Samuel Gompers Quotes

The labor of a human being is not a commodity or article of commerce.

So long as there is one [person] who seeks employment and cannot find it, the hours of work are too long.

Show me that product of human endeavor in the making of which the workingman has had no share, and I will show you something that society can well dispense with.

In the last analysis, the welfare of the workers depends upon their own initiative. Whatever is done under the guise of philanthropy or social morality which in any way lessens initiative is the greatest crime that can be committed against the toilers.

Let social busybodies and professional “public morals experts” in their fads reflect upon the perils they rashly invite under this pretense of social welfare.

One fact stands out in bold relief in the history of man’s attempts for betterment. That is that when compulsion is used, only resentment is aroused, and the end is not gained. Only through moral suasion and appeal to man’s reason can a movement succeed.

You can’t weigh the soul of a man with a bar of pig-iron.

The worst crime against working people is a company which fails to operate at a profit.

The working people know no country. They are citizens of the world.

Doing for people what they can and ought to do for themselves is a dangerous experiment.