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Show Men Have Been Made Better Citizens by Cutting Down Their Working Hours By REPRESENTATIVE FRANK BUCHANAN of Hlinoii At the present t-lae of the discussion of reducing the hours of the workday it is no longer necessary to set out to prove the benefits to mankind man-kind trained everywhere- in industrial life through cutting off all the hour.-of hour.-of employment above ten. On the shelves of every public library in our cities are books and reports by the score telling of communities made more heal I by, more sober, more happv, more enlightened by removing the burden of the intolerably excessive labor to which the workers generally were formerly driven. To lop off two, three, and even four hours above weight was a long step lou'.-trd substituting humanity for brutality. More than that, economically nothing was lost. At the end of the year tin; worker, on the average, yielded as much output at eight hours as at the longer day. lie worked more days, he applied more muscle to his task, and hi: rose from' an automaton drudge to an intelligent mechanic. It is also to be noted that every reduction in the hours of daily labor has been followed by new and better tools and devices by which the productivity produc-tivity of the workers working under an eight-hour day has been vastly increased over the former Ljng-hour workday. . The laborer's strength diminishes graduallv in the course of the dav. The last hours count against him most. Bodily ailments then develop j.-i his weak spots. The quality of his work then falls off. His aversion, Jjorn of weakness and exhaustion, then takes root toward the natural avocations of a healthy nature in the hours oil' from the daily grind. It is then that, with a certain percentage of the worn-out toilers, a craving for stimulant arises, foreshadowing the deplorable consequence of indulgence indul-gence in drink. It is then that the workman is unfitted to take part during the evenings in the various duties of his life; hence he is the less .worthy ns a citizen, the less helpful to the constructive institutions of society, the less a watchful, patient and competent father of a family. |