The labor world. [volume] (Duluth, Minn.) 1896-current, 1910-11-26

the following clear exposition OF, the
causes and principles he mind the
present strike of the Chicago garment
workers. Out OF the mouths of the
victims of the employers brutality
themselves comes the story that
stamps the strike as one of the most
necessary of all labor etuptions that
have had place in recent years:
Thirty-flve thousand garment work.
ers are striking in Chicago, and. as
this Is written, the strike seems to
De spreading to other places. =
Those who know conditions in this
particular trade, it's sweat-shop
methods. Its under pay, its seasons Of
1everlsh work followed by seasons of
ldleness or semi-idleness, do not Won
DER that the workers struck. They
only wonder that the strike did not
come long ago.
What most people are asking, there
fore, is not whether conditions among
the garment workers are bad or good
but rather what the particular griev-
ances were which led to this great,
almost spontaneous uprising in an un-
organized industry.
This question was answered at g.
breakfast given by the Women's
Trade Union league on November 2
at Kings restaurant in Chicago. Here
the strikers. or the girls and young
women among them, rather, were
given an opportunity to tell their own
stories
answered also at that breakfast. This
ought to be encouraged to go back to
work except under union conditions
and with full recognition of the union
by the employers. The answer was
given not formally and not in the
set speeches Of the girls. 1t was
given rather by their youth, by their
fra1lty and by their evident mex
per1ence. 1t is absurd to think of
girls Of sixteen fighting single handed
against organized greed.
Speeding Up and PAIRING Down.
In considering the particular griev-
ances of the strikers, remember, first,
that the worker Is obliged to make,
not one bargain, but hundreds Of
bargains. There are more than fifty
divisions in the work upon a pair of
trousers, more than sixty upon cost,
and twenty upon a. vest. Each piece
of work and each combination of
pieces of work has its own price,
which 1t Is to the interest of the en-
ployer to make as low as possible.
For this reason he sets over the
workers foreman and makes 1t
worth the foreman's while to get the
largest amount Of work for the small
est amount of money. As the first
speaker at the breakfast said: "Take
the button sewers, for instance; they
used to sew through the buttons three
times, but now we must put the
needle through six times at the same
pay, although it takes twice as much
time. The girls buy five, six, seven
hundred needles. They (the employ
ers) give them the thread and wax.
and they thread the needles at night.
They are threading until IL or 1
O'Clock after coming home at six.
They Just get their supper and then
thread needles. They thread them
every night In the rush season.
Work Far Into the Night.
To make a reasonable living, then,
the girls must now sew on buttons
all day and thread needles half the
night.
Where is the young girl who, un-
aided, could stand up against this
cut In the price Of her labor or against
any OF the other cuts for which the
minute divisions Of the work give op-
portunity, and which have been con-
tinually made of late i'm spite of the
increase: in the selling price of cloth
ing?
In slack season the girls must sit
for hours without work and without
pay. I'VE sit maybe seven hours in
the shop and do nothing. Just sit in
the chair, sit in your place, until the
boss gets tired and wants to go home.
If any other superintendent
comes to your shop, they say the shop
Is running full time; and you see in
the paper he advertises steady work"
The individual girl who objects to
this cruel waste Of her time for the
sake Of keeping up an appearance Of
prosperity for the employer, loses her
JOB and is blacklisted.
The amount that is paid for