JUDGE GARY.

Press, Volume LVI, Issue 16721, 2 January 1920, Page 8

JUDGE GARY.

LEADER OF AMEBIC AN 8.

America is heading straight to-day for the greatest industrial conflict the world has ever seen (wrote F. A. McKenzio from New York to tho "Daily Mail" in October). The man who mado tho conflict inevitable was Judge Jllbert Henry Gary.

He is head of one of tho greatest industrial organisations in tho world, the United States Steel Corporation." He is in many respects an officient ad* ministrator. He represents benevolent despotism at its best. Hut American Labour to-day has made up its mind that despotism, benevolent or otherwise, must cease. Ho is a fanner's son. who has made his own way in life. He studied law at Chicago University, started at £2 10s a week, served for a time as a county Judge, and afterwards became attorney for various steel corporations. Next, tlie Judge came to New York at a salary of £20.000 a year as head of the Federal Steel Corporation. When the United States Steel Trust was formed ho manipulated the deals. In his quiet office in 61 Broadway, ho spends his days receiving visitors, presiding ovor committees, and "putting it over" diverse interests. But ho will have nothing to do with organised Labour. . Tho United States Steel Corporation, with its industrial army of over a quarter of a million men, its own railway system, its own fleet of a hundred steamers, its own mines, and its vast industrial plants, has been tho lender in the refusal to recognise trade unions or trade union methods. It has deliberately substituted a plan of mutual co-operation between employers and men. It has established a system of co-partnership by encouraging cmplovees to subscribe' for shares on which special bonuses are paid. It spends £1,400,000 a year on welfare work to improvo the conditions and tho health of the men employed by it. Last summer tho American Federation of Labour, at its groat convention at Atlantic Citv, resolved to challenge the Steel Trust's position. The Federation of Labour has greatly risen in American public oateom during the last few years bocauso of its sobriety, moderation, and statesmanlike conduct of affairs. Its organisers reported that in sonio steel towns their agents wore not evon allowed to hold public meetings. It was determined to tho matter to an issue. is notice to tho autocrats of tho steel industry," tho Federation stated, "that their autocracy must romove itself from tho face of tho earth or be removed. As" political autocracy has gone, bo must industrial autocracy go. Steel in America must be dcmocratised." Tho American Federation sent a copulation to New York to interview Judge Garv. The Judgo rofused oven to see thorn. The steel kings and the financiers behind them behevod that trado unionism had delivered itself into their hands. I discussed the situation at tho time with many represonatives of capital, nicy scoffed at tho idea of tho trouble being serious. "Only a small_ proportion of tho men aro trade unionists," they said. "Tho Steel Corporation has dono so much for its people and treated them so well that they will nover go out at tho ordor of any union. The American Federation will meet its Waterloo." As one financier put it to mo: "There's got to bo a fight with Labour. Tho sooner the fight comes tho better. We'll havo it rifiht now." They admitted that there must bo troublo in tho coal trade. That fact Wall street regarded as serious, but the stool strike \yould be flie biggest fiasco in history. So tho employers thought. They havo been wrong. _ But it would bo a mistake to put all the blamo of tho present situation on mon of tho typo of Judgo Gary. Labour, like Capital, is heady at the present moment. Tho working man in tho United States has had such amazingly good times that he lias lost liis senso of perspective. Despite tho increased cost of living, he is better paid than lie has ever been before. JIo lives in a condition of greater comfort. He has more leisure, and lie can savo more. The New York mcchauic accounts it an average week when he makes £14. One has ceased to bo surprised at office boys earning £3 a week (which is al>out tho equivalent of £1 a week in England). The six-hour day or the thirty-hour week has already been talked about. Tlie forty-four weok—that js eight hours a day for fivo days a week for labour—is now considered a reasonable programme. Tho men who ore content with it are surprised at their own moderation. Labour demands recognition and authority. It refuses to reeogniso any inferiority.

Jihlot Gary represents an extreme as dangerous to American neace on the one hand as 1.W.W.-Lmi* —industrial revolutionism—on tho other. We havo yet to sec -whether moderate and sano men like John D. Rockefeller, jun., for Capital, and Samuel Gompers, for Labour, have influence enongh to save tho situation. If not, wo are face to face with a war so for-renchinß that its effects can only at present be imagired.

More than 70.000 thrift mottoes were submitted in a cash prize contest conducted by the savings bank section of the Japanese Post Office Department. Tliree of the first five prizes were won by the following phrases: "Think of saving, rather than dream of making money." "Daily saving, daily happiness. '' "Who laughs at a sen will cry for a yen.' :