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About The Wageworker. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1904-???? | View Entire Issue (May 6, 1910)
M I B fc NEBRASKA'S - SELECT - HARD-WHEAT - FLOUR WILBER AND DeWITT MILLS THE CELEBRATED Little Hatchet Flour Rye Flour a Specialty TELEPHONE US BeU Phone 200; Auto. 1459 145 So. 9th St., LINCOLN, NEB. PRISON MADE GOODS, Exploitation of Convicts a Na tional Disgrace. Yl WORKERS UNIONJf rJi t n,r . . . ... irj- UNIONJ STAMP , raetory No. 4 Named Shoes are Often Made in Non-Union Factories. Do Not Buy Any Shoe no matter what the name unless it bears a plain and readable impression of this Union Stamp. All Shoes Without the Union Stamp are Non-Union Do not accept any excuse for absence of the UNION STAMP Boot and Shoe Workers Union 246 Sumner St., Boston, Mass. JOHN F. TOBIN. Pres. CHAS. L. BAINE, Sec-Treas. (sVl I Lyric Theatre I MATINEES wed. cl sat. NEXT WEEK " Brown of Harvard " I 230. .THE LYRIC STOCK COMPANY Evening 8:30; 15c, 25c, 35c; Matinee 15, 25c. 3SQ0 life? 05s Farmers IS Merchants Bank C W. MONTGOMERY. President. -:. -:- H. C. PROBASCO. Cashier Safety Deposit Boxes for Rent Every man and every wo man should have a checking account. The Check is the modern instrument of ex i u i i cnange. 11 is cican auu ton venient. It saves making change and it gives you a receipt. The fact that it has so m-ny advantages and is so universally used proves that you should use it too. Every Banking Convenience Open Saturday Evenings 6 to 8 F. & M. Bldg., 1 5th & O Sts. Lincoln Business College AN ESTABLISHED AND RELIABLE SCHOOL Courses: Bookkeeping, Shorthand, Type writing, Penmanship, Commercial Law, Office Practice, etc. Catalog Free. 13th and P Sts., - Lincoln, Nebraska ....The Reimers-Kaufman Co.... Successor, to THE REIMERS & FRIED CO. Sidewalks, Sidewalk Flags,- Building Blocks, and Tile Floor Office and Yards, 12th and W Sts. Both Phones LINCOLN. NEBRASKA CONTRACT SYSTEM EVILS. I First Trust B Savings Bank I Owned bj Stockholders of the First National Bank THE "BAk'K FOR THE WAGE-EARNER INTEL EST PAID AT FOUR PER CENT Tenth and O Streets Lincoln, Nebraska MERCHANTS AND UNIONS. Distressing Effects of Penal Labor Competition With Free Workers. Livelihood of Women Endangered. Sad Lot of Prisoners. Sensational evidence charging that a mammoth trust is exploiting prison la bor throughout the laud and that this combination corrupts officials, de grades convicts, destroys free industry and denies a living to thousands of working men and women has been laid before the house committee on labor by manufacturers, reformers and rep resentatives of organized labor. In support of bills which If made law would practically abolish Inter state commerce In prison made goods the terrible extent and effect of prison labor were clearly shown by men and women in all classes of life and all parts of the country. That Judge Watson of the appellate court of Indiana is a stockholder and director In the Reliance-Sterling Mauu facturing company, otherwise known as the "prison trust." was charged by A. B. Salant, n shirt manufacturer. It was also related that a warden in New York had made $10,000 "commis sion" In one year for selling prison made goods and that another in Ken tucky was dismissed for receiving bribes from contractors. This powerful prison trust, accord ing to the testimony, controls the con tracts of eleven penitentiaries and re formatories. It pays New Jersey con victs as low as 20 cents for nine hours of labor. One hundred prisoners working at machines turn out 10,000,000 hand kerchiefs a year, which are sold in the open market at 4 cents less per dozen than it costs firms employing free la bor to make the same article. It was estimated that the output of shirts mude by convicts yearly Is 4,500.000, or 75 per cent of the entire industry. Rev. .1. Burkart. ex-chaplain of the Baltimore city jail and house of cor rection, emphatically denied the asser tion made by some that convict indus try teaches trades to the prisoners and prepares them for work after being released. lie said that most of them are employed at making goods done by women workers outside of the pris on walls. He also declared that the contract system is brutal in the ex treme, being worse than peonage or chattel slavery. The prisoners, he said, are driveu from early morn until night, leaving no time to improve them mor ally, mentally or physically. Arthur E. Holder, who, with Thom as F. Tracy, represented the American Federation of Labor at the hearing, gave the following incident in his ex perience as an organizer, showing how convict labor affects "free"' workers: TJp here in a little place called Tldi oute. In northwestern Pennsylvania, last summer I went into a large chair factory, among the employees. 1 tried to induce those men to form a local organization, and those men told me, with tears coursing down their cheeks: "Mr. Holder, it is no use. We are down and out. We are simply living upon bread and molasses. We have to live two families in a small home, where formerly we used to have a home of our own. Then our day's earnings came down to $1.35, from $1.35 they came down to $1.15, and from $1.15 they came down to $1, and last summer we were working for 90 cents a day." B. A. Larger, secretary of the Unit ed Garment Workers of America, told the committee that convict labor threatens the livelihood of the 30.000 women organized in his union. He said: "In the Trenton penitentiary they make corduroy trousers such as are made by our best class of firms manu facturing that grade of goods, and they ship them complete for 50 cents a doz en. Our price on that class of goods is $1.75 a dozen." Henry E. Wise of Wise Bros., shirt manufacturers, said that the competi tion of penal labor has forced them to reduce the number of their employ ees from 3,000 women to 100. Wise said: "We formerly used to run the Maryland reformatory house of ref uge. We could not run it. No man who calls himself a man can run a prison contract and do what is expect ed of him." Minneapolis Union Advocate. Why Business Men Should Favor Or ganized Labor. There is one reason if no other why business men, especially merchants, sbouid favor union labor In prefer ence to cheap nonunion labor, and that reason is 'bat if labor is poorly paid the wage earner will have no money to spend with the merchant. Every business man knows, if be will stop to think, that the retail house depends upon the wage earners for 90 per cent of their trade. If he had to depend upon the trade of the rich for his sup port the retail merchant would stand a small chance of succeeding. If the working people are prosperous the merchant thrives from his trade, and when the worklngman's wages are cut down it takes just that much cash from the till of the business man and just that much comfort from the cot tage fireside. Is not that sufficient reason why the business men in this country should support and encourage the great masses of organized labor? The union men in this country are not so blind or deaf that they do not know their friends. They know the sentiment and attitude of every busi ness man of any prominence, and a careless or slighting remark made against organized labor finds its way into the meeting place of the toiling masses as fast as one spoken in its favor. It has been said that unionism and anarchy travel hand in band, but they are as far removed from each other 'today as heaven is from the last rest ing place of the man who deserted his union. Union men today are the bone and sinew of civilization and our re publican form of government. In times of war the union man is the first to shoulder the musket and rush to the defense of our flag, and he will do so again if he Is called upon. Union men are the champions of right and justice, aud they have the manhood to resist oppression from those who would sap from them, drop by drop, the means of support for their wives and children. A. R. Wyatt in Ameri can Federationist. JUSTICE TO WORKERS. Growing Demand For an Equitable Compensation Act. Compensation acts for workmen must sooner or later come in all our states. Under the present system about one workman in ten who are in jured has the legal right to a lawsuit, and if suit is brought his chance of re covery is about one in ten. The de fenses set up by the employer are, un der modern conditions, arbitrary and unreal. If suit is brought it can be dragged along for several years, and the lawyers' foes and court expenses eat up half the damages. Large employers and the liability in surance companies hare all the advan tage in the trial of a case because of their perfect machinery for getting ev idence, their skillful lawyers and their ability to take all appeals. In New York state this subject is being ener getically pressed at present, the gen eral feeling being In favor of an act providing for compensation equal to 56 per cent of the wage rate in case of disability and in case of death for a sum equal to four years' wages. The present system does not tend to make the employer interested in pre venting accidents or in the proper care and quick recovery of the Injured any more than it tends to give real relief to employees and their families. The proposed change would produce a com munity of interests between the em ployer and the employed. It would lead toward better machinery, better care and far more justice. It Is recog nized, however, on the other side that the act should be so drawn as to pre vent the encouragement of litigation by attorneys who live by collecting ac cident claims, and one method of ac complishing this would be a plan for the settlement by arbitration of prac tically all questions arising under the compensation act. Collier's. sw- IBERTY ? LI n Dnnn t-r. 1 LIBERTY Nuff Sed Suits Cleaned and Pressed SL50 LINCOLN CLEANING AND DYE WORKS LEO SOUKUP, Manager 320-322 So. 11th Lincoln, Neb. Both Phones Read THE WAGE WORKER Labor's Memorial Day. The second Sunday in May is labor's memorial day. Responding to a wide spread sentiment, the Norfolk conven tion of the American Federation ol Labor in 1007 recommended that as the date on which throughout the ju risdiction of the American labor move ment men and women might assemble and give public recognition to the services for labor performed by de parted fellow workers. The observ ance of the day promises to become more general year by year. The offi cial organs of the International unions and the labor press as a whole are making mention of the approach of the date and suggesting appropriate ceremonies for the occasion. There's no a community In all the land which ha not had noble examples of devo tion and self sacrifice among the mem bers of organized labor who are no longer among the living. Here's to our absent comrades! American Federationist. Unions Ask For No Special Privileges. The trades unions ask for no spe cial rights or privileges not accorded to or enjoyed by any individual citi zen. We insist upon freedom of ac tion always within the law and invite punishment by due legal process of law if we transgress. We object to and emphatically protest against gov ernment by injunction, which is an other name for industrial slavery and a hollow mockery on our boasted de mocracy. We want and demand free speech and a free press, both of which are guaranteed by the constitution, but denied us by Injunction judges in some cases. Cigarmakers' Journal. Meaning of Cheap Labor. Cheap labor means poverty and deg radation for the masses of the people. It means low prices for the products of the farm and factory. The consum ing power of the people Is measured by their earnings, and cheap labor means the lessening of their purchases. The sooner the retail merchant looks at these facts in the right way the better off he will be both in the sale of fac tory and farm products. Give Us Men. Give us men, Strong and stalwart ones, Men whom highest hope inspires, Men whom purest honor fires. Men who trample self beneath them, Men who make their country wreath, them As her noble sons, Worthy of their sires: Men who never shame their mothers. Men who never fall their brothers. True, however false are others! Give us men! I say again, " j Give us men! .. i WARM WEATHER WORRIES Are now beginning. They'll multiply unless you divide them. While you are dividing them we will subtract We Take Away Discomfort' We Add Comfort A Gas Range in the Kitchen adds to the Housewife's joy of living. A cool kitchen maketh a good-natured cook. Take out the steel range and cast-iron cook stove that broil the cook while boiling the food and SUBSTITUTE a Gas Range. MAKE HOME HAPPY By making the Housewife comfortable. Fuel Gas is cheaper than coal. It is cleaner, easier to handle and safer to use, Four Thousand families will bear witness to the facts. Once used, never abandoned. Let us figure with you in replacing your steel range with a Gas Range. We furnish the fuel You touch a match. We court investigation. Lincoln Gas & Electric Light Company Open Evenings I 300000000-I0d O OtS 0JOSO500000000OffiOSC