"When the war clouds broke in Europe, American labor was stunned. All its preconceived notions as to the inability of any great nation to wage war upon another nation because the working people would refuse either to fight or produce munitions and supplies of war were shattered when nation after nation quickly mobilized its armies and the organized labor movements of each country, without exception, quickly pledged their men and their resources to the support of their respective governments. But the fact that America itself might be drawn into the world conflict was still foreign to the mind of the American workman. While American labor grieved over the fate which had befallen its kind in Europe no sense of danger to this country was apparent. From the beginning of this Republic it had been our national policy to hold aloof from the quarrels of the Old World. The splendid isolation of thousands of miles of ocean protected us. We had no quarrel with Europe and we asked but to be let alone. We stood upon our rights to protect the people of continental America from invasion or aggression as enunciated by the Monroe Doctrine, and further than that we could not see that the European conflict embroiled us as a nation. Let Europe settle her own family quarrel. We were to remain the one great neutral nation of the earth. When the time came America, untrammeled by participation in the conflict, with no desire for American aggrandizement or territorial expansion, would be the natural messenger of peace to war-worried Europe." SAFEGUARDS FOR WORKINGMEN From the moment of the declaration of war the general loyalty of the laboring classes throughout the United States was apparent. This attitude of loyalty found a ready response in the immediately declared intention of the Government to safeguard the interests of the workingmen. Congress announced its attitude toward standards of legal protection for workers. It was printed verbatim in _Labor Laws in War Time_, 201, p. 1, as follows: "WHEREAS, The entrance of the United States into the World War appears imminent; and "WHEREAS, Other countries upon engaging in the conflict permitted a serious breakdown of protective labor regulations with the result, as shown by recent official investigations, of early and unmistakable loss of health, output, and national effectiveness; and "WHEREAS, Our own experience has already demonstrated that accidents increase with speeding up and the employment of new workers unaccustomed to their tasks, that over fatigue defeats the object aimed at in lengthening working hours, and that new occupational poisoning has accompanied the recent development of munition manufacture; and