The producers news. [volume] (Plentywood, Mont.) 1918-1937, 1919-08-15
DEMANDS
new INDUSTRY
AL CONTROL
eve Million Workers Behind Great
National Public Ownership Move
ment.

one of the most significant devel-
opments IN American history is the
solld massing of the ranks of orpa-
nlZea LABOR behind the new plan for
puonc ownership and Joint operation
OF the railroads. Warren S. Stone.
grand chief of the Brotherhood of
Locomotive Engineers, aetna as
SPOKESMAN for 100000 organized
workers workers declared few days ago be-
Lore a congressional committee that
the workers embrace the new plan of
Punic ownership with all the ardor
OF those who sought political free
CON- In this plan we raise the BAN
nef OF democracy in the control of
INDUSTRY, we advance to a new cru
SSde with the faith of the pilgrims,
win the conviction of the trainers of
LIE constitution and with the hope of
America for economic independence"
A NEW SOLUTION
MI. Stone told the congressional
committee that the Sims bill which
emoodles the new railroad ownership
plan, is the beginning of the new
method of the workers to reduce the
cost OF living, obtain a just remun-
Grafton Tor those who toll and estab-
llsh industrial democracy. The unions
IN the past, he said, had struggled to
MAINTAIN a tolerable standard of liv-
ing by wrestling from capital some
share of the profits for the wage
earners, but that the nature of this
struggle had finally been changed.
Every advance in wages had been
net by the employers in an equal or
greater advance in the cost of liv,
ing, and the general condition Of la
Dor had been bettered but little if
any. The cost of living is determined
by the sum the worker earns plus the
profits he is charged on his own la
boa. So long as the workers as con-
sumers are forced to pay extortion-
ate profits on their own earnings to a
third interest, there is no solution of
the industrial problem, said Mr.,
Stone,
MUST END AUTOCRACY
1--WE find that this third interest
absolutely controls and dominates
the management of industry. 1t fixes
wages and controls working conditions
1t fixes the prices of commodities
without regard to the needs of So
eiety, OF the necessities of producers
and consumers. We have a democrat
ic form Of government but an auto
cratic control of industry.
I'VE exist under Eminent, but
by industry we live. Under such a
system, the majority of democracy
can through their government enjoy
only such rights and privileges as an
autocracy in industry permits them
to receive. This country was peopled
by race who sought within its
boundaries religious freedom. 1t was
established by their descendants thru
revolution as land of political free
dom. We now demand that it be-
come the home of industrial freedom
FOR INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY
"This can only be accomplished by
extending to industry the same right
of individual freedom recognized by
the founders of sour government in
establishing this democracy. The
need of mankind for the products of
industry must be accepted as the
basic interest in all industry. The
right of the worker who supplies that
need demands like acceptance. This
can only be achieved by permitting
producers and consumers to share
in control of the management of their
means of existence. The machinery
for attaining this result we believe is
embodied in the plans outlined in the
Sims bill"
These ideas are not new, but in
America in the past they were advo-
Gated by only few reformers until
the rise of the National Nonpartisan
League with it's public ownership
program started great drift in that
direction. Their advocacy now by
the solid mass of the organized work
ers can mean nothing less than the
uniting of these two elements of the
common people in clear cut political
struggle to place the basic industries,
struggle to place the basic industries,
ing of produce in the hands of the
people.