organized and better equipped to do business from the conditions that exist. Every private shipbuilder is in the fiercest sort of competition with every other shipbuilder, and the only way he can hope to survive is to keep his plant up to a standard of efficiency and the cost of his work down to a minimum, or he can not hope to be able to compete under the conditions upon which business is transacted. Mr. HOLDER. That comparison does not hold good in Great Britain. Mr. POWELL. I beg your pardon, it does.

Mr. HOLDER. How about the construction of the Dreadnought? Mr. POWELL. The construction of the Dreadnought cost Great Britain in the neighborhood of 30 per cent more than they have just placed an order for a similar battle ship with a private contractor. Mr. HOLDER. Which private contractor has this?

Mr. POWELL. The Armstrongs.

Mr. HOLDER. What hours do they work?

Mr. POWELL. Fifty-four hours a week.

Mr. HOLDER. Are you sure of that?

Mr. POWELL. I was told that they worked that long by a shipbuilder in Great Britain whom I have a right to believe. Mr. HOLDER. How long since?

Mr. POWELL. I can not tell you.

Mr. HOLDER. How long since you got the information?

Mr. POWELL. Last May. I was speaking of the time taken in constructing the Tennessee, a ship built under the same appropriation as the Connecticut and the Louisiana. Her date of contract was February 9, 1903. The keel was laid June 20, 1903; she was launched June 20, 1904, and delivered July 27, 1906. That is, her time of construction was six and one-half months less than the Connecticut on a forty-two months contract, and if the extra month for the trial trip is allowed, that is seven and one-half months. I might add, that I do not believe, supposing the law could be literally adhered to, under the provisions limiting the hours of a man to eight hours, the Tennessee could have been constructed within four or five months of this time under that law.

One of the points that will naturally arise is that this time of completing the ships under the eight-hour basis can be bettered by increasing the number of men working. That is unfortunately a fallacy, when the country is in a normally prosperous condition. The number of men in the shipbuilding trades in this country is comparatively small, and the surplus to draw on is, in times of prosperity, practically negligible. I may add that a year ago the Cramp Company's yard was quite full of work. There was apparently a temporary spurt in the demand for merchant vessels, that resulted in our getting practically seven contracts in a very short time, which is more than we have had altogether since that time, and for a year our yard was crowded. We also were doing a considerable amount of other work of different classes not connected with shipbuilding. If we could have obtained machinists, we would have put our machine shops on a 24-hour basis, but it was an absolute impossibility to get the men. If we could have obtained riveters instead of running in the neighborhood of 90 to 100 gangs, as we were able to do, we would have been able, for a period of five or six months, to run 150 gangs. The same applies to nearly every trade in our yards that had to do with shipbuilding. We needed joiners, we needed painters, we needed pattern makers, we needed molders, but they were not to be

had. Therefore, under the conditions as they existed at that time, the reduction in the hours of labor from ten to eight would have meant a direct increase in the output of the yard in the same proportion.

The CHAIRMAN. Is it not necessarily economically true that there never can be more people found in any craft in the country than are required in the times of the greatest demand? In other words, that more people than are required in the time of the highest demand can not be sustained in the craft and can not stay in it?

Mr. POWELL. As I understand, the generally accepted economic principle in connection with the various economical principles is that when there is an excess of in the neighborhood of 2 per cent the conditions are about what are considered as most favorable. Beyond that the number of unemployed is undesirably large. With less than that there is not the supply to cover the shifting demand that will take care of such variations as I have spoken of. This is undoubtedly one of the advantages that the British shipbuilder has over the American shipbuilder. In Great Britain shipbuilding is, I think I may say, the principal business, both as to its standing and as to its amount. The result is that the number of men employed in the different trades is extremely large, and if this year Armstrongs' is especially busy, and if Doxford's has not much work, Armstrongs' will draw on Doxford's, and so it goes. Usually, except in very extraordinary cases, there are enough men to go around to do the work.

Mr. T. F. TRACY. Is it not true that when business is normal it is a great deal more difficult for the Cramps Shipbuilding Company to obtain employees, because of the fact that they can obtain better conditions and better wages in other localities, and when there is a depression that they can obtain all the help that they need because of the fact of the depression?

Mr. POWELL. When business is in a depression anybody can get all the help he needs. When business is normal we do not find any more trouble than is experienced by the other shipbuilders. I think there is no labor in any shipyard that is better satisfied with its conditions than that in our yard. However, I hope that our general superintendent will be before the committee at an early date, and he is intimately familiar with that part of the work and can speak to you very much more authoritatively thereon than I can.

There is another primary objection to this bill from the standpoint of any man who wishes to do anything except Government work, and that is that it is impossible to split up the employees of any one vard into two groups of labor, one of which works eight hours and the other ten hours per day. I am sure that if any two of you gentlemen were working at a machine alongside of each other, one on Government work on an eight-hour basis and one on work for a private firm on a ten-hour basis, when the eight-hour man put on his clothes to go the ten-hour man would certainly feel most discontented.

Mr. HOLDER. I thought you said they wanted to work ten hours. That seemed to be the burden of the argument by the gentlemen here before, that there was a crying demand among the men to work overtime.

Mr. DAVENPORT. Overtime for overtime pay.

Mr. POWELL. The entire question, then, comes back to the wages of these two men. If the Government man on eight-hour work gets the same rate per hour as the man on outside work, who gets ten

hours' pay at the same rate, the man who works eight hours will be most discontented on account of his pay, and the man who works ten hours will be most discontented on account of the time he works. In other words, you will have your entire shop by the ears. With reference to the question that this gentleman has just raised as to the desire of the men to work overtime, I do not remember a case where a man was offered a chance to make overtime at overtime rates where it was not accepted.

Mr. HOLDER. Only under protest?

Mr. POWELL. I did not say anything about protest, and. I never in my experience had a case where a man protested.

Mr. HOLDER. I happen to have worked for the Cramp shipyard away back in 1881.

Mr. POWELL. That is a little too far back for me.

Mr. HOLDER. And I know something about the situation that existed then. I do not like to contradict the gentleman when he is making his testimony, however.

Mr. POWELL. That is hardly a fair basis on which to make a contradiction. Eighteen hunderd and eighty-one is a long way back. Mr. HOLDER. Men have developed since then; they do not want to put all their time in the shop.

Mr. HAYDEN. The conditions have changed since then, and pay has increased, without doubt.

Mr. POWELL. In the second section of the bill under discussion it is stated that nothing in this act shall apply to contracts for such materials and articles as may usually be bought in the open market.

Mr. PAYSON. Pardon me a moment, before you leave that subject. As you seem to be following it in order, may I ask you to give your opinion to the committee on the question of working any man in your yard at any given work upon any ship for eight hours and then quitting that class of work and working other hours upon other work; as to the practical possibility of that sort of thing?

Mr. POWELL. That could not be done. There are two reasons that occur to me immediately the first is that you could not have enough work lying idle upon which you could put these men when their eight hours was up, and which would of necessity have to be waiting for them; and the second is that I do not believe you could get men to do it. The second section of the act under consideration states that nothing in this act shall apply to materials or articles generally bought in the open market, whether made to conform to particular specifications or not. This does not exempt from the application of this act most of the material that the shipbuilder has to use. There are a few items there are probably a good many more I have skipped-that occur to me, to which I would like to call your attention.

The most important is the ordnance and ammunition; the steel plates and shapes; steel forgings; iron castings; brass, bronze, and composition castings; linoleum; steering engines; electrical generators and electrical motors and apparatus; wire; windlasses; rubber supplies; pumps; condensers; boiler fittings; feed-water heaters; ash ejectors; bearing metals, and life buoys. All of those articles, as used on board Government ships, are manufactured especially to meet the Government requirements. They are not commercial, and, except as manufactured for the Government, they are not made at all. The result is that the shipbuilder, in providing these articles, must assume a responsibility for any violations of this law on the part

of the subcontractors who furnish this apparatus. The boilers, which form one of the large subcontracts, for instance, are one large item of the work that the shipbuilder agrees to provide. He must then purchase them from one of the manufacturers, and this manufacturer must in turn obtain the tubes and castings and various other things to make up this boiler. Each of those tubes and castings is also made to the Government requirements, but it is not a commercial requirement. It is just as special to that battle ship as the battle ship itself is special. It seems so evidently impracticable for the shipbuilder to prevent the violation of this law by the man who makes the tubes that further argument is futile. If the Government is to provide the inspectors to see that the law is carried out, it will mean an army of place holders that will be appalling, and if the shipbuilder is to do it, it will be absolutely impossible for him to estimate on the cost of the work. It would simply make every contract a gamble, and what the actual cost and what the actual penalties would be no living man could tell. I have used the boilers as one case. Almost any other item here would result in the same complications. The steering engines, or the windlass, are composed of many different parts, some of which are made to special Government requirements which are not commercial. The shafting is made of special material, and it may require special ores that are only used on this Government material. On the other hand, there are of course certain products that evidently come within the exemption of this bill, commercial lumber that would meet the Government specifications, nails and hardware that are not special to the Government ships; but probably at least 90 per cent of the material that the shipbuilder would work into the vessel would be covered by this law.

The effect of this bill on the cost of the work to the contractors, and its effect on their ability to compete in other commercial work, is also of importance. Anyone going into our machine shops to-day would see near the door a large hydraulic turbine that is being built for the Canadian Copper Company. Next to that are the bedplates for the South Carolina's engines, and the engines themselves in course of erection. Next to that the bedplates for the engine for a merchant ship, and beyond that various parts of the engine for a side-wheeler. Then there are the casings for some water turbines, and beyond that again the turret track for the South Carolina in process of machining. On the sides of the shop there are a number of hydraulic pumps for various purposes, and, possibly, parts of sugar apparatus for Cuba or for Porto Rico. I think it will be conceded that this shop must either run on the eight or the ten hour basis, and I think it will also be conceded that if it was on the eight-hour basis it would be at the ten-hour pay. That would mean an immediate increased cost of labor of 20 per cent at the present time. In our foreign turbine work for Canada we are practically on an even basis with the Swiss and the Germans, in so far as duties are concerned, and we have been able to do a very large proportion of all of this work that the Canadians have purchased. With the extra cost entailed by putting these shops on an eight-hour basis we would simply have to give up either the Government work or this lucrative export trade.

We also do a very large miscellaneous business in building commercial boilers, in building sugar apparatus, and in building miscellaneous high-grade machinery for making glass plates, and other commercial work, probably constituting in its total from one-half to

one-third of our total business, and it is certain that this would be absolutely wiped out if our yard were to conform to the requirements of this law. It would therefore become a case with us of giving up the Government work entirely and trying to extend our outside work other than shipbuilding to such an extent that the shipbuilding would be merely a side issue and would only cover construction for the private lines, or we would have to give up this outside work and trust to Government orders to live.

The question of the amount of work that any shipbuilder can depend on from the Government is most indefinite. One year the appropriation may be for six large vessels, the next year there may be none. If he is not able to take care of the amount of work during the full years, the chances are the excess will be done in the Government yards, so that it will not help at all in the lean years, and in the lean years, with no Government work to fall back on, it would be practically a case of closing his plant. It seems to me that the result of the passage of this bill would be the separating of the present shipbuilders into two classes, a certain number, probably not more than two, on an eight-hour basis, who would be able to compete for Government work, and the remainder who would struggle along without it, some of them falling by the wayside. I think, by the law of the survival of the fittest, those who remained would have to build up enough business aside from the small coasting shipping to keep their plants in operation.

The extra cost of such a system as this to the Government it is certainly hard to estimate. With only two outside bidders, and with the uncertainty in the amount of work, I should be inclined to say that the bids would be 50 to 75 per cent higher than at the present time. Personally, with the indefinite penalties that might attach, which the passage of this bill would entail, I should think that 50 per cent on present prices was a very moderate increase to allow.

This rather leads up to the question of what the passage of this bill will cost the Government. It seems a very moderate statement that the yearly sum expended that would be directly affected by this bill would be considerably over $100,000,000, and also it seems a moderate statement to say that the increased cost would be 25 per cent. On this basis the passage of the eight-hour bill would represent an additional expenditure of about $25,000,000 to the Government, and at a time when, in spite of the needs of the Navy, not more than two battle ships can be appropriated for from economic reasons, it seems, from the standpoint of the shipbuilder, extremely hard to justify an additional expenditure of more than $25,000,000 for results that are, to say the least, extremely doubtful.

Mr. NICHOLLS. Could you give us an idea of about how many men doing this work for the Government by the year would be limited by this proposed law?

Mr. POWELL. I do not exactly understand your question.

Mr. NICHOLLS. Could you give us an idea of about how many men are employed on Government work of this kind whom this bill will cover, and whose work would be limited by this proposed law? Mr. POWELL. Do you mean at the Cramp yard, or at all the shipyards?

Mr. NICHOLLS. In the country, I mean.

Mr. HAYDEN. Contractors, or subcontractors?

Mr. NICHOLLS. I mean the workmen whose time would be limited.