The Birmingham age-herald., 1917-03-20


 1 The temporary wage increase pro | vision, he said. does not make the law an exertion of power to permanently establish wages.
 "If it be said that rates cannot be changed at will. but only by permis- sion of authority" he continued, q cannot think that permission will not be given if necessary to fill the coni- mand of the law Indeed. if not given the law might encounter constitutional restriction"
 When one enters into Interstate commerce" Justice McKenna said, in discussing the laws effect upon the trainmen. lone enters into public serv- ice in which the public has an inter- est and subjects ones self to it's be- hests.'
 Washington, March 19.-Following is the synopsis of the dissenting opinion of Justice Pitney, joined by Justice Van Deventer:
 MT. Justice Pitney, for himself and MT. Justice Van Deventer, delivered a dissenting opinion expressing concurrence in the view of MT Justice Day that the Adamson law is unconstitutional because Congress, although confessedly not in possession of the information necessary for intelligence and just treatment of the controversy between carriers and the trainmen, arbitrarily imposed upon the carriers the entire and enormous cost of experimental increase in wages, without providing for any compensation to be paid in case the investigation should derrA orstrate the impropriety of the increase.
 MT. Justice Pitneys opinion expressed the view of himself and Mrs. Justice Van Deventer that the act is unconstitutional on the further and more fundamental ground that it is not a proper and legiti- mate regulation of commerce within the meaning of the constitution; that it does not establish eight hours as the limit of a days work, there being prohibition of service in excess of eight hours per day, nor any penalty for overtime work; that the act merely provides that eight hours shall be treated as the measure or stan- dard of a days work for the purpose of reckoning compensation for services and that the third section in providing that, pending the report of the investigation commission, and for 30 days therafter, the compensation of railway employees subject to the act for a standard eight hour day, which is based upon a 10- hour day, required the railroads during pe- riod of from to Il months to pay as much for eight hours work as previously was paid for 10 hours work. The effect being to increase wages without the con- sent of the railroads to the amount of
 
 MT. Justice Pitney said: That the act cannot be sustained as a regulation of commerce because it has no such opera ton or effect; prescribed no service to the public; does not regulate the mode in which service is to be performed, or the safeguard to be placed about it, or the qualified tions or conduct of those who are to perform it and has no closer relation to or connection with commerce than has ba yrti oh arrio itS engines and cars or for the coal used in propelling them.
 ',The tranmen having accepted employ ment under the carriers in interstate com merce, so that employers and employees all engaged together in a quasi public service, the act simply sets in and pre- scribes how the money earned in the public service shall be divided between the employers. and the employees; this being regulation not of commerce, but Of the internal concerns of the commerce carriers, precisely as if the act were to provide that the rate of interest payable to the bondholders must be decreased and the dividend payments to the stockholders co orrespondingly increased
 That the act cannot be sustained by analogy to the hours of service act, the safety appliance acts, or the employers
 liability act, for each of these has a direct and substantial relation to and eff feet upon the commerce itself. while the Adamson law has none.
 Thai it cannot be sustained on the u cory that increasing the wages of train men will encourage prompt and efficient service, because the increase is not condi- toned upon efficiency of service, but ben efits alike those who are efficient and those who are not.
 That as a measure for improving the service it. is al absurd as a law would be that required the companies to pay 20 per cent more than before for each loco motive or for it's rails crossties, fuel, etc. without stipulating for any improvement in the quality.
 That the act cannot be sustained as analogous to the power to fix rates of freight and fare, or as a branch of that power. The interests of the public in the regulation of Tates lies in limiting the carrier to a reasonable compensation and is in the direction of lowering not in crea sing expenses, while the present act has for it's purpose and necessary effect the increasing of expenses.
 That the act cannot be sustained as an emergency measure, for an emergency cannot create a power nor excuse a de- fiance of the constitutional limitations upon the powers of the government. If the public exigency requires 1t, Con- gress perhaps might appropriate public moneys to satisfy the demands of the trainmen, but there is no argument for requiring the carriers to pay the cost l that would not apply equally to renewed demands as often as made if made by l men who had the power to tie up traffic. And that the act usurps the right of | the owners of the railroads to manage 1 their own property in matters not affect | ing the character of the service, and is an attempt to control and manage them rather than to regulate commerce In particular it deprives the railroad com panies of their constitutional right to agree with their employees as to the terms of employment"