Seward daily gateway., 1925-12-14
TRADE DISPUTES DISCRIMINATING 
 WORKINGMEN
SECRETARY, oF LABOR DAVIS Y. v RAPs JURIsDlcTIoNAL Dis-
 PuTE IN BUILDING TRADES.

PUTE IN BUILDING TRADES.
 - WASHINGTON D. C., Dec. 14- Commenting upon the work of the Division of Consolidation of the De- partment of Labor during the past year, the Secretary of Labor in his
 report to Congress takes a. fling at I the so-called jurisdictional dispute. He says, "On the matter of jurisdic- tional disputes I have strong convic- l tions and shall open my mind freely and frankly on the evil effect these disputes have on the building pro- gram of the entire country. In some
 instances it is more than jurisdic-
 tional dispute-it is civil war between contending organizations.
 T know of nothing more disheart- ening to a workman to set out in the morning not knowing whether or not he is going to get a days pay, because one of these jurisdictional disputes may be on; I don't know of anything so disheartening to the owner of building, the man who is paying for it, or to the contractor who employs the men to built it. All par ties connected with the enterprise of raising a new building can side step the responsibility for these dis putes, but it is usually the workman who in the end gets the blame for stoppage of work and organized la bor suffers from it.
 'The contractor, the sub-contrac- 1 ttor, the architect, the owner, the financial organizations paying the bills are all innocent losers in a sit uation not of their making. I know many men who are anxious to build, and afraid to build, because of these jurisdictional disputes. r
 ''The fact is, these jurisdictional disputes have become a matter of grave concern to the whole public. The whole business and industrial machinery of the countryl'is upset as, one after the other important fac tors in the national building program are subjected to loss by wrang1es and stoppages of work. The loss begins with the wages of the trades in dis pute. It spreads and spreads until large sections of the public are out of pocket. That sort of thing, if long continued, can slow up the building program of an entire section of the country, and it has bad eff feet on business generally. It is impossible to over-emphasize the bad effects arising from one of these dis putes, and it is just as hard to over emphasize the importance of getting them settled and stopped as prompt ly as possible And the worker him. self can not get out of his part in getting them settled.
 Nothing can do more to destroy the chances of organized labor to deal with large organized industrial interests than these civil wars among the unions. Organized labor has withstood destructive assaults within and without it's own ranks. It should root out the jurisdictional dispute. So long as the trade-union movement stands true to its principles and de- serves the support of it's membership and the public, it will get that SUD- port But, unlike other movements in this or any other country, organ ized labor can commit suicide thru internal dissension. And these jur- isdictional disputes are just that form of suicide.
 'There are angles to this abuse in building that can not go into here, but in all the human elements that enter into it the workman always gets the blame. These constant stoppages are costly. They cost the worker not only in loss of wages but in constant assessments that the fighting may go on. Every loss caus- ed by these disputes comes home to the worker, because every addition al cost to a building is paid in higher rents and purchase price. These fights are even cutting down work by frightening people from building.
 Here is the case in nutshell: Invention and change in building me- thods are going to go on. So long as progress goes on disputes are bound to occur. The thing is to get them settled.
 After all. the American worker is a business man. We have got to rely on his business sense to refer to an impartial tribunal created for