The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1906-03-22
ROOSEvELT'S REPLY
To Petition and Addresses of Omcers
OF Labor Federation.


men Of the American Federation at
the White House Wednesday afternoon
PRESIDENT Roosevelt said:
MI. Gompers. If your body OBJ
Jects TO the passage of the proposed
ant-inJunction bill, / have no question
that you can stop it, for there is not a
capitalist concerned who simply as a
capitalist is not against it; though /
pe3eve goodly numbers, both of capi-
tallstS and wage workers, Who are con-
cerned primarily as citizens favor it.
me law was worked over and substan-
tally whipped into its present shape at
number of conferences between rep
T6senEauVeS OF railroad organizations
and the department Of justice and bu-
reau OF corporations with me. 1t goes
as Tar as 1 personally think it should
go IN limiting the right of injunction;
at any rate no arguments have hitherto
been advanced which make me think
It should go farther. I do not think it
has any chance of passage because
there has been great criticism in both
houses Of congress against the attitude
OF the administration in going so far
as we have gone; and if you think it Is
not far enough. why you will have no
earthly difficulty in killing the bill.
Personally, 1 think the proposed law
most admirable one, and I very sin
cerely wish it would be put through
AS for the right of injunction, it is
absolutely necessary to have this power
lodged in the courts; though of course
be reprobated. During the four and a
half years that have been president
don't remember an instance where the
government has invoked the right of
Injunction against combinations of la
Dor. We have invoked it, certainly a
score of times, against combinations of
capital, 1 think possibly oftener. Thus
though We have secured the issuance
of injunchons in a number of cases
against capitalist concerns it has hap
pened we have never tried to secure
an injunction against a com bination of
labor. But understand me, gentlemen
if ever thought it necessary. if
thought a cOmbina ton of laborers
we're doing wrong, I would apply for
an injunction against them Just as
quick as against so many capitalists.
Replies to Petition.
Now I come to the general subject
of your petition. I wish in the first
place to state my regret that you did
not divorce so much Of the petition as
refers to the action of the executive
from so much as refers to the action of
the legislative branches, because I can
not consider any petition that you
make that reflects upon the coordinate
branch of the government or that
makes any charges whatever against it.
would not even receive it, save for
the fact that in part it affects the ex-
ecutive. Therefore, IN what I have to
say, shall limit myself solely to what
the executive.
You speak of the eight hour law.
our criticism. so far as it relates to
the executive. bears upon the signature
Of the appropriation bill containing
the money for expenditure on the
Panama canal. with the proviso that
eight hour law shall not there apply.
If your statement is intended to mean
that no opportunity was given for a
hearing. then the statement is not in
aPP0TCa with the f9nfG I'M wa <
ample opportunity that any one could
be heard, but not a single request for
such a hearing came to me. I received,
however, some hundreds of telegra ms
and letters requesting the veto of the
entire appropriation bill because It
contained that provisO. Frankly, I
found it difficult to believe that you
were writing and telegraphing with
any kind of knowledge Of the condi-
tons in the case I believe emphati-
cally in the eight hour law for our own
people, in our own country. But the
conditions of labor such as we have to
work with in the tropics are so alb
sOluteIy different that there Is no pos
sible analogy between them and an
eight hour law for the Panama canal is
an absurdity. Every one of you knows
that we can not get white labor, can
not get labor of the United States to go
to Panama and work. We are driven
to extremities in the effort to get any
kind of labor at all Just al the mo-
ment, we are working chiefly with ne
grOes from the West Indies. The usual
result in the employment Of those men
is that, Monday and Tuesday they
work fairly well, Wednesday and
Thursday there is a marked falling off,
and by Friday and Saturday not more
than half, sometimes less than a
fourth of the laboTers will be at work.
The conditions that make the eight
hour law proper here have no possible
reference to the conditions that make
the eight hour law entirely improper
there The conditions are so utterly
different on the Isthmus as compared
to here, that it is impossible to draw
conclusions affecting the one from
what is true about the other.
You hamper me in the effort to get
for YOU what I think you ought 70
have in connection with the 8-hOur
law when you make a request that IS
indefensible and to grant which would
mean indefinite delay and injury to
the work on the isthmus.
LAS to the violation Of the 8-houT
law, Mr.. Morrison, you give me no
specifications. At your earliest con
venience please lay before me in de-
latiOn of the hour law. Where I
have power I viii see that the law is
obeyed. All I ask IS that you give me
the cases. I viii take them up and
facts I shall see that the law is en-
forced.
Chinese Exclusion
Now about the Chinese exclusion.
The number Of Chinese now in this
country is. If remember Alright, some
$4,000 or 10000. So far from there be-
ing a great influx of the Chinese, the
fact is that the number has steadily
decreased. There are fewer Chinese
than there were ten years ago; fewer
than 20 years ago; fewer than 80 years
ago. Internationally some scores nf
cases occur each year where Chinese
laborers get in either by being snug
gled over the Mexican and Canadian
borders, or by coming IN under false