Labor organization

“ Before the dire year of 1837, there are, then, to be found the beginnings of most of the elements of modern labor organizations—benevolent societies and militant orders; political activities and trades activities; amalgamations of local societies of the same trades and of all trades; attempts at national organization on the part of both the local trades unions and of the local trade unions; a labor press to keep alive the interest of the workman; mass meetings, circulars, conventions, and appeals to arouse the interest of the public in the issues of the hour. ”

“ On the other hand, the labor organization, recognizing the strength and fair dealing of the employers’ association, is from time to time so modifying its plans and methods as to make it possible to work in harmony with the employer, and together secure results for both that have heretofore been impossible. ”

“ And a 'labor organization' means any organization of any kind or any agency or employee representation committee or plan which exists for the purpose in whole or in part of dealing with employers concerning grievances, labor disputes, wages, rates of pay, hours of employment or conditions of work. ”

“ The Organization of Labor.—These measures of protection and relief have been due in part to the disinterested activity of philanthropists, and in part to the efforts of organized labor, backed up by public opinion; occasionally capitalists have voluntarily improved conditions or increased wages. The greatest agitation and pressure has come from the labor-unions. Unlike the mediæval guilds, these unions exist for the purpose of opposing the employer, and are formed in recognition of the principle that a group can obtain guarantees that an individual is helpless to secure. ”

“ Two other functions of the economic organization of society remain to be considered, the distribution of labor and its remuneration. In the organization of industry society will have to achieve a twofold result, a maximum of general, social efficiency, on the one hand, and of personal liberty and comfort to the workers on the other. The state would not only guarantee the right to labor, but, as a corollary, it would impose the duty of labor upon every competent person. ”

“ But the industrial organization, as in all civilized countries, is such that labor and capital, and especially labor, must press for employment on any terms—the industrial organization is such that mere laborers are not in a position to demand their fair share in the new adjustment, and that any reduction in the application of labor to production will, at first, at least, take the form, not of giving each laborer the same amount of produce for less work, but of throwing some of the laborers out of work and giving them none of the produce. ”

“ Experience proves that even the most thoroughly organized labor unions are not all-powerful when the employers stand together, and the paramount importance of organization among the employers has been repeatedly demonstrated. When this organization of the employers shall have been effected, inquiry into cause and effect, careful study of the labor problem, will quickly show the great advantage and profitableness of dealing fairly with labor. ”

“ I believe that under modern industrial conditions it is often necessary, and even where not necessary it is yet often wise, that there should be organization of labor in order better to secure the rights of the individual wage-worker. ”

“ The mere fact of a universal organization maintaining discipline and preventing breaks within its own ranks would suffice for the end in view—the maintenance of pay that should conform to its natural standard. The supposition of a universal organization of labor has at present only a theoretical interest. What society has to deal with is an organization that includes a small minority of workers and is composed of separate unions which are endeavoring each to promote the interests of the men of its own craft. ”

“ Wages as adjusted by a General Organization of Labor in a Subgroup.—Where organization goes to the length of uniting all the employees in a particular industry or subgroup, the situation is unlike the foregoing in an important particular. No quick filling of the places which the men may vacate with altogether new workers is possible. The employers are not so situated that they can compare the old force with a new one, measure the difference in their values, and govern their conduct accordingly. ”

“ He consolidates and harmonizes every branch of wage labor in the industry, until should he declare the present owners expropriated the industry would go along its accustomed course in the hands of the industrial organization without any shock or jar to the rest of us. ”

“ But there are thousands of workers who are beginning to realize that they have nothing in common with the employer they are working for. While the craft unions (the American Federation of Labor) says that the workers must organize to get a "fair share" of what they produce, the industrial organization (the Industrial Workers of the World) says that the workers must organize to get all they produce. ”

“ That the organization of associations of employers in kindred branches of industry tends to uniformity in method of regulating the employment of men, and at the same time affords protection against the demands which may be unfair or the strife which may be instigated by unwise leaders of organized labor. ”

“ Consider for a moment the labor organizations, which always class their members as producers. With utmost respect for many of Labor's great leaders and for the great good their organizations have accomplished for their members do I say it, yet I am forced to say that they do not follow policies and practices that tend to stabilize an industry, including their own. ”

“ There is another phase of the labor question which must be considered, and that is the general relations of employer and employed. As corporations have grown, so likewise have the labor unions. In general, they are normal and proper antidotes for unlimited capitalistic organization. ”

“ To distribute the income belonging to the working organization and to provide for the development of the material basis for their work; to distribute income among the working people; to meet the working organization's obligations to the social community; 6. To decide on the admission of working people into the working organization, the cessation of their work, and other labor relations; to determine working hours in the working organization in accordance with general working conditions; to regulate other matters of common concern ”

“ But it is probable that in the future public opinion will be more positive and will grant to labor organizations fuller recognition and greater participation in the control of industrial activity than heretofore. ”

“ Worker delegates to be elected by actual productive workers in their respective industrial divisions; peasant delegates to be elected by farm hands and those peasants employing no wage labor—non-exploiters. Factories, and other industrial establishments, to be under direct control and management of their respective labor organizations; industries of national scope under control of corresponding national labor organizations. ”

“ The whole purpose of such an organization would be the attempt to develop efficient labor and prosperous laboring men, whereas the tendency of the existing organization is to associate the prosperity of the laboring man with the inefficiency of labor. ”

“ But the modern, more enlightened, labor movement has better ideals and policies in respect to the safety, sanitation, and decency of the working places.
Labor organizations have also secondary objects of very great importance. ”

“ Since labor organizations are here, and here to stay, the managers of employing corporations must choose what they are to do with them. They may have the union as a present, active, and unrecognized force, possessing influence for good or evil, but without direct responsibility ”

“ Second.—The accomplishment of their object requires labor organizations to secure the membership of the largest number of persons employed in any kindred trade, and (because voluntary advancement of wages rarely or never occurs) to demand a change in wages and betterment in conditions whenever it appears that the need for their labor is in excess of the supply, and therefore warrants such demand. Labor organizations are necessary also to resist collectively any movement on the part of the employer which would result in injury to the workingman. ”

“ Come into our ranks, ye shirkers, for we now rule this land.
Work or starve, the workers said, for you must earn your bread.
Then into their ranks came the masters and joined the workers' song;
Then into their ranks came the masters and joined the workers' song.
All workers, "The Army of Production," in One Big Union, regardless of age, creed, color or sex, is invincible.
Labor is entitled to all it produces. An injury to one is an injury to all. ”

“ The labor union movement, unlike the political socialist revolutionary movement, undertakes in its operation to supply labor with a certain working content, which the administrative scheme of industry has excluded from the experience of its workers. ”

“ There is little difference of opinion regarding the immediate steps that must be taken to unify the Labor Movement. Five distinct aspects of the problem demand attention. First, there is the necessity of organizing each shop, mine, department or factory—each unit of occupational activity—and having it under the direction of a shop committee. Second, there is the task of organizing by trade or industry or occupation, within each country, and internationally. ”

“ Labor organizations are formed, not to employ combined effort for a common object, but to indulge in declamation and denunciation, and especially to furnish an easy living to some officers who do not want to work. ”

“ The chief objects of the union are indicative of the important demands of the labor reformers in 1877: reduction of the hours of labor; higher wages; factory, mine and shop inspection; abolition of the contract convict labor and truck system; employers to be held responsible for accidents to employees on account of the neglect of employers; prohibition of child labor; establishment of labor bureaus. ”

“ Also, because of the variety of commercial enterprises which are the legitimate prey of the cooperative society, the demand for skilled workers is much more varied than in the organized labor movement. ”

“ Long hours, the employment of women and children, the weakened economic position of the laborer, fluctuations in production, liability to be without employment, industrial accidents, the abolition of personal ties between employer and employe, the crowding of workmen into a small space to work by day and their concentration in city tenements by night—these are some of the problems for which the factory system must be held responsible. The condition and position of labor have been vitally affected. ”

“ Organized labor, ever running ahead of legislation in its standards of hours and sanitary conditions, provides a school of education and experiment for the whole community, by procuring for trade unionists working conditions which afterwards serve as the model for enlightened employers, and as a standard that the community in the end must exact for the whole body of workers. ”

“ The Rise and Growth of Organized Labor The American Federation of Labor.—Meanwhile a powerful association of workers representing all the leading trades and crafts, organized into unions of their own, had been built up outside the control of employers. ”

“ The One Big Union, therefore, seeks to organize the wage worker, not according to craft, but according to industry; according to class and class needs. We, therefore, call upon all workers to organize irrespective of nationality, sex, or craft into a workers' organization, so that we may be enabled to more successfully carry on the everyday fight over wages, hours of work, etc., and prepare ourselves for the day when production for profit shall be replaced by production for use. ”

“ As I hinted before, in the new order of things all branches of labor will be organized, similar to the arrangements we see to day in large factories, large estates, or institutions of the government. Unnecessary work will be avoided and the reward for work done will be greater. ”

“ Skilled workers have often been able to form skilled labor monopolies, or unions, where their particular skill has been in demand, and have forced their employers to give them shorter hours, higher wages or better working conditions. ”

“ That not, as in former times, the individual works alone and for his own account, but dozens, hundreds and thousands of men work together in shops, in mines, on huge farms and lands, coöperating according to the most efficient division of labor, while the fruits of this cööperative labor are not reaped by the workers themselves, but are in a great measure appropriated by the owners of the means of production. ”

“ One of the aims of the Labor Movement is to secure such changes in the run of things that “the workers should own their jobs.” Well, some of the unions of the A. F. of L., bakers, printers, etc., have secured such a hold upon their trade in certain localities that they succeeded in putting into their contracts with the employers provisions that the union is to act as the employment agency for the employer, and the latter, whenever he needs help, must take whomever of its membership the union will send to him. ”