The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-01-07
UNDERWOOD ON STRIKES

From the Montgomery Advertiser.
 NTl5E address by Senator Underwood
 II in Birmingham Friday night offers
 clear and Illuminating presenta- ton of the much discussed but not gen. orally understood anti-strike provision of the Cummins bill. Many people on both sides of the issue talk glibly of the anti- strike clause in the Cummins bill with out understanding what it really is.
 In the first place it does not chain any worker to his job. He can quit whenevr he feels like it. If his job does not suit him. if his hours are too long. or his pay too small, nothing in the bill pre- vents him from leaving his present em- ployment. Any number of dissatisfied em- ployes can quit their work when they choose.
 But they cannot combine or conspire to tie up the railroads before or after they quit work They cannot enter into a conspiracy to prevent the movement of trains, commodities or passengers. That is the crux of the whole clause, designed to protect the people of America from the terrors of a general railroad strike no conspiracy or combination of employees shall prevent the public from being served Iby the railroads.
 l Moreover, the critics who attack the anti-strike provision ignore the elaborate machinery provided for dealing with re- I quests for wage increases. The railroad employe is not deprived of any possl-
 bility of securing higher wages by the
 anti-strike provision; the government Tn
 the same bill sets up a special tribunal
 to see that justice is done him. Ten
 pages of the Cummins bill are devoted
 ot providing this tribunal and to laying
 down positive rules under which 1t IS to proceed. The bill specifically states that the wages and salaries, the hours or labor and the condition of employment
 shall be flair. just and reasonable and
 the tribunal shall take into considera-
 tion the scales of wages paid for similar
 kind of work, the relation between wages and the cost of living, the hazards of 1 the employment. the training and skill required. the degree of responsibility and lthe character and reguiarity of the em- ployment.
 1 The railroads are compelled by the act
 to accept the findings of this tribunal; they are compelled to operate too. They must keep their roads going and they must pay the wages laid down by the | tribunal as just and reasonable. The op- | pcnents of the anti-strike provision. as we understand it, are fighting to keeR from being placed under the same equality under the law with the railroads. The possibility of a strike will. of course, not enter into a controversy until after the ileral tribunal makes its award. The opponents of the provision are claiming the right to strike, and to tie up the lrailroads if the tribunal should fan to meet the demands of the railroad en- Senator Underwood, in the course of his address, mentioned two deeply signi3- lcant facts, first. that over billion dol liars was paid by the public in recently Increased freight and passenger rates and of that enormous sum s5 per cent was Iabsorbed by increased wages. and sec ond, that it was general or universal strike that was threatened in 1916. when the President and Congress were as ' sured that the railroads of the country