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means of extorting rent for ore and forest lands, and, far from contributing to the further development of manufacturing industries, in reality depresses them and works in the same direction as did the English Corn Laws, directly opposite to the intentions of those who are protectionists from principle.

In all this I have said nothing of the effect of the tariff on wages, and if my views are accepted, I cannot see that it is necessary to say anything. In the best position to which trades unions can bring him, the laborer is a partner of the capitalist in his venture; and if the capitalist is really only an agent of the landowner, to whom he must pay over all surplus profits that he has secured from consumers, there is no extra compensation left for the laborer. Our workmen are intelligent enough to see that protection has given them neither steady employment nor-if we take into account their superior efficiency—high wages; and they may yet conclude that they have not only made a mistake in supporting laws that exclude foreign goods and admit foreign laborers, but that they are committing a still graver error in deliberately shutting themselves off from foreign buyers who would give us all more work to do, when the only effect of our present policy is to pay a higher rent to owners of land.

EDWARD J. SHRIVER.

THE BENEFIT FEATURES OF AMERICAN

TRADES UNIONS.

So little being known of the means other than strikes which

our American labor organizations are using to elevate and help their members, a circular letter of eighteen comprehensive questions was sent out in the fall of 1886, to the secretaries of the forty-four national and international trades unions enumerated in the official publications of some of the unions.1

Fourteen labor organizations with 145,915 members in the United States gave fairly complete returns. Seven with about 100,000 members reported either that the benefit features, though in most cases important, were entirely under the control of the local branches which had not furnished returns to the national secretary, or that the returns could not be published. A few facts were also gathered relative to the benefits - entirely local in character, except a death benefit of the 700,000 to 900,000 members of the Knights of Labor. From many unions it was impossible to secure returns for 1886. In those cases returns for 1885 are given. The unions that did report, however, gave information which may justify a short article.

It must be borne in mind that the very recent development of strong labor organizations on American soil has not given time for the growth of those benevolent features which are such a marked characteristic of the English unions and of such effectiveness in relieving distress and assisting to obtain work. Strikes are the almost inevitable attendant of the birth of labor organizations. Sick, funeral, accident, out-of-work and travelling benefits, etc., come later. Those American unions which now possess these features did not have them at first, while those unions which now have none will almost surely be led to adopt ere long friendly features. Many of their leaders have

1 See The Carpenter, September, 1886, and The Cigar-makers' Official Journal, July, 1886. A list (corrected to date) of most of the unions is given in every number of The Labor Leader, Boston, Mass.

in their correspondence with the writer directly testified to this. Again, the migratory character of American workmen has often taken them to places where there were no local divisions of the union to which they belonged. With the rapid extension of our trades unions which, according to competent judges, now number, outside the Knights of Labor, considerably over half a million men, and with the more settled habits of our employees, the great obstacles to the growth of benefit features are disappearing. Death benefits may continue largely the province of the present insurance companies; but where these companies refuse to assume the extra risks of such hazardous employments as mining and railroading, the trades societies are under imperative obligations to insure their members. The same may be said of accident benefits. Assistance to those out of work from any good cause and to those unable to travel in search of work, or to the sick, the so-called out-of-work, travelling, and sick benefits, can only be given by societies whose members know each other individually, work by each other's side, and are personally interested in detecting all "shamming" which would deplete the common funds.

We hear much nowadays of competitive price and just price, as if they were opposed to one another. It can easily be shown, the writer believes, that they are as nearly identical as can be conceived, provided — and that is the vital point—that there is any such thing practicable in the economic life of to-day as perfectly free competition. To realize it, capital must be perfectly mobile, and the laborer must be intelligent enough to know where he can improve his condition; he must have the ability and the will to seek that place and must be free from the necessity, in order to keep starvation from the door, of offering his services at cut-throat or bare subsistence prices to the first employer willing to give him work. How far this ideal state of the old economist is from the actual facts of life we all know. A study then of the various benevolent features of labor organizations is a study of the crutches, often most essential to the lame, by which the poor or ignorant or unfortunate wage-earner may obtain the advantages of fair com

petition on somewhat equal terms with his fellow-workmen and with his employer.

One of the most advanced in its benefit features of our unions is the Cigar-makers' International Union of America, whose membership grew from 1016 in September, 1877, to 1400 in September, 1883, and 25,789 in 262 unions December 1, 1886. It is called international because it includes Canada as well as the United States. In 1879 the system of relief funds was

adopted. In the following six years, ending September 1, 1885,

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The president estimates that, adding to these the amounts raised by voluntary subscriptions and local assessments, the aggregate expenditure exceeded $650,000. During the three months of September, October, and November, 1886, the national organization spent $24,671.75 for travelling, sick, and death benefits, and only $7961.81, or twenty-four per cent of the total expenditures, for strikes. If, as is probable, this was a fair sample of the year's expenditure, there was spent on benefit features about $98,000 in 1887, and for strikes about $32,000.

These benefits are carefully guarded. No strike can be entered upon with the hope of help from the rest of the order, without first being approved by the executive body of the national order; and if the proposed strike is to involve more than twenty-five men, it must be approved, after careful examination of all the facts, by a two-thirds majority of all the votes cast in all the local unions of the entire order. A wiser, more conservative measure could not be devised. To avoid the temptation of long-continued strikes it is provided that the relief for the first sixteen weeks shall be four dollars per week, for the following eight weeks three dollars per week, and then two dollars per

week until the strike is concluded. These munificent sums can hardly be said to encourage idleness. The travelling benefit is guarded as follows. Any one who has been a member in good standing for six months and is desirous of seeking employment elsewhere is entitled to a loan sufficient for transportation by the cheapest route to the nearest union in any direction that he desires to travel, and to a loan of fifty cents besides; but the aggregate loans must not exceed twenty dollars, or twelve dollars at any one time. These loans must be repaid by a weekly payment of ten per cent of his weekly wages to the officer appointed for the purpose in the union to which he goes, until the debt is cancelled. This tends to prevent reckless or idle travelling on the union's funds. The sick fund is guarded with equal care. A sick member is entitled to five dollars per week from the time of notifying the proper officer, provided his sickness or inability shall last at least seven days, and shall not have been caused by intemperance, debauchery, or other immoral conduct. But if the sickness extend beyond the eighth week, the relief then becomes three dollars per week. No relief is given in any one year after a second eight weeks' sickness. Fifty dollars is given to assist in the burial of all who have been members one year.

The Amalgamated Society of Carpenters and Joiners. This truly international organization embraced in December, 1885, a membership of 22,935 in all English-speaking lands, of which 1127 were in the United States. The benevolent features of the entire organization for 1885, are thus given in the twentysixth annual report:

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