Peoceedixgs of the Farmers' Club. 3C9 



wlicn there was time enougli to lioiise it tlien, but a rain was 

 threatened next day. Why, tlic wliole crop might be lost in that 

 way. I cannot think that it will l)e profitable for this Bystem to 

 obtain between the laborers and the farmers. If the former insist 

 npon it, why then the farmers mnst go to work and increase their 

 macliinery so that they can do withont that labor that wonld stop at 

 the end of eight or ten hours and let tlie crop be lost. I do not think 

 tliat we should advocate its being applied to farmers at all. It 

 wonld increase the price of food if we shonld rednce thehonrs of 

 labor. 



Mr. A. S. Fnller. — Onght we to meddle with the thing at all? 



Dr. Isaac P. Triml)le. — I don't think so. The farmers are able to 

 take care of themselves. If we iind that the Held hands will not 

 work more than eight hours, then we must go to machinery, 



Mr, Thomas Cavanagh. — I think the gentleman is a little old- 

 fashioned. It seems to me that the farmers, when they pay eight or 

 ten dollars a month, tliink that they do not get enough of work out 

 of the men. On Long Island I remember the farmers used to have 

 the men out at four o'clock in the morning, and worked them till 

 after dark at night ; but that time has passed away. If a man is 

 hired for ten hours, he has the right to stop when those ten houi-s are 

 expired. Tlie best way is to hire monthly men, 



Mr. J, "W. Gregory, — When I v\-as young I was l)ound by the year, 

 and my employer believed that he owned me, body and soul. 



Mr, Aaron M, Powell (Brooklyn). — iNo one who has observed at 

 all can fail to see that the question is a great problem. There must 

 be evidently, upon the part of the working classes, some standard. 

 It will not do to have them an exceptional class of workers. In 

 manufactories, and such like, there is a standard which the national 

 government has adopted. The men reipiire to resolve that they will 

 not go through harvest. "When the president allies himself with the 

 eightdiour movement he affects society from one end of the country to 

 the other, and it must be met. Senator Sprague sees, looking ahead 

 like a shrewd statesman, that the labor movement is to be in the hands 

 of the politician ; and when it does get in that attitude, then it becomes 

 a very important rpiestion to farmers, Tliey will have it thrust upon 

 them, and I thiidc it is well tliat tliey sliould have it thrust upon 

 them, Tlie young men know that in the farm life there is not the 

 poetry that is spoken of; and it is because we have ignorant men 

 who have consented so long to be classed as an exceptional class that 

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