The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-08-29
 ADDRESS ON
 R.R. CRISIS
Chief Executive Presents Situation Concisely in Masterly Speech to Both Houses of Congress.

Washington. Aug. 29-President Wilson laid the threatened railway strike before Congress today in .an address to both houses assembled in joint session. He spoke as follows:
 'Gentlemen of the Congress: have come to you to seek your as- sistance in dealing with very grave situation which has arisen out of the demands of the employees of the raii- roads engaged in freight train service that they be granted an eight-hour working day, safeguarded by payment for an hour and half of service for every hour of work beyond the eight. Sg
 ''The matter has been agitated for more than a year. The public has been made familiar with the demands of the men and the arguments urged lin favor of them, and even more fa- miliar with the objections of the rail- roads and their counter-demand that tcertain privileges now enjoyed by their men and certain bases Of pay ment worked out through many years of contest be reconsidered, especially in their relation to the adoption of J an eight-hour day.
 "The matter came some three weeks ago to a final issue and resulted in a lcomplete deadlock between the par tties. The means provided by law for the mediation of the controversy failed and the means of arbitration for which the law provides were rejected. The | Representatives of the railway execu- ftives proposed that the demands of 1>> in, Ito arbitration, along with certain questions of readjustment as to pay and conditions of employment which seemed to them to be either closely associated with the demands or to call for reconsideration on their own mer- it's; the men absolutely declined arbi- ltration, esecially if any of their estab- lished privileges were by that means to be drawn again in cumstion.
 ''The law on the matter put no compulsion upon them. The 10000 men from whom the demands pro- cceded, had voted to strike if their deynands were refused; the strike was 1 imminent, it has since been set for the 4th of September, next. It affects the men who man the freight trains on practically every railway in the country. The freight service through out the United Etates must stand still until their places are filled, if, indeed, { 1t should prove possible to fill them at Tall. Cities will be cut off from their food supplies, the whole com merce of the nation will be paralyzed.
 Just so soon as 1t became evident that mediation under the existing law had failed and that arbitration had been rendered impossible by the atti- tude of the men I considered it my duty to confer with the representa- tives of both the railways and the brotherhooas. ~~ ss
 ''It seems to me. in considering the subject matter of the controversy that the whole spirit of the time and the preponderent evidence of recent economic experiences spoke for the eight-hour day. ]" :
 T, therefore, proposed that the eight hour day be adopted by the railway. arrangements and put into practice for the present as a sub- stftute for the existing ten hour basis Of pay and service; that I should ap- point, with the permission of the Con- gress a small commission to observe the results of the change. x xxx
 'These proposals were exactly in line, 1t is interesting to note, with the position taken by the supreme court of the United States when appealed to to protect certain litigants from the financial losses which they confi- dently expected if they should submit to the regulation of their charges and of their methods sof service by public legislation.
 T unhesitaHngly offered the friend 1y services of the administration to the railway managers to see to it that justice was done the railroads in the outcome. I felt warranted in assur- ing them that no obstacle of law would be suffered to stand in the way of their increasing their revenue to meet the expenses resulting from the change so far as the development of their business and of their admins tfative efficiency did not prove ade- quate to meet them.