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Show THE SEARCHLIGHT The Position ot Labor By President FULLMER Utah State H. LATTER Federation of jority Labor The path of Organized Labor during the first few months of the United States’ participation in World War II has been a rocky one. It may get rougher and rockier. Instead of labor being left alone to devote its energies to an all-out effort to win this war, we have had to fight for our very lives. In spite of the fact that all of the anti labor interests have taken every opportunity to level their big guns at us in an effort to blow us off the road, we have kept our feet on the ground and are still on the right highway and not wrecked in the barrow pit and production along with us, as some people have tried so hard to do. Organized Labor is giving its all to win First, we gave up our right to this war. strike. The pledge not to strike is being kept Hmand will be kept during the duration. ployers who are taking advantage of this pledge by refusing to pay wages according to their contracts with labor and defying labor to do something about it are not contributing to industrial peace and full scale production. Employers who take advantage of the no strike pledge to stall negotiations and not bargain in good faith are stifling our war effort. Organized Labor has agreed to negotiate, conciliate, mediate and arbitrate their differ- ences with their employers, but all employers will not agree to this program in its entirety. Our jurisdictional disputes in the family of labor are now being referred to the proper parties for settlement without work stoppages. Machinery has been set up to even settle jurisdictional disputes between the two great labor organizations. The A. F. of L. and the C. I. O., except in a few rare instances, are working hand in hand together, through understanding and unity, so that there will be no delay in the defense of our country. In less than five months’ time, pledges, agreements and programs have been worked out by Organized Labor that have ironed out disagreements of long standing, making it possible for our nation to reach its highest peak of production in the shortest period of time ever known in our history. Production in the ma- of cases is far ahead of expectations. Without labor’s wholehearted cooperative efWe fort this would not have been possible. will continue to pour more and more effort into this program. Organized Labor is also putting its dollars to work in this war. Out of local treasuries have come millions of dollars. Individual members are buying war bonds by pay roll deduction plans and various other methods every pay day. We have pledged our efforts and cooperation in every way to the State Civilian De- fense Council. Our organizations stand ready to do any task assigned to them in the Civilian Defense program. Organized Labor will not be stampeded into anything that would injure our program of cooperation with our government. When the history of World War II is writ- ten the organized workers of the United States must and will be given the credit for the saving of our country, our way of living and the world from destruction and domination from dictators. The Power Pool Utah is to be congratulated on the readiness of municipal power plants and private systems to pool their resources of power, equipment, and personnel for the duration of the war. The pool not only makes surplus current generated in one locality available in distant places, and brings together the reserve capacity of all systems for common use, but it throws new safeguards around the power needs of Sabotage or breakevery Utah community. downs that might prove disasterous for a single city are minimized, by inter-connecting all systems. Utah Power & Light Company which led out in the formation of the pool is to be comIf fair dealing is observed by all mended. members of the association a permanent peace time arrangement, beneficial to all, will be inevitable. A peace time pool arrangement, under administration of the Public Service Commission, and protected by statute, could reduce electric rates much below present standards. |