St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1894-06-10

member. It will be remembered that in set
Ting q strike this man required the en-
plOyers to pay 500 for the benefit Of the
Union, for which he was prosecuted, convict
cd and sentenced to the pententiary. A stay
was granted and he went to Boston. The
Court Of Appeals reaffirmed the decision by
a majority vote, the minority holding that no
crime had been committed, and Mr.. Baron
dess, to the surprise of his prosecutors, re-
turned to New York and gave himself up.
After serving portion OF his sentence be
was pardoned by Governor Flower, on the
ground that he did not know he was break
ing the law in demanding the money and that
he had no criminal intent. Mr.. Barondess is
an able, earnest-looking, handsome man, that
no one would take for a criminal. and he has
probably done more than any other man in
the United States to bring public opinion to
bear against the sweating system. But there
is a sweat shop in the very house where his
Union has it's headquarters and where they
publish in Hebrew the Union Zeittng, and in
this very sweat shop in the early days Of this
month it was found that they had the
measles.
Smallpox was epidemic in Brooklyn in
March, April and May. The scare was 80 great
that the Board Of Health sent doctors with
guards of policemen, said by the papers to be
one hundred strong, to make night raids on
tenement house districts. They would sur
round block, and leaving some on guard,
enter the houses, forcing the doors that were
not opened to them and subduing with clubs
those who strenuously resisted vaccination,
carrying on the raid as late as two o'clock in
the morning. Many died of smallpox, and
it is literal and proven fact that more than
one died Of vaccination by force. 1t must
have been serious emergency that justified
the measures taken to stamp out the disease,
but, after all, those measures were not
thorough; the doctors did not go through all
the slums, much less all the tenement house
districts, and it is quite safe to say that there
was many case of the disease in mild
form that escaped altogether the notice of
the doctors. The disease was especially rife
in the Eastern District, the seat of the cloth
ing industry in Brooklyn. How many gar
ment infected with smallpox has been
packed up there and sent out to scatter
germs Of this disease elsewhere no one can
tell, but that there is an element of danger in
the case, any one must know. And, if danger
in this case, why not more Or less danger Of
some disease from every garment made in
each vile den of a sweat shop in New York,
q danger, too, scattered North, South, East
and West, where, in the United States, the
ready-made clothing trade of New York ex-
tends. And the little noted sp,t,tn of con-
sumptive workers on the dirty floorl Dried
up in the heated room, the invisible baccilh
borne in the air to the garments in process
of manufacture, and carried in them far away
to decrease the chances of life of some delicate
person with no idea of the risk involved with
his necessary economist Surely, in the
aggregate, the risks from the infected gar
ments must be more serious evils than the
sad and shortened lives of the workers, or
the infections and contagious spread in the
manufacturing city. And if the city of
Brooklyn was justified in its drastic mode of
stamping out smallpox, or even if it was
not justified in going so far, are not we justi-
fed in doing something, not only through
public opinion, but by the action of the law, to
mitigate the evils of the sweat shops of New
York.
Boston is not paradise for clothing
workers, but sweat shops of the New York
kind are there unknown. They have law
against sweat shops in Massachusetts,, and
although it is not SO thorough as that of New
York, the authorities have habit of enforcing
it.
The New York law provides ii,at 10 room
or apartment in any tenement house in
habited as dwelling or part of a dwelling
shall be used as clothing factory, except
that the husband, wife and children COM
prising one family there living, may manu-
facture clothing. In the excepted case the
place shall be deemed workshop, and it and
the articles there worked upon shall be sub
ject to inspection by the Board of Health or
special inspecting officers, who must be noti-
fled by the tenant whenever he thus appro-
PIRATES his dwelling to manufacturing pur-
poses. The inspectors may require healthy
conditions, and they may destroy, if need be,
infected clothing. These provisions of the
law, if carried out as they could be, with the
active cooperation of all intelligent clothing
workers, would destroy all the worst features
Of the system. It is the little filthy tenement,
with the family quarters crowded, and for
unconscionable hours, with dirty workers,
that is the most dangerous breeder of dis
ease, and which by the elimination of rent,
air, and reasonable light from the bill of
necessary expenses, makes the standard Of
living one Of slowly dying, and the piece
price wages SO low that the workers outside
of these sweat shops cannot preserve healthy
conditions of life.
The New York law also provides for labels
on all goods manufactured in these family
workshops, and it requires the Mayor to
appoint persons to enforce the law, while it
provides for permits for family workshops,
conducted under sanitary conditions. It is
most unfortunate that such a law should be
dead letter through the apathy and neglect
or, possibly, gross corruption of State and
local officers whose duty is to enforce it.
This clothing trade is also great ques-
ton of interstate commerce. Congress has
been investigating it and clearly has right
to deal with it in that relation. But how to
deal with it within the limit of Federal
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