STATEMENT OF MR. B. H. ROBERTS, OF WASHINGTON, D. C..

Mr. WHEELER. Are you located in Washington?

Mr. ROBERTS. I am secretary of W. F. Roberts Co.

Mr. WHEELER. Florists?

Mr. ROBERTS. Printers. I would like to state-shall I just tell it. in my own words ?

Mr. WHEELER. Yes.

Mr. ROBERTS. In 1904 our organization up to that time had been a union affair but we were called upon to sign an agreement employing only union men, which was repulsive to our principles of business. and we refused to sign it.

Mr. BLANTON. You were running an open shop ?

Mr. ROBERTS. We are.

Mr. BLANTON. And you were then?

Mr. ROBERTS. And we were then.

Mr. BLANTON. And employ union and nonunion men?

Mr. ROBERTS. Yes, sir; we refused to employ only union men or rather we refused to sign a contract to only employ union men, and our works was picketed, our men were thugged and people stood on the outside and yelled at our patrons, and in one instance beat up a patron, and, in other words, gave us a general hard time and all but broke up our organization until we were relieved by a restraining order from Justice Stafford. We applied for a writ of injunction and obtained that writ through the employing printers association here, and that prohibited interference with our men. Since that time we have conducted an open shop, but I just want to state that picketing in our particular instance, if it had been permitted to have lasted much longer, would have completely put us out of business. Mr. SPROUL. How long did it last?

Mr. ROBERTS. It lasted, I should say, about eight weeks.

Mr. WHEELER. You know of your own knowledge that the union men were responsible, of course, for the picketing.

Mr. ROBERTS. In a good many instances they were our own union men and in other instances men whom we had never seen before. Mr. WHEELER. Was it those men that slugged and beat up certain parties?

Mr. ROBERTS. I could not state positively about that part of it. I know that in several instances there was that kind of business but we could never locate the parties.

Mr. WHEELER. So you do not know whether it was some drunken fellow who did not belong to the union or whether it was a union

man.

Mr. ROBERTS. Well, it was our opinion and we had reason to substantiate but not to prove it, that they were hired men. Mr. WHEELER. Hired men?

Mr. ROBERTS. Yes; men hired by the union, probably.

Mr. BLANTON. Right in that connection, gentlemen, I want to introduce this article.

Mr. WHEELER. Did you want to ask him any further questions or are you through with him?

Mr. BLANTON. I may want to ask him some questions after I have read this article.

Mr. WnCELER. I understood he was in a hurry to get away.

Mr. ROBERTS. I will be very glad to wait, if I can be of any assistance.

Mr. BLANTON. I offer this from the Chicago Daily Tribune of May 11, 1921:

TWO UNION CHIEFS FOUND GUILTY OF SLUGGING PLOT DRAW PRISON TERMS AND HEAVY FINES.

What is considered a smashing blow was struck at labor slugging and bomb outrages yesterday when a jury in Judge Thomas Taylor's court found Edwin E. Graves, of Boston, international vice president of the Upholsterers' Union, and Roy F. Hull, business agent of Chicago local No. 111, guilty on conspiracy charges and sentenced them to the penitentiary from one to five years and to pay a fine of $2,000 each. Rudolph Krueger, member of the executive committee, was found not guilty. The verdict came as a climax to a trial lasting over four weeks which was replete with sensations.

GROWS OUT OF STRIKE VIOLENCE.

The indictments grew out of violence and destruction of property which marked the upholsterers' strike in Chicago more than a year ago. The strike was ended when the police arrested 15 members of the union.

The strike was called in August, 1919, and continued until April, 1920. For more than a year Graves fought extradition, taking the case up to the Supreme Court of Massachusetts. He had come from Boston early in the strike and directed its activities.

WITNESS TELLS OF SLUGGING.

Samuel Fisher, principal witness for the State, told a story of having been hired by Graves and Hull to carry on a campaign of terror by slugging employees and employers in the upholstery industry. He quoted his prices for broken noses, arms, and heads as ranging from $10 to $100.

Then, I offer from the same paper this article [indicating], to show that even girls were connected with graft that was carried on in that city, through the leaders, to the detriment of the people and their own employees. This is from the same paper.

Mr. SPROUL. That has nothing to do with picketing.

Mr. BLANTON. That is carrying out the statement of Mr. Roberts that they did slug his patrons and his employees.

Mr. SPROUL. I mean this last article that you put in there.

Mr. BLANTON. That is in connection with that same question in Chicago.

MA. SPROUL. Just a minute. That is on the graft proposition that they have up there now. That is not on picketing, is it?

Mr. BLANTON. It is on both, I think. It covers both questions. Mr. SPROUL. If it does not cover the picketing proposition, I certainly object to it going into the record, because we are not taking that up now. We are not here on the graft proposition.

Mr. BLANTON. I want to state this, gentlemen: I was on the bench for eight years as a circuit judge trying cases; and I have tried hundreds of cases, and whenever I went into a case I went into the merits from beginning to end; but since I have been in Congress I have found out that the greatest trouble with us Congressmen is that whenever we start an investigation, whenever we get off of a certain particular line, we are stopped. If Congress can not go into a full investigation of a subject, then the people are absolutely helpless.

Mr. SPROUL. The probabilities are, Mr. Chairman, that I may be wrong about this; but this article is headed, "Girls accused of union

graft to face juries." I am perfectly willing to take up the graft case if the committee wants that to be taken up.

Mr. BLANTON. I am willing to withdraw that article if he wants me to, and we will thrash that out later.

Mr. SPROUL. We are here on a picketing bill and not on the graft proposition. If we are going into the graft proposition we should take up the question of all the graft in this country, not only with labor leaders but with the contractors and employers of labor as well. Mr. BLANTON. What was it you wanted to state, Mr. Roberts? Mr. ROBERTS. I just wanted to make one statement in connection with this picketing proposition that I did not get in my previous testimony, and that is this: In a great many instances the patrons and the employees were yelled at and accosted and intimidated, and in granting a writ of injunction stopping this matter, Justice Stafford made it quite drastic. In other words, he prevented the union pickets from even talking to our men, and that was a point, it seemed to me, you should know, because it was in that particular that we were protected, and that is where we sought protection.

The CHAIRMAN. I would like to ask these two gentlemen while they are here, some questions. It has always been my impression that the attributes or qualifications necessary to become a member of a union were faithfulness and efficiency, and that where a union man did a job of work it was presumed to be well done, and that the union taught the best kind of discipline and faithfulness. From what you say they come and work from 11 o'clock until 2 o'clock, and that would necessarily have to be a species of labor profiteering of some kind, and would be altogether contrary to my conception of what a union man ought to be, because I think he should be a better man than the others, and I thought he was taken into the union for that reason. I want to know what is your judgment of that as employers here, and then I want to have the union men reply to that, as to whether or not I am correct in my presumption.

Mr. WALLACE. I would like to answer your question.

Mr. BLANTON. In that connection, Mr. Gude, when they came to you and demanded that you unionize your shop, they did not ask you anything about the efficiency of your employees or whether or not they would make good union men; they just wanted you to unionize them just like they came, so many head?

Mr. GUDE. Yes; and if I said they were florists, whether they were bootblacks, or what not, they were florists.

Mr. BLANTON. The main thing was to unionize them and take them into the union.

Mr. GUDE. That was the sole idea and the reason they gave for picketing our shop was not because they had a grudge against us and not because we did not pay our men enough, but because they needed our shop to force the others into the union.

Mr. BLANTON. Mr. Gude, is there any union shop in Washington that pays its employees more than you pay yours? Mr. GUDE. Oh, no, sir.

Mr. BLANTON. You pay yours as much as any shop?

Mr. GUDE. I am told there are two union shops here; one has only one employee, and that is his brother, and the other one is a promiscuous institution.

Mr. BLANTON. Mr. Roberts, do you pay your employees less than the union employees receive?

Mr. ROBERTS. We do not, and in most cases more.

Mr. BLANTON. State whether or not your employees are satisfied. Mr. ROBERTS. Absolutely.

Mr. BLANTON. They would not be unionized unless you made them?

Mr. ROBERTS. They would not be unionized under any circum

stances.

Mr. BLANTON. That is all.

Mr. ROBERTS. Now, I might answer the gentleman's question as to loyalty by referring him to the printers' oath.

The CHAIRMAN. The union oath?

Mr. ROBERTS. The union oath.

The CHAIRMAN. They take an oath, do they?

Mr. ROBERTS. Yes; and their oath ties them up to allegiance to the union above country, State, and everything else.

Mr. BLANTON. Above fraternity, State, and church.

Mr. ROBERTS. It does.

The CHAIRMAN. And above their country?

Mr. ROBERTS. It does, sir.

Mr. BLANTON. In that connection, I will put a copy of the oath in the record.

The CHAIRMAN. Above their country?

Mr. ROBERTS. Above their country, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you agree with that?

Mr. WALLACE. I absolutely deny the assertion.

Mr. BLANTON. You just keep still in this committee and don't interfere with a Member of Congress when he is conducting an examination.

Mr. WALLACE. I was asked the question.

Mr. BLANTON. As a Member of Congress I am not going to permit permit these interruptions. I will treat you fairly and squarely, but you are not going to run this hearing. This is one hearing before Congress you are not running.

The CHAIRMAN. Let him go ahead and tell about that oath.

Mr. ROBERTS. I have not a copy of the oath here.

Mr. BLANTON. I have a copy.

Mr. SPROUL. Have you a copy of it here?

Mr. BLANTON. No; but I have one at my office.

Mr. ROBERTS. It places the loyalty of a member of the union, as I have stated before, above country and above everything else.

Mr. FOCHT. I am a publisher also and employ a number of men, and they are efficient. I pay them the highest topnotch wages, and I would rather pay them 50 per cent more than have indifferent men. They are loyal and faithful and capable. They are not union men at all. Am I to understand that if they were to go into a union they would have to subscribe to an oath that broke up their loyalty to me and to the plant and to their country and to their church?

Mr. ROBERTS. I mean just that.

Mr. BLANTON. To be fair to the union, I would like for the stenographer to put this oath in the record word for word, just like it reads without our interpretation of it. I want to be perfectly fair to the union and let the oath speak for itself, because we might put an in

terpretation, in trying to repeat what its effect is, that would not be fair to the union, and in lieu of remarks about what the oath contains, let the reporter put the oath itself in the record, which I will furnish to the reporter. It will be the oath that these gentlemen will admit is the oath, and they will not deny it is the oath.

Mr. FоCHT. Did either of you gentlemen hear anything from the head of these lodges condemning this action of going around and calling people scabs in front of their door instead of simply walking out and waiting until an opportunity came to talk across the table with you about an increase of wages or an adjustment of time. Do the heads of the lodges condone that sort of thing or encourage it?

Mr. ROBERTS. That is a question I am unable to answer, inasmuch as I have had nothing to do with union men since the time stated. which was some time back.

Mr. FOCHT. I am for the union and for the advancement of the men as we understand unions in Pennsylvania and as we have them on the Pennsylvania Railroad; and that is, to better their condition, to make them happier, and to make their families happier, and they never strike on the Pennsylvania Railroad. They have insurance and everything of that sort, and are perfectly contented and happy, and I have been for them, and have voted for them in the Pennsylvania Legislature and also here, but this is something new to me, gentlemen, I must confess, if you are bound down by an oath against your country and everything else in favor of the union.

Mr. WALLACE. Mr. Chairman, may I be permitted to answer that question?

Mr. FOCHT. It is a bad thing for your organization if that is so.

(At this point an oath was administered for the subcommittee to Mr. Edgar Wallace and Mr. B. H. Roberts, covering the statements previously made by them in this hearing as well as those to be made subsequently.)

TESTIMONY OF MR. EDGAR WALLACE, WASHINGTON, D. C., REPRESENTING THE AMERICAN FEDERATION OF LABOR.

Mr. WALLACE. Mr. Blanton made the statement that one of the pickets was fined for making a remark to a woman that if she patronized that hotel she was indecent.

Mr. BLANTON. I read an article in reference to that.

Mr. WALLACE. If that is the case, and I do not doubt but it may have happened, is there not a law covering any act of any man of that kind, whether he be a picket, or otherwise, if he went beyond his rights as a picket?

Mr. SPROUL. He was fined $25, according to that statement.

Mr. WALLACE. There is a law covering such language, and the same thing applies to the article that you read from the Chicago Tribune, which in effect was that a man was slugged. There is a law against slugging and there is a law against using language that people should

not use.

Mr. BLANTON. Indecent language in the presence of women.

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir; and hence they were fined, and the law is

sufficient.

Mr. SPROUL. I want to ask a question right there: Of the sluggers, how many are caught? Not one in a hundred is caught, is he?