The Bon Homme County independent. [volume] (Tabor, S.D.) 1904-1913, 1913-01-23
The JobIess Mans Enemy.

- Sttuy, U6dTdBBleu lnOlVluudl Is naleu
before the Judge. A policeman t~estifies
he found the man prowling in a hallway
searching for a place to sleep. The Judge
inquiries whether the man has a job. He
has not. Money? He has not. Friends?
No-his home is a thousand miles away.
So the court pronounces the mar a vag-
rant and sends him to prison. :
TIL solution for yagrancy in the United
states Hes not In prison sentences. 1t lies
not in bounding the jobless n helpless
individual. II lies in the Intelligent, eff
cient handling of the problems of unem-
ployment, In the abolition of the agencies
which create vagrancy.
In most European cities the jobless man
concerns the government. The German
worker who loses his job goes to the mu-
nicipal labor exchange of his city and in a
short time work is found for him. He
does not pay a cent for 1t. Judgment Is
used in the work and in the place Of work
selected for HIM. A man in a south Ger
boring town. He viii not be, shot across
the country a thousand miles from his
family to take work for-the short period
Of ~slackness in his W trade,
In the United States the man who loses
his job becomes a subject for speculation
byN the ignorant and inefficient. n not
actually thieving, labor agent. He be-
m the prey, and gamble of the private
employment shark. and is ultimately
forced to become a vaRrant.
There are 500 private employment agen-
cies in New York city alone. Chicago has
hundreds OF them. So has every. other in-
dustrial center. They cover the entire
country like o spider web. The authorities
license and supervise these agencies. This
Is done to guard the applicant for employ
ment from imposition, fraud, and misrep-
re~sentation. 1t is successful sometimes:
most often not. For these agencies can
only thrive upon fraud and misrepresentn-
ton. The trick is TO make this fraud and
Misrepresentation stick within the con-
fines of legality. In this they succeed adj
mirably.
Every private employment agency spec
ializes in a certain kind Of labor. One
supplies q railroad with section hands.
Another supplies men to lumber mills. A
third specializes in construction help. They
are all out for the 81 fee which they charge
for every job. Their business, therefore,
is to place" men. The man specializing
in jobs on railroads will send every. appli-
cant who has 81 to pay for the job to work
on the railroad, regardless of his fitness
or unf1tness. II the man Is fired two days
He gave him a job. 1t was up to the
man to hold 1t.
Daily thousands of jobless men are
placed" by these agents. The men are
worth while. In reality, however, they
have, been ruined. They have been taken
and sometimes thousands of
miles from their homes. They are put to
work at occupations to which they are not
used and In surroundings which are detrl-
mental to their health. Instead OF being
placed, they are displaced. They are dis
lodged from their sphere of industry and
removed from friends for months, and
sometimes years
A large share Of the vagrant population
in this country Is drawn from among the
men who ave at one time or another been
dislodged from their niche In industry by
an employment agent who for the sake
of the 81 fee has sent them across many
to take a permanent Job which
was not permanent. The jobless man is
not nearly so helpless in his home town
or near his home town as he is hundreds
OF miles away from the place where he il
Penniless In a strange town, he
Is arrested and jailed as a vagrant.
Gambling In a mans wages is a crime
and Is punished by the community. But
lives of thousands Of helpless men by self,
labor sharks Is licensed by the
authorities.
Employment-the iob-is the most vital
thing In a mans or woman's life today.
In the United States especially. the city
tenement worker is mostly detached from
all property. from all re sources. He has
no folks back home" to come to IN time
of a crisis. When he loses his job he must
find another one quickly-or starve.
Finding work for the jobiess man or
woman Is too serious a matter to be made
a gamble Of by private agencies. To let
the detached, helpless city worker become
the prey Of q scheming, lying labor shark.
Is more than an injustice to the worker,
1t is a menace to the community. 1t is
preposterous that a man seeking work to
his family should have no place to
to for honest and disinterested in
formation about the labor market in the
The private employment agen-
cies should go. Their place should be
by municipal labor exchanges which
will aid the handicapped Jobless rather
traffic and fatten on their handi-