The Butler County press. [volume], April 15, 1938, Image 1

About The Butler County press. [volume] (Hamilton, Ohio) 1900-1946

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breast
AFL Rallies Full Strength
For Chinese Civilian Relief
Washington, D. C. (ILNS)—Four
million members of the American Fed
eration of Labor thus far are enlisted
in the
campaign
Serving with Mr. Woll on the na
tional committee, of which William
Green, president of the American Fed
eration of Labor, is honorary chair
man,are more than 100 officers of na
tional and international unions, he
said.
State Organization Pushed
Organization of state committees
also is well underway, according to
Mr. Woll, with twenty-five state chair
men actively engaged in forming lo
cal committees within their states. Cit
ies where these units of the national
committee have been formed represent
a population of more than 40,000,000
people, he revealed.
Sub-divisions of the national com
mittee also are being formed, accord
ing to Woll, and these have been divid
ed into the following classifications,
newspaper publishers, fraternal and
civic groups, writers' divisions, speak
ers and radio.
Four Million Trade Unionists Throughout Nation Enlist
In Campaign to Raise Funds to Aid Victims of Japan
ese Invasion, Chairman Woll, of Labor's Relief Com
mittee, Announces.
9
being formulated by
labor's committee for civilian relief in
China, Matthew Woll, chairman of the
committee, announced here.
Chairman Woll, who announced in
itial organization of the committee
several weeks ago, said that funds
raised through activities sponsored by
the committee would go for aid of the
more than 30,000,000 Chinese civil
ians who have been victimized by the
Japanese invasion of North China.
Declaring that the response of news
paper editors to invitations to serve
on this division of the committee has
been more than heartening, Woll an
nounced that to date 625 editors of
daily and weekly newspapers have sig
nified their active support of the
cause of Chinese civilian victims of
the Japanese invasion by accepting
membership on the committee. More
than 100 radio stations also are lined
up behind the committee, he said, and
seven heads of leading national fra
ternal and civic organizations are
represented on this sub-committee.
"The cause of the millions of Chi
nese civilians who have been rendered
homeless and destitute by the Japan
ese invasion of North China is one
that strikes a sympathetic chord in
the
of every member of the
American Federation of Labor," Mr.
Woll declared.
"And the responses we have received
from every one whom we have asked
to serve with us makes me feel that
Social Security
Benefits Children
Columbus (OLNS)—Very few chil
dren receiving assistance under the
aid to dependent children section of
the social security act become juven
ile delinquents, Judge Henry J. Robi
son, chief of the state division of pub
lic assistance, announced last week.
Unofficial figures gathered by the
division disclosed that Ohio's aid to
dependent children program, provid
ing care for thousands of neglected
and dependent youngsters, deserves
credit as a big factor in helping to
reduce juvenile delinquency among
under-privileged youth.
More than 28,000 children in Ohio
are being cared for under the pro
gram, Judge Robison said. They are
youngsters, mostly under 16 years of
age, who came from homes threatened
with being broken because of the
death, absence or incapacity of the
wage-earner.
Through the program, these chil
dren are being kept together in their
own homes or those of blood rela
tives, under the supervision and ad
vice of the division of publpic assist
HAMILTON, OHIO
all of our fellow Americans are
equally as sympathetic toward this
campaign on behalf of the more than
20,000,000 Chinese civilian victims of
undeclared war.
"Authentic dispatches received at
the New York headquarters of our
committee report almost unbelievable
horrors which the Chinese civilian
population in the path of the Japan
ese advance is undergoing.
Wounded Lie Untended
"Eye witness correspondents report
that the sight of men, woiyien and
children, maddened by the pangs of
hunger, raking through refuse piles
with the pitiful hope of finding a mor
sel of something edible is a common
sight. We learn also from reliable
sources that the wounded lie side by
side with the dead in fields, ditches
and roads for days, while a dreadfully
nadequate force of heroic doctors and
nurses attempts to cope with needs
unequalled within memory of our
modern civilization.
"These are some of the conditions
labor's committee for civilian relief
in China will attempt to alleviate by
raising funds for a people who sent
more than $1,4425,000 to American
agencies for comforts and necessities
of American soldiers during the
World War."
GREEN SAYS
Government Rail Ownership
Is Sure to Come
Chicago (ILNS)—President Wil
liam Green, of the American Federa
tion of Labor, told the A. F. of L.
Railroad Employes' department con
vention here that railroads should be
taken over by the national govern
ment.
"Railroad lines are headed toward
inevitable government ownership," he
said, "It is the only permanent, prac
tical remedy for the problem as pre
sented by the owners. The railroad
situation is extremely bad."
Green, charged that rail manage
ments were responsible for the des
perate plight of the roads, adding
that if they had paid off some of
their debts from year to year in the
past, the present huge debts would
not have been accumulated.
"The only way the railroads can
be saved, the interest of the workers
maintained and service be kept up
for the good of the country is through
government ownership," the labor
head said.
Discussing the present wage sit
uation in general, Green sail that in
service to the nation by maintaining
dustry and management could do a
existing levels and if possible raising
them. He said that the favored few
with regular incomes could not buy
enough goods from industry to keep
the country's economic machine ruli
ng at high speed. It took huge
buying power such as could only be
furnished by the rank and file of all
workers in this country.
Labor Party Wins
In Queensland
Washington, D. C. (ILNS)—Wire
less dispatches from Brisbane, Aus
tralia, say that the labor party has
won the parliamentary election of
Queensland by quite an unexpected
majority. It will have at least 43
votes in the parliament to 19 held
by all others.
Queensland, the northeastern state
of Australia, and two and a half times
as large as Texas, has had a labor
government for 24 years, except the
period from 1929 to 1932.
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EHE BUTLER COUNTY PRESS
VOL. XXXVIII. No. 2 HAMILTON, OHIO, FRIDAY, APRIL 15,1938 ONE DOLLAR PER YEAR
Also, in some fashion, they must be
saved. They are still, though no
longer a monopoly, the greatest
single agency of transportation. You
cannot imagine the modern United
States without railroads.
It would be presumption to lay out
a complete plan for rehabilitating the
railroads. It is not presumption, but
a necessary bit of common sense, to
point out some things that any rail
road cure must include and two
things should be clear from the start.
Labor Must Be Protected
First, the railroads must not and
cannot be cured at the cost-of their
workers. That would please Wall
street, no doubt but it would be in
justice and misfortune to everyone
else. Railroad labor is not overpaid
now, and never has been. Some of
it, the maintenance of way men, for
example, is wretchedly underpaid
If any cure is found that involves the
abandonment of services and even of
lines, the men must be compensated
for the loss of their jobs, and, if re
quired to move, for their homes.
It is a very fortunate circumstance
that the railroad unions are fully alive
to this need, and that railroad man
agements in some instances have con
ceded most of what is here stated. It
is another fortunate circumstance
that President Roosevelt has made it
clear that he wants no railroad wage
cuts.
Cuts in Capitalization Due
Another thing equally certain but
not so well guarded as the first is
that no plan should be considered
which does not make drastic cuts in
the present overcapitalization of the
railroads. They have always been
overcapitalized. The Cullom Com
mittee, which held protracted hear
ings all over the country in 1886 be
fore drawing up the interstate com-r
merce commission law which was
passed in 1887, reported that at least
one-third of the capitalization of the
railroads at that time was just plain
water.
That is pretty nearly true today
Exposing the Easter Bunny
hi
v
Sentiment Strongly Against Making Workers
Pay for Carriers' Rehabilitation, Though This
Would Please Wall Street Interests.
No. 3
By ELIOT HARRIS
Washington, D. C. (ILNS)—Wh^t
must the railroads do to be saved—
or what must be done to them to save
them? Some of the 'best minds in
America are being concentrated on
answers to those questions and the
problem is well worth all the brains
that can be brought to it. Taken to
ether, railroads are one of our sick
industries. If they had been in the
market for materials and labor for
the last year as they were in earlier
times, we should have heard much less
about the recession.
*The railroads are capitalized at
around $23,000,000,000. The market
value of their outstanding securities
may be half that sum, but one doubts
it. The actual prudent investment is
certainly very much less. Wall Street
will fight and scheme endlessly for
some plan that will turn water into
gold.
Watchfulness Demanded
The attitude of high menace is
shown by the Wall Street Journal,
which, not so long before the crash
of 1929, said that the railroads could
not be reproduced for less than $55,
000,000,000 and asked with an air
of injured innocence why they should
not be allowed to earn profits on that
s*um.
President Roosevelt is on record
as in favor of cutting down the capi
talization of electric utilities and
may be trusted to take the same at
titude with railroads. No small num
ber of congressmen and senators
know the situation fore and aft. The
courts may not be awake to the facts
but at least, railroad attorneys have
no such grip on the supreme court as
they once did. But this is a matter,
none the less, which demands inces
sant watchfulness from the public.
A national subsidy or some sort
may be necessary as a start but as a
permanent cure, it would be worse
than the disease.
60-Year-Old Union
Cleveland (OLNS)—Opening of the
1938 Great Lakes shipping season
marked the 60th anniversary of the
Sailors' Union of the Great Lakes, the
oldest trade union of sailors in the
worl.d.
The original organization was ef
fected at Chicago in 1863, and was
reorganized April 1, 1878, to enlarge
its activities to cover the entire lake
area. The union played an important
part in the formation of the American
Federation of Labor, and has remain
ed an affiliate of that organization
since its inception.
Union Teachers To
Meet at Cincinnati
Cincinnati (OLNS)—The 1938 con
vention of the American Federation
of Teachers' International Union, af
filiated with the American Federation
of Labor, will be held in this city
August 15 to 19. The Sinton Hotel
has been chosen as the convention
site and headquarters, according to
word received from Irvin R. Kuenzli,
Chicago, executive secretary of the
Teachers' International Union.
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UNION LABOR LIFE TO MEET
Baltimore, Md. (ILNS)—The an
nual stockholders' meeting of the
Union Labor Life Insurance Company
will be held at the Lord Baltimore
Hotel here on April 20. Directors will
be elected and other business trans
acted.
5
A Mattress
You'll Be
Proud To
Own
THIRD
in
EMPLOYER
Must Put Agreements With
Workers Into Writing
....Washington, D. C. (ILNS)—The
NLRB has decided in the case of the
Inland Steel Company of Chicago and
the Steel Workers' organizing com
mittee that if an employer, bargain
ing collectively with his employes,
comes to an agreement, that agree
ment must be put in writing and sign
ed. The decision is a long one, cover
ing many points but the heart of the
much-discussed bargain-but-not-sign
doctrine as the board views it is here:
"The respondent (Inland Steel) is
correct in its assertion that it is not
compelled to reach an agreement.
However, the precise question before
us is a different one. It is whether
a refusal to embody, in a signed
agreement, any understandings that
may be reached, constitutes a failure
to bargain collectively within the
meaning of the act."
The board further says that a will
ingness to write out and sign any
agreement actually reached is an in
tegral part of bona fide collective bar
gaining. It says:
"Employes, in insisting on a writ
ten agreement, are merely asking
what any prudent business man would
expect as a matter of course from
those with whom he deals.
"The respondent (Inland Steel), in
dealing with a large automotive con
cern, for example, would be expected
to refrain from the obvious impro
priety of rebuffing an attempt to en
ter into a contract, and insisting on
mere negotiation without reduction of
the terms to a written agreement.
Such conduct is simply not engaged
in between concerns dealing as
equals."
New York City (ILNS)—New York
University has signed a collective
bargaining agreement with the Build
ing Service Employes' Union for 280
of its workers who fall in that classi
fication. They get a $2 a week raise
all around. The minimum wage is
put at $23 a week, and hours at 44
a week.
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