the wheels have stopped and they have ceased to earn the wage and the product is not coming out of the mill, it would appear to be a great disaster; but if you say, like other evils, it works out for good, it is a far-fetched conclusion.

Mr. GOMPERS. For instance, the Department of Commerce and Labor within the past week or so published a bulletin in which it gave the exports of the United States to all countries for the past ten years included, and it shows there (I had the honor of presenting that statement to this committee in a hearing upon another bill) that the increase in the exports of the United States for the past ten years have been more than 150 per cent. So much for that. I think the most expensive strike we have had has been the strike in the anthracite coal region of 1902-3. Most all of the people of the country were more or less inconvenienced by that strike. The fact is that as a result of that strike the material condition of the men and women and children in the coal regions has improved more than words can convey in a few moments. The production of coal in the anthracite region has increased vastly, exceeding that of any previous production of coal in that region, and is still going on. The question is whether, after all, that great strike, seeking to avert it as we did, was not a great natural blessing.

Mr. FOSTER. It may be So, in some inscrutable way. But I would take no man's word for that prophecy.

I will say to you, Mr. Chairman, that you may have been expectant, your committee, and a little disappointed, to discover that there has been no partisan lobby come before you in behalf of this bill. I know many of the manufacturers of the country, and if I had thought that it was best to have their support to this bill I would have approached them to argue before you its advantages to them. I know some of the labor leaders of the country, and through them I certainly should have gotten an introduction to Mr. Gompers, and would have labored with him to try to get his support to the bill as the representative of that magnificent organization of which he is president; but I did not do it. The bill has been offered to you as an adjustment of words to define a meaning, to accomplish a purpose; and the bill, if it succeeds, will do so by its own inherent logic, by the logic of the bill, by the cures for these evils that appeared in the bill; not as the bill now stands, perhaps, but the bill as it will be when every earnest, patriotic soul takes hold of it here and helps to change the language where it is obscure, so it will accomplish the intended purpose of those who formulated it.

INHERENT PURPOSE TO STOP STRIKES AND LOCKOUTS.

Mr. FURUSETH. On that subject, what is the fundamental, inherent purpose if it is not to prevent and stop strikes?

Mr. GOMPERS. And lockouts?

Mr. FOSTER. And lockouts. Why do you leave that out?

Mr. FURUSETH. That was purely accidental.

lockouts.

Stop strikes and

Mr. FOSTER. Do you discover in this bill anywhere a bias toward

the manufacturer or toward the laborer; can you discover it? Mr. FURUSETH. I would rather answer that question later.

Mr. VREELAND. That is the purpose of the bill, I suppose, Mr. Foster-to prevent strikes and lockouts?

Mr. FOSTER. Yes, sir.

Mr. FURUSETH. That is the final purpose of the bill. Now, let me ask this question: Has any improvement in the condition of the working people come anywhere in the world except through a scarcity of labor, or a scarcity of labor artificially induced through a strike or the

fear of a strike?

Mr. FOSTER. I think that you are going into the academic side of this question, and I have two reasons for preferring not to do so. The one is the time it would take of the committee and the other is my ignorance on the subject. In regard to what labor has acquired and may acquire, it seems to me there never was better opportunity than now exists. I am very glad from the bottom of my heart that they have sponsors to speak for them now; that when they deal with a great proposition on great fundamental principles they have men like Mr. Gompers, that do not beg the question, but are willing to stand up and discuss with the representatives of employers any great vital question that can come before the peeple. That is a long way toward solution. But I believe that this is another step, just one step farther, to select from our fellow-men these representatives that speak with authority and with wisdom, with logic, in regard to these vital matters, and we need go no higher than to select from the best men of our country— as any President would do-these men who would stand in these places of duty and honestly endeavor to solve these controversies between man and man. I think our country is peculiar in this, that currents of thought are not hindered here by artificial barriers, and, for the most part, a first class, good man riding in a coach and a good, honest, conscientious coachman are thinking about the same way on nearly every subject. We have no lords, no earls, no dukes, no counts with garden walls or intellectual walls that run to the sky-walls they do not see, but which hinder the mixing of thought in those countries, and therefore genuine public sentiment will never be possible under such circumstances. But with us here, where unhindered thought flows where it will, and where we are, generally speaking, thinking in the same way on most public questions, we will come to the crystallization of what is right and what is wrong by the measure of public sentiment that, acting through a tribunal of this character, will be received almost as from Mount Sinai, and quite as well as from a supreme court where they give us, sometimes, decisions that are decided by four on one side and five or six on the other.

Mr. GOMPERS. We are in accord with you, not with your compli

ments

Mr. FOSTER. It was sincere.

Mr. GOMPERS. But apart from that, we are in entire accord as to your statement of reverse conditions that obtain in monarchial countries and our free countries. Well, if we have progressed so splendidly under our present methods, why take such a chance that may crystallize into a fact what so many feared upon the part of employers and upon the part of labor also; why depart from a road that has given us the wonderful conditions that you have so splendidly described just now? Where is the necessity for it?

Mr. FOSTER. As our civilization becomes more complex, as more things are happening as they are happening in greater rapidity, we shall need a better and more systematized method of dealing with

them.

We will have to have a lot of new ways of doing things when we get 300 people to the square mile, for instance, living here.

Mr. VREELAND. Let me suggest an answer to that, if it is an answer. This country has progressed splendidly and built up magnificently in spite of the fact that we have a fire loss of from $100,000,000 to $200,000,000 a year, a waste, a drain upon our resources of that amount. We have progressed as we have in spite of that. Is that any reason why we should not attempt to do away as far as possible with the fire waste, and eliminate it, so that we can progress faster?

Mr. GOMPERS. If I may be permitted, Mr. Chairman, I would say that the destruction by fire is entirely wasteful, and the effort to prevent that is not only proper but wise and practicable. The withholding of labor or the stoppage by the one or the other side for a period and to attain a specified purpose can hardly be likened to the wastefulness and destructiveness of fire.

Mr. VREELAND. But the loss of 1,000 men in a day's work for a month-if it can be prevented-does away with that which is an absolute waste.

Mr. GOMPERS. If employers conducted business every day in the year except Sundays and holidays, if workmen could toil every day in the year other than holidays and and Sundays, that argument might hold good. But, as a matter of fact, there is scarcely an industry in the whole country that is continued in operation all the working days in the year. And, as a matter of fact, the strikes or the lockouts are the determination that the cessation of industry shall occur at a time more convenient or more advantageous to either the one side or the other than it is to the other side. It is not a loss-an industrial, a social loss.

Mr. VREELAND. You think, then, the strike may be in the nature of a necessary holiday, which is beneficial to the men and the employers also, perhaps?

Mr. GOMPERS. I do not want to appear, and I do not think it is the chairman's intention to make me appear, as an advocate of strikes, except that I appear as an advocate of the right to strike. The theory of strikes, the philosophy of strikes, is a very deep question, and while I make no pretense of knowing the entire subject I have some notions upon the subject which, if it would be convenient or desired by the chairman or the committee, I should be glad to present at some time. But I want to say here, for fear of being misunderstood, that I make the claim that there is not a force, that there is not a factor, in the whole economic, social, or political life that makes so effectually for a diminution of the number of strikes or the intensity with which strikes are contested as the organizations of labor. But strikes are not fully understood. The purpose of strikes is not fully understood. The results of strikes are not fully understood. I have some notions upon that question, of the social advantages, which I should like to present some time, if convenient.

Mr. DAVENPORT. Would Mr. Gompers permit this inquiry? Whether be thinks it would be wise, it being the inherent right of men to strike, a number of men, whether it would be wise to direct the whole power of society in the way of compulsion to prevent them from striking if they thought it was to their interest to strike?

Mr. GOMPERS. I think that that should not be done.

Mr. DAVENPORT. And generally, recognizing the same right of the

employer, that if the judgment of the employer was that he ought not to run his business as the community demands, that the whole power of the community, the moral compulsion which is contemplated by this bill, ought not to be brought to bear upon him, but that the principles of liberty, which have been coupled with the enormous increase in production and the control over the powers of nature and the improvement in labor-saving machinery, which have contributed to the improvement of the world and the workingmen, should be allowed free play?

Mr. GOMPERS. Absolutely, modified by the power on the part of the workingmen organized on their side and modified by the power of employers associated for I believe that as a result will come agreement between the employers and the employed. Out of it will come the continued production of wealth to its fullest possible limits; out of it will come the best relations that are possible between the employer and the employee, of which all the people will reap the advantages, and not, as some scribblers have tried to make it appear, that the agreements between the employers and organizations of labor will contribute toward the mulcting of the public. I do not pretend to say that here and there that has not been the case; but the great outcome of it all has certainly resulted in a social advantage to the people and in an economical advantage.

Mr. FURUSETH. I would like to ask a question of Mr. Foster.

Mr. DAVENPORT. One word. Following out the illustration of the chairman that loss resulting from fire would be no reason for the elimination of fire from our world, so

Mr. VREELAND. You are not proposing to eliminate labor?

Mr. DAVENPORT. Not at all. So the elimination of liberty by any means, legal compulsion or moral compulsion, is a much greater evil than the consequent evils that flow from the exercise of the liberty. Mr. GOMPERS. Undoubtedly.

Mr. FURUSETH. I would like to ask Mr. Foster a question.

Mr. GOMPERS. Just a moment. The whole history of legislation in the past or the proclamations by Government in dealing with the matters of wages or the relations between employers and employees have been, too, an infringement on liberty, and the organizations of labor have made for a larger degree of liberty for the workingmen, expressed by numerous things that I might mention, but which it is not necessary to mention now.

Mr. DAVENPORT. About which we would perhaps disagree

Mr. GOMPERS. Well, I would find myself in rather strange company with Mr. Davenport agreeing to any proposition.

MR. GOMPERS SAYS WORKINGMEN ASK FULL OPPORTUNITY OF RIGHT TO STRIKE.

But the fact is that the workingmen ask to have the full opportunity of the right to strike. The employers will look out for their proclaiming their right to lock out. We believe, for labor, that any attempt to limit that right would make an evil.

Mr. VREELAND. Is there anything in this bill that limits or takes away from the men the right to strike?

Mr. GOMPERS. We believe it does; and what is worse still-
Mr. VREELAND. How so?

MR. GOMPERS SAYS THE BILL IS INITIATIVE TOWARD COMPULSORY ARBITRATION.

Mr. GOMPERS. And what is worse, we believe that this is simply the beginning of a proposition leading to what would be compulsory arbitration. It is the beginning; that is the point. It is the initiative

Mr. VREELAND. Do you find anything in this bill taking away the right to strike?

Mr. GOMPERS. I can not say that it does in direct terms; but this is not the first time I have had the pleasure of addressing myself to the features of this bill. About four months ago Mr. Foster appeared before a meeting of the National Civic Federation in New York, of which I am vice-president, and our late friend, Senator Hanna, was the president. And at that meeting Mr. Foster explained the features. of his bill and a number of questions were addressed to him, which he acknowledged were criticisms that were just, and he said that he would undertake to modify them. It was there

Mr. FOSTER. Excuse me, but are not they modified?

Mr. GOMPERS. Some of them, yes; some of them are not. The Hon. Charles Francis Adams, about a year or so ago, read a paper before one of the meetings of the National Civic Federation favoring a somewhat similar measure and it was expressed in the bill, I think, that has been introduced in one of the Houses of Congress and in a discussion of it with him I took the occasion to express the same fears that I expressed just now in regard to this bill, that it would be the stepping-stone to compulsory arbitration, and Mr. Adams said that if he thought that that would be the fact he would not urge its passage, and here we are, Mr. Chairman.

If this bill became a law, or if Mr. Adams's bill became a law, and after it had been in operation for a year or two, and finding that there were no practical results-practical from the view of those who hope to prevent the strike and lockout-as the result of such laws, it is only then another step in the direction of compulsory arbitration.

Mr. VREELAND. You say it is another step. What steps have been taken toward compulsory arbitration?

Mr. GOMPERS. There have been several efforts made by bills to sway Congress to adopt compulsory arbitration laws, and it is only through the growing interests of employers, as well as the initiative interests that organized labor has in it in exposing the fallacies of such a proposition, that both sides are agreed--without getting together for that purpose, but both sides are agreed that the compulsory features of any law would be most injurious to both employers and to workmen and to the public generally. It is the fear we have for the present as well as the future.

The CHAIRMAN. Have you made any endeavor in the way of finding any less wasteful method for settling strikes and lockouts and labor disputes?

Mr. GOMPERS. Yes; the organization of workmen, the association of employers; and, as a friend of mine described it, sitting around a round table and discussing with each other the interests of industry, the interests of employers, and the interests of employees, and the interests of the public. For instance, within the past few months there have been conferences held between representatives of the miners' organization on one side and the representatives of the operators in the bituminous