Archive Transcript: Speeches
David Dubinsky's Speech at the Conference on Vivisection of Section 7A, 1935
Conference on Vivisection of Section 7A
Introductory Remarks by
David Dubinsky
President, International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union
Chairman, Conference at Russell Sage Foundation Auditorium
Saturday, February 16, 1935
As a man who has spent a good many years of his life in cutting garments with a knife in hand, I should find this task of officiating as chairman over the vivisection of Section 7A rather easy.
Yet, I confess that I am not quite ready to help drive a final nail into the coffin of this famous section, just as I am not prepared to sing songs of praise for it. Because, if the truth is to be told, the NRA, in its entirety, and Section 7A, in particular, while it affects, generally, labor and industry in the United States, has met with a different reaction in individual industries and among individual groups of workers.
The reason for this is not hard to find: In the United States, we have not one uniform labor movement, centrally directed and moving in the same pace and tempo. We have varied labor organizations in different stages of development, with different backgrounds and histories. It stands to reason, therefore, that the NRA could not, under such circumstances, affect the labor movement as a whole with the same uniformity.
True, all organized labor in the United States found itself, in the Spring of 1933, in an exhausted, almost tragic, situation. True, the ranks of all unions were at that time badly depleted, and many of them were financially insolvent and functioning only on the defensive. But, as we look back on these past two years and observe the effect of recovery legislation in our unions, we must inevitably reach the conclusion that NRA, in itself, was not and could not have been a patent medicine for such unions as lacked red blood or fighting power in their veins to take up the recovery program or Section 7A as a fighting program with the help of which they could strengthen their position in industry, conquer new territory and bring thousands of new recruits into their organization.
Looking, therefore, at both the NRA and Section 7A from this viewpoint, I think it provides us with a fairly good criterion as to what we may expect from the new edition of the NRA which is likely to pass Congress with some important and unimportant modifications. I sincerely believe that it is less vital for us, of the labor movement, to vivisect or condemn or sing the praise of the NRA,--I say, it is of much less consideration than to apply ourselves to the more real, the more important tasks of our own movement, the tasks of militant trade union action.
Let me turn to some of the more concrete problems facing the American workers today.
I fully and without reservation subscribe to the principle that only the shorter work-week can solve the distressing problem of unemployment and supply jobs to the idle millions. In our own industry, we had adopted this policy long before the present depression set in, namely, that the only cure for unemployment is the shorter work-week. Back in 1923, we adopted the 40-hour week in order to absorb the growing number of unemployed. The reduction of work hours in our industries in 1933 to 35 hours per week also came, not as a gift from the New Deal, but chiefly, because we compelled our employing interests to concede the shorter work-week so as to give jobs to thousands of workers who until then could not obtain any work in the shops. Despite the 35-hour week, we still have unemployment, and we hope that through a further shortening of the work-week our industry will get the opportunity to absorb this new reserve army of workers.
And it is quite evident to me that what holds good for the women's garment trade can be applied with equal force to every other trade and industry. Can we, nevertheless, expect at the present moment that the 30-hour week will be legislated into existence by Congress? There may be different answers to this question. I, however, am inclined to lean to the less optimistic side. It would seem to me that most of the work in connection with shortening the working hours of industry will have to be done by the trade unions, themselves, adjusting themselves to their individual situations in the various industries.
And this applies with no less force, I believe, to the other no less important question with regard to the general problem of recovery, namely to the question of earnings, of minimum wages and of classified wage scales, in particular. Those who have attended the recent Hearings on Employment Policy before the National Industrial Recovery Board in Washington could not have failed to observe how those who spoke for the employers and for industry were uniformly in opposition to classified wage scales. All of them were attacking it as an impossible and un-American wage system. They were all strong for the minimum, I suppose because most of them in their hearts know that in the more poorly organized industries these minimums eventually become the maximums and make it impossible for the workers to rise up from the lower levels. These spokesmen for the employers were class-conscious enough; they knew what they wanted, and it should be the immediate objective of organized labor to fight and to force this issue of classified wages for various crafts and degrees of skill in every industry. Such classified wage scales are needed for the protection of both the minority of the unskilled and the majority of the skilled workers in every trade.
Labor must also insist on the right in assisting in the making or amending of codes. The organized workers have no confidence in such codes as were framed or put through by the employers, alone, but labor does have confidence in the few codes that were written with the participation of their own representatives. As a matter of fact, only those codes were collective bargaining was a real factor provide shorter hours, classified wages and an opportunity for better enforcement.
We, in the women's garment trade, have found it to be invariably true that in such codes where we had participation in code authorities, even though they provide comparatively higher classified wage scales and the 35-hour work-week, the labor provisions are substantially enforced. On the other hand, in such codes where we were deprived of active code participation and where only one basic minimum of $13 per week and longer work hours exist, there is hardly any enforcement at all. I am, therefore, firmly convinced that the first essential of compliance with code regulations is that labor be represented on every code authority with full power. This is, in my judgment, the key to the entire question of code compliance and observance.
And, finally, let me say briefly, as follows, about Section 7A: I believe that this section has been largely a failure not because it was not clear or explicit enough, but because the Government has failed to prosecute cases of its violation. That is why labor has no confidence in it. Labor feels that Clause 7A is a promise that has not been fulfilled as yet. Employers violate the provisions of Clause 7A, secure in the knowledge that nothing will happen to them. On the other hand, it can be fairly stated that even where the Government failed to enforce Section 7A, wherever there existed a strong and a fighting union in an industry, it succeeded in putting its own teeth into Section 7A and in making the employers respect their power.
It is from such a viewpoint that I am looking at the prospective legislative changes which are now being proposed by our friends in Congress for the strengthening of Clause 7A. I am not certain whether we shall muster enough strength in the House and the Senate to pass the Wagner Bill, which would strike a crushing blow at company unionism. By all means, it deserves our support. Yet, in the light of past experience, I am still inclined to place the main emphasis on our own ability, the ability of organized labor, to enforce Section 7A as all other vital rights which are at stake at the present critical moment. Our employers somehow always manage to find a loophole in a law, no matter how clear and explicit. They know how to drag out cases for months and months. But they are far more quickly impressed by a show of determination and force on the part of their organized workers.
Let us know proceed to the discussion of the subject which the Education Department of our International has arranged in the interest of clear-headed thinking and action on the part of those who are deeply concerned with labor needs and labor problems. I am glad that we have here speakers whose ability to handle the subject is undisputed and widely known.