The Farmington times. (Farmington, St. Francois County, Mo.) 1905-1926, 1917-03-16
IMPORTANCE OF WORKING
MEN ORGANIZING
(Contributed.l

Labor, it is said, is a commodity Il
be bought and sold, and it is as idlt
to attempt to regulate the price Of
this, or any other commodity, as Il
try to stop the flow of the tides. La.
Dor, however, is a commodity of pc.
culiar sort. 1t is a part of the very
being of the man who sells it. The
commodity sold is a human creature
whose welfare in the eyes of the law
should be of more Importance than
any mere accumulation of wealth on
the part of the employer. 1t is a
commodity, further, which it is difficult
to sell to advantage. The working
man cannot know the best market for
this ware, his labor, nor can he sell
it at any place except where he him
self is, He cannot send a sample of
it, nor can he, without organized eff
fort, regulate the supply. AS long as
he lives and is without resources, he
must work and for many years in
succession he may be forced to sell
his product at price considerably
less than the cost to society of repro
ducing it.
The commodity of labor is one
which, in a great many instances, can
be supplied by women and children,
and if there is no limit set either by
organization or by the force of law
to its exploitation, it can very well re-
suit in the wholesale destruction of
the commodity itself, and in the per-
manent deterioration of the workmen
OF the community. Without organi-
cation and without the interference
of the law, therefore, the individual
workman is practically at the mercy
of the employer. 1t does not follow
that all employers will abuse this
privilege, as some of them do in the
Lead Belt. Some employers, it must
be admitted, are willing to pay their
employees a reasonable and humane
remuneration. At the same time the
force of competition will in many
cases compel the unprotected and un-
organized workman, rather than
starve, to accept a wage insufficient
to maintain a decent standard of liv-
ing or to keep him in a state of indus
trial efficiency.
Wherever labor is unorganized
and competition exists, the effect is
not only felt in decreased wages, but
also, in longer hours, in unsanitary
and in the tyrany of
straw bosses. In many ways other
than the amount Of wages and the
hours of labor, does the employer ex-
ert strong influence upon the well
fare of the workingman. Wherever
there is unorganized or disorganized
labor there are cases of unfair ad-
vantage taken of employees. The en-
ployer dictates to the unorganized
workman where he shall live, where he
is to work. The conditions under
which the work shall be done, the
amount of remuneration he shall re
ceive and as to the protection the
worker shall have from death in mine
or mill are wholly in the hands of the
employer. The employer also retains
the right to choose unreservedly the
and fellow-servant of
the unorganized workman; and thus
the man who may put the new en-
ploye's life in jeopardy is entirely of
the employers choosing.
The crisis and commercial depres-
slons which have swept over this
country during almost every decade,
have resulted in intense suffering on
The part of workingmen, a suffering
iccentuated by the competition of |
great masses of immigrants who
come here during more prosperous
lines. Even apart from such crises,
he workingman is subject to the loss
# his job through sickness, accident
'r other contingencies beyond his
ontrol, and in vast majority of the
asses he can secure no compensation
rom the employer for injury in
licted by an accident, no matter how
rec the workman himself is from
arelessness or contributory negli-
.ence. The employee is also subject
o loss of his position through ad-
ancing age, and in the case of ma
ority of unorganized workers, no pro-
ision is made for him in this event.
think it time we workers of the
,ead Belt were waking up and de-
handing justice both lin respect to
ages and working conditions. Ex-
erience has taught us that the only
ray in which any concessions can be
btained from some of the older cor
orations of the Lead Belt is through
force. Then, why not organize and
Ike men, and true American citizens,
emand without equivocation or men
Al reservation what is right and
istly due US. WORKER.