The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1900-10-13
UNION LABEL BOOM
THE LABEL IS A PEACEFUL WEA-
pom FOR LABOR.

With the Purchaser-The Label
Will Danish the Sweat Shop aud
Tenement House Labor.
That this world contains many self
ish people who have no thought for the
welfare of others is undoubtedly true,
but we believe the. vast majority of
people act from good motives and in
tend to so conduct themselves as to
benefit their fellows rather than injure
them, says the Boot and Shoe Worker.
If their personal conduct does at
times indirectly cause injury to anoth-
er, it is because they are not cogni-
zant of the natural consequences of
their own act, and yet the gravest in
jury may be done their fellow beings,
and sooner or later react upon them
selves.
This applies with peculiar force to
all persons when purchasing goods of
any kind.
The purchaser Of goods makes de-
mand for labor to the extent of the
purchase.
The purchaser is for the time being
the employer of the labor engaged in
producing the particular kind of goods
and it rests with the purchaser to de-
eide what kind Of labor he will pat
ronize or employ. It is in the power
of the purchaser to use labor we'll or
ill.,
If purchaser of fruit, while ap-
preaching the stand, should see the
fruit dealer strike a little girl a blow,
not one in hundred would purchase
fruit at that stand, no matter how at
tractive the fruit. They would feel a
resentment against that particular
dealer and would, go elsewhere, be-
cause this case came under their per-
sonal observation.
Yet the same Individual might go
into shoe store bent wholly on pleas
ing the eye and the purse and buy
shoes without thought of the conditions
under which they were made or what
sort of brute ran. the factory. Hun
dreds of little girls may be ruined for
life by hard work at a tender age,
whole families may be Impoverished by
the unbearable conditions, women may
faint through fear of fines, or may be
brutally advised to 3 augment their
inca gre wa ses III 81 life of All
! inds lslla all iols
il! b.
iets lisiE -
bread from laN-a ding scft e,S, or
|thGy may be made b,yI Asiiaitlic labor at
a few cents day, or they may be
made by firms who publish pictures Of
factories full Of girls and boys Of school
|age. Any of these conditions may ex-
list and still the we'll neanings purchas-
Ter buys the shoes in blissful ignorance
Iof what evil systems Of labor may have
produced the shoes, because not made
under his personal observation. -
All this injury to unfortunate human
beings cannot be eradicated in mo-
ment, but every purchaser can make
sure his money and influence has not
been uesed to encourage employers to
maltreat their employees and employees
to tamely submit to injustice and op-
preston, no matter how attractive the
goods.
The union label affords the purchaser
the only assurance that the goods are
made under conditions tending to per-
petuate free institutions.
In purchasing union label goods the
purchaser may rest assured that the
goods were not made by convicts or
Asiatics, or under conditions calculat-
ed and in many cases intended to de-
grade the standard of living of the
wage workers., who are the real found
alton of society and of government. If
all right-minded people fully UNDER
stood the good they would do by pur-
chasing goods only bearing the union
label and the evil they encourage by
buying goods not bearing the union
label, the power for good of the union
label, great as it is, would be in
creased a thousandfold in a single
day. g.,
. Rapid progress is now being made
in this direction. One after another
of the strong unions of labor are en-
listing themselves in union label work.
Other societies are falling in line. If
all who seek the same result should
once act together, this world would be
a different and better place in which
to live. The result is worth the effort.
The progress made should stimulate
all unionists to even more determined
efforts. Boom all union labels.