_Nonproducers_
After a very friendly parting with all our friends, we embarked on the
Martian airship and were on our way to earth. We at once made a visit
to our own plane which we found in perfect condition.
We were speedily getting nearer to earth and of course, during these
two days we continually had very important conferences with Sun-Rank
Banard.
He prepared a friendly message of greeting from the Martians, to be
delivered to our President.
Forty-eight hours after a last friendly parting with the Martians we
embarked in our own plane and were cut loose from their ship. A few of
our veterans were experienced air pilots, who operated it.
Since some of them had to return to their hospitals on the west coast
for medical attention, Sun-Rank Banard agreed to let our plane out over
the stratosphere so that we could land on the west coast of the United
States.
It took us a little time to land at Hamilton Air Field. In the meantime
the Congressman wired our President of our safe arrival, and requested
an appointment so as to report to him all what happened to us, as well
as to deliver to him the Martian message.
The President then called for a full secret cabinet meeting, and
invited certain congressional leaders, as well as a few of the most
prominent scientists. He wired us to report and also to bring along
with us all of those who came back from the Martian trip.
We landed on our own planet and after our veterans were given their
medical treatments at the hospital, we all again re-embarked on a
flight to Washington for the President's engagement.
* * * * *
Finally the great day arrived. Foreign diplomats, United Nations
delegates, Supreme Court judges, party leaders, many others and
senators, congressmen, labor union presidents, industrialists--all were
cooling their heels in the lobby of the President's office, impatiently
waiting to see him. The appointments with some had been delayed for
more than three hours, and with others postponed, an unheard-of
occurrence.
It was a most important conference the President was having with a
few scientists, congressmen, and those of us who had returned from
Mars. Even the Washington columnists couldn't fathom what was going
on. Except to those who were attending the meeting it has been kept a
complete secret.
Here is what was taking place. After the Congressman delivered to the
President the Martian message and gave him a general report, one of the
companions, who recently served in the American army in Korea, began
giving the President his own account of the adventures and experiences
on the planet Mars, picturing the life of the Martians. He made an
appeal to the President as follows:
"Starting in the seventeenth century, the ancestors of the great
many living here, for numerous reasons left their home countries to
establish themselves in new lands. Then they had good opportunities
to emigrate to a newly discovered continent. Now, our earth has been
entirely explored and there are no more new lands to emigrate to,
except to the planet Mars, from which we just returned. We asked the
Martians to grant us the privilege of permanently remaining on their
planet, but they refused; first, they want us to clean our own house,
and second, they are chary of introducing other new problems to their
population.
"We would like to have you, if our plan meets with your approval, to
ask congress to pass a law allocating to us four adjoining islands in
the temperate zone of the Pacific where we fought our battles, or in
some other territory, where we can colonize and experiment in living
under a different economic system, similar to the one on Mars.
"We are seeking a solution, a possible change of conditions, without
conflicts.
"At first, we would like to be helped by lend-lease from our government
through the veterans bureau as per the allotments of our bill of
rights. Then we would ask that the islands or territory be put under
the protection but not under the rule of our government. Our new
system of life may not prove to be 100% successful in a world where
existence is interdependent, but we believe that a start in this
direction should, within a reasonable length of time, show good
results. We may even have to operate for awhile by bartering our
products to obtain others from other parts of the earth. And of course
the intercommunication, and shipments from and to our islands, of post
offices, of telephone, telegraph, and even radio may have to be done
with foreign exchange, but it would be handled solely by our post
offices until gradually discontinued.
"These islands would be peopled by selected intelligent young families
of our four different races. Each race would live separately and
exclusively on its own island, but all would be federated under our
same constitution and laws. The pioneers would have to be in good
standing and of good mental and physical condition who are to start a
new way of life. We propose to carefully investigate and select each
applicant and try him out; if he proves to be willing, ambitious and
cooperative, he will become one of our citizens. If not, he will be
shipped back.
"These pioneers must include many of our disabled and crippled war
veterans of proven integrity, to occupy positions of government
administratives, and if capable, of faculty members in our new
universities and schools; so that the strong ones can work at
construction. No other people will be allowed to immigrate there, and
visitors will be limited to a certain number and for a definite length
of time.
"Upon landing on these islands, we would first need shelter for both
ourselves and the domestic animals. We intend also to bring with us
prefabricated metal houses which may be easily and quickly erected.
These homes will be used by our first contingent and their domestic
animals. After that we propose to build them ourselves of stone and
concrete.
"It will be our irrevocable aim and principle to have absolutely
fire-proof living quarters for man and beast.
"It is our intention to leave our families here until we have developed
suitable shelters and conveniences for them. We propose to land in
groups, to start reclamation, to clear the land, to dry up marshes, to
survey and divide the islands into farming homestead tracts. We shall
plan homes for a population of sixty thousand on each island within a
few years.
"For those who prefer to live in communities or small towns, we have
preliminary plans for a Model City to accommodate a population of
about thirty thousand, to be located if possible across a river not
wider than 150 feet. Each family will get free, one of our constructed
furnished, air-conditioned and fireproofed homes. The houses will be
built so that additional bedrooms may easily be attached and furnished
with the latest mechanical and electrical fixtures and appliances.
"The house will be on a seventy-five foot (front) by one hundred
fifty-foot-plot, the front facing a twenty-foot deep lawn alongside a
six-foot concrete walk. Beyond the walk will be a forty-foot landscaped
parkway between rows of nicely pruned trees, with flower beds and a
children's playground. Opposite will be another concrete walk, lawn and
house, so that the houses will be ninety-two feet apart, with lawns
and flower beds also on the side of buildings. Block lengths will be
fifteen hundred feet, with a width of four hundred and forty-two feet.
There will be twenty houses on each side of a parkway in a block.
"In the rear of these houses there will be enough space for a small
garden patch, a small helicopter, airplane landing area, a small
fireproofed chicken coop, and a garage for a jeep station wagon. These
spaces will face a fifty-foot back street fenced on both sides and
sunken ten feet below the surface. The sunken back streets will be used
only for mobile traffic, with underpasses and tunnels every two blocks
or three thousand feet apart for turning and reaching parallel streets.
"All sewer lines, gas lines, hot and cold water lines, telephone,
electric, and steam conduits will be located in these back or
alley streets, supplying utilities from the rear into the homes.
All automobile, bicycle, bus, truck, and horse traffic will not be
allowed on the surface. All pedestrians will be able to walk and cross
everywhere on the surface streets or parkways within the city limits,
with their eyes closed, in perfect safety.
"All deliveries will be made from the rear. Our motto will be utmost
safety. No one will obtain a driver's or a pilot's license before he
has been proven trustworthy; his training will be severe and his skill
thorough, before he is licensed. No leniency will be permitted in our
safety rulings. Speed travel will be strictly controlled.
"The city will be formed like a large square, with residential homes
on all four comers and sides. It will contain four zones, and each
zone will be divided into three districts. Each zone will have its own
hospital, churches, community houses, and schools. Within the exact
center along both sides of the river, we expect to locate our public
parks, artificial lakes and waterfalls; artistic bridges will span the
river at every street. There will be parks, where we will congregate
for rest and to hear our symphony orchestra, and facilities for all
city activities. All large buildings will have roof landing fields for
helicopters, with auto parking garages under their surface.
"Manufacturing, mechanical shops, plants for electrical and other
utilities, and all other craft shops will be located outside the city
limits.
"In our survey for a small city of thirty thousand, we find that for
the good care and health of our inhabitants we will make provisions
for at least one permanent hospital bed for fifty of our people, or
six hundred hospital beds for the city. At least six hundred medical
doctors, an equal number of nurses, one hundred fifty dentists, fifty
chiropodists, and fifty optometrists will be required in the city, and
additional ones will be needed by our rural population.
"In a western city of the same size, there are now only about
forty-seven physicians, twenty-two dentists, four chiropodists, ten
optometrists, and but two hospitals with a total of two hundred beds in
both of them.
"We do not approve of the wantonly extravagant and wasteful methods
now used by owners of industrial and commercial enterprises, their
innumerable competitive undertakings in the same lines.
"We propose to considerably save on them by concentrating our
industries and not multiplying them in competition with each other. We
believe in the economy of large size establishments, saving us valuable
time, and abundance of material, and considerable labor.
"We propose to have four large markets, each to be located in the
center nearest its zone, and every one of us in our district will be
allowed only two specified days per week to do our shopping.
"There are to be two very large department stores. Two large pharmacies
will take care of prescriptions, and medicines. Two bakeries, five
cleaning and dyeing establishments, five laundries, two lumber
yards--all large establishments--and only five accountants and five
attorneys will be allowed. Milk and dairy products will be delivered to
homes. Theatres will have sufficient seating capacity so that everyone
can see two shows per week. We shall receive all necessary supplies
free but we will be restricted through our ration books.
"In contrast, consider in the Western city above mentioned of thirty
thousand population. There are one hundred and forty-one attorneys,
twenty-four accountants, twenty cleaning and dyeing establishments,
fifteen laundries, ten lumber yards, nineteen druggists, seven
department stores, eight bakeries, nine men's clothing stores,
fifteen dress shops, twelve shoe shops, and twelve furniture stores.
We no doubt will save a great deal in labor, handling, delivery, and
materials by concentrating our stores to the minimum, at the same time
provide a better service.
"At first we will do away entirely with the non-productive professions,
and occupations as well as considerably reduce the semi-productive
ones. We will create and increase necessary and productive callings so
that every one, including idlers and aged (excepting the infirm) shall
always be employed. Let me explain what I mean by non-productive or
non-essential jobs.
"One of the fundamental causes of our troubles is that nearly
fifty percent of our young and vigorous active workers are doing
non-essential work; not only in unnecessary jobs but in the many
branches of necessary ones. We propose to do away with the unnecessary
jobs and concentrate on the needful ones, thus furthering our well
being and adding to the advantages of the requisite productive ones. I
will list herewith, in consecutive order, some of the non-productive,
non-essential, and dispensible jobs and service to which I have
reference.
"No. I--Non-productive services: We will have no use for a fire
department, fire escapes, fire alarm systems, fire insurance and fire
underwriters of all kinds; thus avoiding the services of firemen, labor
and materials of fire houses, fire trucks, and all supplies and labor
of fire insurance companies, while having complete safety in our waking
and sleeping hours.
"No. II--Since we are not going to own property directly or use money,
we will entirely dispense with innumerable non-productive services
connected with money. In these alone you can conjecture about how many
of those directly and indirectly employed can be shifted to productive
employments to great numbers of professions, crafts and trades running
into the hundreds.
"No. III--We are going to have one language on our islands. There is
a great waste of time, labor, energy, and materials in having so many
different languages on our earth.
"A universal language would doubtless save us more than the cost of all
our earth wars, and maybe it would help to keep them away.
"We will not need or use the economic waste to advertise or push any
product. All of us realize the enormous amount of time and energy
spent in advertising. It is not always the quality but most often the
publicity which sells a product. Much labor and materials are being
used and wasted in this boundless non-productive service.
"No. IV--We will have no gambling of any kind, or alcohol, dispensing
with gambling houses and devices, no breweries, distilleries, bars,
saloons, night clubs and their equipment and supplies. In fact, we
will do away with all unethical, unprincipled, and immoral business and
their workers.
"I can give you a list three times as large, but I do not wish to take
up your valuable time.
"Can you roughly estimate the great percentage of our inhabitants that
are employed in all the above dispensible and non-productive wasteful
services? It must certainly be very large. The amount of materials used
and wasted is enormous. If all of them could be shifted into productive
labor and services and these materials used for the benefit of mankind,
what a beautiful world we would have."
The president asked, "What will you do with the excess workers that you
expect to save from all these side-line and unproductive employments?"
"Why there are hundreds of professions, crafts, and trades that need
them. We need a great many more doctors, dentists, nurses, architects,
engineers of all kinds, draftsmen, teachers, chemists, and all kinds
of laboratory research men, many reclamation and highway workers,
and workers in crafts and trades. We need a great many farmers, farm
laborers, farming implement makers, construction workers, concrete and
cement workers for homes, buildings, bridges, machine tool workers,
tinsmiths, iron and steel workers, electricians, telephone mechanics,
steamfitters, plumbers, airplane and parachute makers and mechanics,
railroad and transportation workers, roofers, radio, refrigeration
and air conditioning mechanics, fireproofing and insulation workers,
shoemakers, tailors, dressmakers, milliners, hat makers, and hundreds
of other workers that we can keep busy provided that we always try to
construct, improve, and expand, to produce and build, and to better the
conditions, convenience, and comfort of us all."
"Do I understand that you will obtain all this without paying for it
and that all of you will live on the same standard, regardless of
the better workmanship and ability of others of you?" The President
questioned, "And how will you compensate those of you who excel
in their endeavors, and others of you who may invent an important
mechanical improvement, discover the cure for a disease, or contrive
some chemical development which will save labor and materials. In
other words, what incentive will any of you have to excel?"
"I was expecting that question. First, as I have mentioned before,
every one of us will get our house, our food, and all of life's
necessities absolutely free; second, we will copy the system of the
Martians. We will have ten lower degrees and ten higher ones. The
higher ones we will call rank degrees. There will be ten points between
one degree and another and we will be gradually and honorably promoted
or demoted by points the same as we were in the army. Those who have
made a discovery, an invention or a needful improvement and those who
have done meritorious service will receive for life a better, larger,
and more comfortable home in the suburbs outside the city, with certain
luxuries such as a better and larger plane and luxurious pleasure
automobiles. They will have the services of attendants in their homes;
first production and best quality of all our necessities, and many
other compensations and honors that our authorities will decree. On the
other hand, we will demote and punish any one who, through malicious
intent, will not obey our laws and regulations or will not comport
himself honorably according to our rules.
"We and many others of our returned soldiers and sailors who have just
served and fought in the bloodiest of world battles, and we, with
our buddies, who sacrificed themselves on the battlefields, were the
instruments in this most atrocious war. The victims of inhuman hellish,
cruel warfare, we experienced and endured the ordeals of the greatest
sufferings that human flesh and fortitude can stand in battles.
"We fought on the blood-soaked decks and gun-turreted floors of
battleships, in the fuselage, cockpit, bellies, and wings of flying
fortresses, inside hot, cramped, fire-and-cannon belching tanks, in the
putrified trenches and shell and fox holes of battle scarred beaches,
on the sides of most inaccessible steep mountain precipices, and on
deserts and in jungles where we lay day and night in putrid mud, water,
and scum. We faced blinding, blazing sun, terrific heat, torrential
rains, and body-freezing snow blizzards. We suffered from frost bites,
lack of sleep, hunger, and thirst, surrounded by dirt and bitten by
insects, vermin, and reptiles during the agonies of our painful wounds.
We constantly heard the anguishing, pleading and moaning of men
lying wounded on No Man's Land. Before our very eyes, our buddies and
brothers and best friends were shot and torn asunder. Others had their
eyes gouged out and hanging over their cheeks. Many of our paratroopers
were used as clay pigeons and by mistake shot down by our own soldiers.
At any moment we were expecting to meet their fate. Many of our buddies
were destroyed like a puff of smoke, whose only remains and memories
are the star medals worn by their mothers.
"We were like a pack of maddened wolves with the strength, daring, and
fearlessness of lunatics. With diabolical fury, we darted and bounded
wildly and fearlessly into No Man's Land in the face of the greatest
danger.
"Timid ones became heroes without knowing it. The weakest ones killed
with their bare hands. It was indescribable! All of us became filthy,
cruel, inhuman beasts, with fierce irrational emotions and the sole
urge to kill, kill, and kill our enemy. We fought to the death with no
quarter asked or given. Most of us were mumbling our prayers or the
names of our beloved. It is really a miracle that those of us who came
out alive from this vertex of blood and slaughter are again normal and
human.
"Closing his eyes, kneeling, passionately weeping, and vehemently
imploring, he exclaims--In my mind's eye I see passing in front of me,
the lost souls, images of dead soldiers, some of the countless billions
of them who died on the battlefields of our earth.
"Their spirits are joining and inspiring me in this solemn entreaty for
you to help us, so that their sacrifices shall not have been in vain.
Standing up, he continued:
"What of the great many of us who survived, but who are maimed,
crippled, invalidated, disfigured and shell shocked for life? The
terrible pictures of our battle sufferings recur to us very often
in our dreams. Through our torments, tortures, and ordeals, we have
learned in the hardest way the contributive whys and causes of wars and
inhumanity.
"Labor and capital struggles, strikes, unemployment, racial hatred,
and misery are becoming burdensome and unbearable to the majority of
us in this world. In our military life, in the army, in our company,
and on the battlefields, we lived unselfishly as brothers and buddies.
We loved each other, judged each other on our merits, and forgave each
other our frailties and weaknesses.
"Now that we have re-entered civilian life, it is irksome to us to
adjust ourselves and face an existence of selfishness, where the main
object in life is personal interest, regardless of those others. Nature
has endowed us with intelligence; on account of it we are humane,
helpful, unselfish, and self-sacrificing for the welfare of our kind.
Our ancestors have planted on us a money system, a most heartless,
dangerous, tempting, criminally corrupting, degrading, and depraving
medium without which we cannot obtain our necessities.
"In the last war we who endured agonies were used as tools for gaining
victory in war for a _part_ of humanity. _Now_, we are anxious to be
used as implements for gaining universal salvation for _all_ humanity.
By our test and peaceful experiment which we ask you to allow, we hope
to exemplify the new order which will achieve universal and lasting
peace by destroying the real causes and incentives for crime and for
all cruel wars with its wanton disregard of human life, and thereby
save humanity.
"On our planet, in three successive progressive changes, with each
consecutive variation, we increased and intensified our armed war
conflict cruelties against each other.
"First, the stone age, then the iron age and now we have with us,
appalling atomic, gas and bacterial warfare. Help us to once and
for all make an end to them. 'Tempora mutantur, et nos mutamur in
illis'--The times are changed, and we are changed with them. You as the
head of a leading world nation by such an act, example, and pattern to
humanity, you will the sooner bring about the brotherhood of all men,
and world security. A showdown is getting nearer, help us to forestall
it.
"Please! Please! Mr. President, grant us these four islands for world
experimental stations and laboratories, now so indispensable. Let them
and us be the testing grounds and mediums in a new and better plan
and ways of human conduct, relationship, intercourse, culture, and an
economic system for the unlimited benefit of all mankind."
The President said, "I would suggest that you have our Congressmen here
with the one that visited Mars who has observed their mode of life,
present a Bill to Congress so that it be passed. I will sign it, and
good luck to you!"
"We all hope that Congress will pass this Bill, and if our experiment
of improved new economic ideas prove satisfactory, adjoining islands
and peoples may join us, extending our influence. Then the United
States will gain world leadership, and other nations will imitate us.
Therefore you and Congress will gain eternal honor, and fame in history
and posterity, as the saviors of humanity, and the time may come, I
hope, when there will be a gradual peaceable absorption of all earth's
inhabitants to our way without undue pressure or strife that one world
government will come into being, and a new life and the emancipation of
all will bring happiness in '_Our Coming World_.'"
* * * * *
About two weeks after our return, a mysterious package attached to a
small parachute of a strange design and fabric was seen floating down
from the skies at La Guardia airfield. In it were found letters written
on strange paper, enclosed in unstamped matching envelopes. One of them
was addressed to me from Lieutenant Balmore; eleven other letters were
addressed to his and his crew members' parents.
There was also a portfolio crammed with money, jewelry, and papers.
Included were the last wills and testaments and transfer of properties
of the crew, appointing me as executor and providing directions for
turning over as soon as possible moneys and valuables and all their
earthly possessions to their respective families. In his letter
Lieutenant Balmore described his happy marriage with his beloved Xora,
as well as the marriages of his crew members with beautiful Martian
maidens of their choice, performed in one grand ceremony.
As another expression of his gratitude he writes: "Our opportune
acquaintance, with our trips to Mars, was a very auspicious event, not
only for us but with our efforts and your book a momentous opportunity
to promote the deliverance of my former fellow Earthmen. My crew
members join me in not only being very thankful, but also greatly
obligated for the sincere faith you had in me, and it is due to your
wholehearted support, that we are now the happiest men in the universe."
He enclosed a copy of announcements of large front page headlines which
were in all Martian newspapers as follows:
"A RED LETTER DAY ON MARS"
"Today took place the unprecedented, extraordinary occurrence marking
the beginning of a new and momentous era. Eleven Earth youths were
married to eleven of our maidens. These couples were joined in a grand
nuptial ceremony at one wedding attended by all the high dignitaries
of our planet."