Show NEWS ai i n by PAUL ML LON Ite released leased by western newspaper union DECLARED OLD IDEAL WASHING washington TON although All hough the full employment bill Is being pushed through congress into law by a preponderant favor for it and there la Is no objection to the basic hopefulness of its theory ano no one seems to know what it means or even where it came from by great odds it la Is the most uncertain and piece of legislation of my time here I 1 have been calling it a CIO bill because the CIO lias has campaigned for it in the usual ex pensive and prepossessing man nor ncr which obscures other backing and monopolizes the publicity out but CIO planners did not write it the e num numerous erous senators whose names a are re attached as co authors will give you little satisfaction it if you inquire where they got the notion of passing a law proclaiming the rig right h to work which has always existed legally constitutionally and by custom the original draft of their bill was probably composed as nearly as I 1 can ascertain by the farmers union farthest left of the three farmers lobbies and often called the farmer branch of the CIO but of all things the farmers need right now a law declaring their right to work must run behind help shortages equipment shortages price fears and practically every other existing agricultural consideration the farmers union people will say they got the idea out of a speech mr roosevelt made in which he mentioned a lot of rights including the tight light to work but mr roosevelt did not say there ought to be a law and before he mentioned the matter it had gotten into a resolution tio of an international labor office meeting in philadelphia sir william beveridge Beverl dge whose vast social security arity hopes were swamped in tho the last election was an ardent champion of legislation to declare the right to work going behind and beyond him an investigation will bring you to the fact that such a right is declared in the soviet russian constitution there it has some meaning because under a dictatorship fixing salaries controlling hours renting homes and even cooking and charging for tho the workers worker s meals while restraining th the e worker from freedom a law promising to share whatever work the 0 government gives is a realistic right but this is all far behind american ideals and rights which already go much further promising among other things freedom of work at one place or another and the right not to work even this would not be so perplexing except that both sponsors and amen amanders dern of this right to work bill agree it carries no legal rights coauthor thomas of utah may not have been pinned down on that point yet but coauthor co author murray and amender taft and all the others seem agreed no citizen could sue an employer or the government tor for a job or get out an injunction or that a labor union could sue or get the courts to make someone lish 1 jobs or wages hours or anything this they all say Js as just a declaration of policy by congress no matter how it is worked its authors particularly deny that it Is a trick to establish a legal basis for a whole new conception of law in which the unions or individual workers could build up decisions through this new supreme court to indict the goberm government nent or employers and perhaps establish criminal penalties it if it does not do this then what does it do well its sponsors rather frankly indicate they look on it as a political icat propaganda step establishing a pol lcy icy peg upon which they can hang future legislative demands particularly they want big spending appropriations made tn in the future and they will then says say the polley policy of every man a job has been established so III this appropriation must be made to give him a job or of they can build up a demand that the aluminum company be broken up for that reason or that all black hair be made white because it would create jobs in the hair dyeing industry this makes it seem unimportant because congress retains the right to appropriate or not appropriate regardless of this undefined declaration of an policy frankly then I 1 do not know what it means except that everyone will ask tor for government funds A decline tn in work week is another provision plans hocut to cut the govern ment work week again from 4 40 0 it was 48 to 30 have already been proposed in bills this keeps salaries where they were and prevents normal utilization of the talents abilities and aptitudes of the nations manpower it does not increase pur chasing power or create more employment opportunities it merely shares the work less work for the notion nation as a whole there therefore fure less productivity and less tax revenues to sustain a high economy needed for full employment |