Evening star., 1947-01-04

their right to collect for travel time.
In 194l the administrator, MAJ. (now
Maj. GEM Philip B. Fleming, ruled
that such time was work time and
that in the future they could collect
for it. The usual time -and-one- half
provision for overtime would apply.
The Wage and Hour Administration
would seek to enforce the ruling.
In 1914 the Supreme Court upheld
the administrator ruling. The
metal mining companies complied
settled the workers claims, and did
something more. They improved
their own operations in a manner
to reduce the average of travel time
from As minutes to less than IS
minutes.
UNIV i'm Curious Course.
Meantime the United Mine Work
ers had followed a curious course.
Their attorney, Earl Houck, Joined
with Charles O'Neill of the opera
tors, in a letter to the Wage and
Hour Administration, suggesting
that any decision on the subject
should not apply to the coal mines.
The pay scale, they said, took travel
time into account
But, the Tennessee Coal & Iron
Co. having brought an injunction
suit against the union in 1941, the
union countered with a suit for
damages under the Fleming ruling,
presenting claims for overtime back
to 1888. And in 1943 John L. Lewis,
negotiating the annual contract, put
in a demand for back pay and dam
ages, under the ruling. Confronted
with the O'Neill- -Houck letter, he Is
said TO have remarked that it was
merely scrap of paper. In any
case the issue was settled. by token
payment of $40 per man.
Then there was the Jewell Ridge
case. a suit started by former Sena-
tor Edward r. Burke, then head of
the Southern operators organiza-
ton. The Supreme Court in 1945
again affirmed the Fleming ruling
and extended it to coal mining.
During 1943, 1914 and 1945 the
administrator ruled similarly in a
number of cases. Some cases in
volved time spent in changing into
the clothes required by employers,
preparing machines, sharpening
company tools and other so-called
nonproductive work. Loggers won a
decision on the time spent travel
ing from camp to trees.
The present prairie fire Of law
suits did not begin, however, until
the Supreme Court upheld Federal
Judge Picard in the Mount Clemens
Mich.) Pottery Workers case, re-
manding it to him to determine just
how much overtime pay and dam
ages the workers should receive
A nice job for the judge.
Part Played by CLIO.
Which brings us to the part being
played by the CIO, whose attorneys
have been preparing some enormous
claims in behalf of members of af-
filiated unions. Persons close to the
hierarchy of the CIO intimate that
President Murray and his advisers
are not very happy about the situ-
alton. 1t is a case apparently of
having a bear by the tail and being
unable to let go. This. is explained
by the fact that, under er"che law, any
employe or any group of employees
can bring suit. ANY lawyer looking
for fee can instigate suit. 1t is
not necessarily a union matter.
The CIO moved into the situation
it is asserted, in an effort to head
off preposterous claims that might
tend to make all organized labor
both ridiculous and unpopular. In
any case, President Murray has sent
out a general memorandum on the
subject to all affiliates, setting forth
the workers rights under the law
and advising them concerning posi-