The Butler County press. [volume] (Hamilton, Ohio) 1900-1946, 1929-04-19
The Cherry
" Where with our
we tell the truth
about many things. sometimes pro-
foundly, sometimes flippantly,
sometimes recklessly.


linas and Tennessee, where revolt
against low wages is flaming in town
after town. 1t was sure to come. The
human race stands oppression up to
a point and then comes the flare
back. Sometimes the race will stand |
more, sometimes less.
All who can speak with a fair mind
proclaim the justice of the workers
cause. A South Carolina legislative |
committee declares the workers are
right in protesting. The employers
generally have sought to introduce
the stretching system" The legisla-
tors cut out all technical terms and
say what this does is to stretch
humanity and not machinery"
Humanity refuses to be stretched
too much. Secretary of Labor Davis
joins in and says the south is the
worst paid section of the country and
only organization can cure the evil.
Well, the mill owners went into the
south to find what is called "cheap
labor" The term itself is An insult
to those whose self-respect is not
dead. AS President Green said, only
"puny minds" will believe labor will
remain Cheap"
Men and women will stand a pow
erty that is the outcome of their own
struggle with the soil in much more
patience and to a further degree of
depression than they will stand it at
the hands of mill owners whose prof
its are large and visible. The brain
that can reason will, in the light of
such things, rebel, sooner or later .
In the south the hour seems to have.
struck. For many workers in new
| mill towns, such as Elizabethton, the
mill job is the first contact with mod
ern industrial life and consequently
| it is their first contact with its fruits.
| In Elizabethton there are workers
whose silk stockings cover legs that
three months ago were bare The rea-
son silk stockings, or any others, are
possible, is that colonization has taken
place-which means that whole fam
| lilies have gone to work
The family wage provides better
| living than the family has known be-
fore. But, saving grace that it is,
this slightly better living, still poor
as measured by decent standards,
soon begets it's desire for improve
ment. 1t cannot be had without a
ight-and so the strike
| Corporations whose interest ramify
| throughout this country and even
throughout the world are building or
have built their plants in the south
Against these workers, acting one by
one, are slaves. Only workers in
strong unions can win anything ap-
preaching justice.
| Glanzstoff, the big rayon mill in
Elizabethton, is child of a great Ger
man combine, which in turn is inter-
locked with the Krupps, with DUPONT
and with great Dutch interests. 1t
is said also to have British alliance.
Equally powerful interests operate
other equally big plants.
Bemberg, making a product carry
ing that name, an artificial silk, is of
the Glanzstoff family. A single dis
covery, made in the Tennessee plant,
increased output so per cent and low
cred cost simultaneously. This is no
washed-out New England proposition
| But textiles are not all. The south
has its old principalities of cotton and
tobacco. The revolt starts in textiles.
| Cotton and tobacco can scarcely hope
| to escape.
1t may have been logical for resent
ment to start in Elizabethton The
| WOlhIIS CiICAC SLii1 fidfC dICCSS W tllc
land. Moreover, Tennessee has the
| best labor laws of the south and a
| factory inspection that stands high in
effectiveness. 1t has compensation
law. Women may not work more than
81 hours a week. The consciousness
that workers have rights was already
we'll developed and those rights had a
certain protection. Also in many
places and in many lines the state
has long had its strong and effective
unions.
The country will watch the struggle
in the south. 1t will give support to
workers who show their eagerness to
rise. Nothing is more inspiring than
the sight of slaves rising to the stat
ure of men.