OPPOSED TO TRADE UNIONISM

I am opposed to trade unions because I believe the workers should be satisfied with any conditions the bosses want to put on them.

I am opposed to trade unions because wherever they exist the workers are more independent and insist on what they might call their rights.

I am opposed to trade unions because wherever they exist the rate of wages is always higher and I believe in low wages always and everywhere.

I am opposed to trade unions because wherever the workers are organized, the hours of labor have been reduced. Organized trades have the shortest workday. I believe in long hours, as it tends to keep the toilers ignorant: I don’t think they ought to know too much.

I am opposed to trade unions because they are trying to take children out of the shops and factories and put them to school and have secured the passage of laws that prohibits their employment under a certain age. Children will work for almost nothing, and if the unions succeed in sending them to school they will become educated and ask ugly questions when they grow up. The way to keep these people ignorant is to make their children work.

I am opposed to trade unions because they demand that women shall receive pay with men for equal work. I think a woman should be content with whatever she can get. She has got no vote anyway. And if these trades unionists would only stop their agitation we should soon have her work for nothing.

I am opposed to trade unions because they insist on and have secured the passage of legislation that makes the boss protect dangerous machinery and run his factory under proper sanitary conditions. I think this is all rot. Formerly is a man was killed or lost a limb or met with an accident that was all there was about it. Men are cheap and anxious to get to work, and if it were not for these blamed unions we could do as we liked and run our businesses to suit ourselves.

I am opposed to trade unions on principle. I don’t think they are any good; they make the wage earner dissatisfied; they put the idea into his head that he has the right to think for himself; that he should receive more returns from his labor; that he should work less hours; that he has a right to enjoy some of the luxuries of life, and that their children have the same right to be educated as the children of the rich.

Yes, I am utterly opposed to trade unions, first, last and all the time. They make a workingman think they have the right to set a price on their labor, and say under what the conditions they will work. If we could only get rid of the unions we would do pretty much as we liked. We could work men for twelve or fourteen hours a day at a dollar rate, and they would be too ignorant to make a kick. Yes, these trade unions are a bad thing when they teach our workers that they have rights the same as we have. This is where I draw the line and I don’t see how any intelligent person can uphold them in their outrageous demands. Yes, sir, the union is a bad thing; a bad thing, I say, a very bad thing; it should be suppressed.- Ex.

Reprinted from The Seattle Union Record, August 11, 1900