Labour Day.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXXI, Issue XVII, 24 October 1903, Page 15

Labour Day.

The bulk of our illustrations this week are devoted to the Labour Day procession in Auckland, which was not merely the finest display of the kind even seen in the Northern city, but

was unquestionably far beyond anything of the sort attempted, and carried out in the colonies. The amount of space devoted thus to a single subject may seem at first sight somewhat out of proportion to the importance of the occasion, and under usual circumstances this would be the case, but I am inclined to think this was not a common occasion, for it was the first on which I remember to have seen the day observed as a close holiday by business men, lawyers, merchants, and the majority of tradesmen. This is important for the reason that it shows distinctly that the bad and irritating assumption that only the man who works with his hands has a right to call himself a working-man, and to be honoured by a Labour Day, is passing away. It was obvious, too, and admitted indeed, that but for the co-operation and indeed generosity of employers the splendid display in Auckland on Wednesday could not have taken place. Many of the exhibits were costly, and they were certainly not paid for by employees, while on the other hand it is equally certain that to those employees who entered into the spirit of the thing, and help to carry out their employers’ intentions, Labour Day was Labour Day indeed, “it amuses me to see these fellows on an occasion of this sort.” said one bystander to me, as the procession wended its way past. “Why, those men have been working earlier and are working harder, than they do on ordinary days.” It was true, but the speaker had missed the whole significance of the show, viz., the willingness, the cheerful willingness, to the employers, to recognise the day which honours labour, and the pride and enthusiasm of the employees in their own business, and their personal desire to help to advance the interests of those who pay their wages. If this more complete understanding is not important, well, few things are, and that it should have found such emphatic expression in Auckland is significant also, tfor in no city in the colony have employers been called upon to grant such increases, such terms and such concessions as they have in that city. It shows that all these have, after all, been considered just, and have been granted—though by force to some extent, yet with no ill-will. But to return to the other point. The general closing on Labour Day in Auckland was, as I have said, indicative of a general recognition of the fact that the title working man belongs to us all in this colony. In the past the honourable distinction has been assumed solely by a class, large indeed, but limited, who earn their living by manual labour, and the rougher and less responsible classes of labour have endeavoured to make the title peculiarly their own. The irritation caused by this has undoubtedly iq the past been bitter, and though the recognition of that we are all working men in New Zealand is gaining ground fast, it still exists sufficiently to be mischievous. A general observance of Labour Day by the classes who work hard indeed, but with their heads rather than their bodies, will break up this absurd contention better than anything else, and for this reason the extent to which it was honoured in Auckland this year is worthy of chronicle here, and in the illustrations of this paper. + * *