igner of certain
classes is its victim. The contractor or sweater in our cities is an
organizer and employer of immigrants. His success depends upon getting
the cheapest help, and life is of no account to him, nor apparently to
the man above him. The clothing may be made in foul and damp and
consumption or fever-infested cellars and tenement-styes, by men, women
and children sick or uncleanly, but the only care of the sweater is that
it be made cheaply and thus his returns be secured. It is a standing
reproach to our Christian civilization that the sweating system and the
slums are still existing sores in American centers of population. So far
the law has been unable to control or check greed, and the plague spots
grow worse. Here is a typical case, taken from the report of the
Industrial Commission:

[Sidenote: A Striking Example]

"A Polish Jew in Chicago, at a time when very few of the Poles were
tailors, opened a shop in a Polish neighborhood. He lost money during
the time he was teaching the people the trade, but finally was a gainer.
Before he opened the shop he studied the neighborhood; he found the
very poorest quarters where most of the immigrant Poles lived. He took
no one to work except the newly arrived Polish women and girls. The more
helpless and dependent they were, the more sure of getting work from
him. In speaking about his plans he said: 'It will take these girls
years to learn English and to learn how to go about and find work. In
that way I will be able to get their labor very cheap.' His theory
turned out to be practical. He has since built several tenement-houses."

[Sidenote: A Foreign Importation]

The cheap tailor business is divided among the Italians, Russians,
Poles, and Swedes, Germans and Bohemians. The women and children are
made to work, and hours are not carefully counted. Long work, poor food,
poor light, foul air, bad sanitation--all make this kind of life far
worse than any life which the immigrants knew in Europe. Better physical
starvation there than the mental and spiritual blight of these modern
conditions here. That so much of hopeful humanity is found in these
unwholesome and congested wards proves the quality worth saving and
elevating.

[Sidenote: Story of a Sweat-shop Girl]

Here is an illustration of the resolute spirit which conditions cannot
crush. A young Polish girl was brought by her widowed mother to America,
in hope of bettering their condition. The mother die