one by one the professions of intention which time and 
| time again the world has been given to understand are 
| the objectives fought for.  In this connection Wilson 
| either stands now for his programme or else he does 
| not. </p>
| <p> And the point to be well considered is that if rulers 
| can change their minds there is no obligation on the 
| part of peoples to do likewise.  It is, of course, very 
| true that all kinds of "atmosphere" will be created to 
| show that things are now different and that the changes 
| are not "vital" changes.  The argument will even be 
| advanced that the new proposals although quite different 
| to the old ones, are none the less in harmony with them.  
| For all this tergiversation we are well prepared. </p>
| <p> In fact so positive is the Labor Movement that peace 
| is a matter of social principles and not a mere 
| arrangement of frontiers with all kinds of conditions 
| respecting army establishments and indemnities, that it 
| refuses to follow the drum of those who beat the cancan 
| of conquest and victory.  For it the formulae of a 
| peoples' peace and self-determination of nations is 
| something more than a sophist's verbiage or a lawyer's 
| plea of alternative. </p>
| <p> The most superficial glance at the history of war 
| shows that any settlement of the present struggle on 
| lines analogous to those which ended previous conflicts 
| leaves the world incubated with the seed of new 
| disasters.  A new order cannot be built up on the old 
| foundations.  For those who have eyes to see the 
| requirements of the hour are no longer in doubt. </p>
| <p> They consist in the denial of all right of conquest 
| in this war.  There is requisite the restoration of 
| Belgium, France, Serbia, and Roumania.  Provision will 
| have to be made to give to the German people free access 
| to the world.  There must be no landlocking of millions 
| in the heart of Europe.  Recognition must be given the 
| claims of Alsace-Lorraine, the Trentino, the Slav 
| districts of Austria-Hungary, the Armenian 
| Provinces <mdash>-</mdash> and equally of Ireland, Poland, 
| Finland, and the Jews <mdash>-</mdash> not necessarily to 
| complete independence, but to some effective voice in 
| their national destiny. </p>
| <p> All of this has to do with essentials to what we 
| understand by self-determination.  But it is not all.  
| While the "bitter-enders" speak of victory and the 
| smashing of armies, Labor speaks of breaking down to the 
| utmost extent consistent with the economic security and 
| establishment of each country all artificial barriers.  
| It asks for the removal of the menace of aggression by 
| an international determination to preserve the world's 
| peace. </p>
| <p> This cannot be done without the co-operation of the 
| peoples of Europe, Germany and Austria included.  The 
| guiding conception of Labor's policy is therefore an 
| elimination of the underlying grievances which make for 
| war, and the building up of a new social order based 
| upon the conscious solidarity of the peoples. </p>
| <p> All of which means that in order to face the future 
| Labor does not hesitate to turn its back upon the past.  
| Denunciation because it fails to see in punishment the 
| gateway to a better day does not shift it from its 
| purpose.  Whoever counsels a rejection of peace 
| possibilities has to give us a better peace than that 
| negotiations now would realise.  It has to be shown that 
| because its cost in lives and treasure will be vastly 
| greater its worthwhileness will be in keeping with its 
| demands. </p>
| <p> No peoples' man can guarantee any such end.  The 
| longer the war lasts the worse becomes the social 
| condition, the more bitter the antagonisms which must be 
| bridged.  Another year of war will find the ruling casts 
| very much in the same relative positions they occupy 
| now.  The young men will march to the graves; the old 
| politicians will keep to their cabinets. </p>
| <p> It would appear the rulers cannot give to the world 
| what it most needs.  There is nothing left then but for 
| Labor to act despite the Governments. </p> 
| <trailer><p> <October 11, 1918> <The Westralian Worker> 
| <Friday, October 11, 1918> </p></trailer>