The regular work of the League would largely consist in accepting invitations from factories, and in supplying and training experts for the purpose of conducting in a factory mutual advertising campaigns, or studies in attention between workmen and employers, adapted to different types of factories. The way out for democracy in dealing with predatory wealth which organizes to hold up the consumers, and with predatory labor which organizes to hold up the consumers, is for the consumers to organize. XVII THE NATIONAL LISTENING MACHINE People are so much more apt to bear in mind in proportion, the power of an organization to be ugly, than they are its power not to need to be ugly--to get what it wants with people by combining with them instead of fighting them, that perhaps it might be well to dwell a moment on the fact that the power of the consumers of the country as organized in the Air Line League, to make it uncomfortable for predatory labor or predatory capital, will never be abused. If what an organization is for, is to put the soul and body of a people together it is compelled as a matter of course, to get its own way with the same quietness, dignity and power it is telling other people to. The first business of the Air Line League is going to be, to be believed in by everybody. The way to be believed in by everybody is for the League to do itself the thing that it talks about doing. If in this way the League soon gets itself believed in by everybody, the first thing people will notice about the Air Line League will soon be that it is an organization that can lick anybody in sight with its little finger. The next thing people will notice is that it never gets so low that it has to do it. The power of labor unions and employers' associations has frequently been abused because they have many of them organized their power for the express purpose of abusing it. It is highly unlikely that people will need to be afraid of the power of the Air Line League. An organization which exists for the express purpose of driving out of business people who get what they want by holdups, the entire activities of which are devoted to proving to people how much more holding out a hand gets for people in business than sticking out a fist, soon gets its fist trusted. If the Air Line League abuses its power it will commit suicide so fast that people will feel suddenly safe. * * * * * If I were writing a platform for the Air Line League, it might be put perhaps for all practical purposes in one sentence. Subject--War. Object--Stopping it. Predicate--What we believe about war. Verb--What we propose to do about what we believe about war. Adverb--How we propose to do it. Period--Peace. The main trouble with the sentence forty nations are trying to stutter out now, is that there is no predicate, no verb, no spinal column of belief.