by Dale Moerke
I spent some time yesterday watching the Minnesota Ways & Means committee debate the proposed minimum wage changes. While there are many things about the debate that caused a spike in my blood pressure, I am really concerned about those who think farm workers do not deserve the same rights as other workers in our state’s economy.
For some reason paying farm workers overtime after 40 hours is sacrilegious. Rep Sarah Anderson (R-Plymouth) tweeted, “When Minneapolis runs the #mnleg, they think farming is a 40 hour per week kind of job.”
Don Davis in his April 29th Capitol Chatter column quotes DFL Rep. Jeanne Poppe, “Ag workers are not necessarily like factory workers where they can clock in and clock out.” No, it is not necessarily a 40 hour per week job. Yes, you have to often “make hay when the sun shines”.
But then, a lot of jobs are like that. It is the beginning of the construction season and you will see workers taking advantage of the daylight and good weather to get as much done as possible.
Electrical workers recently worked seven days a week restoring power in SW Minnesota after the recent ice storms.
I wonder what the difference is between a worker putting in 70 hours a week on the farm and one putting in 70 hours a week paving a road. Both will be tired at the end of the week but the farm worker will get the shaft. Some legislators need to quit fantasizing about the “family farm” and realize that it is a business that should be held to the same standard for workers’ rights as other businesses. Get a clue people. It’s not your Grandpa’s farm.
A couple years ago I posted the lyrics to the song Eight Hours, by I.G. Blanchard, in a note to Facebook. I think it is relevant again today.
Eight Hours
We mean to make things over,
We are tired of toil for naught
With but bare enough to live upon
And ne'er an hour for thought.
We want to feel the sunshine
And we want to smell the flow'rs
We are sure that God has willed it
And we mean to have eight hours;
We're summoning our forces
From the shipyard, shop and mill
Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest
Eight hours for what we will;
Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest
Eight hours for what we will.
The beasts that graze the hillside,
And the birds that wander free,
In the life that God has meted,
Have a better life than we.
Oh, hands and hearts are weary,
And homes are heavy with dole;
If our life's to be filled with drudg'ry,
What need of a human soul.
Shout, shout the lusty rally,
From shipyard, shop, and mill.
Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest
Eight hours for what we will;
Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest
Eight hours for what we will.
The voice of God within us
Is calling us to stand
Erect as is becoming
To the work of His right hand.
Should he, to whom the Maker
His glorious image gave,
The meanest of His creatures crouch,
A bread-and-butter slave?
Let the shout ring down the valleys
And echo from every hill.
Ye deem they're feeble voices
That are raised in labor's cause,
But bethink ye of the torrent,
And the wild tornado's laws.
We say not toil's uprising
In terror's shape will come,
Yet the world were wise to listen
To the monetary hum.
Soon, soon the deep toned rally
Shall all the nations thrill.
Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest
Eight hours for what we will;
Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest
Eight hours for what we will.
From factories and workshops
In long and weary lines,
From all the sweltering forges,
And from out the sunless mines,
Wherever toil is wasting
The force of life to live
There the bent and battered armies
Come to claim what God doth give
And the blazon on the banner
Doth with hope the nation fill:
Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest
Eight hours for what we will;
Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest
Eight hours for what we will.
Hurrah, hurrah for labor,
For it shall arise in might
It has filled the world with plenty,
It shall fill the world with light
Hurrah, hurrah for labor,
It is mustering all its powers
And shall march along to victory
With the banner of Eight Hours.
Shout, shout the echoing rally
Till all the welkin thrill.
Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest
Eight hours for what we will;
Eight hours for work, eight hours for rest
Eight hours for what we will.
A resident of Luverne, Dale Moerke works as a forklift operator at JBS Swift in Worthington and enjoys being a wanderer in the wild, wild west of Minnesota.
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