Morning journal and courier., 1882-05-15
Monday Morning, May 15, 1882.
TRADEs-UNIONs AND BOYS.


 Judge Wylie, of Washington, in sentencing young man to the penitentiary for larceny the other day took occasion to say that he could not see how young man can get a trade now because the trades.unions control the matter of apprenticeship. And he at tributed ''the universal idleness'' of the American boy to the action of the trades unions. Moved by these remarks 8 profess sional gentleman wrote to a Washington pa- per giving an account of his experience in 1 trying to learn 8 trade. When he was fifteen | years old he had desire to become ma | chinist. He had liking for the trade and | also some knowledge of it. Armed with good recommendations he visited every re- putable machine shop in great northern city, spending weeks in the task. Every where he met the same response "We would be glad to take you, but the Machin- ists' Union will not allow it." Great shops employing 800 men and more were allowed to take only two apprentices at time by that organization. Barred from the trade he preferred he sought a chance to learn any one of number of others. It was the same with every one. A union barred him out, and at last he went into an office to drive quill ten hours 8 day for $1.5O week. Three brothers had the same experience, only one in the family getting chance to learn trade.
 The case of this gentleman was hard one, and there are doubtless many others in this country who could tell a similar story. houa cb,f oY,4 men from trades and they will probably shut out many more, but it is hardly fair to at- tribute what Judge Wylie called 'the uni versal idleness" of the American boy to the trades unions. We are inclined to think that the Providence Journal is nearer right when it says: 'In the last analysis, the reason why American boys gre not learning trades is that they have no inclination to learn them Neither they HOT their parents desire their entrance upon life of manual labor in the field or workshop. No preachment upon the dignity of labor, nor upon the independence and usefulness of the agriculturist and skilled mechanic has the slightest effect upon the reason or purposes of father or son. The boy will not till the soil nor live as his father AAo oAo oOCS3 HUT VIII uo uoFOge GuEG6 yohTS to the learning of trade, exercising the re- quisite industry and economy. Nor is this by any means to be accounted for by saying that because of the use of machinery there is in every trade a sub division of labor not known in the earlier days. The master me- chanic must understand his business now as then. The trade, whatever it is, demands as much ability, more general information, and is as profitable as ever. The methods have changed but the substance remains and has been vastly enlarged. No machinery nor the minutest division of work into specialties can do away with the necessity for comps- tent carpenter if good house is to be built"
 The truth is, it is not as respectable" in this country to work with the hands as it once was and as it still ought to be. Young men do not see any dignity in manual labor, 4 and most of them would rather be clerks or bookkeepers, or struggle for place in the overcrowded learned professions than to master good useful trade. They could be moro independent and happier with trade, but they do not take 8 sensible view of the matter. And it must, in fairness, be said that society encourages them in their mistak- en notions. The result is a great deal of un- necessary and harmful idleness, false pride and suffering.