The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1907-06-22
MANS SALVATION IS
IN union OF LABOR
Through No Other System Can
Labor Secure Better Work.
ing Conditions.
Every Workingman Should Be a
Member of Some Useful La
Dor Organization.

only hope and security while we live
under the commercial system which
reigns today. Sugar coat it as we
may, labor is today a. commodity, and
the capitalist goes into the market
and buys 1t as cheaply as it can be
purchased. So there seems to be no
limit to the lowering of wages were
there no preventing forces. Mems
very necessities compel them to COM
pete with one another until the very
lowest possible living price is reached.
The fact that man has wife and
several children does not always urge
him on to demand higher wages in
order to support them. He is, indeed,
more helpless than the single man.
He dare not be idle; his family will
starve. and so he is compelled to beg
for chance to work at any price;
consequently the single man is often
discharged to make room for the
married man whose family's needs
drive him to work for less.
The one man who refuses to work
unless he is better paid can accom-
plish but little, but a hundred men
| doing the same thing at the same
time can bring about wonderful re-
suits. The force they WELD is some
thing that must be reckoned with.
Combination is the workingman's
| only weapon against the encroach-
| ments of well-entrenched capital.
The struggle between the two forces
have been many and bitter. Great
| suffering. deep enmities, hunger, de-
| spair have resulted from these COM
bats, and because of this it is said
trade unions are wrong and should
be destroyed. But struggles are never
pleasant things. Must we then SUI
| pinely submit to any wrong that is
tween peace at any price" and "the
| hell Of war;" Who would purchase
modern, civilized, aspiring working
quiet at the price of iberty? Not the
man, who is Americas best citizens.
Combination for self-defense and
| security is the first lesson o. the freed
wage-earner. It has not been an easy
lesson. The primitive type of man
could hunt and fish as an Individual;
could even build a shelter alone and
! prepare the skins Of animals for
clothing. Association was not then so
much necessity III times of peace as
a pleasure. Danger from wild ami
mails, human enemies, the rage Of the
elements urged them to combine for
| self-defense. but in peaceful, produce
| tive labor each man could work and
! protect himself lone. But then, no
one disputed his right to all he pro-
duced; If anyone did, it was equiva-
lent to declaration of war. AS labor
became more complicated, requiring
more tools and more complex ar
| rangements, laborers became DIVERSE
fled and classes sprang up. Combi-
nation for mutual security and de-
tense became a necessity. The trade
union or guild is. a very ancient af-
fair, and even yet the good Of all is
a more modern movement, and one
| that has made progress with some
difficulty. Many obstacles have been
In a manner overcome by the Amer
! lean Federation of Labor in this
country, and the task has been most
gigantic one. In the last twenty five
years the change has been marvellous.
| We have had to deal with laborers
| from every country on the globe,
speaking all languages, possessing
thousands of varying prejudices; they
have been stupidity selfish, blindly sell
| fish, and through that very sel1shness
have stood in their own way; and
they have been more or less stepped
in ignorance and servility. But such
have been caught, taught, trained,
pulled and pushed into something like
order, and the first principles of mu-
tual combination for the interest Of
! all has seeped into their understand
! ings. Today the workingmen Of
America are generally intelligent and
| we'll informed. They are far from
being perfect and from really compre-
hending their own rights they have
not thoroughly ilnbibed the principle
! Of layalty to one another. and they
are not cool and calm and suave and
polite at all times, as are some en-
ployers even while deceiving and
wronging them.
Every workingman knows some-
thing about the ''union," and he knows
that he must hold some relation to
it, either that Of mutual support or
Of direct antasonism; and every
! worker, from the humblest to the
highest in position, is better off for
the existence of the union" The
poorest toiler receives more for his
labor than he would have done but
for the, union" He may have de-
nounclu the trade organizations with
scorn; he may have called them
tyrannical" and declared his inde-
pendence of them by working where
and when and how he pleased" but
nevertheless. he has profited by them,
and but for their hard earned victo-
RIGS he would he no better situated
than the Chinese coolie, working ten
hours a dav for two cert3.
The most noticeable strides have
been made in the ranks of women
workers! Twenty-Five years ago
women had just emerged from the
seclusion and work of home. Follow
ing the trend Of production from the
spinning wheels Of factories and mills,
women developed from the home
maker and worker to the wage
Garner She became part Of an army,