The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-02-07

portant and douDtful. and the pending
 decision fin the oregon case will doubt | less dispose of all the main questions in- l volving the Minnesota statute"
 The Source of Opposition | Some opposition to minimum wage leg | islation has expressed itself on the par. Of employers who retained as counsel apolis, to represent them before the su- preme court of the United States.
 More surprising opposition is found, here and there, among labor leaders. In the United States Samuel Gompers ani | Hugh Frayne in the east. and a small l group of members of San Francisco labor unions have vigorously opposed all wage board legislation for men, and have ex- ercised a mildewing influence upon such effort even when confined to women. Because in Australia, wage determina- tions were enforced by the courts of in-
 dustrial arbitration, these American la bor leaders opposed them as a part of their general dislike of compulsory ar bitration-a dislike rooted in their long
 and dire experience of American courts. This objection is however, less intellig- ble when, under the newer wage laws, conpulsion is confined to the employers. who must pay at least the agreed wage, though no worker. need accept it.
 Another possible explanation of their hostility may be found in a calculation that in the long run, the power of the unions may be undermined if morgan ized workers can get through wage com missions such improved rates as have in the past been attainable only through labor organizations.
 This reasoning Is discredited by the facts. For. fin the brief experience of Massachusetts, the conspicuous feature is the impetus given to workers in the candy and brush trades to form organiza- tions where none had been before. In Australia, labor organization seems to have kept step with the march of the wage boards, and, in England. the first labor organizations of women in the nail and chain industry accompanied the cre- ation of the first wage board, though the trade is so old that women in 1t sol- emnly told the writer, a generation ago, that their 'forbears had made the chain mail for King Arthur and his knights" :" These circumstances-the extraordinary powers of the courts, and the attitude of certain labor leaders-explain the state of the movement for minimum wage laws in America compared with England and Australia. The case now pending before the United States supreme court to de- termine the constitutionality of the Ore- gon minimum wage law will settle the fate, for years to come, of effort in this field. If the law is upheld, consumers in search of ease of conscience, and so- cial workers striving to reduce all that
 portion of tuberculosis, insanity, vice and
 premature death which they believe to be
 directly due to underpay, will carry for
 ward with renewed zeal the crusade for
 wage laws.
 If the Oregon law Is upheld, then the
 Ohio constitution will loom up with it's
 provision, adopted by a popular vote in
 1912, authorizing the legislature to fix
 working hours and wage rates and pro-
 hibiting any construction of the 1nstru-
 ment itself in conflict with this prohibi-
 tion. Whenever the people of Ohio may
 care to avail themselves of 1t. the broad
 wording of this clause admits men. The constitutional convention of New York
 which will meet in April will be urged
 to initiate the example of Ohio, and to adopt a modification of the Ohio clause. to be submitted in November. 1915, to the voters of the greatest industrial state in the union.