The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-09-18

Mexico than 1t is for man to refrain from infiicting corporal punishment
 for a misdeed of his child? Or was it more truculent for us to shame Germany into ceasing her frightful- ness, than for a real man to withhold his fist when he has been uninten- i tionally injured in t,N blind passion of a street brawl?
 President Wilson's handling of fn- dustrial problems has had this same
 forward looking quality He has from the beginning of his administration
 shown a disposition to find out what
 labor thought and wanted and, where
 possible for him, he has been on its side. t4.E .i One of the best proofs he has g1v- en of his desire to secure sympathetic and intelligent treatment of labor and social problems in the government was the appointment of Louis Bran-
 deis to the Supreme court. It is one of the greatest and best things that President Wilson has done. The Su- preme court Is a body of high-mind- ed, upright men, but the majority of them are not experienced or interested in modern industrial ideas. They re-
 present the prevailing conceptions of forty years ago. They can hardly be expected to be in touch with the new social views. of life. He has studied the great social and industrial ques- tions Of our times and he has feel ing for and a sympathy with them. Now. by this very act of putting Brandeis on the bench of the Supreme Court, especially by the opposition
 made by the Old Guard to his confir- .mation, Brandeis and the point of view he represents was forced into the foreground of consciousness Of the people. They talked about Bran
 deis. And the bet(er grew the con- test over his confirmation. the more clearly did the people see and agree
 with the reasons which prompted President Wilson to make this seem ingly radical promotion. This is the
 real progressiveism in a leader.
 The Eight-Hour Work Day
 President Wilson is absolutely right
 in his attitude toward the eight-hour
 day. It is movement world wide in
 it's nature, and nothing will stop it. Like any other great invention of
 the human mind, it has beer looked upon askance but it will come be-
 cause the big: majority of the labor
 believes in it, think it right and just
 and demand it. Under proper man.
 agement the eight-hour day in any
 IT. odern industry is the most produc-
 tive. There are hundreds of intelli-
 gent experiments to prove this. The
 long hours make for inefficienty. They
 are tolerated only by old-fashioned and out-of-date managers. When the railroads declare they cannot adjust
 their day on three shift of eight hours
 each they are simply saying they do
 hot want to try modern scientific
 management which would quickly en- force eight hours. It is a difficult
 problem, no doubt, but it is pos-
 sible one-a standard day with a stan-
 dard task are for me conclusions in modern industry.
 Moreover, President Wilson was
 right in asking that the possibility of such a humiliating experience as the
 country has just gone through will
 be made forever impossible in the
 future. If the program he first pro.
 posed to the disputants could have
 been put through it would have mark
 ed a tremendous advance in our in-
 dustrial life. Sooner or later it will
 be put, through and more, too. One thing is certain; the public labor or capital-is going to control our com
 mon carriers. President Wilson's
 handling of the recent trouble makes
 that far mere certain than it would
 have been, if he had let the strike
 come. What he has done is to set us
 all to thinking hard. A strike would
 simply have set us to fighting or at
 least feeling fight and to inventing
 reasons fol backing our particular (Continued on Page 3.)