Wheeling majority. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1907-192?, 1910-04-14
Labor Turned Down.
President is Interested in ArmoT
Plate, But Not in
Men.

Washington, D.: c. April 9.-Presi-
dent Taft's assurance to delegation
of business men from Bethlehem,
Pa, that the government will con-
tinue to buy Bethlehem steel regard
less of the charge made by the strik-
ers that the products of the company
is. of an inferior quality, turned out
by incompetent scahs. brought forth
a ringing denunciatfen from >Presi-
dent Gompers of the American Fed
Grafton of Labor. Gompers said
Gompers Flags Taft.
"The presidents utterance to the
delegation of business men of Beth
lehem who were coereed by. the Beth
lehem Steel company is but confirm
ing as well as disappointing.
Disappointing that he would
carry his former attitude toward la
Dor to the logical conclusion, regard
less of underlying causes, confirming
of his utterances and actions in every
material issue in which the real. in
terests of labor are involved.
According to the presidents posi-
ton it is not the governments CON-
Germ how brutal and inhuman the
workers of a concern are treated; it
matters not whether American work
ers are displaced by the worst ele-
ments of foreign labor, Coolie, Jap
or Slav, whether Americanism may
be possible aof development among a.
company's employees, it is simply a
question of product, So long as the
product is acceptable, the producers
may be damned for all time in the
production,
President Stands Pat.
I ''The president stands pat on the
tariff in products from foreign coun-
tries and stands equally pat in the
free trade in labor from all climes
and under any conditions"
Other labor leaders interviewed by
the Pan-American Press were equally
strong in their condemnation of what
may be considered the most bare
faced attack on labor made by the
present administration.
After speech by H. J. Myers, who,
headed the business mems" delega-
/
tion,- in which he told the president
that the reputable citizens of Beth
lehem condemn the. efforts of the
professional agitators to injure the
company" the Father Of Injunc-
tons replied, in part:
81 am utterly opposed to the prin-
ciple of boycott. Every issue
ought to be settled on it's own merits.
If the Bethlehem work isn't up to
contract, then the government ought
not to give the contracts to it. If it
is then the contract ought to go to
it without regard to any controversy
the Bethlehem company may have
with third persons, whether those
persons are consumers or employees.
Speaks ON Boycott.
''The merits of the controversy be-
tween Bethlehem and its employees,
in so far as the public is concerned,
will be settled on the merits of that
controversy, and the mutual rela-
lions or lack of relations, between
the Bethlehem company and their
employees; and there is no relation
between the one controversy and the
other, because say that with en-
phasis-because to hold otherwise is
to introduce into government meth
DDS the system upon which the boy
colt rests, to wit, that third persons
are to be involved against their will
in a controversy with respect to
; which they have no natural relation.
/ ''That is the position occupy. 1t
Il is the position my administration, as
far as | can control it, will occupy"
! The Bethlehem Steel company,