Evening star., 1935-06-30
INDUSTRY GAINS,
LABOR TROUBLES
SHOW RECESSION
Strikes Far Less Severe
and Numerically Low
During Half Year.
OUTPUT WELL ABOVE
1894 DESPITE DECLINE
Long Attack of Textile Interests
on Cotton Processing Tax
Is Important Feature.
BY WILLIAM S. WHITE,

Associated Press Stan Writer.
A relatively prosperous half-yeaI
rounded, industry and labor head into
the last six-month stretch OF 1885
toward eventualities the measure and
scope of which their leaders can only
guess.
The historic friction between the two
great groups has been for the most
part free of disastrous upheavals: and
although there has been plenty o1
controversy, strikes have been numer.
ically at low point, as well as fai
less severe than in the preceding year
N. r. A. Codes Destroyed.
With the Supreme Courts invalida-
ton of the N. r. A. codes. on which
a huge new framework of industrial
law had been founded only to be de-
stroyed-both sides suddenly faced an
economic world in which the old rules
which governed for two years, held
fast no more. The courts decision was
received with mixed emotions. Or
ganiZed labor sorrowed and made
gloomy predictions Of widespread
strikes if wage and hour advantages
under the N. r. A. we're taken away
by employers; some leaders in industry
regretted the result, others hailed 1t as
a boon.
Labor, making no attempt to con-
ceal its readiness to use its economic
and political strength If necessary, be-
gan placing even more emphasis on It's
demands for passage Of such measures
as the Wagner labor disputes bill, the
3O-hour-week bill. social security legis-
lation and the Guffey coal stabiliza-
ton bill.
The Wagner measure was declared
necessary by labor leaders before the
death of N. r. A. in part because
of the long controversy over the mean
ing of section IA of the recovery
act-that guaranteeing the right to
bargain collectively.
Differences as to the sections in
terpretation were many during the
first part of the year. Moreover. a
lower Federal court cast doubt upon
the whole plan, holding IA inop-
erative to a large steel company in
Delaware, on the finding the firms
business was not in interstate COM
merce and therefore could not be
regulated, as to labor affairs, under
the commerce clause Of the Consti-
tuition.
Meanwhile many employers opposed
the Wagner and 30-hour bills as
stanchly as labor clamored for them
Deep-seated economic PHILOSOPHERS
were at war.
Production Still Ahead.
OF the small number of strikes
occurring In the first half Of the
year the two most important were
those involving motor car workers,
in Toledo and elsewhere. and lumber
workmen on the West Coast. Both
were settled, and another threatened
disturbance in the rubber industry
was avoided, Secretary of Labor
Frances Perkins personally conduct
ing the negotiations.
Business picked up over the same
period in 1884, the Commerce Depart
ment reporting that for the first four
months of this year industrial pro-
duction, factory pay rolls, employ
ment and domestic trade showed gains
ranging from fractional to material.
One feature of the period for industry
was the Long attack made on the cot
ton processing taxes by textile in
terests, which claimed they were being
penalized and foreign goods makers
aided.