Denver labor bulletin., 1917-08-04
TRADE UNIONISM AND INDUS
TRIAL PROGRESS.

Inc constructive force OF trade un-
ionism is something that is very fire.
quently overlooked in discussions of
the labor question. By that we do not
mean so much the constructive gain
which it brings to the workers in the
way of higher wages and better work
ing conditions, but it's contributions to
industry as a whole in the form of
those laws, factory regulations and ap-
pliances for health and safety which
are brought about through trade union
agitation. AS a rule everything of the
sort meets with the bitterest kind of
opposition from employers of anti
trade union tendencies and from en-
ployers' associations. By and by, how
ever, when such become part of the
industrial code and it is found they
safety and health, little or no credit is
given the unions for their activity in
bringing them about.
In view of this, it is refreshing to
run across an employer who expresses
the conviction that employers as a
body owe more than they are inclined
to admit to the improvements of man.
ufacture due to the firmness and in
dependence of trade organizations.
Sir William Mather, a member of the
big British engineering firm of Mather
is forced to admit that the energy and
pertinacity of trade unions have
caused legislation to be passed which
would not otherwise have been pro-
NOTED by lawyers and politicians, all
of which have tended to improve Brit
ish commerce. In an article published
in the English Contemporary Review
recently he pays striking tribute to
trade unionism for its contribution to
industrial progress in the course of
which he says:
"The enormous production of
wealth in Great Britain during the
present half century-which is due to
natural resources and the labor and
skill bestowed upon their development
has grown most rapidly during a
period remarkable for the extension of
power of trade unionism. Prosperity
beyond the dreams of avarice has fol-
lowed in the wake of our industrial
habits and customs, and these have un-
doubtedly been largely promoted by
the great labor organizations.
Every intelligent employer will ad-
nit that his factory or workshop when
equipped with all the comforts and
conveniences and protective appl-
ances, prescribed by parliament for
the benefit and protection of his work
people (even tho great effort has been
made on his part to procure them),
has become more valuable property
in every sense of the word, and profit
has accrued to him owing to the i'm
proved conditions under which his
work people have produced"
Trade unionists and union leaders
have of course long recognized this
remarkable phenomenon in the rela-
tions between capital and labor and
%
of wasted energy than that of the con-
slant, unceasing struggle of the re-
dictionary, union labor hating employ
er against every contribution which
the trade unions make or attempt to
make toward industrial betterment
and industrial progress. One could
enumerate at random a host of labor
law, factory regulations and so forth
which would never have been put in
operation were it not but for the per-
sistent agitation of the trade unions
and which afterward proved a valua-
able asset to the employer.
Sir William Mather, in the article
from which we have above quoted, al
so pays tribute to the keen interest
felt by trade unions in seeking to Sc
cure permanence and progress in the
trades they pursue, and that is an
other characteristic of trade unionism
which is not usually recognized The
unions take a vital interest in indus,
try because their welfare depends up
on the successful operation of the
trades they pursue; they know the
skilled needs of each trade from the
ground up and they know the psy-
chology of the workers. When the
time comes, and it is coming, when la
Dor, through the trade unions, is al
lowed to share in the control and di-
rection of industry, we may look for
an era of much greater industrial ex
pansion and enterprise.