IN THE FIELD OF LABOR.
Senator Tanner's bill specifying
that the label of the allied printing
trades shall appear on all state print
ing had a narrow escape from un
timely death Wednesday. In com
mittee of the whole, where members
are not required to go on record, the
bill was marked for slaughter, the
committee recommending it for in
definite postponement. Immediately
after the committee arose and re
ported Senator Tanner offered as a J
substitute motion that the bill be en
grossed for third reading and demand
ed a roll call. This put members on
record and the bill was saved for the
time being. The vote on the motion
to engross the bill for third reading
stood 17 for to 13 against. Every vote
in the negative save one was cast by
a republican. Every vote save one
cast to engross the bill was cast by
& democrat. Banning, democrat, voted
against the bill, and Bartling, repub
lican, voted for it. Selleck and
Brown of Lancaster voted against
the bill. Banning said sucfc a law
would put the printing of the state
in the hands of a few firms, thus ex
hibiting his ignorance of conditions.
The present condition puts it into the
hands of a few firms that render
poor service and execute cheap work
because they hire cheap labor. Hoag
land said he was a friend of union la
bor but not of the closed shop the
sort of friendship that jabs the knife
under the fifth rib while giving the
kiss of friendship. When Hoagland
stated that the bill would merely
place all the printing in the hands
of Lincoln and Omaha firms he ut
tered a statement that had no founda
tion. It would not take a dollar s
worth of work from any print shop
that now has state contracts if those
shops would comply w'th union con
ditions which conditions are to pay
a decent scale of wages and work a
reasonable number of hours.
The enactment of this bill would
put a stop to a huge graft that is
often worked. Two years ago a no
toriously unfair print shop at York
secured the contract for printing a
biennial report, taking it at a price
per page fully one-half less than the
next lowest bidder. The book wag
two months late in delivery, and
when it came it showed 137 blank
pages out of a total of less than 500,
and enough other space wasted by
"padding" to account for fully 165
pages. The state paid the contract
price per page for the 165 padded
pages. This is common under pres
ent conditions. The basement at the
state house is full of old bulletins ami
reports printed in non-union shops by
cheap and inefficient help, the de
partment officials refusing to send
such botch work out with their sig
natures thereon. The label of the
allied printing trades will be a guar
antee that the state is getting just
what it ' pays for. It will be a guar
antee that the mechanics employed
on the work were paid decent wages
that permits them to live like Amer
ican citizens, and that they were not
compelled to work long hours. Sen
ator Tanner's bill is a bill to raise
not only the standard of printing done
for the state, but to raise the stand
ard of living of hundreds of mechan
ics and their families. There can b&
no logical opposition to the bill.
There is another printing bill intro
duced that ought to be enacted into
law. It provides for . L a v4real stale
board of printing. The present state
board of printing is a joke. This is
not meant as a slap at the men who
constitute the board, nor to its ef
ficient secretary-expert. The fault
is with the law. Under the present
law no one Is responsible for poor
work, for insufficient delivery, for
failure to make prompt delivery oi
for other failure. Under it oficfials
aFe able to pay debts political debts
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at the expense of the state. An
oficial wanting a supply of printing
makes out his requisition and files it
with the board. The board lets the
contract. The work is done but is not
delivered to the board but to the
official asking for it. That official
puts his "O. K." on the voucher and
the printing board allows it, always.
But no one checks up the delivery,
and that's where the gouge comes in.
A state official can ask for say 10,000
bulletins or letterheads. Then he
may call up' the editor of the paper
that boosted hardest for him and say;
"I've asked for 10,000 of such-and-such
a report. Now you bid on the
10,000 with the understanding that
you'll have to print only 5,000." As
a result the favored bidder has it all
his own way, for while he is aware
that he will have to print only 5,000,
the other printers figure on having
to deliver 10,000. When the job is
done it is deliverd to the official, the
voucher is made out, properly certi
fied to, and it is then paid.
The bill referred to aims to cure
all this, and will if enacted into law.
It provides that all work must be de
livered to the secretary of the print
ing board and certified to by him be
fore the bill is paid. This fixes abso
lute responsibility. This expert must
be a printer of experience covering
a specified number of years, and a
salary is provided that will enable
him to give his whole time to the job.
Nebraska pays out in the neighbor
hood of $60,000 a year for printing, 25
per cent of which is wasted. In other
words, if the printing board was what
it should be the state would get far
better service for two-thirds of what
it is now paying for wretched service.
Missouri, long the most notorious
of convict labor states, has at last
seen the light. The bill abolishing
convict labor for private contractors
has passed both branches of the leg
islature and is now before Governor
Hanley. The law provides that no
further contracts be made for prison
labor, and that 300 contracted con
victs be withdrawn every year until
there is no longer a convict working
under contract. Provision is to be
made for enlarging the state Miming
twine plant, and for the manufacture
by convicts of articles used by the
state, such as furniture, bedding, gar
ments, brick, cut stone, etc. But the
product of this labor is not to be
sold on the open market to compete
with the products of free labor.
The railroad brotherhoods are feel
ing good over the success that is at
tending their efforts to secure rem
edial legislation. The representatives
on the ground, Routt and Omstead,
seem to have acquired the art of doins
entirely without sleep, and as a re
sult of their efforts not only have se v
eral good bills been passed, but others
are well on the way.
Trades unionists, and especially
members of the allied. printing trades,
owe Senator Tanner of South Oma
ha their hearty thanks for the bullj
fight he made to save the union label
bill from being stabbed in the back
and from ambush. Tanner put up
just the kind of a fight he is always
likely to put. up when he gets good
and warm and he can get quite trop
ic when organized labor is attacked.
"Doc" carried a card in the typo
graphical union for a long time, and
he employs only union men in his big
printing plant in South Omaha. He
never bids on state printing, either.
Ten thousand building tradesmen
in Chicago are out on strike. Rumors
of an intended strike became rife ami
an attempt was made to head it ofr
by applying to Judge Gridley for an
injunction forbidding the issuance of
the strike order. But the leaders got
wind of the injunction business and
called the strike while the judge was
reading the petition.
The safety appliance laws of 189'3,
1897 and 1903 were bunched in tht
United States supreme court last
Wednesday, and the qustion. of their
scope and constitutionality will be de
termined. Cases were up from Ten
nessee, Alabama, Nebraska and Col
orado, and the court determined to
take them all at once.
The Temple amendment in Iowa
has been held constitutional. This
act prohibited a public service cor
poration from compelling an employe
to sign away his rights to sue foi
damages on account of injury, eithei
as a condition of employment or be
cause of membership in any relief as.
socaition. A bill for a similar law
is before the Nebraska legislature.
The Chicago printers settled their
strike in short order. Within a few
minutes after President Lynch had
notified them that their strike was
illegal they went back to work. The'
trouble will be arbitrated atonce. ;
Chicago Typographical union at Wa
last meeting voted $1,000 to aid the
Chicago Daily Socialist.
The strike of the photo-engravers
in the Los Angeles Times plant crip
pled Otis badly and he is having
great difficulty in 'securing compe
tent men despite his extraordinary
inducements of high wages. There is
a mistaken impression abroad that
the photo-engravers permitted their
men to enter the Times office and ac
cept jobs before the strike. Such was
not the case. The men who walked
out were formerly non-unionists and
were organized secretly. And when
the time came to make a stand for the
right they acted like true men. That's
why Otis raves. Cleveland Citizen.
STUDYING CHILD LABOR.
The National Child Labor commis
sion is in session at Birmingham, Ala.
It will endeavor to draft a uniform
child labor law, and will listen to re
ports from men and women who have
made a study of the child labor evil.
CAN ORGANIZED LABOR STAND
FOR THIS.
John Mitchell has been forced out
of the Natoinal Civic Federation. The
edict came from the convention of
the United Mine Workers of America
recently held in Columbus. It was
voted that either Mitchell give up his
membership in the National Civic
Federation or in the Mine Workers'
organization. Here's democracy for
you and personal liberty which gives
the ordinary friend of organized la
bor a cold chill. It will give the ne-