Mr. HUGHES. Nobody infringed upon their rights in those days? Mr. GOMPERS. Nobody infringed upon their right to work in those days. They worked from early morning until late at night. Nobody infringed upon their right to work. The union said not a word. Very little of a union existed, and that which existed had not taken any action as to the hours of labor. The result of which was that the men in the trade were the worst paid of any craft of which I know. They were the most demoralized, the most unreliable and shiftless set of men of any trade of which I know.

In 1884 the organization, in convention, considered the question of limiting the hours of labor to ten per day. I should say that the proposition for any such matter must come, not by delegate from an organization, but from the organization itself making the proposition-in other words, the essential features of the initiative. The proposition to limit the hours of labor of the members of our organization to ten per day was considered in the convention and adopted, and then a referendum vote was taken of the members.

Two years afterwards we met by the same method, and a proposition to establish the eight-hour workday for the members of our craft was made, discussed, and adopted by the convention, and referred to a referendum vote.

The proposition to reduce the hours of labor from ten to eight was adopted by a much larger majority than the first proposition to limit the hours of labor to ten; the reason of it being that those who worked without interference of any union, or regulation of any kind, had become so accustomed to that "freedom" to swelter and squalor, that they had not intelligence enough to vote in their own interests; but two years of a limitation of their hours of labor to ten per day had so demonstrated its benefits to them that they gladly voted to limit it to eight hours per day; and mark you, gentlemen, this was not an industry paid by the day, where men receive " ten hours' pay for eight hours' work," and all that sort of thing, but it was a trade in which piecework is the universal rule. So that the men presumably reduced their wages by reducing their hours of labor; that is, they did not get ten hours' pay. But they did get higher prices per piece very soon after.

Mr. HUGHES. The cigar makers, as I understand it, Mr. Gompers, are regarded as more nearly approaching ideal conditions than any other craft. Is not that true?

Mr. GOMPERS. I ought to have added that the set of men, whose condition I have attempted to convey to you as prevailing before the limitation of the hours of labor by the organization, are everywhere regarded now as self-respecting, intelligent men and citizens, whose earning power is better to-day than it was during those periods of which I speak, when they were uninterfered with and when they had liberty to work as many hours as they wished. Their organization to-day is most economically conducted and most intelligently administered.

It is almost automatic in character, the initiative and referendum obtaining in it not only in the nomination and election of its officers, but in the adoption of a resolution, the change of a law or the constitution of the organization, etc. As regards the benefits paid, not merely in controversies and in strikes, but also for benevolent and protective purposes, we have expended nigh on $6,000,000 within the past fifteen years.

Mr. GOEBEL. I do not want to interrupt you, but I am afraid you did not quite get my question. My idea as a legislator is to look at the provisions of the bill that we are to recommend. One of the provisions of this bill will absolutely prohibit a man from working longer than eight hours.

Mr. HUGHES. Except in cases of emergency.

Mr. GOEBEL. Except, of course, in cases of emergency. What I want to know is, whether the interests that you represent desire a limitation of their right to labor longer than eight hours, if by contract it could be made so?

Mr. GOMPERS. I would say that we want the hours of labor reduced, and we want no overtime. We want no man to have even the opportunity of overtimewe put it strongly-unless there be an extraordinary emergency, as already indicated in the provisions of the bill and as already stated by others before this committee.

Let me say, too, in further answer to this question, that in any given industry operated under modern conditions, a man can not find opportunity for overtime. Men are employed for eight hours, and at the end of eight hours other men take their places. If plants operate sixteen or twenty-four hours and have two shifts of men, they change at twelve hours. If the plant operates ten hours a day, they close down at the end of the ten hours, and no man can get a chance to work overtime in any modern industrial plant, even if he wants to.

Mr. GOEBEL. Overtime, as I said before, means time over above a limited time. Let me suppose a case where a contractor having Government work to do would say to his men, "Let us agree here that you work ten hours instead of eight, or nine hours instead of eight." This bill would absolutely prohibit that. It would therefore, of course, infringe upon the inherent right every man has to labor as long as he pleases, and to make such a contract as he pleases, in any operation or any line. What I am trying to get at is, in such an instance or such a case do you contend that they should not have the right to enter into such a contract?

Mr. GOMPERS. Yes, sir.

I think another point upon which the opposition agree is that they want to be let alone. It was almost a piteous plea that they made. They want to be let alone. Some men who have come away from their mother country and who have joined their fortunes with the people of our own, and who in their own country were raising their voices for the same relief and same redress, were met in their own countries by the same cry, "they wanted to be let alone." They come here and enjoy advantages that are, and have been, most fortunate, and now, when the workmen ask for some relief, they, too, join in the cry, "We want to be let alone. We do not ask any special favors from you, but we want to be let alone." They do not ask for any special favors from you except when they want some subsidy or some tariff legislation, or some other kind of legislation. Then they do not want to be let alone, and they do not let you alone.

I am not making an argument against either one or the other at this time. That is not the question; but they want to be let alone. In what? When Great Britain held the colonists in her grip, and France made up her mind to try to help the struggling men who wanted to build a new nation, Great Britain wanted to be let alone. When chattel slavery existed in the South, and the voices of men were raised appealing to God and man for human freedom, the slave master wanted to be let alone. Spain in her grinding of Cuba and other colonies wanted to be let alone from the interference of the great American people. The dog that is gnawing at a bone wants to be let alone. The gourmand wants to be let alone. The modern Moloch who is grinding the very bones of the toilers of to-day wants to be let alone.

I want to say to you, gentlemen, that they will not be let alone. I want to say to the organization of the Manufacturers' Association, who have an unreasonable and unreasoning man or a few men at the head who have no conception of the rights of men or of modern industrial conditions, and to the Antiboycott Association, which has a powerful mind controlling it, whether it has a real or an imaginary existence, to the detective agencies hired to spy, betray, and lie about labor and labor men, the efforts to outlaw the organizations of labor, the efforts to force men who are as honorable, as honored, and as patriotic citizens of this country as any there be, to improper, impractical, or un-American action or expressions will not succeed. You will not make anarchists of American organized workmen. You may make unorganized workmen desperate and make them do the things that may give you the seeming provocation to invoke the prejudices of men, but we have tasted freedom. Men may be kept in servitude and slavery from infancy to the grave and never know what freedom means; but we have tasted freedom through organized and united effort, and you can not make slaves of men who have once tasted freedom. You can not take away from them the freedom that they enjoy through their united effort.

The organizations of labor have reduced the hours of labor, to the advantage of the workmen and without detriment to the employers, and with advantage to the whole community.

It is a mistake to say that production is curbed or reduced when the hours of labor are shortened. The whole history of industry demonstrates the reverse. Even so competent an authority as Mr. Cramp, the head of the Cramp Shipbuilding Company, of Philadlphia, before the Senate Committee on Education and Labor, I think or before the House Committee on Labor-I am not sure which, but the hearings will show-stated that the Russian Government wanted a battle ship built, and asked for bids, and that the French shipbuilders offered to build the ship in five years. Cramp received the contract and built it in thirty months-the words "thirty months" were used by Mr. Cramp-at a lesser cost than the French shipbuilders offered to build it for.

I want to say a word or two

Mr. GOEBEL. You have heard the charge made that this bill is an invasion of personal liberty and the right of contract. What do you say about that?

Mr. GOMPERS. As a matter of fact, freedom of contract of the individual workman is impaired now. It does not exist, except in theory. The individual workman has not the opportunity to freely contract with his employer in modern industry. The principle involved is the joint bargain between associated workmen and the employer, for labor and the hours of labor, rather than to give the employer the jug-handle advantage of using his accumulated wealth, his position, power, and ability to wait, as against the empty stomach of the workman and the expectant stomachs of his wife and children.

Mr. GOEBEL. Do you claim it is not an invasion of that right, or do you claim the circumstances justify it?

Mr. GOMPERS. I mean to say that that right does not exist, practically and actually. I mean to say that modern industry has robbed the workmen of their industrial individuality. The division, subdivision, and specialization of industry to-day makes it so that a man only performs one insignificant part of the great whole, whether that be a great big machine or a battle ship, a pair of shoes, a coat, a hat, or bread. I am told that in this city the bread industry is divided, by reason of the use of machines, into 8 different branches in the making of a loaf of bread.

A gentleman forcibly stated some time ago a fact which I think may bear repetition. It was that he favored an eight-hour workday because it was a human advantage as well as a great industrial and social advantage; that if you want to get all the work you could out of a man immediately, the best thing would be perhaps to work him for twenty-four hours, and in two days you would have him "all in," and all out of him that you could get out of him: but if you want to work a man for five or six years, work him about sixteen hours a day; if you want to work him for ten years, work him about eleven hours a day; if you want to work him for about fifteen years, work him ten hours a day or nine hours a day. But when you want the very best that can be gotten out of a man, during the whole great increasing lifetime, work him eight hours.

I have not the statistics with me now, but I might say to you gentlemen that in several of our craft organizations they have proved that the lives of the members of these crafts have been prolonged from five to eight years by reason of the fact of a reduction in the hours of labor. Men have grown in stature by an inch or two by reason of reduction in their hours of labor.

We have been told that lawyers work longer hours than eight, that they work twelve, fourteen, and sixteen hours a day. So they do, at times; but I believe that as a rule the entire legal profession enjoys rather an extended vacation, and that at other periods they have longer hours for recuperation. But in any event, it was stated very fairly yesterday, I think, before the committee, that if more workmen were given the chance they might become lawyers, too, and if lawyers would reduce the hours of their labor there would be more to go around, and perhaps some lawyers might very profitably become bricklayers and earn $4.50 a day. (Laughter.)

May I say this? I will not occupy more than a few minutes longer. When this bill was first introduced, the miners generally worked, when they did work, ten, twelve, and more hours a day. To-day it is almost the universal rule that miners work eight hours.

Some statement has been made in regard to inspectors who might pass work that was produced in violation of the provisions of this law should it be enacted. I want to call attention to the fact that in California and at other points the inspectors of the seal fisheries have been employed by the Government for a number of years; and every seal, male and female, large and small, is counted and accounted for, and in all the period of years under the operations of the law there has never been a discrepancy of one by even a clerical error,

Some men are so accustomed to deal in money matters, and to measure men and things upon money values, that they can not comprehend that some men are honest, and that some men have a higher regard for duty than mere money. I realize that the time is up, and I only want to say one word more in conclusion, gentlemen. That is as to the imputation that the men who have appeared here in favor of this bill do not represent the sentiment, the wishes, the hopes, and the wants of labor. If we do not, pray who does? Where do these men get their authority to speak for workmen?

The Members of Congress receive their authority from the untrammeled expression of the voters of their respective districts or States. If there be any who do not participate in the election, it is not their fault. It does not vitiate their credentials to help their districts or States. It is the constant effort of

the men active in the labor movement to secure the largest possible attendance at our meetings, and penalize by fine the absentees.

I know, beyond cavil, that wherever workmen have come together at any gathering of any sort where they were to discuss their own conditions-the conditions of industry-and the hope that they had for anything in the future, they have always been in favor of a reduction of their daily hours of toil. The old National Labor Union had its foundation upon the eight-hour proposition. The Knights of Labor stood for the eight-hour workday.

Every local union of any trade in any part of the country always declared in favor of a shorter workday. Every national or international union in America has stood for the shorter workday; every central body of organized workmen, every State branch of organized workmen, has stood for the shorter workday. The American Federation of Labor has from the time of its inception in 1881 stood for the eight-hour workday.

Soon after its formation it came before Congress and succeeded in having a Senate committee appointed to inquire into the conditions of industry, and I invite your attention to the testimony taken by the Senate Committee on Education and Labor, of which the Hon. Henry W. Blair was chairman, for proof of what I say. There has never been a gathering of workmen anywhere in America that has not declared for the eight-hour day.

We

Gentlemen of the committee, we ask you to report this bill favorably, and to not only do that, but to press it to enactment before this session of Congress shall adjourn. We have been appealing to Congresses for many years. We have been pleading, asking, urging, and arguing in favor of this measure. believe it is just; we know it is just; we know it is fair; we know it will result to the advantage of our people. It will impair no vital principle. It will be helpful in the uplifting process of the wageworkers of our country, and you can do nothing that will help them that will not help all our people. The fears that our opponents express are unfounded.

The legal arguments which they hurl against this bill are farfetched, and you will observe that when defeated in one contention they go to another. At the outset it was argued by the secretary of the Anti-Boycott Association that the bill was unconstitutional, because the contractor could not impose a condition upon a subcontractor, a party with whom the Government had no dealing; and when it was pointed out by the committee, first, that it was a condition which now obtained in contracts, and, secondly, that it could be made a feature of the contract, and that the bill specially aimed to reach that point, they come to you with the next contentions this morning. We have tried to take as little as we possibly could of the committee's attention because of the large amount of testimony that had been elicited before the various committees of previous Congresses. We trust that the bill will receive your favorable attention and that we may be in a position to report to our fellow-workmen and to the people generally that we have not again been disappointed. I thank you, gentlemen.

STATEMENT OF MR. JAMES O'CONNELL, PRESIDENT OF THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MACHINISTS.

Mr. O'CONNELL. Mr. Chairman, I am the president of the International Association of Machinists, an organization composed of 75,000 skilled machinists. I am also president of the Federated Metal Trades of North America, an organization composed of the various national organizations engaged in the metal industries, representing approximately about 300,000 men engaged in the metal trades. I am also vice-president of the American Federation of Labor.

In opening up the discussion from the standpoint of those who are favorable to the pending bill, I desire to say, in behalf of the bill, that we are asking the Government to inaugurate a reduction in the hours of labor in its contracting and subcontracting work. We are not asking the Government to be the first to reduce the hours of labor in its work being done by contract, but maintain, in behalf of the bill, that the hours of labor are gradually being reduced in every walk of life where men are engaged in a laboring capacity.

We believe that the Government should go as far and as rapidly in the direction of reducing the hours of labor as do private employers. We believe that the Government should be as good an employer as any private employer; and I speak on the line of industry with which I am thoroughly familiar and not from a technical standpoint, but from a practical standpoint, having spent twenty-five

years as a tradesman in the various machine industries in this country, and having not only practical experience as an officer of a practical skilled organization in this country, but the experience of an investigation made abroad as a representative of organized labor, and am therefore somewhat familiar with the conditions prevailing in the industries in Great Britain. I think I speak on this question from the practical standpoint and represent absolutely and accurately the men to whom this bill is supposed to apply.

Some few years ago, or, to be accurate, in May, 1901, the machinists of this country made a move in the direction of reducing the hours of labor from ten to nine, ten hours being recognized as the regular day's work up until that time. In May, 1901, a strike occurred among the machinists throughout the United States, Canada, and Mexico, in which there were involved approximately 100,000 men. The result of that strike was that the hours of labor during the period of about six months following were reduced for about 100,000 metal-working men. The tradesmen whom I represent being employed largely by the Government, directly and indirectly, in the manufacture of battle ships and all that goes therewith, both by the Government and by private employers, we feel that we' are one of the largest bodies of men directly affected by this bill. We feel that the Government should reduce the hours or make it necessary for those contracting and subcontracting from the Government to reduce the hours of labor as rapidly as do the private contractors themselves. A few of the largest concerns that are contracting from the Government are the shipbuilding yards. Mr. FOSTER. Will a question interrupt you?

Mr. O'CONNELL. Not at all.

Mr. FOSTER. As the law now is, anyone working for the Government, or anyone working on a straight contract from the Government, can work but eight hours?

Mr. O'CONNELL. Only those working directly for the Government.
Mr. FOSTER. Or for a contractor?

Mr. O'CONNELL. The law does not apply to those working for the contractor. The law only applies, in our trade, for instance, to the men employed at the Washington gun factory, the guns being made by the Government; but at the Bethlehem Steel Works, where the material is furnished for the manufacture of the guns, the men work ten hours or as many hours as the firms desire they shall work, the Bethlehem Steel Works being a direct contractor from the Government.

Mr. FOSTER. But on a battle ship, for instance?

Mr. O'CONNELL. The Cramp shipyard works ten or fifteen hours.

Mr. FOSTER. If they took the contract for the building of a ship for us.

Mr. O'CONNELL. The hours of labor there are practically ten hours.

Mr. HUGHES. Twelve hours, I think it was stated.

Mr. FOSTER. They arranged that?

Mr. O'CONNELL. They arranged that to suit themselves; but the war vessel being built at Brooklyn now by the Government is only worked upon eight hours per day. The Cramp shipyard and the Newport News shipyard are two of the large contracting companies, and these two concerns enjoy

Mr. FOSTER. Mr. Vreeland tells me public buildings are excepted. That is my mistake.

Mr. O'CONNELL. Public buildings are only excepted in so far as they are put up on the Government property; but the stone in the Government building can be cut at a place off the Government property in a ten or fifteen hour day.

Mr. FOSTER. I was under the impression that if a man took a contract for the construction of a public building, it is provided in the contract that he shall not permit any one to work on that building more than eight hours per day. Mr. O'CONNELL. That is on the Government property.

Mr. FOSTER. I mean on the construction of the building.

Mr. O'CONNELL. Yes.

Mr. HUGHES. But the stone can be cut on the next lot, and that provision would not apply.

Mr. O'CONNELL. That situation of affairs does not exist in the case of building ships.

Mr. HUGHES. The contractor can cut the stone on the next lot and work ten hours a day.

Mr. FOSTER. I did not know that.

Mr. HUGHES. Yes; the actual contractor. It is a technicality by which they have nullified the provisions of the law. According to the report that accompanied it and according to the debates in the House when the law was passed,