Mr. KELLER. Yes; that is good.

Mr. TAYLOR. If there are any questions, sir, I would be very glad to answer them to the best of my ability.

Mr. KELLER. Do you have any questions?

Mr. RAMSPECK. Mr. Taylor, do you have any figures to show how many of those complaints involved the question of wages below the

code standards?

Mr. TAYLOR. Can I qualify just a little bit in that connection, please, sir?

Mr. RAMSPECK. Yes, sir.

Mr. TAYLOR. In handling the record part of the work on the board, which has been part of my duties, we have classified our complaints under four major classifications: First, or, as we termed them, the A complaints; they were the complaints that alleged violations of the hour and wage provisions of the code; B complaints were 7 (a) discriminations or labor dispute complaints; C complaints were stretchout complaints or increased work assignments; and D complaints were miscellaneous complaints.

Those complaints have been broken down, and I think that I can answer your question either in toto or in part, as you would prefer it, sir.

Mr. KELLER. I think we would like to hear it in toto.

Mr. RAMSPECK. I would like to get an idea of what percentage of complaints involved the question of wages and hours.

Mr. TAYLOR. I may have to do a little bit of adding, sir, but I will try not to. I will take the annual report here, which will give it to you up until last September in one set of figures, and then in the other I can give you the last quarter and up until this last Saturday, I think.

During the first year of the board, from September 26, 1934, to September 30, 1935, we received a total of 4,560 complaints. Of that number, 1,166 were hour and wage complaints; 2,393 were 7 (a) or discrimination complaints; 484 were stretch-out work assignment complaints; 517 were miscellaneous or special complaints which could not fall under either one of the previous classifications.

Mr. RAMSPECK. That is all I have, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. KELLER. Now, if you have the record, what happened in the class A complaints? That would be hours and wages? Mr. TAYLOR. That would be hours and wages.

Mr. KELLER. Yes; and how did you get by with them?

Mr. TAYLOR. Of that number we were able in that year through various means to adjust 1,145.

Mr. KELLER. Out of how many?

Mr. TAYLOR. Out of 1,166. Out of a total of 1,166, we adjusted 1,145.

Mr. KELLER. You got nearly all of them?

Mr. TAYLOR. Now, as to the basis upon which those complaints were adjusted, sir

Mr. WOOD. One thousand one hundred and sixty-six? What type of employers were they?

Mr. TAYLOR. I do not quite understand.

Mr. WOOD. Textile employers or what?
Mr. TAYLOR. This is all textile, sir.

Mr. WOOD. All textile?

Mr. TAYLOR. All textile; primarily cotton, wool, and silk.
Mr. Wood. You adjusted 1,100 cases?

Mr. TAYLOR. Complaints, sir.

Mr. WOOD. One thousand one hundred or eleven thousand?

Mr. TAYLOR. One thousand one hundred. We had 1,166 hour and wage complaints, and of that number we adjusted through various means 1,145.

Mr. KELLER. Only 21 that were not adjusted?

Mr. TAYLOR. At the end of the year.

Mr. KELLER. What is the next?

Mr. ELLENBOGEN. What do you mean by adjusting?

Mr. TAYLOR. In adjusting those complaints, the hour and wage complaints were handled on the basis of going into the field and getting from the complainant his story, and then after we got that information we went to the mill and investigated the records and found what the exact status was from the manufacturers. We had on the one side the manufacturer's slant, and on the other hand the employee's slant.

Mr. WOOD. In those cases you adjusted, how many were adjusted satisfactorily to the employees? Were all those cases adjusted satisfactorily to the employees?

Mr. TAYLOR. I can answer that in this manner: Of the number of complaints-I am speaking of hours and wages, sir-adjusted by payment of wages, that our investigation found that those people were entitled to, was 50.

Mr. WOOD. Fifty cases?

Mr. TAYLOR. Fifty complaints or cases, sir. If I may digress there, you speak of cases and I refer to them, sir, as complaints. We considered everything as a complaint, and then developed it into a case later, sir.

Eleven were adjusted by an adjustment in the wage rates. If it was found that the wage rates were incorrect, an adjustment was brought about in 11. One of these employees was dismissed, that being a wage complaint, for refusing to follow instructions. Of the wage complaints, so many of them were dismissed for inefficiency, old age, or perhaps mental condition, and others were investigated and it was found that they did not violate the conditions of the code.

Now, I cannot answer that question in the detail that perhaps you would like to have it through the fact that in our adjustments we have included one general adjustment classification. It can be broken down, sir, if you so desire.

Mr. WOOD. These complaints were primarily based, first, upon the refusal of the employer to deal in collective bargaining with his employees?

Mr. KELLER. No; that comes under another heading.

Mr. TAYLOR. That is another section, sir. I understood that we were talking on hour and wage complaints, sir. They were on the basis

Mr. WOOD. Do any of the 1,166 complaints that you speak of involve the question of discharge at all?

Mr. KELLER. Not insofar as union activity or collective bargaining is concerned; no, sir. That is carried in a separate group of complaints.

Mr. WOOD. Have you any data upon that?

Mr. TAYLOR. Yes, sir. There were 2,354 of those complaints in that classification.

Mr. WOOD. How many of those complaints were settled satisfactorily, and, if you have it, how many employees were reinstated that were victimized on account of their union activities?

Mr. TAYLOR. Eleven of those were adjusted on the basis of arbitration; 338 on the basis of mutual agreement; the mills agreed to employ the workers as fast as possible in 387 instances; the complainants were reemployed in 218 instances; the strike was called off by the union in 7 cases; the mill was in bankruptcy in 17 instances; in 31 instances the mill operations had been suspended indefinitely; and 603 were referred to our legal department for development into a case to be heard before our board.

Mr. WOOD. Have you any data upon the carrying out of the agreement of the employer to take back the employees as fast as possible? Have you any data upon whether they have carried out their promise or not?

Mr. TAYLOR. I cannot say, sir, whether that has been carried out 100 percent or not; no, sir.

Mr. WELCH. What percentage of textile firms are paying the wage scale as provided in the code under N. R. A.?

Mr. TAYLOR. That I cannot state positively, sir. Our work in that connection was only to handle such complaints as were referred to us. We did not make any investigation as to the number of plants or the number of mills that were adhering to the former code provisions.

Mr. WELCH. It was stated here that something like 92 percent of the firms are paying the wage scale provided for in the code and are working their employees the number of hours provided for under the code.

Mr. TAYLOR. I have no direct information in that connection, sir. My only source of information there would be from the newspapers, which I have seen. Our work did not consist of our going out to make that investigation. Since the termination of the codes we have only been a mediation and conciliation agency.

Mr. WELCH. Who would have that information?

Mr. TAYLOR. That, sir, possibly would be in the Bureau of Labor Statistics, I am not positive of that; or there is also, I understand, a study that has been conducted by one of the sections of the former N. R. A. staff, under the direction, I think, of a Mr. Marshall.

Mr. KELLER. I understand that that has been sent to me today for presentation to this committee.

Mr. WELCH. What will the report convey to the committee?

Mr. KELLER. That I do not know, of course. Mr. Marshall, of the N. R. A., as he suggested, has made a study along the line you are talking about, and I asked for it the other day through a friend who is working there, and I understood today from him that the report had been made out and sent to me. It is supposed to be there now on my desk, and if it is I will bring it here tomorrow morning.

Mr. WELCH. That is as to the percentage of firms paying the wage scale provided for under the original code?

Mr. KELLER. It will be a very simple matter to ask for that if it is not. If you like, I will ask both the Bureau of Labor Statistics and Mr. Marshall for it and be sure to get it.

Mr. WELCH. That will carry, of course, the number of hours as compared with the number of hours provided for in the code.

Mr. RAMSPECK. Mr. Taylor, in the 1,166 cases of complaints involving hours and wages, do your records show how many employees were involved in those complaints?

Mr. TAYLOR. I do not have that broken down; that is, not in its entirety. I am having it done at the present time. I was rather pressed for time in getting over here, sir, but it is being carried on in my office at the present time. The total number of employees involved in the complaints that we handled during our first year was 109,000.

Mr. RAMSPECK. That was in the whole number of 4,400 complaints? Mr. TAYLOR. Yes, sir; and I imagine, that I may venture an estimate, that perhaps 25 to 35 percent of those will be hour and wage complaints, the bigger proportion being the labor complaints.

Mr. RAMSPECK. Somewhere around 25 or 30 percent of complaints about wages and hours-I mean the number of employees involved? Mr. TAYLOR. The employees.

Mr. KELLER. Mr. Welch, will you give me now specifically just what you want and I will take it just as you ask for it. You want a record showing what?

Mr. WELCH. What percentage of the textile firms are paying the wage scale provided for by the code?

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Do you mean now paying?

Mr. WELCH. That are now paying the wage scale provided for by

the code.

Mr. Wood. Of these 2,354 cases which you say involved collective bargaining, how many employees does that involve?

Mr. TAYLOR. I cannot answer that specifically at this moment, sir. It is being broken down in my office at this present time.

Mr. WELCH. Also the number of hours.

Mr. KELLER. Yes.

Mr. TAYLOR. If I may venture an estimate with certain reservations in that connection, in the first year 4,560 complaints which we handled involved 109,000 people. I just answered the gentleman from Georgia that perhaps of that number 25 to 30 percent were hours and wages, and I would venture the estimate that about 60 percent were the labor complaints.

Mr. Wood. About 60,000 would be covered, then?

Mr. TAYLOR. The balance in there being stretched out and miscellaneous complaints. The labor complaints are the discrimination complaints, alleging violation of section 7 (a), and former labor positions of the code. Some people speak of them as discrimination and others. as labor.

Mr. WOOD. How many were involved in the 603 cases that finally went to the board for adjudication?

Mr. TAYLOR. That I cannot answer at this particular moment, sir. I do not have it broken down but I will be pleased to get that for you. Mr. RAMSPECK. Can you tell how many mills or employers were involved in the 1,166 hour and wage complaints?

Mr. TAYLOR. I am afraid not, sir, at this particular moment. The total mills in all the complaints were, 1,407, and I would venture perhaps that the same percentage of mills were involved as the number of employees, or approximately so, sir.

Mr. RAMSPECK. Twenty-five or thirty percent?

Mr. TAYLOR. Yes, sir.

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask the witness if he has read the bill.

Mr. KELLER. All right, sir.

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Have you read this bill?

Mr. TAYLOR. Yes, sir.

Mr. SCHNEIDER. Have you made a study of it?

Mr. TAYLOR. No, sir; I have not.

Mr. SCHNEIDER. What is your opinion about the mechanics of the bill in its use with reference to the adjustment of grievances?

Mr. TAYLOR. I have not had an opportunity to study it over from that angle. I have just had a chance to study that very casually and I have not had a chance to go into it thoroughly, and I am afraid I could not answer it in an intelligent manner for that reason, sir.

Mr. ELLENBOGEN. Mr. Taylor, will you compile all those figures and come back again?

Mr. TAYLOR. In connection with the break-down on the basis that you asked for. Will you give me a little more idea on that? I will see you personally about it.

Mr. ELLENBOGEN. Yes; I will give you a list personally.

Mr. TAYLOR. Thank you, because you are catching me very much at a disadvantage, I assure you, sir.

Mr. KELLER. We will be delighted to have you do that. We will call as the next witness Mr. William Kelly, second vice president, United Textile Workers of America, representing the Middle Atlantic States. Is Mr. Kelly present?

STATEMENT OF WILLIAM F. KELLY

Mr. KELLY. My name is William F. Kelly, of Philadelphia. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I am submitting herewith data which is irrefutable proof that the standards of wages and working conditions set up by the textile industry in the various codes of fair competition under the now invalidated N. R. A. have been broken down. You will note that no division of the industry has escaped the effects of this break-down, despite what the several institutes have to say to the contrary.

The worst offender of all is the silk industry and, if the committee will analyze the figures herein set forth, you will realize the necessity of some legislation, national in scope, which will save the industry from itself.

The textile industry is one of the oldest and largest basic industries of our economic life and supplies a national need much older than many industries such as utilities or railroads, which are today supervised and regulated by the Government. Because of this supervision, a cloak of certain protection is thrown about the workers in these industries and we believe that the same sort of protection should be given to the workers in the textile industry.

In reading the history of the industry in this country, it is not very illuminating insofar as the labor aspect is concerned. The textile industry was fostered and protected by our Government in its early development but labor has never received its share of this protection. High protective tariffs were inaugurated when the leaders of the industry shouted from the housetops the necessity for protection against cheap, foreign labor abroad, with whom they could not compete.