Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-11-16
TIPPING NUISANCE.
|;III- How Il Makes for Slavery.
By Frederic j. Haskin.

Samuel Gompers president of the Amer
lean Federation of Labor, for forty-tive
! wears an advocate of the rights of labor
and connected with efforts to organize the
working people, believes that the tipping
system is an insidious evil operating to
undermine the independence of the work
ingman. In discussing the problem he
said:
The American laboring man has one
| advantage over the workers of Europe,
and that is that while he is not yet abb
solutely independent, he is not servile.
| The tipping system is predicated upon
servility.
THE amazing growth of the tipping
evil In this country, both in the size of
the tips demanded and given and in the
increase of the things for which tips are
exacted. grieyes me and all other true
friends of the workingman
Labor cannot achieve independence
when it holds out a palm to be creased
and wears the cringing Smirk of a slave.
The tipping system is detestabe to
| every truly intelligent man. 1t is demon
! alizing to all. persons who are connected
| with it. either as givers of tips, takers
of tips or as the ultimate beneficiary of
| tips.
The only beneficiary of the tipping
system is the employer who takes ad-
vantage of it to en-
Benefits Only ploy workers without
to Employer. his benefits can be
measured only in money, for the system
demoralizes his manhood.
THE whole tipping system is bad; there
is nothing good In it. Its rapid growth
in the United States in recent years may
be attributed in part to the Importation
of European manners and European per-
sonal servants. But whereas the system
is a nuisance in Europe it has become a
| crying evil here. Every laboring man
ought to resist its further spread and de-
veopment."
The man who takes n tip coaks him
self in mantle of servility that lie
| grades him from the plane of free labor
and makes of him a slave. He cannot
| escape this consequence by being impo-
| lite to the tip giver-his willingness to
| accept the fee is the collar of h s serf-
| dom. Most men who take tips know this
and resent it. but like all other slaves
| of all other times they are bOnd-servants
| 1t is true that they are not serfs bound
| to certain plot of ground. nor chat
tells to be sold at their masters pleasure.
Serfs and chattel slaves were always
4,
| OF modern industry are not.
Take. for instance. a waiter III "A New
fault of the tipping system. And the tip
| kind. He is paid
Effects of System from s13 to $50 a
in New York City, dollar a dav by
the proprietor. He must lend the head
waiter an average Of So a week. He
must 'dlvvy' with the server and see
| that the chef and the order cooks are
friendly by dividing also with them. And
then he has to support his family and save
a bit for his old age. 1t is true he is
free to quit whenever he pleases and
seek other employment, but he is a wait
er by force of circumstances. he knows
| that work and no other. and if he can't
keep a job he will starve.
Under this compulsion. and because it
! is in the line of least resistance. he is
servile and he is obsequious. and he does
take tips-as many and as big as he can
| get. He takes tips from all sorts and
| conditions Of n1en-men who tip to buy
cheap distinction; men who tip because
| they are sorry for the waiter; men who
| tip because it is a habit, and men WHO
| tip because they know they must. He
| despises them all. in his heart of hearts.
He abhors the cheap gilt of the tipping
snob. he pities the poor devil who tips
| from habit and he hates the man who
| tips unwillingly for fear the waiter will
| detle his food. And yet he is a servile
creature who cannot openly voice his
| thoughts, he must smile and smirk and
| shipper. He cannot be a free man and
| take tip
| x
| And this Is not his fault. Ii is the
fault of the tiping system. And the tip