Chapter XVII: Section VIII: The Congress shall have power (7)

President WHITE—This is a most valuable paper, and it will be printed, together with the other papers and addresses of this convention. Every one should avail themselves of the opportunity to subscribe for this book, which costs one dollar.

I will now introduce to you the gentleman who kindly gave his hour to Mr. Farquhar. He is Mr. Reginald Pelham Bolton, of New York City, who will speak to you on “The Prevention of Elevator Accidents.”

Mr. BOLTON—The preservation of human life and the protection of our fellow-creatures from physical injury, claim prior consideration over conservation of mere materials.

Any form of danger which results in the destruction of life, and exhibits a tendency toward increased developments, invites our systematic investigation. Ameliorative measures, if undertaken in advance of the growth of an evil, are of double value. To one phase of the subject, of the conservation of life, I desire to direct your attention.

The increase of fatalities and injuries resulting from the extensive use of passenger elevators has become sufficiently marked to deserve careful attention by those who are concerned with the benefit of our fellow-citizens. Complete statistics as to the number of accidental occurrences in and about elevators of all classes throughout the country are not available, but an estimate based upon such official returns as relate to labor alone, indicate that the annual total is now probably in excess of seven thousand, of which probably three-fourths are of a preventable character.

From small beginnings, the roll of such accidents reported by the New York Department of Labor, which it is conceded do not cover all such occurrences, rose in 1909 to a total for five years of 1,600 injured persons, of whom 198 were killed and about 298 permanently disabled.

The Wainwright-Phillips Commission of the New York State Legislature reported in 1911 a list of injuries and deaths, in the three years 1907 to 1910, affecting 1,108 persons, of whom 106 were killed and 241 were more or less seriously and permanently crippled. In addition, no less than 200 persons fell down hoistways, of whom 43 were killed outright and 19 permanently injured.

These occurrences took place only on elevators in industrial establishments, and are only those which have been officially reported.

The Industrial Commission of the State of Wisconsin reported for the ten months, September, 1911, to June, 1912, thirty-nine accidents in and upon elevators, and fifteen more due to falls down elevator shafts; all occurring in establishments of various industries. Accidents occurring in transportation were 195, so that the relation of elevator accidents and falls was 28 per cent. of transportation.

That such accidents are duplicated outside the limits of observation of labor departments is indicated by an examination of the reports of the New York county coroners, which show about one hundred deaths annually from elevator accidents in the county of New York only. In the year 1911, in the Borough of Manhattan, there were reported sixty-eight fatalities in connection with elevators, about two hundred permanent injuries, and probably about three hundred more may be estimated as having sustained lesser injuries.

The fact that accidental occurrences in or about elevators are thus found to be deplorably numerous and increasing is not to be taken as a reflection upon the general security of elevator travel. Their number is relatively small in comparison with the vast number of persons utilizing these appliances. One express schedule elevator handles about 700,000 persons per annum. Further, by far the larger number of mishaps are not due to failure or fault of the elevator itself, but occur in and about the entrances of, or in the hoistways of such apparatus, from persons falling through unguarded openings into elevator shafts, and of course a number are due to the recklessness and incompetence of employes and operators.

It remains the fact, however, that a large part of these occurrences are unnecessary, just as was found to be the case with many of the forms of danger to life and injury to limb which attended the operation of freight and passenger trains prior to the adoption of certain of the safety appliances and methods which have been brought into general use on railroads, as a result of the concentration of public attention upon the subject, and legislative action based thereon. Similar attention and action with the compilation of statistics upon the subject will undoubtedly result in diminishing the number of fatal and injurious occurrences connected with elevator operation.

Some loss of human life and injury to the person may to some extent be regarded as an unfortunately inevitable accompaniment of all forms of motive apparatus, and the complex conditions of modern existence have not only increased this liability by demands for more rapid movement of all forms of mechanical transportation, but the vast increase in the usage of appliances has introduced new elements of danger.

In no class of transportation are the effects of haste and crowding more apparent and dangerous than in the modern means of vertical transportation, use of which is now made by all classes of people. Liability towards accidental occurrences in elevators, therefore, affects the whole public, and it is needless to dilate upon the general concern in, and economic loss resulting from deaths or injury of any member of the community. It may be conservatively estimated that the economic value of the mere services of persons killed in and about elevators, based upon life expectancy, and the loss of time of those injured, would annually exceed the cost of equipment of all passenger and freight elevators with modernized safety appliances.

There are some features connected with elevator accidents which call for consideration and rectification. These have grown up around the development of the appliance in a manner somewhat peculiar to it. The elevator is a transportation apparatus which is for the most part privately operated and owned. Unlike the railroad, it is not regarded by the law as the apparatus of a common carrier. Unlike the road carriage or car, it is not operated upon the public highways. Unlike the machinery of a factory, it is not utilized exclusively by employes.

Its development and use have been, perhaps, too restricted to require the attention of such legislation as has been rather freely applied to the other classes of appliances engaged in transporting human beings.

It has therefore come about that the legal status of the elevator is in a very indefinite condition, its public regulation is generally local and therefore at best erratic, and the liability for the security of its occupants is as varied as the legal practice and rulings of different States.

The results are unfortunate to all concerned except perhaps that part of the legal profession which concerns itself with the prosecution of claims for injuries. Only two States, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island, have adopted legislative provisions, of limited character, relating to elevators. The former State provided so long ago as 1895 a requirement for automatic locking devices on all passenger elevators, thus being the pioneer in this direction. The State of Rhode Island by its general law, Chapter 129, requires all elevators “to be equipped with safety appliances to prevent the starting of the elevator car in either direction while any door opening into the elevator is open.”

The State of Wisconsin, by its Industrial Commission law, Chapter 485, of 1911, placed in the hands of that body general power to require safeguards “in all places of employment,” but it does not appear that the powers of the act extend to every class of building in which elevators may or can be employed. Other efforts have been made to effect legislation in the same direction, but have so far failed of enactment.

A bill was introduced in the House of Representatives December 12, 1910, by Mr. W. Bennet, requiring all elevators in the District of Columbia to be provided with gate and car interlocking devices, which bill did not become law. A bill was introduced in 1911 into the Assembly of the State of New York amending the labor law in the direction recommended by the Wainwright-Phillips Commission, and empowering the Commissioner of Labor to require automatic door-locking and car interlocking on all passenger elevators in factories. Senate Bill 911 and Assembly Bill 329 of 1911 were designed to require in general terms the use of “such safety devices as will prevent accidents to persons getting on or off elevator cars and from falling through open doors into the elevator shafts.”

The attention of the American Museum of Safety has been directed for some years towards the accomplishment of some amelioration of existing conditions, and that humane organization made a strong effort to arouse public interest in these measures and to secure their enactment, but without success.

The subject has received some sporadic attention by several public associations, including the National Civic Federation, the American Association for Labor Legislation and the New York Association for Labor Legislation, but without effective results.

With the foregoing exceptions, the obligations of an owner of a building, as regards the security of an elevating appliance, are practically limited to a compliance with the then existing local regulations to the purchase of a device commensurate with the existing state of the art, of a design made by a reputable concern, and to the employment of reasonable care in upkeep and operation.

No legal obligation appears to lie upon an owner to alter or modify the appliance in conformity with greater knowledge of the art, or to add to it greater means of security. Until some unfortunate occurrence has taken place, an owner of property naturally feels unwilling to embark on such expenditures. The present system of liability insurance rather tends to such a situation, as an owner has no inducement in the form of reduced premiums, to expend money upon desirable safeguards. If the liability corporations should concede a substantial reduction of premiums, in connection with appliances dealing with a certain proportion of the risks attending elevator operation, much could be accomplished without the aid of special legislation.

While the law-making powers do not hesitate to direct such measures to be taken with and upon the property of common carriers, they seem to regard the operation of a practically public conveyance within private property as a privileged possession and hesitate to enter the castle of the owner and involve him in enforced expenditures upon a privately operated appliance.

Yet an elevator, whether used for the purpose of the carriage of goods, of tenants, of employes, or of visitors to a building, is a common carrier earning a profit, even if indirectly, for it is as much a source of revenue as is the machinery of a factory around which many enforced safeguards have, by legislation, been thrown.

If, therefore, the owner of a building installs elevators for the convenient carriage of tenants and visitors within his property, he does so because the apparatus enhances the value of that property, and that enhancement is largely due to the public use of the appliance, in which use the unknowing users have some right to legislative protection from results of ignorance or incompetence, of neglect or parsimony.

It has taken a long time for this view of the matter to become even partially recognized, even in the city of New York, in which the use of elevators has multiplied beyond all conception of what seemed probable twenty-five years ago. The number of passenger elevators in the Borough of Manhattan alone, now exceeds nine thousand, and these increase annually by about five hundred new machines. The estimated number of freight elevators, none of which under present circumstances are subject to official inspection, is not less than ten thousand.

The regulations regarding elevators in Manhattan, commencing with feeble beginnings, have advanced under the careful direction of the present Superintendent of Buildings of Manhattan, Rudolph P. Miller, C. E., into the field of interference with private control, and the department is compiling further regulations which will go a long way towards the protection of the public in safeguarding the elevating apparatus they are compelled to use. The Manhattan regulations, while in themselves excellent, are directly applicable to passenger elevators only with such freight elevators as are within the same shaft enclosure as a passenger elevator. They require the operator to be of reliable and industrious habits, not less than eighteen years of age, with at least one month’s experience in his duties.

A number of known elements of unsafe character are prohibited and some constructive features of value are insisted upon. No provision is, however, made for automatic interlocking of gates and car movement, nor are projections in the shaft prohibited. Some good, detailed regulations and suggestions have been issued by the Wisconsin Labor Commission, but these and other State and local regulations could be substantially increased in value, by a thorough technical investigation and settlement.

Some improvement of deficiencies in apparatus existing prior to these rules has been effected by requiring safeguards to be applied upon any alteration or large repair work being sanctioned. This course has brought about the addition of speed safety appliances in a number of old installations where this elementary security was absent.

Later regulations will, in similar manner, require carefully conducted tests of all machines whether new, altered or repaired. Many minor matters of security are or will be thus provided for, yet the limited powers of a bureau can but at best halt in dealing with the entire problem. And when the regulations of Manhattan are made, as they should be, the best possible, it is regrettable that in another city or even in another borough of the same city, the same desirable conditions will not apply.

Yet the security of an elevator requires the same measures of attention, in one State as in another, as much in the merest hamlet as in the great metropolis.

The use of elevators is now widespread through all States, and in all classes of buildings, affecting the convenience and security of all classes of persons; and calling for the establishment of well considered and equalized regulation in every part of the country.

It speaks volumes for the sense of responsibility of our leading manufacturers of elevators, that among all the tens of thousands of machines turned out by such concerns as the Otis Elevator Company and their competitors, accidents due to the physical breakage of the machinery of elevators should be in number only what they are, when they include the failures of machines built in days when the industry was small and the art far less understood than it is at present.

When we reflect upon the fact that the passengers carried in elevators in the city of New York far exceed in number those carried on all the surface and subway lines, we may the more appreciate the point to which I desire specially to direct your attention, namely, the desirability in the public interest of State regulation, and as far as possible, uniform regulation, of the security and operation of elevators. The local regulations may be left to care for details of installation but the State authority is necessary to require elevators to be not only modern but progressively modernized appliances; that no antiquated and essentially dangerous apparatus shall be continued in use, and that necessary safeguards and properly qualified operators shall accompany their operation.

The State may further require that in excessively tall buildings, where the elevators constitute the only practical means of egress in emergency, there shall be a proper sufficiency of such appliances capable of removing the occupants within a reasonably safe period of time.

The limitations of the carrying capacity of an elevator are now well understood, and the safety of operatives in high loft buildings and of tenants in loftier “tower” office buildings, demands that the parsimony of owners and the ignorance of architects should not be allowed to restrict the exit of occupants of such buildings. A second elevator, in the Triangle fire disaster, would not only have saved its capacity in human occupants, but would have averted the fatal overcrowding of the single car which rendered it practically of no avail.

Many loft buildings of twelve stories and some even exceeding twenty stories are in existence in which the elevator accommodation is utterly inadequate for the removal of occupants of upper floors in a reasonable time, in case of emergency. The effectiveness of exterior “fire escapes” and of crooked interior stairways, especially for great heights, is now known to be strictly within certain limitations, and elevators have on many occasions demonstrated their value in the saving of life in panic and fire.

Office buildings are constructed thirty and more stories in height, without fire escapes and with winding stairways which are useless in emergency, and with such limited elevator capacity as would not remove the tenants in less than thirty minutes.

A most important and desirable subject for general action is afforded by provisions for safeguarding elevator gates and doorways. In and about these orifices, as previously observed, a large proportion of unnecessary accidents and fatalities occur. The unlatched door, the open gate, the absence of inner gates, the projecting sill, and the slippery tread, are fruitful causes of deplorable injuries and have caused the unnecessary loss of many precious lives. The proportion which this class of occurrence bears to the total is evidently large. An analysis of a list of four thousand accidental occurrences shows the following proportions:

Per cent.
Getting on or off cars 58
Falling through unguarded openings 20
Fractures and fall of cars, only 17
Mechanics making repairs in shafts, etc 4
Unexplained 1

A number of devices have been developed during recent years, which have overcome objections to their use in the past, whereby the gates of elevators must be securely locked and fastened before the car can be moved. Six of such devices are approved for use in the State of Pennsylvania. It would seem that so simple a feature eliminating the essential danger surrounding the operation of a car moving vertically between floors in a shaft would long ago have been demanded by every form of authority.

With other engineers, I was at one time opposed to the use of such appliances on the ground of their uncertainty. But the growing volume of fatalities directly attributable to the lack of such safeguards, together with radical improvement in their construction, now demand the opposite conclusion.

There has been particular objection in some large cities to the application of devices for locking the gates, on the ground that the speed of operation on rapid schedule service would be retarded and inconvenience and overcrowding would result. In order to satisfy myself upon this point, I made this year a series of comparative trials of elevators equipped with one such appliance, the Clarke automatic safety devices, and found that no such loss of time in service actually resulted. On the contrary, a trial of the elevators in the Atlantic Mutual Insurance Company’s Building, 49 Wall street, New York City, and in the Hotel Imperial, showed that the operators made better time with the device in service, as they were compelled to make more exact landings and thus avoided much of the time frequently wasted in reversals of the car movement.

Under the present circumstances, therefore, it seems that the proper time has arrived for action in this respect, and that the example set by the States of Pennsylvania and Rhode Island may be embodied in careful legislative requirements in other States, which would, at some expense, it is true, to private owners, safeguard the public from those peculiarly present dangers which have taken such unnecessary toll of human life and limb, in the ghastly entanglement between the gate or doorway and the moving car, or the dreadful fall through the opened gate.

It would be very desirable, if, in the investigation of this subject, and the preparation of legislation to deal with it, competent technical and legal ability were employed, as the subject is of a technical character. Some of the legislation already in existence has been worded in so ill-considered a manner, as to give the impression that it was phrased in order to prevent the recovery of damages by injured persons.

The expression of your interest in this matter will tend to strengthen the hands of those who are seeking at present, by the limited means available, to enforce good methods of installation, proper safeguards and proper operation. It will also aid our great manufacturers, who lead the world in the design and construction of these truly American appliances, in securing the proper surroundings and proper care they are constantly urging for the appliances they construct, and will aid humanity by averting some unnecessary wastage of the health and lives of our fellow creatures.

Following Mr. Bolton’s paper he presented the following resolution:

Whereas, The number of accidents and fatalities attending the operation of elevators is increasing, many of which are of a preventable character;

Resolved, That the National Conservation Congress recommends to the Legislatures of all States an official investigation of this subject, and the enactment of such provisions as have been adopted by the States of Pennsylvania and Rhode Island.

President WHITE—This is important, and if there is no objection it will be handed to the Resolutions Committee.

Mr. FREDERICK KELSEY (Orange, N. J.)—I would like to offer this resolution:

Whereas, Under the laws of the District of Columbia and some of the States, fictitious and fraudulent overcapitalization of corporations is permitted; and

Whereas, Under the operation of these promoter-made laws enormous and widespread losses to innocent persons all over the country and throughout the civilized world have resulted;

Resolved, That this Congress earnestly favors the amendment of these laws and calls upon the President and the United States Congress to enact such legislation affecting the incorporation and control of corporations as will bring the creation and conduct of these creatures of the State back to the moorings of common honesty.

I would like to say that, like most of the previous speakers, I have given this subject very careful attention. I was chairman of a committee, a civic and economic committee of our State, which committee spent eight months in considering this subject, and I want to say that you cannot appreciate the widespread loss, the injury, the injustice of improper concentration of wealth that has been the direct outgrowth of these laws in our own State and other States of the Union.

President WHITE—The resolution will be referred to the Resolutions Committee.

The Congress now stands adjourned until 2:30 o’clock this afternoon.

_EIGHTH SESSION._

The Congress assembled at the Coliseum, at the State Fair Grounds, Indianapolis, on the afternoon of October 3, 1912, and was called to order by President White.

President WHITE—This Conservation Congress was to have been addressed today by the Governors of two of the States. I am very sorry to announce that Governor Hadley, of Missouri, is unable to attend.

This Congress is greatly honored today. The city of Indianapolis is greatly honored today. The State of Indiana is greatly honored, and I personally am greatly honored. I feel honored in having the privilege of presiding over a meeting at which our distinguished guest is to speak.

He who causes two blades of grass to grow where only one grew before is a public benefactor. He who with one talent helps one child, one boy, to rise to manhood and usefulness, is a great and useful citizen. He who is fortunate enough to possess ten talents and who is an inspiration to thousands of the youth of the land, who has planted in their minds and in their hopes the desire to become great and useful in this world, to become great and good, efficient citizens—he is the greatest of all.

He is the Governor of a great State, and has inspired the citizens of mature age to a better government for the people and led them on to a greater field of usefulness. We feel perfectly safe in trusting him. To whatever position duty may call, whatever fortune may trust him with, the people will be safe under his guidance. (Applause.)

I feel unworthy to present to this audience one who has been the leader in so many good works, one who has been a practical conservator of human effort, but I take pleasure in introducing to you as the speaker of this day one who has come here to get closer in touch with the Conservationists of the United States, to gather from this audience an inspiration as to the great force of Conservation which is to lead the world—the Hon. Woodrow Wilson, Governor of New Jersey. (Great applause.)

ADDRESS BY THE HON. WOODROW WILSON, GOVERNOR OF NEW JERSEY.

Mr. Chairman and Fellow-Citizens: It is with genuine pleasure that I find myself in this place, facing a company of men and women who are devoting themselves to so disinterested a cause as that to which this Congress is consecrated.

Your chairman has stated in exactly the terms of my own thought, the errand upon which I have come. It would seem presumption upon my part to instruct this Congress, or to attempt to instruct it in the means of Conservation. I have come here, as he has said, to share in the inspiration of the occasion, to gather into my own thought an impression of the men and women who are working for these great objects in the United States. When I was on my way out here, and was thinking of this occasion, I prepared my talk on the conservation of our natural resources. When I arrived at the station, I was told to change the subject, that was not what the Congress was, this year, devoting its particular attention to, but to the conservation of the vital energy of the people of the United States. I had thought that I would have to apologize to you for wandering off before I had finished my address, into that very topic, because it seems to me that the more broadly we view the field of obligation, the more clearly it will appear to us that our duty is only done in respect to the laying of the foundation, when we have conserved the natural resources of America, for those natural resources are of no consequence unless there is a free and virile people to use them.

We are in the midst of a political campaign, and most of the audiences that I have faced have been political audiences. I want to say very frankly to you, that it is a comfort to me to face another kind, because, in a campaign, we take politics, as it were, to the people, but on this occasion the people of the United States are bringing to us the great forces of their thought.

A congress like this means something more vital, in some aspects, than any of the ordered efforts of political parties; for here are represented the men and women from every quarter of the Union, come together to speak that great volunteer voice of America, which is the atmosphere of politics, which creates the environment of the public man, which is the independent conscience of a great people asserting itself and instructing those who serve it, what their lines of best service are.

All voluntary effort distinguishes a free people from a people that is not free. An effort, an organization, that comes about whether the politician wants it or not, is the kind of effort and organization which shows that the people are ready to govern themselves and to assert their own opinions, whether the men in the public eye now consent to be their servants or not. (Applause.)

I have often made this boast about America, that, truly as we love our own institutions, proud as we are of the political history of America, if you could imagine yourself absolutely forgetting the documents upon which our constitutional history rests, over night, in the morning, we could make a new Constitution; we would not lose our self-possession, we would not lose our long training in self-control; we would not lose our instinct and genius for self-government. Strip us of one government, and we would make a new America in which we would shine as much as we did in the old. (Applause.) If that be not true, then it is not America, for America consists in the independent and originative power of the thought of the people. And so, when men and women from every part of the country gather in a great congress like this, to speak, not of matters of interest so much as of matters of duty, you realize in a gathering like this the vitality of the heart as well as of the mind of America, and men of every sort must give heed to the utterances of gatherings of this kind.

I know that there are some persons who come to these gatherings representing only themselves. I know that a gathering of men interested in a special cause is a great magnet to the crank. I know that all sorts of people, with special notions of their own, come sometimes to exploit them; but, after all, we ought to be very tolerant even of them, because some of the finest notions in the world have lived for a little while very lonely in the brain of a single man, or a single woman, and it is only by the tolerance of preaching that they get their currency, and finally get their imperial triumph by conquering the minds of the world, so that it is these voluntary contributions of thought, these irresistible currents of national life that are the most vital part of every people’s history. That is the reason I say it is a comfort to face an audience that I am not trying to persuade in regard to anything, but with which I am trying to get in sympathy, in order to share the great force which they represent.

It would be almost like assuring you that I was a thoughtful and rational being to say that I am in profound sympathy with the whole work of this great Congress, and that I am in particular sympathy, in keenest sympathy with that part which affects the conservation of the vital energy of the people of the United States. (Great applause.)

We have prided ourselves, ladies and gentlemen, upon our inventive genius; we have prided ourselves upon the ability to devise machines that can almost dispense with the intelligence of man. We have become a great manufacturing people because of this genius, because of our ability to draw together not only the tangible machinery of great enterprises but also the intellectual machinery of great enterprises, and we have been so proud of the mere multiplication of the resources of the Nation, so proud of its wealth, so proud of the ingenious methods by which we have increased its wealth, that we have been sometimes almost in danger of forgetting what the real root of the whole matter is.

I say, without intending to indict anybody, that it has too often happened that men have felt themselves obliged to dismiss superintendents who overtaxed a delicate piece of machinery, who have not gone further and felt obliged to dismiss a superintendent who overtaxed that most delicate of all pieces of machinery, the human body and the human brain. (Applause.)

If you drive your men and women too hard, your machinery will presently have to go on the scrap heap. If you sap the vital energy of your people, then there will be no energy in any part of the life you live, or in any enterprise that you may undertake. The energy of your people is not merely a physical energy. I am glad to say that the great State of New Jersey, which I have the honor to represent, has been very forward among her sister States in attempting to safeguard the lives and the health of those who work in her factories, and in all the undertakings which are in danger of impairing the health. I am glad to say that our Legislature has been to a very considerable extent, though not so far as it ought to be, thoughtful of the health of the children, thoughtful of the strength of women, thoughtful of the men and women together who have to breathe noxious gases, who are exposed to certain kinds of dust bred in certain manufactories, which dust carries congestion and danger to the lungs and to the whole system—we have been thoughtful of these things, but after all, we stand in exactly the same relation to our bodies that the nation stands to her forests and her rivers and her mines.

I have no use for my body unless I have a free and happy soul to be a tenant of it. We have no happy use for this continent unless we have a free and hopeful and energetic people to use it. I know that I have sometimes spoken of how foreigners laugh at Americans because they boast of the size of America, as if they had made it, and we are twitted with a pride in something that we did not create. We did not stretch all this great body of earth and pile it into beautiful mountains and variegate it with forests from ocean to ocean, and they say, “Why should you be so proud of what God created? You were not partners in the creation?”

But it seems to me that it is perfectly open for us to reply, “Any nation is as big as the thing that it accomplishes, and we have reason to be proud of the size of America, because we have occupied and dominated it.” (Applause.)

But we have come to a point where occupation and domination will not suffice to win us credit with the nations of the earth or our own respect. It was fine to have the cohesive and orderly power to plant commonwealths from one side of this great continent to another. It was pretty fine, and it strikes the imagination to remember the time when the ring of the ax in the forest and the crack of the rifle meant not merely the falling of a tree or the death of some living thing, but it meant the voice of the vanguard of civilization, making spaces for homes, destroying the wild life that would endanger human life, or destroying the life which it was necessary to destroy in order to sustain human life; and that the mere muscle, the mere quickness of eye, the mere indomitable physical courage of those pioneers that crossed this continent ahead of us, was evidence of the virility of the race, and was evidence also of its capacity to rule, to rule and to make conquest of the things that it needed to use. But now we have come to a point where everything has to be justified by its spiritual consequences, and the difficult part of the task is that which is immediately ahead of us.

Until the census of 1890, every census bureau could prepare maps for us, on which the frontiers of settlement in America were drawn, and until that time there had always been an interspace between the frontier of the movement westward and the little strip of coast upon the Pacific, which had been occupied, as it were, prematurely and out of order.

But, in 1890, it was impossible to draw a frontier in the United States, it was impossible to show any places where the spaces had not, at any rate, been sparsely filled, sparsely occupied by the populations that lived under the flag of the Union. It was about that time, by the way, or eight years later, that we were so eager for a frontier that we established a new frontier in the Philippines, in order, as Mr. Kipling would say, “to satisfy the feet of our young men.”

But the United States, ever since 1890, has been through with the business of beginning and now has the enormously more difficult task before it of finishing.

It is very easy, I am told, though I have never tried it, roughly to sketch in a picture, that all the students in art schools can make the rough sketch reasonably well, but they almost all, except those who have passed a certain point, spoil the picture in the finishing. All the difficulties, all the niceties of art, you have in the last touches, not in the first, and all the difficulties and niceties of civilization lie in the last touches, not in the first.

Anybody with courage and fortitude and resourcefulness can set up a frontier, but we have discovered, to our cost, that not many of us can set up a successful city government. (Applause.) Almost all the best governed cities in the world are on the other side of the water; almost all of the worst governed cities in the civilized world are in America. And the thing that is most taxing our political genius is making a decent finish, where we made such a distinguished beginning. We show it. You can feel it under you as you traverse a city; you can feel it in the pavements. They are provisional, most of them, or have not been laid at all and in jolting in the streets that are not the main thoroughfares of an American city, you feel the jolt of unfinished America. We have not had time, or we have let the contract to the wrong man. (Great applause.)

But, whatever be the cause, we have not completed the job in a way that ought to be satisfactory to our pride. You know that we are waiting for the development of an American literature, so I am told. Now, literature can not be done with the flat hand; you can not write an immortal sentence by taking a handful of words out of the dictionary and scattering them over the page. They have to be wrought together with the vital blood of the imagination, in order to speak to any other reader except those of the day itself. And, as in all forms of art, whether literary, or musical, or sculptural, there is this final test: can you finish what you begin? I believe, therefore, that the problem of this Congress is just this problem of putting the last touches on the human enterprise which we undertook in America.

We did not undertake anything new in America in respect of our industry. You will not find anything in the way of industry in America which can not be matched elsewhere in the world. If the happiness of our people and the welfare of our people does not exceed the happiness and welfare of other people, then, as Americans, we have failed; because we promised the world, not a new abundance of wealth, not an unprecedented scale of physical development, but a free and happy people. (Applause.)

That is the final pledge which we shall have to redeem, and if we do not redeem it, then we must admit an invalidity to the title deeds of America.

America was set up and opened her doors, in order that all mankind might come and find what it was to release their energies in a way that would bring them comfort and happiness and peace of mind. And we have to see to it that they get happiness and comfort and peace of mind; and we have to lend the effort, not only of great volunteer associations like this, but the efforts of our State governments and national government, to this highest of all enterprises, to see that the people are taken care of, not taken care of in the sense that those are taken care of who can not take care of themselves, because the best way to teach a boy to swim is to throw him into the water, and too much inflated apparatus around him will only prevent his learning to swim, because the great thing is not to go to the bottom and many of the devices by which we now learn to swim make it unnecessary to swim, because you can stay on top just the same, and I, for my part, do not believe that human vitality is assisted by making it unnecessary for it to assert itself. On the contrary, I believe that it is quickened only when it is put under such stimulation as to feel the whip, whether of interest or of necessity, to quicken it. But the last crux of the whole matter comes here: I am not interested in exerting myself unless the exertion, when it is over, brings me satisfaction.

If I have to work in such conditions that, every night, I fall into my bed absolutely exhausted, and with the lamp of hope almost at its last dying flicker, then I don’t care whether I get up in the morning or not; and when I get up in the morning, I do not go blithely to my work. I do not go to my work like a man who relishes the tasks of life. I go there because I must go, or starve, and there is always the goad at my stomach, the goad at my heart, because those dependent on me will suffer if I do not go to my work and the only way I can go to my work with satisfaction is to feel that, wherever I turn, I am dealing with my fellow-men, with fellow-human beings. So that we must take the heartlessness out of industry before we can put the heart into the men who are engaged in the industry. (Applause.)

The employer has got to feel that he is dealing with flesh and blood like his own and with his fellow-man, or else his employes will not be in sympathy with him and will not be in sympathy with the work, and a man who is not in sympathy with his work will not produce the things that are worth using.

All the stories we tell to our children about work are told of such men as Stradivarius, who lingered in the making of a violin as a lover would linger with his lady; who hated to take his fingers from the beloved wood which was yielding its music to his magic touch. In all poetry and song since, Stradivarius has been to us the type of the human genius and heart that is put into the work that is done without attention and zest.

We point to some of the exquisitely completed work of the stone carvers of the Middle Ages, the little hidden pieces tucked away unseen in the great cathedrals, where the work is just as loving in its detail and completeness as it is upon the altar itself, and we say this is the efflorescence of the human spirit expressed in work. The man knew that nobody, except perhaps an occasional adventurer coming to repair that cathedral, would ever see that work, but he wrought it for the sake of his own heart and in the sight of God. And that, we instinctively accept as the type of the spiritual side of work.

Now, imagine, ladies and gentlemen, imagine as merchants and manufacturers and bankers, what would happen to the industrial supremacy of the United States if all her workmen worked in that spirit. Would there be goods anywhere in the world that could for one moment match the goods made in America? Would not the American label be the label of spiritual distinction? And how are you going to bring that about? You are going to bring it about by such work as this Congress is interested in and the work which will ensue, because the things which you are discussing now are merely the passageways to things that are better.

Just so soon as you make it a matter of conscience with your legislatures to see to it that human life is conserved wherever modern processes touch it, just as soon as you make it the duty of society to release the human spirit occasionally on playgrounds, to surround it with beauty, to give it, even in the cities, a touch of nature, and the freedom of the open sky, just as soon as you realize and have all of society realize that play—enjoyment—is part of the building up of the human spirit, and that the load must sometimes be lifted, or else it will be a breaking load, just as soon as you realize that every time you touch the imagination of your people and quicken their thought and encourage their hope and spread abroad among them the sense of human fellowship and of mutual helpfulness, you are elevating all the levels of the national life, and then you will begin to see that your factories are doing better work, because, sooner or later, this atmospheric influence is going to get into every office in the United States, and men are going to see that the best possible instruments that they can have are men whom they regard as partners and fellow-beings. (Applause.)

I look upon a Congress like this as one of the indispensable instruments of the public life. Law, ladies and gentlemen, does not run before the thought of society and draw that thought after it. Law is nothing else but the embodiment of the thought of society, and when I see great bodies of men and women like this, running ahead of the law, and beckoning it on to fair enterprises of every sort, I know that I see the rising tide which is going to bring these things in inevitably. I know that I see law in the making; I know that I see the future forming its lines before my eyes, and that, presently, when we come to an agreement, and wherever we come to substantial agreement, we shall have the things that we desire. So that, for a man in public life, an assemblage like this is the food of his thought, if he lend his thought to what his fellow-countrymen are desiring and planning; and all the zest of politics lies, not in holding things where they are, but in carrying them forward along the lines of promise, to the place where they ought to be. (Applause.)

You are our consciences, you are our mentors, you are our schoolmasters. The men in public life have only twenty-four hours in their day and they generally spend eight of the twenty-four in sleeping—I must admit generally to spending nine—and in what remains they cannot comprehend the interests of a great nation. No man that I ever met, no group of men that I ever met, could sum up in their own thought the interests of a varied nation. Therefore, they are absolutely dependent upon suggestions coming from every fertile quarter, into their consciousness. They are subject, or they ought to be subject, daily, to instruction. A gentleman was quoting to me today a very fine remark of Prince Bismarck’s. He was taxed with inconsistency, with holding an opinion today that he had not held yesterday. He said he would be ashamed of himself if he did not hold himself at liberty, whenever he learned a new fact, to readjust his opinions. Why, that is what learning is for. Ought any man to be ashamed of having accepted the Darwinian theory, because he did not hold it before Darwin demonstrated it? Ought any man to be ashamed of having given up the Copernican idea of the universe? Ought any man to be obliged to apologize for having yielded to the facts? If he does not he will sooner or later be very sorry, because the facts are our masters, and if we do not yield to them, we will presently be their slaves. I suppose if I chose to assert the full consistency of my independence I would say that I was at liberty to jump from the top of this building, but just as soon as I reached the ground nature would have said to me, “You fool, didn’t you ever hear of the law of gravitation? Didn’t you hear of any of the things that would happen to you if you jumped off a building of this height? Suppose you spend a considerable period in a hospital thinking it over,” and it would be very impressively borne in upon me what the penalties of ignorance of the law of gravitation are. Now, it is going to be very impressively borne in upon the public men of this country if they ignore them what the laws of human life are. As Dr. Holmes used to say, “The truth is no invalid. You need not be afraid; no matter how roughly you treat her, she will survive, and if you treat her too roughly there will be a certain reaction in your own situation which will be the severest penalty you could carry.”

I come, therefore, to Indianapolis today to put my mind at your service, merely to express an attitude, merely to confess a faith, merely to declare the deep interest which must underlie all human effort, for, when the last thing is said about human effort, ladies and gentlemen, it lies in human sympathy. Unless the hearts of men are bound together the policies of men will fail, because the only thing that makes classes in a great nation is that they do not understand that their interests are identical. (Applause.)

The only thing that embarrasses public action is that certain men seek advantages which they can gain only at the expense of the rest of the country, and when they have gained them those very advantages prove the heaviest weight they have to carry, because they are then responsible for all that happens to those upon whom they have imposed and to those from whom they have subtracted what was their right.

So that the deepest task of all politics is to understand one another; the deepest task of all politics is to understand everybody, and I do not see how everybody is going to be understood unless everybody speaks up, and the more independent spokesmen there are the more vocal the Nation is, the more certain we shall be to work out in peace and finally in pride the great tasks which lie ahead of us. (Great and prolonged applause.)

_NINTH SESSION._

The Congress reconvened at 8 o’clock p. m., in the Palm Room of the Claypool Hotel, and was called to order by President White.

President WHITE—This is the evening session of the National Conservation Congress. I foresaw what was coming a long time ago when we began to prepare a program. I knew there would be a large number of ladies here, because they were getting very enthusiastic. I knew they would want section meetings for themselves to talk over matters of vital interest and plan how they were going to work for Conservation in all its departments, vital, social and political.

I felt that I was not capable and I did not know of any man who was capable of presiding over a large number of women, who sweetly and persistently know what they want and are bound to get it. (Laughter and applause.)

I was invited by the lady who is going to take charge of this meeting to attend the convention of the General Federation of Women’s Clubs at San Francisco, and right there I decided that Mrs. Moore should preside at this Congress at some one of its meetings, and I politely told her so at that time. I did it in justification of her rare ability displayed upon that occasion, and, selfishly, because I knew I was too timid to rule on points of order where there were so many women. (Laughter.)

I take pleasure in introducing Mrs. Philip N. Moore, of St. Louis, former President of the General Federation of Women’s Clubs, and a member of the Executive Committee of this Congress. She needs no introduction, as you all have met her many times. I now turn the meeting over to her good graces and good will.

Mrs. MOORE—Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen: During the year that I have had the pleasure of working with the presiding officer of this Congress, it has been his gracious courtesy during the whole time to the woman who was on the Executive Committee that has induced me to accept the position he has given me tonight.

Many of you will remember that four years ago, when the Governors were called to the White House in Washington, to discuss the natural resources of our country, the only woman’s organization that was represented at that time was the General Federation of Women’s Clubs, through its President. From that time to this, the Conservation Congress has recognized this organization as being very much interested in the conservation of the natural resources of the country as well as in the conservation of human life through its public health department, through its industrial and social conditions and through its home economics, four of the strongest departments of the General Federation. I am, therefore, very proud tonight to accept the courtesy of the presiding officer of the Congress.