Morning journal and courier., 1881-04-27
gournal ana Gauier.
Wednesday Morning, April 27, 1881.

JOHN D. OARRINQTON.
 EDWARD T. oARHINGroN. JOHN B.. cARRINaToN, yR. Wednesday Morning, April P, 1881. TEN HOURS BETTER THAN MORE. The reports of the Massachusetts Bureau
 of Statistics of Labor. prepared by MT. Car
 roll D. Wright, are valuable contributions to
 the discussion of social questions. Perhaps
 the most interesting part of the twelfth re- port, just published, is that which relates to
 uniformity of hours of labor in the mills in
 the States of Maine, New Hampshire, Massa- chusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island and | New York. Massachusetts is now the | only ten-hour State in this group, but it is found that Massachusetts with ten hours produces as much per man, or per loom, or per spindle, grade for grade, as other States with eleven or more hours. Wages also rule as high or higher in Massachusetts, and there is | no reason, concludes Mir. Wright, why the mills in all these States should not adopt ten hours.
 During the autumn of 1880 all the States named above were thoroughly canvassed and data bearing on the question secured from 246 manufacturing establishments and 545 employees. The establishments visited com prehended all grades of mills engaged in tex tile manufactures. The report gives numer- ous instances of recent changes to ten hours
 with good results One employer said: eve
 get better class of help and the improve
 ment in this particular is worth quite as
 much to us as the eleventh hour" A Con necticut silk firm says it cannot afford to run | more than ten hours and is building mill in Massachusetts, ten-hour State. A large
 cotton mill, surrounded by eleven-hour mills,
 accomplishes more work in ten hours and
 has adopted that rule. A woolen mill in an
 eleyen-hour State has for ten years by pref erence run ten hours Three woolen mills
 in an eleven-hour district long since profit
 ably reduced the time from twelve hours to
 ten carpet mill employing 1, TOO per
 sons, reduced from twelve to ten twenty-five
 years ago and has run since without a break
 and with success The Willimantic Linen
 company reduced to ten hours two years ago.
 with no loss after the first six months. MT.
 Wright gives some interesting impressions
 from the reports of his agents as follows:
 We have learned how little the manufac-
 turers sometimes understand the operatives.
 Not seldom has 1t happened that after the
 manager of a mill has expressed his own
 view, and confidently declared it to be that
 of his employees also, our agent upon inter
 viewing them has found their real view quite
 the opposite of that which their employer
 supposed. Perhaps no one impression is so deeply made as this wide and intense con- trast of feeling which exists between the manufacturer and operative with reference to matters which intimately concern them both
 | 1 Il AL
 of our agents upon going directly from the
 one to the other, and hearing them both
 speak their minds freely and fully upon the same subject. As further result we have found that large majority of the manufac- turers would prefer ten hours to any greater number, Eff only all would agree to it." Re peatedly has it occurred, when our agents have made known their errand, that almost the first words of the manufacturer would be,
 s'It (ten hours) would be better for manufac- turer and operative if it could only be made universal ;'' and these words always spoken 50 spontaneously as to show that they were the expression of settled conviction, may be fairly taken to express the united wisdom of the manufacturers of textile fabrics in New York and New England.
 MT. Wright points out that the question of ten hours is not merely, nor even mainly, an economic question. It is chiefly human question. He says
 Not yet is the mill more than the man; and. if it ever comes to be, then society will begin to die. Therefore, for all humane people, the highest thought concerning even a cotton factory must be the welfare of the operatives. But the welfare of the opera tives cannot be secured without their own active cooperation. To seek for ten hours, instead of eleven, eleven and half and twelve hours, is to seek for better conditions fo1r fha Rpt hatfar will not make the persons better, without the persons appreciate the better conditions, and aspire to improve themselves by a fit use of them. The aspirations of men are the pow CT by which society grows up to higher con ditions, and nobler state of existence and this power which blossoms in efforts after g nobler state springs out of the greatest de- sire of their hearts. To know the greatest desire of mems hearts is to know what there is of good or ill, of hope or fear, for them in the future. What is the greatest desire of the factory operatives? We reply, beyond the factory operatives of America, relative to employment, is for ten hours.
 In all the investigations but three serious objections were urged against the adoption of ten hours The first is the small mills Their one voice was: ''Ten hours would de- stroy us" But Mir. Wright points out that they work at disadvantage anyway, and that they may fairly be left out of the acconnt in the beginning of ten-hour movement. The l second objection may be stated in three 1 words-whiskey, tobacco and loafng. MT. 1 Wright in reply to this objection pertinently | asks: To which portion of the people l should the general condition of society be shaped, to the well-behaved or the ill.be- 1 haved? The third objection is the presence 1 of the Canadian French, who are called ''the | Chinese of the Eastern States" They are l industrial invaders, not stable settlers Con corning this objection MT. Wright says:
 Now, it is not strange that so sordid and 1 low people should awaken corresponding feelings in the managers, and that these | such people. the better, and that to work | them to the uttermost is about the only good | use they can be put to. Nor is 1t strange that this impression is so strong that the mana i gers overlook for the time being all the rest of the operatives and think that everything | should be shaped to these lowest ones Yet | the same principle which we have stated as 1 showing the right way of conduct in the for | ner case should direct here also. Society | should be shaped to the better portion of the 1 people; and where the case requires 1t the | laws should be so amended and enforced that | these people will either De coerceo to con- form to our established ways or else go where | the already established ways of the country | do please them.
 It thus appears, from full survey of the whole field, that the objections urged against the universal adoption of ten-hour day are not really serious obstacles. A little reso- | lute energy, and some improvements in meth | ods. and they will all vanish. It appears also that there is no economic hindrance to block | the way of ten-hour day. If all would | act together, and make the change, then all will be in equally as good condition for sue cess as now. - EDITORIAL NOTES. The Maine prohibitory law has brought l considerable money into the public treasury. 1