vors to laboring people. Many protests against this feature of the bills have been filed with Members of Congress, and some time ago Senator Pettus, of Alabama, introduced an amendment to the bill which provides that the Labor Department shall not be transferred to this new department. On January 7th, the bil was up in the Senate for consideration, and Mr. Nelson, of Minnesota, presented a protest from the Knights of Labor against including the Labor Department in the bill, and the following discussion took place, which makes it evident that our legislative representative at Washington, Bro. H. R. Fuller, has by his proper manners earned an influential standing among the Members of Congress:

Mr. NELSON. The pending question is on the amendment of the Senator from Alabama (Mr. PETTUS) to strike out the Department of Labor from the

bill.

The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. PLATT of Connecticut in the chair). The amendment will be stated.

The SECRETARY. In section 4, page 3, lines 18 and 19, strike out the words "the Department of Labor."

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is the Senate ready for the question?

Mr. JONES of Arkansas. Mr. President, I have listened to some of the arguments which have just been presented to the Senate to show why the Labor Bureau should be put in this proposed new department, but none of them satisfy my mind. I have in my hands a protest coming from large labor organizations against this action, and I will read it to the Senate. It is addressed to the Senate. It was handed to me, and perhaps should have been submitted at the time petitions and memorials were presented, but it may as well be done now.

WASHINGTON, D. C., January 22, 1902. To the honorable the Senate of the United States:

As the representative of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen, the Order of Railway Conductors, the Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen, and the Order of Railroad Telegraphers, I earnestly but respectfully protest, on behalf of these organizations, against that part of the pending bill (S. 569) which proposes to place the Department of Labor under the department of com

merce.

The Department of Labor was created in the general labor interests of the country upon the recommendation and influence of organized labor. The Department of Labor's usefulness has been steadily growing, and its benefits to the laboring classes are unquestioned. To subordinate this Department, as is pro

posed in this bill, might render it useless for the purposes for which it was created, because it would be subject to the domination of a Cabinet officer who might be selected at the instance of and in the interests of employers of labor rather than at the instance of and in the interest of the laboring people themselves.

It is the hope of the laboring people of this country that an independent Department of Labor having a Cabinet officer as its official head may be created. This element of our citizenship, comprising as it does the great majority of our population, is certainly worthy of such recognition, and that, too, by this ConRespectfully submitted,

gress.

H. R. FULLER. Mr. Fuller signs this memorial as the representative of the different organizations named.

Now, Mr. President, it seems to me it

is a perfectly reasonable anticipation that in case this new Cabinet officer is selected it will be insisted that the Secretary shall be a man who is familiar with commerce-who is connected with great commercial enterprises-and he will necessarily be in sympathy with the employers of labor rather than with the laborers themselves.

Mr. WELLINGTON. Will the Senator permit a question?

Mr. JONES of Arkansas. Certainly. Mr. WELLINGTON. I observe that the memorial he has read is signed only by a person named Fuller.

Mr. JONES of Arkansas. Yes.

Mr. WELLINGTON. There are a number of organizations named there, and they are powerful ones. It seems to me that if they intended to send to the Senate of the United States any communication it would be sent officially by them and signed by their officers. I question, as that document is signed, whether we can consider it as coming from the allied organizations which it pretends to repre

sent.

Mr. JONES of Arkansas. This gentleman, Mr. Fuller, has been in Washington as the representative of these labor organizations for a number of years. I know him personally. I have known him for a long while. I have never been present at one of these labor meetings, but I have no more doubt that he represents the labor organizations which are specified here than I have that the Senator from Maryland represents his State.

Mr. LODGE. I will say, if the Senator from Arkansas will permit me, that Mr. Fuller appeared before the Committee on Immigration the other day in connection with the proposed Chinese-exclusion act, and he presented formal credentials from all those organizations authorizing him to represent them in regard to legislation pending in Congress. I think there is no doubt of his authority at all.

Mr. JONES of Arkansas. I am obliged to the Senator from Massachusetts. I

know that Mr. Fuller has represented these labor organizations here for years. I know that he has presented the arguments in favor of legislation that these organizations have been interested in. He has conducted himself like a gentleman, and seems to me to be a clear-headed, strong man. He is himself a practical railroad man; he has been a workman on the railroads, and is connected with them, and is familiar with their affairs. He is a man of intelligence and integrity, and the suggestion of the Senator from Maryland that there is any doubt about his representing the people he claims to represent I think is entitled to no consideration and is unwarranted and not sustained.

Mr. WELLINGTON. Mr. PresidentMr. MONEY. Will the Senator from Arkansas allow me to ask him to whom he refers?

The PRESIDING OFFICER. To which Senator does the Senator from Arkansas yield?

Mr. JONES of Arkansas. I yield to the Senator from Mississippi, and I will state to him that I refer to Mr. H. R.

Fuller.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from Arkansas yield also to the Senator from Maryland?

Mr. JONES of Arkansas. Certainly. Mr. WELLINGTON. I merely desire to say that the objection I found to the paper is, in my judgment, well founded upon its face. I do not think that it is proper for a single person to send to the United States Senate a communication pretending to represent a large body of organizations that have their official heads. If they desire to address the Senate upon any matter, it seems to me that the communication' should be officially perfect, and that this paper is not upon its face. Of course, I accept the explanation offered, but I do intend to say that I was warranted in finding fault with the communication as it was read.

Mr. JONES of Arkansas. Mr. President, these labor organizations do not stay all the time in Washington. The men constituting these organizations have something else to do. They earn their bread by the sweat of their faces all the days of their lives, and they are busy at something else besides being here. But when they have an intelligent representative, a man who stays here to represent their interests, and who reports to them, I think he has a right to speak for them, and the Senate has a right to listen to what he says.

Mr. CULLOM. Will the Senator allow me to interrupt him?

Mr. JONES of Arkansas. Certainly. Mr. CULLOM. I merely desire to add that I myself, as chairman of the Committee on Interstate Commerce, know this gentleman, and heretofore he has been before our committee, I think at least twice. He always, I think, came to represent these organizations, and I never heard

anyone raise a question as to the fact. I think he is a gentleman worthy of respect.

Mr. JONES of Arkansas. I have known Mr. Fuller for some years. He has borne himself like a gentleman and has conducted himself like a man of sense and ability. He has rendered valuable services, to my certain knowledge, to the organizations he represents here, and I think he is entitled to the consideration and respect of every member of this body as well as of the people outside.

The argument presented by him that this new department of commerce is more likely to have at its head a man in sympathy with the employers of labor than of labor itself seems to me to be a strong reason why the Department of Labor should be allowed to remain as it has been all this time, and, with these organizations, I see no reason why it should be subordinated to any other. I do not believe that there is any good reason for the head of this Bureau being put in any other department. He can go ahead and do his work as he has done it in the past, with just as much credit as he has done it, and that is the best way, in my ganized as well as unorganized, throughopinion, to benefit labor of all kinds, orout the country.

Keeping Tab on Congressmen.

The railroad men of Arkansas are

wide awake when it comes to keeping tab on Members of Congress who oppose legislation intended for the protection of working people. In 1893, when the Safety Appliance bill was being debated in the Senate, Mr. Jones, of Arkansas, placed himself on the side of the opponents of the bill-and now the railroad men of Arkansas are remembering it! If all railroad men were as watchful of the actions of their Congressmen as are these Arkansas people we would have more friends in Congress.

been one of our best friends within reBut, strange enough, Mr. Jones has cent years, and as such has materially aided us in the attempt to secure desirable legislation-which complicates the Arkansas situation in no small degree. Whether we should hold old offenses against a friend, just because he has not always been a friend, or take him at his present worth, is a question for the Arkansas railroad men to decide for themselves, but from this distance it would seem, to a disinterested person, that they should hang on to a Member that is now doing all he can to help pass our bills.

The Arkansas railroad men have remembered the Safety Appliance bill so strongly that they have been asking Bro.

Fuller all about it, and in reply the following correspondence is published:

Washington, D. C., Feb. 12, 1902. Mr. W. S. Carter, Editor Locomotive Firemen's Magazine, Peoria, Ill. Dear Sir and Brother:-I enclose you herewith copy of a circular letter that I have just sent out to the lodges and divisions in Arkansas. This question of Senator Jones was before the meeting of the Chief Executives held here last month, and the position taken by me, which is voiced in this letter, was indorsed by all of those present.

I also enclose you a copy of our AntiInjunction bill as introduced in the House by Congressman Grosvenor of Ohio. It is in the hands of the House Judiciary Committee, a large number of whose members are opposed to it. I sug

gest that in the March issue, you appeal

to the lodges and members in the states represented on that committee, to get after their member hard.

I also enclose you copies of our Safety Appliance bill, (S. 3560 and H. R. 11059), which is in the hands of the Senate and House Committees on Interstate Commerce. I suggest that you take the same action in regard to petitioning as that suggested as to the Anti-Injunc

tion bill.

The Injunction bill in the Senate has been reported favorably from committee. Yours fraternally, H. R. FULLER.

Washington, D. C., Feb. 8, 1902. To the Members of the B. of L. E., B. of L. F., O. R. C., B. of R. T. and O. R. T., in the State of Arkansas.

Dear Sirs and Brothers:-Having rcceived several letters from members of these organizations in Arkansas, asking for the record of Senator James K. Jones on the Safety Appliance law at the time it was being considered in Congress, and for the purpose of saving time which would necessarily be given up to the answering of each letter, and to give better satisfaction to all members in the state, I adopt this plan of sending a letter to each lodge and division therein:

On February 9, 1893, when the Safety Appliance bill was under consideration in the Senate, Senator Jones opposed it, giving as his reason that it would sacrifice all the small and weak roads to the rapacity and greed of the richer ones, and that it would enable the great trunk lines to swallow up the weak ones. He further says: "This, in a word, is my reason for opposing the bill; and unless some reason is given to me which will overcome this argument, I shall vote against it."

The vote on the bill is shown on page 1486 of the Revised Congressional Record of the 2d session of the 52d Congress. Mr. Jones did not vote, as he was paired, but said if his pair were present he would vote nay.

While the Senator's record on the

Safety Appliance law is not a friendly one from a railroad employe's standpoint, his attitude on other measures has been exceedingly so.

to

The fourth Biennial Convention of the Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen passed resolutions several praying Congress enact certain legislation. If these resolutions had been presented to Congress in the ordinary way, their contents would not have been printed in the Congressional Record, but they would have been referred to various committees and that would have been the last of them. We wanted these resolutions to be printed in the Record, and the only way it could be done was by getting consent from the Senate, or have some Senator stand up As it was in his place and read them. thought it would be impossible to get the stood up and read them into the Record consent of the Senate, Senator Jones

for us.

(See Congressional Record for January 23d and 29th, 1900.)

During the last Congress, while our Accident bill was being considered, he was with us all through the fight. When it was found that the railroads were trying to smother this measure in committee, he voted with us on a motion to discharge

the committee from its further consideration. While this motion lost, it had the effect of bringing a report from the committee. After the bill was reported out of committee, our opponents tried to prevent action thereon. Our friends then moved to take it up for consideration, and on this motion the Senator voted with us. After we had secured the passage of this bill it was stolen and held up for probably two hours, during which time our friends in the Senate, including Senator Jones, who took the floor in favor of it, secured the passage of a resolution providing for a re-print of the bill. (See Congressional Record for March 2, 3 and 4, 1901; also see LoCOMOTIVE FIREMEN'S MAGAZINE for April, 1901.)

During the consideration by the Senate at its present session, of Senate Bill 569, which is the bill creating a new Department of Commerce, Senator Jones stood by the railroad labor organizations and the American Federation of Labor in their efforts to prevent the placing of the Department of Labor under the jurisdiction of the Department of Commerce, and in the debate he read the protest of our organizations against such action.

(See Congressional Record for January 27, 1902.)

On yesterday, February 7th, he endeavored to get our Anti-Injunction bill, (S. 1118), up for consideration in the Senate.

(See Congressional Record for February 7, 1902.)

In addition to these friendly actions on his part, I have, as the Legislative Representative of these organizations, received many favors at his hands, and I have always found him ready to do every reasonable thing we ask of him.

It is certainly gratifying to me to know that the members of our organizations are taking such an interest in these matters, especially to see them going back so far and looking up the records of public men who are again before them for their suffrages, for this, in my mind, is the key to the whole situation. But in view of the fact that Senator Jones has been our friend on all measures except one, and that he is now engaged in an effort to press for passage in the Senate our Anti-Injunction bill, which, if enacted into law, we think will furnish us much relief from the abuses now heaped upon us by some of our Federal Judges through the obnoxious and unAmerican writ of injunction, I think it would be a grave mistake for the railroad

employes to come out and fight him. Especially when we come to consider that it is impossible for us to get any legisla tor to vote with us on all measures. In my experience in legislative work, I have yet to find the first man who voted with us on all propositions.

I say this in all honesty to our cause, and to the Senator himself. I hope that you will give this letter the fullest circulation among our members, in order that all may have an opportunity to judge for themselves what is right.

If any of the brothers desire the Congressional Records to verify these statements, I will be glad to furnish them.

Yours fraternally,

H. R. FULLER, Legislative Representative.

Statistics

"humbugged" in legislative matters is made evident by the manner in which many so-called labor bureaus are conducted. As a sop thrown out to organized labor legislative bodies provide for labor commissioners, and in a loose way define their duties-and then make political "jobs" out of the position by placing the appointment of labor commissioners in the hands of the governors. This means one more political job for the partisan henchman of the governor's party in each state. A pretense is made of consulting members of organized labor in selecting such commissioner, but whoever gets the "plum" is subject to the unwritten law, that nothing must be said, written or done by the labor commissioner that in any way may cost votes for the party! Nor is this all; great, voluminous reports are compiled by state and national authority, at enormous expense, all of which is charged to the labor bureau, and which report has little or no bearing on the labor situationunless it was issued for the purpose of "proving" that some particular policy on the "money question" or "tariff question" which the particular administration advocates, is just the proper thing for working people.

But there are apparent exceptions to this general rule, one of which appears to be the Bureau of Labor Statistics of New York. I don't know how Mr.

of that state, secured his appointment, but doubtlessly there must have been some "politics" in it. But, even though this be true, there is evidence in the reports issued by the Bureau of Labor Statistics of New York that it is at least the intent of the Commissioner to make a labor bureau out of his department. His reports are full of interesting statistics of direct interest to labor, and it is to be regretted that the bureaus of other states, and of the United States, are not as instructive. Just what methods are used in New York State to secure statistical information, or how thorough and reliable they are, I do not know, but if secretaries of local unions will do their part in carefully and conscientiously giving the information desired by the Commissioner, the documents issued by the New York State bureau will be of great economic value in the years to come.

The Nineteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Labor and Statistics, of the State of New York, has just been issued, and is for the year ending Sept. 30, 1901. While it will be impossible to reproduce an extended synopsis of this report, some interesting matter will be taken therefrom. If we may accept this report as indicative of industrial conditions throughout the United States it will be of value to all. The introductory remarks are as follows: