The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-12-06

profound industrial disturbances for lack of additional means or 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 im- mediate and uninterrupted use of the railroads for the concentration of the military forces of the nation wherever they are needed and whenever they are needed.
 This is programme of regulation, prevention, and administrative eff ciency which argues it's own case in the mere statement of it. With regard to one of it's items, the increase in the efficiency of the interstate commerce commission, the House of Representa- lives has already acted; it's action needs only the concurrence of the Sen ate.
 | I would hesitate to recommend, and dare say the Congress would hesitate to act upon the suggestion should I make it, that any man in any occupa- tion should be obliged by law to con- tinue in an employment which he de- sired to leave. To pass a law which 1 forbade or prevented the individual workman to leave his work before re- l ceiving the approval of society in do- 1 ing so would be to adopt a new prin- ciple into our Jurisprudence which I take it for granted we are not prepared to introduce. But the proposal that the operation of the railways of the coun- try shall not be stopped or interrupted by the concerted action of organized bodies of men until public investiga- tion shall have been instituted which , shall make the whole question at issue plain for the judgment of the opinion of the nation is not to propose any such principle. It is based upon the very different principle that the concerted action of powerful bodies of men shall
 not be permitted to stop the industrial
 processes of the nation, at any rate be-
 fore the nation shall have had an op-
 portunity to acquaint itself with the
 merits of the case as between employe and employer, time to form it's opinion upon an impartial statement of the
 merits, and opportunity to consider all practicable means of conciliation or ar bitration 1 can see nothing in that
 proposition but the justifab1e safe guarding by society of the necessary
 processes of it's very life. There is noth- ling arbitrary or unjust in it unless it
 be arbitrarily and unjustly done. It can
 and should be done with a full and scrupulous regard for the interests and liberties of all concerned as well as for the permanent interests of so-
 ciety itself.
 Three matters of capital importance await the action of the Senate which
 have already been acted upon by the House of Representative: The bill
 which seeks to extend greater freedom of combination to those engaged in 1 promoting the foreign commerce of the
 country than is now thought by some
 to be legal under the terms of the laws against monopoly; the bill amending the present organic law of Porto Rico; and l the bill proposing more thorough and systematic regulation of the expendi-
 ture of money in elections, commonly called the corrupt practices act. I need not labor my advice that these measures be enacted into law. Their urgency lies
 in the manifest circumstances which
 render their adoption at this time not only opportune but necessary. Even de- Hay would seriously leopard the in terests of the country and of the gov ernment