*To protect the workers in their inalienable rights to a higher and better life; to protect them, not only as equals before the law, but also in their health, their homes, workers, and as citizens to overcome and conquer prejudices and antagonism; to secure to
them the right to life, and the opportunity to maintain that life, the right to be full sharers in the abundance which is the result
of their brain and brawn and the civilization of which they are the founders and the mainstay"
Samuel Gompers, President of the American Federation of Labor, 1898
Based on this passage, which issue facing laborers did Samuel Gompers want to focus on first?