The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1905-04-22
HIGH IDEAL Of LIVING
IS TRADE UNIONS AIM
Prof. Graham Taylor of Chi
cago Common Speaks for
Union Labor.
Tells Minneapolis Church Peo-
ple What Good Labor
Unions are Doing.

Minneapolis, April 20.-As an apostle
of social settlement work and an ad-
vocate of closer relations between or
ganized labor and the church, Prof
Graham Taylor, dean Of the Chicago
Commons. and well known for his sue
cessful efforts in hettering the condi-
ton of the poor, addressed three public
meetings in Minneapolis Sunday.
In the morning he spoke at Plymouth
church. telling of the great necessity
for social settlement work and what is
accomplished by it. He spoke of the
great benefit of such work to the life
of a city, and said that what is needed
is more of community feeling, making
the city what it should be, compact
of families or kind of municipal
household.
Professor Taylor has been member
of the municipal voters league of Chi
cago for over ten years and. speaking
from experience. he says that few
men standing out for clean politics can
accomplish much and put to rout d
large number of grafters.
In this connection he told of his own
work in the Seventeenth ward Of Chi
cago, where he and his family have
resided for many years and where his
settlement work has been conducted.
This ward was once noted not only for
the peculiarly isolated feeling Of its in
ha bitants, but also as being the ward
represented by the worst alderman In
the city.
All this has been changed through
the gathering together of the different
classes with the Commons as a center.
and the intermingling of employer and
employe. Political conditions have also
been greatly improved until now the
ward is represented in the city council
by men Of high character.
Speaking in the evening at the Lyn-
dale Avenue Congregational church, on
the subject What There Is in Common
Between Organized Labor and Organiz-
ed Religion" Professor Taylor deliv-
cred an address which was in great
measure a defense of labor unions. The
union as we'll as the church, he said
stands for high ideal of living.
He illustrated this point by showing
that one Of the principal objects of the
labor unions in demanding higher
wages for their members has been that
the ldUOIlA6 pcOplc live Dell0T
keep their children in school longer and
keep the wives and mothers at home
He laid much emphasis on the last
point, saying that many children were
ruined through lack of mothers care
the mother frequently being unable ia
look after them in the evenings because
she is obliged to go down town and
scrub the floors in an office building
in order to earn sufficient money to
exc out her husbands salary.
The work Of the labor unions In
agitating the child labor question was
also brought prominently before the
audience, Professor Taylor relating
how they, cooperating with Jane
Adams and other settlement work.
ers had prevented the passage of an
act by the legislature of Illinois, grant
ing permissions for the employment of
children on the stage and in glass fac
tories. He expressed regret that the
churches as organizations had never
taken any active part in movements
to secure better laws of this character.
Continuing the discussion, the speak
er declared that the laboring man was