The Eight-Hour Day Fight
Everett labor organizers call out local manufacturers for 'calamity howls' and fear-mongering regarding the movement for shorter workdays.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Isn't it funny the mournful plaints that arise from large employers of labor the minute it is proposed to reduce the hours of labor? They are apparently blind to the economic fact that decreasing hours of toil increases the efficiency of the toiler. The proprietors of the Sumner Iron Works warned that the business they have built up would be threatened with heavy shrinkage if an eight-hour day were put into effect. This sounds exactly like the 'calamity howls' they made nine years ago when workers struck for a nine-hour day. The company did not go broke then, and they will not go broke now. It is organization they fear, not an eight-hour day. History shows that every reduction in the hours of labor has resulted beneficially, decreasing intemperance and making better homes.
“It is organization they fear not an eight-hour day.”
This 1910 labor dispute highlights the long-standing tension between Everett's industrial backbone and the welfare of its workers. The rhetoric of 'ruin' used by manufacturers against the eight-hour day mirrors contemporary debates about the economic impacts of labor regulations and wage increases.
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