Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1896-10-05
THE FIELD OF LABOR.
ITEMS or INTEREST TO THE
WAGE WORKERS.
Shortening the Hours of Labor the
Only Real Cure for the Present Pain
full Industrial Situation in the
United States-Labor Notes.
Two Unfortunates.

Two Unfortunates.
Before we can hope for general pros
perity, before we can expect TO see our
country without its thousands Of hun
CRY and shivering humanity; before we
can see done away with the distressing
and unciyilized spectacle of men work
ing nearly all their waking hours for
the mere privilege of existing, there
must come a change in our system Of
employing labor.
Long before the inventive genius of
man had evolved from his God-like
brain machinery by means of which
the results of labor may be multiplied
many fold, there was an old maxim
which wisely directed the disposition of
the tWentyfour hours in each day:
Eight hours for work, eight hours for
sleep, and eight hours for play. But
the world has progressed and never
SO rapidly as during the past twenty
years. Invention has followed lnyen-
tion and machine has succeeded ma
chine with bewildering rapidity. The
youth hardly learns a trade, before ma
chinery comes in, renders his years
of labor so much time thrown away
and makes his skill of no earthly value
to him. First one trade feels the blight
ing frost Of invention and then another.
Thousands of men, skilled in their
trades, are in this country to-day will
ing and anxious to do the commonest
labor for livelihood, knowing that
never again will their skilled hands
find their wonted employment. Ma
chimes have displaced them.
Labor-saving machines we call them.
Laborer- starving machines would be
the better term under our present sys-
TEN. 70 be sure, the product is cheap
ened, but with the cheapening is re-
moved the ability to buy on the part
of thousands Inventions should be
blessings to the world-to humanity as
a whole And such they would be were
they ''labor-saying machines in real7,
ity. 1t stands to reason that as each
year goes by and new means are dis
covered of producing greater results
more and more men must be thrown
out of employment. unless the hours
Of labor are reduced to meet the new
conditions.
Labor may be represented as the Two
unfortunates-the man with too much
work to do, and the man with none"
We see one unfortunate toiling his life
away under the burden of long hours
Of labor, with no time for rest, mental
improvement, proper recreation-With
scarcely Il pleasure in life beyond that
to be found in work and mere exist
ence. His burden is as great to-day in
many branches Of trade rs before the
''labor-saving' machine was intro
duced, while in others it is made even
greater by the extra strain OF caring
for and directing the complicated mech
anism of the invention.
The other unfortunate. hungry and
ragged, prays for the privilege of help
Ing his brother with the load, but is
powerless Injustice chains him to en-
forced idleness. Were he permitted to
take up that part Of the burden which
his overWorked fellow creature should
be allowed to lay down, each would
have in all justice and humanity
enough to do, and there would disap-
pear Immediately the painful paradox
or plenty going to waste i'll the midst
of want. The farmers wheat, oats and
rye would fill the stomachs now empty,
and there would spring up such a de-
mand for manufactured products as
would speedily remove from the view
the mill ''closed for lack of market"
How about wages? That is some
thing that would adjust itself With
work enough for everybody and with
out three men looking for two mems.
jobs there would be no trouble as to
wages
How bring all this about? How are
other things brought about in this
country! Where does the power in a
republic lie? Why should a just and
humane supervision of the hours OF
labor be more difficult of attainment
than the placing of a tariff on imported
goods. than the exclusion of the China
man. than the prevention of sheep
stealing or than the prevention of ne
gro slavery?