Mr. MATTERN. That is a manufacturing proposition that I can not see how the raising of the duty would affect one way or the other. Mr. Pou. That has been the past experience of all the manufacturers in this country, has it not, that the higher you put the duty, the more protection you give them, the less price they can sell for? Mr. MATTERN. I can not see it that way. The selling price depends entirely on the cost of manufacture, regardless of what the tariff or duty may be.

Mr. BOUTELL. Who are your best customers?

Mr. MATTERN. We have sold large quantities of chains to the United States Government. We sell to the large ship-building interests-Cramps, Newport News, Fall River Ship Building Company, New York Ship Building Company, and others. We sell largely to large dredging concerns in New York, like the William H. Taylor Dredging Company, and some dredging concerns in Boston and Philadelphia.

Mr. BOUTELL. Those are large chains?

Mr. MATTERN. Yes, sir.

Mr. BOUTELL. Who are the purchasers of these small chains?

Mr. MATTERN. Oh, the machine shops and large concerns who use cranes. These small chains are used for crane work principally. The Bethlehem Steel Company buys some of that. The Pennsylvania Steel Company buys some.

Mr. DALZELL. Do you represent any person here to-day except your own corporation?

Mr. MATTERN. I represent only our own corporation, except that some of the chain manufacturers made an effort to get together and decide on a suitable proposition to bring before this committee, but they did not respond very freely on account of some of the manufacturers being in Memphis, Tenn., at some convention or other, and the few of us who did meet decided that myself and Mr. Woodhouse, who is also here, should appear before the committee.

H. F. MATTERN, LEBANON (PA.) CHAIN WORKS, FILES A SUPPLEMENTAL STATEMENT RELATIVE TO CHAINS.

COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS,

LEBANON, PA., January 2, 1909.

Washington, D. C.

GENTLEMEN: During the tariff hearing held Friday, November 27, the question was asked by one of your honorable committee, Mr. Underwood, that Mr. Mattern file the American cost prices on chains at factories, with freight rate to New York added, compared to the selling prices of English chains f. o. b. Liverpool, plus freight and proposed duty:

In response to this request, we beg leave to submit statement based on prices ruling in England, 1907, compared with the approximate cost in the United States factories for the same period. In both of these instances the prices are figured on the basis of New York delivery.

Comparing notes with other manufacturers, there was necessarily a great variety in the cost of delivery of an article at one given point, but we have endeavored to arrive at what we consider a just and fair average cost, as per schedule hereto attached and marked "Exhibit A."

In arriving at the English selling prices we are not convinced that we have secured the lowest prices that were then being quoted, but have simply submitted prices as named by several leading English manufacturers.

LARGE-SIZE CHAINS.

The chain manufacturers with whom we have conferred, and who represent practically every chain manufacturer in the United States, were hopeful that they could recommend a greater reduction of duty on large-size chains than our schedule represents, but were confronted by the extremely higher labor cost of productive and nonproductive work in this country, to wit:

The wages paid chain makers greatly exceed the wages paid abroad, as shown by the respective tables hereto affixed and marked "Exhibit B."

The nonproductive labor in this country receives from $1.50 to $1.75 per day, whereas the same labor in England consider themselves well paid at $4.50 per week (18 shillings). Would add that nonproductive labor on large-size chains is a very important item in figuring costs, and is work which can not be done by the installation of machinery.

SMALL CHAINS.

On smaller chains, under thirteen-sixteenths of an inch, where an advance is asked, American manufacturers have to compete against chains made by "outworkers" in foreign countries, to whom chain manufacturers abroad supply the material and allow 7 per cent waste. The outworker furnishes his own building or shop, frequently located in the rear of his own home, where male and female labor of 14 years of age and upward are employed. He, the outworker, is therefore a subcontractor, and furnishes, besides his shop, his blast (which is a hand bellows), fuel, and all appliances or tools for the making of chains. Consequently, the manufacturer or factor has merely his labor in receiving and shipping the finished product per 100 pounds, plus his material, to figure his costs.

This permits of chains being sold abroad at prices which can not be met by American manufacturers, whose employees consist of men and boys over 16 years of age, under one roof, supplied with all appliances for chain manufacture, and paid the wage scale hereto attached and marked "Exhibit B," covering only actual prices for welding.

In this connection we respectfully ask a careful study of the wage scales paid our chain makers and the prices paid the outworkers, keeping in view the conditions governing the outworkers.

Referring to the wage scale for handmade chains. Every shop in the United States is a union shop, and which scale manufacturers are compelled to pay, notwithstanding the existing depression, the same scale of wages which were adopted in March of 1907, being 10 per cent advance over the previous scale, while in England the

official scale during the year 1907 was the 6-shilling list for outworkers.

We are credibly informed that during the year 1907, notwithstanding the fact that the 6-shilling list was the published list of union wages paid outworkers in England, wages were actually being paid on the basis of the 3-shilling list to outworkers during this time. This disparity between the published union list of wages and the 3-shilling list actually paid is brought about by the fact that while the total number of chain makers in the black district in England is about 5,000, only about one-fifth of the chain makers were members of the union, thus leaving four-fifths of the chain makers free to accept any price that the chain manufacturer chose to pay, which was an average of 25 to 50 per cent less than the union wages. All of the above facts as to membership of the union, and the number of chain makers employed in the black district in England, were taken from the annual report made by the national secretary, Mr. Sitch, and as published in the Brierley Hill Advertiser (England) in the latter end of November, 1908.

To establish the foregoing statement we submit herewith clipping from the Iron Age, of New York, as published in the issue of February 7, 1907, on the subject of women chain makers in England. In regard to these outworkers, we would respectfully call your attention to the fact that their overhead charges and general expenses can not, in our opinion, exceed 25 per cent of the welding prices, whereas by our factory system all nonproductive labor is paid by the manufacturer in the United States, and represents in the best regulated factories at least 80 per cent of the welding cost, and on the lighter sizes the percentage of the welding cost is from 100 to 125 per cent. By the lighter sizes we refer to the sizes less than onefourth inch.

WOMEN CHAIN MAKERS OF ENGLAND.

[Iron Age, February 7, 1907.]

J. Sitch, secretary of the Chain Makers and Chain Strikers' Association in Great Britain, has commented quite severely on the condition of the women workers in the chain-making trade of the black country, the district surrounding Birmingham, England. After a period in which conditions among these workers changed for the better, they are now said to be as bad as at any time. The average wage for a week's work, with long hours, six days in the week, is between 4 and 5 shillings-from $1 to $1.25.

Secretary Sitch, referring to the evils of sweating and of competition for the chance to work, severely reflects on workmen as well as employers. Not a few of the women have husbands who earn good wages. "I was pained to find,” he says, "among this class wives of members of the Chain Makers and Chain Strikers' Association who, I know for a fact, earn more in three hours than their wives earn in a week. Some of these men brag about being good trade unionists when they are in a public house, but they are quite content to allow their wives to toil and slave in a chain shop for a mere pittance. Such men are not worthy to be members of a trade union."

In order that your committee may have a clearer view of the chain industry, it may be proper to state that the cost given in "Exhibit A" on stud link BBB, or dredge chain, are all based on handmade chain, in the manufacture of which no machinery can be used, but, rather, all skilled labor.

MACHINE-MADE CHAINS.

Chain made in England to compete with the chain made in the United States known as "machine-made chain" is a very low-grade quality and is known abroad as "hammered chain," in which they use the cheapest grade of iron that can be manufactured, and particularly the smaller sizes of three-sixteenth inch to three-eighth inch, inclusive, which are made by boys and girls and women, who can not earn, under the arbitrary scale of wages paid, more than 6 shillings per week (approximately $1.50), after having paid all of their running expenses, as before referred to.

It is a well-known fact that Parliament recognized that it was a national disgrace to have women working at the forge making chain, and some years ago the British Parliament appointed a committee to investigate employment of women to manufacture chain, with the end in view of passing a law forbidding girls and women working at the forge making chain. This brought about great distress and nearly an uprising in the black district, where the women maintained that they had the right to earn their own living, that they had no other trades, that they and their mothers and grandmothers for generations back have worked at this trade, and they insisted upon the right to labor at their chosen avocation.

Physicians employed by the committee from Parliament reported that no physical injury followed the making of small chains by women and girls, and the committee therefore had no grounds on which to report back to Parliament that a law should be enacted preventing the employment of females in this branch of industry. Comparing the American wages on this class of work, your honorable. committee will readily see that the American manufacturer of these small chains is seriously handicapped by the difference in wages paid abroad and here, as chain makers of this class of chain in this country earn from $1.50 to $2.50 per day, according to size of chain. This fact is proven by the selling price of the foreign manufacture, as recently quoted f. o. b. Liverpool.

In comparison therewith we attach the present average cost prices, Exhibit "A," for this grade of chain. The present production of chain in the United States during 1908 is less than 60 per cent of that of 1907. The industry is sadly depressed, and if undue reduction. is made in tariff, so as to allow the free importation of English chain, there are but two courses left to the chain manufacturer in this country, and they are to reduce the price of labor or discontinue the business. The effect of a radical reduction in the tariff would be, in our

opinion, first, a reduction in the price paid to laborers; second, a reduction of the number of employees, which would mean that the skilled chain maker, having no work at his trade in which he has spent his life, would be driven down to work as a day laborer and at a day laborer's wages.

CHAINS, IRON OR STEEL.

The following tables are made up by comparing the average of actual English or foreign selling prices f. o. b. Liverpool, as compared with the actual average cost to American manufacturers delivered at New York City in both instances. American costs given do not, however, include any profit whatever. American costs compared with foreign selling prices are in each case figured on the same sizes in each group, and are, as the Ways and Means Committee requested, selling prices ruling on English chain during 1907, and the American costs are the costs for 1907.