Bush Celebrates Labor Day
BUSH CELEBRATES LABOR DAY
My first real job was with the National Biscuit Company at their branch on Tallapoosa Street in Montgomery, Alabama. The title of my position was “Assistant Shipping Clerk and Assistant City Deliveryman”, the elaborate title making up for the low salary of $14.00 per week. I was proud to be working for such a fine company and enjoyed being associated with fellow workers in the warehouse and in the office. My boss was G.T. Smith who had the title of Cashier. The ‘head man’ was J. H. Girardeau who had a title of Manager and whose principal job was to direct the salesmen in a manner that would enable each of them to meet their sales quota and hopefully gain an additional percentage on the above quota sales. He also supervised the Cashier and the general operation of the branch.
This was in the days of the N R A and we proudly pasted the blue eagle emblem on our windows to certify our joy at being a part of the New Deal program in overcoming the depression and bringing in a new era of prosperity. Actually I was a beneficiary of the program in that I was hired so that Nabisco would have enough hands to get the work done without requiring employees to work more than the 40 hours per week specified in the program. It seemed that with more people working the unemployment rate would improve, and with the shorter work week we would have time to enjoy a few more of the good things of life.
Mr. Girardeau happened to be one of those few Republicans in Montgomery, and was not pleased with his governments interfering in his operation of the company’s office. However, he was a law abiding citizen and proceeded to set up a time card system to record the time worked each day by the employees. He and the Cashier were exempted from the weekly hour limit and would not be paid for any overtime they worked. It seemed to irritate Mr. Girardeau when we would leave at the 4:30 quitting time. Often he would stop us and ask us to do some chore before leaving, such as washing the windows, sweeping the floors or cleaning out the shipping room. This displeased all of us, and a couple of the employees got into verbal scrapes with Mr. Girardeau about it. They were fired within a few weeks.
Regardless of the actual hours worked we were directed to enter our time on the cards to total no more than 40 hours.
After a time Mr. Girardeau got a letter from the local office of the Wage and Hour Administration. As I lived only a block from the post office I was assigned the job of picking up the mail each morning. Of course I noticed the oversized brown envelope and could not help seeing the source. I did wonder about its message but didn’t mention it to anyone. Later another letter came from the same office. This time Mr. Girardeau called the employees into his office and informed us that the dismissed employees were trying to get him into trouble, and that the Administrator would call us and have us go to his office to discuss our working hours with him.
Mr. Tom Fitzpatrick, the Administrator was friendly and explained that he wanted us to give him the facts about our working hours. He pointed out that we were dealing with the federal government and that giving false information or withholding information would subject us to prosecution. In due course each of us got checks from Nabisco. Mine was for $623 and some cents designated as overtime compensation. No further details were given. Mr. Girardeau offered no explanation other than instructing us to be sure to enter on our time cards the exact time we worked.
Those were good days for working people. The new laws guaranteed workers the right to organize unions, specified that the working work week was forty hours and that time in excess of forty hours would be paid with a bonus of 50% of the usual rate.
Enforcement of the wage and hour laws has not been consistent through the years since I left Nabisco in 1937 to pursue a career in Property and Casualty Insurance. But the provision for bonus pay for the hours exceeding 40 per week has remained in force. President Bush is in the process of having the Labor Department revise the rules to permit employers to avoid paying the overtime bonus. The Labor Department, created to be the protector of the rights of workers, is in the process of revising the rules and regulations on overtime pay that will deny an estimated 6 million workers the right to overtime pay.
This action by the president brings to mind the pre-New Deal days when, as a teenager, I heard stories of coal miners in West Blocton who had been crippled for lack of enforcement of safety laws. I learned of their payment in “script” that could be spent only at the Company Store where everything was overpriced and of Company housing where tenants had to make their own repairs in spite of paying higher than average rent. The miners complained about the standing company rule against any effort to organize a union. I was easily swayed to believe in the Democratic party which stood for the workers as opposed to the Republicans who favored the rich, the mine owners and selfish people who wanted more riches and didn’t care if the laborers remained poor.
President Bush has not pretended to be pro-labor. This action on the overtime pay issue firmly establishes him as an anti-labor president. It is truly ironic that the news of this action of the Labor Department would be published within days of the celebration of Labor Day, established to honor the working people of the United States.
Jerry 8-18-04
My first real job was with the National Biscuit Company at their branch on Tallapoosa Street in Montgomery, Alabama. The title of my position was “Assistant Shipping Clerk and Assistant City Deliveryman”, the elaborate title making up for the low salary of $14.00 per week. I was proud to be working for such a fine company and enjoyed being associated with fellow workers in the warehouse and in the office. My boss was G.T. Smith who had the title of Cashier. The ‘head man’ was J. H. Girardeau who had a title of Manager and whose principal job was to direct the salesmen in a manner that would enable each of them to meet their sales quota and hopefully gain an additional percentage on the above quota sales. He also supervised the Cashier and the general operation of the branch.
This was in the days of the N R A and we proudly pasted the blue eagle emblem on our windows to certify our joy at being a part of the New Deal program in overcoming the depression and bringing in a new era of prosperity. Actually I was a beneficiary of the program in that I was hired so that Nabisco would have enough hands to get the work done without requiring employees to work more than the 40 hours per week specified in the program. It seemed that with more people working the unemployment rate would improve, and with the shorter work week we would have time to enjoy a few more of the good things of life.
Mr. Girardeau happened to be one of those few Republicans in Montgomery, and was not pleased with his governments interfering in his operation of the company’s office. However, he was a law abiding citizen and proceeded to set up a time card system to record the time worked each day by the employees. He and the Cashier were exempted from the weekly hour limit and would not be paid for any overtime they worked. It seemed to irritate Mr. Girardeau when we would leave at the 4:30 quitting time. Often he would stop us and ask us to do some chore before leaving, such as washing the windows, sweeping the floors or cleaning out the shipping room. This displeased all of us, and a couple of the employees got into verbal scrapes with Mr. Girardeau about it. They were fired within a few weeks.
Regardless of the actual hours worked we were directed to enter our time on the cards to total no more than 40 hours.
After a time Mr. Girardeau got a letter from the local office of the Wage and Hour Administration. As I lived only a block from the post office I was assigned the job of picking up the mail each morning. Of course I noticed the oversized brown envelope and could not help seeing the source. I did wonder about its message but didn’t mention it to anyone. Later another letter came from the same office. This time Mr. Girardeau called the employees into his office and informed us that the dismissed employees were trying to get him into trouble, and that the Administrator would call us and have us go to his office to discuss our working hours with him.
Mr. Tom Fitzpatrick, the Administrator was friendly and explained that he wanted us to give him the facts about our working hours. He pointed out that we were dealing with the federal government and that giving false information or withholding information would subject us to prosecution. In due course each of us got checks from Nabisco. Mine was for $623 and some cents designated as overtime compensation. No further details were given. Mr. Girardeau offered no explanation other than instructing us to be sure to enter on our time cards the exact time we worked.
Those were good days for working people. The new laws guaranteed workers the right to organize unions, specified that the working work week was forty hours and that time in excess of forty hours would be paid with a bonus of 50% of the usual rate.
Enforcement of the wage and hour laws has not been consistent through the years since I left Nabisco in 1937 to pursue a career in Property and Casualty Insurance. But the provision for bonus pay for the hours exceeding 40 per week has remained in force. President Bush is in the process of having the Labor Department revise the rules to permit employers to avoid paying the overtime bonus. The Labor Department, created to be the protector of the rights of workers, is in the process of revising the rules and regulations on overtime pay that will deny an estimated 6 million workers the right to overtime pay.
This action by the president brings to mind the pre-New Deal days when, as a teenager, I heard stories of coal miners in West Blocton who had been crippled for lack of enforcement of safety laws. I learned of their payment in “script” that could be spent only at the Company Store where everything was overpriced and of Company housing where tenants had to make their own repairs in spite of paying higher than average rent. The miners complained about the standing company rule against any effort to organize a union. I was easily swayed to believe in the Democratic party which stood for the workers as opposed to the Republicans who favored the rich, the mine owners and selfish people who wanted more riches and didn’t care if the laborers remained poor.
President Bush has not pretended to be pro-labor. This action on the overtime pay issue firmly establishes him as an anti-labor president. It is truly ironic that the news of this action of the Labor Department would be published within days of the celebration of Labor Day, established to honor the working people of the United States.
Jerry 8-18-04
posted by Jeremiah | 10:50 AM
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