Reduction of conflict in industry is the phase that not only looms large in the public mind, but conflict is the public exhibit of the greatest mark of failure in industrial relations. The imminence of conflict is evidence of failure to have discussion or to arrival at mutual agreement. Therefore, under the plan of the Conference that mutual agreement is the best basis for prevention of conflict, the second step in the Conference proposals is that there should be a penalty for failure to submit to such processes. That penalty is a public inquiry into the causes of the dispute and the proper ventilation to public opinion as to its rights and wrongs. The strength of the penalty is based upon the conviction that neither side can afford to lose public good will. Pressure to rectitude by government investigation is distinctly an American institution. It is not an intervention of public interest that is usually welcomed. In the plan of this Conference, this general repugnance to investigation is depended upon as a persuasive influence to the parties of the conflict to get together and settle their own quarrels. They are given the alternative of investigation or collective bargain under persuasive circumstances. In order to increase the moral pressures surrounding the investigation, either one of the parties to the conflict may become a member of the board of investigation, provided he will have entered on an _a priori_ undertaking that he is prepared to submit his case to orderly and simple processes of adjustment. Thus his opponent will be put at more than usual disadvantage in the investigation. If both sides should agree to submit to normal processes of settlement, the board of investigation becomes at once the stage of a collective bargain and the investigation ceases.