Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1919-12-08
PLAN FOR SETTLING
CRISIS DESIGNED TO
SAVE FACES Of ALL
Compromise Is Similar to
Method Adopted by Presi-
dent Roosevelt.
BY DAVID LAWRENCE.


Out of a succession of blunders in
handling the coal crisis. the Wilson
administration has finally evolved a
plan which is designed to save the
faces of all concerned-a typical com
promise that might just as well have
been proposed two weeks ago and
spared the country a period of I'M
necessary suffering.
Briefly, the plan resembles the meth
cd adopted by Theodore Roosevelt
when. as President of the United
States, he persuaded the miners to go
, back to work while a commission in
vestgated" the subject, with the re-
suit that the miners got a substantial
increase in wages and the operators
increased the selling price to the pub
| lie
Split Over Settling Issue.
Tie present situation is complicat
ed by the fact that inside the gov
eminent two rival authorities essayed
to settle the strike-Secretary Wilson
with his suggestion of a 81 per cent
increase in wages, based upon an in
crease in the selling price of coal. and
DR.. Harry A. Garfield. fuel administra-
| tor. with his ultimatum that the SELL
ing price of coal must not be in
creased and that the miners should
get along on IA per cent increase in
wages. The cabinet did not have the
audacity to resolve this difference. but
sidestepped the issue. failing even to
1 COHSull IIcSlocHl /" llSOn- NOW. HOW
ever, the cabinets error has been cor
rected to the extent Of getting Mr..
Wilson's personal attention to the
whole controversy. He has virtually
| knocked sky-high both the plans suR-
| gested and undertaken by new
| scheme to effect a settlement.
The Presidents official family has
| been uneasy about the coal situation
because it was discovered that injunc-
| tons did not get coal and that the
miners were in earnest in their de-
| termination to fight to finish for
wages that would enable them to meet
the cost of living.
Have Been Conferring q Week.
Conferences have been going on for
| practically q week with the heads OF
| the miners union in order to deter
| mine what would persuade them to
get their men back to work. The
miners realized that the government
had publicly proclaimed that the OPP
| orators could absorb a il per cent in
| crease SO that IL a commission did
| finally discover that the wages of the
! miners should be increa sed, the add
tionai sum above the IL per cent
would not depend upon the operators
| for acceptance but the fuel admins
I tration, which would then increase the
price of coal. In other words, If the
commission decided that Is per cent
was a fair increase in wages, the op-
IA per cent and the public the other
IL per cent.
BY the appointment of a commission
the whole question of whether any set
or DR.. Garfield or the operators or
| miners is to be smothered. The miners
are to go back to work. The public
| is to get its coal. And by the time
the commission reports the furore
which the operators or economists may
\ raise the m iSS iSio
| may be lost in maze of other con-
| troversies much more pressing at the
| time and much more acutely in demand
Of public attention.
But the operators insist that any
| plan which eventually is proposed that
| contemplates an increase in the selling
price Of coal will be vigorously opposed
by them. I'VE do not want more
money for our coal" is what the oper-
ators are saying, because if we don't
look out we shall be boosting the price
| so high that industries will begin US
| ing the irsmense supplies of Mexican
| fuel oil and we shall be underbid-"
The operators claim that this mat
| miners to worry about, too. They
! predict that by next spring, as the
demand for coal diminishes, miners
| will be out of work and the new COM
petition with fuel oil will begin to
| be effective. SO that operators and
| the price of coal to the public
The other side OF that argument is
that if the miners can't get enough to
live on while digging coal they may
decide to go into factories, shops and
on farms and get wages as mechanics
or agricultural laborers which might
give them enough to live on. The
miners themselves have been making
threats about accepting jobs in other
industries than coal mining.
On the whole, however, both miners
and operators are expecting some
thing more than wage increases and
selling prices to come out of the new
plan of settlement proposed by Presi-
dent Wilson. The commission will en-
deavor to bring order out of chaos in
the mining industry. 1t will attempt
to regularize employment and correct
those factors which have hitherto pre-
vented the miner from getting enough
work or the operators from getting
out of the men work enough. All of
which was under consideration two
weeks ago and could have been &C.
complished by the Wilson administrs-
ton if the men surrounding President
Wilson had been disposed to stick by
their respective views and carry the
matter to the President himself for
settlement
Copyright, 1919,