The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1908-01-11
GOSPEL MINISTER ! ].
.FAVORS. Uh|0h|SM
Believes in the Righteousness,
Wisdom, Necessity, and Eter-
nal Future of Movement. =
Considers Non Union Men Fool.
ish and Inconsistent, and Both
Wrong and Illogical.

Rev. Charles S. MacFarland, pastor
of a. leading Congregational church at
Norwalk, Conn.,, was the speaker OF
the day at a recent session of the Bos-
ton Central Labor Union. He said In
part:
Il am here this afternoon to tell you
in frank and simple way how your
cause and your organization appear to
minister Of the gospel who tries to
see them, as he tries to see every
cause and movement, in the light of
that gospel.
"The issue of it all is that, so far as
it's essential nature is concerned, I am
a profound religious believer in the
righteousness, the wisdom, the neces-
sity, and the eternal future Of the la
Dor union movement.
"The truth is brightly dawning upon
all but the blindest of employers and
the most one sided of students that any
system of industry which makes the
workman the sullen obeyer of his en-
ployer is not only morally but econoni-
cally unsound. The laws which once
forbade workingmen to combine and
| which made the consultation GRIM
Hnal conspiracy passed away not only
because wrong, but because of their
economic failure.
Among the most significant of all
the lessons of history is this-that no
| institution, however great and power
full, has survived unless it had a deep
underlying moral content:
There are two main directions from
| which support must come to give the
movement pernanency- the sup
port Of sympathetic legislation; second,
the sympathy of the people, I strongly
| urge a wise and dbold use of the bal
| lot and the unceasing demand for the
| protection Of the state.
1.-THE people,. however, must be will
ing to endure Inconvenience. When
| they are called on to do so they must
| be shown the larger principles and
| needs involved In what seem at first
small despotic laws; hence we must in
form and educate the: people. The
union must be not secret society, but
public institution. You well know
the failure Of the knights Of Labor as
sferet order. A defiant and dogmatic
attitude will kill the union, as it does
the church
| L
serting this moral Significance and in
! f1uence of organized labor I was asked
by hostile nearer to name illustra-
tons of it, I was ready. Its own great
issues, such as sweating. the COnd1-
tions of labor; the regulation Of Indus
trial relations between the sexes. it's
influence in inducing men not to ne
elect the divine right of suffrage, it's
sense of brotherhood, it's magnificent
work in behalf Of women and children,
are all great; moral issues. Its; splendid
provision for sickness and death are
both moral and divine. It's influence
in obtaining reduction of Sunday labor
has greatly benefited both laboring
men and the Christian church.
Its moral influence is world-reach-
ing. The binding together of wage
earners of one country with another
will do much to settle international
peace, for when thus joined, they will
refuse to fight each other without jus
tifiable reason.
Indeed, the very things that have
been most condemned reveal most
largely the moral element. Are strikes
an evil? Yes and no. There have been
revelations of self-sacrif1ce in them
that bear the glow Of Calvary. Again
and again have men resisted the Temp
tation to profit at the expense Of their
fellows and have chosen Christ rather
than Barabbas. D.:
ION it's side,- the church must aban-
don its Improbable controversies over
doctrines Of life to come and give
itself heart and soul to present actual
human needs. see no mediator, no
final arbiter, except the gospel of the
brotherhood of love-"
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