They could be enlisted to make good workmen. I hope that this may be one of the lessons of the war. I was talking with a man connected with the Government Hospital for the Insane with regard to this and he said, "I am surprised that there should be any doubt about it. On the basis of my own experience I know what you say is absolutely true." After this war we must apply science to industry, in a way to make industry more wholesome and healthy; which means not only better sanitation and ventilation, not only how to make the workman keep his bodily functions going properly, but how he may obtain mental health so that he may live, as Professor Alfred Marshall says, a complete all-around life. And if we are to say that the world owes every man a living we should mean not only that it owes him wages, but also that it owes him the full expression of the fundamental instincts of a human being. II MOBILIZING THE LABOR SUPPLY JOINT SESSION WITH THE AMERICAN ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION AND THE AMERICAN FARM MANAGEMENT ASSOCIATION Presiding Officer: IRVING FISHER President, American Association for Labor Legislation Coordination of Federal, State and City Systems of Employment Offices HENRY R. SEAGER Secretary, United States Shipbuilding Labor Adjustment Board Iteration, reiteration and rereiteration have made every American school boy familiar with the thought that the present war is not a contest of armies merely but a contest of the whole complex of industries essential to the maintenance of efficient armies in the field. If the Allies are to beat the Central powers, they must beat them in the production of food, of munitions, and of aeroplanes, and they must add to their equipment ships and ever more ships to transport these essential supplies safely past lurking submarines to the distant battle fields. This means, if it means anything, that the mustering of an industrial army is quite as essential a part of our war program as the mustering of an efficient military army. With these facts universally conceded, why has the problem of supplying our war industries with the hosts of workers they require thus far received so little attention in Washington? One reason for this stands out prominently. While it was recognized from the outset that it was the government's business to muster the army, the task of directing the industries necessary to equip the army has thus far been left largely to private business men spurred on by the expectation of making profits out of war contracts. Looking chiefly to private employers to supply the war needs, the government's first inclination has been to leave it to them to devise ways and means of securing workers for their shops and factories. Up to the comparatively recent past, private employers have seemed to justify the confidence that has been reposed in them. They have built cantonments for the soldiers, have built and equipped new factories and shipyards, and through private employment bureaus or agents employed by themselves have drawn thousands and hundreds of thousands of workers into the war industries. To this accomplishment the government has of course contributed something. Agents of the |