New Britain herald., 1916-10-19

trainmen demand the eight hour jaw.
 But MT. H;.;hes, whose Vlslon as d
 statesman is certainly defactVe, IS
 against he eight hour law, and WHY -? Why, first he says the new eight
 hour law does not fix hours, but in the
 second paragraph of his speech ne
 says the AdamsOn act provides Ter
 eight hours as the standard of days work by which wages shall be meas
 ured. If 1t does not fix hOuds no
 does it provide for eight hours as the
 standard of day? Then he says the
 law only fixes wages. Well, of course,
 the law says an eight hour day snail
 be the standard by which wages gre measured, fixes wages to that extent. Then MT Hughes says that this lnW provides that the trainmen shall get ten hours pay for an eight hour cay.
 MT. Hughes says the president did not study this question Well, if all that Is known on the subject is what MT. Hughes knows, the president would not have to study it. MT.
 Hughes says that the men are goins to be paid a ten hour day for eight hours work The only trouble I find with MT. Hughes is that all he studied in this railroad problem was what the railroad companies told him. I do not mean that he did that consciously and religiously, because I believe that men in public life should speak fairly and not dishonesty impugn the mo- lives of the leader of the opposition. But I do mean this, that if MT. Hughes had asked the trainmen some ques- tions they would have given him lot of illuminating information, because the trainmen asked only two things.
 First, they asked for an eight hour day, and then they asked that they be paid time and a half for overtime If the railroads should compel them to work over the eight hours. Is that clear An eight hour day and time and a half for every hour over time. Then when the discussion got hot, the men conceded their demand for time and a half for overtime in order to reach a satisfa ctory settlement at the hands of the president of the United States. But the railroads conceded nothing. And when MT. Hughes says that the men are going to get ten hours pay for eight hours work he has not understood, or heard, of this very interesting fact, that hereafter the trainmen are to do ten hours work in eight hours time. Do you know tnaI tllS IdIlIOdu res uldlloAio pA ooSA'No that you may carry freight one hun dred miles in five hours with safety? And of course if you carry it in eight hours, you carry it that much safer. But this law does a thing that MT. Hughes has not even thought of. It makes it possible for these men to do the same work in eight hours that they did in ten, and 1t makes it poss1- ble for you and me to get our freight two hours faster.
 That idea hasn't dawned on MT. Hughes-the interesting circumstance that the consuming public will get it's freight quicker under the new eight hour law Then MT. Hughes said this interesting thing that this was not a good eight hour law because thero wasn't any penalty which would pro vent a man from working more than eight hours. have not been on the United States Supreme Court. but I know that any law which would tell you or me, if well and rested, that we could not work more than eight hours would probably be uncon- stitutional And I wouldn't think of engaging in a constitutional discus sion with MT. Hughes except on such palpable point but if any law told you or me that we could not work more than eight hours the law would be unconstitutional. But the pen atty in the law should be and is against the railroads, that the railroad companies may not work the men more than eight if the men are not fit and rested or don't want to work. Then MT. Hughes says that ultimately the public would have to pay the cost. Why should the public pay tho cost? When the railroads started this discussion they said it would cost one hundred million dollars to put into effect the eight hour law. and in speech in New York I said 1t would cost no such sum. They de- nied my statement. But when the railroad presidents went to Washing ton, after one talk with the president, they said 1t would cost fifty million and so I was only liar by fifty mil
 lion dollars And the fact of the matter is that this fifty million dol lars is based on the hypothesis that there will necessarily be as much overtime with an eight hour day ;.s with a ten hour day. But if you move freight quicker and in eight hours than you did in ten hours, you have not so much overtime to pay for. But that interesting circum- stance made no appeal to Mr. Hughes. Why should the public pay? If it costs one or twenty million dollars to install an eight hour day as a sound economic proposition why should we, the public, be made to pay additional freight rates to the railroads, when the figures of the rail- roads in the month of January of this year, railroads covering ninety per cent. of the mileage of the country show the roads made sixty-f1ve mill lion dollars profit above expenses? This multiplied by twelve is nearly nine hundred million dollars profit for