The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1896-12-29
ON INDUSTRIAL NOBILITY
THE LABOR PROBLEM CONSIDERED
FROM An ETHICAL PLANE.

President Adams of Michigan University
Views the Question From u Novel Stand
point-Freedom of the Individual to
Realize Himself Essential-Collective
Bargaining Imperative.
Baltimore, Md, Dec. 2S.-Levering
hall of Johns Hopkins university was
we'll filed with economists from all
parts of the country when Professor
Henry C. Adams, president, called the
ninth annual meeting Of the American
Economic association TO order this
morning. President Gilman of Johns
Hopkins university welcomed the visit
ors. President Adams, who IS profess
sor in the University Of Michigan, re-
sponded and then delivered an address
on 1.-The Relation Of Economies to Jur-
isprudence." He said in part:
employers still asserc their pur-
pose to bargain with Individual en-
ployes, and the employees still show a
timidity amounting at times even 10
ccwardice, in the presence of definitely
expressed responsibilities. Neither
party appears to recognize that the
sociology of the industrial process has
rendered collective bargaining impera-
tive in order that due regard may be
paid to the instinct of individualism by
which both are impelled.
"The one thing needed is a true anal
ysfs of the situation and n satisfactory
expression of the advantages that
would accrue from the labor contract.
"Of the labor contract itself little can
be said with confidence. 1t is likely
that it will provide for determining pay
for the work after the work is done;
that it will secure to each worker an
industrial home; that 1t will provide
for a board of arbitration in each in
dustry 1t is likely that the bylaws
of this court of arbitration and the
decisions which it renders will evertu-
ally come to be a common law of labor
rights.
Arbitration would result in a valued
| possession or privilege of the worker
and on this account he would become a
responsible party in the world of in
dustrial association. Wherever the in
terests of a society at large are con-
| cerned increased distress will be laid
upon the theory of Industrial agency.
There is no necessity for the develop
ment of new principle, but rather for
the return to an old principle well rec
ognized by common law. The problem to
which this thought leads is the one
forced upon our attention by the evolu-
tion of corporations, trusts and great
Industries. The theory properly ad-
justed to the needs of our time Is of
q dual character. 1t must first express
the rights Of individuals associated to-
gether in an industrial unit; it must
next express the duties of these indus
trial units to the public at large.
THE former constitutes the labor
problem and the test of it's solution
should be freedom for the individual to
realize himself. The latter constitutes
the monopoly problem and should aim
at a just price and the preservation of
industrial nobility. Provided these
| rights can be discovered and expressed
in such a manner that they may be
incorporated into contract on the one
| hand and in Legislative enactments on
| the other, there is no reason in the ma
| ture of the case why harmony cannot
| be restored to the industrial world"
A public reception followed the pa
per of President Adams. The paper
will be discussed at to-morrow's ses-
| sion.
The convention will be continued un-
til Thursday.