Webster City freeman. [volume] (Webster City, Hamilton County, Iowa) 1884-1946, 1919-06-09
l LA,.B0R. IN Al. .
NUA.l MEETING
ASKS REFORMS
Executive Council of Ameri-
can Federation of Labor
Makes Annual Re-
port.
TO KEEP WAGES UP
Ask That Courts be Denied
Right Of Passing on Acts
OF Congress.
TO KEEP WAGES UP
(By The Associated Press }


Atlantic City, ". j., June 9.-Impor
tant projects for the advancement ol
labor and Improvement Of working con
ditions, as well ac comprehensive out
lines Of what has been accomplished OF
labor's behalf during the last year, are
set forth in the report of the executive
council of the American. Federation OF
Labor, submitted today to the officers
and delegates attending the opening
session of the thirty-ninth annual con
vention.
The advent OF srrace is taken by the
council to hold out bright prospects fol
labor. OF the peace treaty, itself, the
labor executives forming the council
after endorsing the triumph of free,
dom and justice and democracy as ex.
emplified in the covenant Of the league
Of nations" says the labor sections are
a compromise but that it must, how
ever, be a source of deepest satisfaction
to the American working people to
know that the American position and
the American declarations as presented
for insertion in the treaty ranked above
all others in point Of progress measured
and in point of actual and practical ap-
plication in the lives of the working
people. Whatever of compromise APP
pears was made because of the claim
that other nations Of the world could
not pledge themselves to an immediate
and definite acceptance as the estab-
lished practice of our day"
Oppose Judicial Enroachment.
Foremost among the matters sub
mitted by the council to the conven-
tion are suggestions dealing with leg
islation to prevent any invasion OF
the rights and prerogatlves of the leg
islative branch of our government by
the Judiciary" The report of the co,n-
ance with resolution adopted by the
st. Paul convention. In that resolu
ton the council was ordered to study
''the successive steps which have been
taken by our federal and supreme
courts through which, without consti-
tutional authority and i'll opposition If
the action of the constitutional convcn-
ton, they laid hold upon power which
they now exercise" The study has
now been partially completed and con-
tains remedial suggestions made by
Jackson III. Ralston, attorney Of the
Federation of Labor. Three
are submitted in the re-
port for the consideration Of the con-
vention, each proposing that authority
Of the supreme court to pass upon acts
Of congress should be cancelled or
abridged.
This section of the report closes with
The statement that the writer is con-
vinced that in this subject the execu-
tive council has had before it ''one of
The gravest fundamental questions with
which we will have to deal-the preser
ration of truly democratic govern
nent against what has often been call
I'd the 'aristocracy of the robe
Labor Legislation.
Considerable attention is devoted by
he report to labor legislation. 1t is
said that some rule should be adopted
N congress which would prevent oh.
legislative methods. The re-
Dort lists among the measures stalled
~ "the weary waste of worthless
words in the last congress and in
which labor was especially Interested.
he appropriation bills for the war la