Chapter V: Section II: Manufacturing Labour

So much is said in Europe of the scarcity of agricultural labour in the United States, that it is a matter of surprise that manufactures should have succeeded as they have done. It is even supposed by some that the tariff was rendered necessary by a deficiency of labour: that by offering a premium on manufacturing industry, the requisite amount was sought to be drawn away from other employments, and concentrated upon this. This is a mistake. There is every reason to suppose that the requisite amount of labour would have been forthcoming, if affairs had been left to take their natural course.

It has been shown that domestic manufactures were carried on to a great extent, so far back as 1790. From that time to this, they have never altogether ceased in the farm-houses, as the homespun, still so frequently to be seen all over the country, and the agricultural meetings of New England, (where there is usually a display of domestic manufactures,) will testify. The hands by which these products are wrought come to the factories, when the demand for labour renders it worth while; and drop back into the farm-houses when the demand slackens.

It is not the custom in America for women (except slaves) to work out of doors. It has been mentioned that the young men of New England migrate in large numbers to the west, leaving an over-proportion of female population, the amount of which I could never learn. Statements were made to me; but so incredible that I withhold them. Suffice it that there are many more women than men in from six to nine States of the Union. There is reason to believe that there was much silent suffering from poverty before the institution of factories; that they afford a most welcome resource to some thousands of young women, unwilling to give themselves to domestic service, and precluded, by the customs of the country, from rural labour. We have seen how large a proportion of the labour in the Lowell factories is supplied by women.

Much of the rest is furnished by immigrants. I saw English, Irish, and Scotch operatives. I heard but a poor character of the English operatives; and the Scotch were pronounced "ten times better." The English are jealous of their 'bargain,' and on the watch lest they should be asked to do more than they stipulated for: their habits are not so sober as those of the Scotch, and they are incapable of going beyond the single operation they profess. Such is the testimony of their employers.

The demand for labour is, however, sufficiently imperious in all the mechanical departments to make it surprising that prison labour is regarded with such jealousy as I have witnessed. When it is considered how small a class the convicts of the United States are, and are likely to remain, how essential labour is to their reformation, how few are the kinds of manufacture which they can practise, and that it is of some importance that prison establishments should maintain themselves, it seems wholly unworthy of the intelligent mechanics of America that they should be so afraid of convict labour as actually to obtain pledges from some candidates for office, to propose the abolition of prison manufactures. I believe that the Sing-Sing and Auburn prisons, in the State of New York, turn out a greater variety and amount of products than any others; and they have yet done very little more than maintain themselves. The Sing-Sing convicts quarry and dress granite: the Auburn prisoners make clocks, combs, shoes, carpets, and machinery. They are cabinet and chair-makers, weavers, and tailors. There were 650 prisoners when I was there; and of these many were inexperienced workmen; and all were not employed in manufactures. Jealousy of such a set of craftsmen is absurd, in the present state of the American labour-market.

I saw specimens of each of these kinds of labour. A few days after I entered the country, I was taken to an agricultural meeting, held annually at Pittsfield, Massachusetts. We were too late to see the best part of it,--the dispensing of prizes for the best agricultural skill, and for the choicest domestic manufactures. But there were specimens left which surprised me by the excellence of their quality;--table and bed-linen, diapers, blankets, and knitted wares. There was an ingenious model of a bed for invalids, combining many sorts of facilities for change of posture. There were nearly as many women as men at this meeting; all were well dressed, and going to and fro in the household vehicle, the country-wagon, with the invariable bear-skin covering the seat, and peeping out on all sides. A comfortable display, from the remains of the dinner, was set out for us by smart mulatto girls, with snow-berries in their hair. The mechanics' houses in this beautiful village would be enough, if they could be exhibited in England, to tempt over half her operatives to the new world.

The first cotton-mill that I saw was at Paterson, New Jersey. It was set up at first with nine hundred spindles, which were afterwards increased to fifteen hundred; then to six thousand. Building was still going on when I was there. The girls were all well-dressed. Their hair was arranged according to the latest fashions which had arrived, viâ New York, and they wore calashes in going to and fro between their dwellings and the mill. I saw some of the children barefooted, but carrying umbrellas, under a slight sprinkling of rain. I asked whether those who could afford umbrellas went barefoot for coolness, or other convenience. The proprietor told me that there had probably been an economical calculation in the case. Stockings and shoes would defend only the feet; while the umbrella would preserve the gloss of the whole of the rest of the costume. There seems, however, to be a strong predilection for umbrellas in the United States. A convict, in solitary confinement in the Philadelphia prison, gave me the history of all his burglaries. The proximate cause of his capture after the last was an umbrella. He had broken into a good-looking house, and traversed it in vain in search of something worth the risk of carrying away. On leaving the house, he found it rained. He went back, and took a new cotton umbrella. It dawned as he entered the city, and he was afraid of being seen with the umbrella; but thought suspicion would be excited if he "heaved it away." He met an acquaintance who was further from home than himself, and insisted on his accepting the loan of the umbrella. The acquaintance, of course, was caught, and told from whom he had had the umbrella; and the burglar was, in consequence, lodged in jail. What English burglar would have thought of minding rain? If, however, there ever was a case of amateur burglary, this was one.

I visited the corporate factory-establishment at Waltham, within a few miles of Boston. The Waltham Mills were at work before those of Lowell were set up. The establishment is for the spinning and weaving of cotton alone, and the construction of the requisite machinery. Five hundred persons were employed at the time of my visit. The girls earn two, and some three, dollars a-week, besides their board. The little children earn one dollar a-week. Most of the girls live in the houses provided by the corporation, which accommodate from six to eight each. When sisters come to the mill, it is a common practice for them to bring their mother to keep house for them and some of their companions, in a dwelling built by their own earnings. In this case, they save enough out of their board to clothe themselves, and have their two or three dollars a-week to spare. Some have thus cleared off mortgages from their fathers' farms; others have educated the hope of the family at college; and many are rapidly accumulating an independence. I saw a whole street of houses built with the earnings of the girls; some with piazzas, and green venetian blinds and all neat and sufficiently spacious.

The factory people built the church, which stands conspicuous on the green in the midst of the place. The minister's salary (eight hundred dollars last year) is raised by a tax on the pews. The corporation gave them a building for a lyceum, which they have furnished with a good library, and where they have lectures every winter,--the best that money can procure. The girls have, in many instances, private libraries of some merit and value.

The managers of the various factory establishments keep the wages as nearly equal as possible, and then let the girls freely shift about from one to another. When a girl comes to the overseer to inform him of her intention of working at the mill, he welcomes her, and asks how long she means to stay. It may be six months, or a year, or five years, or for life. She declares what she considers herself fit for, and sets to work accordingly. If she finds that she cannot work so as to keep up with the companion appointed to her, or to please her employer or herself, she comes to the overseer, and volunteers to pick cotton, or sweep the rooms, or undertake some other service that she can perform.

The people work about seventy hours per week, on the average. The time of work varies with the length of the days, the wages continuing the same. All look like well-dressed young ladies. The health is good; or rather, (as this is too much to be said about health any where in the United States,) it is no worse than it is elsewhere.

These facts speak for themselves. There is no need to enlarge on the pleasure of an acquaintance with the operative classes of the United States.

The shoe-making at Lynn is carried on almost entirely in private dwellings, from the circumstance that the people who do it are almost all farmers or fishermen likewise. A stranger who has not been enlightened upon the ways of the place would be astonished at the number of small square erections, like miniature school-houses, standing each as an appendage to a dwelling-house. These are the "shoe shops," where the father of the family and his boys work, while the women within are employed in binding and trimming. Thirty or more of these shoe-shops may be counted in a walk of half-a-mile. When a Lynn shoe manufacturer receives an order, he issues the tidings. The leather is cut out by men on his premises; and then the work is given to those who apply for it; if possible, in small quantities, for the sake of dispatch. The shoes are brought home on Friday night, packed off on Saturday, and in a fortnight or three weeks are on the feet of dwellers in all parts of the Union. The whole family works upon shoes during the winter; and in the summer, the father and sons turn out into the fields, or go fishing. I knew of an instance where a little boy and girl maintained the whole family, while the earnings of the rest went to build a house. I saw very few shabby houses. Quakers are numerous in Lynn. The place is unboundedly prosperous, through the temperance and industry of the people. The deposits in the Lynn Savings' Bank in 1834, were about 34,000 dollars, the population of the town being then 4,000. Since that time, both the population and the prosperity have much increased. It must be remembered, too, that the mechanics of America have more uses for their money than are open to the operatives of England. They build houses, buy land, and educate their sons and daughters.[7]

It is probably true that the pleasures and pains of life are pretty equally distributed among its various vocations and positions: but it is difficult to keep clear of the impression which outward circumstances occasion, that some are eminently desirable. The mechanics of these northern States appear to me the most favoured class I have ever known. In England, I believe the highest order of mechanics to be, as a class, the wisest and best men of the community. They have the fewest base and narrow interests: they are brought into sufficient contact with the realities of existence, without being hardened by excess of toil and care; and the knowledge they have the opportunity of gaining is of the best kind for the health of the mind. To them, if to any, we may look for public and private virtue. The mechanics of America have nearly all the same advantages, and some others. They have better means of living: their labours are perhaps more honoured; and they are republicans, enjoying the powers and prospects of perfectly equal citizenship. The only respect in which their condition falls below that of English artisans of the highest order is that the knowledge which they have commonly the means of obtaining is not of equal value. The facilities are great: schools, lyceums, libraries, are open to them: but the instruction imparted there is not so good as they deserve. Whenever they have this, it will be difficult to imagine a mode of life more favourable to virtue and happiness than theirs.

There seems to be no doubt among those who know both England and America, that the mechanics of the New World work harder than those of the Old. They have much to do besides their daily handicraft business. They are up and at work early about this; and when it is done, they read till late, or attend lectures; or perhaps have their houses to build or repair, or other care to take of their property. They live in a state and period of society where every man is answerable for his own fortunes; and where there is therefore stimulus to the exercise of every power.

What a state of society it is when a dozen artisans of one town,--Salem,--are seen rearing each a comfortable one-story (or, as the Americans would say, two-story) house, in the place with which they have grown up! when a man who began with laying bricks criticises, and sometimes corrects, his lawyer's composition; when a poor errand-boy becomes the proprietor of a flourishing store, before he is thirty; pays off the capital advanced by his friends at the rate of 2,000 dollars per month; and bids fair to be one of the most substantial citizens of the place!

Such are the outward fortunes of the mechanics of America. Of their welfare in more important respects, to which these are but a part of the means, I shall have to speak in another connexion.

There are troubles between employers and their workmen in the United States, as elsewhere: but the case of the men is so much more in their own hands there than where labour superabounds, that strikes are of a very short duration. The only remedy the employers have, the only safeguard against encroachments from their men, is their power of obtaining the services of foreigners, for a short time. The difficulty of stopping business there is very great; the injury of delay very heavy: but the wages of labour are so good that there is less cause for discontent on the part of the workmen than elsewhere. All the strikes I heard of were on the question of hours, not of wages.

The employers are, of course, casting about to see how they can help themselves; and, as all are not wise and experienced, it is natural that some should talk of laws to prohibit Trades Unions. There is no harm in their talking of such; for the matter will never get beyond talk;--unless, indeed, the combinations of operatives should assume any forms, or comprehend any principles inconsistent with the republican spirit. The majority will not vote for any law which shall restrain any number of artisans from agreeing for what price they will sell their labour; though I heard several learned gentlemen agreeing, at dinner one day, that there ought to be such laws. On my objecting that the interest of the parties concerned would, especially in a free and rising country, settle all questions between labour and capital with more precision, fairness, and peace, than any law, it was pleaded that intimidation and outrage were practised by those who combined against those who would not join them. I found, on inquiry, that there is an ample provision of laws against intimidation and outrage; but that it is difficult to get them executed. If so, it would be also difficult to execute laws against combinations of workmen, supposing them obtained: and the grievance does not lie in the combination complained of, but somewhere else. The remedy is, (if there be indeed intimidation and outrage,) not in passing more laws, to be in like manner defied, while sufficient already exist; but in enlightening the parties on the subjects of law and social obligation.

One day, in going down Broadway, New York, the carriage in which I was, stopped for some time, in consequence of an immense procession on the side-walk having attracted the attention of all the drivers within sight. The marching gentlemen proceeded on their way, with an easy air of gentility. Banners were interposed at intervals; and, on examining these, I could scarcely believe my eyes. They told me that this was a procession of the journeymen mechanics of New York. Surely never were such dandy mechanics seen; with sleek coats, glossy hats, gay watch-guards, and doe-skin gloves!

I rejoice to have seen this sight. I had other opportunities of witnessing the prosperity of their employers; so that I could be fairly pleased at theirs. There need be no fear for the interests of either, while the natural laws of demand and supply must protect each from any serious encroachment by the other. If they will only respect the law, their temporary disagreement, and apparent opposition of interests will end in being mere readjustments of the terms on which they are to pursue their common welfare.

FOOTNOTES:

[5] Hamilton's Report on Manufactures. 1790.

[6] The following sketch of the aspect of the south-eastern States is a very faithful one. The error of the writer is in supposing that such a condition could be brought about by the tariff, rather than by the necessary operation of the slavery system, by which the children of the third and fourth generations are always reduced to sigh for the comparative prosperity of their fathers.

"These views of the degradation of the southern States receive a melancholy and impressive confirmation from the general aspect and condition of the country, viewed in contrast with its former prosperity. If the ancestors of this generation could rise from the grave, and revisit the scenes of their former usefulness, they would not hesitate to pronounce that the hand of oppression had fallen heavily upon the inheritance of their children. They would be utterly at a loss to account for the change everywhere exhibited, upon any other supposition.

"With natural advantages more bountiful than were ever dispensed by a kind Providence to any other people upon the face of the globe, they would behold, from the mountains of the sea-coast, one unbroken scene of cheerless stagnation and premature decay. With one of the most valuable staples that ever blessed the labours of the husbandman, and swelled the sails of a prosperous and enriching commerce, they would find that our estates are, with a steady and fatal proclivity, depreciating in value, our fields becoming waste, and our cities desolate. With habits of industry and economy which have no example in our former history, they would find the heirs of the largest inheritances generally involved in embarrassments, and many of them irretrievably ruined. Wherever they might cast their eyes, they would find melancholy evidences that the withering blasts of an unsparing despotism had passed over the land, blighting the choicest bounties of Providence, and leaving scarcely a solitary memorial of our former prosperity. They would look in vain for the animating scenes of successful industry, for the wealth and comforts of a thriving population, and for those mansions of hospitality which were once the seats of elegance, and the abodes of cheerfulness."--_Southern Review, Nov. 1828._ p. 613.

[7] The deposits in the Lowell Savings' Bank for 1834, were upwards of 114,000 dollars.