The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1920-01-23
LABOR AND ITS R|EVANCES,
PROTESTS AND ITS DEMANDS
Continued from Page One.l

Continued Fl
levied by middlemen and specula-
tors. We urge:
The deflation of currency; pre-
vention of boarding and unfair
price fixing; establishment of CO.
operative movements operated UNI
der the Rochdale system; making
accessible all income tax returns
and dividend declarations as a di-
rect and truthful means of reveal
ing excessive costs and profits.
The ideal of America should be
the organization of industry for
service and not for profit alone
The stigma of disgrace should at
tach to every person who profits
unduly at the expense of his fellow
men.
Labor is fully conscious that the
world needs things for use and that
standards of life can improve only
as production for use and consump-
ton increases. Labor is anxious to
work out better methods for in
dustry and demands it be assured
that increased productivity will be
used for service and not alone for
profits.
Wage-earners aspire to be some
thing more than numbers on the
books of an industrial plant, some
thing more than attendants of a
machine, something more than cogs
in an industrial system dominated
by machinery owned and operated
for profit alone. The workers in
sist upon being masters of them
selves.
Labor understands fully that
powerful interests today are de-
termined to achieve reaction in in
dustry if possible. They seek to
disband or cripple the organizations
of workers. They seek to reduce
wages and thus lower the standard
of living. They seek to keep free
from restriction their power to
manipulate and fix prices. They
seek to destroy the democratic i'm
pulse of the workers which is bred
into their movement by the democ-
racy of the American Republic.
Labor must be and is militant in
the struggle to combat these sinister
influences and tendencies. Labor
will not permit reduction in the
standard of living. 1t Will not con-
sent to reaction toward autocratiC
control. In this it is performing a
public service.
Only in highwage countries is
productivity in industry greatest.
Only in high-wage countries do the
people enjoy high standards of liv-
ing. Low-wage countries present
the least degree of productivity and
offer to their people only low
standards of living and rectricted
liberties. AutocEacy always insists
upon restricting the income and the
activities of workers.
Creative power lies dormant where
autocratic management prevails.
No employer has a vested right to
the good will of his employees. That
must be earned, as between men,
1t can be earned only when man
agement deals with workers as hui
man beings and not as machines
There can not be a full release OF
productive energy under an auto
cratic control of industry. There
must be a spirit of cooperation and
mutually between employers and
workers. We submit that produc-
ton can be enhanced through the
cooperation of management with
the trade union agencies which
make for order, discipline and pro-
ductivity.
We hold that the organization OF
wage-earners into trade unions and
the establishment of collective bar
gaining are the first steps toward
the proper development of our in
dustrial machinery for service.
To promote further the produc-
tion of an adequate supply OF the
worlds needs for use and higher
standards of life, we urge that there
be established cooperation between
the scientists of industry and the
representative of organized work
ers.
Credit is the life blood of modern
business. At present under the
control of private financiers it is
administered, not primarily to serve
the needs of production, but the
desire of financial agencies to levy