Los Angeles herald., 1910-11-27
Labor's Share of the Tariff

IN speech made when the Payne-Aldrich tariff
bill was under discussion Senator Gore of
Oklahoma cited instances where woolen mills
at Fall River Mass had paid p per cent dividends
to their stockholders during the panic season Of
1908, although, as result of the hard times, the
companies owning these mills had discharged a
considerable portion of their employees and had re-
duced the wages of all the others. These facts
were cited by Senator Gore to show that the
American laborer did not get fair division OF the
tariff which was levied in behalf of one of the most
strongly protected industries in America in the
name OF American labor Some of the high tariff
senators made effort to question the correctness
Iof Senator Cores figures but he fully maintained
their correctness and silenced his critics.
In this connection, the following which ap-
Ipeared in a recent number of the Literary Digest
lis of interest. Under the caption The Factory
Iand the Death Rate the Digest says:
"The people of Fall River are troubled by
Census Director Durands announcement that this
Massachusetts city has the highest death-rate of
any American city-19.l deaths per 1000 lnhab1-
Itants. The death-rate for the country as whole
lis IS per 1000. This was too severe arraign-
ment for the Fall River board of health to let pass
Iunnoticed. The census director in replying to their
protests points out that his data furnished by
the Massachusetts, secretary OF state and ascrbes
1.-THE excessive death-rate to an abnormal mortality
IdmOnG
Iern knowledge New York Times editorial in
forms us the reason for this is not far to seek
"'Fall River attends to its municipal house
keeping more than fairly well, and its inhabitants
are intelligent as we'll respectable, BUT III Is
IA TOWN WITH MANY FACTORIES, EN-
'PLOYING WOMEN IN GREAT NUMBERS
DURING LONG HOURS EVERY DAY. THIS
lis GOOD FOR BUSINESS BUT IT IS HARD
.ON THE CHILDREN. Born Of tired mothers,
they start in life under handicap, and while they
are not neglected or starved, they are lamentably
apt not to receive the sort of sort of food
for which science has yet found no really ad-
equate substitute
Enough of the children thus raised die to
make Fall River seem to be what it probably is
not-an unhealthful city in the common sense OF
that term. But what of those that survive? IT
rs UPON THE SURVIVORS THAT, IN ALL
LIKELIHOOD, FALL THE HEAVIEST PEN
IALTIES WHICH IMPLACABLE NATURE
IMPOSES UPON THE VIOLATORS OF HER
LAWS. STATISTICIANS CAN NUMBER
THE DEAD BUT THERE is NOBODY TO
TELL JUST HOW THE LIVING ARE RE AZ
IFECTED BY AN ANCESTRY OF FACTORY
POISONED MOTHERS. Occasionally the army
recruiting officers or the examiners of candidates
for positions in police and fire departments start
the cry of steady physical deterioration among the
Ilaboring classes in the manufacturing centers.
That cry has not yet been frequent loud in this
country, but it has been both in England and
people with sharp are hearing it here.
Thus we see that in of the most highly
protected of American industries industry
(which, on account of the enormous protection ac-
lCorded it, able to pay its stockholders p per
cent dividends upon their stock during the worst
financial panic that this country has for many
years, the wages paid the aborers engaged in this
highly protected industry small that the
women of the families of these laborers have to
labor so strenuOusy as to make themselves in
capable of bearing healthy children. Or to state
it in another way, these overworlled women in this
highly protected industry, ON ACCOUNT OF
THEIR REDUCED VITALITY INCIDENT
TO THE DRAIN UPON THEIR STRENGTH
BY THE HEAVY LABOR NECESSARY TO
EARN A LIVING FOR THEIR FAMILIES,
ARE PRODUCING CHILDREN WHO ARE
SO WEAK THAT THEY EITHER DIE IN IN
FANCY, OR, IF THEY GROW UP, ARE
CURSED WITH A WEAKNESS OF BOTH
MENTAL AND PHYSICAL CONSTITUTION
ISUCH AS WILL PREVENT THEIR BEING
PRODUCTIVE CITIZENS OF THE BEST
TYPE, AND WILL INSURE THEIR BECOM-
ING AT AN EARLY DAY A CHARGE UPON
THE COMMUNITY IN WHICH THEY LIVE.
The Herald some time ago published figures
showing how in the other most highly protected
industry in America, to wit, the iron industry,
Iron works twelve hours a day and seven days a
face of these figures if the American people do not
wake up to the fact that the tariff tax which the
whole of the people of this country is paying in
the name of the American laborer is the most
colossal fraud that was ever perpetrated upon any
people, then they are less intelligent than we
think them.