LABOR: Elmer's Teeth

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When Elmer Andrews took office last year as the first U. S. Wage & Hour Administrator, he vowed that industry should be gentled into its new harness. Elmer Andrews last week finally reached for the whip.

Indicted by a U. S. grand jury at Boston were the first defendants in a wages and hours criminal prosecution. Defendants: Brown's Contract Stitching, Inc. of Lawrence, Mass. Charge: that Brown paid less than 25¢ an hour, falsified records. Maximum penalties: $10,000 fine for a first offense; $10,000 and six months in prison for a second. Said Elmer Andrews, apprised of the indictment: "The act has teeth in it and the Administration proposes to enforce it. . . ."

Elmer Andrews' lawyers have also filed six civil suits, obtained four settlements in workers' favor by consent decrees. At the maximum, defendants in civil actions may be compelled to pay their employes twice the difference between substandard wages and the wages due under the act. In practice, when an employer consents to settle without trial, he may get off by paying the actual difference (plus court costs).

Out of 8,000 complaints received since Wages & Hours went into effect last October 24, Elmer Andrews' staff last week had sifted 2,800 which deserved further investigation and possibly prosecution. But U. S. business need expect no crackdown performance akin to General Hugh Johnson's NRA siege. Gentle Elmer Andrews hardly knows how to bellow and doubts that he will ever need to know.