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ploitation of the men, women, and children in our industry, as it has in the past, then let's forget the States rights. And let us concentrate on Federal legislation. If the Supreme Court declares this bill unconstitutional, Mr. Chairman, it will be only one more added to the large pile of labor bills that have been thrown out, just one more. But, some of these days they will declare the last one unconstitutional; the American people will get sick and tired of it and they will do something about it. And the employers and the bankers will not stop them either. And it will be done in an American way, I say. Mr. KELLER. Mr. Gorman, you may call your next witness.

STATEMENT OF J. A. FRIER, APPEARING FOR UNITED
TEXTILE WORKERS OF AMERICA

Mr. FRIER. Mr. Chairman and genetlemen of the committee, I will be just as brief as I can possible be with what I have to say. I have revised my statement and will eliminate a number of the things I had intended saying. But I do want to begin by saying, gentlemen, that I do not appear here in my own behalf. I have already reached that age where textile workers are expected to go on to the scrap heap any day.

I am only actually 47 years old, but having spent 33 years of my life in a Southern cotton mill I am considered an old man.

I come before this committee today to ask you to give careful consideration to the legislation that you are now considering and to the many statements that have been made to you as to the need for such legislation in this Nation.

I am constantly in attendance on the general assembly of my State. Every year we make efforts to have labor laws passed. We are never confronted there by our employers, but we are confronted by a battery of lawyers who are in the employ of our employers. And they tell us that we must not with our laws invade State rights.

I want to cite an instance that happened in my State last week that brought me almost to the conclusion that we are too careful of State lines. I think probably last Thursday at 10:30 in the morning a bank in Aiken, a small town in my State, was held up at the point of machine guns by five men. There were 23 customers and employees in the bank. Then the men got into their automobiles and officers began to chase them, but they crossed the State line and before our officers could contact some officials in the other State they lost the trail. The last information I had was that that money was still gone and nobody had been arrested.

We believe we need national legislation to regulate the textile industry. It was said here at the very beginning of this hearing that the manufacturers were afraid. Gentlemen, I think it is high time that the manufacturers begin to be afraid, because they have always tried to keep their employees under a cloud of fear.

When I began working in the mills in 1903 I was told by my first employer that they were making no profit, that they were running on borrowed money in order to create jobs for the employees. And I have been told the same thing constantly while they have built up

great fortunes every year. They said that they were making no profits but were running at a loss on borrowed money in order to give the employees jobs.

Your committee has been told here-and told by men in position to know better than to make such a statement-that under N. R. A. the textile industry lost money. I am not prepared to speak for all the States, but speaking for the State of South Carolina these are their own figures made to the State Department of Commerce and Industry. And during 1933 where we had only 6 months of operation under the code, but during those 6 months they made a profit of $33,954,371 more than they did during the same period of 1932. I wonder just how much money it would take for the textile industry to say that they had made a few pennies.

Gentlemen, this is a need that has confronted us for many years. We have appealed to State legislatures, and we have waited patiently until patience has almost ceased to be a virtue. We have waited for the industry to adjust itself and govern itself and save itself from chiseling and unfair practices. And we now appeal to the national Congress for the relief in this situation.

There can be no question but that code provisions have been violated in my State. I remember a village that comes to mind just now. Somebody said that we ought to live out of our gardens and to work for accommodation in the mills. And some of our employees seem to do that and some of our employers seem to have that thought.

I moved into a little house in 1903. And I will give you the name of the village where it is located. The little town is Lexington, S. C. At that time the mill was owned by a local company, but it is now owned by the Martel chain. The house was numbered 16, and it had at some time been painted, but the paint was beginning to scale off. A few days ago I stopped a car in front of that little house and saw the stain of the very same paint. There was no improvement. I counted 11 panes of glass broken out of the windows. And the family of the textile worker was living in that house and working on a night shift in the mill for a living.

And let me say when I was living there I ran 14 to 16 looms. Today 1 weaver, 1 battery filler, and 1 loom-fixer run 100 looms to the section. On 400 looms they employ 7 weavers each shift to do smashing and everything else.

Gentlemen, I feel that enough has been said. I feel that you are going to give careful consideration to this legislation and bring to this largest group of workers that we have in my State some relief through national legislation.

Mr. GORMAN. Mr. Chairman, may I place into the record this chart describing the trend of the so-called stretch out, of which we have heard so much, and the trend of wages, using 1926 as a base, with a description and other material bearing upon the evidence we have submitted?

We were going to enter into a detailed explanation of this material, Mr. Chairman, but owing to the lack of time we will be satisfied with presenting it before your committee with this short discussion of it. Mr. KELLER. Yes; you may do that.

(The chart referred to is as follows:)

COTTON TEXTILE STRETCH-OUT.

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Mr. GORMAN. This chart shows how textile employers have solved their problem at the expense of textile workers during the past 10 years. The upper, rising line represents the number of active spindle hours per man-hour of employment in the cotton textile industry. The lower, declining line shows average weekly wages in the same industry.

The upper line shows how manufacturers have steadily increased the amount of work taken out of the hides of textile labor. It is a crude measure of the increased amount of machinery handled by each productive worker; in other words, it measures the stretch out.

This stretch-out line increased from a base of 100 in 1926, in every year but 1, to a figure of 128.7 in 1934, a total increase of 28.7 percent, and an average annual increase of about 3 percent.

It should be borne in mind that this line is constructed from data 1 imping together the man-hours of all textile workers, including those whose jobs are such that little stretch-out or speed-up is possible, such as cleaners, fixers, and outside workers. As a result, it underestimates the rate of stretch out to which machine operators are subjected. This factor accounts for the temporary decline in the stretch-out line in 1930, when machine or productive employees were laid off or put on part time, while nonproductive employees were kept on for a while in hopes of returning prosperity.

The lower line shows what textile workers received for the work they did. Even before the depression this wage line was declining, and in 1929 was lower than in the base year of 1926. By 1932 weekly wages declined to 68.6 percent of the 1926 level.

Some increase during the N. R. A.-nothing like the 70 percent which the employers talk of, brought the weekly wage index to 79.1 in 1934. As was brought out earlier in the hearings, wage rates are again being cut, and weekly wages will decline sharply as soon as the current spell of heavy production activity weakens.

What is most significant is the constantly growing spread between the two lines, the growing spread between what the employers get out of the workers, and what the workers get in return. Even when we received slightly higher weekly wages in 1933 and 1934, most of the increase was taken by the employers through the stretch-out. In fact, the increasing stretch-out, and declining wages are closely related. Stretch-out increases unemployment and part-time work, so, directly decreases labor's income. Through creating unemployment, it weakens labor's bargaining power, and makes it easier for the employers to reduce wage rates.

Complete figures for 1935 are not yet available, but it appears from data for the first 10 months that in spite of improved business in the cotton textile industry, employment has averaged 15,000 men less than in 1934, and pay rolls just about the same. This means that due to rising living costs, the real income of cotton textile workers declined further last year.

It is necessary to drastically increase wages and to eliminate stretch-out in order to insure for textile labor a decent and reasonable share of the product of their industry, as well as a sufficient share to enable them to live like human beings.

I will now present this statement which is headed Cotton textile statistical indexes.

(The statement referred to is as follows:)

Cotton textile statistical indexes

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Column 1, N. R. A. statistical materials-No. 1 Cotton Textile Industry, p. 14, table V111B.

Column 2, N. R. A. same release. p. 9, table 111C.

Column 3, 100 times column 1, divided by column 2.

Column 4, column 3, converted to 1926 base.

Column 5, N. R. A. same release, p. 10, table 1VB.

Column 6, column 5, converted to index numbers on a 1926 base.

Mr. GORMAN. Mr. Chairman, we have two more witnesses from branches of the industry that have not been heard from, the rayon and synthetic yarn industry and the dyeing industry.

56725-86- -22

Mr. KELLER. How much time will they take?

Mr. GORMAN. The representative of the dyers will not be here until this afternoon at 1:30. The representative from the rayon and synthetic yarn industry, and his statement will be very brief. Mr. KELLER. We will now call Mr. Woodard.

STATEMENT OF ALBERT R. WOODARD, PRESIDENT, UNITED SYNTHETIC YARN WORKERS

Mr. WOODARD. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, this is the report, in general, of the past and present development in the rayon manufacturing industry which shows the necessity and desirability for the regulations and protection which the National Textile Act affords textile manufacturers and textile labor.

The largest break-down in the rayon industry is in the stretch-out or increased machine and production load per operator.

Some of this has been brought about through the introduction of so-called modernized machinery. Where this is the case, the work load of the operator has not been decreased but in most cases attempts have been made to increase the work load greatly over the former status. The worker has not gained, even partially, in the benefits of the modernized machines.

I refer you back to the term "modernized machinery." A better name, so far as I have seen in the rayon industry, is "Labor Lay-off Machinery."

My frank opinion is that most of the machinery is designed not to run at a lower power and maintenance cost but primarily to operate mainly with a greatly reduced operating force. These machines do operate at a lower power and maintenance cost. That is the only logical reason for calling them modernized machines. The managements are not satisfied with acquiring just this saving in power and maintenance costs. They, at least most of them have to go a great deal further and gobble up a great deal more savings or increased profit by stretching out the employee and increasing his production and work load over his or her former status. They then say they want to pick out this one or that one and lay him off because he cannot keep up with the requirements of the new modernized work load. This operator was doing a good, satisfactory job before; but now we must modernize and he cannot take it, so he must go.

I wonder who is going to take care of all these unfortunates who cannot seem to become streamlined.

At one time prior to the N. R. A. the plant where I am employed operated, for example, one department with 56 men per shift at a wage of an average of about 54 cents per hour. Since that time they have reduced each shift to 32 men, which makes an approximate saving in this one department of $250 per 24 hours. That is one example of stretch out with an example in increased profits. This occurred in other departments and other mills. At the time they employed 56 men per shift they carried on extensive machine repairs which since then have been deemed unnecessary. They were unnecessary at the time, and the management knew it, but they were selling their rayon for around a dollar a pound then so did not mind throwing away around $50,000 a year on needless expenditures.

The managements are continually throwing it up to the workers that they should be more efficient. People who live in glass houses

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