The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, December 2, 1918, Page 8

I i Plans for Demobilizing the Sol.‘diers - What the More Progressive Members of the Administration 'Think Can Be Done to Smooth the Way to Peace-Time Employments Washington Bureau, Nonpartisan Leader vz JLMOBILIZATION of more than 7 | three million men in the army and navy, and as many more in the war industries, is the first big job in the reconstruc- tion program that the people of the United States will have to handle. A partial plan is being 2 ; developed by some of the pro- gressive element in the administration, in the hope of final approval. It proposes that the war depart- ment shall release the men as fast, and no faster, than the labor department shall determine that there is proper employment for them in definite lo- calities, at trades or callings which the men are competent and willing to follow. Take, for example, a farming community such as western North Dakota. The community labor board there will make a survey and find exactly how many men in the army, coming from that sec- tion, will be wanted in farm work there. Then it will determine whether the conditions of employ- ment—where the soldiers are not from families already engaged in farming on their own account —are such as will satisfy the returning soldiers. This will mean that the labor department, together with other departments of the government, must first determine what shall be a reasonable standard of wages and conditions, and shall make it clear to each’ community that no men will be released to take jobs there unless the community meets those requirements. : These are days of rapidly changing standards of privilege. It is now the government’s privilege to grant or refuse the release of enlisted men to a community unless that community shall meet the government’s terms. Those terms will be as strict as though they were written by the inter-allied command in France to a German commander seek- ing the chance to quit fighting. They are probably to provide, absolutely, against any renewal of in- dustrial warfare by the employers against the wage-workers in this country. Not only will the returned soldier who becomes a wage-worker be safeguarded by standards of wages, hours of em- ployment, ete., but-he will be guaranteed a voice in the industrial management whenever he works in a modern, organized industry of manufacture or transportation. And on the farm his status as a . citizen will be made plain, just as his responsibility i to earn his pay will be made a condition of his hold- ing the: job. ) BUFFER EMPLOYMENT TO BE PROVIDED But how can the government overcome the or- ganized manufacturers of the country if they re- fuse to fall in with this idea, even though all the § farm workers in the army shall have been placed under-the best conditions? Can not the manufac- turers declare a strike against high wages, and start ‘a stampede in public opinion which may force the war department to release a million men at once, to compete for jobs at the old conditions? No. ‘Because the federal, state and local gov- | ernments will be induced beforehand to draw up i plans for “buffer employment.” That is, every : city, county, state or federal plan of building or road construction, of power development or other { public improvement, will be prepared for the em- i ployment of men coming home from France. The ¥ war department will be asked to report upon the number of men willing to engage in this work at a “Pershing Rifles”—a group of college boys from the University of Maryland who entered their country’s service. All of the soldiers are faced with the problem of taking up civil life again. These college boys have to start where they left off when war was declared. Nearly every one of the soldiers would succeed better at this task if there were a well worked out plan of reconstruction in which the interest of those who must work with hand or brain would be considered as first. certain place, under the labor conditions which the government will have established. There is no compulsion upon the private employers in any community, of course; they can assume any atti- tude toward the returning men they choose, but it will be strange indeed if the vast majority will not choose to take a friendly attitude. Men will want to work where the atmosphere is friendly. They - will co-operate with the war and labor departments . in adapting themselves to the jobs that are offered with the best conditions attached. The plan of “buffer” employment will be so broad—covering so many kinds of work, suitable to almost any man capable of being a soldier—that the locality which waits for its soldiers to go back to old wages and the old long hours of labor will have to wait a very long time. There is the railroad service, for example. A million additional men could well be employed in bettering the railroad properties in the United States during the coming year. Half that force should be kept at work on extensions and improve- ments of the tracks, bridges and buildings for at least two years to come. Public opinion would justify the payment of very good wages indeed to the army of discharged soldiers and sailors who would volunteer for this patriotic work. This as- sumes, as-every one of any wvision in Washington now does assume, that congress will never venture to return the railroads to private profiteering con- trol. Fair payment will be made, in due time, but the public will own and run the railways. In order to learn exactly what each man in the army can do as a wage-worker, what he was able to do before he entered the army and what he has learned ‘in the service, the bureau of classification of personnel of the army has been making a survey, covering all of the millions of men. This is done through a special inquiry in each company, and the i result will be the first real census of our construc-. tive American man-power. While the war department is finding out how many carpenters, teamsters, machinists, tractor ex- perts, bricklayers, bookkeepers, bakers, chemists and other skilled and semi-skilled men it has to take care of, the labor department, through its 1,600 community labor boards, is in a position to inquire—if this plan is adopted—just how many The story on this page from the Leader’s Washington Bureau, does not give what the administration and congress is going to do to aid the soldiers and munition workers to get back to peace-time employments, but only what the more progressive leaders of the administration think ought to be done. As a program it expresses in part the | very least we ought to.do for our war workers and soldiers, but it will not. come to pass without a hard fight by | the democratic elements of the country. The big interests control, and they must have theirs whether the soldier is properly cared for or not. These same interests are very anxious to drive wages down artificially. They want revenge_ for labor’s opportunity to organize during the war. Again, we can not give good conditions for our sol- diers without giving them to the whole people o n farm and in factory, and our special interests were never fur: ther from agreeing to such a policjtrl.' Gt While the people have been very busy winning the = ~war the special inferests have beén as busy planning how to out-general = =~ = = .. them on reconstruction. Which side will succeed? . ; jobs for these men are ready, under the right con- ditions, in each community. The war department will be able to report to the labor department, say, that 1,000 good machinists from the army and from munition factories in Bridgeport are willing to go to Buffalo, or Chicago, to a manufacturing plant that has been returned to a peace basis. The labor department learns that a plant in Buffalo is anxious to get these men, at government conditions. If the community labor board in Buffalo reports that general employment conditions are satisfactory, judged -by the govern- ment standard, and that the men will not be forced presently to go on strike to maintain the terms of their bargain, the thousand men will be released from the army and sent to Buffalo. PUBLIC IMPROVEMENTS CAN BE PUSHED : Suppose, at the same time, 1,000 building me- chanics from the region of western New York are waiting' for release from military service, and the building contractors in and near Buffalo fail to guarantee the right conditions of employment. The labor department would get in touch with all the municipal governments in that region, and with the state government, and suggest that a lot of high- way and bridge construction be undertaken, and other “buffer” employment furnished, as a cold business proposition. The authorities will see the chance of a lifetime to win the thanks of these sol- diers. Taxpayers will be satisfied, because public improvements have been largely suspended during the war and must be brought up to date. The building - contractors, when they see the soldiers going to work for the public, will fall over them- selves, so to speak, in their haste to explain away their original hostile attitude. : If the United States were dependent largely upon foreign trade for its commercial ‘life this plan of nation-wide increase of wages would create serious alarm among employers. They would protest that foreign low-paid labor would kill our industries. But over 90 per cent of the goods produced in the United States, normally, are consumed here.: We employ machinery, in producing everything from hay to watches, better than any other people on (Continued on page 14) o SRR .-'lw