The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1900-05-08
A GOOD THING.
Eight Hour Day Endorsed Without
Reserve by House Labor
c,onl11iffae

committee.
washington, May SIN view of the |
recent 8-hour movement throughout the |
country the report made to the house of |
representatives today by Chairman |
Gardner Of the committee on labor on |
the Gardner S-hour bill and the general
subject of S-hour legislation has a time |
ly interest The bill requires a clause |
in all government contracts that the |
labor under the contract shall not eX- |
coed eight hours daily. The report says
in part:
TT is contended by the advocates of
the shorter day that the additional
leisure given to labor in every instance
of the shortening of the work day as it
has been shortened step by step from
sixteen hours to fourteen, twelve eleven, |
ten, nine and in many instances eight
has resulted in a decrease of intemper-
ance among laborers, the requirement
of better taste and new and better de-
sireS, resulting in better homes, greater
domestic felicity, and q higher degree of
intelligence, with an increase OF laud-
able pride as to the clothing of them
selves and those dependent upon them.
In a word, it has increased their in
terests in home and better social rela-
tions, raising their moral status, and
has made them much better consumers
of the products of labor and hence re-
suited in increased production.
THE proposition that without varia-
ton the elimination of intemperance,
poverty, pauperlsm, ignorance, crime
and their accompanying evils move
parallel with and proportionate to the
increase of the social opportunities of
the laboring class stands without i'm
parchment of it's historical accuracy. No
recognized authority today combats the
proposition that the condition of the
laborer has improved with every reduc-
ton in the hours of daily service that
has up to this time been made. Nobody
is disputing that he has become a better
consumer with each reduction. No rea-
sonable person would for moment
entertain the proposition that the work
day should again be heightened to four
teen or twelve hours When the hours
of work We're so long, that workers had
no social opportunities they resorted to
stimulants for solace and the saloon for
society, where they encountered an iron
law for spending which could not be
| diSregarded without loss of caste in the
only society which they had opportunity
| to enter. A gentleman Of responsibility
and exceptional opportunity for ObseIv-
! alton has borne testimony that the
| shortening of the work day has Danish
/ ed blue Monday
| "A significant fact in connection with
| the shortening of the work day at var
| ious times during the present century
! is the entire silence OF the older school
/ of economists with regard to the effect
| Of the shorter work day on society, bust
ness, industrial conditions. or the labor
| erS themselves. 1t is nowhere claimed,
| in so far as your committee is aware
| that any reduction in the hours of labor,
| has had a detrimental effect on bust
| ness, on manufacturers, on labor as a
unit, or individual laborers The advo-
| Gates of the short hour theory on the
| other hand trace the moral, social and
financial improvement of the labOrer to
this cause and allege that business was
at no time injured, but improved if af-
| fected and that production was stimu-
| lated and consumption increased.
Economists who advocate the S-hour
| day contend with great p1auSibility that
the shorter day results in an increase of
| xx-e. e~ot- an i11a Of nc
greater consumption enlargeS produce
ton and the larger the scale of produc-
ton, the cheaper the given article is
produced; that the laborer, when he has
the leisure, resulting from the shorter
hours, has new aspirations, ambitions
and greater personal self-respect and as
before stated wants a better house, bet
ter furniture, better clothes, better food
and becomes a great deal better con-
sumner; that the scale of wages is con-
trolled by the wants of the laborer in
any given state of society, rather than
by the iron law of wages that modern
men cease to work under normal condi-
lions if the proceeds of their labor dc
not satisfy their normal wants; that
therefore the social status of the laboreI
controls the law of wages to as great ar
extent as the law of wages controls the
status of the labOrer.
while there is still a variance OF
opinion on the general question whether
modern machinery and methods sc
? tighten the physical drudgery of mOst
occupants as to have an equivalent eff
feet to the shortening of hours in the
conservation of energy or whether sucf
machinery and methods operate to 81
tax the nervous powers as to be equiv
alent in exhaustive effects to the length
ening of hours, your committee are o.
5 opinion, after what has been said OF
: both sides, that the higher tension o
, modern employment is at least a full
: Offset to the saving accomplished II
2 muscular force"
/ The report also presents an elaborat
review of the 8-hour legislation in all tn
I states and the previous S-hour statute
enacted by the federal government