The National tribune., 1910-11-10

speak in public against woman's rights.
I am not in favor of women voting. but
may be wrong and they right. and I
will not put the least stumbling block in
the way cf my sisters by adverse criti-
cism of their cause"
ToSEPH BARoNDESS. How many
people, outside the State of New
u York, ever heard his name, and
yet 1t has fallen to the lot Of few to
accomplish what he has for suffering
humanity? Joseph Barondess LIS Rus
sian Jew. and in his own country the
awful condition of the working people
about him, the utter impossibility of
the men to keep their families from
starvation, the shocking injustice and
cruelty of the laws of Russia which
governed this class, filed his heart with
unutterable sadness, and the dream of
helping his brothers became the ruling
spirit of his life. He realized that he
was powerless to effect even the slight
est change in this respect, for this was
Russia of 22 years ago. SO to escape
these conditions himself, and with the
bright hope of being able to interest the
good, liberty-loving, justice-lOving men
of America in his oppressed Russian. he
and his wife. with their baby girl, sailed
for the Land of the Free. Once in New
York City, Joseph Barondess found that
he had been falsely informed as to the
condition of the workingman in Amer
lea. Republican institutions, he dis
covered, did not seem to do very much
toward keeping hungry mouths filed.
All this talk about liberty" was a good
deal of a delusion and a snare. The
only work he could get to do was in
sweatshop, where men worked for IS
week and were expected to make 80
pairs of children's drawers in Il day of
13 hours Think of it,
IA Dr. sY1 L.
sweatshop' sat a man with a sick child.
The doctor had refused to visit it un-
less his fee was paid as he went IN the
door. The poor man worked for three
days and nights without rest, in order
to get the money to pay that cruel doc
tor. and at the end of the third day fell
over on his machine dead. The sweat
err refused to give the agonized wife
the extra money which her husband had
earned at the cost of his life, and the
baby died, of course The half-starved
workers in the shop clubbed together
bought a ffve-cent rose for the
baby, and managed to have the two
graves in Potter's Field made close to-
gether. It was all they could do.
Experiences of this kind, and there
were plenty OF them, every day was
filled with them, made Joseph Baron
dess desperate. Surely in a land like
America there must be scme chance
iOA DcltCih SoIiC iodu VI csCdpoi
He fully appreciated the fact that their
only hope lay in getting together. that
in union was strength, and he tried to
get these badly treated people to Or
ganiZe for their own relief. 1t was no
good: for some reason they seemed to
think that no matter how many there
might be of them, they were powerless
against the terrible sweaters" Joseph
Barondess became an agitator-Anarch-
ist, they called him-speaking on the
streets or wherever he had the chance,
trying to persuade the deluded men that
the only way for them to get away from
the living death of their daily lives was
to organize into q union and strike for
better wages and better shops. They
fIooted him, said he was crazy, drove
him from the streets and even impris-
oned him; but he kept on, and at last
they began to see, and the first work.
ingmans union in New York was
formed.
Joseph Barondess was in dead earn
est. and people who go about thing
in dead earnest succeed. His union
grew in numbers daily. Other unions
were formed. Joseph Barondess made
interested, influential and helpful
friends. He managed finally to get on
the floor OF the Legislature at Albany,
where, in rather poor English, he made
a speech which passed his bill abolish
ing the sweat shops. Later on the bill
was put in better shape by an expert
enced lawyer, passed by the courts, and
his battle for right and justice was won,
his dream of helping his fellows real
lied. To-day the unions he formed are
admitted to be the strongest in Amer
lea, and the sweat-shop system he so
persistently and courageously fought
has been abolished by State law. Wasn't
lit splendid work, and shouldn't his
name be known and revered from one
end of this broad land to the other?
Shouldn't his name be known and loved
all over the world?
Joseph Barondess has another dream.
He is now a prosperous business man,
but he gives only two hours daily to his
business. The rest of the time he spends
working on his dream. This is to gath
Ter together in Jerusalem all his poor
people who have been driven out of
Russia, Poland. Roumania and pretty
nearly every land except America His
whole soul Is bent on forming a Repub-
lie of Jews in Palestine. What could
be more fitting2 The Jews of America
are well satisfied, as indeed they should
be, but in other lands are thousands of
poor Jews who are despised and op-
pressed, starved. massacred. given no
show whatever to earn a comfortable
living. What would it mean for them
to have their own country, to be gov
erned by laws made by their own peo-
pie? May Joseph Barondesss second
dream come true, as did his first.