Mohave County miner., 1916-12-09
ANNUAL MESSAGE OF PRESIDENT WILSON
 ID SENATE AND HOUSE IN JOINT SESSION

the scope of the commissions author ity or it's inclination to do justice when there is no reason to doubt either.
 The other suggestions-the increase in the interstate commerce commis- sions membership and in its facilities for performing it's manifold duties, the provision for full public investigation and assessment of industrial disputes, and the grant to the executive of the power to control and operate the rail ways when necessary in time of war or other like public necessity-I now very earnestly renew,
 The necessity for such legislation is manifest and pressing. Those who have entrusted us with the responsi- bility and duty of serving and safe guarding them in such matters would find it hard, I believe, to excuse fail ure to act upon these grave matters or any unnecessary postponement of actlon upon them.
 Not only does the interstate com merce commission now find it practic- ally impossible, with it's present mem- bership and organization, to perform its great functions promptly and thor oughly but it is not unlikely that it may presently be found advisable to add to it's duties still others equally heavy and exacting. It must first be perfected as an administrative instru- ment.
 The country cannot and should not consent to remain any longer exposed to profound industrial disturbances for lack of additional means of arbitration and conciliation which the congress can easily and promptly supply. And all will agree that there must be no doubt as to the power of the executive to make immediate and uninterrupted use of the railroads for the concentra- tion of the military forces of the na- tion wherever they are needed and whenever they are needed.
 This is a program of regulation, pre- vention and administrative efficiency which argues it's own case in the mere statement of it. With regard to one of its items, the increase in the eff ficiency of the interstate commerce commission, the house of representa- tives has already acted; it's action needs only the concurrence of the sen ate.
 l would hesitate to recommend, and l dare say the congress would hesi- tate to act upon the suggestion should l make it that any man in any occu- patton should be obliged by law to con- tinue in an employment which he de- sired to leave. To pass a law which forbade or prevented the individual workman to leave his work before re- ceiving the approval of society in do- ing so would be to adopt a new prin- ciple into our jurisprudence which I take it for granted we are not pre- pared to introduce. But the proposal that the operation of the railways of the country shall not be stopped or in corrupted by the concerted action of organized bodies of men until a pub lie investigation shall have been in- stituted which shall make the whole question at issue plain for the judg- ment of the opinion of the nation is not to propose any such principle. It is based upon the very different prin- ciple that the concerted action of pow erful bodies of men shall not be per mitted to stop the industrial processes of the nation, at any rate before the nation shall have had an opportunity to acquaint itself with the merits of the case as between employe and em- ployer, time to form it's opinion upon an impartial statement of the merits. and opportunity to consider all prac- ticable means of conciliation or arbi- tration. I can see nothing in that proposition but the justifable safe guarding by society of the necessary processes of its very life. There is arbitrary or unjust in it un- less it be arbitrarily and unjustly done. It can and should be done with a full and scrupulous regard for the inter ests and liberties of all concerned as well as for the permanent interests of society itself.
 Three matters of capital importance await the action of the senate which have already been acted upon by the house of representatives: the bill which seeks to extend greater freedom of combination to those engaged in r