The Washington times., 1921-02-03
BY DAVID M. CHURCH,
International News Service.

International News Service.
The spectre of transportation
tie-up is lowering over the nation
today as the result Of threats to re-
duce railroad wages, according to
labor leaders here. ~. "
Railroad workers, embittered
over wage conditions, are even now
threatening to leave their work,
leaders here declare.
NATION FACES CRISIS.
While the heads Of the railroad
labor organizations refdse to pre-
dict strike in the~event that rail,
road wages are reduced. they declare
that the nation will face a transpor-
tation crisis and intimate that tho
men will simply refuse to work at re-
duced wages, whether their leaders
want them to or not.
There has been a rumbling of dis
content in railroad labor circles for
many months, as the result of the
failure of the Railroad Labor Board
to grant the fuif wage demands Of
the workers and the granting of in-
creased rates to the railroads. This
discomfort is steadily mounting. and
IL wages are reduced. leaders here
admit that they will not be able to
hold their men in line. 81
The hardest job we have right
now is to keep the men at their
work. said f. o. Dawson, secretary
of the International Machinists' Ora
ganization. The International Ma
chinists' Association embraces a mas
iority of the railroad shop workers.
The men are bitter" said Dawson.
"They want to throw up their jobs
and quit working now. Our task 10
to keep them on the job. 'e ~
81 don't want to. talk strike. I
don't know what the men will do ffs
wages are reduced, but I know that
II will be next to impossible to hold
the men in line. If / were a shop
worker and wages were reduced. I
would throw up my job right away,
and il necessary l would leave the
trade.
"The railroad men made enormous
sacrifices during the war. They
lived under terrible conditions, but
they kept the flow OF supplies steadily
going on. when the. war was over
and they saw the railroads being
plundered they became bitter, and
they are more bitter now than ever.
reducing wages. Such talk az After
bury's about the reduction of wages
is a crime, and the men know 1t is q
crime. 4,
OPPOSE REDUCTION.
"The railroads were granted huge
rate increases to meet the rising cost
of labor. Labor has secured 80 per
cent of those rate increases and the
public is bearing the burden. Tho
other 40 per cent of the increase
hasn't gone to labor, and the rail-
roads have no justification for talk~
ing wage reduction.
1--WE have the facts. We know ths
conditions of the railroads. They
can afford to pay Ave times as much
for repair work, done outside OF their
shops, as they paid for 1t In their
shops before the war, and yet they
talk OF the need of reducing wages.
"I don't believe wages are going
to be reduced. Certainly the national
agreements are going to be main-
tained. or the men just won't work.
IL won't say there will be strike
II wages are reduced. I don't know,
nobody knows, but I do know this,
that II Is n hard job to keep the men
at work right now"
w. Jett Lauck, economist Of the,
railroad labor organizations. In un-
derstood to be preparing new facts
on railroad earnings which will be
used to resist any wage reductions
President Wilson, meanwhile. ap-
parently Is refusing to participate In
the controversy that has arisen. asa
Il was indicated at the white House
that he would take no action on the
unions request for an investigatiou
on possible wage reductions untfI
after the Railroad Labor Board hAA
actod finally In the matter. -