large. But in connection with that we are met with the fact that an instrumentality which has hitherto produced inconvenience and discomfort only in localities-and which we recognize as a very useful factor in the development of what the working man desires and ought to have is to be employed now in the practical paralysis of all the operations of society. For, of course, if you tie up transportation for a week or two weeks it means that all production, or almost all production, practically comes to an end, and thus the employers and their employees and all society are involved in common chaos. Now, the question is as to whether a civilized society can simply remain inert and inactive when it is confronted by such a condition; and I have been in hopes that the men connected with the labor organizations and brotherhoods, who certainly have shown extraordinary capacity in leadership and in organization, would help us in some way to construct some plan by which these disputes can be settled as all other disputes between man and man and between man and the Government are settled--by some tribunal organized for the purpose. It may be that it is impossible for you to suggest any. I must say that my own mind is groping upon the subject, but I am going to try to do something as a single legislator in that direction, and I invite the helpful and cooperative aid of the labor organizations in that direction for the good of us all and not in any spirit of hostility to your organizations, whose beneficent results I fully recognize. Mr. GOMPERS. Senator, may I be permitted to make an observation? The CHAIRMAN. Yes. Mr. GOMPERS. If the railroad men undertook to perform any affirmative action that would mean an attack upon life, upon the person, upon property, they are subject to the laws of the country and of the States. If they undertake to do an act that would unlawfully prevent any other workman, a citizen of the country. from going to work, they are amenable to the law and can be made to answer for such action; but when the men working in the railroad service do nothing more than quit their trains and say they will not work under the old conditions, they are within their rights, constitutionally and inherently, and the Republic can not endure if that right is taken from them. You can not make free men of some and compel others to give service or be punished by fine or imprisonment or both. Look at the disposition of the railroad companies, assuming that the Adamson law is merely a declaration of Congress in the prinicple that eight hours should constitute a day's work. Take that law, passed by a practically unanimous vote of the Congress of the United States, recommended by the President, and then signed by the President-no consideration is given to it other than to fight it. before the courts. Suppose, now, these presidents and the other officials of the railroads should themselves go on a strike, or suppose they should resign their positions and leave all of these institutions. without directing boards, without a president, without a general manager, without superintendents, without foremen. and all that sort of thing. How are you going to reach them? Have they not the right to resign? And is not that a strike? The CHAIRMAN. I think if they should resign, and the operation of the trains in interstate commerce should, as a result of that, be paralyzed, the Government would find some way of having those trains operated. Mr. GOMPERS. I do not know of a way. Suppose the Members of Congress, the House and the Senate, should resign collectively Senator BRANDEGEE. Oh, they may die, but they will never resign. [Laughter.] Mr. GOMPERS. Suppose they should resign. They have a legal right to do so. Would they be indicted for conspiracy for resigning from the service of the Congress of the United States? Suppose the House of Representatives refuses to make appropriations until the will of the House is obeyed; and that, after all, is the inherent principle provided in our Constitution, and that is taken from the British law, that appropriations must originate in the House of Representatives. Suppose the House of Representatives should determine that a certain law should pass as a condition precedent to the making of any appropriations for the Government. Would they be held before the courts for conspiracy and subjected to a fine and imprisonment? The whole element of popular government has its essence right in the power of the appropriations made by the House of Representatives, and it is the old idea of compelling the king to yield. The CHAIRMAN. But do you doubt that if to-day we were confronted with a situation which would involve such a paralysis of the Government as you suggest, as legislators we would be now engaged in some effort to meet that contingency? Mr. GOMPERS. The contingency which I have mentioned? The CHAIRMAN. The contingency which you have referred to, which is really a serious danger, such as the prostration of commerce has been. Mr. GOMPERS. As a matter of fact, the King would yield. Senator CUMMINS. He is speaking of the House of Representatives, and you are speaking of the railroads. There is a little difference between them, I think. The CHAIRMAN. This question of the paralysis of transportation is a practical question that is facing us, and we know that it is there. The contingency that you refer to, regarding a strike of a legislature, or an absolute failure to perform its duties, is not an imminent danger. It is not suggested at all. Mr. GOMPERS. Some might think it was desirable, but I do not. [Laughter.] The CHAIRMAN. But suppose that that contingency should face us, and we should know that within a year there might be a possibility of such a thing as a practical paralysis of government by the strike of its legislators and its executive officials. Don't you suppose we would be very busy with legislation now, either in the organic law or in the statute law, to provide for that contingency? Mr. GOMPERS. You would have a nice time doing it without the House of Representatives. The CHAIRMAN. Ah, but I am speaking of a threatened strike. As yet we have not a paralysis of transportation. We are speaking only of a threatened paralysis, and I assume that you were speaking only of a threatened strike of legislators and executive officials. Mr. GOMPERS. I used that as an illustration of rights. The CHAIRMAN. Yes. Now, the question is, when we know that a danger of that kind is imminent in the future, either a paralysis of transportation or a paralysis of government, don't you think the latter would be the subject of very anxious consideration by legislators now in office? Mr. GOMPERS. I think so; but you would have the popular brand of the Government, in which appropriations must originate, against you, and you could not enact any legislation without that body. The CHAIRMAN. Not if the strike were on, of course. Mr. GOMPERS. No; or before. As a matter of fact, the Constitution provides that appropriations must originate in the House. However, that is probably a little wide of the mark. The CHAIRMAN. Is there anyone else who desires to be heard? Dr. CRAFTS. I should like to submit a few remarks in addition to what I said the other day. The CHAIRMAN. Very well, proceed. STATEMENT OF REV. WILBUR F. CRAFTS, SUPERINTENDENT INTERNATIONAL REFORM BUREAU, WASHINGTON, D. C.—Resumed. Dr. CRAFTS. Mr. Chairman, my name has been brought in a number of times. I would like just a minute to reply to what Mr. Gompers has said, and, I understand, several others. I think if my original remarks as taken by the stenographer are examined, you will find that the points have not been well taken. I did not say that Australia was a land without strikes. I specifically said that there were strikes. Nor did I say that even of New Zealand. They have had one or two. What I said was that the common method of settling these industrial difficulties in that social front of the world was by conciliation and by reference, voluntarily or otherwise, to the courts; that it is the custom there and that it works well. If there are exceptions, they are the exceptions that come to all rules. As to the figures that I gave that 5 per cent are involved in strikes and that 95 per cent of us are the sufferers, I think that statement has not been shaken. I said that in any particular strike, whether it were the city or the Nation, it would be found in almost all instances (it would be true in this case) that not more than 5 per cent of the population to be affected, whether national or local, would be involved directly in the strike, and that 95 per cent, which would include in such a case as this the families of the wokingmen themselves, must suffer the babies and the mothers-but in any case that I can think of, of a city strike or a national strike, even when the transportation of a city is involved, not more than 5 per cent are directly interested in the strike and 95 per cent must be the sufferers. And so when it comes to interstate transportation I made this very distinct point, that that is the circulation of the blood; that we can not consider that that is open to strikes any more than the United States mails which it involves, and that as we settle all other difficulties between men, not by quarrels in the streets, but by law, we are bound in this case to settle them by the orderly processes of law. The only controversy, it seems to me, is just this: That the question is whether a quarrel existing between two parties representing 5 per cent of the population shall incommode and endanger life and property for the 95 per cent, without even giving a reason for their quarrel, without even showing the man from Missouri why they are fighting. Five per cent engaged in the management and in the working of the railroads being involved, 95 per cent must suffer peril of life and property without even having a short period in which to look into the matter, and to be even rendered the reasons for the quarrel. It seems to me that the whole matter of the strike to-day is essentially a matter of resorting to violence instead of law; and, as I said at the time of the Carnegie strike, when the workingmen have a thousand times as many votes as the employers, the orderly processes of law, which are used more in some cther countries than here, of electing officials representing labor and resorting to the courts, is the plan that should be followed, and that particularly a strike involving the United States mails and the ailroads of the country is an unthinkable situation which the public will surely look to Congress to make impossible. (Dr. Crafts was thereupon excused.) STATEMENT OF MR. SAMUEL GOMPERS, PRESIDENT AMERICAN FEDERATION OF LABOR-Resumed. Mr. GOMPERS. Mr. Chairman, I am very glad that the Rev. Mr. Crafts has cleared up some things. I am perfectly willing that his statement now shall be compared with his statement before this committee last week, when he stigmatized these men who go out and strike—that is, refuse to work-virtually as hoodlums and murderers and mobs, etc. I wonder whether he did not leave the same impression upon the members of the committee that he left upon my mindthat Australasia was a country without strikes, and that wherever he came in contact with the United States he simply ran into strikes. I do not want to argue with him The CHAIRMAN. He certainly did not make the impression on my mind, Mr. Gompers, that he was characterizing the strikers as murderers and lawless men. On the contrary, I thought he was distinguishing between the strikers themselves and the disorderly elements of society that are often called into the strikes by the prevailing emotions and disorder. Mr. GOMPERS. He never mentioned the fact that much of this is provoked and paid for by the employers of the country The CHAIRMAN. Possibly. Mr. GOMPERS (continuing). And their gunmen and detectives and spies and traitors. There are men who will not differentiate between violence performed by men and the men stopping work, simply folding their arms-not with their hands uplifted, not with a mallet or a revolver in their hands, but a man or a number of men simply folding their arms and refusing to work until they get better conditions. Of course, ministers do not go on strikes, but they usually heed a call higher up. The CHAIRMAN. We will now hear from Mr. Perham. STATEMENT OF MR. H. B. PERHAM, PRESIDENT ORDER OF RAILWAY TELEGRAPHERS. Mr. PERHAM. It is assumed that any bills such as are now being considered by your honorable committee, if enacted into laws, will be construed as applicable to railroad telegraphers, train dispatchers, telephone operators, levermen, interlockers, train directors, block operators, and staffmen (hereinafter termed telegraphers) who are engaged in the operation of trains, or whose duties directly connect them with the movements of trains in interstate commerce. Such was the decision of many courts respecting the arbitration law commonly known as the Erdman Act, the Krowland Act, and is likely to be the case with the Adamson Act. Consequently it seems to be in order that the above enumerated class of railroad employees should be permitted to express their views respecting proposed legislation which may affect their welfare and hence the chief executive officer of their organization requested leave to file a statement, which was granted, and the same is herewith respectfully submitted. Telegraphers have for many years past endeavored to establish an eight-hour day by contract with the railroads. Their efforts along those lines were not successful. In the year 1907 Congress enacted a law providing: That no operator, train dispatcher, or other employee who by the use of the telegraph or telephone dispatches reports, transmits, receives, or delivers orders pertaining to or affecting train movements shall be required or permitted to be or remain on duty for a longer period than nine hours in any twenty-four hour period in all towers, offices, places, and stations continuously operated night and day, nor for a longer period than thirteen hours in all towers, offices, places, and stations operated only during the day time, except in case of emergency, when the employees named in this proviso may be permitted to be and remain on duty for four additional hours in a twenty-four hour period on not exceeding three days in any week. This law enhanced public safety and ameliorated telegraphers' conditions to a large extent because they were kept on duty from 12 to 18 hours per day quite generally prior to March, 1908, the date the law became effective. Interstate Commerce Commission reports for the year ending June 30, 1916, indicate that the railroads report 15,967 cases where telegraphers were on duty more than nine hours in continuously operated day and night offices. And 3,139 instances where telegraphers were on duty more than 13 hours in offices operated only during the day time. A new bill providing for 8 continuous hours on duty and 16 hours off duty in a 24-hour period for telegraphers was introduced in the House of Representatives by Mr. Cullop, of Indiana, last year, but it was so emasculated by committee amendments that it is likely to be left on the calendar. H. R. 19730, introduced in the House of Representatives on January 6, 1917, by Mr. Adamson, of Georgia, contains some important amendments to the existing hours-of-service law. It will be noted that efforts to establish the 8-hour day by contract between the railroads and their employees have been unsatisfactory and that legislative efforts have been only partially successful. The telegraphers desire to establish & continuous hours service in a 24-hour period as a standard work day. |