Address in Scranton, Pennsylvania

Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

I am happy to be here today in Scranton, in the heart of the hard coal industry.

You know, the weather seems to have something to do with every visit I make as President. You know, I think about 20 years ago, on my way to New York City, Scranton was all fogged in, and New York was all fogged in; and Frank Walker found out that I was at an air field in Scranton, and Frank came after me in a car, he brought me out here, and I had the greatest time I think I ever had. I don't think Scranton lost anything, and I don't think it gained anything, but I did, for I had a grand time.

Now that same situation is also on this trip. I was expecting to fly in here about noon, and the weatherman again said that the situation was expected to be pouring down rain in Scranton this morning, and it would be impossible to make a landing on the airport out here, so I came on the train.

I am very sorry I had to postpone my visit to Scranton 2 weeks ago, but it was necessary for me to meet with the Secretary of State in Washington. I had asked General Marshall to fly home from Paris between sessions of the General Assembly of the United Nations, and that Saturday--October 9th--was our only chance to talk together about our plans for peace.

I understand that this great center of industry and mining has Democratic city and county administrations.

That's just the way it ought to be. And I hope, after November, that you will have a Democratic Congressman, too--in Harry O'Neill. You know, you are already helping to run the Government, and with a man with the record of Harry O'Neill in the Congress, this district will be well represented. Harry O'Neill has a wonderful record in the State Legislature.

When you look at the record of the last 2 years, I'm sure you know that electing a Republican from this district in 1946 was a mistake--one of those 1946 mistakes--when too many people stayed at home and didn't vote.

But it was a mistake which has cost every one of you a very great deal. In fact, more than you can possibly realize. But it has taught you a good lesson.

You can't afford to make that mistake again. This year, Lackawanna County ought to be firmly in the Democratic column from top to bottom.

I have just had the privilege of paying honor to the memory of John Mitchell. I wish I could be with you to help celebrate John Mitchell Day next Friday.

John Mitchell was a great leader. He laid the foundations of the United Mine Workers, which has grown from his day to ours until now it embraces most of the miners in the United States. John Mitchell was not only a great labor organizer, he was a great labor statesman. And they are few and far between. He pioneered in the development of effective collective bargaining, and he paved the way for good relations between mine operators and mineworkers.

We all know the kind of opposition John Mitchell was up against, in his day, in fighting for the rights of labor and for the principle of collective bargaining.

In the early days of this century, big business was trying to destroy the labor union movement. Those were the days of the coal and iron police.

Right after the First World War, the employers of this country, aided and encouraged by a Republican administration, launched their open shop drive to wipe out American labor unions. The Republicans in .power first tried to strip the workingman of the protection of his labor unions, and then they led him into the worst depression in history.

In 1932, when 12 million Americans were out of jobs and hundreds of thousands of miners were on relief, the American people elected Franklin D. Roosevelt.

And I am sure we all thank God for that.

In 1932, miners who were lucky enough to have a job were being paid about $1.70 a day--and working only one or two days a week. Now, miners are getting $14 a day-or more--and working a full week. That increase is a direct result of the great advances of the New Deal.

President Roosevelt believed that the rights of the workingman were more important than the profits of the corporations. He saw to it that the power of the Federal Government was used, not to destroy the unions, but to protect them against unfair and evil practices of the employers.

The New Deal established the right of labor to organize and bargain collectively as the keystone of our industrial system. Labor is no longer a commodity, under Democratic rule. The Wagner Act was the Magna Carta of labor. And that great act stood firm and unchallenged, until the Republican 80th Congress got to Washington 2 years ago.

The Republican 80th Congress began all over again the old attack on the basic rights of the workingmen and women of this country. The 80th Congress passed that awful and shameful Taft-Hartley law. That law is only the beginning--it is only the first step in the long-range strategy of the Republican Party to crush organized labor to the ground.

The Taft-Hartley law is like a termite, undermining and eating away your legal protection to organize and bargain collectively. I vetoed the Taft-Hartley law, not only because it was bad in itself, but because it was only the first step in the drive to wipe out labor's rights.

Let me give you a specific example of how the Taft-Hartley law directly affects your rights.

The United Mine Workers and the mine owners have recently set up a welfare fund in the anthracite industry--the Anthracite Health and Welfare Fund. The contract on that welfare fund was signed in the office of the President of the United States. That welfare fund was obtained with the help of the President of the United States. Not only did I fight for it, but I forced the mine safety clause into that contract.

This welfare fund is the result of collective bargaining. It is a fine thing for the miners. It is conducting a program of research and treatment to find a cure for the disease of silicosis, the scourge of hard coal miners.

This disease causes nearly 25 percent of the so-called "natural" deaths of hard coal miners. I am sure I do not have to tell you about the terrible effects of this disease, or the suffering that it causes. At last, we can hope for a cure, for over half a million dollars is being devoted to this project. Think what a relief this will be to miners, not only here, but throughout the whole country and the world!

Now, I can't understand, and you can't either, why anyone would oppose a health and welfare fund which is doing such magnificent work. But there are some people-even now--who say that it is an outrage to ask employers to contribute to an employee welfare fund.

Yet by that contribution, the employers themselves keep the workers helpless. These selfish, backward-looking men slipped a provision into the Taft-Hartley law about welfare funds. They thought they fixed it so that an employer could refuse to bargain with a union about setting up a welfare fund.

But they were wrong. A Federal court only last month held they were wrong. That court said that employers have to bargain about welfare funds. Well, now these same people are planning to amend the law. They want it illegal for a union to ask for a welfare fund.

Congressman Hartley, of the Taft-Hartley team, who has decided that he can't get reelected this time, says he leaves the job to his successors.

Don't be fooled--they will outlaw your welfare fund, if they can.

If another Republican Congress is elected in November, the Republican leaders will do all they can to destroy the growth of union welfare funds.

They will try to close the doors to progress that are being opened up by American labor-progress such as finding cures for occupational diseases and giving relief and comfort to workingmen in their old age.

They will do it all under the hypocritical cloak of "correcting abuses" in our labor laws. They will do it behind the mask of what the Republican candidate for President calls "national unity." And, before we know it, they will have us all unified into a depression, the way the Republicans did in 1929. I don't think we want that, do you?

This attack on welfare funds may seem to be a small thing, but it means the difference between sickness and health, the difference, indeed, between life and death, to thousands of Americans. And it is a straw which shows the way the wind is blowing.

If, however, all of you go to the polls and vote in your own interests--in the interests of yourselves and your families--you can defeat this Republican strategy.

You know, when you exercise your right to vote, you are the Government. You decide what sort of government you want. When you do like you did in 1946, when two-thirds of you stayed at home, you get just what you deserved--you got that good-for-nothing 80th Congress.

Now, you can elect a Democratic administration, pledged to the protection of labor's rights, the expansion of social security, the improvement of education and health, the building of adequate housing, and the control of the cost of living.

You can do that now, if you exercise your right as a free-born American citizen to go to the polls and vote the straight Democratic ticket, and then you can't make a mistake.