Twin city review. [volume] (Champaign, Ill.) 19??-1929, 1922-03-03


they ere willing 10 submit to the
public. have taken these excerpts
from The official printed report
which Was issued BY Mr.. 6lenn's Of
flee, So there Is no question as Il
their accuracy. They adopted reso.
luton lor rather submitted one. II
reads rs follows;
| Whereas. Ii is recognized in this
country, that all law-ahiding citizens
or residents thereof, have the right
TO work when they please, for whom
they please. and on whatever terms
mutually agreed upon between EN-
ployers and employer and without IN
terferenee or discrimination ON the
part of others; therefore, be it
Resolved, That we hereby express
our purpose to support these funda-
mental principles of the American
Plan OF employment by the mainten-
ance of the Open Shop
And TO this resolution, Mr.. +. IL.
Clausen added an amendment, which
reads:
Resolved, Further, That we urge
our members to secure by discussion
and education the active support of
workers, merchants, bankers and pro-
| fessional men and all other elements
of their respective communities in fa-
vor of American ideals and the Open
! Shop
The committee made its report To
! this convention of employers. In
Minneapolis they were a little dubious
and this is what Mr.. George Nj. Gil
| lette of the Minneapolis Steel Ma
chinery company said:
II don't think it is a practical
thing to do, but you can go on and
| you can declare from now until
doomsday and pass resolutions on
| this and that, day in and day out,
and as TO the open shop If you at
tempt to carry II out with a mixture
of union and noaunion men in your
plant, you are inviting trouble and
| disaster.
81 have done il time and again, and
periodically, a union man will try to
unionize your shop or make il disa-
greeable for the nonunion men who
are there. The thing don't mix any
more than water and oil. To my
mind, there is one important thing TO
do today. and that is this: We run
practically a non-union shop. We
have to be very careful ourselves,
Mr. Chairman, how we, who are adj
yocating what you call an open shop
but what | would call a non-union
shop-how we deport ourselves In
these conferences"
Ii is very evident that Mr.. Gil
lette believed the open shop was a
nonunion shop. Mr.. Zoller, chairman
of the committee that introduced the
resolRtiap, admitted that the com
mittee itself did not agree rs to
what was meant, for, in reply to a
question by Mr.. Gillette, he said:
81 have to say that the committee
was unable to agree upon any defini-
ton of the open shop as such, ex
cept as it is stated in the preamble
of the resolution. When we get
down to defining the open shop as
such, We parted company in the
committees; however, we all agreed
to the preamble and TO the conelus-
ion. That is as far as we got, and
that is the best we could do. | do
not believe any definition | could
give, and | am not authorized to give
any, of course, as chairman and one
s,Amber of the ommittee-except as
stated here in these terms, in the
terms of the preamble, would be sat
isfactory to the people here"
Mr.. T. f. Donnelley, of II. r. Dom
nelley & Sons Company of Chicago,
tried to help out by stating:
81 would like to attempt to define
the open shop for Mr. Gillette's sat
isfaction, if possible.
81 run a shop the same of Mr.. Gil
lette. would say, the open shop
is the shop where a man employs
union or nonunion employees utterly
regardless of union affiliation, except
where the unions attempt to unionize,
under which circumstances the en-
ployer tries to protect his nonunion
employees"
Mr.. A. NJ. Glossbrenner of the In
diana Manufacturers Association,
gives his idea;
II happen to be running a shop
which | think is similar to yours, Mr..
Gillette, in the manufacturing busi-
ness; in that we will not employ an
individual in any part of the plant
that does not sign an individual con-
tract, in which it is understood that
he is not and will not become a mem
Der of a labor organization while in
our employ. am in favor of this
resolution, because the Interpretation
| give to it is that the open shop
means to me that can employ
whomever | may please as an indi-
vidual employer.
"That is the definition | understand
under the resolution"
Not satisfied with this, Mr.. A. T.
Simonds, of the Simonds Manufac-
turing company, Fitchburg, Mass,
added his definition in the following
language:
81 would like to give to you my
definition Of an open shop to see
whether it has any standing in the
community here.
my definition of an open shop
would be a shop in which the EN-
ployer deals with his employees sole
iy as an individual, whether he be
union or non-union."
Now, this is the gem of the whole
lot. Mr.. w. S. Finnell, Of the
American Scrubbing Equipment COM
my definition Of an open shop
would be that we would leave out
the word open and use the words
American plan.
"Now, as to the open shop idea, |
think that we all have a fairly good
idea of what the open shop is. |
cannot define it myself any better
than we have heard it defined here,
but knowing what we do, | think We
should endorse the open shop as it
is generally known"
These are the official definitions of