The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1916-09-29
Continued from Page ~

Commerce of San Francisco is al
ready as good as whipped in it's mil
lion dollar open, shop campaign.
Although the Law and Order Com
mittee" has succeeded in lining up
every big advertiser and whipping
the newspapers and the small mer-
chants into line through fears of
boycott labor's strength has proved
equal to the test Today some of the
biggest employers in San Francisco
are denouncing the attempt of their
associates to throw the city into a
civil war that would cause untold bit
terness, suffering and tragedy.
San Francisco has mayor, mil
lionaire ship owner and capitalist, who
was put there by the same business
men who now urge anarchy and VIC
| lence as a means of driving the
workers to their knees. Mayor James
Rolph Jr. was business mans can
didate." In his first campaign he de-
feated a union labor candidate, and
he owes nothing to organized labor
except as a good citizen whose bust
ness interests cannot blind him to the
rightness of labor's cause.
Today Mayor Rolph is lifting his
voice to denounce the Chamber of
Commerce campaign and the would-be
industrial autocrats who started it.
And because labor, with the aid of
men like Rolph and Rudolph
Spreckles, is too strong for them, their
attempt to line up by intimidation and
coercion the entire business COM
munity in a relentless war of ex-
termination is marked for failure.
Here is what Mayor Rolph had to
say about the Chamber of Commerce
campaign in public speech in San
Francisco. Remember that he is one
of the biggest employers of labor in
San Francisco, man who has had
more dealings with the unions than
any of the Law and Order" commit
teemen, and that his only interest in
unionism is that of a humane and
progressive citizen. ROlph was not
even a self-made man. He never
worked with his hands or carried a
union card. Today he controls some
of the most important shipping in
terests in the Pacific. Always he has
been the idol of the citys people and
a San Franciscan above everything
else. To no man is the welfare of his
native city a matter of greater con
Germ.
Said Mayor Rolph:
"In San Francisco at this moment a
strong effort is being made in certain
quarters to destroy organized union
labor.
Il predict the failure of this move
ment
Il am sure that not even a cOnsid
cradle minority Of our people is il
sympathy with any campaign to de
= stroy organized labor, a movemen
. which would precipitate wastefu
and distressful struggle which settles
nothing, brings no good to anyone
and divides a community for years.
The public is informed, however
that this campaign is not an attacl
on organized labor.
Most opponents of organized labo
declare that they do not wish to de
stroy the unions.
They would permit the unions t.
exist if they confine themselves t,
the functions of benevolent societies
visiting the sick and burying tn,
dead, but they must not attempt t.
. deal with the wages or conditions o
employment or interfere with the in
alienable right of every man to worl
whether he belongs to a union or not
According to this school of though
every man has an inalienable right t.
work
But let any man seeking employ
ment go into any shop or factory Of
bank, and, relying upon his alienable
right to work, demand job. He vii
soon find that his inalienable right tC
work is nothing but group of words
and that about the only inalienable
right he has is the right to starve.
1--WE need in this community more
men of vision and insight, men who
can think in terms of human rights
as well as in terms of property.
Labor thinks in terms of living.
When a union fixes wages at SO day,
it has not in mind so much the SO as
SO worth of living; and, when SO will
no longer maintain that standard of
living the union feels that it is no
longer getting its due.
"Of course, it is easy to argue
against this plan of wage scale, but
men do not live on techniCalities and