Evening star., 1920-02-15

nenSlNe experiment at present
under way in America. in the in
PRODUCTION of a new cooperative and
democratic relationship in industry.
1t has demonstrated it's success in
certain factories over a longer period
than any other. 1t has operated in
what was for years the most turbulent
OF industries. the mems clothing
trades. Here competition among en-
ployers was bitterest and most un-
scrupulous; here labor conditions were
the worst; here in the ghettos and the
tenemene> -"i"ts of New York and
chicago extreme radicalism-. "und it's
toughest rootage. And yet out OF this
condition of industrial anarchy has
developed reign of law, founded
upon a genuine spirit of cooperation.
In the shops of Hart Shaffner &
Marx of Chicago. with 1000 workmen,
since the nine-year testing out of the
new idea, lasting through the strain
of the war and through epidemics of
labor disturbances in neighboring
clothing factories. there has not been
strike. On the other hand. an i'm
menSe Improvement has taken place.
not only in the living conditions, but
in the spirit of responsible indepen
dence. in the morale. the manhood, of
the workers: production per man Cn
that market at least has been ris-
ing. and. finally, the employers have
been steadily prosperous. AS to the
effect of the new system upon the
consuming public 1 shall speak later.
Passed ThrouEh Three Stages.
A plan. system. a spirit. which
will accomplish all these results in q
time of industrial unrest is assuredly
worth careful examination.
In order to make the present situa-
tion perfectly clear, let us recall for
a moment the three stages through
which the clothing industry, in COM
mon with others, has passed during
recent years.
% The period of unrestricted COM
petition among both employers and
workers. l remember well. many
years ago. studying conditions in the
garment trades. Clothing was then
veritable sweat shops'-by miserable
and helpless foreigners, who were
driven to long hours of work at star
walton wages by the unregulated op-
Grafton of the law of supply and de-
mand. The whole industry had be-
come blind and greedy struggle for
jobs among thousands of unskilled
men. Employers were practically as
helpless as the workers: they were
equally bound upon the wheel of cut
throat competition Any one Of them
who tried to improve conditions was
speedily forced to the wall by ruth
less competitors.
(2) The second great stage repre-
sented the effort to escape from this
hopeless condition of competitive an
all branches of American industry
began to combine. the employers in
corporations. trusts, associations; the
workers in labor unions. Where large
tCI ,0eN Nyn
machinery was necessary-as in the
steel industry-anarchy often gave
place to an autocracy of capital, with
law and order imposed from above
by strong man. Judge Gary today
10 such an autocrat. and the United
States Steel Corporation is an example
of this state of development. 1t has
succeeded by organizing capital and
keeping the workers more or less dis
organised. Z. -
Long and Bitter Warfare.
But this development was not pos
sible in the clothing industry. because
an employer could get into it with al
most no capital at all. All that was
needed was loft. a few sewing ma
chimes Cor not any) and an ability to
attract. dominate or browbeat labor.
But if the employers in the clothing
industry could not combine. the work
ers could and did. There ensued long
and bitter warfare of strikes and lock-
outs. Unions were broken and de-
feated only to rise and fight again
The whole industry was kept in con-
dition Of chaos. The United Garment
Workers at one time became very
powerful. but not powerful enough TO
impose upon the industry an autocracy
of flabor-equivalent to the autocracy
of capital in the steel industry. For
floods of new immigrants kept coming
into the country, bringing new labor
competition and requiring herculean
efforts on the part of the union TO
educate them to the need Of organiza,
ideas upon which unionism ten
rested-and it remains today an es-
sential weakness of the American
Federation of Labor-was craft or,
1anization, at a time when craft skill
and craft lines were of steadily de-
creasinE importance in many branches
of industry.
In the years from about 1908 until
the outbreak of the great war ut
was worst of all in New York-better.
after 1911. in Chicago) the conditions
in the clothing industry were ally but
intolerable. There were repeated
and costly strikes and lockouts. a
constant tendency on both sides to
steady decrease in production and
efhciency. Neither side was strong
enough to impose law and order In
the industry. This is the unfortu-
i
dustries in America now find them
selves. The coal mining Industry.
for example. has recently reached a
hopeless deadlock.
Begun by Two Men.
f3) We are now entering upon the
great third stage OF development.
Some wholly new method became
necessary. Organized hostility in m
dustry had produced only chaos: what
remained but to try cooperation? Au,
tocracy of capital in industry nao
not resulted in justice nor in reign
of law: what remained but to try
democracy?
This is the great change. the right
about-face implied in the present re-
m4{kable wave OF experimentation
which l have described in former ar
tfaes. with the new system OF shop
coGmittees," works councils. trade
boards
Two men. both in the same shop.
ooe an employer. one a worker. are
nings of the new development in the
g1rment trades. They were both men
Of vision and of practical courage
Il is a very interesting story. The
employer was Schaffner of Hart
S.hafYner & Marx. He had built up
a large business in Chicago: he had
rvtained in his workers a more than
opoinarily close and benevolent in
tsrest WHEN the great strike began
in 1910 II nearly broke his heart. 1t
aasmed the height of ingratitude on
the part o. the workers. Bat. un-
like many employers who have to
face this problem. he did not become
was all rigHt and the workers all
wrong-and that stupid resort to
force was the only solution. He aske ed
himself what the trouble really was.