Show washington during the recent bitter campaigning both national political parties en the coal in a good industry deal of palaver i about abou t the cohl coal industry As usual the politicians were patting the miners on the back telling them what wonderful assets to the nation they aie are and carrying their demagoguery further by criticism of the mine owners every now and then because tt it was popular with labor to attack employers altogether it wasa rather sorry spectacle and I 1 think eid not do credit to either side to any extent but in this report I 1 want to stress a very much less obvious phase of the problem than was made apparent in any of the electioneer ing with au all pt the verbiage ca cast it aside with all of the political hoodwinking forgotten there Is a very deep and difficult problem in the coal Ind industry I 1 think it can be summarized in one questions whit what Is the future of coal the coal industry and the thousands of men who know no other source of livelihood than that which they eke out in t we the bowels of the earth this question it if proper analysis is made encompasses more than the usual factors that operate in economics it does that because of policies of the federal government among states and among municipalities because of the attempts to tb influence votes the whole question has got into politics and that of itself is ruinous an obstacle to a sc scientific lenti solution not so many years ago coalmine coal mine owners and coal labor units had what amounted to a monopoly on our fuel supply then came oil oil with all of the scientific development that followed in its wake despite this operators operator s and labor I 1 e a 13 d e ii r s continued to take their toll from the hapless user of coal for fuel bo be that usera user a great facto an individual consumer in furnace or round oak stove but that was not all electricity came along with its constantly increasing automatic control first of course in the larger communities and later it came to villa villages and farm homes still the mine owners and the coal labor leaders followed an unwise course still they continued to take their toll and before they fully realized what the circumstance was they had succeeded by their acts in building up a desire on the part of millions of people to use some other sort of fuel the end is not yet and that is why the subject Is most important at this tage stage s of our YlI history story during the roosevelt administration we have seen an impetus given to public owner r public ship of power ownership plants plant s never f equalled equal led i I 1 t think h I 1 fik i much orthis of this development has gone gan e on in a hit and mi miss s s fashion and that eventually the will pay for the shiftless methods employed in development but that is beside the point the present question is whether our nation is going to continue nue to expand public ownership in sued ucha a way as an industry that ts Is as much a part of our basic basle economic strut structure ture as any other unit of our natural life I 1 think sometimes it goes beyond that tor for the reas reason on that unless people awaken to the tact fact that they the ylare are being hoodwinked to a considerable extent by public ownership propaganda it if Js is likely to tD spread and public ownership will willi become a parasite on bourbo our baay dy public abe referred ta the destruction of a ireat great industry 1 I hadin mind the thought that the consequences consequences will run in two direct loiis ims yet paradoxically as it may seem they constitute a cycle it works out like this As the demand for coal declines it Is quite natural that production costs go up when production costs go up they eventually reach the point joint where a further diminution occurs in dema demand fid when that dec decline linein in demand occurs I 1 there Is s only oily one answer labor is thrown out butof of work because you cannot it produce 0 uc e and have those product piled high in storage it takes mona money to keep labor and machinery occupied oc cu pied the coal itself after being removed from the mines represents money and it is subject as well to deterioration so the ultimate to be expected exp on this side of the picture ts to aai an industry dying of dry rot on the other side of the problem Is an equally important factor at work it takes an immense amount of capital massed in corporate form to maintain a going concern whether that concern be coal mining rall rail loading or any other of our great industries it idus tries these industries operate largely largel ly on funds obtained through thestle the sale of stocks and bonds of the corporation but it has always been true and human nature shows no signs of changing changar g that capital I 1 is s not attracted to it docs not seek investment in a declining industry there you have a possibility at least of insufficient mcdent funds to carry through for the coal mining industry until it can readjust itself to the now new place f it must occupy in our economic structure it will a now new place be because carusd it will readjust itself but it has bas not done so yet and the con se sequence quence of this c condition ondi tion is in my opinion coal mine labor la Is d due for some very hard sledding in tae the next od decade notwithstanding the hone honeyed ye words word of the politicians now to turn to the part that government plays in bringing about present conditions blame i have attempted dema demagogues 9 to show how greed on the part of both capital and labor was responsible in a measure tor for building up what amounts to ill will among many coal consumers but the industry itself Is 6 not wholly responsible indeed I 1 rather hold the opinion that government is as much responsible for condit conditions fons as the industry itself and when I 1 say government I 1 must almust limit my arky reference to political demagogues ag ahey always haye have been shortsighted and they are still s shortsighted they have been and they are now willing to sacrifice great masses of men and money for personal political gain of an entirely transitory character I 1 have said before in these columns that the country is being sadly kidded itis it is almost tragic by the wonders of such paras parasitic I 1 tic organizations as TVA the public ownership crow crowd dhave have had a willing leader in president roosevelt and his hangers on have promoted his policies of public ownership without being ing honest as to the ultimate goal or I 1 the eventual effect it la is not alone that there have been millions wasted in the development of the he tennessee valley elec electro trl aal 21 mirage itis it is not so much that taxpayers throughout the country will be paying a bill and paying it oyer and over again that causes me to complain it is not so much that the tennessee valley authority will never be economically operated or become that brings brinds this outburst it is the fact that when a government nationals national nation alp state or lacal leads the way in this diorec i tion it wields an influent e upon a certain percentage of our pop population ula since public ownership advocates in many instances plain socialism cial ism where in control of these agencies such as TVA it is perfectly natural that they present presen tto to the taxpayers only the most rosy side of the story they do not disclose to the taxpayers the adverse the costly side of the situation naturally then hundreds of thousands of people believe that tha t government govern government men can do tills this sort of thing better bette 1 than private enterprise they become convinced that private bravate initiative has been turned intha into a spigot through which individual pocketbooks are drained they do not realize that theli their pocketbooks are being i drained mu h more mor e heavily through public ownership lp by means odthe of the taxes they take from you and me everyone else that is sad story made worse bythe by the fact that through nearly four bears years the wash Ington government has been encouraging people to beli believe evel public ownership propaganda and distrust and destroy private invest investment mek recent treasury figures show that the resettlement administration has paid approximate ex expensive ae asive ly of dream its total 4 ti atlon of for administrative expenses that is the organization chichis which chis is the pride and joy of professor rexford quy guy tugwell his has paid that amount of money tojos to job holders in trying frying to carry out the I 1 professors impossible dream while the sum shown as used for administrative expenses by professor soP tugwell Is small compared to the billisi ns of total waste I 1 in the roosevelt administration the proper way to consider this circumstance stan ceis is on a perce percentage niage basis if you take your pencil you can calculate that about 20 per cent or one fifth of allathe funds appropriated to professor tugwell tor for resettlement has been used in maha management gement of his hispran hi plan it may be a traction under 20 per m cent but it is so close that even the fastidious mr tugwell would not noi quarrel about I 1 the difference ference one fifth of an appropriation that is designed theoretically at least to sarve serve tor for relief purposes purposed sei is entirely too much it is not as greather great perhaps as has happened with one or two other relief appropriations but it has always been claimed that the tugwell scheme was planned to reestablish those who have been resettled on a permanent basis that its s to ta say it was planned that the bulk of the le money should be used in providing thase people with h a fresh start in life but I 1 cannot see where they are getting the full measure of help intended if a lot of job holders sit around in washington offices or in offices in various states using up one fifth of the total layout of cash 0 newspaper union |