The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-01-20
KING or THE
 LABOR UNIONS Frank Carpenter Interviews the Head of the Federation of Labor.

tons they will be followed by further reductions. 1t Is only by fighting that we can hope to hold our own. l would like to see our workmen have such system of dues as would create fund sufficient to enable them to engage in strike at any time without fear Tue employer who knows his workmen can successfully fight will not impose unfair exactions upon them.'' '
 Wages Not Too High. But. Mr. Gompers, are not wages too high in many branches of industry? "No," was the reply. ''The higher they are the better for the country ana the people. If you will look over the world you will see that the most prosperous nations and those who do most Ia tho manufacturing and commerce of the world are those Tn which the highest wages are paid. .Take the United States first, then England, and after that Ger many. All are lands of high wages and short hours and all are more prosperous than our brother nations"
 But what should govern in fixing wages-the cost of an article!
 Mot at all. The wages necessary to make the article under comfortable con- ditions should be that which fixes the price of the article, and not the price the wages"
 E1gnC dourS ana LeSS. The conversation here turned to the
 numoer of working hours, and l asked MT. Gompers whether the workingmen would be satisfied if the whole United States were run on an eight-hour basis. or whether they would not demand still | shorter days. He replied:
 "I think the time will come when the working day will be less than eight hours My idea is that the working day will con I tinually grow shorter, while wages will continually go up. I want tomorrow to be always better than today. Labor condi- tions are far better now than they were three or four decades ago, and in the fu- ture they will be just as much better in proportion. By combinations of capital. by new inventions and a better organiza- | ton of material forces. We shall, age by age, and year by years. reduce the amount of manual labor required to the minimum, and at the same time advance the reward therefor to the maximum. That Is what
 we want. the least work and the most pay, a minimum of work and maximum
 of wages. giving us the leisure to develop Il and cultivate our better natures"
 Can the Young Workingman RiseP
 "How about the unions as helping the
 ambitious workingman, Mir. Gompers
 Has the young man of today chance to succeed as he had in the past?'
 "I don't think he has as good a chance lreplied MT. Gompers. But that Is not the fault of the union. New inventions and great combinations of capital have
 destroyed the opportunities of the indi' vidual man. A generation or so ago one man, or at best two or three, could make a completed product. It did not require much capital or many men to start fac tory. Now work is so divided by i'm proved machinery that the single work man Is but one of the cogs of a very large wheel, and if he slips out another can be very easily fitted fin. A half cen
 tury ago one man made whole shoe; to- day sixty-eight men have their part 1T
 making a shoe. and each of them does but
 one thing all the day long. One man cut' the sole, another the upper, another fin ishes one part and another another, ant so on, the whole sixty-eight making th' shoe. Tn the past each one of these six . ty-eight workmen could have started { shop of his own. Now they are onl! pieces of machines, and as such can be re placed by others.
 , It Is modern invention which has de stroyed individuality, and 1t Is only b!
 combination in the union that the indi sidual can act as a whole End protec
 himself. Under the old method one mal amounted to something; now 1t is only b! combination that he is able to accomplish results. If the sixty-eight men stop, thu shoemaking cannot go on. It is the unioI that makes this possible, and thus enables . each of the slxty-eight to get his rights.
 Organized Labor in 1904. Are trades unions increasing in thu
 United States?'' "Yes," replied MT. Gompers, "Very rap
 idly. I don't know of any time in oul history when they have grown faster thai
 they are growing now. The Americal , Federation of Labor Is, you know, com posed of nearly all the international. na , tional, State, central and local unions O . the country. These unions are indepen6 ent organizations. but they work in con nection with and as part of the Amer l ican Federation of Labor. We are coll 3 tinually adding new members. During tn . past year we have issued new charter for twenty international unions, thre State federations, III central labor union f and more than 1000 local and fedora [ unions. We have al told more than 24,0O ] unions of various kinds in the federation l and our membership is very near 2OOO,OOC
 We increase our members by missionar . work on the part of organizers, whom W
 send to all sections of the United State 1 and in addition vast amount of volun l teer work Is going on on the part or tH : unions and individuals"
 3 . The Great Labor Trust. : "You say you have 100000 workingIne { | in your combination, MT. Gompers. sup 1 pose they will average s day, or l 1 the aggregate, $6.OO0.0O0 a day. or nor
 than S, ,OO0 0O0.00O year. Is not organize , labor "a trust. and where will you find trust with such power and such div 3 dends?"
 , You may call it trust" replied Mir 3 Compers with a smile, Out it Is trus for the good of the many. and not for tn | individual few. The combinations of cap IitaI try to eliminate every one but them l selves. They try to. freeze out as many O.
 their own members as they can, and the
 biR fish eat the little ones. Our trust. fl won call it so. is open to all. We wei
 come every one, and our only aim is tine
 good of the country and of all the mem-
 bers of our organization"
 ''Will the day come when all labor m
 this country will be organiZed?"
 ''I think so,' replied Mir .Gompers. Tt
 is coming fast"
 Organized Labor vs. Anarchy.
 ''But will not combination such IS vou have be a menace to the government? You have 100000 now, embracing,
 should say. one-seventh of the voters of the United States. At the present rate of
 increase your organization might soon be
 auRurate policies, and rule or ruin the
 country.
 "Organized labor will certainly increase
 as an economic force" said MT. Comp
 CTS. ''although, as at present organized