The guardian. [volume] (Boston, Mass.) 1901-1960, 1939-12-16

ONCE MORE WE introduce the
readers of The Guardian to section
of the International Ladies' Garment
Workers Union in order that they
can again get a glimpse of the clear,
constructive and emancipated view
point and philosophy which dOmi-
nate this most progressive of
American trade unions. On Novem-
Der 25th in Carnegie Hall in New
York, Local 81 celebrated its Thrift
eth anniversary with concert and
cultural program that will long be
remembered by those present. An
interesting feature of the celebra-
ton was the presentation of Bundle
Brigade" by members of the Union
and in which several Colored mem
berS starred.
FOLLOWING is A portion of the
address made on that occasion by
Samuel Shore, Manager of Local 81
and a member of the Negro Labor
Committee. Besides your cOlumnist,
others who spoke were David Dublin
sky, President, and Luigi AntOninni,
Vice-President of the IL.G.W.U.
"Thirty years ago, our Union occu-
pied a dingy, small office in Clinton
Hall. The broken bannister, guarding
the creaking stairway leading to the
office, was a picturesque symbol of the
condition of the union of that day
Clinton Hall was a dismal old building
on New York's East Side. Tonight we
are in Carnegie Hall, the glittering,
fashionable center of music and cultu-
raj life. This contrast strikingly re-
fleets the three dramatic decades of
trade union history which we are now
celebrating.
cat the turn of the century, men
and women who entered the wearing
apparel industries were mostly immi-
grants who fled the religious and poll
teal prosecutions then so rampant in
Europe. Here in New York they
found the sweatshop with all its char
acteristic evils. They endured suffer
ing and privation. Young girls were
forced to toll sixty and seventy hours
a week. Payday was painful uncer-
tainty- sometimes twice a month
and sometimes once a month, and fire.
Ouently INSCRIPTIONS employers
would disappear without paying their
workers at all. Living and struggling
in the sweatshops the workers-stran-
gers in strange Kindergarten each
other with suspicion and distrust
To-day, thirty years later, the gains
and improvements obtained are, in
comparison with the past, indeed
phenomenal. The sweatshop is gone
but the heroism, self-sacrifce and
devotion of those who built the union
are still with us!
"In 1909 our office rent was eleven
dollars a month, and we were often
unable to pay it. Now we have a model
headquarters and a substantial treas
ury. These years represent growth
and accomplishment through it
all is evident the spirit of Local g.
a burning force thirty years ago-a
brilliant flame today That flame has
burnt away many old ideas. I recall
the CONSERVATION with which many
employers greeted the very word
UNION in those old days The manu-
facturers believed that signing a union
agreement meant signing away their
business. That fear was evident in
the torturous expressions invented to
coat the pill. 1t was a day when a
spade was called a shovel. Louis D.
Brandeis called it a preferential shop;
Hamilton Holt called it an elective
shop; the dictionary was searched for
terms calling union shop something
else under the theory that rose by
some other name would smell like
geranium.
"Twenty-six years ago, my friend
Judge Harry A. Gordon, who sits here
tonight and who then represented the
old Cotton Garment Manufacturers
Association, prolonged a strike for
several freezing wintry days because
he insisted that there was some mys-
FERROUS difference between the words
practical" and possible" I de-
manded that the contract should con-
tain clause providing that during the
slack period work shall, as far as "pos-
sible" be divided equally among all
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