Gilpin observer., 1918-06-27
Germany's
Treatment of the
Workinenan
D. DANIEL LOUIS HANSON
OF 1Jss Y19iiaRtss


beautiful homes for them, pay widows
pensions; also pension for old age,
sickness, loss of work and increases in
families. pay high wages, limit work.
ing hours, make loans easy to farmers.
/ have no slums as do America and
Great Britain; adjudicate all strikes.
Nine Is the land of the care-free and
happy workingman."
That Is the boiled
tences propaganda that Germany COW
cred the whole world with before the
war with the ostensible purpose Of
weakening the morale of her enemies
In the war she then was planning.
Great credit is due to Chairman Eas-
ley of the National Civic Federation in
his published refutation Of Germany's
claims; just a few items from that
valuable document will prove illumi-
hating:
Widows pensions In Germany dur
ing series of years averaged 35 cents
a week; sick pensions 95 cents a week;
invalidity pension the same; orphans
pensions 81 cents week. Wages
averaged per day for carpenters $1.45;
plumbers Sips; railway employees
engineers and conductors on state rail-
ways 70 cents; shop workers $1.O2;
male farm labor 72 cents; female farm
labor AZ cents.
And this in a land where govern
ment statistics placed average cost of
keeping families at over $500 per year.
How did they make both ends meet?
By working the whole family, every
second woman in Germany worked dur
ing the before-the-war period-nearly
100000 all told-and as the writer
can testify from an extended trip
throughout the empire, Mt the hardest
labor.
AS to hours: those of skilled labor
ran about 5S per week, in textile and
other lines from II to IA per day. In
1911 the big stores of Berlin kept open
till 8 at night and some hours on Sun
days-though that last was remedied
the following year. The smaller stores
were even worse as to hours. A bank
ing concern across from my hotel
worked from z in the morning to 8 at
night.
Regarding strikes which Germany
claimed to always adjudicate that
year I saw the beginning of such
disturbance in the Moabit section of
Berlin-and the end, for the authorities
settled 1t in true Homestead fashion
by shooting down the ringleaders. 1t
lasted only two days and the press
was allowed to say nothing about it.
However, the Vorwaerts referred to 1t
and was suppressed for three days as
punishment. According to Mr.. Eas-
ley's statistics. more than two-thirds
the strikes In 1912 were unsuccessful
and labor unions only allowed to meet
Under government supervision.
AS to slums-whoever has Smelled
the horrible odors in Cologne-until
1914 the filthiest city in Europe in
some of its residence sections, will
laugh at Germany's claim to being slum-
less. And what about the foulness of
Madgeburg and Dantzig? East London
is Paradise alley by comparison. Ber-
lin, the show city Of the empire, looks
like town of palaces with the streets
lined by stucco-fronted houses, but
back Of them--and this condition IS
much worse in Hamburg, Cologne,
Frankfort and other large towns
stand the serried ranks of poverty's
tenements, row upon row. Berlin has
more One-room tenements than any
other city in the world. Families of
six and seven herding in one apart
ment and hall bathroom doing serv-
ice for half dozen such families.
AS to land distribution: over n third
Of Germany's farms are less than IL
acres in size; 226 per cent between
IN and 8 acres; IT'S per cent, 5 to 12
acres; 1875 per cent, II to so acres;
while 1865 junkers, the land barons,
own nearly 25,OO0,OO0 acres, running
from $50 to 500 acres and more each.
The above Is only small part of
the picture which Germany actually
presented to the world In the before
the-war period. Not of course what
she claimed, but nevertheless collated
from her official records-all except
the filth of her large cities. 1t sounds
inviting to an American workingman,
does It not And since then, of course,
conditions have gotten even worse with
women doing work that would stoop
the shoulders Of the strongest man.
Oppression Of farmers, underpaid
workers, enslavement Of women and
children industrially shocking housing
conditions, chronic underfeeding with
resultant fearful infant mortality,
counterfeit social insurance-are few
counts In the Indictment made by Mr..
Easley against Germany before the
war.
German efficiency goes to appalling
lengths, whether 1t is breeding German
subjects from the enslaved young
women Of France and Belgium; or in
Issuing lying propaganda with which
to break down the morale of the