The CHAIRMAN. I do not know. I suppose that so much of the testimony already taken, appearing in the record, which is considered to be pertinent, might be extracted and embodied in these present hearings.

Mr. GOEBEL. I think that would be the proper thing to do.

Mr. GILBERT. Somebody ought to summarize that testimony.

Mr. HUGHES. Was it not understood in the last meeting that the proponents or the opponents of the bill were to proceed with their testimony on February 4?

The CHAIRMAN. It was decided at that meeting that we would begin the hearings at this time (February 4), and the chairman was instructed to give out notice to that effect, and such information was given to the Associated Press. To what extent that has been published I do not know. I will say to the committee right here that it is quite possible that some people who are very much interested in this matter probably should have been written to or notified, who have not been so notified. It has not suited Congress in its wisdom up to this time to give to this committee more than a session clerkship, and so at the adjournment of the Congress the committee has no clerk, and the law takes away my clerk at the end of a session, and busy as I am with the Post-Office Committee and with 24,000 labor unions, with whom I have had correspondence, it has simply been an impossibility with the organization allowed this committee to do the work required of it; but we do the best we can.

Mr. HUGHES. If I remember, there was some effort made about two weeks ago to have the hearings commence then, and there were purely formal objections put in, and the understanding was that on February 4 the committee would get down to work.

Mr. McCAMMON. I received no such notice, and I probably was as much entitled to a notice as any one interested in this proposed legislation. I simply received a notice that there would be a meeting on the 4th of February-a meeting of the committee.

The CHAIRMAN. I do not know that you have filed a protest against the bill, and if not that may account for your not receiving any notice. We have not had any written replies to communications we have not

received.

Mr. McCAMMON. I received a notice of the meeting and I thank the secretary for that.

Mr. HUGHES. Are there not any of the opponents of the bill here who are ready to go on and take up some of the time?

The CHAIRMAN. Are there no representatives of any organization here ready to go on this morning?

STATEMENT OF MR. DANIEL DAVENPORT, OF BRIDGEPORT,

CONN.

Mr. Chairman, I am an attorney at law, practicing at Bridgeport, Conn. I represent an organization with a various and numerous membership in different parts of the country. Over a hundred of them are in Connecticut. I will say that the membership is private. The organization is formed for the purpose of aiding in the enforcement of laws, particularly the law against boycotting, and those members look upon this bill as an attempt to boycott every concern in this country which is not willing to arrange its affairs according to certain

requirements that they find impossible. Those members will be unable to enter into competition. In other words, it is an attempt by law to boycott those establishments.

I came down here to-day for the purpose of expressing to this committee the opposition of that organization and its members, and for the purpose of giving to this committee information to show you how the employers of this country are opposed to this bill, and, further, information that the individual workingmen of this country are bitterly opposed to this bill.

It so happens, Mr. Chairman, that when this movement that I speak of started I was requested to go out over the country for the purpose of interviewing employers, manufacturers, for the purpose of interesting them in that movement, and it has fallen to my lot to visit probably several thousand establishments; and I have come in contact with the managers of those associations and I have made it my business, as far as I could, to go into their works and talk with the men to

see whether or not they believed in any such measure as this, and I am prepared at a suitable time to lay before this committee the information which I have obtained. A greater mistake was never made in the world than to suppose that the workingmen of this country are in favor of any measure which will deprive a man who may be off to-day on account of sickness or any other thing from making up that time. If you limit him to eight hours a day, six days in the week, I say that when the matter is explained to the individual workingman he is opposed to it.

I have also the information to impart to the committee in regard to the attitude of the employers on the subject, which I have also gathered. I am a little surprised to learn, however, that opposition is made here to a bill first-that is, that the opponents of a measure are first heard. I supposed that the sensible and ordinary way of getting at it would be first to hear what is said in favor of a bill. Perhaps after what ha been said in favor of it has been heard the committee might not thinks it was deserving enough to require any answer. It seems that the practice has been rather to put the cart before the horse here and to require those who oppose a bill to advance arguments why it should not be passed, in order that they may be met.

Now, if the programme

The CHAIRMAN. Pardon me. Is that not a very general practice in legislative proceedings-that gentlemen come before committees to be heard on a bill in protest?

Mr. DAVENPORT. My experience in that regard is very limited. I have had no other practice than that before the legislative committees in Connecticut, and there we pursue the other course. But so far as that is concerned, that is immaterial. If the opponents are to go ahead, then at the proper time I would like to present to the committee reasons why this bill ought not to be passed, as I have gathered them from the extremely intelligent gentlemen who represent these great establishments, and as I have gathered them also from the working men themselves.

How late does the committee sit to-day, Mr. Chairman?

The CHAIRMAN. The usual time for adjournment is 12 o'clock, but I do not know that our presence is required in the House, and perhaps the committee could go on for several hours.

Mr. DAVENPORT. If the matter is to go over for a week I will ask the privilege of being heard. Of course I know there are other gentlemen who wish to be heard, I know there are great interests represented here, and of course the committee will accord to all a hearing adequate to the importance of the questions involved. I would prefer, so far as I am concerned, for those I represent, if an opportunity could be given to me a week from to-day, say, for an hour and a half, to lay before you what information I have, as well as something in the way of argument.

The CHAIRMAN. Without objection, the hearing of Mr. Davenport can be made a special order for next Thursday morning at 10.30 o'clock.

Mr. CALDWELL. Do you expect to have both employers and employed here next Thursday?

Mr. DAVENPORT. No sir; I expect myself to be a witness. I propose to state to this committee what I know about this business, and I would say it would take an hour and a half for me to do so. And I would solicit the opportunity, on account of my other engagements, of being heard if no one else wants to be heard-at that particular hour. Mr. CALDWELL. In addition to your argument against the bill, do you propose to have persons here representative both of labor and the employers of labor as witnesses!

Mr. DAVENPORT. No, sir.

Mr. CALDWELL. Simply your own statement against the bill?
Mr. DAVENPORT. Yes, sir.

Mr. McCAMON. Your own statement based on your own experience and investigations?

Mr. DAVENPORT. Yes, sir: absolutely. If this committee would undertake to do what I have done this bill would never see the light of day from this committee. The so-called representatives of the laboring class here are no more representative of them than light is of darkness.

Mr. GOMPERS. You can readily understand the bona fide character of the gentlemen's clients when he will not even bring any of them here.

So far as we are conterned, myself included, we who favor the passage of the bill, we have at no time failed to produce men who could testify of their own knowledge, and of their own ability to work, men who have worked and who were working at the particular trade they testified about, and who were experts at their trades. Of course, when a man comes here and in some mysterious fashion says that he represents a body of men whose membership is private and whose names I doubt he will give to your committee-that is one side of the case. On the other hand, we come here representing more than 2.000.000 organized workmen and 24,000 local unions, of which the chairman spoke a few moments ago in connection with another matter, whose names and addresses are published broadcast throughout the country, whose names we give to you gentlemen.

Let me say, further, gentlemen, that there has not been a gathering of 25 workmen in the United States at any place within the past fifty years who have had under consideration the question of the hours of daily labor but who have gone on record unqualifiedly in favor of an eight-hour workday. These are the men I represent. Whom does

this gentleman represent? He may represent a number of employers of labor, of respectability and eminence, but whose existence is private; and what he may say as to the views of workmen whom he has interviewed as the representative of that private organization of employers-well, you can very well imagine what an individual workman would say to this attorney of the employers' association, whose existence is private.

Mr. GOEBEL. Do you not think that may be a good argument after it is heard?

Mr. GOMPERS. But he has made the statement

Mr. GOEBEL. I understand he simply says now that he desires to make a statement. The question before this committee now, I submit, is in what order we shall proceed.

Mr. GOMPERS. But if our honor is impugned I think we ought to have an opportunity to be heard.

Mr. HUGHES. The statement was made that Mr. Gompers does not represent the workingmen of this country.

Mr. GOMPERS. And I am simply trying to show, in answer to that, the relative positions that the gentleman occupies and that we occupy before this committee.

The CHAIRMAN. Without objection, the special order for next Thursday is the hearing of Mr. Davenport at 10.30 o'clock. He will be given one hour and a half.

Mr. CONNER. I understand, Mr. Davenport, that you will have no representatives here from the manufacturers, or from among the workingmen either, at that time?

Mr. DAVENPORT. No, sir.

Mr. CONNER. In what way will you convey to us the protest that the laborers themselves make to this bill?

Mr. DAVENPORT. I am going to give you the information which I myself have. Now, then, gentlemen, if it were an issue between myself and Mr. Gompers as to whether our statements are correct or not, if this committee will undertake by subpoena to get the attendance of these people here it will be very easily determined; but, of course, what I say the committee can take and give what weight it chooses to, and what Mr. Gompers says it can take and give what weight it chooses

to.

What I did say was that if the members of this committee had gone around this country and interviewed the establishments, as it was my opportunity and my duty to do, they would get a very different idea in regard to this thing than perhaps they would get otherwise. So far as an imputation here of Mr. Gompers is concerned, I would like to ask, Are these intimations ordinary and common in hearings of this kind? Mr. Gompers, no doubt, thinks he does represent the great working people of this country

Mr. GOEBEL. I submit, with all due deference

The CHAIRMAN. The question was asked awhile ago as to how much time was given on this bill in the last Congress. The clerk has looked up the record.

On February 13 we began the hearings, and sat about all day. We had hearings on the 20th, 26th, and then on March 6, March 13, and March 18, both morning and afternoon sessions on the two last dates mentioned, and closed up the work. So hearings were held on six different days, and the time consumed was equivalent to nine or ten ordinary sessions.

Mr. SPALDING. I have read very carefully the hearings before the last Congress, and in reading them over I was impressed very strongly with what seemed to be one fact or condition-and I am more impressed with it this morning and that is that a great part of the time was taken up with criminations and recriminations, which were entirely useless and out of place. Now, I have other business to perform and other duties, and I think all of us here have. I want individually to give this matter the fullest and most careful and candid consideration, but I do not want to spend a great deal of time here that is utterly useless, and it seems to me that when either side starts out on these charges and recharges the speakers should be called down, and if they do not desist then, that they should not be heard further.

The CHAIRMAN. There has been too much of that.

Mr. CALDWELL. Is it not a fact that we defined a difference between hearings and arguments, and that we gave a certain amount of time for argument for and against the bill at the close of the hearings in addition to the hearing of witnesses, and were not all those arguments at the close of the hearing?

The CHAIRMAN. We had arguments on what was called the testimony, yes. The fact is, however, that most of the hearings were arguments, and then there were arguments on the arguments.

Mr. CALDWELL. We had a great many men here who occupied something of the same position that Mr. Davenport occupies; we heard a great many statements from both sides, and then we heard arguments as to what weight should be given to the different testimony.

Mr. CONNOR. I understand Mr. Davenport comes here as a witness. Mr. CALDWELL. I understand he is to make an argument.

Mr. CONNOR. He comes here to testify as to what he has discovered. Mr. HUGHES. That is hardly testimony.

Mr. CONNOR. I am wondering how he can convey to us the conditions he has found without bringing any witnesses here. Are we to learn about this on written information, Mr. Davenport, or are we to take your statement?

Mr. DAVENPORT. You are to take my statement as to the facts.

Mr. GOEBEL. I think the suggestion of my friend on the right (Mr. Gilbert) was a good one, namely, that some one should go through the printed record of testimony, as heretofore taken by the committee, and make extracts from that testimony. Let both sides take that record and go through it and then present that to the committee. We will gain something in that way, and then if there is any additional evidence on either side let it be presented. It seems to me that would facilitate the matter, and in that way we will not go over things we have gone over before.

Mr. HUGHES. That was the very thing we were driving at the last time this bill was up before this committee. The evidence had been put in and every argument for and against the bill was in writing, and it was assumed that the members of the committee would make themselves familiar with that; and, as I understand it, the object of the committee then was to have the opponents of this measure come forward and advance anything new that might be pertinent to this particular bill, or that they might have discovered since the last hearing. Mr. BARTHOLDT. Mr. Chairman, I would suggest that any argument among the committee as to the bill should be made in executive session.