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| After making full allowance for the general madness
| that has got the world in its grip, caused by the war
| and in consequence of which all the politics of mankind
| are muddled, there are evidences in Australia of a slow
| return to-day of sober sanity. Throughout it all in
| fact, there has been a substratum of solid, sound sense
| very little heated and perturbed by the universal
| hysteria, otherwise it would have gone ill with us. But
| the fierce fires and fumes from the cauldron of
| Plutocracy were for a time almost as menacing as the
| foul gases of the hated Huns. The workers were compelled
| to breathe in an atmosphere so maddening that they
| rushed at each other's throats, and life long
| comradeship and brotherly love ended - for
| a time. It was the employers’ opportunity, an
| opportunity most readily seized. The toilers in strife!
| What better time to make permanent their divisions? If
| it could only be arranged that instead of the united
| workers presenting an unbreakable front to the bosses,
| they could be plunged into unrelenting war against each
| other, and kept in a state of bitter strife, then indeed
| could be secured peace and power and plenty for the
| Plutocratic pirates. They straightway hoisted the flag
| and had it carried among the workers. It blazed forth
| the word "Nationalist" - a word not
| wanting in sweet and noble associations. Around that
| flag they pitched their tents and blew their bugles till
| they almost burst. And a section of the workers deluded
| by the flag and deafened and driven half mad by the
| noise rushed for respite into the bosses' tents and
| placed themselves at the bosses' command. From that day
| on they became the sentries, spies and servants
| - nay the servile slaves consciously or
| unconsciously, honestly or dishonestly, of the camp of
| Federated Employers. How these employers smiled when
| they saw these deluded deserters from the labor fold
| enter into their charmed circle each one adorned with
| the bunkum button "Nationalism"! How did they still
| more rejoice when they saw how readily these new-comers
| lent themselves to do their will and bidding. The
| new-comers helped them to engineer lock-outs, to break union
| effort by scab intrusions, to foment division and strife
| when real National union was most necessary. The
| new-comers became the real fighting enemies of the genuine
| Laborites, and saved the bosses all the worries and
| evils of a direct conflict. They did by means of the
| new-comers what they never would have had the cheek and
| courage to do of themselves. The new recruits made a
| docile army of strike-breakers, and disseminators of
| discord. They became the cruel instruments to cover
| their comrades with clouds of contumely and contempt.
| They withdrew their bitterness and all their grievances
| against their old foes and turned their new-filled viols
| of wrath upon their oldtime friends. Naturally they
| received their reward. They obtained not only bread and
| butter in the very sight of their starving mates, but
| some of them were lifted high in political life and even
| made Ministers of the Crown. The Plutocratic Press
| poured its putrid praises upon them. Employers'
| associations huskily gulphed forth fusty panegyrics.
| The "National" camp was in triumph for they concluded
| that forever hence the Labor ranks had been split in
| twain. But the land settles even after an earthquake.
| And even though the earth may quake it still may remain,
| despite its scars, solid earth. And so despite this
| storm of "National" insanity that has swept over us
| Labor is still solid ~~ nay, indeed, more solid than
| before. It would be foolish to deny that it was stirred
| and wounded whilst the treachery and betrayal tore at
| its vitals, but it was the wounds it received that put
| it upon its mettle and made it enduring and strong. It
| knew henceforth where danger lurked; it knew the value
| of its own loyalty and strength. The crisis has passed.
| The deserters are recognised at their true value, and
| even those who welcomed them are beginning to weary of
| them. The Nationalist can now even spare Billy Hughes
| from the National Parliament. The Press has ceased its
| praises even of patriotic Pearce. And as for the people
| they are becoming sick and tired of all the Nationalist
| crew. That is because the crew never was "National" but
| used that flag and that cry as a means to an end, as the
| screen to their cunning and wicked machinations which
| aimed at crippling Labor and making the toilers their
| slaves. Moreover the ruse served another purpose. It
| diverted the public attention from their own
| profiteering exploits, from their unpatriotic use of
| war-conditions to feather their own nests. The public
| gaze has, however, penetrated the cloud of blinding dust
| and they are commencing rightly to sum up the impostors.
| They have judged and given their verdict in Queensland.
| They have declared that the so-called Nationalists are
| the very opposite of National, - that they
| are the provocateurs of division and strife. The people
| have unmistakably said in the State where Ryan is
| Premier that Labor is national - and that
| its flag alone symbols unity, patriotism, industrial
| peace and social and political progress. Not less
| convincing are the recent elections in South Australia.
| The people have sent the national betrayers to political
| oblivion. The so-called Labor "Nationalists" have gone
| to the wall. Even with a crowd of comparatively weak
| candidates - with no commanding leader
| among them - the Laborites have scored an
| immense moral victory. And signs of a coming victory
| are not wanting in our own State. How soon it may come
| it is impossible to say, but that it will come is as
| certain as that the sun shines after the storm. Local
| National-Labor Conferences may do a little lusty
| crowing; but in their hearts they know they have joined
| a losing cause that Time counts for their comrades in
| the Old Camp. The swirl of political insanity is
| lifting from their brains and they are just beginning to
| realise that they stand pinioned prisoners now in the
| compound of their enemies.
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