The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1915-10-15
MANLY REPORT ON
RIGHTS AND WRONGS
OF ORGANIZED LABOR

In last weeks installment, summar
izing the findings of the Industrial Re
lations Committee, as given in the
Manly Report, it was pointed out that
the struggle of labor for organization
is not merely an attempt to secure an
increased measure of the material
comforts of life, but is a part of the
age-long struggle for liberty; that this
struggle is sharpened by the pinch of
hunger and the exhaustion of body
and mind by long hours and improper
working conditions; but that even if
men were well fed they would still
struggle to be free.
Quoting now the same section of the
report it is also pointed out that the
evolution of modern industry has
greatly increased the necessity for or
ganization on the part of wage earn
ers, while it is not admitted that the
employer who has only one employee
is on an economic equality with the
person who is employed by him, be-
cause of the fact that the employer
controls the means Of livelihood which
gives him an almost incalculable ad-
vantage in any bargain. nevertheless
this condition of inequality is held to
have been enormously increased by
the development of corporations con-
trolling the livelihood of hundreds of
thousands of employees, and by the
growth of employers associations
whose members act as unit in ques-
tions affecting their relations with
employees.
The report points out that less than
half a dozen employers out of 230 EN-
ployers or their agents who have tes-
titled before the commission, have
denied the propriety of collective ac-
tion on the part of employees, but
that many maintained what they, In
accordance with common terminology,
called open shop"
MEANING OF "oPEN SHOP"
OF the open shop the report says:
THE theory of the open shop ac,
cording to these witnesses, is that
workers are employed without any
reference to their membership or
non-membership in trade unions;
LII AF
found upon investigation that these
employers did not willingly or know
ineiy employ union men. Neverthe-
less. this is deemed to be a minor
point. The open shop even if union
men are not Disseminated against, is
as much a denial of the right of col
lective action as is the 'anti-union
shop In neither is the collective ac-
tion of employees permitted for the
purpose of negotiating with reference
to labor conditions. Both in theory
and practice, in the absence of legis-
lative regulation, the working condi,
tions are fixed by the employer
at is evident, therefore, that there
can at best be only benevolent des-
potism where collective action on the
part of employees does not exist"
Discussing the attitude OF employ.
ers who refuse to deal collectively
with their workmen, but who do in
fact grant audiences at which the
grievances of their workmen may be
presented, the report says:
INDIVIDUAL COMPLAINTS
"One is repelled rather than i'm
pressed by the insistence with which
this idea has been presented. Every
tyrant in history has on stated days
granted audiences to which his faith
full subjects might bring their com
plants against his officers and agents.
At these audiences, in theory at least,
even the poorest widow might be
heard by her sovereign in her search