The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1917-01-20

ed as American and yet which Hour ishes in America like Jonah's gourd is the Chinese laundry. While the 1aun- dry run by white man is subject tC laws and regulations, that of his Chi nese competitor is singularly free from even the local requirements which ii might be assumed the good of the community in which it thrives de mands. Many people when spoken tc on this matter were of the opinion that workers and any attempt to bring them within the scope of laws might be deemed class legislation.
 This matter will here be treated from no standpoint save that of what the investigator considers absolute jus tice to the hundreds of men in the bus mess who have to comply with every restriction of the law, expend money for sanitary conditions. use large quan- 1 titles of water, heat and light, and still ,<keep within a close. distance of the prices of class of workers who have scarcely anything of this sort to in crease the cost of their labor, for, com putting the amount of money that is spent by the white laundrymen in pro- viding the water that they use and then comparing it with the bills of the Chinese for the same necessary help it requires no argument to point the moral.
 Every state in the Union has laws for the regulation of white laundries. Some of these laws entail expense which some of the laundry owners can i'll afford to meet. But if they do not they are fined. Yet no white mans laundry, however dilapidated and out of-date, ever sheltered the conditions that can be found to be general rather than exceptional in Chinese laundries. Whether or not anything can be done about these conditions, it is only right that the public and especially the legislative part of the public, have some knowledge of their existence. Perhaps it may be of use to let some of the patrons of these places have sight of more than their work and the check for it's payment
 There are probably more than 800 of these laundry workers in Connecticut. When the association three years ago scheduled the existing Chinese laun- dries to the best of it's ability to so do, there were in twenty-five cities and towns in the State two hundred and forty-five plants, employing six hum dred and fourteen Chinese and four whites. The amount of business done by these plants was one million, one hundred and fifty thousand, eight hundred and forty dollars.
 Some idea of the expansion of the business since then can be gathered by I-f fo 0r~ two cities at that time and comparing it with the number which the investi- gator knows exists in those same cities to-day. Waterbury in the 1913 record had 25 to its name. sThe city direc-' tory of 1915 lists A, and the investi- gator would be willing to say that 60 would be nearer the real number: A statement from exact knowledge. can not be made, as it was not possible to go over every street in the localities in the city in which this sort of place can be found. But while looking over the other class of elaundries, at tention was paid to the Chinesel both as to numbers and state. Tn Bridgeport there are more than the, city direc- tory gives; in New Haven the, same. and Hartford has a number which no one but the patrons know exists.
 They are purely and simply money making institutions of which the town and the country receive little toll. Us ually situated in apologies for business dwellings, the rents are low. The ac- commodations are usually such as no other class of business would tolerate and which would not for an instant be tolerated in white. mans business. The amount of money spent for that necessary part of the labor material water, is so small in comparison with that of the white laundryman, that no town ever has the chance to feel az grieved when one of the Chinese bus inesses leaves it. But they do not. leave. The same inscrutable almond eyed believer in Confucius may seem to the casual customer to hand one the goods and the check with the same confident childlike blandness for twen- ty or thirty years. But he does not. Scrutiny shows there is an endless and silent procession in the business. Such a thing as a sick laundryman was nev- CT known to a customer. No Chinese laundry, they say, is closed on account of any illnessAor death But when a Chinaman becomes i'll he is no longer seen in the outside \part of the ebusi- ness. And if he dies there is no pa geant of mourning. No one knows about any save apparently well and strong men.
 If there be a case of illness in white laundry, the sufferer is sent home and the doctor is called. If it be of a contagious or infectious char acter, the laundry will be promptly quarantined, while all it's employees are examined. If the case be in the prop rietor's home he cannot come to busi- ness nor can others of the family, whether they have been near the sick perscn or have been careful to keep away. Thy have to fight to prove the latter fact.
 toned, there has to be fumigation of the laundry, rigid inspection before and after, and a great deal of precau- tions which need not be detailed.
 , Still more is required of the white laundry: Should any of the patrons have contagious or infectious illness inatheir families or even the suspicion thereof, the company dare not take the work of these people. It's teams seen standing before the homes of such would mean the positive falling off of ars business and a loss of confidence 1t could never regain. Nor could t.le afflicted family bring nor send it's laundry to its usual place without having it rejected. This is so fully that no one tries to make