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Show t Published Every Saturday BY GOODWIN8 WEEKLY PUBLISHING C0.v INC. F. P. GALLAGHER, Editor and Mgr. L. J. BRATAGER, Business Mgr. 8UB8CRIPTI0N PRICE: in United States, Canada and Mexico $2.50 per year, the Including postage $1.50 for six months. Subscriptions to all foreign countries, within the Postal l'nion, $4.50 per year. 8ingle copies, 5 cents. Payment should be made by Check, Money Order or Registered Letter, pay- able to The Citizen. Address all communications to The Citizen. Entered as second-clas- s matter, June 21, 1919, at the Postoffice at Salt Lake of under March 3, 1879. Act the City, Utah, Ness Bldg. Phone Wasatch 5409. Salt Lake City, Utah. 311-12-- . 13 MACHINERY TO ADJUST LABOR DISPUTES TAKES FORM members THAT the with the of the Presidents industrial conference are difficulty and magnitude of their task is evi- chinery, there is another argument in favor of the method adopted by the present conference. Most people, left to themselves to conjecture how the laws and courts of our civilized society developed, would say that the principles of justice came first and the machinery of the law next, but just the reverse is true. In the beginning disputes were settled by curious formalities, tests and trials which had no relation to the principles of exact justice. There were trials by fire, by combat and by queer tests of witnesses. Gradually the principles of justice began to operate through the machinery thus provided and the machinery itself was developed slowly into our present systems of law the English common law in English-speakin- g countries and the Roman law in continental Europe. The Presidents conference is not fantastic when it puts the machinery above the principles. Once the framework is established the principles can be fitted into it. After all, the development of both the form and the principles of adjustment must be mutual. The evolution will follow the usual process of the elimination of the unfit and the survival of the fittest. denced by their preliminary report. They put forward tentative recommendations for the purpose of obtaining constructive criticism which will aid them in the development of their machinery to adjust ' industrial disputes without strikes. Disputes are divided broadly into three classes those affecting government employes, those affecting employes of public utility cor- porations and those affecting employes of private concerns. A definite principle is announced only in the first class of cases. The conferees lay down the rule .that there must be no strikes among government " employes and that, therefore, they must not join or affiliate with labor organizations sanctioning strikes as a means of settling disputes. With reference to disputes between public utility corporations and their employes the report is vague. It points out that government usually controls only the rates and service of such corporations and declares rather vaguely that there must be some merging of responsibility (as between the state and the corporations) for regulation of rates and services and the settlement of wages and conditions of labor. They recognize that some method should be arrived at to ORIENTATION OF MR. BRYAN prevent any cessation of service, but hesitates to take the position that all strikes which would cause such cessation should be forbidden is again running for President. Ilis former campaign by law they tacitly admit that they do not know the correct principle BRYAX is touring the cast in an effort to revive the Bryan to apply and say that they must consider the subject further before leagues. Later, perhaps, he will attempt to revive the Bryan issues putting forward concrete proposals. without waiting for the aid or consent of any other nation on earth, Apparently the right to strike in competitive industry is conceded and the conferees fix their hope on some machinery of adjustment, as they used to say. .f nationwide in its operation, that shall prevent strikes by means of Bryan was always apt at finding picturesque issues that lent arbitration, the men continuing at work pending the decision. themselves to flamboyant catch phrases, but times change and we The machinery is elaborate and yet simple. It provides for a with them and we much fear that he who once was the boy central body, twelve regional boards and processes of appeal. change orator of the Platte can no longer lure the attentive ear of the votWhether the system will work smoothly is not of controlling importand ers with his musical epigrams. The Man above the dollar ance ; the important thing is that some such system should be estabBack to the people were magical in their day, but now they are lished. The best way to bring inventions to perfection is to use them. The automobile would be far less perfect than it is had it remained all as lusterlcss as an old handbill. It will be necessary to create new issues that will fit the Bryan school of oratory and light new lamps of these years in an inventors laboratory. If the machinery of adjustment and arbitration is set up and put in motion we may be sure that epigram. The task is not easy even for a spellbinder. Surely Air. Bryan cannot face the nightmare of his record as sec, its tlaws will quickly be discerned and improvements provided. retary of state without losing heart. Those who maintained their The most natural fault to find with the proposal is that it profaith in him without wavering for many years felt that something vides only a framework and fails to enunciate principles of adjustment. Aside from the fact that the Presidents first conference went had gone out of their lives when their idol was put to the test and turned out to be, not gold nor even silver and gold at the ratio of six- to pieces in an attempt to agree first on principles and then on ma |