A long walk through the enormous yard and past many shops brought me to the office building of the plant, and there, in a small room, I found the committee, that is, the group of workmen elected by the entire working force of the factory to manage the industry and to fix all conditions of labor. Every industry in Russia is thus managed. I had a long talk with this committee, but I did not get into the factory. The man would not permit me to get in. They wouldn’t even allow me to see any one connected with the office force. Kindly but firmly they gave me to understand that they were all the power there was in that plant and they could give me all the information I could possibly need. So I sat there for an hour or so, and, through my interpreter, learned how manufacturing is carried on when the workers own their tools. Because I could carry but few notes out of the country, I am not certain how many delegates per thousand workers make up a committee of management in a Russian factory, but I think each unit of one hundred men elects a representative. Perhaps there are two hundred men to the unit. My memory for numbers is not always reliable. At all events, the committee members, who are usually the intelligent and highly paid workers, do no work except committee work. But they draw their full pay. The employer has no voice in the conduct of his own business. The committee tells him how much he pays his employees, what their hours of work are, when they arrive and when they depart and how much they produce. And the employer pays the committee for its kind words and deeds. I asked the particular committee which thus informed me if this seemed fair to the employer. Mostly the men said they thought it did. One man asked me who in my opinion ought to pay the committee members. I told him I thought the workers might pay at least a part of their salaries, and perhaps also give the employers a casting vote in case of a tie, or something like that. They seemed to find the idea humorous, all except one fine, thoughtful young fellow, who said: “There may be an element of unfairness in some of the present conditions, but time will adjust them. There is no question but that the workers should own the industries, and they will. The working class has never had a square deal and now that they have seized the powers of government, nothing less than confiscation of industries will satisfy them.”