The progressive farmer., 1901-05-28
THE EVILS OF OUR PRESENT FACTORY
LABOR SYSTEM.

LABOR SYSTEM.
Ever since the writer became editor
of The Progressive Farmer, this
paper has been demanding law to
prevent the employment of child
labor in our factories and to prevent
the over working of factory hands.
We hoped for such law from the
last General Assembly, but because
that body failed to do it's duty in
this respect, we are none the less
determined to continue our efforts
until humane labor law is placed
upon our statute books. Quite re
Gently came the significant state
ment from Superintendent Murphy,
Of the State Hospital, that the mum.
ber of cotton mill operatives who be-
come insane is out of all proportion
to the rest of the population. This
is but one evidence of many Of the
wretched brutality of the system
now in force in the South, fOstered
by a spirit of soulless commercial
ism. 1t is literally a case of the
man VS.. the dollar. Childhood is
being robbed of its joys, young man
hood and womanhOOd enervated and
wrecked, and age broken down by
yoke too heavy to be borne. Yet
our law makers touch not the bur
dens with one of their fingers, be-
cause, forsooth, capital is timid,
and labor law might frighten our
capitalistic benefactors. AS the
Farm and Ranch aptly says:
"We would be delighted to see
factories dot the Southwest from end
to end, wherein honest labor could
earn an honest recOmpense. But we
want no institution that depends for
dividends upon the labor of physic
ally frail women and tender infancy.
Factories that can't live without
such labor, the poorest paid of all
labor, have no right TO live at all,
should promptly go into the hands
of a receiver and have their affairs
wound up. There should be law
in every State prohibiting the
employment of children of ten
der age in factories, and regulat
ing the hours and manner Of labor
of women. We would rather never
see u spindle twirled in all the South
than that the present pre- Vailing sys-
tenn of labor adopted in Southern
cotton imills should continue"
In the Georgia Legislature some
months ago, Hon. Seaborn Wright,
representing a district which con
tains many cotton mills, made an
eloquent speech in behalf of the bill to
prohibit child labor, which was then
pending. In the course OF this
speech, Mr.. Wright said:
"rhe spirit anim4ting the opposi-
tion to this bill is the spirit of com
mercialism. 1t knows no pity. 1t
chills every generous thought and
deadens every holy feeling. 1t
measures all things, manhood, wo-
manhood ana childhood by the dol
lar. The heLrts ard brains, aye, the
puny weight of childhood, are valu
able only as they are coined into
money. You lay your little children
at the feet of Eastern capital and
say: "All this will we give in ex-
change for your dollars.
I lift the standard Of revolt to-
day, and in the name of the South
denounce the Unholy traffic
II would like to see every boil of
cotton, whose white bosom opens to
the kiss of Southern suns spun and
woven in the South, but this is a
price 1 would not pay for it,"
This is indeed one of the problems
about which our people should think
seriously, and which should be con-
sidered IN the selection of members
of the Legislature.
We must have u humane labor
law from the Legislature of 1908.