and doubtless partly due to the fact that the company's growth has been coincident with the automobile industry, to which the Bibb Mills have sold a high proportion of their products. It should be noted also, because the fact will be referred to later, that the Bibb Manufacturing Co. has maintained its quarterly dividends throughout the depression. În 1930, in addition to declaring its regular 6-percent dividend, the company drew $5,000,000 from its surplus and retired all its 6-percent preferred stock which had been distributed as a stock dividend in 1925. Throughout the year 1931, the Bibb Co. maintained 6-percent cash dividends without extra stock dividends. Now, during the year 1933, this Bibb Manufacturing Co., in the face of its tremendous dividends, which it received from its operations throughout these 17 years, instituted two or three reductions in wages during the year 1933. Mr. PEEL. Yes, sir. Mr. WOOD. Did they comply with the code during the period of the code authority? Mr. PEEL. No, sir; they did not, not entirely. There were complaints of stretch-out, and also of-I will not say any great wage reduction, but slight reductions. Mr. Wood. You mean by stretch out, adding additional machines per employee? Mr. PEEL. Yes, sir. Mr. Wood. In other words, if an employee operated 10 machines. normally under the N. R. A., he was compelled to operate 12 or 14 machines? Mr. PEEL. Yes, sir. Mr. WOOD. At the same piece rate? Mr. PEEL. Well, Mr. WOOD. Most of the work in the mills is done on a piece rate, is it not? Mr. PEEL. Well, in most cases weaving is done on piece rate, either paid for by the pound or the yard, but Mr. WOOD. But even though they did pay the $12 or $13, by the stretch-out system, they probably did not pay any more per unit or per garment than they did prior to the N. R. A.? Mr. PEEL. No, sir. Mr. WOOD. It was a method of getting around the law? Mr. PEEL. If you will permit me, I will try to explain that or give you an illustration of how it is done. We will say a weaver is operating 10 looms or running 10 looms, and they decide to give him 4 more. They give him the four more and for the first week or 2 weeks possibly the piece rate is continued, which means that on four additional looms they will make a little more money, but then the piece rate is reduced to where if he was making $14 for running 10 looms, he will get $14 for running 14 looms. Mr. WOOD. This statement has never been refuted successfully. It says that during the 2 months of this investigation these complaints and appeals have been coming in in great number and with increasing insistence. There have been repeated wage cuts reported, former earnings were cut in half, from 16 to 60 percent. I take that that is just prior to the N. R. A. going into effect? Mr. WOOD. Now, this Bibb Manufacturing Co., all these firms you have mentioned, have adopted the stretch-out system and they have lengthened the hours and reduced the wages since the voiding of the N. R. A.? Mr. PEEL. Yes; and quite a bit of it has been done in the past 2 months. Mr. WOOD. In the past 2 months? Mr. PEEL. Yes, sir. Mr. Wood. Yet, a great many of the employers insist that since the declaring unconstitutional of the N. R. A., business has taken a tremendous upturn, and that the voiding of the N. R. A. was responsible for it. I cannot harmonize the methods that have been used by the employers of increasing hours and reducing wages with their statement that business has gotten better and prices have improved and purchasing power has increased. The fact of the matter, don't you think, that since the voiding of the N. R. A., the unscrupulous methods of many employers of lengthening hours and shortening wages has retarded progress rather than increased it? Mr. PEEL. Yes, sir; I think by next summer we will be down to a $6 or $8 wage unless something is done to prevent it. Mr. WOOD. In other words, we will be practically back to where we were in 1933 if the employers are allowed a free hand to continue as they were in 1933 and manage their own affairs? Mr. PEEL. If you will permit me to make this observation: Of course, if I am asked the direct question as to which mills they are, perhaps I will not be able to mention more than one or two, but in 1930, 1931, and 1932, the mills were unable to pay dividends, they were not paying dividends. I talked with a broker or a stock and bond salesman and he told me of the terrible condition some of the mills there in Greenville, where I live, were in. But, in 1933, 1934, and 1935 they have paid dividends and they did it during the period that the N. R. A. was in existence. Certainly, Mr. McColl never made $96,485 in 1931 as the president of the mill, but he received that in the year 1935. Mr. WOOD. I think that is all. Mr. RAMSPECK. Mr. Peel, I wonder if you could give the committee any details as to the Atlanta Woolen Mills situation? Mr. PEEL. The Atlanta Woolen Mills situation? Mr. RAMSPECK. Yes; you mentioned three companies that are located in my district, the Atlanta Woolen Mills, the Gate City Cotton Mills, and the Fulton Bag, and I just wonder if you could tell us what the situation was at those three places. Mr. PEEL. I cannot give you any figures. I would be glad to get those for you. But the information I have is that the stretch-out has been installed, wages cut under the code minimum, and the hours have been increased in some instances. In addition to that, the Atlanta Woolen Mills hearing was held before the Textile Labor Relations Board in December 1934. Following that hearing two gentlemen, I cannot give their names right now, but the president and vice president or secretary-treasurer, father and son-representatives of the Atlanta Woolen Mills, discussed the case with members of the board, and, as I understood it at that time, they were going to make the necessary adjustments; in other words, they were going to reinstate the workers with the excep tion of one man, whose return to work they were bitterly opposed to. They were all to be reinstated-at that particular time he made the statement that because of the general strike he was not able to make samples at the proper time, and, therefore, he did not have orders, but he expected orders, and he thought that during January he would have orders and his mill would be running full time, all the machinery in operation, and they would return all of the people or reinstate all of the former employees except this one man in particular. He later agreed that he would return that person or reinstate that person at a later date. They have never done that from December 1934 to January 1936; they have not, and they will not do that. A petition or charge has been filed with the National Labor Relations Board in regard to discrimination on the part of the management of the Atlanta Woolen Mills. Mr. RAMSPECK. What about the Gate City situation? Mr. RAMSPECK. What your complaint is against them? Mr. PEEL. The complaint against the Gate City is that they have discriminated against our members. They refused to meet with the committee designated by the majority of the workers to represent them, and when we petitioned for an election, they went into the courts to prevent the election. I do not know just what disposition has been made of that. Mr. RAMSPECK. It is in the courts here in the District of Columbia. Mr. PEEL. Yes, sir. Mr. RAMSPECK. I wonder if you know that the employers generally who are interested in fighting the Wagner-Connery bill are sort of making a test case out of the Gate City case? Mr. PEEL. I think so, and the decision of the Supreme Court has given them several million dollars to help fight it. Mr. KELLER. How? Mr. PEEL. Well, in the processing tax. You see, they got many millions back that they collected from the consumers. They acted as the collecting agency, and there is no doubt in my mind that it was on, and that the processing tax was never paid by any mill, but that all of us who bought a shirt or anything made of cotton paid the processing tax. Mr. KELLER. Where is that money? Mr. PEEL. Where is it? Mr. KELLER. Yes. Mr. PEEL. Many of the mills had it impounded, I am told. I want to state that I am not a lawyer, but I have just been reading. Mr. KELLER. I just want to try to help you. Mr. PEEL. It was impounded, and the decision of the Supreme Court means that the manufacturer will receive the amount of money that he paid in as a processing tax, or that went through his hands as the processing tax, it will be returned to the manufacturer. Now, if I am incorrect in that I might say it is through ignorance on my part. Mr. KELLER. Let us get the fact. That is only a small part of the processing tax. I have some figures which I have on my desk but which I cannot hold in my mind. Most of the processing tax is in the Treasury of the United States and it will never get out unless Congress is foolish enough to vote it out, and I do not think they are going to be as foolish as that. Mr. RAMSPECK. The only difficulty with the Gate City, I understand, Mr. Peel, is the question of recognition and dealing with the union? Mr. PEEL. No, sir; Gate City Mills is using the stretch-out, which means that the workers have been cut below the minimum, and some workers on longer hours. Mr. RAMSPECK. The reason I asked specifically about that mill is because the manager of that mill told me about the time that they had the hearing before the Labor Board, or the regional officials in Atlanta, that he was paying above the code wages at that time and that his only difficulty was the question of dealing with the union, and he claimed the union did not represent a majority of his employees. That is the only one that I have any information about personally, and he did make that statement to me. Now, what is the situation about Fulton Bag? Mr. PEEL. Will you pardon me while I say something about the Gate City? Mr. RAMSPECK. Yes. Mr. PEEL. Of course, I am assuming that he is perfectly honest and a nice gentleman, but if he was in doubt as to whether those who came to see him as a committee of the workers were representing a majority, he could have let the election go on, and then it would have determined whether the local union had a majority or not. Mr. RAMSPECK. I want to state to you in all frankness that I think probably the reason he did not do that that other people engaged in this same line of industry wanted to make a test case of the Wagner-Connery bill, and, while he did not tell me this, my own opinion is that they put up the money for the lawyers. I know the lawyers representing the case here in Washington did not come from our part of the country. One of them is the man who represented Schechter Bros. in the N. R. A. case. I think that is the whole story, that they decided this was the first case coming up where there was an election ordered in the mill and they made a test case out of it. Mr. PEEL. About the minimum wage, I would like to say this too. There is some question about the minimum wage. The employer said, "I am paying the minimum wage", but he does not say in the same breath, or tell you at the same time, "Well, while I am maintaining code standards and paying the minimum wage, yet, I have reduced weavers who made $16 or $17 a week down to $13." That is not maintaining code standards. If a weaver is making $16 or $17 a week and he has been gradually reduced to the point where he is making $12.50 or $13, just because the employer is paying that weaver $12 does not mean that he is maintaining code standards. That means he has reduced the weavers $4 or $5 a week. Now, you asked about the Fulton? Mr. RAMSPECK. Yes; the Fulton Bag. Mr. PEEL. The Fulton Bag report mentioned increased work and lower daily wage of all productive records, increasing the hours of all productive workers. In the Piedmont Cotton Mills of Atlanta the hours are 60 per week. I do not know whether that is in your district or not. Mr. RAMSPECK. Yes; it is. Mr. WOOD. Increasing the hours to 60 now? Mr. WOOD. A week? And they worked 40 before? Mr. PEEL. Yes. Mr. RAMSPECK. The Fulton Bag is opposed to this bill as they were to the Wagner-Connery bill, and the chief executive in the organization was, I have been told-I do not know this of my own knowledge but I have been told-gunning for me politically because of my support of the Wagner-Connery bill. I do know this, that living conditions around the Fulton Bag and Cotton Mill are not anything like they ought to be. Mr. WELCH. How long has it been since they increased the hours from 40 to 60? Mr. PEEL. I think in this particular case it has been done in the past 2 months. I could get that information but I have not got it right at my fingertips. But I think it has been done within the past 2 months. Mr. KELLER. Since the N. R. A. decision? Mr. PEEL. Yes, sir. Mr. KELLER. I understand all these hours have been increased since the N. R. A. decision? Mr. PEEL. Yes, sir. Mr. RAMSPECK. That is all I have. Mr. KELLER. Any other questions? (No response.) Mr. KELLER. I thank you, Mr. Peel. I shall call to the stand next Mr. Taylor, of the National Textile Labor Relations Board. STATEMENT OF WALTER C. TAYLOR Mr. TAYLOR. My name is Walter C. Taylor, technical adviser, National Textile Labor Relations Board. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, a member of your committee, Mr. Ellenbogen, called and asked that I come over and present such information as I could. I can give you such information as you may desire from my records. I do not have a prepared statement in connection with the situation other than gross figures in the way of complaints, and I would be very glad to offer that for your approval if you so desire it. Mr. KELLER. Certainly. Mr. TAYLOR. The Textile Labor Relations Board has received through various sources a total of 4,808 complaints; that is, from the time of the creation of the board, September 26, 1934, up until this past Saturday. Of that number of complaints, 2,566 had to do with labor complaints in this manner: These complaints, or that number of alleged violations of the various labor provisions on the codes that were under the jurisdiction of the Textile Labor Relations Boards, were 7 (a) complaints, discrimination complaints, or call them as you may. Of that number of complaints we have been able through various means to adjust 2,464 through mediation, conciliation, and cooperation with both labor and management. That, briefly, is a statement with regard to the so-called discrimination complaints. The other complaints have been grouped under several classifications, but that is the statement in that connection. |