FIRST ANNUAL REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF LABOR To the PRESIDENT: DEPARTMENT OF LABOR, OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY, In accordance with the requirements of section 9 of the act of Congress approved March 4, 1913, entitled "An act to create a Department of Labor," I respectfully submit for transmission to Congress the first annual report of the Secretary of Labor. Describing the present incomplete organization of this Department and its work for the four months of the fiscal year following its creation, my report also describes the work of its subordinate bureaus for the eight months preceding before the Department existed and while its bureaus were under the jurisdiction of the Department of Commerce and Labor. In less detail, yet with considerable fullness, material is included descriptive of work in execution of the Secretary's authority to act as mediator in labor disputes. The report is in this particular brought down to the close of the calendar year. Supplementary to descriptions of work, suggestions and recommendations are offered and financial estimates for the next fiscal year presented. Both the descriptive and the suggestive parts of the report may be better understood if the purpose and origin of the Department are first considered. PURPOSE OF THE DEPARTMENT. WELFARE OF WAGE EARNERS. The Department of Labor was created in the interest of the wage earners of the United States. This is expressly declared by the organic act. "The purpose of the Department of Labor," as that act reads in its first section, "shall be to foster, promote, and develop the welfare of the wage earners of the United States, to improve their working conditions, and to advance their opportunities for profitable employment.' There is of course no authority in that declaration to foster, promote, or develop for wage earners any special privileges; but the 7 inference is irresistible that Congress did intend to conserve their just interests by means of an executive department especially devoted to their welfare. ORGANIZED AND UNORGANIZED LABOR. Nor is there any implication that the wage earners in whose behalf this Department was created consist of such only as are associated together in labor unions. It was created in the interest of the welfare of all the wage earners of the United States, whether organized or unorganized. Inasmuch, however, as it is ordinarily only through organization that the many in any class or of any interest can become articulate with reference to their common needs and aspirations, the Department of Labor is usually under a necessity of turning to the labor organizations that exist and such as may come into existence for definite and trustworthy advice on the sentiments of the wageearning classes regarding their common welfare. Freely as conferences with unorganized wage earners are welcome, official intercourse with individuals as such has practical limits which organization alone can remove. Manifestly, then, the Department of Labor must invite the confidence and encourage the cooperation of responsible labor organizations and their accredited officers and committees if it is to subserve its prescribed purpose through an intelligent and effective administration of its authorized functions. FAIRNESS TO ALL INTERESTS. While the Department of Labor sustains friendly relations with labor organizations, as in the interest of all wage earners and of the general welfare it ought to do, nevertheless this attitude must not be exclusive. Similar relations with unorganized wage earners, and also with employers and their organizations to the extent to which they themselves permit, are likewise a duty of the Department. The great guiding purpose, however the purpose that should govern the Department at every turn and be understood and acquiesced in by everybody is the purpose prescribed in terms by the organic act, namely, promotion of the welfare of the wage earners of the United States. In the execution of that purpose the element of fairness to every interest is of equal importance, and the Department has in fact made fairness between wage earner and wage earner, between wage earner and employer, between employer and employer, and between each and the public as a whole the supreme motive and purpose of its activities. The act of its creation is construed by it not only as a law for promoting the welfare of the wage earners of the United States by improving their working conditions and advancing their |