Milford chronicle., 1912-02-02
BTaHdeis Th9yGat TCOLlttIH
For Necessities Of Lie.
QUOTES AMAZING FIGURES
Declares Enormous Profits of Trust
Are Used to Crime Down Employees
to Present Miserable Condition.

That 80 per cent Of tile employees OF
the United States Steel Corporation in
the Pittsburg district earn less than
the actual cost OF subsistence of the
average American (anily IN rittsburg,
was calculation maize before the
Stanley steel trust probers in Wash
ington by Louis u. Brandeis.
The Associated Charities OF Pitts
burg computed the cost OF bare exist
ence of family OF a husband. a wife
and three children in that city at Si6S
a year" said he. BY working twelve
hours a day, 365 days a year, 65 per
cent of the steel workers there earn
$3.50 less than the amount actually re-
quired for the bare cost of living"
Mr. Brandeis declared that in ten
years the Steel corporation mad taken
from the American people $G5e.oO0,OOO
in excess Of liberal prof, on lis invest
ment.
This enormous profit" he said,
has been used to grind down its EN-
ployes to the misery OF their present
condition.
American labor has been driven from
the plants OF the s,eel industry byI
long hours and lower wages ana a sys-
TEN Of repression and espionage not
to be found generally outside Of Rus
sia, according TO Mr.. Brandeis.
we have been hearing lot about
the tariff which will protect Ameri-
can labor, but the commissioner OF
labor tells us that 90 per cent of the
steel employees are foreign born, and
out OF all American labor II per cent
are foreign born.
Mr. Young, Of Michigan, interrupted
him, saying: Such figures would sus-
gest there is contract labor"
Il don't know" replied Brande.s. |
but any large employer of labor finds |
it possible without entering into vio-
lation Of the contract labor laws to at |
tract to his place people who would |
not otherwise come. The 40 per cent !
of slaves and 20 per cent OF other for
eign laborers in the steel plant is not
an accident When sou find this per |
you may conclude, 1 take it, |
that the result is one that was cOntem- |
plated and desired, especially as it ap- |
peared in one Of the most thorough or
CARNATIONS in the world"
Mr.. Brandeis read from reports Of
John A. Fitch, Of the Russell Sage
Survey. in which Fitch charges that in
all mill towns, save McKeesport, Pa,
the United States Steel corporation IS
the dominant political factor, dictating
the votes OF its employees. In McKees
port, he said, this influence is shared
by the brewery people.
Referring further 20 Fitch's book,
Brandeis read an anonymous state
ment that in May, 1908. the officers Of
he Steel corporation ordered the su-
Derintendents at the Edgar Thompson
plant, at Braddock, Pa, 10 line up its
men for Penrose. Penrose, said Bran
ieis. was the anti-lccal option man.
and the superintendent who were
-orced to work for him were all local
option men.
Brandeis assailed the pension sys
EN- of the Steel corporation as d
pension peonage.' and then passed TO
|. discussion Of the so-calleo bonus sys-
EN- and the stock purchase system.
I'm the division of the bonus fund
n one of the plants. he said, out of
eventy-twO employees who received
eward, ftty-two were superintendents,
assistant superintendents and foremen,
line we're civil and mechanical engi-
leers. six we're in the mechanical de-
,artment, and five were OF the office
administrative force. There was not a
abOrer benefited by the fund.
ut gives the incentive which is the
most feared by the workmen-not the
incentive to drive men, but
he incentive to drive men in the hope
t a reward To speak of the stock
purchase feature as profit-sharing is
misnOmer.'