understood by the citizens. In Ireland, where we have
at present no thought of foreign policy, no question of army or
navy, departments of State should fall naturally into a few divisions
concerned with agriculture, education, local government, justice,
police, and taxation. The administration of some of these are matters
of national concern, and they should and must be under parliamentary
control, and that control should be jealously protected. Others are
sectional, and these should be controlled in respect of policy by
persons representative of these sections, and elected solely by them. I
think there should also be a department of Labor. I am not sure that the
main work of the Minister in charge ought not to be the organization of
labor in its proper unions or guilds. It is a work as important to the
State as the organization of agriculture, and indeed from a humanitarian
point of view more urgent. Nothing is more lamentable, nothing fills
the heart more with despair, than the multitude of isolated workers,
sweated, unable to fix a price for their work, ignorant of its true
economic value; connected with no union, unable to find any body to fall
back on for help or advice in trouble, neglected altogether by society,
which yet has to pay a heavy price in disease, charity, poor rates,
and in social disorder for its neglect. Was not the last Irish rising
largely composed of those who were economically neglected and oppressed?
Society bears a heavier burden for its indifference than it would bear
if it accepted responsibility for the organization of labor in its own
defense. The State in these islands recommends farmers to organize for
the protection of their interests and assists in the organization, and
leaves the organized farmers free to use their organizations as
they will. As good a case could be made for the State aiding in the
organization of labor for the protection of its own interests. A
ministry of labor should seek out all wage-earners; where there is no
trade union one should be organized, and, where one exists, all workers
should be pressed to join it. Such a ministry ought to be the city of
refuge for the proletarian, and the Minister be the Father of Labor,
fighting its battles for an entry into humanity and its rightful place
in civilization.

If we consider the problem of representation, it should not be
impossible to devise a system of which the foundation might be the
County Councils, where there wou