The Letters of Franklin K. Lane, Personal and PoliticalLane, Franklin K.
History
The Letters of Franklin K. Lane, Personal and Political
Lane, Franklin K.
United States -- Politics and government -- 1913-1921; World War, 1914-1918 -- United States
The call for socialism or communism is generally a call for more
of justice and of honesty and of fair dealing between men, rather
than a demand for any particular and organized method of carrying
on industrial life. If business is squarely conducted we won't try
experiments in mechanicalizing and sterilizing business. But a few
more years of profiteering, and Conservatives would have become
Reds.
Now we should be studying and planning for a safer industrial
life, one in which there will be fewer waves, a safer and more
even sea. That we can have, if we are willing to be less greedy
now, less venturesome and predatory.
The only people who have done much in the way of substantial
thinking as to cooperative action, collective action, are those
who think in terms of immediate and large fortunes for themselves,
through plans of capitalizing combined brains and money. Their
example is a good one to follow in lesser things, where the object
is not great wealth but a more even measure of good living.
Insurance is the right word for it, business life insurance
through honest cooperation. You mark my word, that is the next big
move in business affairs. Nationalization of things is not their
socialization. Not at all. It may mean their deserialization,
their withdrawal from the use of society altogether, or their more
imperfect use. Calling things by nice names, popular alluring
names, does not solve problems. Nevertheless such names evidence
our social dreams. We all feel that there must be more of justice
in the economic world. But we don't want it at the expense of
society, that is at our own expense, for that means Bolshevism and
Bolshevism is paralysis. ...
Oil is one of the fine forms of Power that we know, for many
purposes the handiest. Industrially it is as indispensable and
staple as the soil itself. To lose faith in the future of oil--
why, that's as unthinkable as to lose faith in your hands. Oil,
coal, electricity, what are these but multiplied and more
adaptable, super-serviceable hands? They may temporarily be
unemployed but the world can't go round without them.
A slack time is always one of fear, never of confidence. And no
policies should be adopted in such an atmosphere. For the man who
can afford to take the long view these are great days. He can take
up what others cannot carry. Better still he can prepare for the
demand of to-morrow, or the day after to-morrow--find more oil, if
you please, plan for its fuller use, as we are talking of oil, but
the principle applies to everything. Take the railroads. Their car
shortage is mounting and their out-of-order equipment is way up.
This has always been so in hard times. But this is the very time
when they should have plenty of money, to get road bed and
equipment in perfect shape for to-morrow's rush. No, the nation
would do no better if it had the roads. Congress doesn't think
ahead two years. It is a reflector, not a generator. The fault is
ours.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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