The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1913-02-28


ISLATURE, OLYMPIA, WASHING
/ TON
We are opposed to Senate Bill No.
100, by Senator Piper for the follow
ing reasons
FIRST.-Because it creates new
commission, which will add an enor-
nous expense to our already over
burdened taxpayers.
SECOND.-The actual fixing of a
minimum necessary wage for women
/ is legislation and under our state
constitution the legislature ONLY can
enact legislation. unless the people
themselves pass the enactment by
mensa of the Iniative or Referendum.
THIRD.-The legislature cannot
delegate it's legislative power, even to
commission of it's own creation.
THEREFORE,, such commission
could only investigate and RECON-
MEND a minimum wage, but would be
| pON tllcoo W tllOlCt lto du-
thority (Which the legislature would
attempt to delegate) to fix said wage.
Any employer could refuse to obey an
order of the commission Oil the ground
that any attempt at legislation by a
commission, instead of by the legisla-
ture, is a violation of the state consti-
| tutiop on6 tbnrafpra void
FOURTH.-The commission idea,
therefore, simply amounts to an inves-
| tigation and arbitration board, without
power to enforce or to enact it's con-
clusions into either law or actual prac
tice, except by the voluntary consent
Of all the employers in any given in
dustry.
| FIFTH.-Under our present labor
laws the commissioner of labor and
his deputies have practically all the
powers of actual LEGAL investigation
provided for in the Piper commission
bill. (See sections 2, 3, and 8 of La
Dor Laws, published in Sth Biennial
Report of Bureau of Labor for 1911
| 1929
SIXTH The effect of the Piper
commission" bill is to create a com
plicated method of agitation" and
education" at public expense, cover
ing the entire field of wages, for the
benefit of organized union labor of
both sexes and this at the expense of
the unskilled, unorganized, under-paid
women and. girls (whom the labor
unions call "scabs.'O
SEVENTH is only human ma
ture to predict that the unions will
only attempt to protect their own
members, as that would tend to drive
more women and girls into the unions;
and yet labor leaders freely admit that
it is impossible and impractical to or
ganize the great body of uns6Eed
women and girl workers.
THEREFORE,, if a commission bill
is passed it virtually leaves this class
of workers to the combined mercy (or
greed) of the employers on the one
hand and of the powerful organized
unions on the other
EIGHT. Organized labor has little
need for fixed legal minimum wage.
The unions are able by their monopoly
of laborers in MOST trades to force
at least a necessary living wage. Their
chief concern is for a general higher
wage level, which an arbitration board
or commission might help to bring
about: but this is an economic rather
than a legal problem. 1t does not
reach the REAL NEED FOR THE
LEGISLATION DEMANDED. The
REAL problem that confronts the leg
islature of Washington is the fact that
i THOUSANDS of women and girls are
} forced by dire NECESSITY to work
for a wage MUCH LESS than is nee
essary to maintain them in healthy
moral conditions.
The women and girls of our state
are either the present or the potential
mothers of it's future citizens; and II
is therefore the DUTY of the state to
prohibit all women and girls from
working for less wage than viii
maintain them in necessary healthy
moral conditions.
WE ARE, THEREFORE,, in favor OF
and urge the passage of Substitute
House Bill No l. by Mrs. Croake. fol
the following reasons:
FIRST.-It is constitutional.
(a) Because therein it will have
fixed a minimum wage which the legis
lature (the only body that can legis
late) has, after investigation, "fixee
1 and found to be the minimum wage
I NECESSARY to provide health anC
moral conditions for women and girls.
(b) Because the legislature has al
ready fixed minimum number o
! hours which women and girls may b'
employed. This law has already beer
held constitutional by our suprem'
} court.
(c) In the case of Muller VS.. Ore
I gon. 2OS U. s., the supreme court o
the United States upheld the constitu
tionality of the Oregon ten-hour Law
as applied TO women.