North Carolina-Doughton, Robert L.; Godwin, Hannibal L.; Page, Robert N.; Webb, Edwin Y.

North Dakota-Norton, Patrick D.

Ohio-Gordon, William.

Oklahoma-Carter, Charles D.; Davenport, James S.; Hastings, William W.; Murray, William H.; Thompson, Joseph B. Tennessee-Byrns, Joseph W.; Garrett, Finis J.; Houston, William C.; Hull, Cordell; Sims, Thetus W.

Texas-Black, Eugene; Buchanan, James P.; Burgess, George F.; Davis, James H.; Dies, Martin; Garner, John N.; Hardy, Rufus; Rayburn, Sam; Slayden, James L.; Smith, William R.; Summers, Hatton W.; Young, James; Eagle Joe H.

Virginia-Saunders, Edward W.
Wisconsin-Stafford, William H.

This attempt to lengthen the clerks' work day was strenuously opposed by the American Federation of Labor. President Gompers, however, agreed that hours should be equalized, but insisted that the work day of mechanics and other workers who now work eight hours and longer should be shortened instead of the clerks' hours lengthened.

The only commendable feature about this entire agitation is the fact that it resulted in the formation of a Federal Civil Service Employes' Union chartered by the American Federation of Labor, which hundreds of clerks are joining.

COLLECTIVE BARGAINING IN THE ANTHRACITE COAL INDUSTRY. Collective bargaining in the antracite coal industry furnishes a striking example of the possibility of trade agreements and of the peaceful settlement of labor disputes between a group of employers strongly united and a body of unskilled workers composed largely of recent immigrants inexperienced in collective action and untrained in American unionism. The basis for this development was established in the short period beginning with the strike of 1900 and ending with the arbitration of the Anthracite Coal Strike Commission in 1902-03. Out of this has grown a well-developed form of collective bargaining and an unusually efficient system of conciliation and arbitration of disputes, according to a report by Edgar Sydenstricker in Bulletin No. 191 of the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the Department of Labor.

The anthracite coal industry is peculiar in several respects. Nearly all of the anthracite coal production of the United States is confined to five counties of Pennsylvania. Its financial control is concentrated in a few large mining companies united in a community of interest. The evolution in coal consumption has tended to give anthracite a market free from active competition

with bituminous, except in certain small sizes. In spite of geographical and industrial concentration, differences in mining conditions have necessitated unusually elaborate systems of differential rates of pay.

The conditions under which collective bargaining was introduced and has been carried on in the anthracite field possess some features of special interest. Opposed to a highly concentrated control of the interest on the employers' side has been a mass of workers which have become more and more heterogeneous from the standpoint of race and nationality. The introduction of collective bargaining came at a time when employers were, perhaps, most united and the employes least homogeneous. The creation of a permanent board of conciliation for an entire industry as a method of settling disputes arising under agreements and of preventing strikes was unique, and the provision for the adjudication of such disputes as could not be settled by conciliation by an umpire appointed by a federal judge was a step far in advance of what had been done in the coal industry in this country, as well as in other industries of a national scope.

In spite of the fact that on three occasions in 1906, 1909 and 1912-when new agreements were negotiated, obstacles in the way of maintaining peaceful relations appeared to be serious, the relations between employers and employes have been maintained without a break. A habit of collective bargaining has been established, fairly well recognized precedents in the manner of negotiating agreements have grown up, and a system of settling disputes and grievances, which has so far been successful in continuing and furthering peaceful relations and avoiding conflicts, has been developed.

In the three agreements that have been made in the industry since 1906 when the awards of the Anthracite Coal Strike Commission expired, several tendencies appear. While the principal issue of wages, hours, recognition of the union, and questions connected with the presence of a union and methods of settling disputes have been brought up in each series of negotiations, there have been: (a) A tendency to amend the awards of 1903 with more freedom in each agreement; (b) a tendency toward more businesslike methods in negotiations and a better understanding between the representatives of the bargaining parties; (c) a tendency to grant more complete recognition of the union as a party to agreements On only one occasion (in the agreement of 1912) has an increase in wages been stipulated, and the provisions of the agreements have, insofar as they have gone beyond a mere continuance of the 1903 awards, related principally to methods of settling disputes and grievances. The system of settling disputes and grievances provided by the awards of the Anthracite Coal

Strike Commission has been considerably modified by adding machinery for the conciliation of disputes at the collieries where they occur and in the districts in which the colleries are located.

The success of the agreements, judged from the standpoint of collective bargaining, is seen in the fact that at no time has there been any repudiation of any agreement. The success of the agreements appears also to be indicated in the attitude of mine workers and operators; while both parties have expressed dissatisfaction with certain features of the agreements and of the system of conciliating disputes and grievances, the principle of collective bargaining is looked upon favorably by many representative operators as well as by union officials.

The measure of authority attached to the awards of the Anthracite Coal Strike Commission has been a factor in the enforcement of the agreements which is not without its importance. Much of the respect in which its awards have been held has been undoubtedly due to its singularly effective work and to the fact that it marked the end of a struggle whose memories are unpleasant to both sides even today, but a great deal of the reverence for its decisions in 1903 has been due to its governmental character. The fact has not been forgotten that it was a body named by the President of the United States. Naturally there has been a tendency to amend and add to the awards and to take away some of their constitutional character; yet they have performed the service of a constitution at a time when such service was perhaps of vital importance. Only as the habit of peaceful relations has grown, has the usefulness of the awards as a constitution of industrial relations become less important and necessary.

With the successive agreements the employes have made important gains in wages, hours, and conditions of employment. Since 1900 there have been three increases of 10 per cent in the rates of wages-in 1900, 1903, and 1912, the first increase was the result of the strike of 1900; the second, of the arbitration by the Anthracite Coal Strike Commission; and the third, of a joint agreement. In addition to this, the 1903 award provided for a sliding scale, with the rates existing in 1902 plus the horizontal increase as a minimum.

The only provisions relating to hours in any of the agreements and other stipulations in collective bargaining were contained in the 1903 awards, although the mine workers have insistently demanded an 8hour day for all time workers in the making of subsequent agreements. The 1903 award provided for 8-hour shifts for engineers, pump men and firemen. For other time employes of the company, the 9-hour day was to prevail. The present demand for an 8-hour day for all miners is claimed to be justified by the development of nar

rower veins, imposing more arduous working conditions and by the introduction of new coal-cutting machinery also creating special conditions for the miners.

While no specific conditions appeared in the 1903 awards or in the subsequent agreements relating to the maintenance of discipline, it is evident that the Anthracite Coal Strike Commission's idea, which was later upheld in the decision of umpires, was that, while the employer had the right to enforce discipline, even to the extent of suspending or discharging the offending employe, the cause of discipline could best be served by co-operation between employer and employe rather than by an exhibition of domineering authority on the employer's part or of assumption of unwarranted "rights" on the employe's part.

Taking the operations as a whole, however, while they believe that dealing with any organization of employes is detrimental to discipline, the maintenance of discipline under conditions where trade agreements exist is a matter of education of the worker. They are gradually feeling a greater confidence in the ability of the union leaders to understand the difference between questions affecting recognition, wages, hours, and conditions of labor and regulations for the efficient and safe conduct of the colliery, and those affecting the education and control of the untutored and raw worker in the mine. Perhaps it is not too much to say that the average operator has had to learn to see the difference himself.

HEALTH INSURANCE AND
TUBERCULOSIS.

No disease that affects workingmen and women demands more from them in loss of time and consequent loss in wages than does tuberculosis. On this account the National Association for the Study and Prevention of Tuberculosis is interested in efforts being made by the American Association for Labor Legislation and other groups to secure the enactment of laws providing for insurance against all forms of sickness or health insurance, as it is better called.

These two organizations give four important reasons why insurance against tuberculosis is vitally important to the working

man.

(1) It is a disease which causes onethird of all deaths among working men between the ages of fifteen and forty-five, the most productive years of life.

(2) Actual studies made in Boston show that in the cases of 500 men who had consumption, tuberculosis caused a loss in wages alone of $426,039, or averages of time lost ranging from 58.03 to 89.3 weeks.

(3) In 422 families carefully studied, the average weekly income from all sources decreased after the disability of the wageearner with tuberculosis from $17.50 to $7.86, a decline of 65 per cent.

(4) Experience in Germany, England and

Any advances in operating costs of the railroads have not been due to added outlays to transportation employes. Train and engine crews have given to the transportation companies more than they have received in increased rates of pay. This fact is clearly shown by the reports of the railroads themselves to their stockholders and to the Interstate Commerce Commission. Although engineers, firemen, conductors and trainmen have received some advances in rates of pay during recent years, they have had to work harder and have handled more traffic each year for each dollar of additional compensation received.

Transportation employes are piece-workers. They are engaged in handling freight and passenger traffic. The requirement for a standard day's work is to haul so many tons of freight or so many passengers 100 miles. If the weight of a freight train is increased the cost to the railroads for labor in handling each ton of freight 100 miles is less.

The constant increasing of train loads has been the predominant factor in recent railway operating progress. The growth in weight of trains has been more rapid than the advances in rates of pay to transportation employes. Engine and train crews have transported proportionately a greater volume of freight than they have received increases in wages. As a consequence, the labor cost to the railroads of engine and train crews has decreased.

During the course of the recent arbitration between the Western railroads and their engineers and firemen, it is shown that the proportion of total operating expenses arising from payments to transportation employes was 14 per cent less in 1913 than in 1890. In 1913 it was also shown that wage payments to transportation employes required only 19 cents out of each dollar of revenue earned by Western railroads in 1913 as compared with 21 cents out of each dollar of revenue in 1890. When considered on the basis of freight tonnage, it was found that it cost the railroads for wages to locomotive engineers and firemen 65 cents for each 1,000 tons carried one mile in 1890, while, in 1913, engineers and fire

men transported 1,000 tons a mile for only 33 cents, a decrease of cost to the railroads for these employes alone, during this period of slightly more than 50 per cent. It was also shown further by exhibits submitted during the Western Arbitration that during the more recent years, 1900-1913, the cost to the transportation companies for wages of engineers and firemen decreased 12 per cent for each 1,000 tons of freight hauled one mile.

It is apparent from these facts that the productive efficiency of transportation employes has increased faster than their rates of pay. To produce these results for the railroads they have had to work excessive hours. The present movement for an eighthour day is, therefore, a reasonable request by transportation employes to participate in the results of their own labor, not primarily in terms of dollars and cents but in form of a shorter work day.

Allan L. Benson, of Yonkers, N. Y., is the Socialist Party nominee for President of the United States.

He is a newspaper man having at different times held editorial positions on the Washtenaw Daily Times, Chicago Inter-Ocean, Salt Lake Tribune, Detroit Journal, Detroit Times, Washington, D. C. Times and many other prominent newspapers. For the past nine years he has been a magazine writer. His articles in Pearson's Magazine and similar publications have made him well known to tens of thousands of readers.

The Detroit Times in a recent issue commenting editorially upon his nomination for the Presidency said in part as follows:

"One does not have to be of Benson's political faith to admire him for his convictions.

"He left newspaper work on account of them, to find a free field for a vigorous pen, driven by a quick, clear and clean mind, and had soon won for himself a national reputation through his articles in leading magazines and through books he wrote which received wide circulation.

"Benson's earnestness appeals to both his reader and his listener, and the party under his leadership will undoubtedly poll its banner vote this year.

"The Socialists have given us an idea of their progressive thought and ability to give it practical application by the manner in which they have nominated Benson for President and given him a three months' start over the other fellows.

"The ballots were cast by the dues paying members of the party. The referendum vote on which the candidate was chosen is the first ever polled for the nomination of national candidates either in the Socialist Party or any other.

"The method is this: Nominations are made and opportunity afforded those who

wish to decline. Ballots bearing the remaining names are sent to the entire membership and returns received by locals, then by state headquarters, and finally by the national office.

"The nomination of Benson by the Socialists means the first victory for anti-preparedness within a party, too.

"The New York Post sees in the nomination of Benson proof that Socialist sentiment is 'overwhelmingly against the militarist position taken by Charles Edward Russell and other Socialist leaders in a moment of panic.'

"If the other parties should fail to respond to the anti-preparedness sentiment there is in the country, there will be nothing for the supporters of anti-preparedness to do but vote for the Socialist candidate, as a matter of principal. In which event the vote for Benson is going to provide us with some startling figures.

"Another thing is going to add to the Socialist vote this year is the fact that the general public has been educated beyond the point of looking upon a Socialist as of fire-eating propensities and a dangerous person in the community.

"Benson's writings have had much to do in changing the public mind on this point, too.

"He has made it clear for those who were once ignorant enough to shudder at the word 'Socialism,' that Socialism is not at all to be feared, because it cannot come until a place has been made for it and not until it has been invited; that Socialism is only a cure for a nation's political diseases.

"Benson will not be elected, of course, but if the Democrats and Republicans can succeed as the Socialists have in naming a man so earnestly committed to loftiest principles of party, and so sincerely solicitous for the common good of the country's people, the voters will not be able to go far wrong this November in the mater of a man fit for the first office."

PLENTY OF WORK-WAGES GOING UP.

U. S. Government Employment Service Reports More Jobs Than Applicants.

Call Emanating From Canadian Sources for 30,000 Farm Laborers Discounted by Dominion American Consul-General. Workmen Also Protest Importation of Foreign Labor.

As the season advances, the demand for help in nearly every line of industry is increasing throughout Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Delaware, according to United States Government officials in charge of what is officially known as zone three, of the Federal Employment Service, which is composed of the above named States, and

whose offices are located at No. 135 South Second Street, Philadelphia, Pa., with a sub-branch in the Berger Building, Pittsburgh, Pa.

Opportunities for labor, both skilled and unskilled, including farm help and domestics, are becoming so numerous that at times they exceed the number of applicants and it is therefore unnecessary for any one really desiring work in these lines, to be without employment, and with constantly increasing wages at that.

Under these circumstances it is altogether unlikely that the call for 30,000 farm laborers, emanating from Canadian sources, urging workers to migrate to that country, will Imeet with much response, particularly in view of the fact that the American ConsulGeneral at Vancouver, B. C., in a dispatch to the Department of State, describes the Canadian situation in part as follows:.

"In this connection I have the honor to report that there are in Vancouver more than one thousand unemployed, and that many able bodied men in this province are dependent upon public charity for the reason that they are unable to obtain employment.

Special efforts are being made to induce every foreigner of military age, residing in this province, to enlist for overseas service, and it is practically impossible for an American citizen to secure employment here in any capacity. . . . It is reported through the Canadian Immigration officials in Vancouver that a systematic endeavor is to be made this season to induce Americans to come to the northwestern provinces on the promise of profitable employment, notwithstanding the fact that there is, as stated above, a large number of unemployed in this province at the present time. . .

There is no demand for mechanics or laborers in this part of Canada, and I have to recommend that this fact be made known through the press in the United States, as a means of warning American citizens against coming to British Columbia with the expectation of securing employment of that kind. Any considerable influx of mechanics or laborers into British Columbia at this time, would result in many being stranded in a foreign country, in which instance they would be urged to join the military ranks for overseas service, as a means of securing employment. In the endeavor to secure recruits among Americans, they are told by the military officers that they will not sacrifice their citizenship by enlisting for service in the British Army."

A reference to the dispatch of the American Consul-General shows that there are a great number of unemployed in all branches of industry in this western province of Canada. It will, therefore, be seen that there exists no reason for the migration of American workingmen to Canada. The labor organizations of that country, fully informed as to conditions there, earn

estly protest against the coming of any workmen to the Dominion for fear of swelling the ranks of the unemployed.

At any rate there exists no necessity at this time for an American to leave his own country for the purpose of obtaining employment elsewhere; all that will be necessary for him to do, if he wants a job, will be to obtain one of the blank forms of the Division of Information at the nearest Post Office, thereon make application for such position as he is fitted for, and return the

same to zone headquarters. Persons living in Pennsylvania, West Virginia or Dela ware, desiring to use the United States Employment Service as a means to assist them in securing jobs, or in the case of employers desiring help, should call in person, or address United States Employment Service, No. 135 South Second Street, Philadelphia, Pa., or Berger Building, Pittsburgh, Pa. No fees are exacted or accepted from either employer or employe for any services rendered.

Those who predicted a greater year for the San Diego Exposition in 1916 than during 1915, are having their innings. The attendance for the first month since the formal dedication day, March 18, has been more than 75,000 greater than for the corresponding month of 1915. The wonderful displays of Canada, France, Italy, Germany, Austria and other governments participating at San Francisco have added greatly to the 1915 exhibits.

Owing to the limited time at our disposal and the pressure of other business this month, we were unable to prepare even a synopsis of the proceedings of the Third Biennial Convention of The Railway Employes' Department of the American Federation of Labor, held in the Labor Temple auditorium, in Kansas City, Mo., April 10 to April 21, inclusive. A full and complete report, however, is in preparation and will appear in our next issue.

After a lapse of several months we print elsewhere in this issue, a press abstract of the third section of the report of Basil M. Manly, Director of Research and Investigation, of the Federal Industrial Relations Commission which expired by limitation August 26, 1915, containing findings of fact and recommendations of the staff, accepted in full and ordered printed by resolution of Commission. Adopted by Commissioners Frank P. Walsh, John B. Lennon, James O'Connell and Austin B. Garretson.

For months the resolution to print the report and testimony of the United States Commission on Industrial Relations has been before the United States Senate.

Under one pretext or another no action has been taken on it.

The selfish, reactionary interests are trying to prevent the printing of the report and testimony, because they disclose the truth about industrial conditions.

Labor must help the labor group in Congress to force the Senate to adopt the resolution to print.

Write to the Senators from your state!

The organized employes of the Washington, D. C. Terminal Company, assisted by Vice-President Geo. A. Nolte, are at present negotiating with the management of that company for recognition and a schedule of hours and wages similar in nature and character to the one granted the employes of the Southeastern railroads referred to elsewhere in this issue.

So far the officers of the company have refused to grant their requests and the outcome is being watched with much interest.

We take pleasure in printing elsewhere in this issue an illustration and description of the Price Railway Brake Appliance, an invention of Brother John Price, a member of T. T. Slatery Lodge No. 274, B. of R. T., and Division No. 116, O. R. C., of Tyler, Tex., which explains itself. It is intended for steel cars of the large side and center sill type and in the estimation of the inventor should meet with the approval of carmen in particular, as it provides greater safety when inspecting air. For further information other than that contained in the descriptive article elsewhere in this issue, address John Price, 216 East Berta Street, Tyler, Tex.

The following new lodges have been instituted since last report: Kentville Lodge No. 127, Kentville, N. S., and Champlain Lodge No. 554, St. Albans, Vermont, by General Vice-President Louis Beuloin; Sunshine Lodge No. 388, Spring, Texas, by Grand Lodge Deputy E. M. Ware; Bunker Hill Lodge No. 505, Boston, Mass., by Assistant General President F. H. Knight; Mohaska Lodge No. 567, McMechen, W. Va., by General Vice-President W. H. Ronemus; Clifton Lodge No. 348, Clifton, Ariz., by Brother S. Newbury; Overland Lodge No. 442, Kansas City, Mo., by Business Agent G. F. Mounts; Springfield's Hope Lodge No. 576, Springfield, Mass., by Grand Lodge Deputy D. J. Collins; Key West Lodge No. 569, Key West, Fla., by Brother G. S. Graham; Thompson Lodge No. 148, Kam