This column originally appeared in the Victoria Daily Times on Aug. 2, 1941.
That’s a roomy title for one small column. It surely makes a wide-open gate into the meadows of imagination, through which anyone can go in and out and find pasture. We all know the sort of world we would like to find. Hitler looks forward to the time when all patriots and liberty-loving people will either be dead or broken in heart and spirit; when only his own people have the good things of life, and all others are serfs to do the bidding of their overlords.
But that will not be the world of tomorrow. No one nation can darken the sun and blot out the moon and stars and turn the world into a wilderness. God looked at the world when He made it and He saw it was good. Then after trying to lead the unruly human tenants of this good world into the ways of wisdom, by prophets and signs, and wonders — even plagues and flood, He decided to send a Man, His own Son, to teach them, and if necessary die for them.
God, having made the world, loved the world and given His best to it, will not allow it to be destroyed. The teaching of Christ still lives and moves men to noble deeds; the leaven is working.
Every lover of mankind hates war. But let no one say it has not taught us something.
On June 12 of this year in St. James Place in London, representatives of the 14 allied countries vowed to fight on to victory and to work thereafter in unison with other free people for an enduring peace.
There they met in the historic palace of St. James, itself scarred by the fire of the enemy — representatives of the United Kingdom, with all its Dominions, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa and Canada; Free France, Greece, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Jugoslavia, Norway, Belgium.
I have before me a report of their messages — heartbroken stories of their countries’ wrongs and their declarations of faith. It is an impressive document whose towering sentences are not written in ink alone, but come like cries from outraged and bleeding hearts. And through all of it, there runs a high resolve to rid the world of the enemy and establish peace on a firm foundation.
Hitler, with his cruelty and hatreds, has bound the free people of the world into a fellowship which will redeem the world. Out of the welter of wickedness will come a new world of friendly people who are willing to help each other.
This gathering in St. James Palace in London on June 12, this new League of Nations, differed from the old League of Nations, first in size — 14 countries instead of 48; differed, to in the spirit of its speeches. The old League speeches were full of excuses and recriminations and evasions. This new League of Nations spoke frankly, as man to man, and in each message there was more than vengeance and retribution – there was a distinct consciousness of a better day ahead. The youth of Czechoslovakia spoke of “the complete re-education of European man.”
Now what is this new world which alone can restore the years that the canker worm has eaten? Have we suffered enough yet, to have all the meanness taken out of us.
Have we learned that no one can be safe until all are safe, or do we still think we can build a Maginot Line and hide behind it?
In the new world, which will come if we really want it, want it badly enough to sacrifice for it, we will have homes for everyone. That’s human need number one. That will take time, but it will come. Houses will be bought on a co-operative plan, as they are in Reserve Mines, Nova Scotia. I mention Reserve Mines because I saw the houses there, and heard the story at first hand from the people who built them. I saw six-room houses being paid for at $9.65 a month — as a result of intelligent co-operation.
There will be handicraft training and recreation centres, and public baths; swimming pools, playing fields, free for everyone as libraries are today.
In the new world our people will stop burning our forests in the careless way we have been doing and we will do more than we have ever done, without hope of reward or praise or notice, for in service will be our joy, and we will have a better time than ever before.
If we can get the thought firmly fixed in our minds that our peoples’ welfare, their self-respect, confidence in themselves, their hopes, their aspirations, are of more consequence than stocks and shares and coupons, we can make in Canada a society which would be a model for the world. We will learn that all work is dignified, and there is only one race — the human race. No man will be judged by the shape of his nose, the colour of his skin, or the place of his birth. We will think less of money and more of usefulness.
We have made a start this year. Look at your income tax forms and see how wealth is conscripted today in Canada, and nobody is saying much against it.
Hitler and his gang have been — unwittingly — great educators of public opinion. We know we have to pay for war supplies. “What does it matter if we are a bit shabby so long as we are free.”
Now if we really have learned the value of human liberty, we will be willing to let other people have it, too. We must not let this evil thing happen again, but if we go on living selfishly with breadlines and slums, overfed and underfed people, family rows and rackets, it will come again as surely as Tuesday comes after Monday. We had a chance to build a new world in 1918. And now we are going to have a second chance. Will we take it?
We have a simple pattern — anyone can understand it and it works wonders. We call it the Golden Rule. And we know that there is a Power, beside and around us ready to give us wisdom and strength.
Some of McClung’s columns from the 1930s and 1940s have been collected in a book, The Valiant Nellie McClung: Selected Writings by Canada’s Most Famous Suffragist, by Barbara Smith.
