Chapter IX
The Cotton Factory of To-day
God has not gone to some distant star ;
Anna J. GRANNIS.
He’s in the mill where the toilers are.
I should not feel that the whole purpose of this book had been fulfilled unless I added a word in behalf of the factory population of to-day.
It will probably be said that the life I have described cannot be repeated, and that the modern factory operative is not capable of such development. If this is a fact, there must be some reason for it. The factory of to-day might and ought to be as much of a school to those who work there as was the factory of fifty or sixty years ago. If the mental status of these modern operatives is different, then the opportunities of development should be adapted correspondingly to their needs. The same results, perhaps, can not be reached, because the children of New England ancestry had inherited germs of intellectual life. But is it not also possible that the children of the land of Dante, of Thomas Moore, of Racine, and of Goethe may be something more than mere clods? I do not despair of any class of artisans or operatives, because I believe that there is in them all some germ of mental vigor, some higher idea of living, waiting for a chance to grow; and the same encouragement on the part of employers, the same desire to lift them to a higher level, would soon show of what the present class of operatives is capable.
What these poor people need is time, and a great deal of help, before it can be decided what either they or their descendants can make of themselves. Before an infallible decision can be given, there must be, perhaps, two or three generations of growth under free institutions, and under employers who think of something besides coining the bodies and souls of their employees into dollars and cents.
No one can grow mentally, who has not time to read or to think, and whose life is a constant struggle to get enough food and clothing for himself and his family. Our working-people have their intellectual freedom, as well as the wage-question, to fight for, just as the ancestors of the early factory-operatives fought for their social and constitutional liberty. They will carry on the warfare in their own way; and if employers are wise they will try to do some thing practical to prevent strikes, riots, and labor-unions, which are the working-man’s weapons of defence, and so to “lock the door before the horse is stolen.”
Not long ago I was invited to speak to a company of the Lowell mill-girls, and to tell them something about my early life as a member of the guild. I was doubly willing to do this, as I was desirous of forming some estimate of the status of these successors of the early mill-girls.
About two hundred of them assembled in the pleasant parlors of the People’s Club, and listened attentively to my story. When it was over, a few of them gathered around, and asked me many questions. In turn I questioned them, — about their work, their hours of labor, their wages, and their means of improvement. When I urged them to occupy their spare time in reading and study, they seemed to understand the necessity of it, but answered sadly: “We will try; but we work so hard, we tend so much machinery, and we are so tired.” It was plainly to be seen that these operatives did not go to their labor with the jubilant feeling that the old mill-girls used to have; that their work was drudgery, done without aim and purpose; that they took little interest in it beyond the thought that it was the means of earning their daily bread. There was a tired hopelessness about them that I am sure was not often seen among the early mill-girls, and they had an underfed, prematurely old look.
The hours of labor are now less, it is true; but the operatives are obliged to do a far greater amount of work in a given time. They tend so many looms and frames that they have no time to think. They are always on the jump; and so have no opportunity to improve themselves. They are too weary to read good books, and too overworked to digest what they have read. The souls of many of these mill-girls seemed starved, and looked from their hungry eyes as if searching for mental food.
Why are they not fed? The means of education are not wanting. Public libraries are provided, and they have more leisure to read than the mill-girls of forty years ago. But they do not seem to know how to improve it. Their leisure only gives them the more time to be idle in; more time to waste in the streets, or in reading cheap novels and stories. It might almost be said that they are worse off than if they had longer hours, or did not know how to read, unless they can use to better advantage their extra time, or have the means of suitable education provided for them.
Let it not be understood that I would take from the operative or the artisan one of the chances of education. But I would have them taught how to use wisely those privileges, forced, we might almost say, on them and on their children. I would also have them taught how inwardly to digest what they are made to learn. The tools are given them; but as they are not taught how to use them, these prove but an additional weapon of defence against employers, and make them more discontented, and ready to listen to the political demagogue, or the so-called labor reformer. Then strikes ensue, which usually end, as the first Lowell one did, for the time being at least in the success of the employer, rather than of the employee.
The solution of the labor problem is not in strikes, but, as another has said, in “bringing the question down to its simplest form, a practical carrying out of the golden rule; by the employer elevating the working-man in his own esteem by fair dealing, courteous treatment, and a constant appeal to his better side; and, on the other hand, in the working-man himself by the absence of malingering, by honest work, and a desire to further his employer’s interests; and finally, to cement the two, a fair distribution of profits.” “Not what we give, but what we share,” is a good motto for the employers. Treat your employees as you would be treated, if, by the “accident of birth,” loss of employment, or hard luck, you were in their condition. Treat them as if they, too, had something of God in them, and, like yourselves, were also His children. This is the philosophy of the labor question.
The factory population of New England is made up largely of American-born children of foreign parentage, — two-thirds it is estimated; as a rule, they are not under the strict control of the church of their parents, and they are too apt to adopt the vices and follies, rather than the good habits, of our people. It is vital to the interests of the whole community, that they should be kept under good moral influences ; that they should have the sympathy, the help, of employers. They need better homes than they find in too many of our factory towns and cities, and a better social atmosphere, that they may be lifted out of their mental squalor into a higher state of thought and of feeling.
The modern system of overcrowding the mill people is to be especially deprecated. In the old time, not more than two or three beds were put into one large bedroom, which was used only as a bedroom; but not long ago, according to an article in the Springfield Republican on “How Mill-People Live,” it appears that Mr. H. R. Walker, agent of the Chicopee Board of Health, in his official report to the board, states that he found “twelve persons living and sleeping in a suite of two rooms, and sixteen per sons living and sleeping in a tenement of four rooms.” And in another block, owned by a “wealthy gentleman in that city,” he found that “thirty-eight rooms were occupied by ninety seven men, women, and children.” Under such conditions, how can young people be brought up virtuously ?
These are examples of overcrowding which I hope are not followed to any extent by the better class of manufacturing corporations ; al though there is reason to fear that overcrowding is getting to be the rule, rather than the exception.
The cotton-factories themselves are not so agreeable nor so healthful to work in as they used to be. Once they were light, well ventilated, and moderately heated; each factory building stood detached, with pleasant sunlit windows, cheerful views, and fresh air from all points of the compass. But these buildings are now usually made into a solid mass by connecting “annexes,” and often form a hollow square, so that at least one-half of the operatives can have no outlook except upon brick walls, and no fresh air but that which circulates within this confined space.
A year or two ago I revisited the dressing room where I used to work, and found the heat so intense that I could hardly breathe ; and the men who were working there (there were no women in the room) wore the scantiest of clothing, and were covered with perspiration.
The drying of the beams is done by hot air, though sometimes fans are added; the windows and doors are kept shut, except in very fine weather; and this makes an atmosphere unfit to breathe. My old overseer, who had had charge of one room for over forty years, told me that some time ago he had been obliged to change his occupation in the mill on account of the in tense heat consequent on the introduction of this new method of drying the beams.
Nor are the houses kept clean and in repair as they used to be. In Lowell, when I last walked among the “blocks” where I lived as a child, I found them in a most dilapidated condition. — houses going to decay, broken side walks, and filthy streets ; and contrasting their appearance with that of the “corporation” as I remember it, I felt as if I were revisiting the ruins of an industry once clean and prosperous. Would that I could say one word that would lead stockholders to see that it is not from out of such surroundings that the best dividends can be secured!
To one who has watched with sad interest the gradual decline of the cotton-factory industry in New England, and has marked the deterioration of its operatives, it has often seemed as if some thing might be done to restore this great factor in our national prosperity to its early influence and importance. Many schemes have been advanced by political economists, but, thus far, they have borne no fruit, and at this present writing, the Massachusetts Legislature itself has placed the whole subject in the hands of the Committee on Labor, who are to report on the several items submitted to its decision. While I would not venture here to discuss the various points on which this committee is to report, I cannot forbear calling attention to the first section, which relates to the “Dingley Tariff.”
This section enquires, substantially, whether the Dingley tariff has had any influence in producing the present stagnation of the New England cotton industry. As a help to the solution of this question, or a suggestion at least, I will venture to quote from an article in the report of the Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor, on “The Age of Factory Establishments,” where it is stated that “Quite one-half of the whole product of the State is made by manufactories which were in existence before 1860, and most of these establishments were founded in the in dustrial period following the beginning of the reduction of the tariff of 1828; and it can be said, with truth, that the great manufacturing industry of Massachusetts was planted in low tariff times.”
If this statement is correct, of which there can be no doubt, it has a significance worthy of attention, when we see the downward movement of the cotton industry under the present high tariff. It was these “low-tariff times ” that enabled working-people to buy goods that would last, which they cannot do in these days of “home production ’’ shoddy, protected, as it is, by the Dingley tariff. And, without entering into the discussion, it would seem that a low tariff is certainly desirable for working-people, at least, since it enables them to get the best there is for their money, whether it be of foreign or domestic manufacture. An able writer has said: ” The great trouble with the New England mills now is, that the people want a better class of goods which can compete with other textile products.” This is certainly true, as applied to the buyer. A person of limited means can better afford to buy goods of foreign manufacture, no matter how high the tariff is. For woollens we look to England; for silks, to Lyons or Zurich; and lighter material must be of French manufacture. And the dealer says to you, as the best recommendation for the goods you wish to purchase, “It is English, or it is French goods, that I am showing you.”
As for cheap American prints, who prefers to buy them nowadays? Certainly no woman who remembers with affection the good, pretty, durable, and washable old Merrimack print, — the old time calico, that, when partly worn out, would still do for gowns and “tiers” for the children, or for comforters for the family beds. Gentlemen! mill-owners and managers! give us as good material as that we can buy of English and French manufacture, and we will wear no more dress-goods that are not of “home production,” and will cheerfully pay you whatever price you may ask for them. This can certainly be done, with all your inventive genius, and you need no longer fear either foreign or Southern competition.
One more suggestion. It has often seemed that one great cause of the decline of the cotton industry is to be found in the change in the character of the operatives themselves. But could not some inducement be offered to call to this industry a better class of operatives, or to elevate a part of them towards the status of the old-time mill-girls? The factory-operatives of to-day are more like those of England, whom I have described, when the cotton manufacture first began in America. Then, mill-owners and stockholders knew that the daughters of New England would not become mill-girls under existing conditions, and unless they were sure of good wages and of being treated like human beings. This assurance was given: and the consequence was that they flocked from their homes, and so helped to build up an industry that was to give the first great impetus to the coming prosperity of the whole country. Could not this experiment be tried anew? There must be — there are — thousands of young women, all over New England, working for almost a pittance in stores and. workshops, some of them twelve hours a day, subject to temptations that would never reach them in the cotton-factory, — women and girls who have no homes, who would gladly go to the factories, if a comfortable home, short hours, sure work, and steady wages were assured to them. Let the best of them work by the job or piece, as far as possible; for this shows, more than any other “reform in labor,” where the best class of operatives can be found, and the best result of their work can be secured. Why not try these or some better experiments, and so uplift gradually the status of the modern factory-operative?
These suggestions regarding a better class of goods and a better class of operatives, if carried out, will involve sacrifice for a time on the part of the mill-owners and stockholders. But it is certainly better to sacrifice even a great deal than it is to lose all; and there seems to be danger of this if something radical and far-reaching cannot soon be done to improve the present condition of our New England cotton-factories and their operatives.
It is claimed that the factory is not a “philanthropic institution,” and that corporations are not responsible for the well-being of those they employ. But until Boards of Health and Factory Inspectors can succeed in reforming the abuses which exist among the mill-people, who but the corporation ought to be held responsible for the unwholesome surroundings and the hard life which is undermining the vitality and poisoning the blood of so large a portion of our working-people?
“Labor is worship,” says the poet. Labor is education, is the teaching of the wise political economist. If factory-labor is not a means of education to the operative of to-day, it is be cause the employer does not do his duty. It is because he treats his work-people like machines, and forgets that they are struggling, hoping, despairing human beings. It is because, as he becomes rich, he cares less and less for the well-being of his poor, and, beyond paying them their weekly wages, has no thought of their wants or their needs.
The manufacturing corporation, except in comparatively few instances, no longer represents a protecting care, a parental influence, over its operatives. It is too often a soulless organization; and its members forget that they are morally responsible for the souls and bodies, as well as for the wages, of those whose labor is the source of their wealth. Is it not time that more of these Christian men and women, who gather their riches from the factories of the country, should begin to reflect that they do not discharge their whole duty to their employees when they see that the monthly wages are paid; that they are also responsible for the unlovely surroundings, for the barren and hopeless lives, and for the moral and physical deterioration of them and their children?
The cotton-factory gave the first impetus to wards uplifting the social status of the working men and the working-women of New England, if not of the whole country. It should not be a cause of its decadence, as it certainly is in danger of becoming unless corporations can be induced to seriously consider whether it is better to degrade those who work for them to a level with the same class in foreign countries, or, to mix a little conscience with their capital, and so try to bring back, into the life of the factory operative of to-day, this “lost Eden” which I have tried to describe.
