New-York tribune., 1922-01-22
Sherman Law "Iniouitv -
Employer Blames Anti Trust Act for Unemployment
-lrade Agreements Would Help

10 the Editor Of The Tribune.
Sir: Some twenty years ago, with the
iaudablc intention of protecting the
wage Garner from piracy" certain
Mr.. Sherman devised an antitrust act
winch was written on the Federal stat
utcs. This act, and subsequent amend
ments and improvements, assured the
American people of all the benefits of
Tree and unrcstrained competition.
Unrcstrained competition now heirr
hrmly established in every important
line of industry. the processes by which
millions of waEc carners have been
thrown out Of employment are simple
to describe. The evident in;quity of
the Sherman net consists in tying tho
hands OF any group of employers,
large or small, who in time of de-
preston and slack demand could keep
all their workncn employed at part
time by the familiar expcdicnt Of re-
strlctlng output and agreeing not to
steal each others trade by price cut
ting.
What has actually happened is this {:
A large number of employers have cut
their prices, their men have agreed to
substantial wage reductions and they
have hurried out to snap up enough
orders to run their plants full time.
Those plants whose wage rates we're
maintained by union, or whose own
ers refuse to entcr a disastrous price
and wage war, remain idle until the
order books of the price and wage cut
ters are filled.
In some industries all the concerns
have jumped into the competition
First, price cut; then wage cut;
then another price cut; then another
whack at wages-so that each mill, or
mine, is alternately idle and working
and with each blow of the struggle
both the employer and the employee
put themselves a little deeper in the
mirc. Only the buyer profits-and he
must pay the whole bill later, with a
little added for accrued interest
Six to seven million men who were
out of work in 1921-and more than
that who will be out of work in 1872
testify to the iniquity of the ronclad
prohibition Of honorable trade agree
ments.
The employers Of this country have
brains enough, if they are permitted by
our lawmakers to use them, to effect
the gigantic rcadjustment following
the great war, and without causing
any such colossal suffering as exists
to-day.
A reasonable and parallel reduction
in all wages and salaries; thorough
and uniform defation of wholesale
and retail margins, and a proper re-
striction Of output within all produc-
tive trades, would have kept these idle
men and women at work at least three
or four days a week, and avoided the
wanton destruction of many splendid
enterprises, built up by the savings of
thousands Of thrifty people.
The very laws which were designed
to protect the wage earners from "pi
racy" are plunging him into poverty
and the employer who sees things as
they are is powcrless to help the peo
pie who once worked for him.
There is enough domestic trade ir
essentials to keep the wage earners of
this country all employed at least three
days week. Why not take down the
bars that have been raised against
100000 of them?
If the coal miners union. the build
crs' unions and the railroad brother
hoods were commanded by voice o1
sufficient authority to recognize thci,
obligation to their idle co-workers and
recognize the drop in living costs BY
matching the sacrifices already made
by farmers, merchants and laborers ir
all other industries. then the first Of
the bars would be down.
The bar raised by high freight rates
would crumble with the first one and
another important drop in the price o1
necessities would follow.
But these steps are useless unless
the unsurmountable bars raised by
Sherman and Clayton are chopped