Evening star., 1942-03-22
Wage-Hour Chieftain
Links Labor Law Fiqht
To Nazi Propaganda
Frances Case Not Apt,
He Replies to Critics;
Others Defend Workers
3y the Associated Press.

BY the Associated Press.
NEW YORK, March 21.-Assert-
Ing that it was improper to COM
pare the French 40-hour week with
that in the United States. Federal
Wage and Hour Administrator l..
Metcalfe Walling today linked at
tacks on the wage-hour laws to
"skillful Nazi propaganda"
We must remember that our
enemies abroad are attempting to
divide us so as to hamper our pro-
duction schedules" Mr.. Walling
said. The press, I am afraid, has
been taken in by their skillful
propaganda"
Addressing a meeting of the Ma
tional Consumers League, Mr.. Wall
ing asserted that the French 40
hour week law not only controlled
the hours that men in France could
work, but also limited the hours
that machinery and plants could
be utilized.
Since there is no limit on the
number of hours man may work
under the Federal Wage and Hour
Law, provided that his employer
pays him time and half for the
hours over 40 per week, this COM
parison with the French law cannot
be truthfully made he declared
Saying that he did not think
that labor would agree to "a wage
cut in a time like this" he said
that to abolish the wage-hour law
now would create "a serious up
heaval in production for war"
Claiming Dooley, director of
training within industry for the
labor division of the War Produc-
ton Board, told the meeting that
80 per cent of employees in war pro-
duction plants in the next few
months will be women.
BY the end of this year. there will
be more than 10 million persons
engaged in war work" Mr. Dooley
said. Three million of them will be
women"
Other speakers included Mrs.
Gilmore M. Herrick, regional director
for the National Labor Relations
Board in New York, who proposed
that minimum wage levels be raised
throughout the country and de-
clared that the national average now
Is only s16.88 per week"
After all, labor cannot be ex-
pected to be the only group to make
sacrifices for this war" Mrs. Her.
rick said
Morse Hits Frozen" Wages.
In an address prepared for
meeting of the International Juridi-
cal Association Wayne L. Morse.
member of the War Labor Board,
said tonight that "unquestionably
there is need for a thorough study
OF the wage problem in its relation
to the war effort but objected to
freezing" wages.
The difference between a ceiling
on wages. fixing an upper limit ad-
Justed to some flexible formula. and
freezing wages as they existed on
some past date should not be over
looked" he added
Dean Morse, who heads the Uni
versity Of Oregon Law School. said
he believed, too, that there should
be "a national program, balanced
and co-ordinated in nature and
flexible In principle, pertaining to
wages. prices. profits. interest.
prlorities, taxes and cost-plus con-
tracts" He did not elaborate on this
idea.
Also addressing the juridical As
soclatlon Edwin S. Smith, director
OF the oil workers organizing cam
palgn and former member of the
National Labor Relations Board.
asserted tonight, Labor does not
need to yield humbly to reaction, nor
to sit silent under unjust attack"
Can Afford to Yield Ground.
If labor fully realizes its stake
IN winning the war, it will know
when to attack on a wide front and
when to remain relatively quiescent
in the face of unwarranted attacks
upon it., Mr.. Smith said.
He declared that labor could
afford, if the situation demands
it. to lose face and even to lose
tangible and hard-won privileges,
as long as it does not lose its in
creasing momentum on behalf of
the war"