SPEEDING UP THE CLERKS. Some railroad corporation, not satisfied with the long hours of service which they are exacting from their clerks, and the small wages paid for their labor, are adopting an ingenious scheme having for its purpose the driving of a harder bargain with them.

It is called the "bonus system," a cunningly devised name for the speed-up system.

It is now in operation in some of the larger freight stations and works to perfection-from the company standpoint.

For instance, in the billing department the limit of human endurance is taken as a standard and from that basis is figured the number of way-bills which should be turned out by one clerk in the course of the day's work. Then a small "bonus" is offered for each bill in excess of this number.

In this manner the billing clerks are enabled to add a few dollars additional to their meager salaries, dollars which later will go for medical service.

Often young girls who have become experts on the typewriter are placed in these positions.

Fired by youthful ambition and lured on by the glitter of the additional dollars they work at their highest rate of speed for a few months or few years at most; then the

break comes. They are old before their time. Their faces are wan and sallow just when the kiss of young womanhood should. be upon their cheeks.

Their physical resistance reaches the breaking point. They become nervous. wrecks, their speed diminishes and they are unable to perform the task set for them. When they can no longer turn out the number of bills figured as a day's work from the standpoint of physical endurance, they are thrown upon the "scrap-heap." Their days of usefulness to the company are over and with their bloom and beauty gone their chances of having a home of their own are remote. Then what is to become of them? The future alone can

answer.

When one of the young girls is found sufficiently proficient to increase her income through "bonuses" to a point approaching just and equitable wages for her nerve-racking efforts she soon finds her salary reduced. Then it is necessary to further increase the pace she has set in order to maintain her standard of pay.

Some railroad corporations have adopted a plan whereby they hope to conserve as much as possible the vitality of these young girls to the end that their usefulness to the company may be prolonged.

A sufficient number is employed to enable each to be given one week's vacation

-without pay-out of every four weeks' period, one week in which to recuperate for the next three weeks' mad grind. Thus the company is enabled to get four weeks' work for three weeks' pay and at the same time blind the public by a show of interest in the physical welfare of these girls.

And cunningly devised schemes are gradually extending the "speed-up" system to other departments of the service.

Truckmen are in some instances paid a "bonus" for each ton of freight handled in excess of their daily task.

Even the train-service employes, it appears, are not to be immune from this speed-up system. Upon some lines special merit marks are given the crews for getting trains over the division in the shortest possible time, thus placing a premium reckless running and upon "taking

on

chances."

In whatever industry and under whatever name the "speed-up" system is adopted it means just this:

The sapping of vitality in the prime of life. Premature old age. A decrease in labor cost. A vast gain to the employer at the expense of the employe.

There is a Biblical injunction something like this: "What profiteth it if you gain the whole world and lose your immortal soul?" With a slight variation the injunction is applicable to mundane things: "What profiteth it if you gain a few extra dollars in bonuses and cut your working days in half? Lose your health, strength and vitality in the prime of life?"

The "speed-up" system in industry is of momentous public concern. It has a deterrent effect upon the human race as a whole. The offspring of those who come under its baneful influence will be dwarfed in body, mind and soul.

A matter of such far-reaching effect upon the public weal should have the attention of legislative bodies directed to it and a concerted effort made to eliminate it from the industrial life of the nation.

Much can be done in this direction through organization. Our own craft is of paramount importance. In no other department of railroad service does its evil influences extend to the female sex-to the mothers of the next generation.

Let us bend our efforts toward organizing the female clerks. Let us protect them with all the power at our command.

Let us insist that their youth, their strength and their vitality shall not be coined into gold before even the first blush of womanhood is upon their cheeks.

Thus we will be doing a great public service and the public, when it comes to understand our high, generous and unselfish motives, will be with us in the effort.

DECISIONS OF COURTS AFFECTING LABOR.

The United States Bureau of Labor Statistics has just issued its annual review of court decisions affecting labor as its Bulletin No. 169. Approximately 265 decisions are summarized, dealing with the application and construction of the laws, or with the application of the principles of the common law to the rights and relations of the worker.

Decisions of outstanding importance which are reviewed in this bulletin includes the final opinions of the appellate and Supreme Courts of the United States in the famous Danbury Hatters' case, holding members of unions personally liable for damage from boycotts; the dissolution of the famous injunction in the case of John Mitchell against the Hitchman Coal and Coke Company of West Virginia, and holding labor unions legal, and the Supreme Court's opinion in the Coppage case, overthrowing the law of Kansas which undertook to protect workmen in their membership in labor organizations. In the last named case the dissenting opinion, which defended the constitutionality of the act, is also given.

The largest group of cases on a single subject is that relating to the new form of legislation known as workmen's compensation laws. The decisions on this subject range from questions of constitutionality, decided adversely in the case of the Kentucky statute and favorably in other state courts, to the determination of definitions or of single points of dispute. In considering occupational diseases, for instance, the Massachusetts courts hold lead poisoning to be within the state act, providing for compensation for "personal injuries arising out of and in the course of employment," while the Michigan courts, under the provisions of a state law similarly expressed, hold that a case of lead poisoning is not entitled to compensation. An optic neuritis induced by inhaling poisonous gases was

also compensated in Massachusetts, while in New Jersey the court disallowed a claim on account of eczema said to be caused by acids used in a bleachery. Other decisions relate to the mode of computing benefits, the definition of the term "casual employment," what constitutes dependency, wilful act, incapacity, etc. Taken in connection with an earlier bulletin on the same general subject, the Bureau of Labor Statistics has here presented one of the most complete collections of cases on American compensation laws in existence.

Another important group of decisions in a related field is of those determining the application of the Federal liability statute to different classes of railroad employments. Several cases are found which turn on the nature of the employment of the injured person, i. e., whether in interstate commerce or not. The courts are not uniform in their construction of this statute, but among the employments found to be within the act were those of a blacksmith repairing cars used in interstate commerce, a telegraph lineman engaged in repair work, workmen installing block signal systems, a carpenter building an addition to a freight shed, a laborer carrying coal to heat a shop in which interstate cars were being repaired, etc. Employments which, according to the decisions were excluded, were workmen constructing cut-offs for shortening interstate trackage, a hostler killed by the explosion of the boiler of a locomotive whose last run was intrastate, and a switch engine fireman who was at the moment handling only intrastate cars, though his work regularly involved the handling of both classes of commerce indiscriminately.

Other classes of Federal laws that received considerable attention in the court decisions are those limiting the hours of service of railroad employees, and requiting the supply and maintenance of safety appliances.

Other interesting cases are one that grew out of the textile workers' strike in Massachusetts, in which the accountability of the collectors of a fund intended for the relief of strikers' families was affirmed; one connected with the bridge workers' campaign against non-union employers, involving the transportation of explosives in interstate trains; a murder trial growing out of the incitement of a strike leader urging his followers to prevent arrests in the hop pick

ers' strike in California; and a question of the validity of a sentence of a military court during the disturbances among the miners. of Silver Bow county, Montana.

The power of an employers' association to enforce its rules is maintained in a case in which such an association was held by the court to be entitled to recover from one of its members the sum of $5,000 as damages for his defection in a struggle against closed shop contracts. In connection with this may be mentioned a case deciding the illegality of a combination in restraint of trade undertaken and carried on by an association of retail lumber dealers by blacklisting wholesale dealers who sold directly to the consumer.

The minimum wage law of Oregon is. noted in this bulletin as the first law of this class to receive judicial consideration, being upheld by the Supreme Court of that. state. From this decision an appeal has since been taken to the United States Supreme Court.

SPECIAL NOTICE.

This is to call the attention of all Lodges: and those they have chosen to represent them at the Detroit convention next month that credentials from all Lodges have not yet. been received at headquarters and these must be in by August 10th if possible.

I would also call the attention of all delegates and alternates elect to the requirements, under our laws, as regards being in possession of the pass-word for the third quarter ending September 30, 1915, and if your Lodge has not made the necessary reports and remittances to secure this you should see your secretary at once and see that same is taken care of for we desire every delegate to be in shape to pass the Credential Committee and receive their O. K., but you must not expect the Credential Committee to do the impossible or make a special ruling in your case, for they have the laws to govern their actions and must needs follow them, just the same as any other member.