 is Laun Jean. Laun Jean watches have won 10 World's Fair Grand Prizes, 28 gold medals and more honors for accuracy than any other timepiece. Laun Jean, the world's most honored watch, is made and guaranteed by the Laun Jean Wittner Watch Company. It's time for the Laun Jean Chronoscope, a television journal of the important issues of the hour, brought to you every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. A presentation of the Laun Jean Wittner Watch Company, maker of Laun Jean, the world's most honored watch, and Wittner, distinguished companion to the world-honored Laun Jean. Good evening. This is Frank Knight. May I introduce our co-editors for this edition of the Laun Jean Chronoscope. Mr. William Bradford Huey, editor of the American Mercury, and Mr. Henry Haslett, editor of the Freeman and contributing editor of Newsweek Magazine. Our distinguished guest for this evening is Mr. Cyrus S. Ching, director of the Federal Mediation Service. The opinions expressed are necessarily those of the speakers. Mr. Ching, you are the most famous mediator, the most famous labor mediator in the country, with an experience in that business, I think, going back something like 35 years, and you have been the director of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service since it was independently established in 1947. I wonder if you could tell us something about how you or your service typically get into a dispute? Ever since your first remark, Mr. Haslett, I don't know there's fame or notoriety. We get into labor disputes in several ways. The function of the Mediation Service is to try to create an atmosphere where the parties can meet with each other and reach agreement. One of the provisions of the law under which we operate is that the parties shall notify us 60 days before the expiration date of a contract. If at the end of the 30 days they have not reached a settlement in the negotiations, then we are notified again. That does not mean that we get into all these hundreds of thousands of cases that are up for negotiation, but that is the procedure. We pretty well know through the contacts we have with people all over the country, through our agency, we have 220 men located in various parts of the country, about what the conditions are in any given area or any given dispute that may arise. About 60% of the cases we go into were invited in by the parties, one or the other, to help them arrive to settlement. In some cases, we intervene of our own motion. That would be a case affecting the national interest, affecting the defense effort. We would step in and call the parties together. We do that frequently and have a meeting with them and attempt to work out solutions. But in any case, your services are purely voluntary. There's nothing that you can do to impose terms upon either of the parties. We have no authority, no power to coerce anyone. We can't tell anyone what to do. We may tell them what we believe they should do in their own interest, but we have no power of compulsion at all. Mr. Cheng, to most of our Chronoscope audience here, I think that our people think of you as being that big man, about six feet, seven inches tall, who smokes that big pipe. And it's been your job in the last 10 or 12 years to try to ride hood on people like John L. Lewis and Philip Murray and try to save the country from strikes and from inflations. I'd like to ask you, sir, in your present position and during your long service in Washington, have you been primarily concerned with protecting the American people from inflation or have you been primarily concerned with improving labor relations between labor and management? I was primarily concerned in 1947 when I took this post with the improvement of labor management relations. I was chairman of the wage stabilization board for about seven months. My responsibility there was to attempt to do what we called through wage stabilization to stop inflation. The big job in Washington today now is to try to restrain inflation. Is that true, sir? That is quite true. I think it's the job that is concerning most people. I think one of our great difficulties in this country is that we fail to take into account that you can't stop inflation by merely curbing prices and wages. There are a lot of other things that you must curb also. In other words, the question of credit extension and possibly heavier taxes and a lot of other things that might be quite unpalatable to people. But still, they're very nice to take to curb inflation. Well, Mr. Ching, I'd like to ask you some questions about the present relationship of the mediation service to say the war stabilization board as it is now. It seems to me there is a curious situation set up when a war stabilization board exists to make final settlement. Now, doesn't this create a situation where the parties to the dispute tend to bypass mediation and conciliation because they feel if we get to the labor board, let's say a union feels if we can bring this case to the labor board, they'll give us such and such a settlement. And so we're not going to settle for anything less than that, and we'll take it to the labor board. Now, doesn't that tend to happen at present by bypassing the mediation service? No, they must have been able to prove that they've gone through negotiation process and had mediation before they get to the wage stabilization board. It's not as easy to get to the wage stabilization board as a lot of people think. For instance, there are only two ways you can get there. One is by a joint submission where both parties have to agree. Obviously, if a union doesn't want to go to the board or a management doesn't want to go to a board, that's out and there's no possibility of having a joint submission. The other way is through a referral by the president of the United States. That takes place only in the case of almost national emergency, something that would have a very devastating effect on the nation, on every defense effort, something of that sort. There have only been nine actual cases referred by the president to the wage stabilization board so far. Well, wouldn't the Steel Union, for example, pretty much know in advance that if they didn't come to a settlement, the thing must be referred to the wage stabilization board? And don't you get a situation then in which there may be just talking for the sake of the record, but not meeting to reach an agreement until it gets to the board? I think that that element is present. They have been present in the Steel situation. I think it's quite obvious that both sides expected finally to land at the wage stabilization board and the price stabilization board. As a matter of fact, the president of one of the major Steel companies made a statement that the case was going to be settled in Washington. He made that statement before negotiations started. It was quite obvious to those of us who are familiar with the case and the position of the parties that no agreement could be reached between the parties without the intervention of some government agency that would perhaps make some determination both on price and wages. Well, Mr. Cheng, just to put the facts on the table, in these disputes now between management and these very powerful concentrations of labor power, such as Mr. Lewis's union or the Steel workers, is the conflict between the labor union and management or is it a larger conflict between the labor union and the government or all the rest of us? Well, what is the role of management there? Management can't bargain on equal terms any longer with the Steel union, can it? Oh, yes, I think they can. That was said before we had the present laws on the statute books that the unions couldn't bargain with management because of their weakness. The management is now saying they can't bargain with the unions because of the weakness of management. There's no question that these large labor unions are very powerful and our whole system of collective bargaining is predicated on the acceptance of responsibility by both management and labor and I think that there is ample evidence that labor unions and management both are measuring up to their responsibilities and attempting to make collective bargaining work. Well, where is the strength now, sir? Has the strength of these labor unions as against management has that been increasing during the period that you've been in Washington? Certainly, numerically. There's no question about that. Well, isn't the situation that when you get a board like the War Stabilization Board whose recommendations are not technically mandatory but pretty close to being mandatory that it's a plant's collective bargaining that the government in effect then sets the wages and sets the conditions of work? There's no question that the recommendation of any government agency would have a compelling effect and have great weight in the settlement of dispute. I assume that if either side felt sufficiently strongly about it to reject the recommendations of a board then some other steps would have to be taken because obviously this country couldn't take a long steel strike. Has there been in your long experience, sir? I would like to ask you this. After your long experience there and after 12 years of mediation are you generally hopeful of the future of the country now? I certainly am. I think that this country has faced many times situations much more critical than it is at the present time. And I am optimistic about our future. There is one thing that we have in this country that at the present time I think is one of the most dangerous trends. I don't know that you would call it a trend and that is the lack of understanding of the American people of the function of the people in their government and the lack of understanding as to how their government operates. It is well enough for us to indulge in the past time of abusing our government, criticizing our government at all times for everything when we're not occupying the position we do today in international affairs. Well, I'm sorry, Mr. Cheng. I'm afraid our time is up. I want to thank you very much for being with us, sir. The editorial board for this edition of the Laun Jean Chronoscope was Mr. William Bradford Huey and Mr. Henry Haslett. Our distinguished guest was Mr. Cyrus S. Ching, Director of the Federal Mediation Service. 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