The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1926-01-23
And It's Worse Than This in China!
BY James H. DoIsen.


by the Workers Party in March,
compare the condition of the Chinese
workers, men, women and especially
children to that which prevailed
among the working masses of Eng
land during the early years when the
factory system was first displacing
hand industry. Altho the workers of
China, thus effected number millions
where the workers of England num-
bered hundreds of thousands, there is,
indeed, so marked a resemblance that
we can see here before our very eyes
the same social material for the study
of which Karl Marx had to resort TO
the archives of the British Museum
and the great libraries of Paris. One
trouble with us all is we do not real
ize that the drama of history is taking
place before our very eyes.
was again impressed with this
fact the other day in most curious
fashion. l happened to drop into a
secondhand bookstore and by the
nerest chance, picked up the second
volume Of work by c. Edwards Les
ter, entitled Condition and Fate of
England" published in 1912. A glance
at the first page interested me, tho l
had never heard of its author, and
doubt if ten others in this country
have. The book concerned the hor-
rible sufferings of the British workers
whe were dispossessed by the intro
duction of the factory system in that
country, and was an eloquent plea
in their behalf from the humanitarian
standpoint.
The following quotations from this
forgotten volume will give the reader
some conception of the agonies thru
which the Chinese workers are pas
sing right now, in this year 1926. Re
member, that the conditions in China
are even worse than those dipicted
here, tho their prevalence in the Eng
land of the first half of the last CEN
fury seemed "monstrous" and zap
palling" to. the writer at that time.
uolIn. order Ito show the conditions
tannong1the7 factory. operatives of Eng
land, Lester quotes the London Morn
ing Post, of February, 1S41:
Thirty thousand children, many of
them under eight years of age, are
worked in cotton factories even now
in many cases, more than twelve
hours a day. Nay, these helpless are
compelled las was fully proved be-
fore a parliamentary committee) toI
walk after the machinery from twen-
ty to thirty miles a day. The cruelties
proved by irresistible evidence, to be
committed on these helpless victims
of our gambling system of trade, are
sufficient to chill the blood of every
person possessed of the ordinary at
tributes of humanity"
Would Kill Every Third Child.
'For several years." Lester COM
ments, "the restitution and distress Of
the lower classes (workers) have
been steadily and rapidly increasing.
The cry of helpless poverty is going
up from every hamlet in Great Brit
ain... The state of society is so de-
plorable. there are political econom-
lists who have proposed as the only
0ACoouAC Va ACAACAg "A AAA~ ~ CoCAt Se~<~~
of things is to continue, that every
third child born in the three Kingdoms
britain, Scotland and Ireland) should
be instantly put to DEATH"
He points out that not only were
the conditions horrible beyond belief
among the factory workers, but that
there we're great numbers enduring
even worse conditions in the hand-in-
dustries and small establishments
which were forced to face the compe-
tition of the growing capitalist sys-
tenn.
Let us contemplate" he continues,
"the condition of infant laborers out
OF the factories. Their number prob
ably exceeds, says the London Quart
erly Review, ten times those who are
engaged in the cotton, wooden, wors.
ted and linen factories. No laws
regulate their wages employments, or
hours of labor. They are engaged in
fha MAMMA cfura IF lace and silk and