The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1918-09-07
FRANK P. Walsh HAS NO r..
PHILOSOPHY But TO KNOW
LAbOR'S NEEDS and WORK

Of thought, gathered from every one
worth while in the nation. The tes-
timony articulated what has been I'M
said in millions of hearts
A New Intelligence.
A singular coincidence is that
Walsh is now chairman Of the ma
tional war labor board, jointly, with
Taft-progenitor of the original la
Dor. board, the industrial relations
commission. The war labor board is
taking UP the economic problem
where it had been left off by the in
dustrial commission. But It. is TAX
ing it up with the horizons spread
widely. A newer and more vital in
telfgence has come to labor Tho
fell. ON fallow soil. Labor no lnter
cites individual cases f industrial
wrongs: The industrial commission
gave them witnesses to intolerate
practices in industry. It gave them
grasp and vision on the entire ma
chinery which has Oppressed them.
So they enter into the new battle
with ardent hopes and conscious of
equality before the law, before the
people and before the thought Of the
world in their aspirations.
Public Needs Education.
Walsh considers his effort on the
national war labor board as merely
another phase in the cycle of eco
nomic progress for the masses. He
looks serenely ahead to other meas
ures and to other men who will give
direction and wider scope to truths
learned. Education, he believes, is
what the public needs in order to
grasp labor problems. Having that,
no sophistry can uproot verities
|"The fact that labor and capital
saw at the same time the need for
a court of last resort on economics
during the war is, in itself, a fine
indication of the growth Of thought
within the last few years." Walsh de-
clared. There was an unconscious
realization for years that much Of
the bitter differences might be swept
away. The war brought home to US
with a jolt the Earring the industrial
machinery has sustained for decades.
Industry has been poorly directed
and somewhat aimlessly. Labor has
had serious shortcomings. The effort
now should be to minimize the laxity
Of both sides, to unity and harmon
ize.
To Build for Peace Times.
$50 far the boards efforts have
been pitched on war needs. But I
am sure that growing out of this
work there will be methods found
that will work in peace times; that
machinery will be devised at the
close of war so that the inevitable
chaos which would follow without
it, because of changing conditions
and changing needs, may be avoided
altogether"
viewing the economic situation
nj a broad way, Walsh said, the
struggle is merely to assert majority
rule. So far the minority in indus
try-the owners-have ruled with an
iron hand. This view, he believes,
is purely parochial-feudal, as now
applied-and will vanish at the end
of the war. In his opinion the war
has taught valuable lessons. Not the
least Of these is that the nonpro-
uuceES nave learned largely how
much they have missed in being de-
prived Of the pleasures of toll. The
producers have been denied the pro-
fits of their labor. Both classes have
been victims of this. He phrased it
this way:
Both classes have suffered poig-
nantly. That era threatens to be
swept aside. After the war we all
will have the proper vision of what
life really means: that spiritual con-
cept which teaches that life really
lived is love and labor, not the vain
accumulation of desires and that de-
spair which safety breeds It is an
old truth in new skin. We all are
fast learning that
HIIE XNEIIA6 DR. XZHnd