statute expressly prohibiting corporations engaged in interstate commerce from inducing or compelling their employes to sign releases of liability for accidents.

3. Congress should enact a statute prohibiting interstate employers from requiring their employes to contribute to benefit funds, and providing for the participation of employes engaged in interstate commerce in the management of all benefit funds and other funds to which they contribute.

4. The regulation by Federal statute of the employment of police on interstate railroads. The statute should not only provide for the organization, personnel and powers of such police, but should definitely provide that during labor disputes such police should be subject to the proper civil authorities and paid out of the public treasury. The statute should also provide that such corporations should be permitted to have firearms only under license, requiring that a definite record be maintained showing the character of each firearm and to whom it is issued.

5. The assumption by the States of full responsibility and definite provision not only for protecting the property of railroads, but for preventing trespass upon their property.

INDUSTRIAL CONDITIONS IN ISOLATED
COMMUNITIES.

One of the most striking features of the report is the finding that many typical industrial communities present every aspect of a state of feudalism. The report says:

The investigations and hearings of the Commission are the basis for the following statements:

1. The conditions existing in typical industrial communities which are either wholly or in large part owned or controlled by a single corporation or individual employer, present every aspect of a state of feudalism except the recognition of specific duties on the part of the employer. The employes in such communities are dependent on a single corporation, or employer, for their liveli hood. Furthermore, the employer in many cases controls the social and politi

cal life of such communities, either by the complete absorption of local political powers or by domination of the local authorities.

2. The fundamental rights of citizens in such communities are, as a general rule, seriously abridged if not actually denied. Among the rights most seriously violated are the right of free speech and assemblage and the right of public highways.

In some cases, as for example in Colorado, employers in such communities have assumed to usurp the functions of the Federal Government itself in the instances of money orders, and have not only denied employes access to the post office when located in their company stores, but have opened and otherwise interfered with the mail directed to employes.

Such feudalistic conditions tend to develop principally in connection with the private exploitation of natural resources, being most frequently found in mining camps, lumber camps (including turpentine camps) and large plantations. There are, however, striking examples even in the case of manufacturers, as, for example, the textile towns and steel towns.

3. The most extreme form of domination and control exists in what are known as "closed camps," where the employer owns all the land upon which such camps are located and, because of this private ownership, not only exercises control over the local government, but dictates arbitrarily who shall be permitted to come into or pass through such communities. It has frequently been argued that such communities are simply the inevitable accompaniment of the development of new country and will be eliminated with time. This is not true, however, as the Commission's investigations have disclosed a large number of "closed camps" which have been in existence for more than a generation.

It is suggested that the Commission recommend:

1. The enactment of appropriate State legislation providing that where communities develop, even upon privately owned land, the powers of the civil Government shall not be interfered with, nor shall the rights of access to the residence of

any person be restricted, nor shall the rights of persons to come and go unmolested, to speak freely and to assemble peacefully, be interfered with or considered to stand upon a different basis from the rights of persons in other communities.

2. In the case of public lands containing timber or minerals, which are now or may hereafter come into the possession of the Federal Government, it should be provided by statute that neither the lands nor the mineral rights should under any circumstances be sold, but should be used only upon lease for a limited term, such lease to contain as a part of the contract the conditions with regard to the rights of inhabitants as recited above and such lease to be forfeitable without recourse in case of the infraction of said conditions.

3. The Post Office Department should be directed to report to Congerss all communities in which the post office is in any company's store or other building operated by an employer or in which the postmaster is a private employer or the agent of an employer. The report should show the facts separately for those communities in which the employer or corporation operates an industry upon which any large number of inhabitants are dependent.

4. Congress and the State legislatures should enact statutes providing that any attempt on the part of an employer to influence his employes either directly or indirectly in connection with any Federal election either for or against any particular candidate, shall constitute intimidation; and further specifying that it shall constitute intimidation for any employer to give notice to his workmen that in the event of the election of any particular candidate, the establishment will not be operated.

AGRICULTURE.

To-day's section also urges action to improve the condition of farm labor and to stop the increase in farm tenancy by aiding farm owners. It says:

It was obviously impossible for the Commission to attempt a detailed investigation of agricultural conditions; but, because of the very immediate bearing

of the land question on industrial unrest, it was felt necessary to make as thorough investigation as possible of the phases which seemed to have the most direct bearing on our general problem. The phases selected for discussion were first, the concentration of land ownership as shown by existing statistics; second, the problem of seasonal and casual agricultural labor; third, the increase and change in the character of farm tenancy; and fourth, the introduction of industrial methods into agriculture through the development of corporations operating large tracts of land. The findings and recommendations with reference to the concentration of ownership and the problems of seasonal labor are set forth elsewhere. At this point, it is desired to present the results of the investigations of tenancy and agricultural corporations.

The investigations of these problems was confined practically to the Southwest, because it is in this region that the systems have become most fully developed and their results in the form of the acute unrest of a militant tenant movement are most easily studied. The investigations in this region, however, were very thorough, consisting of detailed studies and reports by field investigators, which were later confirmed by a public hearing.

As a result of these investigations the following conclusions are fully justified:

1. Tenancy in the Southwestern States is already the prevailing method of cultivation and is increasing at a very rapid rate. In 1880, Texas had 65,468 tenant families, comprising 36.6 per cent. of all farms in the State. In 1910, tenant' farmers had increased to 219,571, and operated 54 per cent. of all the farms in the State. Reckoning on the same ratio of increase that was maintained between 1900 and 1910, there should be in Texas in the present year (1915) at least 236,000 tenant farmers. A more intensive study of the field, however, shows that in the eighty-two counties of the State where tenancy is highest, the average percentage of tenants will approximate sixty.

Continued on page 14

INTERNATIONAL EXECUTIVE BOARD.

ANTHONY MCANDREW

President 50-51-52-53 Iroquois Life Bldg., Louisville, Ky. W. R. WALDEN... . First Vice-President 2020 E. Franklin St., Richmond, Va. JOHN RUCKERT . Second Vice-President 739 Aline St., New Orleans, La. CHARLES P. ALDER.......Third Vice-President 156 Heidelberg St., Detroit, Mich. . Fourth Vice-President 1486 Pitkin St., Brooklyn, N. Y. Fifth Vice-President 130 Forest Ave., Hamilton, Ont. Sixth Vice-President 1015 N. Fifth St., Richmond, Va. E. LEWIS EVANS Secretary-Treasurer 50-51-52-53 Iroquois Life Bldg., Louisville, Ky.

A. SHEINES

A. J. TURNER

ROBT. FOX

.....

Some of these days laws limiting the right of co-operative effort or collective action through organization of the workers will be urged strongly by the employers. An effort will be made to do it through legislation and it will be just as logical as depriving the workers of the right to strike or leave the premises of the employer.

It is reported that an industry out in California in a town of its own, surrounding the shops, notices have been posted warning the employes that they are not permitted to leave the premises. Chalk this up in your mind.

The Mahoning County Grand Jury returned indictments against the steel trust in the Youngstown, Ohio, district

on the charge of uniting to fix wages for the workers in their employ. The cases grew out of the riots in East Youngstown on January 7.

The effect of the Grand Jury's report on the individuals indicted reminds one somewhat of the protests of a hive of bees if it is disturbed. The bees come out and sail round, giving vent to their anger and expressing in their own way of the words "who has dared to intrude upon our vested rights," "who has dared to assail us in the premises." Judge Gary says it is outrageous, and each one of the indicted voices a protest seemingly questioning the right of any jury to have aught to say against them.

They have considered themselves so safely ensconced behind financial power that their trenches were impervious against invasion, and any one who had nerve enough to charge the trenches should be shot instanter. A little later we will see who gets shot.

With the cooling off of the heat generated by injustices heaped upon organized labor in Colorado, elements of justice are filling in the gaps.

Just recently justice has been again enthroned. Four members of the United Miners who with others were indicted, have on jury trial, been acquitted of the charge of murder in the killing of Major Lester. The case was tried in Judge Dennison's court at Castle Rock.

The State Supreme Court had by decision eliminated Judge Hillyer from the hearings, and justice was made possible. Had Judge Hillyer been on the bench there may be some question as to the results. He being formerly an attorney for the coal company, and at the time when the trouble arose would in all likelihood have exerted an influence inimical to the rights of the accused, and the administration of justice.

Let us hope that Colorado may soon return to her old-time place where justice may obtain.

Does it not seem strange, if not criminal, that in the United States with all the twentieth century improvements and facilities for the preservation of life,

both infantile and adult, that there should be such a fearful mortality as official figures show.

Just think, in times of peace and a rightful plenty we have the enormous death roll of 350,000, and most of them are from preventable causes. We boast of our skill, improvement in machinery and means of production, and entertain the idea that we eclipse all other nations in a productive sense, but we do not seem to count the cost, and too, a cost that need not be. Is this not a sad commentary on our applied efficiency of which we hear so much in the columns of our daily press.

Figures recently published state, that in our industrial exploitation system and preventable causes of death among men, women and children employed in gainful occupations there are killed 250,000 and wounded 4,000,700. In addition to this, poverty, which is one of the causes of our high death rate, causes the death of 100,000 babies before they reach the first milestone of their little lives. Poverty, is assigned as the cause of this terrible killing off of what would be an invaluable addition to our country so plentifully supplied with all that is needful for the preservation of life.

Is a record like this not one that we should be thoroughly ashamed of? It is positively criminal and a dishonor to the name of our great and wealthy country.

The Committee on Industrial Relations in their investigation state that poverty, in this country of peace and plenty, is the direct cause of more deaths and misery than that taking place on the battle fields of any of the warring countries in Europe.

The committee's report further shows, in the industries where the low wages prevail-in the steel, textile and some of the garment industries-the infantile death rate is four times that where organizations of the workers prevail and wages are more nearly normal.

It also shows that in industries where mothers are compelled to work to even up the high cost of living, mortality among the infants is three times that of where mothers are not a part of the factory system. In summing up the question the report says that everywhere dis

ease and death superinduced by poverty is greatest where the work is hardest and where there is no organization to protect the workers against the rapacity of the greedy employers. It is also proven that it is in these towns and sections that the greatest amount of wealth from production is returned to the employing class.

Oh, child of mine, why did I bring
You to the place of suffering and woe;
To be a part of this terrible tearful thing
We call living, when it is only a blasted
show.

When there is any fighting to be done labor is the one that is called upon to do it, while the money-bags laugh to themselves inwardly, and outwardly cheer the poor dupes who are going to the slaughter yards, and leaving behind the soon-to-be widows and orphans to suffer the untold miseries of money-bag's fight. The ruthlessness of the American money-bag system is not less than that of the Prussian money-bag system— nothing deters them. The workers in peace time are the legitimate prey of profit, and in war time, food for cannon, a screen to protect vested interests.

If our military system could be put on a basis of such equality as is the military system in Switzerland, where all are on equal footing when defense of the realm is called upon, the workers of this country would look upon the matter from a different point of view; but our military system as we have it even in peace times has not the democracy about it that is so prevalent in Swiss system. With a large

military system in this country there would be a vast extension of the military aristocracy that now pervades what little military system we now have here, and unless great changes were made, old Moneybags would run the military system in its enlarged form as he does now, and run the government with it, as he now does with his powers derived from financial influences. Money, like water, has a natural tendency to flow to its largest centres and governs these centres as the sea governs the fresh waters which flow into it; it is absorbed as the fresh waters are by the salty sea. Like begets like. The people who control the money gravitate toward each other and become as aristocratically powerful as the sea; a poor devil of a worker has about as much chance as a sailing ship has in an angry sea, and when he goes down, he is thought no more of than the sea thinks of the ship which its waves have battered and sent to the bottom. With a prospect such as that, is it possible for the common herd to look with complacency upon voluntarilly giving the ruthless more power than they have already arrogated to themselves? Not if they are wise and have any sense of future self preservation. If he is content to be a passive inanimate unit and merely a cog in the great wheel of government with the other fellow doing the turning, old Moneybag's idea may suit him. But if he is an active unit with the spirit that a human being is supposed to be possessed of, he will not be content to be the slave of old Moneybags without offering his share of resistance. It is the presence of that spirit that has inspired our labor movement of to-day. It is to the credit of the British workers that they stood like a rock as they did against the militarist spirit and exacted restrictive measures when the conscription question was in course of formation. The question now arises, have we in America got the back-bone, nerve and resourcefulness to provide and stand out for protective measures when a military system suitable to the money-bag interests is turned into the congressional mill to be ground out and fashioned after the will of the powers that be. A test may come that will prove whether the boasted

freedoms and liberties are real or only pieces of fiction.

It is declared that our government is the most responsive to the will of those under it of any on earth; but some people are now living who have had their confidence on this question very rudely shaken. They are now on the "show me" side of the fence and they have many friends to whom the word doubt is not a stranger. These doubting Thomases have been doing some tall thinking during the last few years. Personal and other experiences have started the clockwork in their think-boxes moving, very slowly at first, but gaining in momentum as the months go by, and now this military question has fallen on some minds at least that are in a mobile state and will not be gulped down like the big fish does the little one. These minds are not unmindful of the fear that vested interests have for the safety of that which they control, a large part of which is the result of a legalized highway robbery. They know that the greatest fear these barons have is that they may in turn be robbed of their illegally acquired plunder; they know, also, that the plunderers through their inhuence and governmental control will force the plundered to stand guard over that which they themselves have been robbed, exposing valuable lives to the piercing of bullets and the smashing of cannon, while the robber barons hie themselves to places of safety, to later emerge finding themselves more deeply and thoroughly entrenched than ever before. The workers have ever been willing to give their lives for their country when attacked, but they have a new thought coming when they see in the militarist spirit a noose by which they may later hang themselves. Preparedness is all right for the protection from an attacking enemy from the outside, but when it is to be used for oppressive methods where the workers inside are concerned the horse changes color.

What is to become of the efficiency victims?—that is, the old men who have served the useful days of their lives in a calling, only to suddenly find themselves ruthlessly thrown on the scrap pile to