Do I believe in arbitration? I do. But not in arbitration between the lion and the lamb, in which the lamb is in the morning found inside the lion
SAMUEL GOMPERSIt is impossible for capitalists and laborers to have common interests.
More Samuel Gompers Quotes
-
-
The trade union movement represents the organized economic power of the workers… It is in reality the most potent and the most direct social insurance the workers can establish.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
What does labor want? We want more schoolhouses and less jails; more books and less arsenals; more learning and less vice; more leisure and less greed; more justice and less revenge; in fact, more of the opportunities to cultivate our better natures.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
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.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
So long as there is one [person] who seeks employment and cannot find it, the hours of work are too long.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
No race of barbarians ever existed yet offered up children for money
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
The labor of a human being is not a commodity or article of commerce.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
Where trade unions are most firmly organized, there are the rights of the people most respected.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
Time is the most valuable thing on earth: time to think, time to act, time to extend our fraternal relations, time to become better men, time to become better women, time to become better and more independent citizens.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
Our mission has been the protection of the wage-worker, now; to increase his wages; to cut hours off the long workday, which was killing him; to improve the safety and the sanitary conditions of the workshop.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
The worst crime against working people is a company which fails to operate at a profit.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
It is impossible for capitalists and laborers to have common interests.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
Labor Day is devoted to no man, living or dead, to no sect, race or nation.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
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.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
To be free, the workers must have choice. To have choice they must retain in their own hands the right to determine under what conditions they will work.
SAMUEL GOMPERS -
We will stand by our friends and administer a stinging rebuke to men or parties who are either indifferent, negligent, or hostile, and, wherever opportunity affords, to secure the election of intelligent, honest, earnest trade unionists, with clear, unblemished, paid-up union cards in their possession.
SAMUEL GOMPERS