Every evening, Wilmington daily commercial., 1919-12-15
Coal and Chaos
By Fre3c4ic j. Haekin

Washington, d. c., Dee. II. Whom
you choose 10 blame for the fact that " Il
have just been threatened with all II Q
horrors Of coal famine is largely matter
of politics and point-of-vicw. But one
conclusion You cannot avoid u You look
fairly at the facts. Our failure TO get an
adequate and continuous supply OF coal is
due largely TO the fact that our great in
diistrial system, of which we boast go
much. is poorly and even stupidity organ
iscd. And for this we are all To blame.
Until the last few years the ultimate
consumer has been chiefly Interested m
the pricr, Of coal He has been able TO
get coal by paying the price. He has been
led to believe that this price represents
an undue profit for somebody. Mr.. Nc
Adoo saws the operators have been getting
IL, and the operators rcfort, Search us
But recently the all-important question
of what price we pay for coal was eclipsed
bv the still more important question ot
whether we were going to get any coal at
all We have d6 per cent OF all tfs coal In
the world enough of 1T To last ts Tor
several centuries. There arc enough work
men in the country to dig IT And yet we
have been threatened with freezing both
this winter and last
This state OF affairs suggests that some
thing in wrong with the way we go about
digging and distributing our coal. In
vestigations which have been made re-
Gently by government experts strongly
support this suggestion. There rs sornc-
thing wrong with our coai-producuon
system. And the settlement Of the strike
will not by any means remedy that trouble
4 lack Of intelligent corporation betwecn
a. L. hxs Ia an
the consumer is at the bottom Of the prob
lem. according to the best expert evidence
available
Let ,ls start with the public. The pub
lie. including both domestic consumers
and factory owners, has been accustomed
to buy its coal when 1t needs Il, which Is IN
The winter. The result is that we must
have enough mines and enough miners on
the job TO supply that maximum winter
demand. It follows inevitably that m the
arrinr and summer, when the demand ~
1ax. mines and miners are Idle. They are IN
fact idle from one-fourth TO one-third Of
the time This il one Of the things that
the miners ara kicking about. They want
10 be assured of FIVE days Of work week,
AT least. Sornc Of The dear public still
think that the miners want To work FIVE
davs week at most As n matter Of fact
the miners want 10 work more, not less.
It. r. discouragIng 10 20 to work IN tho
morning and tn he told that there Will he
no work that day, and no pay, because
there is no market for the product. Yet
that is what the miners are told again and
again. In same of the Ohio mines, the
miners were gwen only about 200 days
of work last wear In New Mexico they
worked over 800 In most places they
worked about $50 days
So the miners are idle IN the spring and
summer for lack of market, and when
the winter rush comes along. they are ldie
part of tho time for lack Of cars - handle
the coal II is quite evident that II the
spring and summer market could be stim-
ulated, the miners could he kept busy
then. and the winter rush could be To some
extent forestaled There would then he
more cars available, and the miners would
not le IDLE In winter The MINERS would
have continuous work and We cOaild have
continuous coal supply.
The present state Of affairs has often
been blamed on the operators. II has
been stated that they should provide
storage facilities for coal At the mInes-
Then coal mined in the warm weather
could be stored until needed. But the
technical investigations made by the
Bureau OF Mines do not bear out the
theory that the operators are to blame
They show that the storage Of coal at the
mine is attended with serious difficulties
Soft coal stored In lafge quantities