CHAPTER XXX

MILWAUKEE--WILL THE PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIALISM END POVERTY?

"_Politics rests on necessary foundations, and cannot be treated with levity._"--EMERSON.

Following Christmas day, December 26, 1911, just at the beginning of the most bitterly cold winter weather our country had known for a great many years, I went to Milwaukee. The city was in the last few months of a Socialist Administration. I wanted to see what it meant to the working classes and especially to that class I was deeply interested in,-- the homeless workingman, and at times the destitute, homeless workingman. There were three of our important cities, which, because of their national prominence in social progress, I felt would add a climax to my investigations: "Socialist" Milwaukee; "The Golden Rule" City of Toledo; and "Spotless" Detroit.

It was twenty degrees below zero when I arrived at Milwaukee and this extremely cold weather heralded the speedy gathering of the ice crop. In this city there were four thousand unemployed homeless men, fully one-fourth of them destitute, begging, thieving, sleeping on the floors of the cheaper saloons, seeking all of those available places that would possibly keep aflame the spark of life, in addition to those finding shelter in the Milwaukee Rescue Mission.

In three days the ice crop was made and in four days' time thirty-five hundred of these men were on the ice. The five hundred who did not go were too old, physically weak, or had not sufficient clothing. Many of those who did go, in the condition they were in, froze their faces, ears, hands and feet and from exposure were forced into the hospitals and some into their graves. The wages paid by the ice company was a dollar and seventy-five cents per day, from which the worker paid five dollars per week for board. It is not necessary to refer again to the days of work. For many reasons, the laborer is forced to lose time during the week,--yet the board must be paid.

The weather continued extremely cold for many weeks. I found the Milwaukee Rescue Mission incomplete and inadequate. In this bitter cold I was denied admission to the institution by reason of its being overcrowded, and, also, because its doors were locked at ten-thirty P. M.

Late one afternoon I entered its waiting-room, a long narrow room, near the entrance. It was filled to suffocation with homeless men. I, with many others, was denied the privilege of working for shelter and food. Too many had already applied. I was not to be denied a bountiful five- or ten-cent meal providing I had the price. I heard an old man of sixty-five abused and denied a second cup of coffee. Divine worship, however, was free and while I waited in the packed room for that hour I read these inscriptions on the wall:

"Any man caught in the Act, will have cause to wish he hadn't done it."

"Even a moderate drinker will be denied lodging."

"Whenever you smoke a cigarette, you may say, 'Nearer my God to Thee.'"

"Keep your I's on the spotter for he is watching you."

Smoking was absolutely forbidden, yet no smoking-room provided.

Spitting on the floor was breaking a castiron rule, yet not a cuspidor was provided for that use.

The hour for worship came and on the instant the lights were suddenly turned out. As we stumbled over the benches and chairs, as well as over one another trying to get out, a man told us emphatically "to go in to worship [in a very large audience room, which had stood empty while we were packed in the small one] or get out." The religion or the mode of worship of many of these men was not after their way, but that made no difference. As the thermometer registered twenty-two degrees below zero that night, it was not a very comfortable experience for the half-clothed men who were forced to walk the streets in search of other shelter.

I followed them out to see where they went, and just as I was leaving I recalled the last motto I had read before the darkness was forced upon us:

"No law but love, no creed but Christ."

Most of the men who sought other shelter went to the saloons and by the big red-hot stoves kept from perishing. Others went to the tramway station or the depots, or the offices of the cheap lodging houses.

In one of the Milwaukee daily papers January 2, 1912, I read: "The first man to be sent to the house of correction this year was John L----, sentenced in the District Court yesterday to a term of ninety days. He was begging on Grand Avenue, Sunday night."

The spirit shown in the Milwaukee Rescue Mission, as revealed to me, was not Christian. The heart of the superintendent of this institution may be in the right place--I did not meet the gentleman--but the hearts of his subordinates (at least those I came in contact with), and the spirit of the institution were not. I heard men in the Police Court of Milwaukee beg of the Judge to be sent to the House of Correction as a relief from suffering during the bitter cold winter.

This, my exposition of the condition of the unemployed homeless of Milwaukee, should not be regarded as a criticism on Socialism, although the latter failed in its care and treatment of their unemployed. There are many excuses to offer. An old, rotten political and social system, four thousand years old, could not be reconstructed in a moment's time. Bound by City and State Charters and a netted tangle of City and State laws, it was impossible for the administration to carry out the fundamental principles of Socialism. That brief Socialist administration was more one of theory than of practical interest, although the Fire and Police Departments were not out of control of the administration except in matters of salary. The good intent of the policies of the administration are reflected in many permissive bills which went to the Legislature, in most cases to remain. Among them are bills providing for:

Men dealing in ice;

Unequivocal right to construct Municipal Lodging Houses and Tenements;

Public Comfort Stations;

An act through to build parks.

A municipal lighting plant was planned at this time and municipal markets. The unified press was against this administration, which taking all in all, it would not be fair to regard as a comprehensive example of Socialism, though I may well add that during it taxes were not raised. At that time Milwaukee had the lowest tax rate of any large American city.