The Waterbury Democrat. [volume] (Waterbury, Conn.) 1917-1946, 1944-01-17

JlOnaI service aCI
when the war was young and there
were labor shortages everywhere.
Now there are shortages in only a
few places, and the war is old. The
production situation seems to have
been fairly we'll licked without a
national service act, and therefore
it might be argued that such legis-
lation is no longer necessary.
RECONvERSION PERIOD
AHEAD
Supporters of national service
legislation point to the facts that
the war isn't over yet by a long
shot, that strikes are still too nu-
merous, that there are still some so
tight manpower areas. that the peak
of employment won't come till July,
Then-and here's the new argument
will come the period of recover
sion from war to civilian industries
and In that period it will be just as
important to move manpower from
where there are no jobs to where
there are jobs, and what would be
simpler than to make this big shift
in employment under a national
service act?
But wait a minute. Take look
at few recent experiences in try
ing to move workers from places
where there were no jobs to places
where jobs were going begging:
Up near Lowell, Mass, there is q
war plant that since the start Of
the war has been making a lot of
small arms. A short time ago the
Army decided it had enough of the
small arms such as this arsenal had
been making, and that 1t could begin
to taper off production.
But about the same time it be-
came apparent that there was going
to be a shortage of bearings. Now
the bearing industry has concen-
tration in the Connecticut Valley.
What could be simpler, therefore,
than moving the people from Mas
sachusetts, where there were going
to be surplus workers, into Connec-
ticut where there were shortages?
The War Manpower Commission
people worked out beautiful plan
to facilitate this swap. 1t arranged
to send labor recruiting agents into
Massachusetts to hire people who
might be interested in going to Con-
necticut. Furthermore, 1t arranged
with the Massachusetts plants to re-
lease workers only as rapidly as
they were hired for jobs in Connec-
ticut. In that way there would be
no layoffs. no unemployment, no
lost wages. Everything looked dandy.
COUNTER CAMPAIGN
But along about this time the
local Chambers of Commerce got
next to what was going on. Take
workers out of their communities?
Over the dead body Of civic pride!
Ads began to appear In the local
papers, telling the citizenry, Don't
Leave Lowell. Your Congressman
Is on the Job in Washington. (Con-
greSSwoman Ed h Nourse Rogers
of Lowell) More war contracts are
coming. There will be jobs for ALL"
And SO forth.
The Manpower Commissions
beautiful recruiting campaign ended
right there, and the U. S. Employ
ment Service agents began to look
elsewhere for people to make bear
ings in the Connecticut Valley.
Things like this happen all the
time, and you have no idea how
much heat a congressional delega-
ton, backed by irate constituents,
can put on government admins
trative agency in Washington when
they kindle the fires of local pride
under their boilers of hometown
patriotism and get up steam. This
is nothing to criticize.
Local pressureS of this kind are
going to increase as war contracts
are cut back, as industries recon-
vert from making war goods to
making peace goods. No community
that has gained any of these new
war industries will readily let go OF
those gains.
Not even a national service act
would ease these transitions. For
the minute a national service act
administrator issued directive for
ten or a hundred workers in war
plane factory at Bangville to quit
their jobs and start making re-
frigerators or automobiles in Bing-
vile. everyone in Bangville would
start yelling. And this is just one
of the problems of unemployment in