The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-01-01


the American Federation of Labor, in
common with the secretaries of every
affiliated A. F. of L. labor organiza-
ton throughout the country, have re-
ceived the official appeal from Pres
ident Samuel Gompers, of the A. F..
of L, for contributions to aid the de-
PENDANTS in the Loewe case. The con-
tFibuuons are to be made on January
81.
The appeal announces that January
II will be known in the ranks of or
ganized labor throughout the country
as *Hatter's Relief Day. 1t also sets
forth the plan adopted at the last ma
tiona1 convention of the A. F. of L.
held in San Francisco, in November,
under which the contributions will be
made. Every laboring man in the
country has been asked to give the
amount he earns the second hour. he
works on January 27 to the fund be-
ing raised by the A F. of L., to aid
the defendants in the Loewe case.
Secretaries of all organizations re-
ceiving the appeal are asked to read
it at the next regular meeting Of their
respective organizations. The contri-
buttons will be made to the secretaries
of the various unions and will be for
warded directly TO Frank Morrison,
secretary of the A. F. of l., at Wash
ington. d. c.
The appeal fOIlOWS:
To All -InternationaA and National
Unions and TheirSLo Unions; to
All state and City Central Bodies
and to All Local Unions. A1
Dear Sirs and Brothers-Win you
give an hour? Not an hour to read
this, but an hour of your labor in a
righteous cause. on Hatters' day, JAM
uary IT, 1916?
The plight in which the hatters of
Dahbnry. Connecticut, find themselves
afouses the concern and the sympathy
of all the workers as well as of all
liberty loving citizens of America The
~Danbury hatters have performed a
service Of historic Importance in the
struggle for industrial freedom
Efforts of employers in America. to
keep their workers in subsection have
been particularly heartless and un-
relenting They. have used all their
power and influence economic, poll
teal and particularly the courts. The
legal theory that has enabled the en-
ployers through the courts to restrict
the industrial freedom of their. en-
p1oyes was based upon a concept that
labor power was a. commodity and that
employers possessed rights derived
from a kind of ownership of the labor
power Of their employees and vested
rights derived from the right, to do
business This principle was the bas-
writ and for interpretation of anti
trust law to apply to voluntary organi-
zations of workers associated for the
establishments of better conditions of
work and for the maintenance of their
personal rights and freedom. =
When this abuse Of the Injunction
process and perversions6 of trust laws.
became so frequent and 50 dangerous
aszko meuacez the very extstenceso fsaoEe
ganizatiens-o of workers, the organic
ed labor movement sought for cases
pending in the courts that could be
used and test cases to establish clearly
through a decision from the highest
courts Of the land whether there was
judicial sanction for this principle
which classified labor power as a coma
modify and which had been used to
restrict effonts of workers to better
conditions of life and work
ORGANIZED Labor could not of course.
begin to institute such cases. We
had to wait until the cases were
brought against our movement and Sc
Iect those which presented the funda-
mental principles involved 80
Two cases were found illustrative of
: most fragrant injustice They were
the contempt eases against Messrs-
Gompers, Mitchell and Morrison, and
boycott asE5ciati6n. through Nd. e
Eoewe & company brought against the
matters of Danbury under the provi-
sfons OF the Sherman Antitrust law
During the early period of the case.
before the courts, the United Hat
tiers of North America bore all the
legal EXPENSES involved Then the
membership of the entire organization
throughout the country was involved
in great strike in which every avail
able dollar of the organization was ex-
pended and expended with victory re-
suIting. 1T was during the time when
the United Hatters of North America
was in financial embarrassment that
the American Federation of Labor
was appealed to, and the A F. of
Is then assumed the financial obnga-
ton Of meeting every expense Of the
case before the courts, involving the
amount of $9S.756.02-
Twice the case was before the Su-
preme court of the United States: In
1908, ON a writ of certiorari, the sue
preme court held that sections L. 3
and z OF the Sherman Antitrust act
were applicable to the case and to all
organizations of wage carriers orga-
nized not for profit. but for the Sc
curement of higher wages, a shorter
work day and better working condi-
tons that is for human welfare; and
again when the case came before the
court upon the appeal from the deci-
sion of the federal district court, on
January 5. 1915, when the supreme
court of the United States rendered a
final decision upon this case which
had been pending in the federal courts
eorf4nore than eleven years.
That decision reaffirTned the legal
fiction that human beings, wage earn
ers, could be legally classified in the
4 same category with commodities, con-
troll over which was to be regulated
by the sherman Antitrust act. I'm
der this decision, the Sherman Anti
trust law, which was intended for the
protection of the citizens of the
United States. could be utilized as
nm fnstrurnentality for depriving them
of their rights as free men and wo-
Enen and for denying them control
over their own labor power, a con