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Hellraisers Journal – Friday March 26, 1909
Spokane, Washington – I. W. W. Declares: “Employment Sharks Must Go!”
From Spokane’s Industrial Worker of March 25, 1909:
[Part I.]
This heading ought to interest every worker who sees it. If there is one thing more than another that brings the I. W. W. to the notice of the WORKINGMEN in the Northwest it is the fight that the INDUSTRIAL UNION is carrying on against the licensed robbers known as the employment sharks. These places are run in connection with other grafts like them. Some of these “employment” offices are in the corners of saloons and others in connection with religious outfits. The Beacon Bible Class of the Central Christian Church is running an employment offices, so is that resort for “weak men,” the Young Men’s Christian Association. The last joint, the Y. M. C,. A., has a higher price list, even than the Peerless. The sucker has to pay the Y. M. C. A. one-third of the first week’s pay for the job. This one hired goes to the “Lawd.” Lord in English.
Law Is No Law, without Force.
No longer ago than last year the employment thieves in Spokane grew fat and rich and never a man to try to fix things. The I. W. W. was the first Union to begin a regular fight against this abuse. The employers of the state of Washington have made a law against getting money by fraud: that is, by false pretense. Some men who are not yet acquainted with the Spokane County Prosecuting Attorney were foolish enough to think that this law against fraud could be made to apply to an employment shark. They have learned different, however! The Prosecutor told them that the cases of fraud committed by the employment sharks were so common that it would bankrupt the county to try them all! As for a civil suit for damages it was the exception rather than the rule for a worker to win out. All this, though, was in the days when the Union was small and little known. Continual agitation and hard work built up the I. W. W. from a low dozen to hundreds of members-a social power, for the first time in Spokane. As a result, the Judges began to grant decisions in favor of the working men: few at first, then more often.
Organized Power Better Than Law.
Today the I. W. W. in Spokane numbers thousands of members. It is generally enough to send a few men from the Union Hall to reason with the employment shark in a case where he has robbed a victim. The employment shark pays back the amount stolen. He has had a change of heart.
The System of Graft.
Not one in fifty who ships out from an employment office ever gets the job he paid for. This is so well known that it is only the new-comers in the country or the men from other lands who are foolish enough to go to the employment offices, that is as a general thing, although there is a sucker born every minute! The extent of this trade in jobs and men is greater than most people think. The leading employment shark of Spokane has sold over eighty thousand jobs, real or imaginary, during the last year. No wonder he rides in an automobile and is worth a million dollars! We all know that the man who runs the office pays a part of the fee to the boss on the job, if there is one, and the boss fires a certain number of men every day to make room for fresh ones sent out from town. If there really is a job at all, it must be a very bad one, otherwise the employer could get all the men needed where he is without sending to Spokane for them. A faro lay-out or a shell game is a thousand times more on the square than an employment agency. A man ALWAYS loses in the latter place. If an employment shark gets an order for thirty men he will often hang out a sign: “Wanted, 300 Men.” This is the general rule and not overdrawn. Only because the graft is so open and so rotten is the public hard to convince. It simply passes belief.
Police “Can’t” Help It.
One of the Superior-or inferior-Judges has handed out a rule that the business of employment sharks must not be interfered with nor their licenses taken away by the City Hall. The employment thieves are robbing, swindling, procuring, lying and fighting every day. The City Hall knows all about it, from the Mayor down to the dog-catcher, and they “can’t” help it!
The Union Can Help Things.
It is fortunate for us that we have long since given up the day-dream of better laws. We will proceed to write some laws of our own and then enforce them. The employment offices do not confine their trade to men. When times were dull they were not against making an honest penny by selling young girls for immoral purposes. This sometimes becomes so open that even the law and order bunch learns about it, and the [Spokane Spokesmen] Review and the [Spokane] Press have a scandal which helps the sale of their papers. So we see how one industry helps another! But it would be a waste of time to name over all the crimes of these people. We have their pictures in our rogues’ gallery and can give you pointers on them all.
For those anxious for details we can give you this, that or the other shark’s criminal record. We can tell you whether this one or that one steals blankets, whether Sebring of the Peerless is still in the state’s prison, if Kent of the Empire has been caught, etc.
[Part I of II, to be continued.]
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SOURCES & IMAGES
Quote JH Walsh, re Employment Sharks, IUB p1, Feb 27, 1909
https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/industrialworker/iub/v2n30-feb-27-1909-iub.pdf
Industrial Worker
-“by the Spokane Local Unions
of the Industrial Workers of the World”
(Spokane, Washington)
-Mar 25, 1909
https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/industrialworker/iw/v1n02-mar-25-1909-IW.pdf
See also:
Tag: Employment Sharks
https://weneverforget.org/tag/employment-sharks/
Tag: Spokane Free Speech Fight of 1909-1910
https://weneverforget.org/tag/spokane-free-speech-fight-of-1909-1910/
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Mr Block – Mats Paulson
Lyrics by Joe Hill