The state rights democrat. [volume] (Albany, Linn County, Oregon) 1865-1900, 1866-03-03
PURITAN WHITE SLAVERY.


There is going on all over the country
a general movement to secure reduction
of the legal term of daily labor to eight
hours, and the Legislature of Massachu-
sets have appointed a Committee to look
into the subject From report Of that
Committee tho following extracts are de-
rived:
A discussion here arose
among the Commissioners az to whether
the testimony of the parties from Fall
River should heard. The witnesses were
two men who were operatives in Fall
River factory. Before giving in their
testimony they asked the reporters to
suppress their names, as their employers
would throw them out of employment if
they learned that they had been before
the Commission One of them said:
We work eleven hours during the
day have worked twenty years in the old
country, and eight years here; had work
ed harder in the last eight years than in
the other twenty he has to walk an ag-
gregate of from twenty to twenty
miles day, attending a spinning jack
until within three months he had to work
hard all the noon in cleaning up, and had
to get bites at intervals from his dinner
kettle; now this cleaning work was done
only on Saturday. The operatives have
to work harder here than in England if
reduction of the hours would bring with
it reduction of wages, still he would go
for it heart and soul. The machinery
had to be oiled before starting up in addi-
ton to the eleven hours in some of the
mills on Fall river little children have to
work eleven hours day, and the Law to
prohibit such hard labor vas never en-
forced against the factory owners some
parents were obliged to take their child.
ron from school and send them to work
in the mills"
The other operative said:
/ am spinner; have no education
and am sorry for it; have two little boys
one seven and the other nine years. who
work in the mill they get 81 30a week
aud work seventy hours each wanted t.
have the hours of labor shortened so tha
he could send his boys to school; hi.
condition here as factory operative va.
harder than in England"
These witnesses stated that operative
who had been prominent IN movement
for fair wages had been discharged, other
were employed in their places, and tn,
discharged men had travelled from plac,
to place. seeking employment, but coult
obtain none; that when any of them dit
get employment, it was only for a few
days, and then they were discharged
without any apparent reason. and from
no cause but secret understanding be
tween the owners of the mills.
j This is in Massachusetts in " glorious
hev R6efHa s6rieef fSf hlssdsshp1f llssdo& f4dm saBs aBh
to December. And these uretchad, ovel
worked, persecuted operatives, are tn
Massachusetts, freemen-the subjects c
the Commonwealth where Phillips live
and leeturas; where Garrison continual
] bewails the wrongs of "the poor, dowr
trodden, oppressed African )" where th
mole-eyed fanatic. Whittier, composes {
/ many sensational but souiisss Odss an
, verses to !" Liberty % where Sumner h:
under his very nose every day more
t wrong, oppression, wsctehednsss, miser
} servility and absolute slavery, than WI
ever seen or known among the slaves
: the South; and where Puritan, Abol
E ton orators aad damagoguas, preachs
a and disunionists, editors and politician
r strong minded women and incendiary t
r natics generally. have for so many yea
e continually and pertinaciously dwelt {
a the horrors of slavery"
: Why has it never occurred to the
!. self-eoastitatsd philanthropists to say
word or lend their sympathy in favor
+ the poor operatives who toll in their Nc
t England factories, and who are so near
e slaves that they dare not allow their el
ployers to know that they have said wo
Q or made an effort for the alienation
their own condition The negro is fire.
now their standard subject for declam
}, ton is declared abolished the " plant
:, ton lords" are " subjugated )" now,
;, the philanthropists give some Of tbs
: attention to the factory lords" of ths
= = own New England.