SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE.

DEMOCRATS.

Charles A. Culberson, of Texas.
Lee S. Overman, of North Carolina.
William E. Chilton, of West Virginia.
James A. O'Gorman, of New York.
Duncan U. Fletcher, of Florida.
James A. Reed, of Missouri.
Henry F. Ashurst, of Arizona.
John K. Shields, of Tennessee.
Thomas J. Walsh, of Montana.
Hoke Smith, of Georgia.

REPUBLICANS.

Clarence D. Clark, of Wyoming.
Knute Nelson, of Minnesota.
William P. Dillingham, of Vermont.
George Sutherland, of Utah.

Frank B. Brandegee, of Connecticut.
William E. Borah, of Idaho.
Albert B. Cummins, of Iowa.
Elihu Root, of New York.

Address: Senate Office Building, Washington, D. C.

Since current discussion has been largely upon a matter of vital importance to many millions of people whose welfare has been entrusted to your keeping, and since special interests have endeavored to prejudice the minds of legislators and the public and to place them at variance with the contention of the workers thereon, there rests upon me an imperative duty, not only to those upon whom the dead weight and burden of industry have ever fallen, but to you, that you may avoid being placed in opposition to labor's contentions without having had them fully and completely presented for your consideration.

The matter to which I refer is embodied in the Bartlett-Bacon bill (H. R. 1873, S. 927), Sixty-third Congress.

I am addressing you to explain why the working men and women demand, as a matter of social justice and humanity, that they be given relief from the status in which they are now placed by reason of court interpretations of the Sherman antitrust law of 1890.

The history of those who toil has been one of pathos and bitter struggle, one of great suffering and indomitable courage.

In the earlier centuries the toilers were compelled to work at the will or caprice of masters who owned their bodies and

their labor power. Living beings with human hearts and brains were legally and socially rated as things, property. As a result of the barbarian invasions that overturned the social, economic and political institutions of Europe and produced feudalism, it was expedient that changes be made in the status of the workers—they were made serfs and villeins. Although their bodies were made free, the overlord retained an ownership in their labor power. From this status, this semi-thraldom, the workers struggled to secure more definite and more advantageous terms affecting the services they owned, until finally they reached the level of freedom of contract.

Yet liberty, equality in justice, equal opportunity, had then not been won, nor are they yet assured to those who have always been the oppressed, wherever or whenever oppression has existed. They had no voice or influence in determining the laws of the land, or in selecting the administrative agents who made them effective. The laws of the land had been made by those whose interest, environment, experience in no way touched the world of the workers; political and judicial theories, precedents, were in accord with the convictions and viewpoints of the controlling classes; intellectual life and interests were isolated from the work-a-day world. Ethical and moral standards were as yet untouched by enlightened and merciful humanitarianism. It was the task of the workers to present their pleas and conceptions of justice so that established practices and standards might be broadened to include the welfare of all the people. This was the task laid upon untutored, undisciplined workers. Opposed to them were the keenest, most subtle intellects and forces vested interests could retain. Each forward step was fiercely contested. The controlling interests would not abandon their special privileges even when once lost, but sought to regain them by circumvention, sophistry, and legal chin

cery.

Law is a product of two elements-the imperative and the traditional. Most of our difficulties have arisen through the second element. Precedents and judicial interpretation, determined by the individual bias of the judge or by prevailing economic and political philosophy, have been obstacles to the adoption of newer ideals of justice and to the shifting of standards to suit changing conditions.

These are some of the difficulties which the workers of today inherit from the past ages. They explain why the workers of today have to combat legal and economic theories which accord to employers certain rights to labor power, and why greater consideration has been paid to safeguarding wealth than to safeguarding the freedom of the men who help to create that wealth. The working men of our country ask most seriously and solemnly whether it is just that property be hedged about by inviolable sanctity, while they are denied normal activities in furtherance of the interests of human beings.

When feudal regulation of labor conditions was broken down by the disturbances resulting from the black death, a system of State regulation was inaugurated. This was never effective and completely failed under the changes set up by the "industrial revolution." With the coming of the factory system, individual relations between employers and employed became impossible, and the workers were powerless to protect their rights, interests, and even their lives. Collective action by workmen in furtherance of their own interests, as opposed to those of the employers, was legislated against as "conspiracy." According to the old political and economic theories of justice, employes had no right to withhold labor power necessary to the operation of the employer's business, a theory evolved under the conditions of the former periods when workmen were the master's property. We, in our country, inherit many of the problems and theories from the old country, and some are of our own making. It took years to secure relief from the old "conspiracy" laws which curbed and restricted the workers in pro

tecting and promoting their industrial rights and interests. When at last it seemed that efforts of the toilers were to be rewarded, the courts of the United States, by interpretations which amounted to judicial legislation, applied the Sherman anti-trust law to trade unions in a way which virtually and actually revived the conspiracy laws.

When the courts applied the Sherman anti-trust law to labor organizations, it created an offense never intended by the makers of that law. As has been repeated again and again, but never refuted, as an investigation of the Congressional Record will prove, the men who drafted the Sherman anti-trust act, Senators Sherman, Edmunds and George, did not intend that it should apply to organizations instituted not for profit. On March 25, 1890, when the bill was before the Senate, Senator Sherman insisted upon the following amendment:

"Provided, that this act shall not be construed to apply to any arrangements, agreements, or combinations between laborers, made with a view to lessening the number of hours of labor or the increasing of their wages; nor to any arrangements, agreements, or combinations among persons engaged in horticulture or agriculture, made with a view of enhancing the price of their own agricultural or horticultural products."

Senators George and Edmunds did not oppose the amendment, but regarded it as surplusage. The amendment was agreed to while the Senate was sitting in Committee of the Whole. On March 26th. when the bill came up again for consideration, Senator Stewart, of Nevada, said:

"The original bill has been very much improved and one of the great objections has been removed from it by the amendment offered by Senator Sherman which relieves the class of persons who would have been first under the prosecution under the original bill without amendment. The bill ought now to be satisfactory to every person who is opposed to the oppression of labor and desires to see it properly rewarded."

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