New Britain herald., 1922-08-26

drafted for the army Is not form of slavery.
 Government Operation Unpopular.
 This may be all right in theory" continued MT. Babson. but the pub lie Is in no mood at present for fur ther Government operation. The re- suits of the war. in connection with the operation of the railroads. the building and operation of ships and the various other interests in which the Government took hand, show that under present conditions Gov ernment operation is expensive. in- efficient and unsatisfactory
 The public believes today that better organization, better discipline and lower costs come through pri- yate operation. The public further believes that private operation should continue so long as the present em- ployes of the railroads. public utilities and coal operators are not compelled to work for the owners of these properties but are free to leave them and work for other people, and so
 long as there are plenty of other men available and willing to work on the railroads, public utilities and coal mines under a system of compulsory arbitration.
 Tn view of these facts, 1t seems to me that the public will not at present take seriously the claim of the labor
 leaders that compulsory arbitration applied even to industries operated for profit Is necessarily slavery. If 1t were to apply to all industries or If there were not a group of men per fectly willing to work on the rail- roads, public utilities and coal mines under system of compulsory arbi- tration, then there might be some jus tice in the slavery argument. To- day, however, railroad men are per- fectly free to go into other lines of activity for which no compulsory ar- bitration is suggested, while hundreds of thousands of men are willing to work for the railroads. public utilities and even the coal operators under d compulsory arbitration system. How will such a compulsory system be put in operation in connection with the railroads, public utilities and mines? :? Possibly the people will be so irritat- ed that congress will with one swoop apply the Kansas industrial court idea to the railroads, public utilities and mines. l hope, however, this will not 1 be done. The need of the hour is to have workers feel right. We shall never have efficiency and a reduction in the cost of living until those en- gagged in industry feel right toward their work. People never feel right when forced to do anything against their better judgment Hence my forecast is as follows:
 The railroad labor boards rulings will not now be made compulsory as to the present employees. but they will be compulsory on every employe who goes to work for the railroads after a certain date. Those en- ployes who are now at work for the railroads came on free. competitive basis and have done faithful work. Although theoretically they can change to some other job, yet practi- cally they cannot. They know the railroad business and this is all they do know, and 1t isn't fair to say they can quit at their present time of life and enter a new field of work. There fore I say that unless these present employees will voluntarily come under the compulsory arbitration system they should be free to continue as at present. But every additional man hired will be hired with the distinct understanding that he will conform to the decisions of the railroad labor board, as must the stockholders of such corporations. This would be perfectly fair and would bring about a result which would be gracefully ac- cepted by all in the course of time. Under this system 1t would take few years to bring about the desired result. but we would rapidly approach | it from year to year, and when adopt ed it would have the full cooperation of all concerned. This is my forecast of the way that the problem will ul- timately be worked out. Then there will be no more strikes on our rail- roads nor in connection with the pub lie utilities, mines, etc, when the same method is extended to include them also.