Askov American. [volume] (Askov, Pine County, Minn.) 1914-current, 1932-02-25
BY WILLIAM E. McEWEN

Many Americans are alarmed over
anything that savors of dole to
the workers Unemployment insur-
.ance, they fear, is a dole. Feeding
the hungry victims of unemployment
is a dole. Measured by this stand
ard the world is full of dOle-receivers,
and they are not of the workers either.
They are most usually found in high
places, although there are numbers
of them in the underworld rackets.
The dole is misnomer. 1t is
used by the enemies of social prog
ress to detract from legislation de-
signed to relieve distress among the
workers and the poor. The dole, they
say, robs man of his independence.
1t destroys initiative. 1t makes him
-subservient. 1t debases manhood. 1t
encourages idleness and loafing. It
makes beggarS of the honest and will
ing. 1t leads to laZiness. 1t de-
presses the spirit, warps the soul and
weakens moral character and courage.
!:
me organized enemies OF union
labor do a lot of worrying about what
they fear the dole will do to the
workers. When they introduced the r
-antiunion shop and refused to deal
with their employees except as indi-
viduals, thus robbing them of the
right Of collective bargaining, and
compelling the workers to yield to
their terms or starve. they didn't give
a thought or care as to how this
treatment would serve to rob the in
dividual worker of his independence
They were content to keep him cOwed
No institutions in all the ages have
enabled the workers to stand erect
and assert themselves as their unions
have done. No other institution has
given them the strength and power
to develop and maintain their indie
pendence. No other institution has
equipped them to attain those higher
standards that have enabled them tC
keep step in the march of progress
And yet the enemies of organized
labor would destroy it to compel sub
serviency on the part of labor. Still
they bemoan a dole.
Had the employer enemies of union
labor been less reluctant to share
their power with the workers and
more willing to deal with them
through their unions, most of the dis
tress now suffered by the unemployed
would have been mitigated. By work
ing together they would have built
up within the industries, systems oil
insurance and benefits that would have
served to tide both over periods OF
depression without forcing the job.
less workers to seek doles from gov
eminent or the employers to look fol-
government loans to save them from
bankruptcy.
Instead, most of the unions have
been kept so busy fighting for ex
istence and recognition that they have
not been given a breathing spell tt
work out benefit plans to carry theil
membership over long periods OF I'm
employment, sickness or other re
verses. The unions that haven't hat
to spend their time fighting have es
tablished and successfully maintained
insurance systems that provide FOL
sickness, death benefits, unemploy
ment payments, old age pensions ant
homes for their aged members.
X
Cooperation between organize
business and organized labor would
have perfected a program of eco
nOmic planning that would have serv
ed to stabilize industry, made les:
likely man-made cycles of depression
reckOned with the displacement o
labor through the Introduction of labor
saving methods and machinery, bal
anced the lean and fat years, pre-
vented general unemployment, ant
permitted incomes of workers AM