The Washington times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1902-1939, 1936-09-07
'Fireside Chat
Pledges Aid
In DROUGHT
Continued from Page y


nouncing the ALLEGATION of two and
a half million dollars more to en-
able the Employment Service to
make an even more intensive
search than it has yet been
equipped to make, to find oppor-
tunities in private employment for
workers registered with it.
Calls on Workers
Tonight I urge the workers to
cooperate with and take full ad-
vantage Of this intensification Of
the work Of the Employment Serv-
ice. This does not mean that there
will be any lessening of our efforts
under our WPA and PWA and
other work relief programs until
all workers have decent jobs in
private employment at decent
wages. We do not surrender our
responsibility to the unemployed.
We have had ample proof that
it is the will of the American peo-
pie that those who represent them
in national, State and local gov
eminent should continue as long
as necessary to discharge that re-
SponSlbllity. But it does mean that
the Government wants to use every
resource to get private work for
those now employed on Govern
ment work. and thus to curtail to
a minimum the Government ex-
penditureS for direct employment.
Tonight i ask employers, large
and small, throughout the nation
to use the help Of the State and
Federal Employment Service when
ever in the general pickup of bust
ness they require more workers.
No Class Holiday
Tomorrow is Labor Day. Labor
Day in this country has never
been a class holiday. It has al
ways been a national holiday. It
has never had more significance
as a national holiday than it has
now. In other countries the re-
lationShip of employer and en-
ploye has been more or less &C.
cepted as class relationship not
readily to be broken through. In
this country we insist, as an es-
Sential of the American way of
life, that the employer employe re-
lationShip should be one between
free men and equals. We refuse
to regard those who work with
hand or brain as different from or
inferior to those who live from
property. We insist that labor is
entitled to as much respect as
property. But our workers with
hand and brain deserve more than
respect for their labor. They de-
serve practical protection in the
opportunity to use their labor at
a return adequate to support them
as a decent and constantly rising
standard of living, and to accumu-
late a margin of security against
the inevitable vicissitudes Of life.
The average man must have
that twofold opportunity If we
are to avoid the growth of a class
conscious society in this country.
There are those who fail to read
both the signs of the times and
American history. They would try
to refuse the worker any effective
power to bargain collectively, to
earn a decent livelihood and to
acquire security. 1t is those short
sighted ones, not labor, who
threaten this country with that
class dissension which in other
countries has led to dictatorship
and the establishment of fear and
hatred as the dominant emotions
in human life.
Needs Are One
All American workers, brain
workers and manual workers
alike, and all the rest of us whose
well-being depends on theirs, know
that our needs are one in build
ing an orderly economic democ-
racy in which all can profit and
in which all can be secure from
the kind of faulty economic di-
rection which brought us to the
brink Of common ruin seven years
ago.
There is no cleavage between
white collar workers and manual
workers, between artists and
artisans, musicians and me-
chanics, lawyers and accountants
and architects and miners.
Tomorrow, Labor Day, belongs
to all of us. Tomorrow, Labor Day,
symbolizes the hope of all Ameri-