Evening Republican, Volume 22, Number 318, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 January 1920 — Broad General Principle of Equality of Opportunity and a Fair Start [ARTICLE]

Broad General Principle of Equality of Opportunity and a Fair Start

, McGill University, Montreal

By STEPHEN LEACOCK,

AU the world today is thinking of one ahd the same thing, the new social unrest. As the echoes of the war away,- the sound of a new conflict rises on the ear. The industrial world is filled with agitation. What does it all mean ? Is the light in the sky the dawn of a brighter ot is the glare that precedes the eruption of the volcano. The main aim of the writer is to estimate what is and what is not possible in social reform. The Utopia of the socialist he dismisses as a \ beautiful dream, impossible of realization in the world in which we live. But he repudiates as equally impossible for the future the worn-out doctrine of every man for himself. The syndicated and the bolshevik the writer designates as the man with the bomb, threatening the disruption of The point of view taken leads toward the conclusion that the safety of the future lies in a progressive movement of social control, alleviating at least the misery it cannot obliterate, and based upon the broad general „ principle of equality of opportunity and a fair start. The chief immediate opportunities for social betterment, as the waiter sees them, lie in the attempt to give every human being in childhood “adequate food, clothing, education, and opportunity. This will prove the beginning of many ijyngs. k ■ - , _ ■ -