were such that you could not afford to lose it, even if you lost commercial work.

Mr. GRACE. You understand I am not talking of profit; I am talking of the value of the contract.

Mr. VREELAND. The value of the contract is in the end the profit. Mr. GRACE. The profit means the excess in the work.

Mr. VREELAND. Profit is what is left after you boil it down?

Mr. GRACE. Exactly. But with an armor plant representing a five-million-dollar investment, operating to about only one-fifth its capacity, there can not be much profit in it.

Mr. VREELAND. That is beside our purpose here, and I may say that I have always believed that the United States obtained its armor cheaper, at least, than any other great nation.

Mr. GRACE. That is a well-known fact.
Mr. HAYDEN. Thank you, Mr. Grace.

STATEMENT OF MR. M. E. BREWSTER-GREENE, OF BRIDGEPORT,

CONN.

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. I represent, gentlemen, the Manufacturers' Association of the city of Bridgeport, an association of fifty manufacturers, and in particular, as bearing on this bill, five or six manufacturers who do anywhere from a small to a great amount of Government work, one of them making as much as 70 per cent of its output Government work. If you desire, I will give the names of those plants. The American-British Manufacturing Company, making gun mounts, carriages, and ordnance; the American Ordnance Company, making guns and armament; the Union Metallic Cartridge Company, making ammunition. These firms contract frequently, and they subcontract with three other firms in town, the Bridgeport Brass Company, making rolled brass for ammunition; the General Chemical Company, manufacturing chemicals for use in the preparation of ammunition, and the Bryant Electrical Company, making electrical apparatus for use in the manufacture of armament.

Though I am not connected directly with any of these companies, I have familiarized myself to some extent with the processes in detail at the several plants, and can speak possibly not with so much authority as some of the other witnesses I have heard yesterday and to-day, but still with a pretty clear knowledge of what the provisions of this bill will amount to in their effect on our members.

Mr. DREW. Have you had a technical training?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. I am by profession an engineer, a graduate of Columbia. Primarily I should say that the company manufacturing armament, gun carriages, and so forth, would have to discontinue business, if the provisions of this bill should become a law, on Government work. The work as it comes now, and as it has been explained by Mr. Grace, consists in great part in castings and accurate machine work in large units which, if they were compelled to discontinue work upon at the end of any given period as short as eight hours, the utility of the piece would be endangered, and would almost inevitably become scrap.

Mr. VREELAND. In what particular line of manufacture?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. The output of the American-British and the American Ordnance companies armament, ordnance, and gun

carriages and mounts, both for coast defense and marine work, and guns not exceeding 8 inches.

Mr. DREW. They have the same problems as to having to keep the heat up, and the borings, as was mentioned here to-day and yesterday?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Yes; Those matters have been gone over by experts in detail. I do not want to waste any of your time on that. I want to represent the conditions as being duplicated in Bridgeport, possibly not in so great volume as with the Cramp works, but still in volume seriously affecting our own interests in Bridgeport. The same conditions hold true in regard to the manufacture of ammunition by the Union Metallic Cartridge Company, especially in regard to powder charges and fulminates. The chemists have very long and intricate operations, and in starting a job a man or a gang of men in charge or control of that job must pursue it to the end. It requires anywhere from eight to eighteen hours in some of these operations in the preparation of powder, and it would be impracticable to break it up at the end of any minimum period such as eight hours.

Mr. DREW. Why could not any new set of men come on at the end of eight hours and take these chemical tests of powder and explosives and continue them to a finish?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. There are physical reasons and there are also operating factory reasons. The plant would be disorganized by the division of responsibility, especially in the manufacture of explosives. I believe there are now in Washington some Bridgeport officers of the Union Metallic Cartridge Company on trial for defects in powder. There have been some premature explosions, and they have been trying at the same time to fix it at the other end, in the factory at Bridgeport. They will probably be able to do so; but had there been any division of responsibility or shifting of two gangs of men on the operation, they could not have done that. Then from a practical standpoint, of course, as has already been explained, the chemists and the gangs of men working with the chief chemist on the preparations of powder can not leave their work until the job is finished.

Mr. DREW. Each man has to be familiar with the different steps in the process, and himself follow it through. He could not tell somebody else?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. That is true. The steps comprise so many different governing and leading-up details, the matter of temperature and mixture and atmospheric conditions, that it would be impossible to acquaint the succeeding gang, the following gang, with all of these conditions. Likewise the personal element enters into it to a very large extent. There is a great deal of individual insight involved in the production of steel and in elaborate chemical operations.

Mr. DAVENPORT. Steel or powder?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Both; for instance, in the preparation of heats of steel for casting.

Mr. DREW. Could your people produce a part of their output on the eight-hour basis and produce the rest of their output with the men working longer hours?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Shorter hours?

Mr. DREW. No; longer hours.

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. I see what you mean; have one gang in the shop working one set of hours and another gang another set of hours?

Mr. DREW. Yes.

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Oh, no; it would disorganize the shop personnel altogether. One man working eight hours would not work alongside of a ten-hour man, or vice versa.

Mr. DREW. Furthermore, are there a number of these processes where this Government work and private work is operated upon at the same time?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Yes, sir.

Mr. DREW. So that they could not be distinguished?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Yes; in all of the plants. They follow right alongside of each other in the same classes, and it would not do to segregate them. The social conditions would be seriously disturbed. It would be unendurable.

Mr. VREELAND. What proportion of Government work do you do? Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. The plants I represent average 20 per cent. The Union Metallic Cartridge Company averages about 40 per cent of Government work.

Mr. VREELAND. Of output or value?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Output is the way I found it out in the conversations with the officers of the company. I am sorry they could not be here personally. They did not state it in dollars and cents. They simply called it percentage of output.

Mr. VREELAND. Is nine hours the prevailing time?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Nine hours is the prevailing day in Bridgeport. But especially in the ammunition and gun departments of these two concerns they work a great deal of overtime, and they pay overtime up to double time, according to the amount of work and the hazard in the manufacture of ammunition. Where there is a high degree of hazard they pay double time for overtime.

Mr. DREW. Do your people produce the Government work from the beginning to the end, or do they have to subcontract for any of the material they use?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. They subcontract for a great deal of the material; some in town, but a large proportion of it out of town. They have to get their steels, special alloys, chromium, vanadium, nickel, manganese, and so forth, from Pittsburg and South Bethlehem and from Jones & Laughlin and some other firms; I do not remember them all. Mr. DREW. They have to contract, then, with steel rolling mills? Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. They have to contract with steel rolling mills, with Bethlehem for ingots and rolled material.

Mr. DREW. Do they have to subcontract with any steel-fabricating shops to fabricate the steel after it is rolled?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. No; they are very well equipped in Bridgeport with forging plants for shaping.

Mr. DREW. These people do their own shaping?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. They do their own shaping, yes, sir; they have large hydraulic presses and drop hammers; and steel is not all that enters into it; there is rolled brass, and it has to be made to special proportions; and there are special preparations and acids that enter into to the manufacture of ammunition.

Mr. DREW. Do your people have to subcontract for this rolled brass and these shapes?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. All things that enter into Government work are so carefully protected by Government specifications that everything has to be let by a special Government subcontract.

Mr. DREW. Now, what can you say as to the amount that these subcontracts would represent in the total work of the firms to whom the subcontracts are given? Take, for instance, your steel.

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. That would be conjectural in a degree, but I should say it would not exceed 1 per cent of the output of any one of the large steel plants-Jones & Laughlin, Midvale, Carnegie, or Bethlehem if we gave all our orders to any one of those firms.

Mr. DREW. Then would you consider that if you inserted a clause in your contract for rolled steel providing that it must be produced on an eight-hour day, that any of these concerns would accept such a contract and furnish you with this steel?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. No; not at all. The volume of our business is not sufficient to permit us to dictate to them the terms on which they would supply us with 1 per cent of their output. They would refuse our business, and we could not get raw materials. Mr. DREW. What can you say as to the brass?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Brass is rolled right in Bridgeport by the Bridgeport Brass Company, but that only forms from 5 to 8 per cent of their output on Government work, and they would refuse it, too. There is much indisposition on the part of supply houses of raw material to tie themselves down to hours. They want all the liberty they can be allowed on special specifications in the matter of hours. Mr. DREW. What are the hours of the Bridgeport Brass Company? Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Nine hours a day.

Mr. DREW. And what you have said applies also to the acids for which you have to contract?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. The acids would be one of the most acute things under the limitation of hours. The jobs runs from thirty-six hours to four or five days under certain temperatures, and of course one man there does not follow the job clear through, but from the inception of the job until from about fifteen to eighteen hours have passed, the chemist in charge remains with it. After that it is watched carefully by separate gangs.

Mr. DREW. You also have to subcontract for lead?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Yes; lead comes into the manufacture of ammunition, and that has to be of a certain percentage of purity. We can not buy it in the open market on the specifications which are required.

Mr. DREW. Can you buy any of these materials you have just mentioned and spoken about in the open market?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Not one. I have not mentioned anything in my remarks that could be bought in the open market, because those would hardly be affected, I imagine, by the provisions of the bill.

Mr. VREELAND. What class of goods does the Government buy? Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. The Government buys ammunition, and the ammunition is made of a special rolled brass without poisonous material in it. In the ordinary commercial brass they have to

32796-08-12

insert arsenic, or at least they do it, to make it roll better, and it is a very difficult operation to roll brass without these poisonous elements. Arsenic is what is used.

Mr. VREELAND. How long has nine hours been the prevailing time of work in the factories of Bridgeport?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. In the machine shops it has been the condition for about fifteen months.

Mr. VREELAND. How did it come about? It used to be ten hours, I suppose?

There seemed

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. It used to be ten hours. to be a disposition on the part of the manufacturers there to anticipate the needs of the locality without waiting to be struck or having any fights on the subject, and they declared that after a certain date, which was three months later than the publication of this announcement, they would work on a nine-hour basis.

Mr. VREELAND. How do they compete with similar plants in other places that work ten hours?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. They are on the seashore and have very fine facilities for transportation.

Mr. NICHOLLS. Were they requested to grant a nine-hour day by any of their employees?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. At no time. Some years ago there was a strike for nine hours, but it was not successful. The time was ten hours before that strike and after it. There was no acknowledgment made of the demand.

Mr. DAVENPORT. Did you mention the Eaton, Cole & Burnham Company?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. No; they supply the Government with a large number of pipe fittings, but I believe they are made to standard. Mr. DAVENPORT. They make valves?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. Yes, the Ashton valves; and then there is another valve made by our member, the Ashcroft Company. Those are supplied to the Government, but they are bought in the open market. They have what they call a special high-duty valve.

Mr. DAVENPORT. Do you include the Bullard Machine Tool Company?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. I am not aware that they have any Government contracts. They make the Bullard Boring Mills. They have some of these machine tools at the Watervliet Arsenal and elsewhere.

Mr. DAVENPORT. Did you include, those in the firms doing business for the Government?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. No, I did not; because they are not included in the special Government contract work.

Mr. VREELAND. They would not come under the provisions of this bill?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. They would not have to go out of business if this bill became a law.

Mr. DREW. The others would have to get out?

Mr. BREWSTER-GREENE. I should say that the American-British Manufacturing Company would, and it would very seriously affect the business of the other concerns I named when I first arose.

Mr. DREW. Are there any other questions? I believe that is all.