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applied more emphatically to the laborers, to the poor and hard pressed, than to the rich, and I think that men who employ labor have the welfare of their employees at heart as a rule, and 1 think that a man would feel disgraced and ashamed to go out among enlightened people if he were known to be a grinder of labor, a man living on the blood of women working in sweat shops. No man who attaches any importance to the good opinion of his fellow-men would like to be known to do that sort of thing, and I think that our laborers, that our American laborers, are very free from anarchist virus. I think they are only in a very minor way inoculated with socialism.

MUCH AGITATION AND UNREST DUE TO SOCIALISM.

I think much of the agitation and much of the unrest is due to socialistic ideas brought here from abroad, and this not being a natural soil for them they do not flourish here. But I believe that if the warfare between capital and labor is allowed to become more intense and these disputes to break out into strikes more and more and into lawlessness socialism will grow up and gain power and that public opinion will turn more and more away from the labor union.

During the anthracite coal strike, when the commission was in Scranton, Mr. Mitchell said emphatically, in reply to a question I asked him as to whether if public opinion turned from the labor union he thought they could thrive, that in his opinion they would disintegrate if public opinion resolutely turned against them.

PUBLIC OPINION.

It is not easy to concentrate public opinion. Public opinion exists in a sort of floating, gaseous, unformed state, as a rule, because men feel that upon many questions they have not sufficient data to come to a positive view. Public opinion on labor and capital would be concentrated, at least there would be a force brought to bear to concentrate it, by the action of such a tribunal of men, able men, not specialists, but men of cultivated minds, open, fair, flexible, reasonable, and who more and more would familiarize themselves with these conditions. It seems to me that their opinions would gain weight with the people. They would publish their opinions under the conditions contemplated in the bill, and it would be a school in political economy for the whole people, a most important school, I think, for our American civilization.

SEES NO REAL OBJECTION TO BILL.

I do not see that there can be any real objection to this bill. It is not compulsory arbitration. I suppose compulsory arbitration has very few advocates in this country. Whether compulsory arbitration would be contrary to the constitution or not I could not say, there may be a difference of opinion about that, but it is absurd on its face; you can not compel men to arbitrate. You may go through the forms of it, but you leave it just where it was before. The men will not go back to work, if they have been compelled to arbitrate and all the questions have been decided against them. A number of miners said to me in the anthracite region, " If they send the United

States Army here they could not make us go back to work; if they sent the German army here they could not make us go back to work." And that is very true. I do not think compulsory arbitration would suit so complex an industrial condition as we have. And it is on its face, as I have said, impractical and a contradiction in terms.

COMPULSORY INVESTIGATION.

But a compulsory investigation is a different thing. By it public opinion may be enlightened and the public is interested in these great enterprises, and in a minor way in every industrial enterprise. This seems to me the most desirable thing to be accomplished in the conditions of capital and labor to-day in our country, and I see nothing so likely to do this work as the passage of some such bill as this. Of course people may differ as to the minor points, and the wording may have to be changed here and there.

Mr. VREELAND. Do you think a permanent commission, Bishop, is better than one appointed for each case?

PERMANENT FAR BETTER THAN TEMPORARY COMMISSIONS.

Bishop SPALDING. Far better, Mr. Chairman. I think, in the first place, the permanent commission would have this advantage: It would be a body of trained men, men familiar with the conditions, whereas you take even educated and strong-minded men and if you have to appoint them specially for each case as it comes up they will have to take a long time in the work before they get an insight into what they are doing. I do not think it would be easy to find the right kind of men who would be willing to go on these commissions that would last for weeks or months, whereas if it is a permanent commission I believe the best kind of men could be procured.

Of course good salaries will have to be paid. So far as the salaries are concerned, I think we should not try to save money in that way for a moment. The saving in that direction would be so infinitesimal compared to the importance of having the best possible men that it should not be considered. I believe that men who do important work ought to be paid in a large way, certainly where the Government is concerned-not extravagantly, but what is considered decent and just.

MONEY CONSIDERATION OF COST NOT IMPORTANT.

Mr. VREELAND. You do not consider the money consideration important?

Bishop SPALDING. No.

Mr. VREELAND. There would be this about it. It would go back again to the question I raised a moment ago as to whether such a tribunal could formulate lines which will be accepted by the public as satisfactory, so that after they had made a decision in a few strikes they would continue to find employment and not have to go out of business. Of course, if their work was unsatisfactory, and they were no longer called in to settle strikes, the commission would be useless, whereas a new commission in each case would not be open to that objection. It would be more on the lines of voluntary arbitration. Bishop SPALDING. Mr. Chairman, suppose this commission were

called upon only once or twice, and then, after that, not at all. Would not the existence of that commission be justified from the fact that labor and capital had agreed to come to an understanding; would it not be justified from the fact that that had been the effect?

Mr. VREELAND. Unless the strikes and lockouts went on just the the same.

Bishop SPALDING. If they did go on just the same, one or the other party would appeal to the commission, I think, and then that party submitting its case, and the other party being invited to submit its case, if the other party refused to submit the public would get authentic information of exactly what occurred. The trouble is we do not know what is true or false. Who can say what has been going on in the Russian-Japanese war? We do not know. If you leave it to the newspapers you do not know. If we have one body of men appointed simply to give us the facts, then we say, "Here is what they have said. They are not going to lie. They are not partisans. This is the truth." We would have the facts about that case, and the same way about another case, and little by little the whole people will get an inside view into the conditions of industrialism in this country such as we have not now.

I did not know much about it until I was appointed on that commission. I had read political economy and a whole lot of things, but you can not get the exact facts without great trouble unless you have some source that will give them to you, and this tribunal would be that source, in my opinion, and that is the concern of the American people that they should know about these things, and these cases which lead to trouble, to strikes, and lockouts. If there is any considerable portion of the workmen in America, or even a few, living like animals, and forced to live that way on account of the wages they receive, I think the people ought to know it. Don't you think so?

Mr. VREELAND. It is very desirable to have accurate information always. Bishop, suppose you and Mr. Foster and Mr. Hughes were appointed an arbitration tribunal, and there were a factory here that had ordered a reduction of 10 per cent in wages of the men, and you were to determine whether it is proper or not, what information would you seek to get, what lines would you follow?

Bishop SPALDING. You say there is a reduction of 10 per cent ordered? Mr. VREELAND. Yes; and the men appeal to you as a tribunal. Bishop SPALDING. And the men will not accept it, but go out on strike?

Mr. VREELAND. Yes.

Bishop SPALDING. First I would get what information I could from the two parties.

Mr. VREELAND. Information about what?

Bishop SPALDING. I would ask these operators why they were compelled to reduce the wages 10 per cent. I would get all the information that they could give me or would give me. Then, from the employees, I would find out why they were not willing to accept a reduction of 10 per cent, their reasons for not being willing to accept a reduction, and you would get a considerable degree of information in that way, and then one thing would lead to another. It would be the same way with the employers. What they would say would lead us to a further investigation, and so, little by little, we would get at the bottom of it.

Mr. VREELAND. I am not clear just what the information would be that you are going to get. You say you would ask the men why they would not accept the reduction?

Bishop SPALDING. I would ask the operators why they felt they ought to reduce the wages 10 per cent.

Mr. VREELAND. What answer would justify them in saying that they had to reduce the wages 10 per cent?

Bishop SPALDING. They might say that their prices had changed, that the raw material cost more, and the prices they could get for the manufactured article were less, and there is the question of competition, and so forth.

Mr. HUGHES. That the men were becoming expert and were earning more than they were entitled to?

Bishop SPALDING. There are many reasons, of course.

Mr. CONNER. Suppose it should be disclosed that the factory would run at a loss if they continued to pay the same wages. Would that consideration appeal to you?

WILL NOT RUN AT A LOSS.

Bishop SPALDING. Yes. Of course, no man will long run his business at a loss. It would mean bankruptcy in the course of time.

Mr. VREELAND. Suppose your investigation discloses the fact that the plant is earning 6 per cent on its investment, and they claim that is not sufficient return. Would that be a matter of importance?

Bishop SPALDING. Not to me; the percentage of profit, even if they were making 60 per cent, would not be a matter of importance to me. Mr. VREELAND. If they were making nothing, would that be a matter of importance?

Bishop SPALDING. If they were losing, or-yes, if they were making nothing.

Mr. VREELAND. Suppose they were only making 3 per cent?

Bishop SPALDING. I think if they are making a very small profit that that would be a reason for reducing the wage, unless the wage were already at a point below which it would not be possible to go and enable the men to live in a human way.

Mr. HUGHES. You would believe in having the men bear a fair proportion of the loss so long as it did not reduce them below the American standard of living?

Bishop SPALDING. Yes, sir.

Mr. HUGHES. But, as you said before, you do not believe that any business should be carried on if it is necessary, in order to carry it on, that the employees should be paid so small a wage that it will not enable them to live according to the American standard of living?

Bishop SPALDING. That is my view in such cases where there is no hope of improvement in such conditions. I lived in New York for a few years, and I knew girls there who were really starving and who were working all the time, too. I think that sort of thing ought to be interfered with by the police or something done to stop it.

Mr. VREELAND. Then, you think the tribunal can not escape considering the question of profits that are made and determining whether one party in the division of profits is getting enough or not?

COMMISSION WOULD NOT DETERMINE BEYOND LIVING WAGE.

Bishop SPALDING. Unless we have what we call a living wage; the commission would not determine beyond that.

Mr. VREELAND. You think a man is entitled to a living wage if he can get it; but suppose the mill shuts down, what becomes of him then?

Bishop SPALDING. He must seek work somewhere else.

Mr. VREELAND. Yes; but then what becomes of that mill or factory? Mr. HUGHES. The capital seeks employment in more lucrative channels.

RIGHT TO CONDUCT BUSINESS.

Bishop SPALDING. The mill will not shut down unless it is not making money. That brings up another question to my mind. A great deal has been said-and something has been said in regard to it before this committee-that an owner, an employer, an operator, has a right to conduct his business as he pleases; that property is sacred, and it is not the Government's business, and it is nobody else's business, what a capitalist does in his business.

Now, I think that is a false view. I believe in the sacredness of property as much as anybody does, but I do not believe in the right of an unrestricted use of property. I think the use that men make of property is restricted and has to be restricted in many ways, and I think where you employ a large number of men in certain lines of work, when they have accustomed themselves to it, they do not know any other kind of work. It is especially so with the coal miner. When he has worked four or five or six or eight years in the coal mine he is unfit to do any other kind of work. He has acquired a kind of equity in that property and has become a part of the business, and I do not know that you have the right to turn those men out and bring in other men without saying a word about it.

That is the view that union men take of it, in my opinion, and that is the reason they resent lockouts and attempts to substitute other laborers for them. A man has given his life to that particular work by working in the mines six or eight years; that is, he is unfit for any other work. I do not know the exact number of years, but the evidence could be brought forth to show that a man that has worked many years in the mines is practically unfit for anything else. If you turn him out you condemn him to misery and condemn his family to crime and vice, probably. He feels he has an equity in the business, and that is what the miners maintained when they said, “We will picket, we will intimidate, without permitting violence, because we are protecting our lives, our means of living, the means of keeping our families from starvation, and if you put us out of this we can do nothing else."

OLD IDEA THAT MAN HAS RIGHT TO WORK.

The conditions have changed. The old idea was that a man has a right to work. He has a right to work, but has he the right to work if he uses it so as to throw other men out of work and prevent them from doing anything, if they have become inured to this and are incapable of doing anything else? That is a doubtful question in my mind.

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