The Fight for the Ten-Hour Day
A department store faces legal action for forcing saleswomen into fourteen-hour shifts.
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.
A complaint charging A. G. Buchanan, of the Bon Marche, with violating the state law limiting the hours for the employment of females, was sworn out by William Blackman, the state labor commissioner. Miss M. F. Sweige, employed in the store, was named as the person who worked fourteen hours out of the twenty-four. It is said that on the evening of July 15, Manager Buchanan notified the employees that he expected to keep open until 10 o'clock in the evening, and that the saleswomen consequently added the night hours to their regular daywork. In a previous case affecting the same establishment, a decision was rendered against the defendant, and the matter was taken to the supreme court on the plea that the law is unconstitutional. The supreme court decided that the law is valid. The penalty for the offense is a fine of not less than $10 nor more than $25.
“Miss M. F. Sweige, employed in the store, was named as the person who worked fourteen hours out of the twenty-four.”
This 1903 case highlights the long-standing tension between retail giants and labor rights. Even after the Washington State Supreme Court affirmed the validity of the ten-hour law, corporations like the Bon Marche continued to test the boundaries of labor protections, mirroring modern debates over mandatory overtime and wage theft in the retail sector.
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