TABLE 58.-Months worked during the past year by males 16 years of age or over employed away from home, by general nativity and race of individual.

(STUDY OF HOUSEHOLDS.)

[This table includes only races with 20 or more males reporting. The totals, however, are for all races.]

Of the 1,447 males reporting, 54.7 per cent worked twelve months, 80.1 per cent worked nine months or more, 96.8 per cent worked six months or more, and 99.4 per cent worked three months or more. Native-born of native father show the highest per cent who worked the full twelve months or nine months or more, they are followed by native-born of foreign father and foreign-born in the order mentioned. Native-born of native father also show the highest per cent who worked six months or more and three months or more, being followed by foreign-born and native-born of foreign father as named.

Of the native-born of foreign father Germans show the highest per cent who worked twelve months, Irish, Bohemians and Moravians, and Poles follow in the order named, only 51.4 per cent of the lastnamed race having worked the full year. Irish show the largest proportion who worked nine months or more and six months or more, followed by Germans, Bohemians and Moravians, and Poles. Irish and Poles show the highest per cent who worked three months or over followed in order by Bohemians and Moravians and Germans. Of the foreign-born races Swedes, Lithuanians, and North Italians. show over 80 per cent who worked twelve months, Irish and English between 60 and 80 per cent, and Poles and Germans between 50 and 60 per cent. Slovaks, Bohemians and Moravians, Japanese, and Croatians all show less than 50 per cent who worked twelve months. North Italians and Lithuanians show 100 per cent who worked nine months or more, Swedes, English, and Irish between 90 and 100 per cent, Japanese and Poles between 80 and 90 per cent, and Germans, Bohemians and Moravians, Croatians, and Slovaks between 60 and 80 per cent who worked nine months or more.

English, North Italians, Japanese, Lithuanians, and Swedes show 100 per cent who worked six months or more, Germans, Bohemians and Moravians, Irish, Poles, Croatians, and Slovaks following in the order mentioned, the last named being the only race showing less than 90 per cent. All of the races except Germans, Poles, and Croatians show 100 per cent who worked three months or more.

The following table shows, by locality and by general nativity and race of individual, the per cent of males in the households studied who worked nine months or over:

TABLE 59.-Per cent of males 16 years of age or over working 9 months or over, by locality and by general nativity and race of individual.

(STUDY OF HOUSEHOLDS.)

[This table includes only races with 20 or more males reporting in each of two or more localities. The totals, however, are for all races.]

As might be expected, the table immediately preceding shows a falling off of the proportions of those regularly employed as compared with the showing as to the proportion of individuals working six months or over. Upon referring to the totals, it is also significant that, although all three classes according to general nativity show about an equal proportion working nine months or over in South Omaha, in each of the other two cities the foreign-born show a considerably lower proportion working regularly during the period specified as compared with the native-born and the persons nativeborn of foreign father; and have a slightly smaller percentage in Chicago and a considerably smaller proportion in Kansas City who work nine months or over as compared with the total native-born. Moreover, the employees of native birth and of native father in the two cities in which they are represented, as in the table last presented, indicate a slightly higher degree of industriousness than the total native-born.

The table next presented shows by locality and by general nativity and race of individual the per cent of males in the households studied working six months or over.

TABLE 60.-Per cent of males 16 years of age or over working 6 months or over, by locality and by general nativity and race of individual.

(STUDY OF HOUSEHOLDS.)

[This table includes only races with 20 or more males reporting in each of two or more localities. The totals, however, are for all races.]

The preceding table discloses small differences in the tendencies exhibited by the native-born, foreign-born, and native-born of foreign father. In comparing the total in the three classes, with the exception of the falling off in the proportion of native-born of foreign father in Kansas City, the relative industriousness of each class is seen to be about the same in each locality. The persons native-born of native father, who are shown for Kansas City and South Omaha, show in these two cities greater regularity of employment than either the total native-born or second generation. It also may be noted that all of the Poles in both Chicago and South Omaha work regularly for six months or over.

LIABILITY TO ACCIDENT OR DISEASE.

The nature of the packing industry is such that many of the employees are compelled to work under conditions unfavorable to health. Much of the handling and cutting of fresh meats is done in refrigerating rooms, and the men and women employed in these departments must therefore work constantly in temperatures within a few degrees of freezing. The rooms are frequently lighted only by artificial means. In some instances, at least, the floors are wet and soggy, and the ceilings damp and dripping, while the air, because of insufficient ventilation, is often damp, close, and unwholesome. In certain departments the employees work with their hands wet in hot or cold water or the materials of the industry the whole or the greater part of the time and with their clothing wet and unclean. Such conditions are necessarily detrimental to the health of the workers, among whom tuberculosis, rheumatism, and other diseases are very prevalent. Upon the other hand, the proportion of industrial accidents is probably lower in packing than in most industries of like importance. It appears from the reports issued by the Illinois Bureau of Industrial Statistics that in the six months ending December 31, 1907, only 5 of the employees in the packing houses of the 48296°- -VOL 13--11---7

State were killed and 17 injured, and that in the year ending December 31, 1908, but 3 were killed and 14 injured. The reports show that the fatalities were due to such accidents as might occur in any industry, such as falling with elevator, falling down elevator shaft, falling from platform, falling on stair, being struck by a falling casting, and being caught by machinery. Obviously the perils which beset the packing-house employee arise from disease rather than from accidents.

LABOR ORGANIZATIONS.

The national organization of packing-house workers dates from 1897. Its membership was largest and its power and influence were greatest in the years from 1901 to 1904. The strike of 1904 resulted in a severe setback for the organization, from the effects of which it has not as yet recovered.

There have been local unions of butchers in some of the centers of the packing industry for a number of years. In the fall of 1896 a call was sent out by the American Federation of Labor for delegates to take part in the formation of an international body to include all the workers of the industry. A meeting of the delegates was held at Cincinnati and the new organization came into existence early in 1897 under the name of the International Union of Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America." All packing-trade unions previously affiliated with the American Federation of Labor were required to take out charters from the new international body. At the beginning the organization was made up of skilled workmen only, but about the year 1902 its activities were expanded to include the unskilled men of the trade. It is stated that in 1904 at the time of the great strike, fully one-half of the entire membership of the unions was unskilled. Local unions_are organized, in general, according to the occupation of the members or the department in which they are employed; but in some cities, where the departments are small, it seems to have been the practice for several departments to unite to form a mixed local. In Chicago a number of unions were at one time organized upon a racial basis. Previous to 1904 there were, on a middle plane, between the locals and the international body, a number of "packing-trade councils,', each embracing all the unions of a given trade center. These councils, which consisted of delegates from the different unions of a locality, met at stated intervals, and were designed to bring the different locals more completely into touch with one another, making the interest of one the interest of all. Since the strike of 1904 all of these organizations, with the exception of those at New York and Chicago, have ceased to exist. The international organization has as its officers a president, a secretary-treasurer, and five vice-presidents. All of these officers together make up the international executive board, in which is lodged the general supervision of organized labor in the industry, including the adjustment of disputes and questions of jurisdiction arising among the local bodies. The headquarters of the international body are at Syracuse, N. Y., and conventions are held biennially. Both the president and the secretarytreasurer are salaried officials and devote their entire time to the business of the organization.

During the years previous to 1904 the unions were able to secure from the packers agreements controlling wages and conditions of employment. These agreements related not only to almost all of the skilled workers, but to the unskilled workers in certain departments. The defeat suffered by the unions in the strike of 1904 was a serious blow to organized labor in the packing industry. One of the first and most important results was the disbandment of nearly all the locals made up of unskilled workers. It is stated that, while before 1904 fifty per cent of the total membership of the international body consisted of unskilled laborers, since that time it has been confined, except in one or two of the smaller centers, to the skilled workers only. Moreover, since the strike not even the skilled workers have been able to secure agreements of any sort from the principal packing houses. For this reason and because of the general weakening of the hold of organized labor upon the industry the membership of existing unions has materially decreased during the past four or five years.

LABOR DISPUTES.

The labor disturbances of 1894, arising out of the strike at Pullman, Ill., and the sympathetic strike of the railway employees, centering in and about Chicago, affecting as they did either directly or indirectly, most classes of labor in the locality, were the occasion of a strike of some importance in the packing industry. This strike was an unorganized affair of rather brief duration and had apparently but little effect upon the relations between employers and employees. The striking workmen had no special grievance against the packers— or, if they had grievances of a minor nature, these were not their reason for striking, the demonstration being wholly sympathetic.

Early in the month of July, 1894, the labor leaders of Chicago and the vicinity gathered to discuss plans for a sympathetic strike by all the organized workmen. Such a strike was agreed upon. The employees of the packing industry were at the time unorganized, but on the evening of July 11 a considerable number of butchers affiliated in a body with the Knights of Labor. On the following day these men, numbering probably between 600 and 1,000, went out on a strike. The packers apparently suffered but little inconvenience by reason of the strike; killing was continued, though upon a reduced scale, the work being done by foremen, by employees transferred from other departments, and by the new men who were hired as rapidly as possible to take the places of those who had left.

THE STRIKE OF 1904.

The most serious labor dispute in the history of the meat-packing industry of the United States occurred in 1904. While the strike of that year was participated in to a greater or lesser degree by a majority of all the packing-house employees of the country, Chicago, as the principal packing center, was the scene of the severest and most important contest. The result of the strike was complete defeat for the strikers and the serious weakening or destruction of the labor organizations of the industry.

For some years previous to 1904 the packing-house workers, both skilled and unskilled, had been organized, and agreements had been