Volume 6, No. 2, June, 1918

The Internationalist Page thirteen
power, but their interests lay in the same direction, temporarily.
When the investigating committee brought in its report, it
performed some very clever strategy. Educated by experience,
it made the report free from any animus, because to betray
animus would prejudice the hearers against those making the
report. The report of the committee was clean enough. It
noted "some discrepancies in accounts, some apparent slight
irregularities which could probably be explained," etc. But
the committee was ambitious and bitter, and being ambitious
its collective and individual consciences were somewhat dulled.
It became unscrupulous in its methods. One of its members,
a gaunt, swarthy, sarcastic man, not long in the colony, named
Harquelin, got before the assembled colonists, drew a paper
from his pocket, and asked the privilege of making some remarks.
Herein lay the cunning of the committee. Knowing
the flare-back that would come of a report containing biased
statements or attacks on the administration, these ambitious
power-seekers took this method of making their drum-fire effective.
Now this man Harquelin was not fluent and he knew it.
But he thought to catch the popular ear. The fineness of
psychology escapes even the most acute of us now and then.
The grotesque Harquelin, speaking with a slightly foreign accent,
uncouth, unprepossessing, Tacking in eloquence, and already
suspected of not being altogether ingenuous, opened his
speech with "Fellow sufferers!"
There's something about the human mind that makes it
almost impossible for it to separate the deadly serious from the
ridiculous. An Englishman is likely to take a joke with complete
seriousness, while an American is quite as likely to get
himself badly damaged physically by guffawing at the most
serious place of an argument. Llano audiences were always
courteous, and they are always ready to listen to a speech.
They can take more punishment along that line than any
people in the world. So they listened to the harrowing tale
of Harquelin.
But it was next day that they began to express their real
feelings in the matter. Meeting in the road in front of the
hotel, two colonists greeted each other simultaneously as
"Fellow sufferers." All over the ranch men and women and
children were shouting "Fellow sufferer" as a matter of greeting.
It was the beginning of the end of the committee. When
ridicule begins to creep in, it is time for the committee to begin
folding its tents and silently slipping away.
But the best of us are blind to pyschology sometimes, and
forget the lessons we have learned. Orton and Hungtown
whipped Wonthide into line and renewed their attack. Listening
posts were established, and we were subjected to all sorts
of verbal barrage fire.
There were various complications which kept the committee
from ever finishing its work on time. For one thing, most of
the executives were kept so busy on business trips that they
could not all be gotten together to receive the attack. There
was one splendid example of this, and it came when the attacking
force was rapidly disintegrating.
A special meeting of the colonists was called to hear the
report all over again. The executives and others had been
given notice. The fact that one of them was two thousand
miles away at that time made little impression on the committee.
Bloated with a sense of their own importance, the
worthy individuals composing the committee expected all to
whom they issued notices to at once appear before them and
make such explanations as they might be able to give.
However, the executives had other business and could not
run across the continent to please the whim of a little, ambitious
mind. The meeting dragged. The colonists came out
of curiosity, sat about and talked, and waited.
Finally one of
the committee suggested that the meeting be called to order.
The crowd felt no responsibility in the matter whatsoever.
The committee had called the meeting. Therefore, let the
committee conduct it. So the colonists sat about and chatted
some more. Finally, one of the committeemen took the chair,
called the meeting to order and asked that the chairman and
secretary of the regular General Assembly take charge of the
meeting. But the secretary and chairman were quite loath to
do so and found adequate excuses why they should not. Then
another colonist was suggested. He refused. Man after man
and woman after woman was nominated and all refused to
serve. Some subtle psychology hinted to the audience that
the meeting was to be a farce. There was also the growing
feeling that the committee was more interested in its own
personal filibustering exploits than it was in the general good
of the colony. Later, after nearly an hour, the colony undertaker
consented to take the chair. More time was consumed
in selecting a secretary, and at last the doctor was the only
one who would accept this office. Then some wag went to
the kitchen and got a large soup bone and gravely presented
it to the chairman as the official gavel!
With an undertaker and a*,doctor to direct the meeting, it
could not be taken seriously. A few dispirited motions were
put and languidly voted upon without discussion. Then Orton
tried to make an appeal to stir interest. In a loud voice he
demanded that the absent executives appear, as this was the
appointed time. There was a death-like and soul-chilling
silence. Hungtown tried to arouse some interest, but was not
taken seriously. Finally Orton said that as the executives
were afraid to appear, and there seemed little that could be
done, that the report of the committee should be accepted.
Silence followed that, till some tired colonist, who remembered
that he had to work next day, moved an adjournment. The
motion was put and voted down, but the entire audience got
up and walked out. Technically, a large and disinterested
audience is still considering that report there in the hall.
At a later datt, the report was taken up in order and disposed
of to the entire satisfaction of all but four men—Orton,
Hungtown, Harquelin, and Wonthide.
There was an aftermath to it all, however. A disgruntled
trio went to Los Angeles, formed an association to bankrupt
and disrupt or control the colony, and at last reports were still
operating, with some fell design spurring them on. Revenge
seems to be the motive. Their influence has never been felt in
the colony, and they are probably having a splendid time
making reports, rearranging the colony to their own designs,
and generally re-making and re-working the entire co-operative
field. Wonthide wouldn't stay with the group, but the
three leaders in the plot for power have stayed together.
Two human frailties~that drive people out of the colony are
the lust for power and the greed for gold. We've had scores
of men come to
the colony for the express parpose of taking
almost immediate charge and operating it according to their
impulsive ideas. Then there have been a large number of
those who came for gain. Their idea of co-operation was to
secure substantial advantages for themselves. They were unwilling
to wait for results. Such persons eliminate themselves
in the course of time; the colony never has to take action
against them.
Plots for power have been more numerous than would be
believed by those who forget that a socialist is merely a human
animal who has gotten hold of a vision or a piece of a. vision.
This vision is, too often, merely a hankering to rule, a greed
to seize through collective effort, what he could not take for
himself by individual exploitation, and his selfishness is always
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