The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1929-12-17
By MYRA PAGE.
(Continued)


" to the cotton mills to work they find that
they must live in a town owned and operated
by the company, and in its sole interests. Wher-
ever cotton mill operatives go, or whatever
they do, they discover the long arm of the COM
pany reaching out to dominate their thoughts
and acts.
The firm which controls their jobs also owns
the wooden shacks in which they live, and usu-
ally it owns the company store at which they
trade. The small number of Negroes who work
at the mill are not allowed to live among the
white workers, but are segregated in few
huddled shacks which stand off by themselves
and their quarters and living conditions are
even worse than those to which White Trash
fall heir. Only few mill workers live off the
mill, for ordinarily this is impossible to man
age. Employers usually make one of the con-
ditions of the job that the mill hand will move
into the company house. Furthermore, wages
are so low that mill hands can not afford the
higher rents outside.
They learn that their children, if they attend
school at all must go to the second or third
rate school, either owned directly by the COM
pany or under its control If they are still of
religious mind and go to church, they attend
IN building owned by management and listen
to preacher who is an employee of the COM
pany and breaches only what the company is
wiling for him to say. If they want recreation
or education they must seek out the company
run Y. M. c. A. or community center. if there
is one in the village, or go to an evening class
for illiterates, or take one of the courses Of
fered on textile subjects. Should they desire
to start club or baseball team of their own,
they must get homogeneous permission to use
company land or building-a permission which
can be revoked at moments notice.
of their to their employees as one of "pater-
nalisml.' According to the tradition which
they foster and which city middle-class people
accept uncriticay, the relation is one of
benevolent but all-powerful father toward those
whom'he considers mere children, who must be
provided for, protected, and watched over as
such. Mill workers are not expected to be in
terested in, or capable Of assuming social re-
sponsibilties! Management explains that for
all of the social services performed by the mill
owners for their employees, only one or two
things are asked in return: Mill hands must
be faithful and regular workers, and too
"loyal' to the company to join union, ask
more wages, be "movn on to another viii
lage. Also, they must send their children,
when old enough, to the mills to work and not
let them enter other trades. If this should
happen, the entire family will probably be re-
CURED to leave the mill together.
This policy of paternaism of southern mill
owners intelligent workmen view as an insult
to the people who work in the mills. They also
see in 1t a shrewd attempt arrangements
part to keep the cheap, plentiful labor supply
about which they boast, both cheap and plenti-
full, docile and stationary. Management's lack
of success in this respect, they point out, proves
that they have greatly moderated the stamina
which labor possesses.
When company strategy of propaganda iso-
lation and economic pressure on their employees
fail and they form unions, then management
collects all its weapons of job-owner, creditor,
landlord, spy system and special police power:
and discharges, evcts, denies food from the
company store arrests, blacklists and drives
from its mill and company town, the offending
workmen.
1t is worth noting that the Southern mill vii
lage is typical in it's characteristics of the
thousands of company towns which are spread
ing like an octopus over the industrial life of
the United States. In industries like coal, cop
per and iron mining, steel, oil and lumber, as
we'll as textiles, capitalists have set up their
privately-owned villages in which millions of
American working men and women and their
families live; and in all of these the COM
panies exert an absolute dictatorship.
No Political Rights on Mill Hill.
Company EOHLrOl OF COWnS means tndC there
are no political rights, as well as no economic
rights, for workers on a mill hill AS the pri-
vate property of the company, mill villages are
not Incorporated, so that as far as village
matters are concerned, mill workers are dis
franchised. They are denied all opportunity to
mobilize and express themselves politically on
local affairs, such as those of housing santa
ton, school and mill conditions, and rights of
organization. There is no local government,
but the owners rule through their hired staff
of special deputy sherffs and welfare workers.
Where there are exceptions to this rule, as
in Bessemer City, N. c., the workers almost
invariably elect sympathetic officials.)
"How do we ruler A Greenville mill presi-
dent proudly boosted to an inquirer, "Like the
old czars of Russia!' This is true. CARBON
and paternalism go hand in Ind. A mill viii
lage is similar to medieval feudal estate, with
workmen living in industrial rather than feudal
bondage. Freedom of speech, assemblage and
| press, and self-government are absolutely un-
| known.
| Mill owners have bitterly fought all attempts
| to incorporate the villages, and thereby extend
the franchise to their populations. Evidently
they fear the potential political powers of their
employees. Knowing that company political
| dictatorship makes its economic domination
far easier to maintain, mill owners are deter
| mined to retain this political monopoly as long
as possible. And when their autocratic policies
| sre CHALLENGED, officials offer as an excuse,
that mill village populations are not capable
| of governing themselves!