, 1943-09-02

American Labor
Producing For Attack
IN SEPTEMBER 6, American workers will celebrate
Labor Day by extra effort on the production line: It
- will be one more day of war. American labor will be
producing for attack. America will be facing hard, costly
struggles to invade and destroy the enemy.
Labor Day of 1913 marks the close of a year in which
strengthened by victories on the production line and the
fighting front. But wars are won only by the winners of
the final victories. On this Labor Day we must hold our
gains and redouble our efforts for the harder task ahead.
Last year the spur of immediate danger of defeat forced
us forward to halt the foe. This year we must face the cost in
"blood and sweat and tears" which Americans must pay to
seek out the enemy behind his lines and destroy his power
for evil.
This Labor Day is one in which the fighting fibre of our
nation is tested. We have proved we will work to prevent
defeat. We must prove that we can work to win all the
way through to complete victory. We must work on the
production front just as the armed forces of the United
Nations must fight on the battle front until the Nazs and
the Nipponese gasp the words of unconditional surrender.
Day after day, as our fighting forces move through the
aid, by sea or over the land, each has his objective to attain,
his target to hit. So also on the home front, the target for
our soldiers of production has been established. 1t will be
our objective for Labor Day, and for the days and nights
before and after September 6 until the day when the Axis
collapses!
American Labor-Producing For Attack
That is the theme of Labor Day this year-producng
at home so that our fighting men and our Allies can attack
Lhe NAILS anQ ne JdpS all LneT Satel1CeS wherever
they may be found. This is the Peoples War. 1t is a war of
survival for all our people hold dear. It is a war in which
all our people have tasks to perform. This is a war in which
workers are doing the seemingly impossible. The average
worker of today is producing more than double what the
1917-1918 worker could turn out. New equipment, stream
lined mass production methods, labor-management coopera-
ton and individual effort are making it possible for the
United States in 1943 to equip its biggest army and navy
and air force and to ship huge quantities to our Allies.
\ On Labor Day of 1913, America pays tribute to all who
serve on the production front for their contribution to the
defense Of democracy and calls for even greater effort in
the months to come, producing for attack!
Labor has ben called upon to get out the ores, to get in
the scrap, to make more out of less, to help find substitutes
and also to forego or minimize the use of artificial materials,
Labor has responded.
What the farmers of America are doing to produce food
areas industrial workers have helped to relieve manpower
cultivating or harvesting.
To turn copepr ore into bullets, iron ore into ships and
aluminium into bombers has taken the greatest production
effort on the fastest scale that the world has ever seen
Between July, 1910, when the National Defense Advisory
Council was formed and December 7, 1941, when the Jap
attack at Pearl Harbor plunged us into war, the basic frame
work of a munitions industry had been built and America
had begun to produce arms for defense.
A year and a half later American labor and industry
was producing more than 5k times as much fighting ma
terial per month. American planes and ship had carried
the battle against the enemy on every fighting front; tanks,