Organized labor

“ I hold no brief for organized labor any more than I do for organized manufacturers, being firmly convinced that both are entitled to organize and fight and that to the victors should belong the spoils; but at the present writing I would certainly sympathize with organized labor as being in the main the underdog, and wish it all the luck in the world. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Instead of combining to stop production in this shop or that factory, why not join hands to work for reforms in the interest of the whole people? Be sure that in so doing, organized labor will have the hearty co-operation, and leadership if need be, of the best men in every class of society. ”

“ We know what tremendous power labor has as the creator of all wealth and the supporter of the world. If properly organized and united, the workers could control the situation, be the masters of it. But the strength of the worker is not in the union meeting-hall; it is in the shop and factory, in the mill and mine. ”

“ Organized labor is here to stay for a long time to come, and as the elite of the wage-earning class it should, and probably will, be an increasing force for political betterment and for social welfare in the republic. ”

“ The point is, looked at without the tinted glasses of either capital or labor, that the psychology of the American employer for the past, assuredly the present, and at least the near future, has been, and is, and will be, so inimical to organized labor that the movement would not be allowed to function as a constructive industrial force. Too much of its energies must go to fighting. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ That principle has particular application in the construction of labor legislation which is 'to a marked degree, the result of conflict and compromise between strong contending forces and deeply held views on the role of organized labor in the free economic life of the Nation and the appropriate balance to be struck between the uncontrolled power of management and labor to further their respective interests.' Local 1976, United Brotherhood of Carpenters, etc. ”

“ As unorganized labor, which embraces the vast majority of working people, has no special representation in this Conference, I deem it appropriate to say that all labor should receive due consideration, and that it is the obligation and ought to be the pleasure of employers at all times and in every respect to treat justly and liberally all employees, whether unorganized or organized. ”

“ Compare this situation with that prevailing in Europe, for instance, where the workers have understood to build themselves class political organizations. There Organized Labor is a great political power, and one which must be reckoned with on all vital issues. ”

“ 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. ”

“ The labor organization is thus differentiated on the one hand from the strike—a temporary association—and on the other hand, from friendly societies and socialist organizations, which, though frequently recruited exclusively from the ranks of labor, are chiefly devoted to other ends than the improvement of the conditions of employment. Among labor organizations two distinct classes are discernible—those organized on the trade or occupational principle and those which transcend occupational bounds and attempt to amalgamate in a single, homogeneous organization, all classes of labor. ”

“ The forty year lag in the labor situation had evil effects on all concerned: the Government was too often uncertain, and the leaders of labor too often unfit. Like other organized [146] groups, labor unions did not always consult the public good and criminals were found among them; but organized labor should be compared with organized production or organized banking or medicine or law ”

“ To mention the various national, state and local unions that have joined the progressive labor forces, and to quote from their preambles, constitutions and resolutions, would only tend to weary the reader, and, therefore, it is only necessary at this time to recall a little recent history as proof that organized labor is moving forward. ”

“ As long as organized labor believes in the possibility of amending present society by a series of measures built up one upon the other, it makes use of the means that the present system offers it. It proceeds through intervening elected persons. ”

“ It will perhaps surprise some of you, I confess, that before I became more familiar with this subject, I was agreeably surprised, to hear, in the conferences recently held in the rooms of the National Civic Federation, one of the most important officers of organized labor, state, that he wished it to be understood, that organized labor does not approve of sympathetic strikes, and that organized labor has come to the conclusion that restrictions of output should not be permitted, as all such efforts were uneconomical. ”

“ That out of the capitalist order, which has made its contribution to the world and is rapidly disintegrating, there is arising a new social order based on labor and co-operation instead of ownership and competition. The standard bearers of this new order are the organized workers. ”

“ To all of the making and development of these social institutions the workers, and they alone, contribute their intellect and their manual labor. They have created the instruments to produce wealth with, and improved them as time rolled by.
These institutions are organized in their operative functions to yield profits for a few who never did, nor do, contribute to their making and maintenance, except in a manner to protect them in the possession of things that they did not make. ”

“ The work before us is to build up an organization of our class in the field wherein our power lies. That task must be accomplished by the workers themselves. Whatever obstacles are in the way must be overcome, however great they seem to be. Remember that the working class is a great class and its power is unbounded when properly organized.
As we organize we control our labor power. As we control our labor power a little we control industry a little; as we organize more we will control more of our labor power, and also control industry more. ”

“ Workingmen have developed sufficient intelligence to understand the necessity for unity upon the economic field. All now recognize the need for thorough organization. But organization of numbers of itself is not sufficient. You might have all the workers of the country embraced in some vast organization and yet they would be very weak if they were not organized upon correct principles ”

“ But the organized workers, caring nothing for the interests of any particular employer, demand improved conditions of labor, though the inefficient employer be eliminated and all production be carried on by a few capable employers doing business on a large scale and able to pay the highest wages. ”

“ Labor has organized and it has made a manful fight, and all down the pages of history you will find that labor, thru its organization and thru its lawful methods pursued under its organization, has gradually bettered its condition. ”

“ Drift Towards Monopoly of Control by the Community What is the Socialistic State, or Collectivism, which is its industrial expression, other than industry so organized as to transfer industrial control from Capital to the Community, to the exclusion of the other parties? Under the Socialistic State, the Government would choose the managers of industry, would own the instruments of production, levying taxation where more Capital was required, and would fix the wages of Labor, and the prices at which commodities are to be sold. ”

“ We therefore call for organizers, capable and well-versed in the whole programme of the labor movement, to be sent into each state to preach the necessity of organization on the political as well as on the economic field. ”

“ The effect of the vocations and the division of labor is to produce, in the first instance, not social groups, but vocational types, the actor, the plumber, and the lumber-jack. The organizations, like the trade and labor unions, which men of the same trade or profession form are based on common interests. ”

“ Organization from the bottom up, beginning with the shop and factory, on the foundation of the joint interests of the workers everywhere, irrespective of trade, race, or country, by means of mutual effort and united will, alone can solve the labor question and serve the true emancipation of man. ”

“ Well, what is the world doing for the common laborer? Who will answer? He has been left out in the cold. He does not organize. We have had, and we hope still to have, words of appreciation for the organization known as the Knights of Labor. We glory in its growth. We deprecate anything that hinders its advancement. The Knights of Labor organization takes in the common laborer. ”

“ What has the workman, what has the capitalist employer, and what has the State to do to further the transition already begun to the co-operative method of production, and to bring this change to its consummation in the way most advantageous to the community? ”

“ We now approach a yet more thorny subject than the organisation of the workers. What should be the remuneration of labor—what the share of the product taken respectively by the individual, the municipality, and the State?
The answer depends on the answer to a previous question. Is the organisation of the unemployed to be undertaken in order to transform them into self-supporting, self-respecting citizens; or is it to be carried on as a form of exploitation, utilising pauper labor for the production of profit for non-paupers? ”

“ And only in the course of recent times did there evolve the organizations under which the labors of hundreds and thousands of men receiving wages, are regulated by various orders of paid officials under a single or multiple head. These originally small, semi-socialistic, groups of producers, like the compound families or house-communities of early ages, slowly dissolved because they could not hold their ground: the larger establishments, with better subdivision of labor, succeeded because.they ministered to the wants of society more effectually. ”

“ Side by side with the great majority, exclusively bond slaves to labor, arises a class freed from directly productive labor, which looks after the general affairs of society.; the direction of labor, State business, law, science, art, etc. It is, therefore, the law of division of labor that lies at the basis of the division into classes. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Without such economic organization and the economic power with which it is clothed, and without the industrial co-operative training, discipline and efficiency which are its corollaries, the fruit of any political victories the workers may achieve will turn to ashes on their lips. ”

“ Most laborers are unable to secure either the training or the capital necessary to set themselves up as independent business men.
183. RISE OF LABOR ORGANIZATIONS.—The risks and limitations which the factory system imposes upon the laboring classes have encouraged workmen to organize for the purpose of promoting their mutual interests. The individual gains, it has been found, when his interests are supported by a group of workmen acting as a unit, and bringing their united pressure to bear upon the employer. The labor organization has been the result of this discovery. ”

“ 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. ”

“ The chief of the experiments alluded to is that of co-operation, the association of workingmen as producers, a democratic organization of labor calculated, if successfully instituted, to bring the present system to an end, and replace it by one in which the division into employer and employee, capitalist and artisan, will cease to exist, each workman embracing both of these in his single person, the combined property of the group representing the capital of the concern and the profits being equitably divided. ”