VOL. XV-No. 5. MAY, 19 Presenting all the facts about American labor-Believing that the goal of the American labor movement lies in industry for service, with workers' control. J. F. ANDERSON, Former Vice-President, International Association of Machinists; Candidate for President on an Anti-Labor Banking platform. ALBERT F. COYLE, Editor, Brotherhood of Locomotive HELEN G. NORTON, Instructor, Journalism, Brookwood GEORGE M. SPECTOR, President, Headgear Workers' Credit Union; himself an officer of the Cloth and Cap HERBERT TŔÁCEY, of the editorial staff, the LABOUR I S labor banking a promise or a menace to the labor movement? Equally loyal friends of labor differ widely on the answer to this question. "I don't approve of this labor banking movement," I heard one prominent conservative trade union president say recently. "The prime function of a trade. union is to gain better hours, wages and improved working conditions for labor. To do this, it must be able to clear its decks for action and strike at a moment's notice. It must be free from entangling alliances. When a union goes into the banking field, there is danger that its officers, in deciding for or against a strike, might be influenced too much by a consideration of the effect of the strike on the interests of the bank. "I am further opposed to the unions going into the banking business because I am opposed to 'trade union paternalism'. I think that a union should concentrate on the one job of improving labor's economic condi tions, and should not try to act as a big brother in other fields of effort. That is why I am not enthusiastic about labor banking, labor insurance, workers education, cooperative enterprises, labor politics, etc. Of course, I am an officer of a labor bank myself, but a bank owned by many, not by one union, and its effect on any one union for good or evil cannot be very great." "I'm against labor banking," flashed another trade unionist at me, this time a member of the extreme left wing, "because labor banking leads to class collabora tion. It gives labor the capitalist psychology. It interferes with his militancy. It obscures the class struggle. You need but to read the praises to this movement sung by such financial leaders as Dwight Morrow of J. P. Morgan Company and Charles E. Mitchell of the National City Bank, on the ground that it will make for the stability and conservatism on the part of labor to realize the danger of this movement. Investments by labor banks in big financial enterprises; the meeting of trade union banker, and Wall Street banker, around the table as fellow members of the banking fraternity, are bound to change the psychology of the workers' leaders." LABOR AGE "I am enthusiastic about labor banking," said a syndicalist friend of mine. "The society of the future is going to be grouped around the trade and industrial union. The more functions labor controls, the nearer to the syndicalist society." "It is not true," answered another progressive trade unionist, "that labor banking of the right sort leads to conservatism. If labor is ever to manage industry it must make a beginning. If labor unions remain merely negative, fighting organizations, and their members learn nothing about the actual management of industry, they will be absolutely incapable of running industry should they suddenly, by means of a revolution, gain control of industry. If, on the other hand, they, here and now, assume ever increasing responsibility in the management of industry, they will be able to accomplish the transition to a workers republic peacefully and without a violent reaction. "Five years ago, the control of credit was almost wholly in the hands of the financers. Labor felt that banking was such an intricate business that the workers able terms than from the ordinary banks and for s union itself to invest their funds more advantageous They gave financial advantages to the union and members as stockholders and depositors. They en the unions to support certain sound cooperative ent prises. And they create an additional bond of love between the union and the membership." "What do you think of labor banking?" I asked philosophic student and trade union member. "It all depends," he said taking a long puff of union label cigar, "on the kind of labor banking refer to and the spirit with which the banking vent is undertaken. I see a grave danger in the policy p sued by some of buying into old capitalist banks, continuing to run those banks in the same way as for merly. The menace there, I think, is greater than t promise. And then there are labor banks owned some hundreds of unions, none of which have a co trolling interest. These can neither harm nor can the assist any one union to any extent. "I believe that banks owned by one union have certa PRO AND CON OR the last few years the organized workers have been working out new lines of thought and policy. Hit by the Open Shop drive on the one hand, and by the post-war depression on the other, the Labor Movement turned to the business of trying to strengthen is control over its own resources. One of the most signal of these ventures was the Labor Banking Movement. It has grown with the years -rapidly in comparison with the growth of banking in general. No one is more familiar with that effort than the brilliant Editor of the Brotherhood of Locomotiv Engineers' Journal, Albert Coyle. The Union with which he is associated has been the leader in the new field of financial control. His arguments for a wider extension of this movement will be read with great interest by trade unionists everywhere. Jack Anderson has come to other conclusions. One of the ablest organizers in the labor ranks, he has reached the conclusion that labor banking harms the union fight. This debate will assist greatly, we believe, to clear the air. We are calling the discussion to the attention of a number of distinguished labor leaders and students of labor problems, to get their opinions, in the light of the facts brought out here. These opinions shall be run later, as a symposium. In addition, each of the debaters shall have a chance at rebuttal—which shall appear in our July issue. Out of the exchange of views should come some crystallization of opinion on what should be done about this remarkable development in the future. could not possibly assume control. The labor banking movement emerged. Labor is now beginning to mobilize its own credit. It is making good. It is getting an insight into the financial and business world which is helping it in its day today trade union policies. "Labor banking gives the labor movement additional prestige. Psychologically it places the union in a stronger position in its negotiations with the employer. The successful conduct of labor banks whets the worker's appetite for the management of other businesses. "The trade union leader in any case must invest the funds of the union. He must come into contact, through these investments and through trade union negotiations with the capitalist and financial world. He is often asked to serve on boards of private banking institutions because of the funds possessed by the trade unions to which he belongs. If contact with financiers is contaminating, he is already contaminated. "Labor banking, furthermore, makes it possible for the member of the union to obtain loans on more reason dangers to contend against. The union should re to that the trade union funds invested in its bank are kep in a liquid form, readily obtainable in time of a crisis It must seek to secure the major part of its depositors from outside of the industry. It must be wary about lending money to employers of its trade union members It must not permit its main trade union strategists to divert too much of their attention from the trade union field. It must be ever on the outlook o help in a legiti mate fashion sound cooperative enterprises. It must em ploy experts, but the union must dominate the general policies of the bank. If it observes these and other rules, it may be a big asset to the union and a worth while social experiment in a more democratic form of industrial organization." Which view will history prove to be correct? Labor banking has been among us but a brief half-dozen years No one can afford to dogmatize about it as yet too def nitely. Its development will be watched with keen interest by all elements in our American so, it'y. it L One of Labor's Greatest Hopes A Key to Industrial Democracy By ALBERT F. COYLE ABOR cooperative banks are not a new fad. 65,000 of them are in successful existence in every civilized land on the globe, with 80 years of remarkable achievement to their credit. For cooperative banks are not "just the same" as other banks. They go to the very heart of the defects of the present banking system by taking the control of money and credit out of the hands of selfish exploiters and using it for the service of the community. They replace autocratic money power with democratically controlled finance. They enable the workers to use their funds for socially constructive purposes instead of turning them over to anti-union bankers to use in financing openshop employers in their efforts to crush organized labor. In brief, cooperative banking makes manhood rather than money, social welfare rather than profit-making, the chief aim of the banking business. A New Declaration of Independence Cooperative banking has transformed the lives of hundreds of thousands of workers and farmers throughout Europe and Asia. It has solved the credit problem for the peasant, freed the city worker from the loan shark, enabled poor men of all classes to own their own homes and to finance a host of other cooperative enterprises in order to reduce their living costs and hence enjoy a better standard of living. Cooperative banking, if rightly directed, is able to bring to the average American worker greater freedom and happiness economically than the Declaration of Independence conferrd politically. Perhaps you think this too strong a statement. Then you do not fully appreciate the vital importance of credit in our industrial civilization. For credit is the real monarch of the modern world. It controls railroads, industries, mines. It determines what men shall work and what men shall starve, what industries shall prosper ind what industries shall fail, and even what nations shall be free and what nations enslaved. Credit is power, and no other power in our age wields such a tremendous influence over human welfare. It is idle prattle for progressive labor leaders to talk about industrial democracy unless and until they first control the credit power without which even diluted democracy is impossible. A Vital Question for Labor Shall this tremendous power of credit control be manipulated by a small group of men to exploit both manipulated by a small group of men to exploit the people, or shall it be used by the workers for the vital question for the trade union leader to decide is whether the workers should allow banking power to be employed to destroy organized labor, or whether the workers should not themselves employ it to protect their union and to produce a greater abundance of life for themselves and their children. Can any other question be more vital to labor than this? Labor's Amazing Money Resources Do you think it a wild dream for labor to control the bulk of the nation's finance? On the contrary, it can be accomplished inside of one generation if the workers will awaken to the amazing possibilities of mobilizing their present money resources under their own control. Each year the workers of America receive over $20,000,000,000 in wages. The farmers-and they too are workers receive another $17,000,000,000 for their crops. These primary producers put in the 902 savings banks of the United States last year the staggering sum of $7,977,617,000. In addition, they spent about another $2,000,000,000 for such more or less useless luxuries as chewing gum, face paints and powders for their wives, cigars for themselves, booze and its substitutes, shows, admissions to horse race and prize fights, and a lot of other unnecessary and expensive "bourgeois' indulgences, with more than another $1,000,000,000 of their earnings squandered on fake stocks and similar swindles. Even making allowances for a reasonable expenditure for luxuries and enjoyment, the workers and farmers of this country could put each year into their own cooperative banks savings of at least $6,000,000,000. This would mean no hardships on their part; on the contrary, they would profit in health, mind, morals and money by such thrift. Why Labor Must Have Its Own Banks Some good trade unionist may ask, But why can not labor secure the same benefits by entrusting its money to friendly bankers? One might as well ask why labor should organize trade unions, since many employers are friendly to labor. Granting that some bankers are not opposed to organized labor, especially in the smaller communities where the banker and the worker often live side by side, the blunt truth is that the great majority of bankers are hostile to labor unionism because their large loans are made to employers, not to workers. and they almost always have their personal money invested big industries where fat profits depend on keeping wages down. And even the friendly small banker may easily be compelled by the big banker to adopt an anti-labor policy under penalty of refusing him accommodation in time of need or cutting him off the list of favored participants in profitable underwritings. Because the control of credit means prosperity and power and self-respect for the workers, they cannot afford to entrust it to the hands of outside bankers beyond their own control. It is true that workers are not |