The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1917-04-20
(By Dante Barton)

pllCG Iue rue OI Idul heNeIe, IDe
union carpenter of Revolutionary
days, the workers of America have
always been in the forefront of pa
triotic struggles, whether of peace or
of war.
With the shadow of war already
settled upon the land, the American
workers face the biggest tasks of
patriotism that have ever confronted
them.
Shall the war (if war is here) be
for democracy at home as we'll as
abroad? Shall the United States en-
gage in the war and conduct it and
emerge from it with its citizens freer
than they have ever been, with social
and industrial justice more securely
founded than they have ever been?
Or will this critical and perilous per-
iod see democracy less secure, wealth
and power in the hands of the few
more concentrated, and the advance
toward truer civilization set back
perhaps generation?
This is a tremendous issue and it is
already being met with tremendous
energy. 1t is time of historic docu-
ments and historic actions.
Anticipating three weeks ago the
probability of war, the American
Federation of Labor and the Rail
road Brotherhoods defined this issue
of democracy at a momentous con-
ference and in momentous utter
ance, whether in peace or in war;"
declared the Federation and the
Brotherhoods, ''the organized labor
movement seeks to make all else
subordinate to human welfare and
human opportunity. The labor move
ment stands as the defender of this
principle and undertakes to protect
the wealth producers against the ex-
orbitant greed of special interests,
against profteering, against exploita-
tion, against the detestable methods
of irresponsible greed, against un-
humanity and crime of heartless cor
porations and employers"
Pledging the unstinted loyalty of
the workers in any development of
the national crisis, the organized
labor lealers declared:
"Workers have no delusions re-
garding the policy which property
owners and exploiting employers pur
sue in peace or in war, and they also
recognize that, wrapped up with the
safety of this Republic, are ideals of
democracy, heritage which the
masses of the people received from
our forefathers, who fought that lib
erty might live in this country.
The labor movement recognizes the
value of freedom and it knows that
freedom and rights can be maintain
ed only by those willing to assert
their claims and to defend their
rights"
They asserted that whether plan
nlng IOf peace OF war, IHe govern
ment must recognize the organized
labor movement as the agency
through which tim ust cooperate with
wage earners. This demanded that
labor union standards of wages and
conditions of labor and organiza-
tion for the assertion and mainten-
ance of wage earners' rights should
be the only legalized standards of
industrial preparedness in conjunc-
tion with military mobilization.
eve hold this to be incontrovert-
ible," labor's document declared, that
the government which demands that
men and women give their labor pow
er, their bodies or their lives to its
service should also demand the serv-
ice, in the interest of these human
beings, of all wealth and the products
of human toil-property." The
limitation of all profits, "to be based
on costs of processes actully needed
for product" was demanded.