The San Francisco call., 1908-11-29
MUSICIANS SCORE
JUVENILE BANDS
General Secretary of Union De-
cIares Children Are Physically
Incapable of Labor Required
Plumbers Will Elect Three Dele
gates to Represent Order at
State Building Trades

dEp gEE1sa The board of direc-
gTS16E sSfcoIEch1 tors of the musi-
>S5N SsssS1sES clans union local
No. 6. at its last
meeting reinstated j. Stengle and w.
Z. Wagner who had been suspended for
nonpayment of dues. Immediately after
reinstatement, Wagner resigned from
the organization.
The local has received a letter from
owen Miller, general secretary of the
Amrican federation of musicians in
which he discusses juvenile bands, and
in this he says:
The children who are formed into bands can
not play music, because they are not physically
able to do So but the novelty of seeing little
children doing what is hard work for a man
TO do. and more particularly the inducement of
the cheaper rates at which they can be en-
ployed. is what causes recognition.
There is no form of child labor more OBJ
noxious than this. We have 700 men in our
organization, here in St Louis, and out of this
number there are at least 250. who are physi-
caly unable to march in parade on the streets
Yet it is nothing uncommon to little tots
attempting this arduous task. No human being
can do harder work than a musician is expected
to do parade. While playing he is forced to
assume unnatural position, using his lungs
for the double purpose of breathing and filing
his instrument. Only the strongest men can go
through this ordeal.
Another and more serious phase of the ques-
tion is that these little children taken to
excursions, picnics and balls and are kept out
at unreasonable hours, when they should be at
home enjoying needed rest. On such occasions
they hear and see that which children should
neither see nor hear. and they frequently
tempted to smoke and drink, and for that
son. the standpoint of morality, such form of
child labor should be prohibited.
We do not in the slightest degree object TO
children being taught the grandest of arts,
but we object to their employment for profit
At the request of Marcel Willie, spe-
ciaI organizer for the bakers and con-
fectioners' union of this city, a meet
ing of French and Italian bakers and
bakery wagon drivers has been called
for next Tuesday morning for the pur-
pose of unionizing those who have not
yet joined the bakers union, and that
of the bakery wagon drivers. At that
meeting the organizer will report the
result OF a conference with foreign
employing bakers. At the close of the
meeting in the forenoon, there will be
an adjournment until evening, when
the charters of the two unions will
close and the offer to receive applicants
on a 50 fee viii be annulled. After
that the fee in the bakers union will
be $40 and that in the bakery drivers
union $50. 1t is expected that about
so additional men will be unionized.
The federated trades council of Sacra-
mento. following the example of some
of the local unions has appointed a
committee to discover If any aliens are
employed on any of the public works
At the last meeting of the council the
committee reported that it had for
warded letters to each city trustee and
each supervisor requesting them to en-
force the law in this matter.
Plumbers union No. 442 will at its
next meeting. elect three delegates to
represent it in state buildings trade
next January. The choice will be from
among the following, who were nomi-
mated last Friday night: Thomas A. Cas-
serley. Joseph Lossley Henry Cook, j.
Jessup and Frank Mills.
The carpenters of Sacramento who
are members of local No 5S6 want a
Saturday half holiday. and appointed a
committee to attend meeting Of the
millnen to ask them to join in the
movement.