The daily Nome industrial worker., 1916-05-23
THE EIGHT HOUR LAW.

The Alaska legislature passed ar eight hour law. This law includes all underground workings, placer or otherwise. Every member of the legislature elected from this sec tion of the territory wGs committed to the support of the measure and it was a prominent plank in all their platforms.
 Anything that may give law z moral force in the way of it's being the will of the voting population was attendant upon the passage oi this act Yet from the first we have seen efforts made to defeat it's er. forcement, and thGt it's enforcement, is being defeated through most ridiculous subtcrfuge in this caml is now too well known.
 It is stated on what the Industrial Worker regards as fairly reliable authority that the partnorshiG agreement drawn up by ono notary was submitted to @ prominent gov ernment official with view oi asccrta.ning it's legality or not.
 If this story is correct it is cer. tainly most suggestive. The Indus trial Worker or any other opinion cannot declare against the right tc make partnership agreements, but q so-called partnership agreement that has to be submitted to fed eral official before it is approved ill order that those connected with i; may work a ten instead of Gn eigh, hour day, confers upon such ar agreement immediate and evident suspicion.
 If two miners bent upon a bona fide partnership draw up Gn agree ment they will not feel any adyis- ability to consult government cfiici- als as to it's legality. There must be something radically wrong with the intention of the parties acces- sory to such an agreement when the dcsirability of its being submit. ted to any authority suggests itself to them.
 And obviously when such an agree ment is submitted, the least that we could expect is a otrict neutrality upon the part of tho authorities lest they themselves be contributing d. rectly or indirectly to an evasion of the law.
 The Industrial Worker is further informed that under tha: same agreement, men employed were dis charged, that one of them received damages for injuries sustained anl for this reason it is quite clear that only the official approval obtained and tho federal sanction extended such trumpery partnership is all that could possibly give it any staUding.
 The extension of this obviously and notoriously and viciously fraud ulolt partnership agreement to other claims throughout the camp is becoming scandalous. And the only thing that this paper can do ia the event is to draw public atten- tion to this scandalous condition.
 Here's a law passed in direct response to the popular demand. Supported by the chosen represent tatives of the people, placed upon the territorial statutes and not be. ing enforced to the smallest extent.
 We can readily understand that the federal officials to whose lot falls the responsibility for law en- forcement in this community, feel towards the community no respons- ibility. They are appoIntive and have to give the people of Alaska no accounting of their failure to discharge their duties in any re- spcct whatever.
 Their concern is only with the federal authorities in Washington and for all they care, the labor laws passed by the territory of Alaska may become a joke among employ. CTS without their turning hair,
 That's one of tho great drawbacks of the government system in Alaska. There is no responsibility to the people of Alaska, and hence the will of the people and especially the will of the Alaska workers, finds no response in their offices.