The Connecticut labor news., 1924-10-11

of American labor. In its intention it is entirely a constructive, intelligent and purely pacific revolt against an out
 worn attitude.
 The gentle cynic of American labor calls 1t the more and more movement says Benjamin Stalberg in the New
 York World. This ironic half-truth i:
 in way Illuminating. For six un-
 broken decades labor has been and still
 is fighting to cut the dawn to dusk day
 down to eight hours and less, literally
 wrestling minutes by minutes from the
 dial of industry. It forced better work ing conditions rule by rule in strike af-
 ter strike. Briefly, for we'll nigh half century American labor engaged in a bitter guerilla feud with capital and, to some degree, with the State eschew- ing broader social philosophy in pre- ference to what 1t called economic ac- tion"
 This is not criticism, for it was only step by step that labor could come into its own. But during the war and ever since many things have been happen ing to labor. And all these happenings can be summed up, very generally, into this incontestable fact: today labor is socially, economically, politically, civ fly, and morally-far too significant in American life to go on fighting from %4 Ia1, o@,I 1a~oI %~ In short, by this time labor has won enough rights to have accumulated con siderable duties. To the dismay of re- actionary business, it insists upon more than mere lip service to the partner ship of capital and labor It is, in fact, developing trade union capitalism of it own on a firm credit foundation, spreckling the country with labor banks and capital investments to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars.
 Two Outstanding Leaders
 The two outstanding leaders of this new unionism are President Sidney Hill man of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers and President William H. Johnston of the International Associa- ton of Machinists. They are of the but behind them one can discern the vast infantry formations of American labor. .
 Sidney Hillman, now only thirty-six, is of Russian Jewish origin, full of the fire of his race, at once hard and ideal stic, canny and honorable. He does not fatter his rank and file, which is a rather risky neglect in biennia1ly elective office. Neither does he hold that management is always deliberately pad and hostile. He seemingly dis covered that in a good many cases it S simply dehcient-much like the rest ,f mankind. There are hundreds of in the clothing industry vho are unfit to manage a peanut tand. Some of them honestly cannot 'ay decent wages for the sufficient req on that they do not know how to run heir business proftably without ex-
 loiting labor. Time and again, in lit rally numberles cases, we have had to end our experts to fix up their payro11s, 0 straighten out incredible tangles, to introduce the most elementary eff iency methods.
 We help them for one excellent req on; the clothing workers must make heir living out of the clothing industry just as their employers Until now abor has fought mainly from a sense f outrage against exploitation. Hence orth 1t will fight more and more from
 sense of industrial and social respon- ibi1ity."
 Do you believe then that labor and apital must cooperate? ?" I asked. >oafing on Job Doesn't Pay.
 Well, somehow, don't quite like the erm,'' he answered. Charity workers nd all kinds of other professionally ,ood people have softened this excel ent word too much. You see, our lnion Is not engaged in signing any golden rules. It signs contracts. A dDol IS lIOl d INI1ISdOIl Ol oou put a method of intelligent bargaining. Now we believe in guaranteeing pro- iuction standards to the employer, for he reason that such guarantees en- nance our bargaining strength. You must not forget that, after all, the workers have nothing to sell but their abor. And it is silly to believe that or .anized labor can make a decent living y loafiing on the job. Industry lays 10 golden eggs. We've got to work or living. The job of the union is lot lessen or cheapen this work but o protect it. And sabotaging or sol iering labor has nothing much to pro- ect.