The evening times. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1906-1914, 1907-04-05
Labor Notes

The trade union membership of
Australia is said to be only about
100000.
Work will be commenced within the
next few months on the magnificent
labor temple to be erected in Kansas
City.
Union men affiliated with the iron
trades council in San Francisco have
voted to strike May l. More than
5000 men are involved.
President Henry Lafavour of Sim
mons college is authority for the
statement that about so per cent. of
the women of Massachusetts are wage
earners, and that the number is stead
lily increasing.
Organized labor in Los Angeles is
planning to establish a bank. 1t will
be financed and operated wholly by
trades unionists. 1t is proposed to
place the institution in the new labor
temple.
The German government has dis
charged all parents in government
employ in Prussian Poland whose
children Joined in the strike against
the compulsory use of the German
language for religious instruction in
the schools.
Great activity is being displayed in
an effort to unionize the Hebrew
workers of Boston and vicinity. Sew
eral unions in various crafts which
had declined in membership and DOW
er have been revived.
The International Seamen's Union
of America, which is but twelve years
old, now comprises the local unions of
seamen in all branches of the calling
sailors, firemen, cooks stewards, bay
and river steamboat men, etc.-in the
ca, Pacific, Atlantic, gulf and the
great lakes.
The most peculiar strike ever
known in England was inaugurated
recently by the bell ringers of St.
Giles parish church, New Castle-un-
der-Lyne. The ringers stated that
they were deprived of some of their
privileges and were forced to walk
out, in order to secure redress. The
strike has lasted for several months,
during which time the bells have not
been rung.
A report issued by Labor Commits
sioner Stafford of California, states
that nearly 10 per cent. of the restau-
rants in San Francisco are Japanese,
and that Japanese and Chinese en-
ployes of the Oriental restaurants
work an average of twelve hours
day, while rs per cent. of the white
employees of the Caucasian restaurants
work but ten hours a day. Nine per
cent. of the japanese work fourteen
to fifteen hours a day.
Although the list of states fixing
fourteen years as the legal age for
working slowly lengthens, there are
still a number of exceptions. The
legal age for beginning work remains
at ten years in Nebraska Tin vaca-
tom, and in Alabama and Arkansas
at all times for children of widows and
disabled fathers. Maine, New Hamp-
shire and Vermont are the only re-
naming northern states which permit
factory work at the age of twelve
years.
King Edward VII. is said to be a
| firm believer in union labor. When
he was yet the Prince of Wales. he
frequently showed his sympathy with
the cause of unionism. Since he be-
came king, he has allowed no work
to be performed for his household that
is not done by union labor, and he has
informed the lord chamberlain If any
case was brought to his notice of any
firm serving the royal household de-
Ginning to recognize trades unions and
pay the union scale, he should take
steps at once to have them do so, or to
transfer the royal household business
to firms that were fair to union labor.
The first time in history that the
public ever asked parliament for laws
to protect women and children was
in the year 1900, after an epidemic of
fever among the underground work
ers. The protection which parlia-
ment accorded was to restrict the
hours of labor for children to twelve,
and to set the age at nine years when
a child might be employed. This &C.
ton was the real beginning of or
ganized protest on the part of the
/. English people against established
customs.
Irrigation is doing wonders for the
west. The farmer who irrigates doesn't
have to wait or pray for rain. He sim
ply turns on the moisture as he needs
1t. An authority who is familiar with
the subject estimates that there is
enough unsettled land in what IS
| known as the Pacific Coast states