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Show PSRBILL Washington, Sept. 3 President WI1-, son returned to Washington at 7 o'clock this morning from Lo-ig I Branch, N. J., and signed the elght-j elght-j hour bill for railway employes. He left again at 10:30 o'clock for Hodgen-ville, Hodgen-ville, Ky., to accept tho Lincoln homestead home-stead memorial. The Adamson eight-hour day bill, exacted from congress last week by the railroad brotherhoods as the price of calling off the nation-wide strike ordered for tomorrow, was signed by President Wilson today in his private car at the union station, where he stopped on his way from Shadow Lawn, N. J , to Hodgenville. Ky. That there may bo no question as to the legality of the measure as a result of it having been signed on Sunday, the president will affix his signature again upon his return to Washington next Tuesday. How long peace shall reign as a result re-sult of the bill is dependent upon developments in the proposed test of the constitutionality of the act. Should the railroads take no action, but await the beginning of an investigation of tho workings of the eight-hour day by tne special commission ior wnicn tne measure provides, the brotherhoods will remain inactive. Action Depends on Railroads. The employes' leader declared, however, that should the law be held unconstitutional and the railroads at tempt to restore the ten-hour day on their lines, n strike will follow promptly. prompt-ly. None of the brotherhood leaders witnessed the signing of the bill. They had expected, according to tentative arrangements mado by Secretary Wilson Wil-son last night to bo present, but the president decided to attend to the business at the railroad station. The four pens used by the president in signing the bill one for each syllable sylla-ble of his name will be presented to the four brotherhood heads, A. B. Garretson, W. G. Lee, W. S. Carter and W. S. Stone, after being used for re-signing the bill on Tuesday. No ceremony attended the signing today. Rudolph ForeBter, assistant! secretary to the president, took the bill to the train. Near the car a group of trainmen In their overalls paused in their work long enough to watch tho president write his name. An engineer, passing on a yard en gine, celebrated the occasion with several sev-eral prolonged blasts of his whistle. Tho president also signed several commissions and executive papers, J - and sent Secretary Tumulty to Major. ity Leader Kern of the senate to urge passage of the Webb bill, passed yes- terday by the house, designed to per- mit American firms to utilize com- mon selling agencies abroad without jH violating the Sheriman antitrust law.. jH Later the private car was attached to a special train-, bound for Hodgen-vllle, Hodgen-vllle, Ky., to participate in the exer-cises exer-cises incident to tho transfer of the log cabin in which Abraham Lincoln was born, to tho federal government tomorrow, at which time tho president will make an address. It developed today that the brother-hoods brother-hoods before summoned to Washing-ton Washing-ton by President Wilson, had agreed to call a strike effective August 24, the orders then drafted were used BH when the strike finally was sot for ' Labor day. The strike date, Septem- WM ber 4, was filled in with a rubber stamp but the original date of the call, August 24, was not changed. Hundreds of telegrams came to the brotherhood leaders today. Most of I them were congratulatory. One or two were from locals who had re-ceived re-ceived no notice that the strike was off, so tomorrow morning in some few faraway sections of the country there mM may be temporary difficulties. Efforts were being made tonight to communl-cate communl-cate with all of these points. |
