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426 THE MARINE REVIEW do not care how much of the profit of the business they take, and I will go further than that. If it becomes necessary for the raising of money, a conscription of capital would not hurt my feelings at all. The impor- tance of beating the Germans is so paramount that any or all of these methods may be used. The chamber of commerce of the United States at Atlantic City a very short time ago, representing many business men in the United States, gave voice to this sentiment: that if they treat us all alike they could not go too far in exacting the greatest toll from the business of the United States. We are willing, if necessary, to have the plants commandeered by the govern- ment, under the terms of the United States and under conditions which they see fit to impose, but we do insist that managers, foremen, super- intendents and men shall all be treat- ed alike. Who Gets Steel First? The important question of priority and preference is now the biggest in- dustrial question there is, for the very simple reason that the total production of the United States has been over-absorbed by these war activities. With the prices settled, the only important thing is, who gets his. first, who second and who third. We have in the war department six bureaus buying frequently in competition with each other. We have in thé navy - department five or six bureaus buy- ing, or recommending to buy, not in competition with each other very much, but somewhat. In the shipping board we have a tremendous amount of buying going along more or less in competition with the war depart- ment and the navy department. The government simply wants to get the- material in such quantities as it can, ‘but it is simply impossible to satisfy all these bureaus and departments. What is the answer? The answer that has been found in. Great. Britain in the very - frst months of the war was to divorce the question of business, buying and price fixing from the naval and military activities of the country. A muni- tions minister was appointed; just the kind that we need. The same chamber of commerce I was _ speak- ing of recommended that a board be appointed. JI am a director in that chamber,, but I think a minister: should be appointed, because you want a man who will co-ordinate the interests of the country, and when blankets are necessary he will buy blankets for the United States, and not buy three blankets for the sailors and none for the soldiers. In_ ship- building, in munitions production, and in arming and sending soldiers across to the other side, we have a great problem to meet. What have we in our country? We have great army cantonments. We have great army and navy orders from the govern- ment and are competing day after day; Rivets Are Rivets “There is an idea extant that 1f a ship is called ‘fabricated’ or ‘stand- ardized’ it becomes rather easy to build. It does become easier to build, but it is not any easter to drive a rivet in a fabricated ship than in a common ship, and the 7500-ton fabricated ship will have about 650,000 rivets and some rivet- ers must do a considerable amount of work to drive those rivets in that ship the same as in any other ship. The most onerous work in building a ship is in the driving of the rivets; and, 1f any concern is going to build one ship a week, it must drive 650,000 rivets a week. When we consider that the best rivet drive is by the Union Iron Works Co., where they drive 250,000 rivets a week and the next best by the three largest shipyards on this coast is about 200,000 rivets each per week, the problem of driving 650,000 rivets a week assumes a rather difficult aspect to the casual observer. Still, we all hope it will be done, but if it is done it means the importation of an enormous number of new workers into the in- dustry.”-—Homer L. Ferguson. we do not know who is first, sec- ond or third. I am sure .that the secretary of the navy and the secretary of war have both plenty to do to run the operations of their great depart- ments without working a large part of the time with the question of buy- ing, and whether they are going to get this first, second or third. We have a priority committee, but they cannot settle it, but only recommend it. Actually, the best buying is done by the official who is the most zealous, so that we run great risk, if that keeps on, of having our soldiers on the other side with plenty of guns and muskets and maybe gunpowder, but not enough baked beans or peas or something that they need. It must be done in some way so as to least upset the country. Another reason that business should go on as well as possible is because Britain has 12 or 15 very respectable December, 191 we have to earn some money some- how in order to meet the war taxes. ~ The weakest point in the shipbuild- ing business is the forging situation, in my judgment. . There are nog enough forges in the United States to turn out all the forgings required for the shipbuilding. The great Beth- lehem company, Midvale, and Allis- Chalmers are practically the only large ones we have, whereas Great forging concerns. It is absolutely necessary that someone determine whether this or that or the other kind of forgings shall be first; other- wise a lot of us are apt to end up — with hulls but no machinery in them. It seems to me that we all want to do the best we can, but we would very much appreciate it if we could go to Washington and say to some one that this is the most important, and that is the next, and that is the next. Instead of that, we appeal from. one department to another and fre- quently end up with nothing. : What Congress Must Do I am mentioning this to you be- cause it is very much in my heart and mind; I see it in Washington every time I go there, and I hope very much that next winter when the question comes up in congress they will see fit to do this instead of scattering the work among the navy department and the war department and the shipping board. We all know that it is a joy to have a few good mechanics and give them a job and forget about it, but we have to get away from that and to teach new people, which may fortunately be done with ships of standard make and duplicate makes. The biggest problem that the em- ployment managers have at the pres- ent time is to get hold of the best material possible, house it as decently as we can, and teach it shipbuilding as quickly as possible. The _ prob- lem almost dazes one to contemplate. It can only be solved by bringing in enormous quantities of new men, and which must be done without any hindrance. The leaders of the unions have stated that they would allow this to be done. We have to do it, and no matter what else happens we must insist upon tlie right to break in any number of new men in the business. The shipping board will” back it up, and I am sure that soone or later the administration itself w insist upon that being done on sucl a comprehensive scale as to mak it possible for the United States t carry out its great shipbuilding pro- — gram, which must be carried out. __ 4