"Labor and Education," Bulletin No. 33, September, 1904, Representation of children of wage earners compared, by colleges, Establishment of free employment offices in Massachusetts agitated since 1894, Operations of free employment offices in the United States in 1904, Review of some free employment offices in foreign countries, Summary-applications for help, applications for situations, and positions filled, by Importance of laws to protect women and children in industry generally recognized, Chronological résumé of such legislation in Massachusetts, 1836-1904, Compilation of woman and child labor laws, by States, 26-35 Tabular statement showing aggregation of legislation, 36-43 Consensus of opinion of employees in retail stores on proposed measure to exempt Labor Digest from Governor's Message-Trade School for Girls, Boston, - Child Labor in Maine - Child Labor in Connecticut - Platform on Labor Problems- British Institute of Social Service-Medical Congress on Labor Accidents Special Tax on Department Stores in Germany - Commercial Courts in Ger- Business Failures in Massachusetts and the United States-Cotton Industry in Vir- ginia-Relief Department, Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Co. - Fatal Accidents in Coal Mines, United States and Great Britain - Automobiles in France and the United States - Business Failures in Canada-Textile Operatives in Great Britain - Population of the United Kingdom in 1904- Population of Spain- Strikes in Belgium - Glass Workers in Belgium - Unemployed in France and England - Population of France-Strikes in France - Trade Unions in Ger- 50-52 52 52, 53 53-57 57-60 APR 13 1905 CAMBRIDGE, MASS * In the Labor Bulletin for September, 1904, an article was published under the title of "Labor and Education," written by William J. Tucker, D.D., LL.D., President of Dartmouth College, in which he stated: Another means of giving freedom and expansion to the wage earning population in place of a narrow and exclusive solidarity is by giving to it ready access to the higher education. There is no reason why the former experience of the New England farmer and the present experience of the Western farmer should not be repeated in the family of the intelligent wage earner. The sons of the New England farmer who were sent to college identified their families with the State and church, and with all public interests. They lifted the family horizon. I have said that this experience may be repeated in the families of the wage earner. It is being repeated. Let me give you an illustration with which I am familiar. The students at Dartmouth are divided about as follows, according to the occupation of their fathers: Forty per cent are the sons of business men, twenty-five per cent of professional men, fifteen per cent of farmers; of the remaining twenty per cent, more than half are the sons of wage earners. The per cent from the shops now equals that from the farm. I have no doubt that this proportion will hold in most of our Eastern colleges and universities. The home of the wage earner is becoming a recruiting ground for the higher education, which no college can afford to overlook. As Professor Marshall, the English economist, has said, "Since the manual labor classes are four or five times as numerous as all other classes put together, it is not unlikely that more than half of the best natural genius that is born into the country belongs to them." And from this statement he goes on to draw the conclusion that "there is no extravagance more prejudicial to the growth of the national wealth than that wasteful negligence which allows genius which happens to be born of lowly parentage to expend itself in lowly work." So much for the necessity of fresh, virile, and self-supporting stock to the higher education, if it is to discharge its obligation to society. Immediately after the opening of the collegiate year of 1904–5, letters were written to officers of the several colleges and universities in the Commonwealth requesting information concerning the occupations of fathers of the students then enrolled. From the replies received we have been enabled to prepare the following table which shows for each college or university considered the occupations of the fathers of students classified under the following heads: Business, Professional, Government Officials, Farmers, and Wage Earners; those remaining being included under the headings, Retired and Deceased, or Not Given. |