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FREEDOMWAYS
FIRST QUARTER 1968

them as cattle. We are working them as beasts of burden. We shall not drive war from this world until we treat them as free and equal citizens in a world democracy of all races and nations. Impossible? Democracy is a method of doing the impossible. It is the only method yet discovered of making the education and development of all mend a matter of all men’s desperate desire. It is putting firearms in the hands of a child with the object of compelling the child’s neighbors to teach him, not only the real and legitimate uses of a dangerous tool but the uses of himself in all things. Are there other and less costly ways of accomplishing this? There may be in some better world. But for a world just emerging from the rough chains of an almost universal poverty, and faced by the temptation of luxury and indulgence through the enslaving of defenseless men, there is but one adequate method of salvation-the giving of democratic weapons of self-defense to the defenseless.
Nor need we quibble over those ideas—wealth, education, and political power—soil which we have so forested with claim and counter-claim that we see nothing for the woods.
What the primitive peoples of Africa and the world need and must have if war is to be abolished is perfectly clear:—
First: land. Today Africa is being enslaved by the theft of her land and natural resources. A century ago black men owned all but a morsel of South Africa. The Dutch and England came, and today 1,250,000 white own 264,000,000 acres, leaving only 21,000,000 acres for 4,500,000 natives. Finally, to make assurance doubly sure, the Union of South Africa has refused natives even the right to buy land. This is a deliberate attempt to force the Negroes to work on farms and in mines and kitchens for low wages. All over Africa has gone this shameless monopolizing of land and natural resources to force poverty on the masses and reduce them to the “dumb-driven-cattle” stage of labor activity.
Secondly: we must train native races in modern civilization. This can be done. Modern methods of educating children, honestly and effectively applied, would make modern, civilized nations out of the vast majority of human being on earth today. This we have seldom tried. For the most past Europe is straining every nerve to make over yellow, brown, and black men into docile beasts of burden, and only an irrepressible few are allowed to escape and seek (usually abroad) the education of modern men.
Lastly, the principle of home rule must extend to groups, nations,