Kentucky Irish American. (Louisville, Ky.) 1898-1968, 1914-12-12
Secretary of Labor Wilson Was
Graduated From That
School.
His Address at American Feder-
alton of Labor Worth
study.
HUMAN BEING VERSUS MACHINE

The son of a common working
man. later a miner and member OF
various trades unions for forty
three years, now a member OF Will
sons Cabinet, a foremost statesman
of the land, is the record of Hon.
William B. Wilson, graduate OF the
\ school of trade unionism. Indeed it
was not his family connections, or
education, nor his wealth and grad
ual rise in Government employ that
7 made a statesman out of the trade
unionist. but merely the experience
gained in the weekly and monthly
meetings of his union, at the annual
conventions of his trade, and later
his attendance at the many conven-
tions of the American Federation OF
Labor. 1t was there in the labor
movement, and later in Congress,
that he voiced the hopes and views
and gave expression to the wrongs
inflicted upon labor, and worked
and accomplished much for labor
and for the people generally. 1t is
of much interest 20 trade unionists,
and particularly to all workingmen,
that his address to the delegates of
the American Federation of Labor at
Philadelphia is studied by all. Secre-
tary Wilson said in part:
eve have taken the ground, and
we think Justly, that employers and
employees have a mutual interest in
securing the largest possible produc-
tion with a given amount of labor;
the larger the amount that is pro-
duced, the larger the amount that is
available for distribution; that their
interests only diverge when it comes
to a determination of the share that
should go to each and the methods
under which the material should be
produced. AS their interests only
diverge at those points, 1t is the
proper thing for employers and en-
ployes alike to sit down around the
council table and work out the
problems they have to deal with on
as nearly as correct mathematical
basis as possible. Working from
that theory of the mutual interests
that each has in production, we
have proceeded to the consideration
of these problems. And again, we
have been criticized as being par
tisans, upon the theory that the De-
partment of Labor in acting as a
mediator performs judicial func-
tions. and there is no more reason
that the Department of Labor should
be debarred from handling trade
disputes upon a diplomatic basis be-
cause it is interested in the welfare
of the workers than that the Depart
ment of State should be debarred
from handling international dis
putes because of the fact that 1t Is
a part of the Federal Government OF
the United States.
'sWhat we need in handling trade
disputes, and what we have at
tempted to select In handling trade
disputes, is men who have experience
and who are level-headed and un-
derstand the technicalities of the sub
ject matter they are to deal with.
You can not take man who has
had no experience, you can not take
a man who knows nothing about a
trade, no matter how big he is, and
inject him into the negotiations for
the settlement of a trade dispute
and expect to get beneficial results
from his injection into 1t. You
must take men who have had prac-
tical experience. And so We have
gone on with this line of work, and
as have said, in nearly every in
stance We have been successful. And
those instances where we have been
unsuccessful have been principally
due to that class of employers, ex-
tremists, a class becoming smaller
and smaller as the years go by. who
look upon their employees as simply
a part of the machinery of their es-
r4~L - hA fraafAA In
actly the same way as they would
treat other machines, with this dif-
ference, that the inanimate machine
In their shop is so constructed and
so standardized that they can cal
culate with almost mathematical ac-
curacy what the working strain and
what the breaking strain OF the ma
chine is; and they know II they
crowd the machine up to the break.
ing strain, and II does break, II will
cost them something to replace the
machine. Not so much with the
human being that Is employed BY
them, and that they look upon as q
machine. He is not standardized
he is not uniform In his physical and
mental equipment; there has beer
no method determined by which you
can calculate the breaking strain ol
the working strain OF a human be
ing. Even the worker himself doel
not know what his own breaking
strain is. and II you crowd that hu'
man machine up to the breakini
strain, and II does break. then 4
costs the employer nothing to re
place It. We have held throughout
that the human being Is an entirely
different thing from the machine
and should be treated entirely dif
ferent from the manner I'm which yo,
treat the machine. The human be
ing who is employed In the plant 4
q living. moving. sentient being iik'
themselves. with all the hopes AM