Denver labor bulletin., 1917-08-04


teen or sixteen hours.
This long day existed for all work
ers, the skilled and the unskilled, the
children as well as the men and
women.
The workers had not yet learned to
organize, and as individuals they were
utterly helpless to effect a change in
the hours of their labor or in the
scale of their wages.
There were, of course, no laws to
protect them, and so they were en-
tirely at the mercy of their employers
The normal conditions that existed
in the factory system little more than
half century ago in England and
elsewhere thruout the world are
equaled today only in certain plague
spots.
When one reads the story of the
misery and oppression, the long hours
and low wages of those days one won
ders how the workers managed to
live at all
How much the condition of the work
ers generally has been improved it is
by no means easy to say, but we know
that the condition of the workers has
vastly improved wherever they have
learned to value unity.
In those trades where the men have
known enough to fight for their rights
and stand together there has arisen
what some scoffers like to call an
"aristocracy of labor"
And if in certain trades there are
indeed aristocrats of labor, it is simply
because they have had the intelligence
to fight together, to pay dues to one
organization and to battle ALWAYS with
unity and solidarity.
And what they have done all other
workers can do.
The "aristocrats" hold no patent on
their method Of action, and by acting
in the same manner all other toilers
can win all the "aristocrats" have won
Now, IL is difficult TO ascertain just
how much union workers have benefit
ed by higher wages.
In that matter there is always the
question as to the increased cost of
living, which makes difficult any COM
purison Of wages here and abroad or
Of wages now with those of forty
years ago.
The best one can do is to compare
wages and hours today in one trade
that is organized with the wages and
hours IN another trade that is unor-
ganized.
This has been well done by the de-
partment of labor at Washington, and
ment show beyond dispute the enor-
nous benefits that have come to labor
as result of organization.
Consider for one moment the follow
ing facts:
We all know that the workers in
the iron and steel trade are poorly
organized, and we find that the hours
of labor in this trade are from GO to
" hours per week.
The hot blast men in all parts of the
country work about 81 hours per
week.
On the other hand we all know that
the stone and granite cutters are well
organized
When we look up the figures of their
hours we find that they work about
as hours per week.
The bricklayers, the carpenters. the
hodcarriers. the painters. the paper
hangers and the plumbers are highly
organized trades, and when we in
quire into the hours worked by these
we find that they rarely average more
than so hours per week.
These workers, then, are the "aris-
tocrats" of labor simply because they
are well united in their trade. are loyal
to their organization. pay their dues
and fight n common fight.
II would be difficult to find an argu-
ment in support of unionism so potent
as this one.
To find one set of workers like the
stone cutters working 4S hours, and
another set of workers in the iron and
steel trade working 81 hours per week.
should alone be enough to convince
every toiler in this wide land of the
value of unionism.
But this is not all. The hot blast
men who work an average of so hours
week. obtain only about l6 cents per
hour for their labor.
The stone cutters, who work on an
average of rs hours per week, receive
an average of IL cents per hour.
In other words, the stone cutters,
working about one-half the time of the
hot blast men, receive at the end of
week much larger wages.
To look at it in another way, n hot
blast man during his life sells to his
boss an amount of labor equal to that
sold by two stone cutters during their
life.
The hot blast worker gives in one
life what one stone cutter would need
two lives to give, and he gives the
labor of two lives for less money than
a stone cutter receives for the labor
of his one life,
Think of this. and then consider how
tragic it is that one must actually
persuade workingmen to believe in in
dustrial unity.
1t is almost impossible 80 believe
that any class of workers should be
blind to the value of unionism or
loath to suffer almost anything to
achieve it.
And what astounding evidence of
the working class stupidity it would
be if the workers of this country
should without a fight allow their un-
ions to be crushed and their right of
organization taken away by capitalist