# The American Journal of Sociology/Volume 06/Number 5/Sweating System in the Garment Trades in Chicago

​SOME PHASES OF THE SWEATING SYSTEM IN THE GARMENT TRADES OF CHICAGO.
THE garment trades are, in the main, among the belated industries of this age. A mode of manufacture only a little way removed from the old domestic system still prevails to a large extent. It must not be supposed, however, that all clothing is made under the sweating system.
There are various ideas as to what constitutes a sweat-shop. The term was first used by the employes of the contractor who made a shop of his living rooms and worked his toilers to the utmost limit of their strength. The rooms were sometimes used for bedrooms at night, and kitchen, dining-room, and workshop in the daytime. The people were crowded together, and real home life was undermined, if not destroyed. Mrs. Florence Kelley says :
Technically a sweat-shop is a tenement-house kitchen or bedroom in which the head of the family employs outsiders, persons not members of his immediate family, in the manufacture of garments for some wholesaler or merchant tailor. 1
There are many who choose to use the term only in this sense of a "home-shop," while others apply the term to any "uncon- trolled manufacture" of clothing.
The use of the term "sweating" in this paper follows closely the statement of Mr. Cunningham, of New York, who says :
What is commonly known as the " sweating system " is a general term used to designate a condition of labor by which a maximum amount of work possible per day is performed for a minimum wage, and in which the ordinary rules of health and comfort are disregarded. 2
This is practically the view held by Lord Derby, who declares that sweating exists wherever an "unusually low rate of wages, excessive hours of labor, and unsanitary work places prevail. 3 "
^Public Opinion, Vol. 23, p. 334.
'Proceedings of the Ninth Annual Convention of the International Association of Factory Inspectors, p. 37.
3 Report of the House of Lords.
602 ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 603
The last two definitions are broad enough to include more indus- tries than the garment trades. Indeed, within the last few years it has come to be very generally recognized by those who are interested in labor problems that the conditions of sweating do exist in many other departments of labor, especially in cigar fac- tories, bake-shops, and laundries.
There is still another large class of work which deserves to be called "sweating." It includes those who work in their own homes an excessive number of hours, and often for low wages. A study of every kind of sweating, however, is too broad a field to be entered here. The subject is therefore limited to the gar- ment trades ; but it includes the home-shops, the tailors' "back- shops," the contractors' shops not in their homes, the home finishers, and the home tailors.
In order to understand just the conditions in the garment trades, some general facts must be stated about the kinds of shops and the distribution of the work to be done. A large clothing firm or department store estimates that it will need a certain number of ready-made garments for its spring or fall trade. It may have them made in inside or in outside shops. An inside shop is a room in a part of the store belonging to the firm, or is a separate building elsewhere in the city under the direct management of a superintendent appointed by the firm. Whether to be made in the one or the other kind of shop, the garments are cut, a great many at a time, on the premises of the manufacturer. Steam power is usually used in an inside shop, especially in the separate buildings, and such shops may usually be called "factories." Very few firms have enough inside shops to make all their garments, and most have none at all.
The" manufacturer receives bids from contractors who wish to take the work to their shops, which are called outside, or con- tractors', or often sweat-shops. They usually occupy one floor of a front or rear tenement, or of a small low building erected for the purpose on the rear of the lot. The contractor lives in the same building or in the immediate vicinity. He now acts as employer, and reigns supreme in his own shop. He may have a steam-shop, but more often his necessary equipment consists of ​604 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
a few foot-power machines, a low table or two, and a few chairs. His staff consists of operators or machine sewers, hand-workers, and pressers. His hand-workers sometimes do all the finishing, but more often he employs home finishers, women who come from the neighboring tenements to take the work into their homes for the last touches. These finishers make bids for the work just as the contractors do, and are pitted one against another in the same way. The only difference is that they are poorer, more ignorant, and more helpless, and so are more at the contractors' mercy than the contractors are at the mercy of the manufacturers.
A merchant tailor has in the same shop with himself one or more "bushelmen," who repair garments, and one cutter who cuts all the garments. Besides these, there are usually several "journeymen" tailors in his employ, who come to the shops for garments and make them up in their own homes, unless a "back- shop" is provided a room near by where the tailors work together, although on separate garments.
Although the sweating system, in one or another of its forms, has been in existence almost as long as the poor have been mak- ing clothing for the rich, yet the recognition of the existence of the system has come only within the last twenty or thirty years. No magazine articles are indexed by Poole prior to 1887. Like most industrial problems, it received serious attention first in England. Massachusetts seems to have been the first of the United States to detect the sweating system. The cutters found that their work was being sent to New York to be cut and made, and was then brought back to Boston. 1 Hitherto the contract system had prevailed and wages had been generally good, but the influx of Russians into New York was causing a revolution in the manufacture of clothing. These foreigners must find something to do. They were not skilled workers and had no trades, but the division of labor in the garment industry made that a possible field. The contractors devised an apprentice sys- tem whereby the newcomers spent one or more months at work without pay, learning the trade. They were then able, by working
1 See H. R. Report, No. 2309. ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 605
twelve or sixteen hours, to make from 75 cents to $i a day, with little chance of any rise in wages.
Another new feature of this period was the development of the "task system," giving out enough work to keep one busy for six days, but paying for it as only three or four days' work, and often expecting it to be finished in that time. 1 The home-shop, or sweating in the narrower sense of the term, was the rule. The cutters found that the system was gaining ground in Boston. The public was aroused, and laws were passed against the manu- facture of clothing in living-rooms. Massachusetts has been fairly successful in the enforcement of these laws and has practi- cally done away with the home-shop. New York passed her labor laws in 1886, but the legislation on sweating did not come until a little later. 2 Pennsylvania and Ohio are the only other states thus far, except Illinois, that have attempted to regulate or abolish the sweating system.
Illinois passed her first factory-inspection laws in 1893. They provide that garments shall not be manufactured in living-rooms except by members of the immediate families ; that all shops shall be kept clean and free from -vermin and contagion ; that any goods reported to the board of health or the factory inspec- tors as being infectious or contagious, whether made in this state or some other, if brought here for sale, shall be inspected and destroyed if necessary; that no child under fourteen years of age shall be employed at all in a workshop ; and that no child over fourteen but under sixteen years of age shall be employed, unless the contractor possesses an affidavit signed by the child's parent or guardian stating his age and the date and place of his birth. The next section stated that no female might be employed more than eight hours in any one day or forty-eight hours in any one week, but this was declared unconstitutional by the supreme court of Illinois. The hours required of women each day must be kept posted in every room where women are employed. A list of the names and addresses of children under sixteen must also be kept posted. Violation of any of these provisions is
x See PLUNKETT, Thirteenth Annual Convention, pp. 87, 88. 2 See New York State Factory Reports. ​6o6 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
punishable with prosecution and fine. It should be noted that these laws have no regulations to secure proper ventilation and sanitary accommodations nor to prevent overcrowding and excessive hours.
Soon after these laws were passed it became the duty of the factory inspectors, during the epidemic of smallpox in the sweat-shop districts of Chicago in 1894, to enforce the provisions relating to spread of contagion and manufacture of garments in living-rooms by others than members of the immediate family. The workers were totally indifferent to or in dread of vaccination, had a horror of the pest-house, did not understand quarantine, and had no conception of the danger involved in sending out goods made in rooms where there were smallpox patients. 1
Turning the attention now from the first survey of the rise of the sweating problem and the attempts at regulation, some con- sideration may be given to the conditions among the different nationalities of sweat-shop workers in Chicago. The national differences are perhaps more marked in the garment trades than in trades requiring more skill and demanding higher wages.
According to the Seventh Special Report of the Commissioner of Labor for 1894, on The Slums of Great Cities, in a total slum population of 19,748 in Chicago on April I, 1893, there were 1,045, or about 5 per cent., engaged in the garment trades. This is equal to 15.13 percent, of the 6,823 garment workers reported by the inspectors in 1893, but less than 3 per cent, of the num- ber reported in 1899. Doubtless not all the clothing shops were visited in 1893, while the report on the slums is supposed to be complete or nearly so. It is safe to say, then, that not more than 1 5 per cent, of the garment workers live in the slums, but that 5 per cent, or 10 per cent, may do so.
'Of the 1,045 workers, 541 were males of foreign birth 21 years of age or over. Of these 237, or 44 per cent., were aliens, while 56 per cent, had been naturalized. There were 22 scholars and 201 illiterates 112 males and 89 females. The countries represented in this population were as follows : United States, 163; Austria-Hungary, 274; Germany, 73; Italy, 52; Poland,
'See First Special Report, pp. 25, 33, 34, etc. ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 607
177; Russia, 251; other foreign countries, 32. Total foreign, 859; total, 1,022. In this report the Jews seem to have been counted under the countries from which they came. Of the nationalities now prominent in the garment making of Chicago, this paper discusses the Italians, Scandinavians, Bohemians, Jews, and Poles, stating in regard to each something of their home and industrial conditions, together with the results of some personal investigations in the case of the last four.
The Italians congregate about North Franklin street, South Clark street, and on the west side between Polk and Taylor and Jefferson and Halsted streets. They have the lowest standard of living, and are more squalid and filthy and more crowded than any of the other nationalities. From the Ninth Special Report of the Commissioner of Labor, on The Italians in Chicago, published in 1897, were culled these figures: 1,348 families, including 6,773 persons, were visited, forming a large proportion of the Italians in the city and representing typical cases. Out of the whole number, 182, or 2.68 per cent., worked at the gar- ment trades during a part or the whole of the year ; 28 were males and 154 females; 22 were heads of families and 99 were housewives; 124 were married, 50 single, and 8 widowed.
Only 9 of the whole number were born in the United States, and, in every case but one, the parents were born in Italy. Only 94 of the whole number were able to speak English, and less than 30 could read and write it. Seventy-one were entirely illiterate, and all but 4 of these were women, while 18 were entirely literate, and of this number only 5 were men. Among the women, then, seem to be the extremes of both literacy and illiteracy, while nearly all the men seem to have some education or at least to be able to speak English.
Fifty had been in the United States less than five years, 72 more than five but less than ten years, and 50 more than ten years. Of the males eligible to naturalization more than 63 per cent, had been naturalized, but this was just one-fourth the whole number of males at work in these trades. The husbands or fathers of two-thirds of the females were naturalized. About 30 of the workers came from homes in which there had been at ​608 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
some time during the year contagious diseases. Among these were two cases each of smallpox and diphtheria. It cannot be ascertained from the report whether garments were being made at those times.
The irregularity and uncertainty of employment is shown by the fact that only 44 of the workers were employed for 52 weeks, while 24 were employed for from 48 to 27 weeks, and 47 for 26 weeks. A few had some other employment for a part of the time. The average time of employment of all the workers was 31.18 weeks. In II cases out of 55 the hours were between 60 and 96 per week. Three people were working 96 hours per week. In 21 cases the hours were 60 per week, while 15 of the 55 workers had less than 48 hours' employment per week.
One of the most significant facts, however, is the rate of pay per hour. It was possible to ascertain this in only 52 instances. In only 30 of these was the rate as high as 5 cents per hour, in only 1 1 of the latter is it as high as 10 cents, and in no case does it exceed 25 cents. Two extreme cases may be noted. A housewife button-sewer working 60 hours each week at 40 cents per week (a rate of two-thirds of a cent an hour!) in 52 weeks of the year earned $21. A housewife pants-finisher working 66 hours each week at 30 cents per week (a rate of five-elevenths of a cent an hour!) in 48 weeks earned $14.* The lowest rates are found among the housewife pants-finishers ( T 5 T , i^, i|, 2, 2^, 3f, 5 cents), the housewife seamstresses (i^, I T 7 F , 2f, 2f-f, 4^, 6f, 8^, n^ cents), and one housewife button- sewer (f cent). The tailors receive the highest rate (5, 5, 6^, 7^, I if, i if, 131, 1 3|, 15, 20, 25, 25 cents). The great varia- tion in the prices paid for nearly the same grade of work is brought out by the figures for the housewife seamstresses. This is one of the greatest injustices and evils of the whole system, and might be found in less aggravated form, perhaps, even among more intelligent people.
Forty-three of the workers were receiving less than $i per week, 63 had $i or $2, and only 57 received more than $3 per
1 See Ninth Special Report of the Commissioner of Labor, on The Italians in Chi- cago, Family Nos. 140 and 205. ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 609
week. One hundred and nineteen were earning less than $100 per year, and only 12 could earn more than $300. In 23 cases the family income was less than $100 per year, 89 of the fami- lies had from $100 to $300 per year, while 54 had more than $300. Reference to the following table will show what the averages of the industrial conditions are :
INDUSTRY
Average Weekly Wages
Average Number of Weeks Employed
Average Yearly Earnings
Average Family Earnings
Average Earnings per Week
Average Family Earnings per Week
Dressmakers
$0 90
42
t> 37.00
$213.46
So. 7 1
$4.11
Pants-finishers
I . 31
27.8?
42.41
260.61
.82
S-oi
Housewives and pants-finishers Seatnstresses
1.58 2 03
30.21 32.78
47-49 64. 10
245.92 184.00
9i i .23
4-73
3. 54
Pants-makers
2.13
30.77
75.61
239.05
i .45
4.60
Miscellaneous
2.77
2Q
81.80
405.81
1.58
7.80
Tailors
6 22
31 .06
211 .92
C23.2S
4.08
10. 06
General averages
S2.48
31.18
$ 76.74
$297.29
$5.72
The low average weekly wages, the average earnings per week, 1 and the general 'averages may be noted. The contrast between these conditions and those among the Swedes is start- ling.
The Swedes are scattered more or less throughout the city, but those in the garment trades are to be found on the north side. Where the best pants and coats are made, girls earn as much as $10 or $12 a week. This is partly due to the fact that many girls go into domestic service and leave so small a supply that the contractors are organized for the purpose of securing and keeping workers. The workers, too, are organized, even the women, and so keep up their wages. One of these organizations is the Custom Vest Trimmers', Operators', and Pressers' Union.
The union asked certain things from the contractors : a nine- hour day from 7 o'clock, with forty-five minutes for dinner, beginning at 12 o'clock; overtime work when necessary, but not on union nights ; the Saturday half-holiday in July and August ; a fixed scale of wages for piece work ; or for work by the week $8 or $10 for women and $12 or $15 for pressers or
'/. f., the average weekly earnings if one were earning each week. ​6 10 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
hand-sewers according to the season, the busy season lasting from March I to July I and from September I to January I ; all these stipulations to hold from March I, 1900, until March I, 1901.
Corresponding to the union is the Custom Vest Tailors' Pro- tective Association, with a membership of thirty contractors. They are not allowed to employ any workers who do not belong to the union just described. Last winter they sent a petition to their employers asking a rise in the prices paid for vests, because of a rise in the price of silk and because of the demands of their employes, the scale of prices to hold good during the same time as the scale of wages which they must pay their workers. These requests were granted, and all seemed to be running smoothly between contractors and employes. In the shop visited 1 about twenty people were at work ; the room was large, light, and clean ; the power was supplied by a gas engine. It was really a small factory.
But even among the Swedes conditions are not all up to this standard. Next door to the factory is a cooperative tailor shop, 2 a room rented by several tailors, each working independently of the other and for a different merchant tailor. Each one pays $3 a month rent and about $i a week for silk, car-fare, and other incidentals. Their season is the same as that of the vest-makers, but there is very little work in the slack season. In the busy months each man makes two coats a week by working from twelve to sixteen hours a day, and earns from $8 to $13 a week. One of them, a Finlander, said it was not unusual for a man to work all night in order to fill a special order. The eyes of three of the six men in the shop were much inflamed, and their backs were bent. One or two of the older men, in response to the inquiry whether they had time to answer a few questions, answered wearily that they could take time.
The custom or journeymen tailors as a rule are obliged to furnish their own machines and to work in their own homes or in a room rented alone or with others. Some men prefer to work alone or in their homes, but the majority feel that
1 Personal investigation. a Personal investigation. ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 6ll
there is injustice in the necessity of providing workroom and machine.
The Bohemians are probably second only to the Swedes. 1 The majority of them are found in "Pilsen," in the sixth ward, on Blue Island avenue, Eighteenth street, etc. They are a thrifty people, and the contractors usually own their own homes, but this is less likely to be the case with their employes. Yet the situation of the shops is often bad in the extreme ; accord- ing to one statement 95 per cent, of them front on the alley, are without light in the back, and many are directly over or are near stables. Out of five Bohemian shops on West Eighteenth street two had good street frontage and three were in the rear. All were fairly clean, one was scrupulously so. One was very crowded. The light, ventilation, and heating were better than in the Polish and Jewish shops visited, which are mentioned later. The garments manufactured were coats, pants, and over- coats. Twenty-two males and seventy-two females were employed. The wages ranged from $i to $2 for the girls who were beginning at the handwork, up to $4 or $6 or $8 for the older handworkers; from $3 to $8 or $10 or $12 among the operators ; and from $9 to $12 among the pressers. Foot-power was used altogether. Two or three of the shops reported steady work throughout the year. The others had full work only half or two-thirds of the year, and the rest of the time were idle or had only partial work.*
There is some organization among the workers. It is said that in the coatmakers' strike of 1894 the Bohemians stood nobly by the union and did not "scab it on" the union men as many of the Swedes did. 3 At this time the women stood at the street corners and dissuaded people from working for the con- tractors in opposition to the organization.
The "working" Jews are found mostly between Polk and Fifteenth streets and between Stewart and Blue Island avenues in the seventh, eighth, and nineteenth wards. The external home conditions are worse than those of the Bohemians, and
'See later discussion, p. 617.
2 Personal investigation. 3 Statement of a cloakmaker. ​6l2 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
often worse than those of the Poles. The whole district is "cluttered up" both in and out of doors. There is much crowd- ing, although less than among the Italians. The homes are not well built, are without all modern improvements, and many of them are rear tenements. The home conditions are bad because the people are poor, and the people are poor, as someone has expressed it, because of "economic wounds, the lack of means of making a living." The young women never go into domestic service, and not many in proportion to the number of men are found in the sweat-shops. They prefer to work down town in the department stores, and are remarkably free from any immo- bility which might keep them nearer home.
In the ten shops visited there were fifty-six males and sixty females almost as many males as females while among the Bohemians there were more than three times as many females. In some shops more men than women were employed, and in these and in cloak and suit shops the wages were higher than among the Bohemians. Almost invariably the men and boys were smoking cigarettes, no matter whether there were girls in the room or not. 1 The shops were poorly lighted and ventilated, and were cold from lack of heating, in midwinter. Foot-power was used in every shop, and only two out of the ten reported full work for the entire year.
Although the Poles are scattered more or less throughout the city, there is some concentration of them on Clybourn ave- nue in the twentieth ward, and more especially on Ingraham street in the sixteenth ward. Their homes are worse than those of the Jews, and they are more crowded. They are industrious and frugal. There is a notable difference between the Polish girl and the Jewish girl. The ambitions of the latter have been mentioned ; the former is afraid to go away from home, and is therefore at the mercy of the nearest contractor. She is held fast in the fetters of her religion and her ignorance.
Of all the sweat-shops visited personally most complete information was secured about the Polish shops. As partially indicated already, the Poles work for a little less than the
1 Personal investigation. See accompanying tables. ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 613
Swedes, Bohemians, and Jews, and receive a little more than the Italians. The Polish figures here given can, then, be used to illustrate the detail of the conditions found in all the shops. Of sixteen Polish shops on Dickson and Division streets on the northwest side visited in January, 1900, eight were engaged in making coats, six in making pants, and two in making cloaks and suits. In all but three cases foot-power was used. Of these, two had steam- and one gas-power. Seven had work all the year around at least for the past year five had very little work for four, five, or six months, and another for two months. Eighty-three adult males were employed, 150 adult females, and thirty-seven girls under sixteen. Wages were usually paid by the piece, every two weeks. Two cloak and suit shops, however, paid every week, and two other shops paid by the week instead of by the piece. The operators received from $2.50 to $12, or an average of $6.35 per week; the handworkers from 75 cents or $2 to $8, or an average of $3.65. The lower wages are the prices paid to girls under sixteen who are just beginning and are usually paid by the week. The pressers received from $6.50 to $12, or an average of $9.64 per week. Many shops had no home finishers ; when there were any, $3 seemed the usual wage.
The above figures do not include the two cloak and suit shops already mentioned, where twice as many men as women were employed and where the wages were considerably higher. The operators there received from $15 to $40, the average in one shop being $22 and in the other $16, while the hand- workers received $6 or $8, and the pressers $15 or $20. Yet in both of these shops foot-power was used, and one of them which was working for Marshall Field & Co. and for the Chicago Novelty Cloak Co., was employing five home finishers who earned only $3 or $3.50 per week.
The number of hours which the contractors reported was usually ten, but in three cases was fifteen or twenty minutes more ; in one of these shops the children were allowed to work only ten hours, and in the others the inspector gave warning that they must not allow the children to work more than ten hours if they wished to escape prosecution. One of the steam ​614 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
shops gives a half-holiday on Saturday all the year around, as the Swedish shops do in the slack months. One man, a tailor working by himself, said that in the seven or eight months of his busy season he worked from ten to eighteen hours per day and often all night to fill his employer's orders on time. In this part of the year he could make about $20 per week.
Two of the Polish shops were in basement rooms, and three were over or near stables. One of the workshops deserved no better name than barn, and that not a neat nor sweet-smelling one. Four of the shops were very crowded, and one of those in basement rooms had oppressively low ceilings. In all but four shops the light was not better than fair or poor. Only three of the shops were filthy, but not more than four were more than fairly clean. The ventilation in the winter time is dreadful ; windows are kept tightly closed so that as little fire as possible will be necessary. Except in the winter it is not quite so bad. 1
The average conditions in all the shops may be noted from the accompanying tables.
Altogether 34 shops were visited, in which 315 females and 201 males were at work. In 16 of the shops coats were being made, pants in 7, cloaks, skirts, or suits in 5, knee-pants in 3, and vests in 2 ; foot-power was used in all but 5 shops ; only 13 were busy twelve months in the year ; the hours were reported as more than ten in 9 shops, and less than ten in only 3 ; 1 1 shops were in rear tenements or had alley frontage, and 2 were in basements ; the size and cleanliness of the rooms were usually fairly satisfactory, but 5 were crowded and 6 were filthy ; the ventilation was bad in 23 shops and good in only 3 ; the light was poor in 7 shops and good in less than a third of the whole number.
Wages were almost always paid by the piece, once in two weeks. Polish operators received an average wage of $8.03, the handworkers $4.10, the pressers $9.75, and the home finishers $3.25; while the general average for all the Polish workers was $6.28. The average wage of the Jewish operators was $11.42, of the handworkers $5.14, pressers $11.22, home finishers $2.18,
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AVERAGE OF PRICES RECEIVED BY CONTRACTOR
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and general average $7.49. The Bohemian operators received $7.70, handworkers $5, pressers $10.19, and the general average was $7.63. Swedish operators received $12, handworkers $5.50, pressers $i 1.50, home finishers $3, while the general average was $8.93. The average of all the workers of all the nationalities was $7.58. It must be remembered that very few of the workers have steady work the year round, so that the actual weekly income is less than these figures indicate. Even allowing for this, one is inclined to wonder whether the figures are not stil too high, since it was not possible to get at the wages from the workers' own standpoint.
It is interesting to notice the rates of wages among the different nationalities. According to the averages made from the statements of the contractors, it would seem that the order should be Poles, Bohemians, Jews, and Swedes the last receiving the highest wages. From reading and from conversations with the factory inspectors, the idea was gathered that the order should be Poles, Jews, Bohemians, and Swedes. If the latter is the proper order, it must be that some of the contractors reported higher wages than they actually pay, or that more than wages must be taken into account. Indeed, in point of room, light, cleanliness, etc., the Bohemians are far in advance of the Jews. They live, too, in a roomier, cleaner part of the city and work on a higher grade of garments. 1 Before speaking of the more general conditions in all the shops, the results of an attempt to get at the financial position of the individual contractor may be stated. A Jewish contractor receives 20 cents for making chil- dren's coats ; for coats he now receives 80 cents where five years ago he received $1.25 and ten years ago $1.50; for cloaks and suits he receives from $i to $1.40, and another for cloaks and skirts now receives $i where a year ago he received $1.25 and five years ago $2. For knee-pants one contractor receives 8 cents a pair where for the last three years he had been receiving 9 cents. Another who received g^4 cents last year now receives
'See p. 6 1 6, Table III, "Prices," first column: a Jewish coatmaker receives 80 cents and a Bohemian $1.97. It is as a rule the higher grade of goods for which the higher prices are paid. ​6l8 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
10 cents. A third received 1 1 cents five years ago, only 7 cents last year, and now receives 8 cents. The last employs 6 people and makes about 800 pairs a week. His expenses are $45 per week and his profit about $18. A Jewish contractor on Maxwell street is making each week, with the help of 16 employes, 600 or 800 vests of medium grade at 25 cents each. Last year he received but 22 cents each and in 1896 only 18 cents, "and they were hard to get." His expenses for wages, express, etc., are $130 per week, leaving him $20 per week profit. Prices with him have risen instead of fallen.
A Bohemian coatmaker receives from $1.15 to $2.25 or $2.50 where some five years ago he received twice as much. For overcoats he receives from $1.25 to $1.50 where five years ago he received $2.25. One Bohemian, with the help of 9 employes, finishes 60 pairs of trousers per day at 30 cents per pair, making his daily gross income $18. His daily expenses are about as follows : machine work, $6 ; trimmings, $1.05 ; express, 60 cents; pressing, $1.50 ; finishing, $5.10 ; total, 14.25. At this rate he would make $3.75 per day, or $22.55 P er week. Nine years ago he was receiving 67 per cent, more per pair. In all branches of the trade, then, prices are considerably lower than five or ten years ago. Yet they are in most cases much better than three or four years ago, and the majority of the contractors seemed to feel that business was fairly prosper- ous.
It must be acknowledged that in Chicago at the present time conditions are not so bad as they might be. The wages in many cases are fair living wages. The hours as reported by the con- tractor are seldom more than ten, but it is doubtful if he can always be trusted. At any rate, the statements of some chil- dren from the Jewish Training School, whose fathers work in tailor shops, indicate that long hours are often demanded. It is only fair to tell of two exceptions : one child said her father was a custom tailor and worked from 8 in the morning until 6 at night, earning $10 a week ; another worked in a shop on Bunker street from 7 to 6, and made $8 a week. Both of these men were working a reasonable number of hours and receiving a tolerable ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 619
wage. Another child, however, said her father worked from 6 in the morning until 7 or 8 at night. She did not know what wages he received. Another said her father worked in a down- town shop from 6 to 6, and in the busy season had to begin work at 4 or 5 and work until 8 or 9 o'clock.
A great many of the shops are situated in buildings tene- ments or shops or stables on the back part of the lot. This is bad for two reasons. It deprives the tenement of its yard space and usually makes the shop front on the alley or dirty back street. In one instance on the northwest side there was a court fifteen or twenty feet square surrounded on all sides by buildings four stories high. Heaps of dirty snow lay massed on the ground, too much shut off from the sun to melt and disap- pear. The only entrance to the court was by narrow sidewalks along the front tenement. The narrow spaces between the four buildings only served to make the court more dismal. From below the steps that led to the shop in the rear came, even on the cold winter day, the foul odors of an ill-cared-for closet. One felt almost as if shut up in some dungeon of an earlier age, and breathed a sigh of relief on returning to the freer air and outlook of the street.
There is seldom adequate or proper sanitary accommodation in the shops or on the premises. Often the closets are wholly unfit for use. In one instance the contractor asked the inspector to report the condition to the board of health. He said that he had already asked the landlord to attend to the matter, but he had paid no heed. The Illinois law makes no provision as yet for the regulation of these conditions.
In a time of epidemic of smallpox, scarlet fever, diphtheria, etc., the danger to the public health from the tenement-house manufacture of garments is very great. There are so many shops that it is impossible to inspect them all at any such time to find whether garments are being made where disease exists. Through ignorance or indifference on the part of the workers, clothing permeated with disease germs may be sent out. Except in such a time of special danger, however, it is the workers who deserve our solicitude rather than the wearers. ​620 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
According to the statement of one of the trustees of the United Hebrew Charities, one person out of every twenty-five has con- sumption. This is the great bane, she says, of the garment workers. It causes almost more trouble than the low wages. The injury to one's eyes from the close and constant appli- cation to work has already been mentioned in connection with the tailors. It is they and the home finishers who are most likely to work far into the night and cause their eyesight to fail.
Long hours at a foot-power machine bring serious pelvic disorders upon the women and girls, and ruin their health. One of the inspectors said one day, when leaving a shop where a girl of fifteen was running a machine at a terrific rate of speed : " If I had my way about it, no woman should ever work like that." Even if none of these more serious troubles come, the con- stant nervous strain gradually takes the life and spirit out of one. The danger to physical health is the chief reason why the employment of women and children becomes a serious problem.
So far as any danger of moral contamination is concerned, there seems no reason, now that home shops have been practi- cally abolished, why there should be any more danger in this than in any other kind of shop, except that this is smaller, and the relations of the contractor with his employes, and of the employes with one another, are more likely to be on a personal plane. It is generally believed by those who know the working classes that they are as moral as any other class in our society that they live up to the best they know as well as other people do.
The question of child labor, however, is one that has received a considerable amount of attention in Illinois, aside from the mere question of health and morals. One of the chief activities on the part of the inspectors is the enforcement of the law that no child under fourteen years of age may be at work, and that no child fourteen years old but not yet sixteen may work without an affidavit, and that no child may work more than ten hours per day. Employers are well acquainted now with ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 621
all of these requirements, and a violation of the first is seldom found. If children under age happen to be working, they are hidden away or sent on an errand if possible before the inspector enters. There are instances, indeed, where the child looks under age; but, if the parents have sworn that he is over fourteen, nothing can be done unless he is very much under size or is physically unfit to work. In such a case the inspector may require a physician's certificate that the child is able to work, but such a certificate may easily be bought from some unscru- pulous physician.
One open and actual violation of the law was found last winter among the Poles the first case, the inspector said, that he had come across in months. Little Jakubina thought she had an affidavit ; but it was only a statement from her priest that she had been confirmed a month or two before, when she was twelve years old. The child had a slightly pinched, worried face, but her utter inability to comprehend the value of an edu- cation was a more distressing feature of the case. She had a father, a brother, and two older sisters who were at work, so that there could have been no need for her leaving school to work. There were only eighteen such prosecutions in 1898, while before that year there had been two or three or four times as many.
It is less unusual to find children working without affidavits or with defective ones. In 1898 in all industries 932 children were found working without affidavits. One prosecution of him- self or of a neighboring contractor is usually sufficient to teach the lesson that the law must be obeyed. An employer now generally goes for his affidavits the moment the inspector enters the room. The provision has done something, too, toward making children more stable in their industrial life. It was at one time customary for children to go in flocks from one contractor to another ; but now, when the affidavit has been properly filed, an employer is loth to let his workers go.
The growth and development of the inspection and regula- tion of the garment trades is shown in the following table : ​622
THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
SUMMARY OF FACTORY INSPECTION IN THE GARMENT TRADES. I. CHICAGO AND COOK COUNTY, 1893-9.'
Year
Number of Shops Inspected
Females under Sixteen
Malts under Sixteen
Total Chil- dren under Sixteen
Females ayer Sixteen
Males over Sixteen
Total Employes
1893
704
595
3,617
2,611
6,823
1894
1895 1896 1897 1898
1,413 1,715 2,378
3,688
2,040
i.Vs'i
1, 060 1,415
126
128 323
721
1,307 1,188
1,738 1,624
5,912 7,780
7,181
16,580 11,015
4,469 5,817 6,383 13,647 13,072
11,102 14,904 M,752 3L965 25,711
1899
3,674
1,847
298
2,145
18,332
15,376
35,853
II. CHICAGO AND NEW YORK, 1 898.=
Number
Females
Males
Total Chil-
Females
Males
of Shops Inspected
under Sixteen
under Sixteen
dren under Sixteen
over Sixteen
over
Sixteen
Employes
Chicago
2,040
1,624
11,015
13,072
25,711
New York city
5,532
592
266
858
29,938
40,081
70,877
N. Y. state and city
8,920
1,219
656
1,875
45,785
55,884
103,544
III. CHICAGO AND NEW YORK, l8g8. 3
Total Number of Employes in all Industries
Total Number of Employes in Garment Trades
Percentage of Garm't Workers of all Employes
Chicago
251,556
25,711
12.2 percent
Illinois
351,057
25,711
7.3
New York state . . .
700 41 <?
103. ^44
14.8 "
The work started in Illinois with Mrs. Florence Kelley as chief inspector. The falling off in the number of shops vis- ited in 1898 was due to increased work of the inspectors in other lines. The Illinois reports for 1897 an ^ l %9% rurn i sn a few other interesting facts. In 1897, 50 per cent, of the 3,688 shops were in tenements and 50 per cent, in shop buildings ; 8 per cent, were in basements ; 24, or ^ of I per cent., were over sheds or stables; 685, or i8 per cent., were in living-rooms;
1 See Illinois State Factory Reports, 1893-9 ; Report for 1898, p. 13.
See New York State Factory Report for 1898, p. 41.
3 See Illinois Report for 1898, p. 13, and New York Report for 1898, pp. 19, 41. ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 623
and 53, or ly 4 ^ per cent., were filthy. In 1898, out of the 2,940 shops only 20^ per cent, were in tenements, only 5 per cent, were in basements, and 153, or 5^ per cent., were in living-rooms used as shops. In 1899 only 20 home-shops were found, and prosecutions were instituted against 1 1 of these.
The law as it stands has been bravely enforced, but it does not guard against all abuses. There were about 197 cases where members of a family were working, without outside help, in their own living-rooms, and I ,o 1 1 cases where a single person was work- ing alone. 1 Over these cases our inspectors have no jurisdiction unless the goods are infected. A similar study might be made of the New York reports. Reference to the table just given will show that in New York state there are three or four times as many garment makers as in Chicago, and in New York city two or three times as many. In New York, too, 14.8 per cent, of all the workers whose shops are inspected by the factory inspectors are in the clothing trades, while in Illinois only 7.3 percent, are so engaged.
One of the most interesting conflicts between capital and labor in current history was the strike of the journeymen tailors and the lockout on February 15, 1900. There were 700 men in the union, and thirty-five or forty merchant tailors for whom they worked. The men made certain requests of their employers, most important of which was the plea for free back-shops in or near the same building as that occupied by the merchant tailors. The men knew that in the back-shops overtime and night work could not so easily be demanded of them. The merchant tailors were loth to grant this request, partly from self-interest, partly because many of them had leases on their present quarters which had still two or three years to run, partly because they could with difficulty find buildings near them suitable for back- shops. After two months had passed with various attempts to come to an agreement, the following contract was signed on April 1 6, by the Journeymen Tailors' Union and by the Tailors' and Drapers' Exchange :
1 Statement of a deputy inspector, from the Report of 1899. ​624 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
1. Wages to remain the same as at present for three years.
2. No demand for a back-shop to be made for two years, but any mem- ber of the exchange can put in such a shop if he chooses.
3. If in the third year two-thirds of the men in any one shop demand a back-shop, it will be put in, and those who desire to work elsewhere than in the back-shop may do so.
4. Any tailor now employed by members of the exchange may continue in his work whether or not he is a member of the union.
5. All fines and penalties assessed against members of either body grow- ing out of the lockout are suspended.
6. February i , preceding the expiration of the contract, the union shall state if the contract shall continue.
7. If the union is unable to secure skilled workmen, the boss shall do so anywhere he can.
8. All controversies shall be referred to a standing conference committee composed of three members each of the union and exchange. 1
Many of the tailors were far from satisfied with this settlement. Although many of the employers may soon introduce the back- shop of their own accord, the tailors feel that it is putting its universal introduction too far in the future.
One feature of the sweating system that deserves some atten- tion is the general diffusion of the goods throughout the country. In order to get at the extent of this distribution an inquiry was made into the character of the goods sold in a country town in Illinois 150 miles from Chicago. In the first store only overalls, working shirts, and jackets were kept. They were bought from J. N. Ward & Co., Peoria, 111,, who own a factory equipped with steam-power. The girls make from $5 to $9 per week at piece work, but are required to pay 5 cents per day for the steam- power. The next merchant who was questioned, one who keeps a low grade of goods, denied outright that he kept any sweat- shop goods, and added that what he knew of sweat-shops was favorable to them.
Another merchant, in answer to the questions whether he knew anything of the conditions under which his goods were made, and whether in steam factories, small shops, or tenements, said : " I suppose in all, but I try to get goods that are made out- side of sweat-shops." To illustrate the prices at which it is
1 Chicago Record, April 17, 1900. ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 625
possible to buy goods : this merchant buys knee-pants at from $i to $12 per dozen, trousers at from $2 to $24 per dozen (this probably includes overalls), and wrappers at from $2 to $24 per dozen.
The members of a third firm say they do not know where their goods are made. Sellers tell them that they have their own shops, but they do not believe it. They suppose that some of their goods are sweat-shop goods, but "we would not have such if we knew it." They buy knee-pants at from $2 to $9 per dozen, trousers at from 75 cents to $1.50 per pair, and wrappers at from $6 to $13.50 per dozen. Ten years ago they paid from $3.50 to $12 per dozen for knee-pants, $i to $2.50 per pair for trousers, and $8 to $15 per dozen for wrappers.
The prices at which these goods can be bought from the manufacturer furnish in themselves some indication of the con- ditions under which they must be made. Wrappers at from $4 to $6 per dozen, or 33^ to 50 cents apiece ! The cloth alone at retail would cost 3 cents or 5 cents per yard, and eight or ten yards are required to make a garment. Not all of the 10 or 15 cents' value that is not in the cloth can have gone to the makers. The knee-pants illustrate further. In the three knee- pants shops visited in Chicago the prices received by the contractors were 95 cents, 96 cents, and $1.20 per dozen pairs. In the small town we find the country merchant able to buy knee-pants from the large city firms at $i or $2 per dozen 8^ or 16% cents a pair. Goods which can be sold at wholesale for such a price have prob- ably been made under worse conditions than those for which the contractor receives 8 or 10 cents a pair. There doubtless is some difference in the grade of the garments ; but, granting that, one fears that conditions are not improving for the workers. Accord- ing to the small merchants, 30 cents a pair was the lowest price at which such goods could be bought ten years ago. Part of the cheapening is due to improved methods in the manufacture and sale of cloth, but one is led to doubt whether it is not partly that the workers are receiving lower wages. At any rate the contrac- tors are receiving lower prices from the manufacturers, 1 and hence could with difficulty pay as high wages as before.
1 See p. 618. ​626 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
These goods were bought mostly in Chicago from two promi- nent firms. One of them had in 1893 (later figures are not available) one inside shop with 37 employe's, and two outside shops with 38 employes. One of these was on the fifth floor of a tenement building which was in dreadful condition. The other firm in 1893 employed 179 workers in 22 outside shops. Some of them were in living-rooms, 5 were in basements, some probably the majority sent out work into the neighboring homes to be finished.
In one of the basement shops, where the air was almost unbreathable, 15 girls under 16 years of age were working; 8 of these, on being examined, were found to be unfit for work from spinal curvature, phthisis, irregular development, enlargement of bones, and other ailments. 1
In 1895 this firm had 91 outside shops, employing 1,111 workers. In 1898 it had one inside shop, with 86 employes, and probably many outside shops. Some of the best department stores do a country-order business not at all in keeping with their city style. They send out descriptive catalogues of gar- ments such as they would scarcely keep in their basements in Chicago. Probably the most of the goods made in inside shops are sold in the city, and the cheap garments made in contractors' shops sent to the country stores. One of these firms had in 1898 two inside shops or factories, employing 304 people, 2 but it also has outside shops. 3
The facts stated show how very dependent people in general, and especially people in the country, are upon the work of the outside shops. There is a tendency toward the steam shop, but it is far from being the only kind of shop in existence at present.
One other phase of the sweating system has yet to be stud- ied its parasitic character. 4 By this is meant that one's wages are insufficient to support the life of the worker. In order to find to what extent the garment trades are parasitic, a study was
'Illinois Factory Report, 1893, PP- 2 3. 34. 35- * Ibid., 1898, p. 106.
'During the tours of personal investigation two such outside shops were visited. See also Illinois Factory Report, 1895, P- 7-
. < BEATRICE AND SIDNEY WEBB, Industrial Democracy, Vol. II, pp. 749 sqq. ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 627
made of the records of the Bureau of Associated Charities of Chicago for the months of January to July, 1900. Reports were not in from all the districts of the city ; in all, however, the reports of 1,918 cases were studied, or about one-third as many as were reported in 1899 in the whole city. The result may be regarded as fairly typical, but perhaps a little smaller in pro- portion than the average. The accompanying table summarizes the results of the investigation.
Out of the whole number of records studied, 974 were incom- plete or reported no occupation (probably had none), and 874 reported some other occupation, while only 70 were in any way connected with the garment trades. All but 29 of these were women who did plain sewing or were seamstresses or dress- makers. It is permissible to notice these, although, as their work is usually done in a private house for a particular person, they do not strictly belong to the garment trades. Taking all together, there were 10 dressmakers, 14 seamstresses, 19 plain sewers, 17 tailors or tailoresses, and 12 of miscellaneous occupa- tions. Eleven were Americans, 8 Jews, and 13 Germans, while the rest were of several other nationalities, or were not reported. The total number of persons in all the families was 253, and the average size of the family 3.61 persons. Seventeen were males and 53 were females. Nine were less than twenty-five years old and 8 were over fifty, while 30 were between these ages. Six- teen were single, 24 married, 18 widowed, and 12 deserted or divorced. The average wage was $4.32, rent $5.20, and number of rooms 3.3.* Twenty-three had no secondary occupation, 38 were housewives, and 9 had some other secondary occupation. Work was asked for in 18 cases, transportation in 14, and money, fuel, clothing, etc., in 39. The need was caused by sickness, death, or misfortune in 37 cases, by desertion in 12 cases, and by lack of work in 14.
Of the 29 tailors and other garment workers more than half were Jews and Germans. There were 9 tailors, 6 tailoresses, 5 pants-makers and finishers, and I of each of several other branches of the trade. The wages reported ranged from 75 cents to $5 per
1 The data here were so meager as to make the averages of little value. ​o o
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^ ."2 ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 629
week, while the husband of one deserted woman had earned $18 per week. Women were in need of assistance a few more times than men. The aid asked varied from letters of recommendation to food and clothing or work and money. Sickness or desertion or lack of work were the chief causes of need. It is almost appalling to see how many times desertion appeared as the cause of need (fifteen times out of the seventy cases). It seems as if something must be seriously wrong somewhere.
The conclusion to be drawn from this study of charity records seems to be that sweat-shop workers very seldom ask any aid, and when they do, it is often work which they desire. One is compelled to feel a great deal of respect for them. One sorrow- ful case was recorded a man twenty-nine years old, so far gone with consumption as to be wholly unfit for work, with a wife and child dependent upon him, and his parents living with him. The record says: "The wretchedness of this man is pitiable, his wish to work sad in the extreme."
Statements of Mr. Minnick and Mr. Weller, superintendents of the stock yards and west side districts, respectively, of the Associated Charities, from which most sweat-shop cases would be expected, go to corroborate this view. It is not well, Mr. Minnick says, for charity to interpose in the sweating trade, because it pushes wages down just so much farther. If they can keep along themselves, it is vastly better.
The facts gleaned from the United Hebrew Charities, however, would seem to indicate that the garment trades predominate among the Jews, that the Jews are more in need of assistance than other nationalities, or, possibly, that they are more ready to ask assistance and get it if they can. Then, too, it is true that the wealthy Jews take care of their own poor very well. One of the trustees of the organization says that most of those who need assistance because of sickness or of insufficiency of earnings are at work in the garment or shoe trades. Assistance was given in 1897 and 1898 as follows : x
1 See Report of United Hebrew Charities for 1897-8, p. 27. ​630 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
1897 1898
Total cases (all causes and all occupations) 1 - 3,088 2,364
Need caused by sickness or death - 589 576
Need caused by insufficiency of earnings - - 730 460
Supposing that only one-half of the cases where need was caused by sickness or death and by insufficiency of earnings were among the garment-makers, that would be 659 cases, or 21.35 P er cent., in 1897, an d 518 cases, or 21.91 per cent., in 1898 ; while only about 6 per cent, of the 1,918 cases studied, as reported by the Bureau of Associated Charities, were strictly sweat-shop workers. The marked falling off in the number of cases for insufficiency of earnings is possibly due to the fact that business in the gar- ment trades has been better the last year or two than for some time before. Of the 344 men who asked for work at the employment bureau, twenty-eight, or only 8.1 per cent., were garment-makers. 2
Even before one has become familiar with the facts about present conditions in the garment trades the question arises : "What is the reason for all the abuses, the maladjustments, the ill coordinations in these industries ? " The answer cannot be given in a sentence, nor can the fault be laid at any one man's door.
Perhaps the causes most generally recognized and understood are those due to the character and situation of the workers. First among these is the absence of American ideas and sympathies. It was in New York, where the tide of immigrants enters, that the system first gained a foothold and reached its most acute form. The foreigners, as has already been seen in the case of the Russians, not having money enough to take them farther into the Land of Promise, settle down in New York. Their standard of living is so low that they are willing to work for wages which an American would not accept.
Through living with others of their own nationality they fail to come into touch with American life. It is almost impossible to speak of this without mentioning their ignorance also.
'The occupations are not differentiated in the report, and it was impossible to gain access to the case records.
"Report of United Hebrew Charities, p. 29. ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 631
Illiteracy is very frequent among them, especially among the Italians. On a low plane of intelligence in their own country, they remain on the same plane here or sink to one still lower, because in their own country they had known the common speech, but here they are almost helpless when away from their own people, unless they learn English. This many of them fail to do, especially if they had reached maturity before they came over. But, besides ignorance of the language, there is igno- rance of our laws and institutions, of our ways of doing things, of our aims and aspirations, to work against these people and keep them down. Added to this is their poverty, which makes it necessary for them to accept whatever work with whatever wages they can get. "The destruction of the poor is their poverty," according to the old proverb. The sweating system surely works in two directions : if it is true that the people are poor because their wages are low, it is equally true that their wages are low because they are poor.
Besides these things there is the shifting character of the population. The contractors are here today and there tomor- row. Their employes are even more unsettled in their places of abode. This fact, with that of their isolation and their igno- rance, makes organization almost impossible. The fact of isola- tion applies particularly to the home workers. Unless they happen to have neighbors who work for the same employer, they cannot tell what other people who are doing the same work for the same man are earning. Their situation in small shops works in the same direction, although to a less degree. Although the people in a shop are likely to earn the same wages for the same amount of work, yet a shop making the same grade of garments in the same block, or even next door, may be paying higher or lower wages.
Another set of causes has its rise in the character of the industry. The garment trades are seasonal industries ; that is, there are certain months in the year when a great deal of work must be done and other months in which there is almost no work. The roots of this reason seem to lie in the fact that people all wish to have their suits at the same time. One feels ​632 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
that very few people hold the sensible view of the old lady who refused to have her sleeves made smaller because, as she said, she was not ashamed to let people know that she had some clothes last year. This devotion to fashion makes it necessary for the tailor to sit at his bench all night long, and for the con- tractor to keep his employes at work from 6 or 7 in the morn- ing until 9 or 10 o'clock at night, or else to employ 25 or 50 per cent, more workers. This explains in part the long hours of the home finisher.
In the ready-made clothing trade the garments are made up in the spring for the following fall, and in the fall for the next spring, and the seasonal difficulty still comes in, but rests to a smaller degree on fashion than does the custom trade. The seasonal character accounts in large measure for the fact that only half of the shops visited had steady work and this for many of them only during the past year and that in the knee- pants shops the busy season, with athirteen-hour day, was only four months long, while the rest of the year there was work only for two or three days in the week.
Another cause is that these are to some extent unskilled trades, because of the minute division of labor. A tailor makes an entire garment himself; but in the ordinary contractor's shop one person does the basting, one of the operators sews the first straight seams, another takes the more difficult part, while the rest of the work is divided among several handworkers, the button-sewers, and the home finishers. Most parts of the work one can learn easily in a day, or in a week or two at the outside. It is not difficult, then, to find workers, people who have no trade and no pride of trade or skill ; and the unskilled trades are almost always overcrowded. This leads to competition among the workers for the work that is to be done. If one asks for higher wages, a contractor's ready answer is : " Go, if you please ; I can find someone else who will gladly work for less."
Again, the easy adaptation of labor to the fluctuations of trade is largely responsible for the persistence of the sweating system. Suppose that a contractor's normal output a week is 700 vests, and that to make that number he employs six men ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 633
and ten women and girls. His firm sends him 800 to be made in a given week. He must, then, to finish the work, employ one more man and two more women, or else lengthen the working day. After a week or two the amount of work falls off and he receives but 500 vests. He may keep the sixteen workers with- out keeping them busy the usual number of hours, but he is more likely to dismiss one of the men and three or four of the girls. In a factory supplied with power there cannot be these sudden and frequent changes in the labor force without too great a loss to the employer.
Very closely connected with this is another reason, the inex- pensiveness of such a "plant." A small room, a few sewing machines, and people are all that a contractor needs to set up shop. Fifty or one hundred dollars will do very well for a start, and his workers are in his opinion worthy of little more consideration than his foot-power machines. To open a factory, however, he must have a steam engine with its connection to the improved machines. When he has gone to the expense of putting in power, he cannot afford to let any machines stand idle, and his employes have steady work.
The third set of causes is due to the method of work. To a large degree the clothing trade is a belated industry, through the non-application of improved machinery and through the failure to adopt factory methods.
Home work is another cause of much trouble. Herein lies the danger to the public health, because so many homes cannot be kept under constant inspection. In withdrawing the workers from the protection of the factory acts and in rendering trade combination impossible, home work becomes part of the reason, too, for the long hours and low wages. The wages are kept low because the workers are scattered in their homes, do not know what other people are earning, and sometimes have other means of support, so that they are willing to work for a pittance. There is no law limiting the hours in this state, but in ordinary indus- tries they are limited by custom to eight or ten. The hours in the home are often fifteen or sixteen.
Another stronghold of sweating is the system of piece work. ​634 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
An ambitious person is anxious to earn as much, and as much more than his fellow-workers, as possible. This anxiety and hurry involve severe nervous strain, and the lack of laws restrict- ing the hours of labor makes the abuse in the shops possible. The task system 1 combines the evils of piece work and home work.
A fourth set of causes arises in the attitude of manufacturer, contractor, landlord, and consumer. They all, to a greater or less degree, have a happy, or rather unhappy, feeling of irre- sponsibility and often a sordid desire for individual profit. The manufacturer says : " I give out my work to the contractors who come here anxious to do it ; it is no affair of mine where or how it is done." The contractor says : " I have this work to finish in a given time. I must do it in that time or I can get no more. I am obliged to have my workers come early in the morning and stay late at night. I cannot give them more work when I have none. I cannot help the rush of work nor the lack of work. As for the home finishers, they are glad to get the work, and the condition of their home does not concern me." The landlord says : "Yes, I own the property, to be sure, and I rent it, or my agents rent it, to whoever will pay the most rent the most promptly. It is unsanitary, is it, and out of repair? Oh well, I I have not time to see to that. I can't afford to fix it up now." The consumer says : "Where is the Sunday paper ? Let me look at the bargains for tomorrow. I must surely go to the city to look at those knee-pants, 25 and 50 cents a pair; and night dresses, fine quality, for $i ; fine linen handkerchiefs, hem- stitched and embroidered by hand, 12^ cents each. Yes, I must surely have some of these things."
It is the old story of Cain unwilling to acknowledge himself his brother's keeper, an illustration of the proverb that what is everybody's business or rather, perhaps, nobody's business will never be done ; and, as a result, the worker says : " Yes, I must keep on working, even though my back is breaking and my eyes will scarcely stay open, for wife and little ones must have bread, and I must work now if it kills me, for soon there will be no work to do." And the young woman^says : "Three dollars, four
'See p. 605. ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 635
dollars, or five dollars a week for seven or eight months in the year! What shall I do the rest of the year? Oh, I must try to save a little, or things worse than death may befall me." This is not too dark a picture for many of the 35,853 workers in the garment trades in Chicago.
Connected with the desire for large profits and low prices is competition, or the "higgling of the market." 1 Because manu- facturers have to compete with one another, they drive as close bargains as possible with their contractors ; and because the con- tractors are in a similar race, they must pay their employes as little as possible and get as much work as possible out of them.
A further cause of the perpetuation of the system is the position of the poor, their poverty, and their necessity to buy cheap goods. The Webbs have said that "sweating itself creates the conditions of sweating." 2 It is most certainly true that those who make sweated goods are among those who buy them. But many farmers and the poor in small towns depend on such goods. It may be that they are engaged in a sweating system of their own, and that they are themselves compelled to work too hard for too little pay.
A mere acquaintance with existing conditions in the gar- ment trades is sufficient to cause one to begin dreaming of Utopias for the sweat-shop workers, but mundane creatures like ourselves are hardly ready for Utopias. Just at present some more immediate and practical ideal is desired.
The first thing to be hoped for is the gradual displacement of the small shop and the system of home work by the factory system. Even the small steam or gas factory has some disad- vantages. It is very likely to occupy one or more floors of some old tenement or other building never intended for a factory, and consequently badly lighted, poorly ventilated, and in an unsani- tary condition. The gas engine, too, often poisons the air. Moreover, with small factories, the workers in any one branch of the trade are likely to be widely scattered throughout the city, and organization is still difficult. A building erected purposely
1 S. AND B. WEBB, Industrial Democracy, Part III, chap. ii.
2 See S. AND B. Webb, Problems of Industry, p. 146. ​636 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
for a garment factory will have large, light, well-ventilated, sani- tary rooms for separate parts of the process. Electric power may displace steam- or gas- or foot-power. There will be sepa- rate toilet-rooms for men and women in different parts of the building, with large pleasant dressing-rooms for the women instead of one foul closet for both men and women.
In such a factory the wages may not be much higher than in some of those that were visited. Indeed, it is often true, unless the labor is organized as among the Swedes, that the wages are a little lower in the steam shops than in the better class of con- tractors' shops near by ; but the hours are shorter, never more than ten, and there is not the strain of piece work. The mere abolition of piece work would go far toward destroying the sweating system. Work would be paid for by the week, and could be done at a reasonable rate of speed. The construction of large factories would do much, too, toward overcoming the seasonal difficulty, since the fixed plant of the factory would make for comparative regularity and steadiness of employment. Moreover, home work would be done away, and this would help to destroy the parasitic character of the industry.
Another thing to be desired is a higher standard of life among the workers themselves. Many of them have no idea of cleanliness, and no desire for it. More know nothing whatever of ventilation and sanitation. Education along these lines is, for such people, more practical and of more immediate impor- tance than education along academic lines, at least for the older generation. Efforts to educate foreigners are sometimes dis- couraging, especially when the result is like that in an experi- ment with some Italians. They were put into four- or five-room flats, of which each family was expected to occupy one ; but before the experimenters knew it, there was a family in every room.
Organization of the workers is another part of the ideal con- ditions which one hopes may soon be brought about. Some progress has already been made in this direction, and one of the Swedish unions has already been mentioned. Attempts to form unions with members from different nationalities have not been ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 637
successful, because of the heterogeneity of likes and dislikes, of tastes and ideals, of aims and interests among the workers. It would seem, however, that there might be unions in the different branches of the industry for each nationality. It is hopeless to think of organizing women working in their homes ; but, if the factory system is brought in, there will be no necessity for such organization. Some would think it hopeless, too, to attempt to organize the Italians, but only twenty-eight of the Italians work- ing in the garment trades were men. So small a number of workers, even if unorganized, could not affect the conditions of trade very much.
The immediate change to be desired for the tailors is the introduction of the back-shop. There are two or three reasons for such a change. In the first place, the owner of a factory does not require or expect his workers to pay rent for the room in which they work nor to own the machines they use. The factory system is supposed to have displaced domestic industry in this age in America. The present system is contrary, then, to current ideas of industrial propriety. In the next place, when paid by many isolated individuals for small scattered rooms, rent is likely to be much higher than when one larger and better room is rented by one individual. According to one estimate, the cost of rent would be reduced at least 30 per cent. Besides this waste of money, the waste of space can also be avoided by the back-shop. In the third place, if the men are working together in this way, their conditions can be much better known by the factory inspectors, and night work and overtime will be required by^ the merchant tailors with much more difficulty. Since the supply of custom tailors is not great, there would be more work to do in the busy season, and either wages must rise or the busy season must last longer. This one change in the method of work would help to overcome the seasonal difficulty among the tailors. It would take at least 25 or 30 per cent, longer to do the work if excessive hours were not allowed.
The next question that arises is : " How shall these changes be brought about ?" The means of effecting a change in so com- plex a situation as the sweating system has been seen to be ​cannot be perfectly simple. One of the first means that suggest themselves, however, is legislation. Much has been accomplished toward doing away with the evils of the system in New York and in Boston through the enactment of laws; and the manufacture of clothing in Chicago has been regulated to a large extent. But better regulation is needed. Many urge legislation on the part of the federal government because of the distribution throughout the whole country of the garments made in shops in these cities. Such action could be defended on the ground of the preservation of the public health. It could provide that all goods should be made under sanitary conditions; but, unless the enforcement of this law were left to the state inspectors, a large corps of government inspectors would be necessary.
There might, however, be this further justification of federal legislation. It is probable that the sweating system exists to some extent and in a more or less extreme form in almost every large city and in many of the smaller ones in the United States. The clothing industry is not, like the pork-packing industry, for example, one that is by its character confined to a large city. As was noted in the country trade, not quite all the garments came from Chicago; and one merchant knew of clothing shops in a town of two thousand inhabitants in Illinois. It must require a vast labor force—many more than the 128,255 people reported as at work in clothing shops in 1898 in Chicago, and in the city and state of New York—to make the garments for our seventy-six million people. Considering that only twelve or fifteen of the states in the union have any labor laws or factory legislation whatever, and that only five of these attempt to regulate the sweating system, it may be imagined how widespread the system may be, and how great is the chance for abuses. Until the separate states come to a realizing sense of their responsibility for the conditions of their workers, the federal government is the only power to protest against any evils which may exist.
Another reason often given for the federal legislation is the phenomenon of the states in competition with one another. An instance in point was the case of the Boston cutters, who found their work being sent to New York because of the cheapness of ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 639
foreign labor. 1 The federal government might be able to pro- tect one state against another, and yet, if all had proper laws efficiently enforced, such protection would not be necessary.
In the matter of immigration, however, federal legislation might have a place without encroaching on the duties of the" separate states. Perhaps the only addition that is needed to our present restrictions is the educational test carefully applied. Yet Mr. John Williams, chief factory inspector in New York, urges the complete prohibition of immigration for ten years. New York feels the evils in this respect more keenly than Chicago, because so many of the new immigrants flock into the trade and keep the prices low and the conditions bad. A further suggestion in connection with immigration that seems very valuable is the establishment of a national land and labor employment bureau in New York to help immigrants find suitable work upon land- ing. This might be especially valuable in dealing with the Italians, to offset the padrone system and to help them to find work on the farms instead of settling down in the cities.
Illinois needs further state legislation, providing first of all for a larger appropriation and a larger force of factory inspectors with larger powers. Massachusetts had in 1897 an appropria- tion of $93,300 with 33 inspectors, New York over $60,000 with 44 inspectors, Pennsylvania over $60,000 with 24 inspectors, and Illinois only $15,000 with n inspectors. 2 The Illinois report for 1898 urges the doubling of the appropriation and the addition of five deputy inspectors. Other changes which the chief's experience has made him deem it wise to recommend are the use of a tag and the granting of licenses to satisfactory shops. If all garments made in tenements or dwelling-houses were so labeled, few people of any intelligence would wish to buy them. Furthermore, if the inspectors had power to grant or refuse a license to any individual wishing to employ persons outside of his own family, judging from a personal inspection of the size and cleanliness and sanitary condition of the room or rooms to be used, the number of tenement shops could be greatly reduced, and the standard of their condition raised. The efficiency of 'See p. 604. J See Illinois Factory Inspector's Report, 1898, p. 6. ​640 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
these provisions has already been tested in New York and Massachusetts.
One other matter the state legislature has power to control the number of hours in a working day. It is a disgrace to the state of Illinois that she has no laws whatever limiting the num- ber of hours which a man or a woman may work in a day or a week. The only law which she had on this point was adjudged unconstitutional. The hours of child labor are restricted to ten per day ; but the state ought to amend her constitution, if neces- sary, and enact a similar law for men and women at the next session of the legislature. Let it be a ten-hour law to start with, if she will. This will be vastly better than the present state of affairs, under which one can be compelled to work from twelve to fifteen hours per day without redress. It is probable that all these points will be brought before the legislature at its next session.
One other point for legislation is urged by some thinkers the establishment of a minimum wage. This might do something to keep wages above the starvation level, but would be beset with a good many practical difficulties.
To effect the organization of the workers some assistance may be necessary. It is work of this kind, organizing girls' clubs and teaching them how to protect their interests, to which Miss Ashby, the English socialist and sociologist, devotes a part of her time. The men, perhaps, need less assistance than the women, but with the less intelligent of the men help would be valuable.
Closely related with those who expect much from organiza- tion of the workers are those who feel that the whole existing order of society is unjust, and that the remedy is to be found in socialism, a state of society in which each man shall have just what he produces, no more and no less. It is undoubtedly true that at present there is a class who do little or nothing to add to the sum total of the world's goods, and yet who have most. It is also true that many of those who work hardest have least. Something is wrong if these conditions can exist; and, whether or not the solution lies in the inauguration of the socialistic state, ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 641
it is a serious question whether, if it is true that each person has a " right to be himself such as he is," he has not also the right to have undiminished that which he produces.
Although legislation and organization cannot be expected to do everything, yet a violent subversion of existing society seems hardly necessary if certain people, parts of the social process, can be made to feel their responsibility. First among these is the landlord. Conditions could not now be so bad if his prop- erty were always kept in repair and in good sanitary condition. In many cases the buildings are so far gone that the only proper thing to do is to tear down and build new. A movement in this direction has already been begun. When the rebuilding com- mences, however, a building inspector should be upon the ground to see that no dark rooms are put in, and that the plumbing arrange- ments are adequate. The contractor, too, has his share of respon- sibility, if he is to maintain his position at all. There is no reason why, if he undertakes to do business, he should not do it without destroying the health or lives of the workers.
The next person to be held responsible is the manufacturer. He may be the head of a department store or the owner of a large clothing establishment or a merchant tailor. Whoever he is, if he is not able to erect or to provide suitable factories instead of shifting the responsibility of workrooms upon his petty contractors, he would better delegate the manufacture of his goods to someone who is. There is no more necessity for any of these men except, perchance, the merchant tailor to make his own garments in little shops and in tenements than for him to make his own muslins and challies and lawns, his silks and linens and broadcloths. The manufacture of all these things has been, so to speak, socialized. Anyone who has seen or visited the enormous mills in Lowell or Lawrence, with their perfect adaptation of machinery to the work to be done, and with all their labor-saving devices, is led to wonder whether the ultimate solution of the present difficulties in the garment trades may not be in some such arrangement as has been suggested. Improved methods might throw some of the present workers out of employ- ment ; but there are many children who, because of immature ​642 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
age, have no business to be at work, and many women who are in poor health or should be free to perform home duties. Yet it is to be hoped that, if such a change is to be wrought, it may be in the nature of an evolution rather than of a revolution, in order that the suffering and wretchedness and hatred that attended the introduction of the factory system through the inventions of Kay, Crompton, Hargreaves, Arkwright, Cartwright, and others, may be avoided. It is further to be hoped that some of these factories may be established in the country, or at least in the outskirts of the city, where sufficient space for air and light will be available. There are surely men with the capital necessary to start large factories of this kind. There are also men with the business ability to carry on such an enterprise successfully.
The other person to be held responsible for the conditions of manufacture is the consumer. It has taken many hard lessons to teach the consumer this ; some of these came in the form of the loss of little children through the wearing of infected clothes ; others came through the contraction of disease by older people ; and the lessons have been learned by some through a mere acquaintance with the facts. For these, simply to see and know the conditions of the workers was enough, with- out any selfish interest or fear. And many there are who have not yet learned the lesson at all.
If those men whose hearts are not of stone would find out before the rush season begins what kinds of suits they wish, and would leave their orders early, some of the hurry of the height of the season might be avoided. The department stores seem to have found a way of avoiding some of their rush with ladies' tailor-made gowns, or at least a way of rewarding patience. In one or two of the best stores, late last spring, placards were noticed, "Ladies' suits made during slack season at half price," or something to that effect. Such a reduction is possible, prob- ably not because of lower wages paid to the tailors, but because there is so little to be done.
The Consumers' League recognizes the responsibility of the consumer. So much has been written and printed of the league that it is not necessary to enter into any lengthy discussion or ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 643
description ; yet its principles and aims may be briefly stated. The organization is only about ten years old, having started in England in 1890, and almost simultaneously in New York. It rests on the principles that those who buy are responsible for the conditions under which they buy and under which their goods are made ; that the demand creates the supply, and the character of the demand creates the character of the supply. The two principal objects held in view have been the attempt to secure "fair" conditions to the employes in department stores and to furnish a guarantee that clothing is not made in sweat- shops. It has been difficult to secure garments made outside of sweat-shops because of the prevalence of the system. The offi- cial label of the National Consumers' League, however, when attached to goods is a guarantee to the purchaser that they were made under clean and healthful conditions.
There has been a little ill-feeling or misunderstanding between the trades unions and the Consumers' League. The unions have felt that the league label came into competition with or interfered with theirs that it stood for a lower stand- ard than theirs. The union label stands usually for an eight- hour day and the union scale of wages ; but, as the league advocates point out, takes little account of sanitary conditions. Some of the union men have felt, too, that the members of the league were largely the wives of heads of department stores, factory owners, merchant tailors, etc., who would not concern themselves about any sweat-shop goods in which their husbands might be interested. They have felt that the league, then, could have only selfish interests in view that in considering the public health they were really caring only for their own. Yet this view seems a little unfair to some of the workers in the league, who are at least trying to see both sides and to bring about a solution of some of these problems. There seems to be need just now for some compromise in the question of labels for the introduction of a label, perhaps, which shall incorporate the advantages of both labels.
Yet even if the league meets with great success among those who pay high prices for their goods, it alone can hardly hope to ​644 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
meet the great mass of consumers for some time to come. There are those who will not be reached by an appeal based either on the danger of contagion or on the advantages to accrue to the workers. They are compelled to buy in the cheapest market, and at present those goods are cheapest which are made at the expense of long hours and low wages to the workers. This may not hold good when the factory has come in with the invention of new appliances. It is hardly probable that the Consumers' League will be responsible for all the advances, yet all are willing and anxious that it shall do all in its power, whether in the way of arousing public opinion or of encour- aging the manufacture of goods under clean and healthful con- ditions.
There is still another way of helping to bring about better conditions among the workers in the garment trades. This is by the education and assimilation of the foreign element. The first thing that is needed to effect this is to increase the number of public schools to the needs of the city. There are thousands of children in Chicago who cannot go to school because there is no room for them. If the school tax is not sufficient to provide buildings, it must be raised, or the funds must be more carefully managed. In any case every child has a right to a place in the schoolroom. The next step will be to enforce the compulsory- education law as if it really were a law, and not a flexible rule to be followed or not as meets the parents' convenience.
In the public schools the foreign children are usually brought more or less closely into touch with American children, and have an opportunity to learn American ideas and ideals. It can hardly be hoped that the older generation will be thoroughly assimilated ; but, with proper school advantages and with due attention paid to training in patriotism and institutions, there is no reason why the children may not be. If manual training can be more generally introduced into the schools, so that the chil- dren can gain a technical as well as an intellectual training for life, it is hardly probable that they will enter the class of unskilled workers on leaving school.
After this consideration of the facts as they have been in ​SOME PHASES OF SWEATING SYSTEM IN CHICAGO 645
their origin and in their development and at the present time, and after the study of the causes that have led to the develop- ment of the sweating system, and those that are responsible for its persistence, and after the conception of the ideal to be attained in the garment trades, and of the means that seem most likely to be able to bring about the realization of this ideal, one feels that two principles may be recognized. One is that there is a lack of control, a lack of best adjustment or adaptation in this part of the social situation. The other is that a part of the cause for this has been the lack of the recognition of the ethical relation that is involved in all our dealings with one another as men and women living together on this earth. There has been a lack of fellow-feeling, of social consciousness, and of social conscience. While desiring much for ourselves we have been regardless of what it has cost others. What we now wish to bring about is the chance for each man to develop every side of his life fully; to have as much "health and wealth and socia- bility and knowledge and beauty and righteousness" in his life as his nature is capable of or may be made capable of ; to have "more life, longer, fuller, higher."
NELLIE MASON AUTEN. THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO.