diff options
Diffstat (limited to '10080-0.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | 10080-0.txt | 4268 |
1 files changed, 4268 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/10080-0.txt b/10080-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..01ed637 --- /dev/null +++ b/10080-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4268 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10080 *** + +MOBILIZING WOMAN-POWER + +By HARRIOT STANTON BLATCH + +1918 + + + + + + + +[Illustration: Jeanne d'Arc.--the spirit of the women of the Allies.] + + + + +TO THE ABLE AND DEVOTED WOMEN OF GREAT BRITAIN AND FRANCE + +Who have stood behind the armies of the Allies through the years of the +Great War as an unswerving second line of defense against an onslaught +upon the liberty and civilization of the world, I dedicate this volume. + +HARRIOT STANTON BLATCH + + + + +CONTENTS + +FOREWORD BY THEODORE ROOSEVELT + + I. OUR FOE + + II. WINNING THE WAR + + III. MOBILIZING WOMEN IN GREAT BRITAIN + + IV. MOBILIZING WOMEN IN FRANCE + + V. MOBILIZING WOMEN IN GERMANY + + VI. WOMEN OVER THE TOP IN AMERICA + + VII. EVE'S PAY ENVELOPE + +VIII. POOLING BRAINS + + IX. "BUSINESS AS USUAL" + + X. "AS MOTHER USED TO DO" + + XI. A LAND ARMY + + XII. WOMAN'S PART IN SAVING CIVILIZATION + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + +Jeanne d'Arc--the spirit of the women of the Allies + +They wear the uniforms of the Edinburgh trams and the New York City +subway and trolley guards, with pride and purpose. + +Then--the offered service of the Women's Reserve Ambulance Corps in +England was spurned. Now--they wear shrapnel helmets while working +during the Zeppelin raids. + +The French poilu on furlough is put to work harrowing. + +Has there ever been anything impossible to French women since the time +of Jeanne d'Arc? The fields must be harrowed--they have no horses. + +The daily round in the Erie Railroad workshops. + +In the well-lighted factory of the Briggs and Stratton Company, +Milwaukee, the girls are comfortably and becomingly garbed for work. + +The women of the Motor Corps of the National League for Woman's Service +refuting the traditions that women have neither strength nor endurance. + +Down the street they come, beginning their pilgrimage of alleviation and +succor on the battlefields of France. + +How can business be "as usual" when in Paris there are about 1800 of +these small workshops where a woman dips Bengal Fire and grenades into a +bath of paraffin! + +Countess de Berkaim and her canteen in the Gare de St. Lazarre, Paris. + +An agricultural unit in the uniform approved by the Woman's Land Army of +America. + +A useful blending of Allied women. Miss Kathleen Burke (Scotch) +exhibiting the X-ray ambulance equipped by Mrs. Ayrton (English) and +Madame Curie (French). + + + + +FOREWORD + + +It is a real pleasure to write this foreword to the book which Mrs. +Harriot Stanton Blatch dedicates to the women of Great Britain and +France; to the women who through the years of the great war have stood +as the second line of defense against the German horror which menaces +the liberty and civilization of the entire world. + +There could be no more timely book. Mrs. Blatch's aim is to stir the +women of this country to the knowledge that this is their war, and also +to make all our people feel that we, and especially our government, +should welcome the service of women, and make use of it to the utmost. +In other words, the appeal of Mrs. Blatch is essentially an appeal for +service. No one has more vividly realized that service benefits the one +who serves precisely as it benefits the one who is served. I join with +her in the appeal that the women shall back the men with service, and +that the men in their turn shall frankly and eagerly welcome the +rendering of such service _on the basis of service by equals for a +common end_. + +Mrs. Blatch makes her appeal primarily because of the war needs of the +moment. But she has in view no less the great tasks of the future. I +welcome her book as an answer to the cry that the admission of women to +an equal share in the right of self government will tend to soften the +body politic. Most certainly I will ever set my face like flint against +any unhealthy softening of our civilization, and as an answer in advance +to hyper-criticism I explain that I do not mean softness in the sense of +tender-heartedness; I mean the softness which, extends to the head and +to the moral fibre, I mean the softness which manifests itself either in +unhealthy sentimentality or in a materialism which may be either +thoughtless and pleasure-loving or sordid and money-getting. I believe +that the best women, when thoroughly aroused, and when the right appeal +is made to them, will offer our surest means of resisting this unhealthy +softening. + +No man who is not blind can fail to see that we have entered a new day +in the great epic march of the ages. For good or for evil the old days +have passed; and it rests with us, the men and women now alive, to +decide whether in the new days the world is to be a better or a worse +place to live in, for our descendants. + +In this new world women are to stand on an equal footing with men, in +ways and to an extent never hitherto dreamed of. In this country they +are on the eve of securing, and in much of the country have already +secured, their full political rights. It is imperative that they should +understand, exactly as it is imperative that men should understand, that +such rights are of worse than no avail, unless the will for the +performance of duty goes hand in hand with the acquirement of the +privilege. + +If the women in this country reinforce the elements that tend to a +softening of the moral fibre, to a weakening of the will, and +unwillingness to look ahead or to face hardship and labor and danger for +a high ideal--then all of us alike, men and women, will suffer. But if +they show, under the new conditions, the will to develop strength, and +the high idealism and the iron resolution which under less favorable +circumstances were shown by the women of the Revolution and of the Civil +War, then our nation has before it a career of greatness never hitherto +equaled. This book is fundamentally an appeal, not that woman shall +enjoy any privilege unearned, but that hers shall be the right to do +more than she has ever yet done, and to do it on terms of +self-respecting partnership with men. Equality of right does not mean +identity of function; but it does necessarily imply identity of purpose +in the performance of duty. + +Mrs. Blatch shows why every woman who inherits the womanly virtues of +the past, and who has grasped the ideal of the added womanly virtues of +the present and the future, should support this war with all her +strength and soul. She testifies from personal knowledge to the hideous +brutalities shown toward women and children by the Germany of to-day; +and she adds the fine sentence: "Women fight for a place in the sun for +those who hold right above might." + +She shows why women must unstintedly give their labor in order to win +this war; and why the labor of the women must be used to back up both +the labor and the fighting work of the men, for the fighting men leave +gaps in the labor world which must be filled by the work of women. She +says in another sentence worth remembering, "The man behind the counter +should of course be moved to a muscular employment; but we must not +interpret his dalliance with tapes and ribbons as a proof of a +superfluity of men." + +Particularly valuable is her description of the mobilization of women in +Great Britain and France. From these facts she draws the conclusion as +to America's needs along this very line. She paints as vividly as I have +ever known painted, the truth as to why it is a merit that women should +be forced to work, a merit that _every one_ should be forced to work! It +is just as good for women as for men that they should have to use body +and mind, that they should not be idlers. As she puts it, "Active +mothers insure a virile race. The peaceful nation, if its women fall +victims to the luxury which rapidly increasing wealth brings, will +decay." "Man power must give itself unreservedly at the front. Woman +power must show not only eagerness but fitness to substitute for +man power." + +I commend especially the chapter containing the sentence, "This war may +prove to us the wisdom and economy of devoting public funds to mothers +rather than to crèches and juvenile asylums;" and also the chapter in +which the author tells women that if they are merely looking for a soft +place in life their collective demand for a fair field and no favor will +be wholly ineffective. The doors for service now stand open, and it +rests with the women themselves to say whether they will enter in! + +The last chapter is itself an unconscious justification of woman's right +to a share in the great governmental decisions which to-day are vital. +No statesman or publicist could set forth more clearly than Mrs. Blatch +the need of winning this war, in order to prevent either endless and +ruinous wars in the future, or else a world despotism which would mean +the atrophy of everything that really tends to the elevation of mankind. + +Mrs. Blatch has herself rendered a very real service by this appeal that +women should serve, and that men should let them serve. + +Theodore Roosevelt + + + + +I + +OUR FOE + + +The nations in which women have influenced national aims face the nation +that glorifies brute force. America opposes the exaltation of the +glittering sword; opposes the determination of one nation to dominate +the world; opposes the claim that the head of one ruling family is the +direct and only representative of the Creator; and, above all, America +opposes the idea that might makes right. + +Let us admit the full weight of the paradox that a people in the name of +peace turns to force of arms. The tragedy for us lay in there being no +choice of ways, since pacific groups had failed to create machinery to +adjust vital international differences, and since the Allies each in +turn, we the last, had been struck by a foe determined to settle +disagreements by force. + +Never did a nation make a crusade more just than this of ours. We were +patient, too long patient, perhaps, with challenges. We seek no +conquest. We fight to protect the freedom of our citizens. On America's +standard is written democracy, on that of Germany autocracy. Without +reservation women can give their all to attain our end. + +There may be a cleavage between the German people and the ruling class. +It may be that our foe is merely the military caste, though I am +inclined to believe that we have the entire German nation on our hands. +The supremacy of might may be a doctrine merely instilled in the minds +of the people by its rulers. Perhaps the weed is not indigenous, but it +flourishes, nevertheless. Rabbits did not belong in Australia, nor +pondweed in England, but there they are, and dominating the situation. +Arrogance of the strong towards the weak, of the better placed towards +the less well placed, is part of the government teaching in Germany. The +peasant woman harries the dog that strains at the market cart, her +husband harries her as she helps the cow drag the plough, the petty +officer harries the peasant when he is a raw recruit, and the young +lieutenant harries the petty officer, and so it goes up to the +highest,--a well-planned system on the part of the superior to bring the +inferior to a high point of material efficiency. The propelling spirit +is devotion to the Fatherland: each believes himself a cog in the +machine chosen of God to achieve His purposes on earth. The world hears +of the Kaiser's "Ich und Gott," of his mailed fist beating down his +enemies, but those who have lived in Germany know that exactly the same +spirit reigns in every class. The strong in chastizing his inferior has +the conviction that since might makes right he is the direct +representative of Deity on the particular occasion. + +The overbearing spirit of the Prussian military caste has drilled a race +to worship might; men are overbearing towards women, women towards +children, and the laws reflect the cruelties of the strong towards +the weak. + +As the recent petition of German suffragists to the Reichstag states, +their country stands "in the lowest rank of nations as regards women's +rights." It is a platitude just now worth repeating that the +civilization of a people is indicated by the position accorded to its +women. On that head, then, the Teutonic Kultur stands challenged. + +An English friend of mine threw down the gauntlet thirty years ago. She +had married a German officer. After living at army posts all over the +Empire, she declared, "What we foreigners take as simple childlikeness +in the Germans is merely lack of civilization." This keen analysis came +from a woman trained as an investigator, and equipped with perfect +command of the language of her adopted country. + +"Lack of civilization,"--perhaps that explains my having seen again and +again officers striking the soldiers they were drilling, and journeys +made torture through witnessing slapping and brow-beating of children by +their parents. The memory of a father's conduct towards his little son +will never be wiped out. He twisted the child's arm, struck him savagely +from time to time, and for no reason but that the child did not sit bolt +upright and keep absolutely motionless. The witnesses of the brutality +smiled approvingly at the man, and scowled at the child. My own protest +being met with amazed silence and in no way regarded, I left the +compartment. I was near Eisenach, and I wished some good fairy would put +in my hand that inkpot which Luther threw at the devil. Severity towards +children is the rule. The child for weal or woe is in the complete +control of its parents, and corporal punishment is allowed in the +schools. The grim saying, "Saure Wochen, frohe Feste," seems to express +the pedagogic philosophy. The only trouble is that nature does not give +this attitude her sanction, for Germany reveals to us that figure, the +most pathetic in life, the child suicide. + +The man responding to his stern upbringing is in turn cruel to his +inferiors, and full of subterfuge in dealing with equals. He is at home +in the intrigues which have startled the world. In such a society the +frank and gentle go to the wall, or--get into trouble and emigrate. We +have profited--let us not forget it--by the plucky German immigrants who +threw off the yoke, and who now have the satisfaction of finding +themselves fighting shoulder to shoulder with the men of their adopted +country to free the Fatherland of the taskmaster. + +The philosophy of might quite naturally reflects itself in the education +of girls. Once when I visited a Höhere Töchter Schule, the principal had +a class in geometry recite for my edification. I soon saw that the young +girl who had been chosen as the star pupil to wrestle with the pons +asinorum was giving an exhibition of memorizing and not of mathematical +reasoning. I asked the principal if my surmise were correct. He replied +without hesitation, "Yes, it was entirely a feat in memory. Females have +only low reasoning power." I urged that if this were so, it would be +well to train the faculty, but he countered with the assertion, "We +Germans do not think so. Women are happier and more useful +without logic." + +It would be difficult to surpass in its subtle cruelty the etiquette at +a military function. The lieutenant and his wife come early,--this is +expected of them. For a few moments they play the role of honored +guests. The wife is shown by her hostess to the sofa and is seated there +as a mark of distinction. Then arrive the captain and his wife. They are +immediately the distinguished guests. The wife is shown to the sofa and +the lieutenant's little Frau must get herself out of the way as best +she can. + +My speculation, often indulged in, as to what would happen if the +major's wife did not move from the sofa when the colonel's wife +appeared, ended in assurance that a severe punishment would be meted out +to her, when I heard from an officer the story of the way his regiment +dealt with a woman who ignored another bit of military etiquette. A +débutant, once honored by being asked to dance with an officer at a +ball, must never, it seems, demean herself by accepting a civilian +partner. But in a town where my friend's regiment was stationed a very +pretty and popular young girl who had been taken, so to speak, to the +bosom of the regiment, danced one night at the Kurhaus early in the +summer season with a civilian, distinguished, undeniably, but +unmistakably civilian. The officers of the regiment met, weighed the +mighty question of the girl's offense, and solemnly resolved never again +to ask the culprit for a dance. I protested at the cruelty of a body of +men deliberately turning a pretty young thing into a wall-flower for an +entire season. The officer took my protest as an added reason for +congratulation upon their conduct. They meant to be cruel. My words +proved how well they had succeeded. + +Another little straw showing the set of the wind: we were sitting, four +Americans, one lovely early summer day, in a restaurant at Swinemünde. +We had the window open, looking out over the sea. At the next table were +some officers, one of whom with an "Es zieht," but not with a "by your +leave," came over to our table and shut the window with a bang. The +gentleman with us asked if we wanted the window closed, and on being +assured we did not, quietly rose and opened it again. No one who does +not know Prussia can imagine the threatening atmosphere which filled +that café. + +We met the officers the same night at the Kurhaus dance. They were +introduced, and almost immediately one of them brought up the window +incident and said most impressively that if ladies had not been at the +table, our escort would have been "called out." We could see they +regarded us as unworthy of being even transient participants of Kultur +when we opined that no American man would accept a challenge, and if so +unwise as to do so, his womenfolk would lock him up until he reached a +sounder judgment! The swords rattled in their sabres when the frivolous +member of our party said with a tone of finality, "You see we wouldn't +like our men's faces to look as if they had got into their mothers' +chopping bowls!" + +Although I had often lived months on end with all these petty tyrannies +of the mailed fist, and although life had taught me later that peoples +grow by what they feed upon, yet when I read the Bryce report,[1] German +frightfulness seemed too inhuman for belief. While still holding my +judgment in reserve, I met an intimate friend, a Prussian officer. He +happened to mention letters he had received from his relatives in Berlin +and at the front, and when I expressed a wish to hear them, kindly asked +whether he should translate them or read them in German as they stood. +Laughingly I ventured on the German, saying I would at least find out +how much I had forgotten. So I sat and listened with ears pricked up. +Some of the letters were from women folk and told of war conditions in +the capital. They were interesting at the time but not worth repeating +now. Then came a letter from a nephew, a lieutenant. He gave his +experience in crossing Belgium, told how in one village his men asked a +young woman with her tiny baby on her arm for water, how she answered +resentfully, and then, how he shot her--and her baby. I exclaimed, +thinking I had lost the thread of the letter, "Not the baby?" And the +man I supposed I knew as civilized, replied with a cruel smile, +"Yes--discipline!" That was frank, frank as a child would have been, +with no realization of the self-revelation of it. The young officer did +the deed, wrote of it to his uncle, and the uncle, without vision and +understanding, perverted by his training, did not feel shame and bury +the secret in his own heart, but treasured the evidence against his own +nephew, and laid it open before an American woman. + +I believed the Bryce report--every word of it! + +And I hate the system that has so bent and crippled a great race. +Revenge we must not feel, that would be to innoculate ourselves with the +enemy's virus. But let us be awake to the fact that might making right +cuts athwart our ideals. German Kultur, through worship of efficiency, +cramps originality and initiative, while our aim--why not be frank about +it!--is the protection of inefficiency, which means sympathy with +childhood, and opportunity for the spirit of art. German Kultur fixes an +inflexible limit to the aspirations of women, while our goal is complete +freedom for the mothers of men. + +The women of the Allies can fight for all that their men fight for--for +national self-respect, for protection of citizens, for the sacredness of +international agreements, for the rights of small nations, for the +security of democracy, and then our women can be inspired by one thing +more--the safety and development of all those things which they have +won for human welfare in a long and bloodless battle. + +Women fight for a place in the sun for those who hold right above might. + + +[Footnote 1: Report of the Committee on Alleged German Outrages +appointed by his Britannic Majesty's Government, 1915. Macmillan +Company, New York. + +Evidence and Documents laid before the Committee on Alleged German +Outrages. Ballantyne, Hanson & Co., London. 1915.] + + + + +II + +WINNING THE WAR + + +The group of nations that can make the greatest savings, will be +victorious, counsels one; the group that can produce the most food and +nourish the populations best, will win the war, urges another; but +whatever the prophecy, whatever the advice, all paths to victory lie +through labor-power. + +Needs are not answered in our day by manna dropping from heaven. Whether +it is food or big guns that are wanted, ships or coal, we can only get +our heart's desire by toil. Where are the workers who will win the war? + +We are a bit spoiled in the United States. We have been accustomed to +rub our Aladdin's lamp of opportunity and the good genii have sent us +workers. But suddenly, no matter how great our efforts, no one answers +our appeal. The reservoir of immigrant labor has run dry. We are in +sorry plight, for we have suffered from emigration, too. Thousands of +alien workers have been called back to serve in the armies of the +Allies. In my own little village on Long Island the industrious Italian +colony was broken up by the call to return to the colors in Piedmont. + +Then, too, while Europe suffers loss of labor, as do we, when men are +mobilized, our situation is peculiarly poignant, for when our armies are +gone they are gone. At first this was true in Europe. Men entered the +army and were employed as soldiers only. After a time it was realized +that the war would not be short, that fields must not lie untilled for +years, nor men undergo the deteriorating effects of trench warfare +continuously. The fallow field and the stale soldier were +brought together. + +We have all chanced on photographs of European soldiers helping the +women plough in springtime, and reap the harvest in the autumn. Perhaps +we have regarded the scene as a mere pastoral episode in a happy leave +from the battle front, instead of realizing that it is a snapshot +illustrating a well organized plan of securing labor. The soldiers are +given a furlough and are sent where the agricultural need is pressing. +But the American soldier will not be able to lend his skill in giving +the home fields a rich seed time and harvest. The two needs, the field +for the touch of the human hand, and the soldier for labor under calm +skies, cannot in our case be coördinated. + +Scarcity of labor is not only certain to grow, but the demands upon the +United States for service are increasing by leaps and bounds. America +must throw man-power into the trenches, must feed herself, must +contribute more and ever more food to the hungry populations of Europe, +must meet the old industrial obligations, and respond to a whole range +of new business requirements. And she is called upon for this effort at +a time when national prosperity is already making full use of man-power. + +When Europe went to war, the world had been suffering from depression a +year and more. Immediately on the outbreak of hostilities whole lines of +business shut down. Unemployment became serious. There were idle hands +everywhere. Germany, of all the belligerents, rallied most quickly to +meet war conditions. Unemployment gave place to a shortage of labor +sooner there than elsewhere. Great Britain did not begin to get the pace +until the middle of 1915. + +The business situation in the United States upon its entrance into the +war was the antithesis of this. For over a year, depression had been +superseded by increased industry, high wages, and greater demand for +labor. The country as measured by the ordinary financial signs, by its +commerce, by its labor market, was more prosperous than it had been for +years. Tremendous requisitions were being made upon us by Europe, and to +the limit of available labor we were answering them. Then into our +economic life, with industrial forces already working at high pressure, +were injected the new demands arising from changing the United States +from a people as unprepared for effective hostilities as a baby in its +cradle, into a nation equipped for war. There was no unemployment, but +on the contrary, shortage of labor. + +The country calls for everything, and all at once, like the spoiled +child on suddenly waking. It must have, and without delay, ships, coal, +cars, cantonments, uniforms, rules, and food, food, food. How can the +needs be supplied and with a million and a half of men dropping work +besides? By woman-power or coolie labor. Those are the horns of the +dilemma presented to puzzled America. The Senate of the United States +directs its Committee of Agriculture to ponder well the coolie problem, +for men hesitate to have women put their shoulder to the wheel. Trade +unionists are right in urging that a republic has no place for a +disfranchised class of imported toilers. Equally true is it that as a +nation we have shown no gift for dealing with less developed races. And +yet labor we must have. Will American women supply it, will they, loving +ease, favor contract labor from the outside, or will they accept the +optimistic view that lack of labor is not acute? + +The procrastinator queries, "Cannot American man-power meet the demand?" +It can, for a time perhaps, if the draft for the army goes as slowly in +the future as it has in the past. + +However, at any moment a full realization may come to us of the +significance of the fact that while the United States is putting only +three percent of its workers into the fighting forces, Great Britain has +put twenty-five percent, and is now combing its industrial army over to +find an additional five hundred thousand men to throw on the French +front. It is probable that it will be felt by this country in the near +future that such a contrast of fulfillment of obligation cannot continue +without serious reflection on our national honor. Roughly speaking, +Great Britain has twenty million persons in gainful pursuits. Of these, +five million have already been taken for the army. The contribution of +France is still greater. Her military force has reached the appalling +proportion of one-fifth of her entire population. But we who have +thirty-five million in gainful occupations are giving a paltry one +million, five hundred thousand in service with our Allies. The situation +is not creditable to us, and one of the things which stands in the way +of the United States reaching a more worthy position is reluctance to +see its women shouldering economic burdens. + +[Illustration: They wear the uniforms of the Edinburgh trams and the +New York City subway and trolley guards, with pride and purpose.] + +While it is quite true that shifting of man-power is needed, mere +shuffling of the cards, as labor leaders suggest, won't give a bigger +pack. Fifty-two cards it remains, though the Jack may be put into a more +suitable position. The man behind the counter should of course be moved +to a muscular employment, but we must not interpret his dalliance with +tapes and ribbons as proof of a superfluity of men. + +The latest reports of the New York State Department of Labor reflect the +meagerness of the supply. Here are some dull figures to prove +it:--comparing the situation with a year ago, we find in a corresponding +month, only one percent more employees this year, with a wage advance of +seventeen percent. Drawing the comparison between this year and two +years ago, there is an advance of "fifteen percent in employees and +fifty-one percent in wages;" and an increase of "thirty percent in +employees and eighty-seven percent in wages," if this year is compared +with the conditions when the world was suffering from industrial +depression. The State employment offices report eight thousand three +hundred and seventy-six requests for workers against seven thousand, six +hundred and fifty applicants for employment, and of the latter only +seventy-three percent were fitted for the grades of work open to them, +and were placed in situations. + +The last records of conditions in the Wilkes-Barre coal regions confirm +the fact of labor scarcity. There are one hundred and fifty-two thousand +men and boys at work today in the anthracite fields, twenty-five +thousand less than the number employed in 1916. These miners, owing to +the prod of the highest wages ever received--the skilled man earning +from forty dollars to seventy-five dollars a week--and to appeals to +their patriotism, are individually producing a larger output than ever +before. It is considered that production, with the present labor force, +is at its maximum, and if a yield of coal commensurate with the world's +need is to be attained, at least seventy percent more men must +be supplied. + +This is a call for man-power in addition to that suggested by the Fuel +Administrator to the effect that lack of coal is partly lack of cars and +that "back of the transportation shortage lies labor shortage." An order +was sent out by the Director General of Railways, soon after his +appointment, that mechanics from the repair shops of the west were to be +shifted to the east to supply the call for help on the Atlantic border. + +Suggestive of the cause of all this shortage, float the service flags of +the mining and railway companies, the hundreds of glowing stars telling +their tale of men gone to the front, and of just so many stars torn from +the standards of the industrial army at home. + +The Shipping Board recently called for two hundred and fifty thousand +men to be gradually recruited as a skilled army for work in shipyards. +At the same time the Congress passed an appropriation of fifty million +dollars for building houses to accommodate ship labor. Six months ago +only fifty thousand men were employed in ship-building, today there are +one hundred and forty-five thousand. This rapid drawing of men to new +centers creates a housing problem so huge that it must he met by the +government; and it need hardly be pointed out, shelter can be built only +by human hands. + +One state official, prompted no doubt by a wise hostility to coolie +labor, and dread of woman labor, has gone so far as to declare publicly +that any employer who will pay "adequate wages can get all the labor he +requires." This view suggests that we may soon have to adopt the methods +of other belligerents and stop employers by law from stealing a +neighbor's working force. I know of a shipyard with a normal pay-roll of +five hundred hands, which in one year engaged and lost to nearby +munition factories thirteen thousand laborers. Such "shifting," hiding +as it does shortage of manpower, leads to serious loss in our productive +efficiency and should not be allowed to go unchecked. + +The manager of one of the New York City street railways met with +complete denial the easy optimism that adequate remuneration will +command a sufficient supply of men. He told me that he had introduced +women at the same wage as male conductors, not because he wanted women, +but because he now had only five applications by fit men to thirty or +forty formerly. There were men to be had, he said, and at lower wages +than his company was paying; but they were "not of the class capable of +fulfilling the requirements of the position." + +The Labor Administration announced on its creation that its "policy +would be to prevent woman labor in positions for which men are +available," and one of the deputy commissioners of the Industrial +Commission of the State of New York declared quite frankly at a labor +conference that "if he could, he would exclude women from industry +altogether." + +We may try to prevent the oncoming tide of the economic independence of +women, but it will not be possible to force the business world to accept +permanently the service of the inefficient in place of that of the alert +and intelligent. To carry on the economic life of a nation with its +labor flotsam and jetsam is loss at any time; in time of storm and +stress it is suicide. + +Man-power is short, seriously so. The farm is always the best barometer +to give warning of scarcity of labor. The land has been drained of its +workers. A fair wage would keep them on the farm--this is the philosophy +of laissez faire. Without stopping to inquire as to what the munition +works would then do, we can still see that it is doubtful whether the +farm can act as magnet. Even men, let us venture the suggestion, like +change for the mere sake of change. A middle-aged man, who had taken up +work at Bridgeport, said to me, "I've mulled around on the farm all my +days. I grabbed the first chance to get away." And then there's a finer +spirit prompting the desertion of the hoe. A man of thirty-three gave me +the point of view. "My brother is 'over there,' and I feel as if I were +backing him up by making guns." + +The only thing that can change the idea that farming is "mulling +around," and making a gun "backs up" the man at the front more +thoroughly than raising turnips, is to bring to the farm new workers who +realize the vital part played by food in the winning of the war. As the +modern industrial system has developed with its marvels of specialized +machinery, its army of employees gathered and dispersed on the stroke of +the clock, and strong organizations created to protect the interests of +the worker, the calm and quiet processes of agriculture have in +comparison grown colorless. The average farmhand has never found push +and drive and group action on the farm, but only individualism to the +extreme of isolation. And now in war time, when in addition to its usual +life of stirring contacts, the factory takes on an intimate and striking +relation to the intense experience of the battle front, the work of the +farm seems as flat as it is likely to be unprofitable. The man in the +furrow has no idea that he is "backing up" the boy in the trench. + +The farmer in his turn does not find himself part of the wider relations +that attract and support the manufacturer. Crops are not grown on order. +The marketing is as uncertain as the weather. The farmer could by higher +wages attract more labor, but as the selling of the harvest remains a +haphazard matter, the venture might mean ruin all the more certain and +serious were wage outlay large. In response to a call for food and an +appeal to his patriotism, the farmer has repeatedly made unusual efforts +to bring his land to the maximum fertility, only to find his crops often +a dead loss, as he could not secure the labor to harvest them. I saw, +one summer, acres of garden truck at its prime ploughed under in +Connecticut because of a shortage of labor. I saw fruit left rotting by +the bushel in the orchards near Rochester because of scarcity of pickers +and a doubt of the reliability of the market. The industry which means +more than any other to the well-being of humanity at this crisis, is the +sport of methods outgrown and of servants who lack understanding and +inspiration. The war may furnish the spark for the needed revolution. +Man-power is not available, woman-power is at hand. A new labor force +always brings ideas and ideals peculiar to itself. May not women as +fresh recruits in a land army stamp their likes and dislikes on farm +life? Their enthusiasm may put staleness to rout, and the group system +of women land workers, already tested in the crucible of experience, may +bring to the farm the needed antidote to isolation. + +To win the war we must have man-power in the trenches sufficient to win +it with. To win, every soldier, every sailor, must be well fed, well +clothed, well equipped. To win, behind the armed forces must stand +determined peoples. To win, the people of America and her Allies must be +heartened by care and food. + +The sun shines on the fertile land, the earth teems with forests, with +coal, with every necessary mineral and food, but labor, labor alone can +transform all to meet our necessities. Man-power unaided cannot supply +the demand. Women in America must shoulder as nobly as have the women of +Europe, this duty. They must answer their country's call. Let them see +clearly that the desire of their men to shield them from possible injury +exposes the nation and the world to actual danger. + +Our winning of the war depends upon the full use of the energy of our +entire people. Every muscle, every brain, must be mobilized if the +national aim is to be achieved. + + + + +III + +MOBILIZING WOMEN IN GREAT BRITAIN [2] + + +In no country have women reached a mobilization so complete and +systematized as in Great Britain. This mobilization covers the whole +field of war service--in industry, business and professional life, and +in government administration. Women serve on the Ministry of Food and +are included in the membership of twenty-five of the important +government committees, not auxiliary or advisory, but administrative +committees, such as those on War Pensions, on Disabled Officers and Men, +on Education after the War, and the Labor Commission to Deal with +Industrial Unrest. + +In short, the women of Great Britain are working side by side with men +in the initiation and execution of plans to solve the problems which +confront the nation. + +Four committees, as for instance those making investigations and +recommendations on Women's Wages and Drink Among Women, are entirely +composed of women, and great departments, such as the Women's Land Army, +the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, are officered throughout by them. +Hospitals under the War Office have been placed in complete control of +medical women; they take rank with medical men in the army and receive +the pay going with their commissions. + +When Great Britain recognized that the war could not be won by merely +sending splendid fighters to the front and meeting the wastage by steady +drafts upon the manhood of the country, she began to build an efficient +organization of industry at home. + +To the call for labor-power British women gave instant response. In +munitions a million are mobilized, in the Land Army there have been +drafted and actually placed on the farms over three hundred thousand, +and in the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps fourteen thousand women are +working in direct connection with the fighting force, and an additional +ten thousand are being called out for service each month. In the +clerical force of the government departments, some of which had never +seen women before in their sacred precincts, over one hundred and +ninety-eight thousand are now working. And the women civil servants are +not only engaged in indoor service, but outside too, most of the +carrying of mail being in their hands. + +Women are dock-laborers, some seven thousand strong. Four thousand act +as patrols and police, forty thousand are in banks and various financial +houses. It is said that there are in Great Britain scarce a million +women--and they are mostly occupied as housewives--who could render +greater service to their country than that which they are now giving. + +The wide inclusion of women in government administration is very +striking to us in America. But we must not forget that the contrast +between the two countries in the participation of women in political +life and public service has always been great. The women of the United +Kingdom have enjoyed the municipal and county franchise for years. For a +long time large numbers of women have been called to administrative +positions. They have had thorough training in government as Poor Law +Guardians, District and County Councilors, members of School Boards. No +women, the whole world over, are equipped as those of Great Britain for +service to the state. + +In the glamor of the extremely striking government service of British +women, we must not overlook their non-official organizations. Perhaps +these offer the most valuable suggestions for America. They are near +enough to our experience to be quite understandable. + +The mother country is not under regimentation. Originality and +initiative have full play. Perhaps it was well that the government +failed to appreciate what women could do, and neglected them so long. +Most of the effective work was started in volunteer societies and had +proved a success before there was an official laying on of hands. +Anglo-Saxons--it is our strong point--always work from below, up. + +A glance at any account of the mobilization of woman-power in Great +Britain, Miss Fraser's admirable "Women and War Work," for instance, +will reveal the printed page dotted thick with the names of volunteer +associations. A woman with sympathy sees a need, she gets an idea and +calls others about her. Quickly, there being no red tape, the need +begins to be met. What more admirable service could have been performed +than that inaugurated in the early months of the war under the Queen's +Work for Women Fund, when work was secured for the women in luxury +trades which were collapsing under war pressure? A hundred and thirty +firms employing women were kept running. + +What more thrilling example of courage and forethought has been shown +than by the Scottish Women's Hospitals in putting on the western front +the first X-ray car to move from point to point near the lines? It but +adds to the appeal of the work that those great scientists, Mrs. Ayrton +and Madame Curie, selected the equipment. + +It was a non-official body, the National Union of Women's Suffrage +Societies, which opened before the war was two weeks old the Women's +Service Bureau, and soon placed forty thousand women as paid and +volunteer workers. It was this bureau that furnished the government with +its supervisors for the arsenals. The Women's Farm and Garden Union was +the fore-runner of the official Land Army, and to it still is left the +important work of enrolling those women who, while willing to undertake +agricultural work, are disinclined to sign up for service "for the +duration of the war." + +Not only have unnumbered voluntary associations achieved miracles in +necessary work, but many of them have gained untold discipline in the +ridicule they have had to endure from a doubting public. I remember +hunting in vain all about Oxford Circus for the tucked-away office of +the Women's Signalling Corps. My inquiries only made the London bobbies +grin. Everyone laughed at the idea of women signalling, but to-day the +members are recognized officially, one holding an important appointment +in the college of wireless telegraphy. + +How Scotland Yard smiled, at first, at Miss Damer Dawson and her Women +Police Service! But now the metropolitan police are calling for the help +of her splendidly trained and reliable force. + +And the Women's Reserve Ambulance Corps--I climbed and climbed to an +attic to visit their headquarters! There was the commandant in her +khaki, very gracious, but very upstanding, and maintaining the strictest +discipline. No member of the corps entered or left her office without +clapping heels together and saluting. The ambulance about which the +corps revolved, I often met in the streets--empty. But those women had +vision. They saw that England would need them some day. They had faith +in their ability to serve. So on and on they went, training themselves +to higher efficiency in body and mind. And to-day--well, theirs is +always the first ambulance on the spot to care for the injured in the +air-raids. The scoffers have remained to pray. + +If Britain has a lesson for us it is an all-hail to non-official +societies, an encouragement to every idea, a blessing on every effort +which has behind it honesty of purpose. Great Britain's activities are +as refreshingly diversified as her talents. They are not all under +one hat. + +In the training for new industrial openings this same spirit of +non-official service showed itself. In munitions, for instance, private +employers were the first to recognize that they had in women-workers a +labor force worth the cost of training. The best of the skilled men in +many cases were told off to give the necessary instruction. The will to +do was in the learner; she soon mastered even complex processes, and at +the end of a few weeks was doing even better than men in the light work, +and achieving commendable output in the heavy. The suffrage +organizations, whenever a new line of skilled work was opened to women, +established well-equipped centers to give the necessary teaching. Not +until it became apparent that the new labor-power only needed training +to reach a high grade of proficiency, did County Councils establish, at +government expense, technical classes for girls and women. + +[Illustration: Then--the offered service of the Women's Reserve +Ambulance Corps in England was spurned. Now--they wear shrapnel helmets +while working during the Zeppelin raids.] + +Equipment of the army was obviously the first and pressing obligation. +Fields might lie fallow, for food in the early days could easily be +brought from abroad, but men had to be registered, soldiers clothed and +equipped. It was natural, then, that the new workers were principally +used in registration work and in making military supplies. + +But in the second year of the war came the conviction that the contest +was not soon to be ended, and that the matter of raising food at home +must be met. Women were again appealed to. A Land Army mobilized by +women was created. At first this work was carried on under a centralized +division of the National Service Department, but there has been +decentralization and the Land Army is now a department of the Board of +Agriculture. It is headed by Miss M. Talbot as director. Under this +central body are Women's Agricultural Committees in each county, with an +organizing secretary whose duty it is to secure full-time recruits. + +The part-time workers in a locality are obtained by the wife of the +squire or vicar acting as a volunteer registrar. Many of these +part-time workers register to do the domestic work of the lusty young +village housewife or mother while she is absent from home performing her +allotted task on a nearby farm. The full-time recruits are not only +secured by the organizers, but through registrations at every post +office. Any woman can ask for a registration card and fill it out, and +the postmaster then forwards the application to the committee. The next +step is that likely applicants are called to the nearest center for +examination and presentation of credentials. When finally accepted they +are usually sent for six weeks' or three months' training to a farm +belonging to some large estate. The landlord contributes the training, +and the government gives the recruit her uniform and fifteen shillings a +week to cover her board and lodging. At the end of her course she +receives an armlet signifying her rank in the Land Army and is ready to +go wherever the authorities send her. + +The farmer in Great Britain no longer needs to be converted to the value +of the new workers. He knows they can do every kind of farm work as well +as men, and are more reliable and conscientious than boys, and he is +ready, therefore, to pay the required minimum wage of eighteen +shillings a week, or above that amount if the rate ruling in the +district is higher. + +Equally well organized is the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps, familiarly +known as the Waacs. The director is Mrs. Chalmers Watson. A would-be +Waac goes to the center in her county for examination, and then is +assigned to work at home or "somewhere in France" according to training +and capacity. She may be fitted as a cook, a storekeeper, a telephone or +telegraph operator, or for signalling or salvage work. Let us not say +she will supplant a man, but rather set a man free for fuller service. + +My niece, a slip of a girl, felt the call of duty at the beginning of +the war. Her brothers were early volunteers in Kitchener's Army. They +were in the trenches and she longed for the sensation of bearing a +burden of hard work. She went to Woolwich Arsenal and toiled twelve +hours a day. She broke under the strain, recuperated, and took up +munition work again. She became expert, and was in time an overseer told +off to train other women. But she was never satisfied, and always +anxious to be nearer the great struggle. She broke away one day and went +to Southampton for a Waac examination, and found herself one of a group +of a hundred and fifty gentlewomen all anxious to enter active service +and all prepared for some definite work. They stood their tests, and +Dolly--that's the little niece's pet name, given to her because she is +so tiny--is now working as an "engine fitter" just behind the fighting +lines. Dainty Dolly, whom we have always treated as a fragile bit of +Sèvres china, clad in breeches and puttees, under the booming of the +great guns, is fitting patiently, part to part, the beating engine which +will lift on wings some English boy in his flight through the blue skies +of France. + +But it must not be supposed that the magnificent service of British +women, devoted, efficient and well-organized from top to bottom, +realized itself without friction, any more than it will here. There were +certainly two wars going on in Great Britain for a long time, and the +internal strife was little less bitter than the international conflict. +The most active center of this contest of which we have heard so little +was in industry, and the combatants were the government, trade unions +and women. The unions were doing battle because of fear of unskilled +workers, especially when intelligent and easily trained; the government, +in sore need of munition hands, was bargaining with the unskilled for +long hours and low pay. Finally the government and the unions +reluctantly agreed that women must be employed; both wanted them to be +skillful, but not too skillful, and above all, to remain amenable. It +has been made clear, too, that women enter their new positions "for the +war only." At the end of hostilities--international hostilities--women +are to hand over their work and wages to men and go home and be content. +Will the program be fulfilled? + +The wishes of women themselves may play some part. How do they feel? +Obviously, every day the war lasts they get wider experience of the +sorrows and pleasures of financial independence. Women are called the +practical sex, and I certainly found them in England facing the fact +that peace will mean an insufficient number of breadwinners to go around +and that a maimed man may have low earning power. The women I met were +not dejected at the prospect; they showed, on the contrary, a spirit not +far removed from elation in finding new opportunities of service. After +I had sat and listened to speech after speech at the annual conference +of the National Union of Women Workers, with delegates from all parts of +the country, presided over by Mrs. Creighton, widow of the late Bishop +of London, there was no doubt in my mind that British women desired to +enter paid fields of work, and regarded as permanent the great increase +in their employment. No regrets or hesitations were expressed in a +single speech, and the solutions of the problems inherent in the new +situation all lay in the direction of equality of preparation and +equality of pay with men. + +The strongest element in the women's trade unions takes the same stand. +The great rise in the employment of women is not regarded as a "war +measure," and all the suggestions made to meet the hardships of +readjustment, such as a "minimum wage for all unskilled workers, men as +well as women," are based on the idea of the new workers being permanent +factors in the labor market. + +The same conclusion was reached in the report presented to the British +Association by the committee appointed to investigate the "Replacement +of Male by Female Labor." The committee found itself in entire +disagreement with the opinion that the increased employment of women was +a passing phase, and made recommendations bearing on such measures as +improved technical training for girls as well as for boys, a minimum +wage for unskilled men as well as women, equal pay for equal work, and +the abolition of "half-timers." But while it was obvious that the +greatest asset of belligerent nations is the labor of women, while +learned societies and organizations of women laid down rules for their +safe and permanent employment, the British Government showed marked +opposition to the new workers. If the Cabinet did not believe the war +would be brief, it certainly acted as if Great Britain alone among the +belligerents would have no shortage of male industrial hands. At a time +when Germany had five hundred thousand women in munition factories, +England had but ten thousand. + +There is no doubt that the country was at first organized merely for a +spurt. Boys and girls were pressed into service, wages were cut down for +women, hours lengthened for men. Government reports read like the +Shaftesbury attacks on the conditions of early factory days. We hear +again of beds that are never cold, the occupant of one shift succeeding +the occupant of the next, of the boy sleeping in the same bed with two +men, and three girls in a cot in the same room. Labor unrest was met at +first by the Munitions War Act prohibiting strikes and lockouts, +establishing compulsory arbitration and suspending all trade-union rules +which might "hamper production." Under the law a "voluntary army of +workers" signed up as ready to go anywhere their labor was needed, and +local munition committees became labor courts endowed with power to +change wage rates, to inflict fines on slackers, and on those who broke +the agreements of the "voluntary army." + +To meet the threatening rebellion, a Health of Munition Workers +Committee under the Ministry of Munitions was appointed to "consider and +advise on questions of industrial fatigue, hours of labor and other +matters affecting the physical health and physical efficiency of workers +in munition factories and workshops." On this committee there were +distinguished medical men, labor experts, members of parliament and two +women, Miss R.E. Squire of the Factory Department and Mrs. H.J. Tennant. + +The committee was guided by a desire to have immense quantities of +munitions turned out, and faced squarely the probability that the war +would be of long duration. Its findings, embodied in a series of +memoranda, have lessons for us, not only for war times, but for peace +times, for all time. + +On a seven day week the verdict was that "if the maximum output is to be +secured and maintained for any length of time, a weekly period of rest +must be allowed." Overtime was advised against, a double or triple shift +being recommended. + +In July, 1916, the committee published a most interesting memorandum on +experiments in the relation of output to hours. In one case the output +was increased eight percent by reducing the weekly hours from +sixty-eight to fifty-nine, and it was found that a decrease to fifty-six +hours per week gave the same output as fifty-nine. It need hardly be +said that there was no change in machinery, tools, raw material or +workers. All elements except hours of work were identical. Twenty-seven +workers doing very heavy work increased their output ten percent by +cutting weekly hours from sixty-one to fifty-five. In a munition plant +employing thirty-six thousand hands it was found that the sick rate +ranged from five to eight percent when the employees were working +overtime, and was only three percent when they were on a double shift. + +The war has forced Great Britain to carry out the findings of this +committee and to consider more seriously than ever before, and for both +men and women, the problem of industrial fatigue, the relation of +accidents to hours of labor, industrial diseases, housing, transit, and +industrial canteens. The munition worker is as important as the soldier +and must have the best of care. + +While the friction in the ranks of industrial women workers was still +far from being adjusted, the government met its Waterloo in the contest +with medical women. The service which they freely offered their country +was at first sternly refused. Undaunted, they sought recognition outside +the mother country. They knew their skill and they knew the soldiers' +need. They turned to hospitable France, and received official +recognition. On December 14, 1914, the first hospital at the front under +British medical women was opened in Abbaye Royaumont, near Creil. It +carries the official designation, "Hôpital Auxiliaire 301." The doctors, +the nurses, the cooks, are all women. One of the capable chauffeurs I +saw running the ambulance when I was in Creil. She was getting the +wounded as they came down from the front. The French Government +appreciated what the women were doing and urged them to give more help. +At Troyes another unit gave the French army its first experience of +nursing under canvas. + +After France had been profiting by the skill of British women for +months, Sir Alfred Keogh, Medical Director General, wisely insisted that +the War Office yield and place a hospital in the hands of women. The +War Hospital in Endell Street, London, is now under Dr. Flora Murray, +and every office, except that of gateman, is filled by women. From the +doctors, who rank as majors, down to the cooks, who rank as +non-commissioned officers, every one connected with Endell Street has +military standing. It indicated the long, hard road these women had +traveled to secure official recognition that the doctor who showed me +over the hospital told me, as a matter for congratulation, that at night +the police brought in drunken soldiers to be sobered. "Every war +hospital must receive them," she explained, "and we are glad we are not +passed over, for that gives the stamp to our official standing." + +It was a beautiful autumn day when I visited Endell Street. The great +court was full of convalescents, and the orderlies in khaki, with veils +floating back from their close-fitting toques, were carefully and +skillfully lifting the wounded from an ambulance. I spoke to one of the +soldier boys about the absence of men doctors and orderlies, and his +quick query was, "And what should we want men for?" It seems that they +always take that stand after a day or two. At first the patient is +puzzled; he calls the doctor "sister" and the orderly "nurse," but ends +by being an enthusiastic champion of the new order. Not a misogynist did +I find. One poor fellow who had been wounded again and again and had +been in many hospitals, declared, "I don't mean no flattery, but this +place leaves nothink wanting." + +The first woman I met on my last visit to England upset my expectation +of finding that war pushed women back into primitive conditions of toil, +crushed them under the idea that physical force rules the world, and +made them subservient. I chanced upon her as she was acting as +ticket-puncher at the Yarmouth station. She was well set-up, alert, +efficient, helpful in giving information, and, above all, cheerful. +There were two capable young women at the bookstall, too. One had lost a +brother at the front, the other her lover. I felt that they regarded +their loss as one item in the big national accounting. They were +heroically cheerful in "doing their bit." + +Throughout my stay in England I searched for, but could not find, the +self-effacing spinster of former days. In her place was a capable woman, +bright-eyed, happy. She was occupied and bustled at her work. She jumped +on and off moving vehicles with the alertness, if not the +unconsciousness, of the expert male. She never let me stand in omnibus +or subway, but quickly gave me her seat, as indeed she insisted upon +doing for elderly gentlemen as well. The British woman had found herself +and her muscles. England was a world of women--women in uniforms; there +was the army of nurses, and then the messengers, porters, elevator +hands, tram conductors, bank clerks, bookkeepers, shop attendants. They +each seemed to challenge the humble stranger, "Superfluous? Not I, I'm a +recruit for national service!" Even a woman doing time-honored womanly +work moved with an air of distinction; she dusted a room for the good of +her country. Just one glimpse was I given of the old-time daughter of +Eve, when a ticket-collector at Reading said: "I can't punch your +ticket. Don't you see I'm eating an apple!" + +One of the reactions of the wider functioning of brain and muscle which +struck me most forcibly was the increased joyfulness of women. They were +happy in their work, happy in the thought of rendering service, so happy +that the poignancy of individual loss was carried more easily. + +This cheerfulness is somewhat gruesomely voiced in a cartoon in _Punch_ +touching on the allowance given to the soldier's wife. She remarks, +"This war is 'eaven--twenty-five shillings a week and no 'usband +bothering about!" We have always credited _Punch_ with knowing England. +Truth stands revealed by a thrust, however cynical, when softened by +challenging humor. + +There was no discipline in the pension system. No work was required. The +case of a girl I met in a country town was common. She was working in a +factory earning eleven shillings a week. A day or two later I saw her, +and she told me she had stopped work, as she had "married a soldier, and +'e's gone to France, and I get twelve and six separation allowance a +week." Never did the strange English name, "separation allowance," seem +more appropriate for the wife's pension than in this girl's story. +Little wonder was it that in the early months of the war there was some +riotous living among soldiers' wives! + +And the comments of women of influence on the drunkenness and waste of +money on foolish finery were as striking to me as the sordid condition +itself. The woman chairman of a Board of Poor Law Guardians in the north +of England told me that when her fellow-members suggested that +Parliament ought to appoint committees to disburse the separation +allowances, she opposed them with the heroic philosophy that women can +be trained in wisdom only by freedom to err, that a sense of +responsibility had never been cultivated in them, and the country would +have to bear the consequences. In reply to my inquiry as to how the +Guardians received these theories, I learned that "they knew she was +right and dropped their plan." + +The faith of leading women that experience would be the best teacher for +the soldier's wife has been justified. A labor leader in the Midlands +told me that an investigation by his trade union showed that only one +hundred women in the ten thousand cases inquired into were mis-spending +their allowances. And when I was visiting a board school in a poor +district of London, and remarked to the head teacher that the children +looked well cared for, she told me that never had they been so well fed +and clothed. There seemed no doubt in her mind that it was best to have +the family budget in the hands of the mother. In the sordid surroundings +of the mean streets of great cities, there is developing in women +practical wisdom and a fine sense of individual responsibility. + +Perhaps of greater significance than just how separation allowances are +being spent is the fact that women have discovered that their work as +housewives and mothers has a value recognized by governments in hard +cash. It makes one speculate as to whether wives in the warring nations +will step back without a murmur into the old-time dependence on one man, +or whether these simple women may contribute valuable ideas towards the +working out of sound schemes of motherhood pensions. + +The women of Great Britain are experiencing economic independence, they +are living in an atmosphere of recognition of the value of their work as +housewives and mothers. Women leaders in all classes give no indication +of regarding pensions or remuneration in gainful pursuits as other than +permanent factors in social development, and much of the best thought of +men as well as women is centered on group experiments in domestic +coöperation, in factory canteens, in municipal kitchens, which are a +natural concomitant to the wider functioning of women. + +Great Britain is not talking about feminism, it is living it. Perhaps +nothing better illustrates the national acceptance of the fact than the +widespread amusement touched with derision caused by the story of the +choleric gentlemen who, on being asked at the time of one of the +government registrations whether his wife was dependent upon him or not, +roared in rage, "Well, if my wife isn't dependent on me, I'd like to +know what man she is dependent on!" + +Only second to Britain's lesson for us in the self-reliance of its +women, and the thorough mobilization of their labor-power and executive +ability, is its lesson in protection for all industrial workers. It +stands as one people against the present enemy, and in its effort does +not fail to give thought to race conservation for the future. + + +[Footnote 2: Through the courtesy of the Editors of _The Outlook_, I am +at liberty to use in this and the following chapter, some of the +material published in an article by me in _The Outlook_ of June +28, 1916.] + + + + +IV + +MOBILIZING WOMEN IN FRANCE + + +Compared with the friction in the mobilization of woman-power in Great +Britain, the readjustment in the lives of women in France was like the +opening out of some harmonious pageant in full accord with popular +sympathy. But who has not said, "France is different!" + +It is different, and in nothing more so than in its attitude toward its +women. Without discussion with organizations of men, without hindrance +from the government, women filled the gaps in the industrial army. It +was obvious that the new workers, being unskilled, would need training; +the government threw open the technical schools to them. A spirit of +hospitality, of helpfulness, of common sense, reigned. + +[Illustration: The French poilu on furlough is put to work harrowing.] + +And it was not only in industry that France showed herself wise. I found +that the government had coöperated unreservedly with all the +philanthropic work of women and had given them a wide sphere in which +they could rise above amateurish effort and carry out plans calling for +administrative ability. + +When the Conseil National des Femmes Françaises inaugurated its work to +bring together the scattered families of Belgium and northern France, +and when the Association pour l'Aide Fraternelle aux Évacués +Alsaciens-Lorrains began its work for the dispersed peoples of the +provinces, an order was issued by the government to every prefect to +furnish lists of all refugees in his district to the headquarters of the +women's societies in Paris. It was through this good will on the part of +the central government that these societies were able to bring together +forty thousand Belgian families, and to clothe and place in school, or +at work, the entire dispersed population of the reconquered districts of +Alsace-Lorraine. + +Nor did these societies cease work with the completion of their initial +effort. They turned themselves into employment bureaus and with the aid +and sanction of the government found work for the thousands of women who +were thrown out of employment. They had the machinery to accomplish +their object, the Council being an old established society organized +throughout the country, and the Association to Aid the Refugees from +Alsace-Lorraine (a nonpartisan name adopted, by the way, at the request +of the Minister of the Interior to cover for the moment the patriotic +work of the leading suffrage society) had active units in every +prefecture. + +One of the admirable private philanthropies was the canteen at the St. +Lazarre station in Paris. I am tempted to single it out because its +organizer, Countess de Berkaim, told me that in all the months she had +been running it--and it was open twenty-four hours of the day--not a +single volunteer had been five minutes late. The canteen was opened in +February, 1915, with a reading and rest room. Six hundred soldiers a day +have been fed. The two big rooms donated by the railway for the work +were charming with their blue and white checked curtains, dividing +kitchen from restaurant and rest room from reading room. The work is no +small monument to the reliability and organizing faculty of +French women. + +It was in France, too, that I found the group of women who realized that +the permanent change which the war was making in the relation of women +to society needed fundamental handling. Mlle. Valentine Thomson, founder +of La Vie Féminine, held that not only was the war an economic struggle +and not only must the financial power of the combatants rest on the +labor of women, but the future of the nations will largely depend upon +the attitude which women take toward their new obligations. Realizing +that business education would be a determining factor in that attitude, +Mlle. Thomson persuaded her father, who was then Minister of Commerce, +to send out an official recommendation to the Chambers of Commerce to +open the commercial schools to girls. The advice was very generally +followed, but as Paris refused, a group of women, backed by the +Ministry, founded a school in which were given courses of instruction in +the usual business subjects, and lectures on finance, commercial law and +international trade. + +Mlle. Thomson herself turned her business gifts to good use in a +successful effort to build up for the immediate benefit of artists and +workers the doll trade of which France was once supreme mistress. +Exhibitions of the art, old and new, were held in many cities in the +United States, in South America and in England. The dolls went to the +hearts of lovers of beauty, and what promised surer financial return, to +the hearts of the children. + +To do something for France--that stood first in the minds of the +initiators of this commercial project. They knew her people must be +employed. And next, the desire to bring back charm to an old art +prompted their effort. Mlle. Thomson fully realizes just what "Made in +Germany" signifies. The peoples of the world have had their taste +corrupted by floods of the cheap and tawdry. Germany has been steadily +educating us to demand quantity, quantity mountains high. There is +promise that the doll at least will be rescued by France and made worth +the child's devotion. + +In industry, as well as in all else, one feels that in France there has +not been so much a revolution as an orderly development. Women were in +munition factories even before the war, the number has merely swelled. +The women of the upper and lower bourgeois class always knew their +husband's business, the one could manage the shop, the other could +bargain with the best of them as to contracts and output. Women were +trained as bookkeepers and clerks under Napoleon I; he wanted men as +soldiers, and so decreed women should go into business. And the woman of +the aristocratic class has merely slipped out of her seclusion as if +putting aside an old-fashioned garment, and now carries on her +philanthropies in more serious and coördinated manner. We know the +practical business experience possessed by French women, and so are +prepared to learn that many a big commercial enterprise, the owner +having gone to the front, is now directed by his capable wife. That is +but a development, too, is it not? For we had all heard long ago of Mme. +Duval, even if we had not eaten at her restaurants, and though we had +never bought a ribbon or a carpet at the Bon Marché, we had heard of the +woman who helped break through old merchant habits and gave the world +the department store. + +But nothing has been more significant in its growth during the war than +the small enterprises in which the husband and wife in the domestic +munition shop, laboring side by side with a little group of assistants, +have been turning out marvels of skill. The man is now in the trenches +fighting for France, and the woman takes command and leads the +industrial battalion to victory. She knows she fights for France. + +A word more about her business, for she is playing an economic part that +brings us up at attention. She may be solving the problem of adjustment +of home and work so puzzling to women. There are just such domestic +shops dotted all over the map of France; in the Paris district alone +there are over eighteen hundred of them. The conditions are so +excellent and the ruling wages so high, that the minimum wage law passed +in 1915 applied only to the sweated home workers in the clothing trade, +and not to the domestic munition shops. + +A commission which included in its membership a trade unionist, sent by +the British government in the darkest days to find why it was that +France could produce so much more ammunition than England, found these +tiny workshops, with their primitive equipment, performing miracles. The +output was huge and of the best. The woman, when at the head, seemed to +turn out more than the man, she worked with such undying energy. The +commission said it was the "spirit of France" that drove the workers +forward and renewed the flagging energies. But even the trade unionist +referred to the absence of all opposition to women on the part of +organizations of men. Perhaps the spirit of France is undying because in +it is a spirit of unity and harmony. + +It seemed to me there was one very practical explanation of the +unmistakable energy of the French worker, both man and woman. The whole +nation has the wise custom of taking meal time with due seriousness. The +break at noon in the great manufactories, as well as in the family +workshop, is long, averaging one hour and a half, and reaching often to +two hours. The French never gobble. Because food is necessary to animal +life, they do not on that account take a puritanical view of it. They +dare enjoy it, in spite of its physiological bearing. They sit down to +it, dwell upon it, get its flavor, and after the meal they sit still and +as a nation permit themselves unabashed to enjoy the sensation of hunger +appeased. That's the common sense spirit of France. + +Of course the worker is renewed, hurls herself on the work again with +ardor, and losing no time through fatigue, throws off an +enormous output. + +Wages perform their material share in spurring the worker. Louis Barthou +says that the woman's average is eight francs a day. Long ago--it seems +long ago--she could earn at best five francs in the Paris district. She +works on piece work now, getting the same rate as men. And think of +it!--this must indeed be because of the spirit of France--this woman +does better than men on the light munition work, and equals, yes, equals +her menfolk on the heavy shells. I do not say this, a commission of men +says it, a commission with a trade union member to boot. The coming of +the woman-worker with the spirit of win-the-war in her heart is the same +in France as elsewhere, only here her coming is more gracious. Twelve +hundred easily take up work on the Paris subway. They are the wives of +mobilized employees. The offices of the Post, the Telegraph and +Telephone bristle with women, of course, for eleven thousand have taken +the places of men. Some seven thousand fill up the empty positions on +the railways, serving even as conductors on through trains. Their number +has swollen to a half million in munitions, and to over half that number +in powder mills and marine workshops; in civil establishments over three +hundred thousand render service; and even the conservative banking world +welcomes the help of some three thousand women. + +[Illustration: Has there ever been anything impossible to French women +since the time of Jeanne d'Arc? The fields must be harrowed--they have +no horses.] + +Out on the land the tally is greatest of all. Every woman from the +village bends over the bosom of France, urging fertility. The government +called them in the first hours of the conflict. Viviani spoke +the word:-- + +"The departure for the army of all those who can carry arms, leaves the +work in the fields undone; the harvest is not yet gathered in; the +vintage season is near. In the name of the entire nation united behind +it, I make an appeal to your courage, and to that of your children, +whose age alone and not their valour, keeps them from the war. + +"I ask you to keep on the work in the fields, to finish gathering in the +year's harvest, to prepare that of the coming year. You cannot render +your country a greater service. + +"It is not for you, but for her, that I appeal to your hearts. + +"You must safeguard your own living, the feeding of the urban +populations and especially the feeding of those who are defending the +frontier, as well as the independence of the country, civilization +and justice. + +"Up, then, French women, young children, daughters and sons of the +country! Replace on the field of work those who are on the field of +battle. Strive to show them to-morrow the cultivated soil, the harvests +all gathered in, the fields sown. + +"In hours of stress like the present, there is no ignoble work. +Everything that helps the country is great. Up! Act! To work! To-morrow +there will be glory for everyone. + +"Long live the Republic! Long live France!" + +Women instantly responded to the proclamation. Only the old men were +left to help, only decrepit horses, rejected by the military +requisition. More than once I journeyed far into the country, but I +never saw an able-bodied man. What a gap to be filled!--but the French +peasant woman filled it. She harvested that first year, she has sowed +and garnered season by season ever since. Men, horses, machinery were +lacking, the debit yawned, but she piled up a credit to meet it by +unflagging toil. + +With equal devotion and with initiative and power of organization the +woman of leisure has "carried on." The three great societies +corresponding with our Red Cross, the Société de Secours aux Blessés, +the Union des Femmes de France, and the Association des Dames +Françaises, have established fifteen hundred hospitals with one hundred +and fifteen thousand beds, and put forty-three thousand nurses in active +service. Efficiency has kept pace with this superb effort, as is +testified to by many a war cross, many a medal, and the cross of the +Legion of Honor. + +Up to the level of her means France sets examples in works of human +salvage worthy the imitation of all nations. The mairie in each +arrondissement has become no less than a community center. The XIV +arrondissement in Paris is but the pattern for many. Here the wife of +the mayor, Mme. Brunot, has made the stiff old building a human place. +The card catalogue carrying information about every soldier from the +district, gives its overwhelming news each day gently to wife or mother, +through the lips of Mme. Brunot or her women assistants. The work of Les +Amis des Orphelins de Guerre centers here, the "adopted" child receiving +from the good maire the gifts in money and presents sent by the +Americans who are generously filling the role of parent. The widows of +the soldiers gather here for comfort and advice. + +And the mairie holds a spirit of experiment. It houses not only courage +and sympathy, but progress. The "XIV" has ventured on a Cuisine +Populaire under Mme. Brunot's wholesome guidance. And so many other +arrondissements have followed suit that Paris may be regarded as making +a great experiment in the municipal feeding of her people. It is not +charity, the food is paid for. In the "XIV" fifteen hundred persons eat +a meal or two at the mairie each day. The charge is seventy-five +centimes--fifteen cents, and one gets a soup, meat and a vegetable, +and fruit. + +The world seems to be counselling us that if we wish to be well and +cheaply fed we must go where there are experts to cook, where buying is +done in quantity, and where the manager knows about nutritive values. + +If a word of praise is extended to the maire of the XIV arrondissement +for his very splendid work, an example to all France, he quickly urges, +"Ah, but Mme. Brunot!" And so it is always, if you exclaim, "Oh, the +spirit of the men of France!" and a Frenchman's ears catch your words, +he will correct, "Ah, but the women!" + +And the women do stand above all other women, they have had such +opportunity for heroism. Whose heart does not beat the faster when the +names Soisson and Mme. Macherez are spoken! The mayor and the council +gone, she assumes the office and keeps order while German shells fall +thick on the town. And then the enemy enters, and asks for the mayor, +and she replies, "Le maire, c'est moi." And then do we women not like to +think of Mlle. Deletete staying at her post in the telegraph office in +Houplines in spite of German bombardments, and calmly facing tormentors, +when they smashed her instruments and threatened her with death. +One-tenth of France in the enemy's hands, and in each village and town +some woman staying behind to nurse the sick and wounded, to calm the +population when panic threatens, to stand invincible between the people +and their conquerors! + +It is very splendid!--the French man holding steady at the front, the +French woman an unyielding second line of defense. But what of France? +Words of praise must not swallow our sense of obligation. Let us with +our hundred millions of people face the figures. The death rate in +France, not counting the military loss, is twenty per thousand, with a +birth rate of eight per thousand. In Paris for the year ending August, +1914, there were forty-eight thousand nine hundred and seventeen births; +in the year ending in the same month, 1916, the births dropped to +twenty-six thousand one hundred and seventy-nine. The total deaths for +that year in all France were one million, one hundred thousand, and the +births three hundred and twelve thousand. + +France is profoundly, infinitely sad. She has cause. I shall never +forget looking into the very depths of her sorrow when I was at Creil. A +great drive was in progress, the wounded were being brought down from +the front, troops hurried forward. Four different regiments passed as I +sat at déjeuner. The restaurant, full of its noonday patrons, was a +typical French café giving on the street. We could have reached out and +touched the soldiers. They marched without music, without song or word, +marched in silence. Some of the men were from this very town; their +little sons, with set faces, too, walked beside them and had brought +them bunches of flowers. The people in the restaurant never spoke above +a whisper, and when the troops passed were as silent as death. There was +no cheer, but just a long, wistful gaze, the soldiers looking into their +eyes, they into the soldiers'. + +But France can bear her burden, can solve her problem if we lift our +full share from her bent shoulders. Her women can save the children if +the older men, relieved by our young soldiers, come back from the +trenches, setting women free for the work of child saving. France can +rebuild her villages if her supreme architects, her skilled workers are +replaced in the trenches by our armies. France can renew her spirit and +save her body if her experts in science, if her poets and artists are +sent back to her, and our less great bare their breasts to the Huns. + + + + +V + +MOBILIZING WOMEN IN GERMANY + + +The military mobilization of Germany was no more immediate and effective +than the call to arms for women. On August 1, 1914, the summons went +out, and German women were at once part of the smooth running machine of +efficiency. + +The world says the Kaiser has been preparing for war for forty years. +The world means that he has been preparing the fighting force. The sword +and guns were to be ready. But the military arm of the nation, the +German government believes, is but the first line of attack; the people +are the second line, and so they, too, in all their life activities, +were not forgotten. The military aristocracy has never neglected the +function of women in the state. The definition of their function may +differ from ours, but that there is a function is recognized, and it is +related to the other vital social organs. + +Slowly, through the last half of the nineteenth century, there had grown +up clubs among German women focusing on a definite bit of work, or +crystallizing about an idea. Germany even had suffrage societies. +Politics, however, were forbidden by the government; women were not +allowed to hang on the fringe of a meeting held to discuss men's +politics. But the women of the Fatherland were free to pool their ideas +in philanthropic and hygienic corners, and venture out at times on +educational highways. The Froebel societies had many a contest with the +government, for to the military mind, the gentle pedagogue's theories +seemed subversive of discipline as enforced by spurs and bayonets. + +These clubs, covering every trade and profession, every duty and every +aspiration of women, were dotted over the German Empire. At last they +drew together in a federation. The government looked on. It saw a +machine created, and believing in thorough organization, no doubt gave +thought to the possibilities of the Bund deutscher, Frauenvereine. At +the outbreak of war, Dr. Gertrud Baumer was president of the Bund. She +was a leader of great ability, marshalling half a million of women. No +other organization was so widespread and well-knit, except perhaps Der +Vaterlandische Frauenverein with its two thousand one hundred and fifty +branches. It was evangelical and military. The Empress was its patron. +Its popular name is the "Armée der Kaiserin." + +There the two great national societies stood--one aristocratic, the +other democratic, one appealing to the ruling class, the other holding +in bonds of fellowship the rich and the poor, the urban and the rural, +the professional and the industrial woman. + +Every belligerent president or premier has faced exactly the same +perplexity. What woman, what society, is to be recognized as leader? The +question has brought beads of perspiration to the foreheads of +statesmen. + +France solved the difficulty urbanely. It said "yes" to each and all. It +promised coöperation and kept the promise. By affably--always affably +and hospitably--accepting this service from one society, and suggesting +another pressing need to its competitor, it sorted out capabilities, and +warded off duplication. Perhaps this did not bring the fullest +efficiency, but the loss was more than made up, no doubt, by a free +field for initiative. Britain ignored all existing organizations of +women, and after a year and a half of puzzlement created a separate +government department for their mobilization. America struck out still +another course. It took the heads of several national societies, bound +them in one committee, to which it gave, perhaps with the idea of +avoiding any danger of friction, neither power nor funds. + +Germany faced the same critical moment for decision. The government +wanted efficient use of woman-power on the land, in the factory, in the +home, and that quickly. It made use of the best existing machinery. Dr. +Gertrud Baumer visited the Ministerium des Innern, and on August 1 she +issued a call for the mobilization of women for service to the +Fatherland in the Nationale Frauendienst. Under the aegis of the +government, with the national treasury behind her, Dr. Baumer summoned +the women of the Empire. By order, every woman and every organization of +women was to fall in line under the Frauendienst in each village and +city for "the duration of the war." [3] + +In each army district, the government appointed a woman as directress, +and by order to town and provincial authorities made the Frauendienst +part of local executive affairs. + +Among the immediate duties laid upon the Frauendienst by the authorities +was the task of registering all needy persons, of providing cheap eating +places, opening workrooms, and setting up nurseries for children, +especially for those who were motherless and those whose fathers had +fallen at the front and whose mothers were in some gainful pursuit. With +these duties went the administrative service of coöperating with the +government in "keeping up an even supply of foodstuffs, and controlling +the buying and selling of food." + +Germany anticipated as did no other belligerent the unemployment which +would follow a declaration of war, and prepared to meet the condition. A +great deal of army work, such as tent sewing, belts for cartridges, +bread sacks, and sheets for hospitals, was made immediately available +for the women thrown out of luxury trades. In the first month of the war +the Frauendienst opened work-rooms in all great centers; machinery was +installed by magic and through the six work-rooms in Berlin alone +twenty-three thousand women were given paid employment in one week. + +Such efforts could not, of course, absorb the surplus labor, for +unemployment was very great. Eighty percent of the women's hat-makers +and milliners were out of work, seventy-two percent of the workers in +glass and fifty-eight percent in china. The Frauendienst investigated +two hundred and fifty-five thousand needy cases, and in Berlin alone +found sixty thousand women who had lost their employment. Charity had to +render help. Here, again, it is an example of the alertness of the +organization and its close connection with the government that the +Berlin magistracy deputed to twenty-three Hilfscommissionen from the +Frauendienst the work of giving advice and charity relief to the +unemployed. Knitting rooms were opened, clothing depots, mending rooms, +where donated clothing was repaired, and in one month fifty-six thousand +orders for milk, five hundred thousand for bread, and three hundred +thousand for meals were distributed for the city authorities. + +The adjustment to war requirements went on more quickly in Germany than +in any other country. Before a year had passed the surplus hands had +been absorbed, and a shortage of labor power was beginning to be felt. + +And now opens the war drama set with the same scene everywhere. Women +hurry forward to take up the burden laid down by men, and to assume the +new occupations made necessary by the organization of the world for +military conflict. To tell of Germany is merely to speak in bigger +numbers. Women in munitions? Of course, well over the million mark. +Trolley conductors? Of course, six hundred in Berlin alone before the +first Christmas. Women are making the fuses, fashioning the big shells, +and at the same heavy machines used by the men. That speaks volumes--the +same heavy machines. Great Britain and France have in every case +introduced lighter machinery for their women. But, whatever the +conditions, in Germany the women are handling high explosives, sewing +heavy saddlery, operating the heaviest drill machines. Women have been +put on the "hardest jobs hitherto filled by men." In the +German-Luxemburg Mining and Furnace Company at Differdingen, they are +found doing work at the slag and blast furnaces which had always +required men of great endurance. They work on the same shifts as the +men, receive the same pay, but are not worked overtime "because they +must go home and perform their domestic duties." + +One feels the weight of the German system. Patient women shoulder double +burdens. They always did. + +In the Post and Telegraph department there is an army of fifty thousand +women. The telephone service is entirely in their hands, and running +more smoothly than formerly. Dr. Käthe Schirmacher declares comfortingly +in the _Kriegsfrau_ that "one must not forget that these women know many +important bits of information--and keep silent." Women have learned to +keep a secret! + +One hundred and eighty nurses, experts with the X-ray, were in the front +line dressing stations in the early days of the war, and before a week +of conflict had passed women were in the Field Post, and Frau Reimer, +organizer of official chauffeurs, was on the western line of attack. + +Agriculture claims more women than any occupation in Germany. They were +always on the farm, perhaps they are happier there now since they +themselves are in command. It is said that "the peasants work in the +boots and trousers of their husbands and ride in the saddle." War has +liberated German women from the collar and put them on horseback! + +But strangest and most unexpected of all is the professional and +administrative use of women. The government has sent women architects +and interior decorators to East Prussia to plan and carry through +reconstruction work. Over a hundred--to be exact, one hundred and +sixteen at last accounts--have taken the places of men in +administrative departments connected with the railways. Many widows who +have shown capacity have been put in government positions of importance +formerly held by their husbands. Women have become farm managers, +superintendents of dairy industries, and representatives of landed +proprietors. + +The disseminating of all instruction and information for women on war +economies was delegated to the League of Women's Domestic Science Clubs. +The Berlin course was held in no less a place than the Abgeordnetenhaus, +and the Herrenhaus opened its doors wide on Rural Women's Day when +Agricultural Week was held at the capital. + +When the full history of the war comes to be written, no doubt one +reason for Germany's marvelous power to stand so long against the world +will be found in her use of every brain and muscle of the nation. This +has been for her no exclusive war. Her entire people to their last ounce +of energy have been engaged. + +And this supreme service on the part of German women seeks democratic +expression. From them comes the clearest, bravest word that has reached +us across the border. The most hopeful sign is this manifesto from the +suffrage organizations to the government: "Up to the present Germany +has stood in the lowest rank of nations as regards women's rights. In +most civilized lands women already have been given a large share in +public affairs. German women have been granted nothing except within the +most insignificant limits. In New Zealand, Australia and most American +States, and even before the war in Finland and Norway, they had been +given political rights; to-day, Sweden, Russia and many other countries +give them a full or limited franchise. The war has brought a full +victory to the women of England, Canada, Russia and Denmark, and large +concessions are within sight in France, Holland and Hungary. + +"Among us Germans not only the national but even the commercial +franchise is denied, and even a share in the industrial and commercial +courts. In the demand for the democratization of German public life our +legislators do not seem even to admit the existence of women. + +"But during the war the cooperation of women in public life has +unostentatiously grown from year to year until to-day the number of +women engaged in various callings in Germany exceeds the number of men. + +"The work they are doing includes all spheres of male activity; without +them it would no longer be possible to support the economic life of the +people. Women have done their full share in the work of the community. + +"Does not this performance of duty involve the right to share in the +building up and extension of the social order? + +"The women protest against this lack of political rights, in virtue both +of their work for the community and of their work as human beings. They +demand political equality with men. They demand the direct, equal and +secret franchise for all legislative bodies, full equality in the +communes and in legal representation of their interests. + +"This first joint pronouncement on women's demands will be followed by +others until the victory of our cause is won." + + +[Footnote 3: "Die Frauenvereine jeder Stadt verbinden sich für die Dauer +des Krieges zur Organization Nationaler Frauendienst die zu Berlin am +1ten August begründet wurde."] + + + + +VI + +WOMEN OVER THE TOP IN AMERICA + + +American women have begun to go over the top. They are going up the +scaling-ladder and out into All Man's Land. Perhaps love of adventure +tempts them, perhaps love of money, or a fine spirit of service, but +whatever the propelling motive, we are seeing them make the venture. + +There is nothing new in our day in a woman's being paid for her +work--some of it. But she has never before been seen in America +employed, for instance, as a section hand on a railway. The gangs are +few and small as yet, but there the women are big and strong specimens +of foreign birth. They "trim" the ballast and wield the heavy "tamping" +tool with zest. They certainly have muscles, and are tempted to use them +vigorously at three dollars a day. + +In the machine shops where more skill than strength is called for, the +American element with its quick wits and deft fingers predominates. +Young women are working at the lathe with so much precision and accuracy +that solicitude as to what would become of the world if all its men +marched off to war is in a measure assuaged. In the push and drive of +the industrial world, women are handling dangerous chemicals in making +flash lights, and T.N.T. for high explosive shells. The American college +girl is not as yet transmuting her prowess of the athletic field into +work on the anvil, as is the university woman in England, but she has +demonstrated her manual strength and skill on the farm with plough +and harrow. + +Women and girls answer our call for messenger service, and their +intelligence and courtesy are an improvement upon the manners of the +young barbarians of the race. Women operate elevators, lifting us with +safety to the seventh heaven, or plunging us with precision to the +depths. There were those at first who refused to entrust their lives to +such frail hands, and there are still some who look concerned when they +see a woman at the lever; but on the whole the elevator "girl" has +gained the confidence of her public, and has gained it by skill, not by +feminine wiles, for even men won't shoot into space with a woman at the +helm whose sole equipment is charm. With need of less skill than the +elevator operator, but more patience and tact in managing human nature, +the woman conductor is getting her patrons into line. We are still a +little embarrassed in her presence. We try not to stare at the +well-set-up woman in her sensible uniform, while she on her part tries +to look unconscious, and with much dignity accomplishes the common aim +much more successfully than do we. She is so attentive to her duties, so +courteous, and, withal, so calm and serious that I hope she will abide +with us longer than the "duration of the war." + +In short, America is witnessing the beginning of a great industrial and +social change, and even those who regard the situation as temporary +cannot doubt that the experience will have important reactions. The +development is more advanced than it was in Great Britain at a +corresponding time, for even before the United States entered the +conflict women were being recruited in war industries. They have opened +up every line of service. There is not an occupation in which a woman is +not found. + +When men go a-warring, women go to work. + +A distinguished general at the end of the Cuban War, enlarging upon the +poet's idea of woman's weeping rôle in wartime, said in a public speech: +"When the country called, women put guns in the hands of their soldier +boys and bravely sent them away. After the good-byes were said there was +nothing for these women to do but to go back and wait, wait, wait. The +excitement of battle was not for them. It was simply a season of anxiety +and heartrending inactivity." Now the fact is, when a great call to arms +is sounded for the men of a nation, women enlist in the industrial army. +If women did indeed sit at home and weep, the enemy would soon conquer. + +The dull census tells the thrilling story. Before our Civil War women +were found in less than a hundred trades, at its close in over four +hundred. The census of 1860 gives two hundred and eighty-five thousand +women in gainful pursuits; that of 1870, one million, eight hundred and +thirty-six thousand. Of the Transvaal at war, this story was told to me +by an English officer. He led a small band of soldiers down into the +Boer country, on the north from Rhodesia, as far as he dared. He "did +not see a man," even boys as young as fifteen had joined the army. But +at the post of economic duty stood the Boer woman; she was tending the +herds and carrying on all the work of the farm. She was the base of +supplies. That was why the British finally put her in a concentration +camp. Her man could not be beaten with her at his back. + +War compels women to work. That is one of its merits. Women are forced +to use body and mind, they are not, cannot be idlers. Perhaps that is +the reason military nations hold sway so long; their reign continues, +not because they draw strength from the conquered nation, but because +their women are roused to exertion. Active mothers ensure a virile race. + +The peaceful nation, if its women fall victims to the luxury which +rapidly increasing wealth brings, will decay. If there come no spiritual +awakening, no sense of responsibility of service, then perhaps war alone +can save it. The routing of idleness and ease by compulsory labor is the +good counterbalancing some of the evil. + +The rapidly increasing employment of women to-day, then, is the usual, +and happy, accompaniment of war. But the development has its opponents, +and that is nothing new, either. Let us look them over one by one. The +most mischievous objector is the person, oftenest a woman, who says the +war will be short, and fundamental changes, therefore, should not be +made. This agreeable prophecy does not spring from a heartening belief +in victory, but only from the procrastinating attitude, "Why get ready?" +To prepare for anything less certain than death seems folly to many of +the sex, over-trained in patient waiting. + +Then there is the official who constantly sees the seamy side of +industrial life and who concludes--we can scarcely blame him--that "it +would be well if women were excluded entirely from factory life." The +bad condition of industrial surroundings bulks large in his mind, and +the value of organized work to us mortals bulks small. We are all too +inclined to forget that the need for work cannot be eliminated, but the +unhealthy process in a dangerous trade can. Clean up the factory, rather +than clean out the women, is a sound slogan. + +And then comes the objector who is exercised as to the effect of paid +work upon woman's charm. Solicitude on this score is often buried in a +woman's heart. It was a woman, the owner of a large estate, who when +proposing to employ women asked how many men she would have to hire in +addition, "to dig, plough and do all the hard work." On learning that +the college units do everything on a farm, she queried anxiously, "But +how about their corsets?" To the explanation, "They don't wear any," +came the regret, "What a pity to make themselves so unattractive!" + +I have heard fear expressed, too, lest sex attraction be lost through +work on army hats, the machinery being noisy and the operative, if she +talk, running the danger of acquiring a sharp, high voice. One could but +wonder if most American women work on army hats. + +Among the women actually employed, I have found without exception a fine +spirit of service. So many of them have a friend or brother "over +there," that backing up the boys makes a strong personal appeal. But +some of the women who have left factory life behind are adopting an +attitude towards the present industrial situation as lacking in vision +as in patriotism. Throughout a long discussion in which some of these +women participated I was able to follow and get their point of view. To +them a woman acting as a messenger, an elevator operator, or a trolley +conductor, was anathema, and the tempting of women into these +employments seemed but the latest vicious trick of the capitalist. The +conductor in her becoming uniform was most reprehensible, and her +evident satisfaction in her job suggested to her critics that she merely +was trying to play a melodramatic part "as a war hero." In any case, the +conductor's occupation was one no woman should be in, "crowded and +pushed about as she is." It was puzzling to know why it was regarded as +right for a woman to pay five cents and be pushed, and unbecoming for +another woman to be paid eighteen dollars and ninety cents a week and +run the risk of a jolt when stepping outside her barrier. + +But the ideals of yesterday fail to make their appeal. It is not the +psychological moment to urge, on the ground of comfort, the woman's +right to protection. The contrast between the trenches and the street +car or factory is too striking. But it is, however, the exact moment to +plead for better care of workers, both women and men, because their +health and skill are as necessary in attaining the national aim as the +soldiers' prowess and well-being. It is the time to advocate the +protection of the worker from long hours, because the experience of +Europe has proved that a greater and better output is achieved when a +short day is strictly adhered to, when the weekly half-holiday is +enjoyed, and Sunday rest respected. The United States is behind other +great industrial countries in legal protection for the workers. War +requirements may force us to see in the health of the worker the +greatest of national assets. Meantime, whether approved or not, the +American woman is going over the top. Four hundred and more are busy on +aeroplanes at the Curtiss works. The manager of a munition shop where +to-day but fifty women are employed, is putting up a dormitory to +accommodate five hundred. An index of expectation! Five thousand are +employed by the Remington Arms Company at Bridgeport. At the +International Arms and Fuse Company at Bloomfield, New Jersey, two +thousand, eight hundred are employed. The day I visited the place, in +one of the largest shops women had only just been put on the work, but +it was expected that in less than a month they would be found handling +all of the twelve hundred machines under that one roof alone. + +The skill of the women staggers one. After a week or two they master the +operations on the "turret," gauging and routing machines. The best +worker on the "facing" machine is a woman. She is a piece worker, as +many of the women are, and is paid at the same rate as men. This woman +earned, the day I saw her, five dollars and forty cents. She tossed +about the fuse parts, and played with that machine, as I would with a +baby. Perhaps it was in somewhat the same spirit--she seemed to +love her toy. + +Most of the testers and inspectors are women. They measure the parts +step by step, and weigh the completed fuse, carrying off the palm for +reliability. The manager put it, "for inspection the women are more +conscientious than men. They don't measure or weigh just one piece, +shoving along a half-dozen untouched and let it go at that. They test +each." That did not surprise me, but I was not prepared to hear that the +women do not have so many accidents as men, or break the machines so +often. In explanation, the manager threw over an imaginary lever with +vigor sufficient to shake the factory, "Men put their whole strength on, +women are more gentle and patient." + +Nor are the railways neglecting to fill up gaps in their working force +with women. The Pennsylvania road, it is said, has recruited some seven +hundred of them. In the Erie Railroad women are not only engaged as +"work classifiers" in the locomotive clerical department, but hardy +Polish women are employed in the car repair shops. They move great +wheels as if possessed of the strength of Hercules. And in the +locomotive shops I found women working on drill-press machines with +ease and skill. Just as I came up to one operator, she lifted an engine +truck-box to the table and started drilling out the studs. She had been +at the work only a month, and explained her skill by the information +that she was Swedish, and had always worked with her husband in their +auto-repair shop. All the other drill-press hands and the "shapers," +too, were Americans whose husbands, old employees, were now "over +there." Not one seemed to have any sense of the unusual; even the little +blond check-clerk seated in her booth at the gates of the works with her +brass discs about her had in a few months' time changed a revolution +into an established custom. She and the discs seemed old friends. Women +are adaptable. + +[Illustration: _Copyright by Underwood and Underwood_ +The daily round in the Erie Railroad workshops.] + +But everywhere I gathered the impression that the men are a bit uneasy. +A foreman in one factory pointed out a man who "would not have voted for +suffrage" had he guessed that women were "to rush in and gobble +everything up." I tried to make him see that it wasn't the vote that +gave the voracious appetite, but necessity or desire to serve. And in +any case, women do not push men out, they push them up. In not a single +instance did I hear of a man being turned off to make a place for a +woman. He had left his job to go into the army, or was advanced to +heavier or more skilled work. + +As to how many women have supplanted men, or poured into the new war +industries, no figures are available. One guess has put it at a million. +But that is merely a guess. I have seen them by the tens, the hundreds, +the thousands. The number is large and rapidly increasing. We may know +that something important is happening when even the government takes +note. The United States Labor Department has recognized the new-comers +by establishing a Division of Women's Work with branches in every State. +It looks as if these bureaus of employment would not be idle, with a +showing of one thousand, five hundred applicants the first week the New +York office was opened. It is to be hoped that this government effort +will save the round pegs from getting into the square holes. + +But even the round peg in the round hole brings difficulties. When Adam +Smith asserted that of all sorts of luggage man was the most difficult +to move, he forgot woman! The instant women are carried into a new +industry, they bring with them puzzling problems. Where shall we put +their coats and picture hats, how shall we cover up their hair, what +shall we feed them with? They must have lockers and rest rooms, caps +and overalls, and above all, canteens. The munition workers, the +conductors, in fact, all women in active work, get prodigiously hungry. +They have made a regiment of dietitians think about calories. Here is +what one of the street railways in New York City offered them on a +given day:-- + +Tomato soup 10c. or with an order 5c. +Roast leg of veal 16c. +Beef 16c. +Lamb fricassee 16c. +Ham steak 16c. +Liver and onions 16c. +Sirloin steak 30c. +Small steak 20c. +Ham and eggs 20c. +Ham omelet 20c. +_Regular dinner_ + Soup, meat, + Vegetable, + Dessert, coffee 25c. +Rice pudding 5c. +Pie 5c. +Cake 5c. +Banana or orange 5c. + +The canteen is open every hour of the twenty-four, and the women +conductors at the end of each run usually take a bite, and then have a +substantial meal during the long break of an hour and a half in the +middle of the ten-hour day. + +Another problem brought to us by women in industry is, how can we house +them? The war industries have drawn large numbers to new centers. The +haphazard accommodation which men win put up with, won't satisfy women. +They demand more, and get more. To attract the best type of women the +munition plants are putting up dormitories to accommodate hundreds of +workers, and are making their plants more attractive, with rest rooms +and hospital accommodation. Take, for instance, the Briggs and Stratton +Company, which in order to draw high grade workers built its new factory +in one of the best sections of Milwaukee. The workrooms are as clean as +the proverbial Dutch woman's doorstep. From the top of the benches to +the ceiling the walls are glass to ensure daylight in every corner, and +by night the system of indirect lighting gives such perfectly diffused +light that not a heavy shadow falls anywhere. And the hospital room and +nurse--well, one would rejoice to have an accident daily! + +The factory may become the exemplar for the home. The professional +woman is going over the top, and with a good opinion of herself. "I can +do this work better than any man," was the announcement made by a young +woman from the Pacific Coast as she descended upon the city hall in an +eastern town, credentials in her hand, and asked for the position of +city chemist. There was not a microbe she did not know to its undoing, +or a deadly poison she could not bring from its hiding place. The town +had suffered from graft, and the mayor, thinking a woman might scare the +thieves as well as the bacteria, appointed the chemist who believed in +herself. And she is just one of many who have been taking up such work. + +Formerly two-thirds of the positions filled by the New York +Intercollegiate Bureau of Occupations were secretarial or teaching +positions; now three-fourths of its applicants have been placed as +physicists, chemists, office managers, sanitary experts, exhibit +secretaries, and the like. The temporary positions used to outnumber the +permanent placements; at present the reverse is true. Of the women +placed, four times as many as formerly get salaries ranging above +eighteen hundred dollars a year. + +The story told at the employment bureaus in connection with professional +societies and clubs such as the Chemists' Club is the same. Women are +being placed not merely as teachers of chemistry or as routine +laboratory workers in hospitals, but also as experimental and control +chemists in industrial plants. In the great rolling mills they are +testing steel, at the copper smelters they are found in the +laboratories. The government has thrown doors wide open to +college-trained women. They are physicists and chemists in the United +States Bureaus of Standards, Mines, and Soils, sanitary experts in +military camps, research chemists in animal nutrition and fertilizers at +state experiment stations. + +But the industrial barrier is the one most recently scaled. Women are +now found as analytical, research or control chemists in the canneries, +in dye and electrical works, in flour and paper mills, in insecticide +companies, and cement works. They test the steel that will carry us +safely on our journeys, they pass upon the chemical composition of the +flavor in our cake, as heads of departments in metal refining companies +they determine the kind of copper battery we shall use, and they have a +finger in our liquid glues, household oils and polishes. + +And the awakened spirit of social responsibility has opened new +callings. The college woman not only is beginning to fill welfare +positions inside the factory, but is acting as protective officer in +towns near military camps. Perhaps one of the newest and most +interesting positions is that of "employment secretary." The losing of +employees has become so serious and general that big industries have +engaged women who devote their time to looking up absentees and finding +out why each worker left. + +And so we see on all hands women breaking through the old accustomed +bounds. + +Not only as workers but as voters, the war has called women over the +top. Since that fateful August, 1914, four provinces of Canada and the +Dominion itself have raised the banner of votes for women. Nevada and +Montana declared for suffrage before the war was four months old, and +Denmark enfranchised its women before the year was out. And when America +went forth to fight for democracy abroad, Arkansas, Michigan, Vermont, +Nebraska, North Dakota, Rhode Island, began to lay the foundations of +freedom at home, and New York in no faltering voice proclaimed full +liberty for all its people. Lastly Great Britain has enfranchised its +women, and surely the Congress of the United States will not lag behind +the Mother of Parliaments! + +The world is facing changes as great as the breaking up of the feudal +system. Causes as fundamental, more wide-spread, and more cataclysmic +are at work than at the end of the Middle Ages. Among the changes none +is more marked than the intensified development in what one may call, +for lack of a better term, the woman movement. The advance in political +freedom has moved steadily forward during the past quarter of a century, +but in the last three years progress has been intense and striking. + +The peculiarity in attainment of political democracy for women has lain +in the fact that while for men economic freedom invariably preceded +political enfranchisement, in the case of women the conferring of the +vote in no single case was related to the stage which the enfranchised +group had attained in the matter of economic independence. Nowhere were +even those women who were entirely lacking in economic freedom, excluded +on that account from any extension of suffrage. Even in discussions of +the right of suffrage no reference has ever been made, in dealing with +women's claim, to the relation, universally recognized in the case of +men, of political enfranchisement to economic status. Serfdom gave way +to the wage system before democracy developed for men, and the colored +man was emancipated before he was enfranchised. For this reason the +coming of women as paid workers over the top may be regarded as +epoch-making. + +In any case, self-determination is certainly a strong element in +attaining any real political freedom. + +Complete service to their country in this crisis may lead women to that +economic freedom which will change a political possession into a +political power. But the requirement is readiness to do, and to do well, +the task which offers. Man-power must give itself unreservedly at the +front. Women must show not only eagerness but fitness to substitute for +man-power. It will hearten the nation, help to make the path clear, if +individual women declare that though the call to them has not yet come +for a definite service, the time of waiting will not be spent in +complaint, nor yet in foolish busy-ness, but in careful and +conscientious training for useful work. + +Each woman must prepare so that when the nation's need arises, she can +stand at salute and say, "Here is your servant, trained and ready." +Women are not driven over the top. Through self-discipline, they go over +it of their own accord. + + + + +VII + +EVE'S PAY ENVELOPE + + +No woman is a cross between an angel and a goose. She is a very human +creature. She has many of man's sins and some virtues of her own. + +Moving up from slavery through all the various forms of +serfdom--attachment to the soil, confinement to a given trade, exclusion +from citizenship, payment in kind, on to full economic freedom, men have +shown definite reactions at each step. Women respond to the +same stimuli. + +The free man is a better worker than slave or serf. So is the free +woman. All the old gibes at her ineptitudes have broken their points +against the actualities of her ability as a wage worker. The free man is +more alert to obligation, more conscientious in performance, than the +bond servant. So is the free woman. With pay envelope, or pension, Eve +is a better helpmate and mother than ever before. + +The free man carries a lighter heart than the villain. So does the free +woman. Men have always borne personal grief more easily than women; +observers remarked the fact. The reason is the same. An absorbing +occupation, ordered and regarded as important, which brings a return +allowing the recipient to patronize what he or she thinks wise, that +brings happiness, not boisterous, but dignified. It may be a holocaust +through which Eve gains that pay envelope, but the material possession +brings gratification nevertheless. It is a tiny straw showing the set of +the wind that leisure class British women, however large their unearned +bank account, show no reluctance to accept pay for their work, and full +responsibility in their new position of employee. + +Women are supposed to have liked to serve for mere love of service, for +love of child, love of husband. There is, of course, many a subtle +relation which can't be weighed and paid for; but toil, even for one's +very own hearthstone, can be valued in hard cash. The daughters of Eve, +no less than the sons of Adam, react happily to a recognition that +expresses itself in a fair wage. + +The verdict comes from all sides that women were never more content. Of +course they are content. The weight of suppression is being lifted. For +many their drudgery is for the first time paid for. Is not that +invigorating? The pay envelope is equal to that of men. Is not that a +new experience giving self-respect? Eve often finds her pay envelope +heavier than that of the man working at her side. Right there in her +hand, then, she holds proof that the old prejudice against her as an +inferior worker is ill-founded. + +Women are finding themselves. Even America's Eve discovers that pains +and aches are not "woman's lot." She is under no curse in the twentieth +century. With eighteen dollars a week for ringing up fares, and a +possible thirty-five for "facing" fuse-parts, nothing can persuade her +to be poor-spirited. She radiates the atmosphere, "I am needed!" Doors +fly open to her. She is welcome everywhere. No one seems to be able to +get too many of her kind. Politicians compete for her favor, employers +quarrel over her. It makes her breathe deep to have the Secretary of the +Navy summon her to the United States arsenals, pay her for her work, and +call her a patriot. + +[Illustration: In the well-lighted factory of the Briggs and Stratton +Company, Milwaukee, the girls are comfortably and becomingly garbed +for work.] + +And with the pay envelope women remain clearly human. Their purchases +often reflect past denials, rather than present needs or even tastes. +When set free one always buys what the days of dependence deprived one +of. One of Boston's leading merchants told me that Selfridge in London +was selling more jaunty ready-to-wear dresses than ever before. It was +part of John Bull's discipline in ante-bellum dependent days to keep his +women folk dowdy. The Lancashire lass with head shawl and pattens, the +wearer of the universal sailor hat, in these days of independence and +pounds, shillings and pence, are taking note of the shop windows. And +John is not turning his eyes away from his women folk in their day of +self-determination. + +But it is not to be concluded that it is all beer and skittles for Eve. +With a pay envelope and a vote come responsibilities. Public sympathy +has backed up laws cutting down long hours of work for women. The trade +unions, with a thought to possible competitors, have favored protecting +them from night work. Has Eve been a bit spoiled? Has she let herself +too easily be classed with children and allowed a line to be drawn +between men and women in industry? Is it a bit of woman's proverbial +logic to demand special protection, and at the same time insist upon +"equal pay for equal work"? + +The hopelessness of attaining the promise of the slogan is well +illustrated in the case of a gray haired woman I once met in a London +printing shop. In her early days she had been one of the women taken on +by the famous printing firm of McCorquodale. That was before protective +legislation applied to women. She became a highly skilled printer, +earning more than any man in the shop. When there was pressure of work +she was always one of the group of experts chosen to carry through the +rush order. That meant on occasion overtime or night work. Then she went +on to tell me how her skill was checked in her very prime. Regulations +as to women's labor were gradually fixed in the law. All the printers in +the shop, she said, favored the laws limiting her freedom but not +theirs. Soon her wages reflected the contrast. Her employer called her +to his office one day and explained, "I cannot afford to pay you as much +as the men any longer. You are not worth as much to me, not being able +to work Saturday afternoon, at night, or overtime." She was put on lower +grade work and her pay envelope grew slight. + +This woman was not discussing the value of shorter working hours, she +was pointing out that "equal pay" cannot rule for an entire group of +workers when restrictions apply to part of the group and not to the +whole body. We meet here, not a theory, but an incontrovertible fact. +Pay is not equal, and cannot be, where conditions are wholly unequal. +Protection for the woman worker means exactly what it would mean for the +alien man if by law he were forbidden to work Saturday afternoon, +overtime or at night, while the citizen worker was without restriction. +The alien would be cut off from advancement in every trade in which he +did not by overwhelming numbers dominate the situation, he would be kept +to lower grade processes, he would receive much lower pay than the +unprotected worker. + +What common sense would lead us to expect in the hypothetical case of an +alien man, has happened for the woman worker. Oddly enough she has not +herself asked for this protection, but it has been urged very largely by +women not of the industrial class. Women teachers, doctors, lawyers, +women of leisure are the advocates of special legislation for industrial +women. And yet in their own case they are entirely reasonable, and ask +no favors. The woman teacher, and quite truly, insists that she works as +hard and as long hours as the man in her grade of service, and on that +sound foundation she builds her just demand for equal pay. Women doctors +and lawyers have never asked for other than a square deal in their +professions. + +It would be well, perhaps, if industrial women were permitted to guide +their own ship. They have knowledge enough to reach a safe harbor. There +was a hint that they were about to assume the helm when the rank and +file of union workers voted down at the conference of the Women's Trade +Union League the resolution proposing a law to forbid women acting as +conductors. It was also suggestive when a woman rose and asked of the +speaker on dangerous trades, whether "men did not suffer from exposure +to fumes, acids and dust." + +Women have so long been urging that they are people, that they have +forgotten, perchance, that men are people also. Men respond to rest and +recreation as do human beings of the opposite sex. All workers need, and +both sexes should have, protection. But if only one sex in industrial +life can have bulwarks thrown up about it, men should be the favored +ones just now. They are few, they are precious, they should be wrapped +in cotton wool. + +The industrial woman should stand unqualifiedly for the exclusion of +children from gainful pursuits. Many years ago the British government +had Miss Collett, one of the Labor Correspondents of the Board of +Trade, make a special study of the influence of the employment of +married women on infant mortality. The object was to prove that there +was direct cause and effect. The investigator, after an exhaustive study +covering many industrial centers, brought back the report, "Not proven." +But the statistics showed one most interesting relation. In districts +where the prevailing custom permitted the employment of children as +early as the law allowed, infant mortality was high, and in districts +where few children were employed, infant mortality was low. No +explanation of this striking revelation was made in the report, but many +who commented on the tables, pointed out that the wide-spread employment +of the population in its early years sapped the vitality of the +community to such an extent that its offspring were weakened. In other +words, the employment of the immature child, more than the employment of +that child when grown and married, works harm to the race. + +The woman with a pay envelope must not, then, be willing to swell the +family budget by turning her children into the wage market. For if she +does, she creates a dangerous competitor for herself, and puts in +certain jeopardy the virility of her nation. But in this war time women +have secured more than new and larger pay envelopes, for each +belligerent has reckoned up the woman's worth as mother in coin of the +realm. It is enough to turn Eve's head--pay and pensions accorded her +all at once. + +Allowances to dependents are more, however, than financial expedients. +They are part of the psychological stage-setting of the Great War. The +fighting man must be more than well-fed, well-clothed, well-equipped, +more than assured of care if ill or wounded; he must have his mind +undisturbed by conditions at home. Governments now know that there must +be no just cause for complaint in the family at the rear, if the man at +the front is to be fully effective. In the interest of the fighting +line, governments dare not leave the home to the haphazard care +of charity. + +And so the great belligerents have adopted systems for an uninterrupted +flow of money aid to the hearthstone. The wife feels dependence on the +nation for which she and her man are making sacrifices, the soldier has +a sense of closer relationship with the country's cause for which he +fights. Content at home and sense of gratitude in the trenches build up +loyalty everywhere. The state allowance answers an economic want and a +psychological necessity. + +It is part of our national lack of technique that we were slow to make +provision for the dependents of enlisted men, and even then were not +whole hearted. It may have been our inherited distrust of the conscript +that led us to feel that only by his volunteering something will a +precious antidote be administered to the spirit of the drafted man. To +protect his individualism from taint, the United States soldier must +bear part of the financial burden. Europe, on the other hand, is working +on a basis of reciprocity. The nation exacts service from the man and +gives complete service to his dependents. In America the man is bound to +serve the community, but the community is not bound to serve him. And +yet in our case there is peculiar need of this even exchange of +obligations. The care of parents in the United States falls directly +upon their children, while some of our allies had, even before the war, +carefully devised laws regulating pensions to the aged. + +But first let us get the simple skeleton of the various allowance laws +in mind. The scale of the allowance in different countries adapts itself +to national standards and varying cost of living. The Canadian allowance +seems the most generous. At least one-half of the soldier's pay is +given directly to his dependents. The government gives an additional +twenty dollars and the donations of the Patriotic Fund bring up the +monthly allowance of a wife with three children to sixty dollars. The +allowance, as might be expected, is low in Italy. The soldier's wife +gets eight-tenths of a lira a day, each child four-tenths lira, and +either a father or mother alone eight-tenths lira, or if both are +living, one and three-tenths lire together. The British allowance is +much higher, the wife getting twelve shillings and sixpence a week. If +she has one child, the weekly allowance rises to nineteen and sixpence; +if two children, to twenty-four and sixpence; if three, to twenty-eight +shillings; and if there are four or more children, the mother receives +three shillings a week for each extra child. + +Between the extremes of Italy and England stands France, the wife +receiving one franc twenty-five centimes a day, each child under sixteen +years of age twenty-five centimes, and a dependent parent seventy-five +centimes. Japan grants no government allowance. A Japanese official, in +response to my inquiry, wrote, "Relations the first and friends the next +try to help the dependents as far as possible, but if they have neither +relatives nor friends who have sufficient means to help them, then the +association consisting of ladies or the municipal officials afford +subvention to them." + +Under the law passed by Congress in October, 1917, an American private +receiving thirty-three dollars a month when on service abroad must allot +fifteen dollars a month to his wife, and the government adds to this +twenty-five dollars, and if there is one child, an additional ten +dollars, with five dollars for each additional child. A man can secure +an allowance from the government of ten dollars a month to a dependent +parent, if he allots five dollars a month. Such are the bare bones of +the allowance schemes of the Allies on the western front. + +In the United States the general policy of exemption boards, as +suggested by the central authorities, is most disciplinary as regards +women. Their capacity for self-support is rigidly inquired into. Our men +are definitely urging women to a position of economic independence. The +aim is, while securing soldiers for the army, to relieve the government +of the expense of dependency on the part of women. There is no doubt +that our men at least are faced toward the future. No less indicative +is it of a new world that the allowance laws of all the western +belligerents recognize common-law marriages. In our own law, marriage is +"presumed if the man and woman have lived together in the openly +acknowledged relation of husband and wife during two years immediately +preceding the date of the declaration of war." And the illegitimate +child stands equal with the legitimate provided the father acknowledges +the child or has been "judicially ordered or decreed to contribute" to +the child's support. + +Men are feminists. Their hearts have softened even towards the wife's +relatives, for the word "parent" is not only broad enough to cover the +father, mother, grandparents or stepfather and mother of the man, but +"of the spouse" also. Thus passeth the curse of the mother-in-law. + +One need not be endowed with the spirit of prophecy to foretell that +"allowances" in war time will broaden out into motherhood pensions in +peace times. It would be an ordinary human reaction should the woman +enjoying a pension refuse to give up, on the day peace is declared, her +quickly acquired habit of holding the purse strings. That would be +accepting international calm at the expense of domestic differences. +The social value of encouraging the mother's natural feeling of +responsibility toward her child by putting into her hands a state +pension is being, let us note, widely tested, and may demonstrate the +wisdom and economy of devoting public funds to mothers rather than to +crêches and juvenile asylums. + +The allowance laws may prove the charter of woman's liberties; +her pay envelope may become her contract securing the right of +self-determination. + + + + +VIII + +POOLING BRAINS + + +"Employ them." This was the advice given to a large conference of women +met to discuss business opportunities for their sex. The advice was +vouchsafed by a young lawyer after the problem of opening wider fields +to women in the legal profession had been looked at from every angle, +only to end in the question, "What can we do to increase their +practice?" She spoke with animation, as if she had found the key to the +situation, "Employ them." Perhaps more self-accusation than +determination to mend their ways was roused by the short and +pointed remark. + +The advice has wider application. Taking thirty names of women at +random, I learned in response to an inquiry that only four had women +physicians, two had women lawyers, and only one, a woman dentist. +Twenty-five women of large real estate holdings had never even for the +most unimportant work secured the services of an architect of their own +sex. Further inquiry brought out the fact that of a long list of +women's clubs and associations which have built or altered property for +their purposes, only one had engaged a woman architect. + +Perhaps it is indicative of a lack of nothing more serious than a sense +of humor, that we women unite and, apparently without embarrassment, +demand that masculine presidents, governors, mayors and legislatures +shall appoint women to office. This unabashed faith in the good will of +men seems not misplaced, for not only do public men show some confidence +in the official capacity of women, but to my inquiry as to whom was due +their opportunities to "get on," business women invariably replied, +"To men." + +However, the loyalty of women to women is increasing, and their +solidarity on sound lines of service is a thing of steady growth. +Thoughtful women, for instance, do not wish a woman put in a position of +responsibility simply because she is a woman, but they are even more +opposed to having a candidate of peculiar fitness overlooked merely +because she is not a man. While the conscientious and poised women are +not willing to urge any and every woman for a given office, they do +tenaciously hold that there are positions which cry aloud for women and +for which the right women should he found. In conquering a fair field, +women will have to pool their brains even more effectively than they +have in the past. + +Our efforts at combination are a mere mushroom growth compared with the +generations of training our big brothers have had in pooling brains. War +and the chase gave them their first lessons in cooperation, nor has war +been a bad teacher for women. + +Just as the Crimean War and our Civil War put Florence Nightingale and +Clara Barton and the trained nurse on the map, this war is bringing the +medical woman to the fore. Women surgeons and doctors, unlike many other +groups, offer themselves fully trained for service. They know they have +something to give, and they know the soldiers' need. + +According to an official statement, the emergency call of the army for +men physicians and surgeons fell two thousand short of being answered. +The necessity of the soldier and the skill of the women will no doubt in +the end be brought effectively together; for although the government of +the United States, like Great Britain in the early days of the war, has +left to ever farseeing France the honor of extending hospitality to +American women doctors, their strong national organization, with a +membership of four thousand, will in time, no doubt, persuade Uncle Sam +to take his plucky women doctors over the top under the Stars and +Stripes! Organization crystallized about an unselfish desire and skilled +ability to serve is irresistible. + +The pooling of the brains of women that has been going on on a +country-wide scale for more than a half-century bears analyzing. These +associations have almost invariably centered about a service to be +rendered. Even the first petition for political enfranchisement urged it +as the "duty of the women of this country to secure to themselves the +elective franchise." Unselfishness draws numbers as a magnet draws steel +filings. The spirit of service lying at the heart of the great national +organizations made possible quick response to new duties immediately +upon our entrance into the war. The suffragists said, We wish to serve +and we are ready for service. The government used their wide-spread net +of local centers for purposes of registrations and war appeals. + +Naturally there were many efforts more foolish than effective in the +universal rush to help. America was not peculiar in this, nor for the +matter of that, were women. War!--it does make the blood course through +the veins. Every generous citizen cries aloud, "What can I do?" Perhaps +men are a little more voluble than women, their emotions not finding +such immediate and approved vent along clicking needles and tangled +skeins of wool. On the whole, the initiative and organizing ability of +women has stood out supremely. + +Of the two departments of the Red Cross which are still left in the +command of women, the Bureau of Nursing, with Miss Delano at its head, +mobilized immediately three thousand of the fourteen thousand nurses +enrolled. The first Red Cross Medical Unit with its full quota of +sixty-five nurses completely equipped stood on European soil before an +American soldier was there. Of the forty-nine units ready for service, +twelve, with from sixty-five to one hundred nurses each, are now in +France. Two of the five units organized for the navy, each with its +forty active nurses and twenty reserves, are established abroad, and two +hundred and thirty nurses are already in active naval service here. Miss +Delano holds constantly in reserve fifteen hundred nurses as emergency +detachments, a reservoir from which some eight hundred have been drawn +for cantonment hospitals. An inflow of nearly one thousand nurses each +month keeps the reservoir ready to meet the drain. + +The Chapter work-rooms sprang up at a call in the night. No one can help +admiring their well-ordered functioning. There may be criticism, +grumbling, but the work-room is moving irresistibly, like a well-oiled +machine. And women are the motive power from start to finish. The +Chapters, with their five million members joined in three thousand units +over the United States, are so many monuments to the ability of women +for detail. Once mobilized, the women have thus far been able to serve +two thousand war hospitals with surgical dressings, and to send abroad +thirteen million separate articles packed carefully, boxed, labelled and +accounted for on their books. + +Not only does this directing of manual work stand to the credit of the +Chapters, but they have given courses of lectures in home nursing and +dietetics to thirty-four thousand women, and in first aid; ten thousand +classes have been held and seventy-five thousand certificates issued to +the proficient. Certainly one object of the Red Cross, "to stimulate the +volunteer work of women," has been accomplished. + +It is difficult to understand why, with such examples of women's +efficiency before it, the Red Cross, founded by Clara Barton, places +merely two bureaus in the hands of a woman, has chosen no woman as an +officer, has put but one woman on its central and executive committee, +and not a single woman on its present controlling body, the War Council. +It may be that the protest against the centralization of all volunteer +effort in the Red Cross, in spite of President Wilson's appeal, was due +to the fact that women feared that their energies, running to other +lines than nursing and surgical dressings, would be entirely +sidetracked. + +The honor of the splendid war work of the Young Women's Christian +Association belongs to women. The War Work Council of the National Board +of Young Women's Christian Associations shows an example of how +immediately efficient an established organization can be in an +emergency. As one sees its great War Fund roll up, one exclaims, "What +money raisers women are!" The immediate demands upon the fund are for +Hostess Houses at cantonments where soldiers can meet their women +visitors, dormitories providing emergency housing for women employees at +certain army centers, the strengthening of club work among the younger +girls of the nation, profoundly affected by war conditions, and the +sending of experienced organizers to coöperate with the women leaders +of France and Russia and to install nurses' huts at the base hospitals +of France. It makes one's heart beat high to think of women spending +millions splendidly, they who have always been told to save pennies +frugally! Well, those hard days were times of training; women learned +not to waste. + +A very worthy pooling of brains, because springing up with no tradition +behind it, was the National League for Woman's Service. In six months it +drew to itself two hundred thousand members and built organizations in +thirty-nine States, established classes to train women for the new work +opening to them, opened recreation centers and canteens at which were +entertained on a single Sunday, at one center, eighteen hundred soldiers +and sailors. So excellent was its Bureau of Registration and Information +for women workers that the United States Department of Labor took over +not only the files and methods of the Woman's League for Service, but +the entire staff with Miss Obenauer at its head. If imitation is the +sincerest flattery, what shall we say of complete adoption of work and +workers, with an honorable "by your leave" and outspoken praise! And +nothing could show a finer spirit of service than this yielding up of +work initiated by a civil society and the willing passing of it into +government hands. + +Not only the Labor Department has established a special women's division +with a woman at its head, but the Ordnance Office of the War Department +has opened in its Industrial Service Section a woman's division, putting +Miss Mary Van Kleeck in charge. + +But still our government lags behind our Allies in mobilizing woman's +power of initiative and her organizing faculty. The Woman's Committee +of the Council of National Defense, appointed soon after the outbreak of +war, still has no administrative power. As one member of the Committee +says, "We are not allowed to do anything without the consent of the +Council of National Defense. There is no appropriation for the Woman's +Committee. We are furnished with headquarters, stationery, some printing +and two stenographers, but nothing more. It is essential that we raise +money to carry on the other expenses. The great trouble is that now, as +always, men want women to do the work while they do the overseeing." + +[Illustration: The women of the Motor Corps of the National League for +Woman's Service refuting the traditions that women have neither strength +nor endurance.] + +Perhaps holding the helm has become second nature to men simply because +they have held the helm so long, but I am inclined to think they have a +very definite desire to have women help steer the ship. Surely the +readiness with which they are sharing their political power with women, +would seem to indicate their wish for cooperation on a plan of +perfect equality. + +In any case, it is not necessary to hang on the skirts of government. +America has always shown evidence of greater gift in private enterprise +than state action. Perhaps women will demonstrate the national +characteristic. It was farsightedness and enterprise that led the +Intercollegiate Bureaus of Occupations, societies run for women by +women, to strike out in this crisis and open up new callings for their +clients, and still better, to persuade colleges and schools to modify +curricula to meet the changed demands. + +Women are often passed over because they are not prepared. + +The Bureaus have found the demand for women in industrial chemistry and +physics, for instance, to be greater than the supply because the +graduates of women's colleges have not been carried far enough in +mathematics, and in chemistry have been kept too much to theoretical +text-book work. For example, the head of a certain industry was willing +to give the position of chemist at his works to a woman. He needed some +one to suggest changes in process from time to time, and to watch waste. +He set down eight simple problems such as might arise any day in his +factory for the candidates to answer. Some of the women, all college +graduates, who had specialized in chemistry, could not answer a single +problem, and none showed that grip of the science which would enable +them to give other than rule of thumb solutions. He engaged a man. + +In answering the questionnaire which the New York Bureau of Occupations +sent to one hundred and twenty-five industrial plants, the manager in +almost every case replied, in regard to the possibility of employing +women in such positions as research or control chemists, that applicants +were "badly prepared." As hand workers, too, women are handicapped by +lack of knowledge of machinery. In this tool age, high school girls are +cut off from technical education, although they are destined to carry on +in large measure our skilled trades. I am told that in Germany many +factories had to close because only women were available as managers, +and they had not been fitted by business and technical schools for +the task. + +If women individually are looking for a soft place, if they are afraid, +as one manager expressed it, "to put on overalls and go into a vat," +even when their country is so in need of their service, it is futile for +them to ask collectively for equal opportunity and equal pay; if they +individually fail to prepare as for a life work, regarding themselves as +but temporarily in business or a profession, their collective demand +upon the world for a fair field and no favor will be as ineffective as +illogical. + +The doors stand wide open. It rests with women themselves as to whether +they shall enter in. + +To the steady appeals of the employment bureaus, backed by the stern +facts of life, the colleges are yielding. On examination I found that +curricula are already being modified. None but the sorriest pessimist +could doubt the nature of the final outcome, on realizing the pooling of +brains which is going on in such associations as the Intercollegiate +Bureau of Occupations and the League for Business Opportunities. They +work to the end of having young women not only soundly prepared for the +new openings, but sensitive to the demands of a world set towards +stern duty. + +Not only is there call for a pooling of brains to look after the timid +and unready, but there is need of combination to open the gates for the +prepared and brave. Few who cheered the Red Cross nurses as they made +their stirring march on Fifth Avenue, knew that those devoted women +would, on entering the Military Nurse Corps, find themselves the only +nurses among the Allies without a position of honor. The humiliation to +our nurses in placing them below the orderlies in the hospitals is not +only a blow to their esprit de corps, but a definite handicap to their +efficiency. A nurse who was at the head of the nursing staff in a state +hospital wrote from the front: "There is one thing the Nursing Committee +needs to work for, and work hard, too, and that is, to make for nurses +the rank of lieutenant. The Canadians have it, why not the Americans? +You will find that it will make a tremendous difference. You see, there +are no officers in our nursing personnel. One of our staff says we are +the hired extras! It is really a great mistake." Uncle Sam may merely be +waiting for a concentrated drive of public opinion against his tardy +representatives. + +[Illustration: Down the street they come, beginning their pilgrimage of +alleviation and succor on the battlefields of France.] + +And why should it be necessary to urge that while scores of young men +are dashing to death in endeavors to learn to fly, there are women +unmobilized who know how to soar aloft in safety? They have never, it is +true, been submitted to laboratory tests in twirlings and twistings, but +they reach the zenith. Two carried off the records in long distance +flights, but both have been refused admission to the Flying Corps. Will +it need a campaign to secure for our army this efficient service? Must +women pool their brains to have Ruth Law spread her protecting wings +over our boys in France? + +To any one who realizes the significance of the military situation as it +stands, and who is cognizant of the contrast between Germany's use of +her entire people in her national effort, and the slow mobilization of +woman-power among the Allies and entire lack of anything worthy the name +of mobilization of the labor-power of women in the United States, there +will come a determination to bury every jealousy between woman and +woman, all prejudice in men, to cut red tape in government, with the one +object of combining all resources. + +The full power of our men must be thrown into military effort. And, +then, if as a nation we have brains to pool, we will not stand niggling, +but will throw women doctors in to render their service, grant to the +nurse corps what it needs to ensure efficiency, throw open the technical +schools to girls as well as to boys, modify the college course to meet +the facts of life. Each woman unprepared is a national handicap, each +prejudice blocking the use of woman-power is treachery to our cause. + +As to the final outcome of united thought and group action among women, +no one can doubt. Contacts will rub off angles, capable service will +break down sex prejudice and overcome government opposition. But there +is not time to wait for the slow development of "final outcomes." + +Women must pool their brains against their own shortcomings, and in +favor of their own ability to back up their country now and here. + + + + +IX + +"BUSINESS AS USUAL" + + +It is a platitude to say that America is the most extravagant nation on +earth. The whole world tells us so, and we do not deny it, being, +indeed, a bit proud of the fact. Who is there among us who does not +respond with sympathetic understanding to the defense of the bride +reprimanded for extravagance by her mother-in-law (women have +mothers-in-law), "John and I find we can do without the necessities of +life. It's the luxuries we must have." One of the obstacles to complete +mobilization of our country is extravagance. And at the center of this +national failing sits the American woman enthroned. + +Europe found it could not allow old-time luxury trades to go on, if the +war was to be won. "Business as usual" is not in harmony with victory. + +I remember the first time I heard the slogan, and how it carried me and +everyone else away. The Zeppelins had visited London the night before. +A house in Red Lion Mews was crushed down into its cellar, a heap of +ruins. Every pane of glass was shattered in the hospitals surrounding +Queen's Square, and ploughed deep, making a great basin in the center of +the grass, lay the remnants of the bomb that had buried itself in the +heart of England. The shops along Theobald's Road were wrecked, but in +the heaps of broken glass in each show window were improvised signs such +as, "Don't sympathize with us, buy something." The sign which was +displayed oftenest read, "Business as usual." + +The first I noticed was in the window of a print shop, the owner a +woman. I talked to her through the frame of the shattered glass. She +looked very pale and her face was cut, but she and everyone else was +calm. And no one was doing business as usual more composedly than a wee +tot trudging along to school with a nasty scratch from a glass splinter +on her chubby cheek. + +"Business as usual" expressed the fine spirit, the courage, the +determination of a people. As the sporting motto of an indomitable race, +it was very splendid. But war is not a sport, it is a cold, hard +science, demanding every energy of the nation for its successful +pursuit. In proportion as our indulgence in luxury has been greater +than that of any European nation, our challenge to every business must +be the more insistent. There must be a straight answer to two questions: +Does this enterprise render direct war service, or, if not, is it +essential to the well-being of our citizens? + +But the discipline will not come from the gods. Nor will our government +readily turn taskmaster. The effort must come largely as +self-discipline, growing into group determination to win the war and the +conviction that it is impossible to achieve victory and conserve the +virility of our people, if any considerable part of the community +devotes its time, energy and money to creating useless things. A nation +can make good in this cataclysm only if it centers its whole power on +the two objects in view: military victory, and husbanding of life and +resources at home. + +Let me hasten to add that the act of creating a thing does not include +only the processes of industry. The act of buying is creative. The riot +of luxury trades in the United States will not end so long as the +American woman remains a steady buyer of luxuries. The mobilization of +women as workers is no more essential to the triumph of our cause, than +the mobilization of women for thrift. The beginning and end of saving +in America rests almost entirely in the hands of women. They are the +buyers in the working class and in the professional class. Among the +wealthy they set the standard of living. + +Practically every appeal for thrift has been addressed to the rich. I am +not referring to the supply of channels into which to pour savings, but +to appeals to make the economies which will furnish the means to buy +stamps or bonds. Those appeals are addressed almost wholly to the +well-to-do, as for example, suggestions as to reducing courses at dinner +or cutting out "that fourth meal." + +Self-denial, no doubt, is supposed to be good for the millionaire soul, +but to such it is chiefly recommended, I think, as an example sure of +imitation. What the rich do, other women will follow, is the idea. But +the steady insistence that we fight in this war for democracy has put +into the minds of the people very definite demands for independence and +for freedom. + +In such a democratic world the newly adopted habits of the wealthy will +not prove widely convincing. Economy needs other than an +aristocratic stimulus. + +[Illustration: How can business be "as usual" when in Paris there are +about 1800 of these small workshops where a woman dips Bengal Fire and +grenades into a bath of paraffin!] + +I do not mean to under-estimate the value of economy in the well-to-do +class. There is no doubt that shop windows on Fifth Avenue are a severe +commentary upon our present intelligence and earnestness of purpose. No +one, I think, would deny that it would be a service if the woman of +fashion ceased to drape fur here, there and everywhere on her gowns +except where she might really need the thick pelt to keep her warm, and +instead saved the price of the garment which serves no purpose but that +of display, and gave the money in Liberty Bonds to buy a fur-lined coat +for some soldier, or food for a starving baby abroad. And overburdened +as the railways are with freight and ordinary passenger traffic, I am +sure the general public will not fail to appreciate to the full a +self-denial which leads patrons of private cars, Pullman and dining +coaches to abandon their self-indulgence. + +Undoubtedly economy among the rich is of value. I presume few would +gainsay that it would have been well for America if the use of private +automobiles had long since ceased, and the labor and plants used in +their making turned to manufacturing much-needed trucks and ambulances. +But while not inclined to belittle the work of any possible saving and +self-sacrifice on the part of those of wealth, it seems to me that the +most fruitful field for war economy lies among simple people. Thrift +waits for democratization. + +We of limited means hug some of the most extravagant of habits. The +average working-class family enjoys none of the fruits of coöperation We +keep each to our isolated family group, while the richer a person is the +more does she gather under her roof representatives of other families. +Her cook may come from the Berri family, the waitress may be an +Andersen, the nurse an O'Hara. + +The poor might well practice the economy of fellowship. + +The better-off live in apartment houses where the economy of central +heating is practised, while the majority of the poor occupy tenements +where the extravagance of the individual stove is indulged in. The +saving of coal is urged, but the authorities do not seek to secure for +the poor the comfort of the true method of fuel saving. + +The richer a family is, the more it saves by the use of skilled service. +The poor, clinging to their prejudices and refusing to trust one +another, do not profit by coöperative buying, or by central kitchens run +by experts. Money is wasted by amateurish selection of food and +clothing, and nutritive values are squandered by poor cooking. + +Unfortunately Uncle Sam does not suggest how many War Saving Stamps +could be bought as a result of economy along these lines. + +The woman with the pay envelope may democratize thrift. She knows how +hard it is to earn money, and has learned to make her wages reach a long +way. Then, too, she has it brought home to her each pay day that health +is capital. She finds that it is economy to keep well, for lost time +brings a light pay envelope. Every woman who keeps herself in condition +is making a war saving. There has been no propaganda as yet appealing to +women to value dress according to durability and comfort rather than +according to its prettiness, to bow to no fashion which means the +lessening of power. To corset herself as fashion dictates, to prop +herself on high heels, means to a woman just so much lost efficiency, +and even the most thoughtless, if appealed to for national saving, might +learn to turn by preference in dress, in habits, in recreation, to the +simple things. + +The Japanese, I am told, make a ceremony of going out from the city to +enjoy the beauties of a moonlight night. We go to a stuffy theatre and +applaud a night "set." Nature gives her children the one, and the +producer charges his patrons for the other. A propaganda of democratic +war economy would teach us to delight in the beauties of nature. + +In making the change from business as usual to economy, Europe suffered +hardship, because although the retrenchments suggested were fairly +democratic it had not created channels into which savings might be +thrown with certainty of their flowing on to safe expenditures. Europe +was not ready with its great thrift schemes, nor had the adjustments +been made which would enable a shop to turn out a needed uniform, let us +say, in place of a useless dress. + +Definite use of savings has been provided for in the United States. The +government needs goods of every kind to make our military effort +successful. Camps must be built for training the soldiers, uniforms, +guns and ammunition supplied. Transportation on land and sea is called +for. The government needs money to carry on the industries essential to +winning the war. + +If a plucky girl who works in a button factory refuses to buy an +ornament which she at first thought of getting to decorate her belt, and +puts that twenty-five cents into a War Saving Stamp, all in the spirit +of backing up her man at the front, she will not find herself thrown +out of employment; instead, while demands for unnecessary ornamental +fastenings will gradually cease, she will be kept busy on +government orders. + +Profiting by the errors of those nations who had to blaze out new paths, +the United States knit into law, a few months after the declaration of +war, not only the quick drafting of its man-power for military service, +but methods of absorbing the people's savings. If we neither waste nor +hoard, we will not suffer as did Europe from wide-spread unemployment. +There is more work to be done than our available labor-power can meet. + +There is nothing to fear from the curtailment of luxury; our danger lies +in lack of a sound definition of extravagance. Uncle Sam could get more +by appeals to simple folk than by homilies preached to the rich. The +Great War is a conflict between the ideals of the peoples. 'Tis a +people's war, and with women as half the people. The savings made to +support the war must needs, then, be made by the people, for the people. + +There has been no compelling propaganda to that end. The suggestion of +mere "cutting down" may be a valuable goal to set for the well-to-do, +but it is not a mark to be hit by those already down to bed rock. The +only saving possible to those living on narrow margins is by +coöperation, civil or state. + +It is a mad extravagance, for instance, to kill with autos children at +play in the streets. A saving of life could easily be achieved through +group action, by securing children's attendants, by opening play-grounds +on the roofs of churches and public buildings, by shutting off streets +dedicated to the sacred right of children to play. This would be a war +saving touching the heart and the enthusiasm of the people. + +Central municipal heating is not a wild dream, but a recognized economy +in many places. Municipal kitchens are not vague surmisings, but facts +achieved in the towns of Europe. They are forms of war thrift. In +America no such converting examples of economy are as yet given, and not +an appeal has been made to women to save through solidarity. + +Uncle Sam has been commendably quick and wise in offering a reservoir to +hold the tiny savings, but slow in starting a democratic propaganda +suggesting ways of saving the pennies. + +If business as usual is a poor motto, so is life as usual, habits as +usual. + + + + +X + +"AS MOTHER USED TO DO" + + +Man's admiration for things as mother used to do them is as great an +obstacle as business as usual in the path of winning the war and +husbanding the race. The glamour surrounding the economic feats of +mother in the past hides the shortcomings of today. + +I once saw one of her old fortresses, a manor home where in bygone days +she had reigned supreme. In the court yard was the smoke house where she +cured meat and fish. In the cellar were the caldrons and vats where long +ago she tried tallow and brewed beer. And there were all the utensils +for dealing with flax. In the garret I saw the spindles for spinning +cotton and wool, and the hand looms for weaving the homespun. In her +day, mother was a great creator of wealth. + +But then an economic earthquake came. Foundations were shaken, the roof +was torn off her domestic workshop. Steam and machinery, like cyclones, +carried away her industries, and nothing was left to her but odds and +ends of occupations. + +Toiling in the family circle from the days of the cave dwellers, mother +had become so intimately associated in the tribal mind with the +hearthstone that the home was called her sphere. Around this segregation +accumulated accretions of opinion, layer on layer emanating from the +mind of her mate. Let us call the accretions the Adamistic Theory. Its +authors happened to be the government and could use the public treasury +in furtherance of publicity for their ideas set forth in hieroglyphics +cut in stone, or written in plain English and printed on the front page +of an American daily. + +One of the few occupations left to mother after the disruption of her +sphere at the end of the eighteenth century was the preparation of food. +In the minds of men, food, from its seed sowing up to its mastication, +has always been associated with woman. Mention food and the average man +thinks of mother. That is the Adam in him. And so, quite naturally, one +must first consider this relation of women to food in the +Adamistic Theory. + +[Illustration: Countess de Berkaim and her canteen in the Gare de St. +Lazarre, Paris.] + +When the world under war conditions asked to be fed, Adam, running true +to his theory, pointed to mother as the source of supply, and declared +with an emphasis that came of implicit faith, that the universe need +want for nothing, if each woman would eliminate waste in her kitchen and +become a voluntary and obedient reflector of the decisions of state and +national food authorities. This solution presupposed a highly developed +sense of community devotion in women running hand in hand with entire +lack of gift for community action. Woman, it was expected, would display +more than her proverbial lack of logic by embracing with enthusiasm +state direction and at the same time remain an exemplar of +individualistic performance. The Adamistic scheme seems still further to +demand for its smooth working that the feminine group show +self-abnegation and agree that it is not itself suited to reason out +general plans. + +It is within the range of possibility, however, that no comprehensive +scheme of food conservation or effective saving in any line can be +imposed on women without consulting them. The negro who agreed "dat de +colored folk should keep in dar places," touched a fundamental note in +human nature, over-running sex as well as racial boundaries, when he +added, "and de colored folk must do de placin'." It might seem to run +counter to this bit of wisdom for women to be told that the welfare of +the world depends upon them, and then for no woman to be given +administrative power to mobilize the group. + +But the contest between man's devotion to the habits of his ancestry in +the female line, and the ideas of his very living women folk, is as +trying to him as it is interesting to the outside observer. The +conflicting forces illustrate a universal fact. It is always true that +the ruling class, when a discipline and a sacrifice are recognized as +necessary, endeavors to make it appear that the new obligation should be +shouldered by the less powerful. For instance, to take an illustration +quite outside the domestic circle, when America first became convinced +that military preparation was incumbent upon us, the ruling class would +scarcely discuss conscription, much less adopt universal service. That +is, it vetoed self-discipline. In many States, laws were passed putting +off upon children in the schools the training which the voting adults +knew the nation needed. + +In the same way, when food falls short and the victualing of the world +becomes a pressing duty, the governing class adopts a thesis that a +politically less-favored group can, by saving in small and painful ways, +accumulate the extra food necessary to keep the world from starving. +The ruling class seeks cover in primitive ideas, accuses Eve of +introducing sin into the world, and calls upon her to mend her +wasteful ways. + +Men, of course, know intellectually that much food is a factory product +in these days, but emotionally they have a picture of mother, still +supplying the family in a complete, secret, and silent manner. + +This Adamistic emotion takes command at the crisis, for when human +beings are suddenly faced with a new and agitating situation, primitive +ideas seize them. Mother, it is true, did create the goods for immediate +consumption, and so the sons of Adam, in a spirit of admiration, doffing +their helmets, so to speak, to the primitive woman, turn in this time of +stress and call confidently upon Eve's daughters to create and save. The +confidence is touching, but perhaps the feminine reaction will not be, +and perchance ought not to be just such as Adam expects. + +Women have passed in aspiration, and to some extent in action, out of +the ultra-individualistic stage of civilization. + +The food propaganda reflects the hiatus in Adam's thought. I have looked +over hundreds of publications issued by the agricultural departments +and colleges of the various States. They tell housewives what to "put +into the garbage pail," what to "keep out of the garbage pail," what to +substitute for wheat, how to make soap, but, with a single exception, +not a word issued suggests to women any saving through group action. + +This exception, which stood out as a beacon light in an ocean of +literature worthy of the Stone Age, was a small pamphlet issued by the +Michigan Agricultural College on luncheons in rural schools. Sound +doctrine was preached on the need of the children for substantial and +warm noon meals, and the comparative ease and economy with which such +luncheons could be provided at the school house. Children can of course +be better and more cheaply fed as a group than as isolated units +supplied with a cold home-prepared lunch box. And yet with the whole +machinery of the state in his hands, Adam's commissions, backed by the +people's money, goad mother on to isolated endeavor. She plants and +weeds and harvests. She dries and cans, preserves and pickles. Then she +calculates and perchance finds that her finished product is not always +of the best and has often cost more than if purchased in the +open market. + +It may be the truest devotion to our Allies to challenge the +individualistic rôle recommended by Adam to mother, for it will hinder, +not help, the feeding of the world to put women back under eighteenth +century conditions. Food is short and expensive because labor is short. +And even when the harvest is ripe, the saving of food cannot be set as a +separate and commendable goal, and the choice as to where labor shall be +expended as negligible. It is a prejudiced devotion to mother and her +ways which leads Adam in his food pamphlets to advise that a woman shall +sit in her chimney corner and spend time peeling a peach "very thin," +when hundreds of bushels of peaches rot in the orchards for lack of +hands to pick them. + +Just how wide Adam's Eve has opened the gate of Eden and looked out into +the big world is not entirely clear, but probably wide enough to glimpse +the fact that all the advice Adam has recently given to her runs counter +to man's method of achievement. Men have preached to one another for a +hundred years and more and practiced so successfully the concentration +in industry of unlimited machinery with a few hands, that even mother +knows some of the truths in regard to the creation of wealth in the +business world, and she is probably not incapable of drawing a +conclusion from her own experience in the transfer of work from the +home to the factory. + +If they are city dwellers, women have seen bread and preserves +transferred; if farm dwellers, they have seen the curing of meat and +fish transferred, the making of butter and cheese. They know that +because of this transfer the home is cleaner and quieter, more people +better fed and clothed, and the hours of the factory worker made shorter +than those "mother used to work." With half an eye women cannot fail to +note that the labor which used to be occupied in the home in +interminable hours of spinning, baking and preserving, has come to +occupy itself for regulated periods in the school, in business, in +factory or cannery. And lo, Eve finds herself with a pay envelope able +to help support the quieter, cleaner home! + +All this is a commonplace to the business man, who knows that the +evolution has gone so far that ten percent of the married women of +America are in gainful pursuits, and that capital ventured on apartment +hotels brings a tempting return. + +But the Adamistic theory is based on the dream that women are +contentedly and efficiently conducting in their flats many occupations, +and longing to receive back into the life around the gas-log all those +industries which in years gone by were drawn from the fireside and +established as money making projects in mill or work-shop. And so Adam +addresses an exhortation to his Eve: "Don't buy bread, bake it; don't +buy flour, grind your own; don't buy soap, make it; don't buy canned, +preserved, or dried food, carry on the processes yourself; don't buy +fruits and vegetables, raise them." + +Not a doubt seems to exist in Adam's mind as to the efficiency of +functioning woman-power in this way. According to the Adamistic theory, +work as mother used to do it is unqualifiedly perfect. This flattering +faith is naturally balm to women's hearts, and yet there are skeptics +among them. When quite by themselves women speculate as to how much of +the fruit and vegetables now put up in the home will "work." + +They smile when the hope is expressed that the quality will rise above +the old-time domestic standard. The home of the past was a beehive in +which women drudged, and little children were weary toilers, and the +result was not of a high grade. Statistics have shown that seventy-five +percent of the home-made bread of America was a poor product. I lived as +a child in the days of home-made bread. Once in so often the batch of +bread "went sour," and there seemed to be an unfailing supply of stale +bread which "must be eaten first." Those who cry out against a city of +bakers' bread, have never lived in a country of the home-made loaf. It +is the Adamistic philosophy, so complimentary to Eve, that leads us to +expect that all housewives can turn out a product as good as that of an +expert who has specialized to the one end of making bread, and who is +supplied with expensive equipment beyond the reach of the individual to +possess. But there are rebellious consumers who point out that the baker +is under the law, while the housewife is a law unto herself. Against the +baker's shortcomings such brave doubters assure us we have redress, we +can refuse to patronize him; against the housewife there is no appeal, +her family must swallow her product to the detriment of digestion. + +It may be the brutal truth, taking bread as the index, that only a +quarter of the processes carried on in the home turn out satisfactorily, +while of the other three-quarters, a just verdict may show that mother +gets a "little too much lye" in the soap, cooks the preserves a "little +too hard," "candies the fruit just a little bit," and grinds the flour +in the mill "not quite fine enough." + +But perhaps even more than the quality of the product does the question +of the economical disposition of labor-power agitate some women. They +are asking, since labor is very scarce, whether the extreme +individualistic direction of their labor-power is permissible. The vast +majority of American homes are without servants. In those homes are the +women working such short hours that they can, without dropping important +obligations, take over preserving, canning, dehydrating, the making of +bread, soap, and butter substitute? Has the tenement-house dweller +accommodation suitable for introducing these industrial processes into +her home? Would the woman in the small ménage in the country be wise in +cutting down time given, for instance, to the care of her baby and to +reading to the older children, and using the precious moments +laboriously to grind wheat to flour? My observation convinces me that +conscientious housewives in servantless or one-servant households, with +work adjusted to a given end, with relative values already determined +upon, are not prepared by acceptance of the Adamistic theory to return +to primitive occupations. + +But even if business and home life could respond to the change without +strain, even if both could easily turn back on the road they have come +during the last hundred years, commerce yielding up and the home +re-adopting certain occupations, we should carefully weigh the economic +value of a reversion to primitive methods. + +The Adamistic attitude is influenced, perhaps unconsciously but no less +certainly, by the fact that the housewife is an unpaid worker. If an +unpaid person volunteers to do a thing, it is readily assumed that the +particular effort is worth while. "We get the labor for nothing" puts to +rout all thought of valuation. No doubt Adam will have to give over +thinking in this loose way. Labor-power, whether it is paid for or not, +must be used wisely or we shall not be able to maintain the structure of +our civilization. + +Then, too, the Adamistic theory weighs and values the housewife's time +as little as it questions the quality of the home product. Any careful +reader of the various "Hints to Housewives" which have appeared, will +note that the "simplifying of meals" recommended would require nearly +double the time to prepare. The simplification takes into consideration +only the question of food substitutions, price and waste. Mother is +supposed to be wholly or largely unemployed and longing for unpaid +toil. Should any housewife conscientiously follow the advice given her +by state and municipal authorities she would be the drudge at the center +of a home quite medieval in development. + +Let us take a concrete example:--In a recently published and widely +applauded cookbook put out by a whole committee of Adamistic +philosophers, it is stated that the object of the book is to give +practical hints as to the various ways in which "economies can be +effected and waste saved;" and yet no saving of the woman's time, nerves +and muscles is referred to from cover to cover. The housewife is told, +for instance, to "insist upon getting the meat trimmings." The fat "can +be rendered." And then follows the process in soap-making. Mother is to +place the scraps of fat on the back of the stove. If she "watches it +carefully" and does not allow it to get hot enough to smoke there will +be no odor. No doubt if she removes her watchful eye and turns to bathe +her baby, her tenement will reek with smoking fat. She is to pursue this +trying of fat and nerves day by day until she has six pounds of grease. +Next, she is to "stir it well," cool it, melt it again; she is then to +pour in the lye, "slowly stirring all the time." Add ammonia. Then +"stir the mixture constantly for twenty minutes or half an hour." + +In contrast to all this primeval elaboration is the simple, common-sense +rule: Do not buy the trimmings, make the butcher trim meat before +weighing, insist that soap-making shall not be brought back to defile +the home, but remain where it belongs, a trade in which the workers can +be protected by law, and its malodorousness brought under regulation. + +In the same spirit the Adamistic suggestion to Eve to save coal by a +"heatless day" is met by the cold challenge of the riotous extravagance +of cooking in twelve separate tenements, twelve separate potatoes, on +twelve separate fires. + +The Adamistic theory, through its emphasis on the relation of food to +Eve, and the almost religious necessity of its manipulation at the altar +of the home cook-stove, has drawn thought away from the nutritive side +of what we eat. While the child in the streets is tossing about such +words as calories and carbohydrates with a glibness that comes of much +hearing, physiology and food values are destined to remain as far away +as ever from the average family breakfast table. Segregating a sex in +the home, it is true, centralizes it in a given place, but it does not +necessarily train the individual to function efficiently. Mother, as she +"used to do," cooks by rule of thumb; in fact, how could she do +otherwise, since she must keep one eye on her approving Adam while the +other eye glances at the oven. The Adamistic theory requires +individualistic action, and disapproves specialization in Eve. + +The theory also demands economic dependence in the home builder. +Mother's labor is not her own, she lives under the truck system, so to +speak. She is paid in kind for her work. Influenced by the Adamistic +theory, the human animal is the only species in which sex and economic +relations are closely linked, the only one in which the female depends +upon the male for sustenance. Mother must give personal service to those +about her, and in return the law ensures her keep according to the +station of her husband, that is, not according to her ability or +usefulness, but according to the man's earning capacity. + +The close association of mother with home in the philosophy of her mate, +has circumscribed her most natural and modest attempts at relaxation. +Mother's holiday is a thing to draw tears from those who contemplate it. +The summer outing means carrying the family from one spot to another, +and making the best of new surroundings for the old group. The "day off" +means a concentration of the usual toil into a few hours, followed by a +hazy passing show that she is too weary to enjoy. The kindly farmer +takes his wife this year to the county fair. She's up at four to "get +on" with the work. She serves breakfast, gives the children an extra +polish in honor of the day, puts on the clean frocks and suits with an +admonition "not to get all mussed up" before the start. The farmer +cheerily counsels haste in order that "we may have a good long day of +it." He does not say what "it" is, but the wife knows. At last the house +is ready to be left, and the wife and her brood are ready to settle down +in the farm wagon. + +The fair grounds are reached. Adam has prepared the setting. It has no +relation to mother's needs. It was a most thrilling innovation when in +the summer of 1914 the Women's Political Union first set up big tents at +county fairs, fitted with comfortable chairs for mother, and cots and +toys, nurses and companions for the children. The farmer's wife for the +first time was relieved of care, and could go off to see the sights with +her mind at rest, if she desired anything more active than rocking +lazily with the delicious sensation of having nothing to do. + +Women must not blame Adam for lack of thoughtfulness. He cannot put +himself in mother's place. She must do her own thinking or let women who +are capable of thought do it for her. + +Men are relieved when mother is independent and happy. The farmer +approved the crèche tent at the county fairs. It convinced him that +women have ideas to contribute to the well-being of the community. The +venture proved the greatest of vote getters for the suffrage referendum. + +In fact, men themselves are the chief opponents of the Adamistic theory +to-day. The majority want women to organize the home and it is only a +small minority who place obstacles in the way of the wider functioning +of women. It is Eve herself who likes to exaggerate the necessity of her +personal service. I have seen many a primitive housewife grow hot at the +suggestion that her methods need modifying. It seemed like severing the +silken cords by which she held her mate, to challenge her pumpkin pie. + +But women are slowly overcoming Eve. Take the item of the care of +children in city parks. The old way is for fifty women to look after +fifty separate children, and thus waste the time of some thirty of them +in keeping fifty miserable children in segregation. The new way, now +successfully initiated, is to form play groups of happy children under +the leadership of capable young women trained for such work. + +Salvaging New York City's food waste was a very splendid bit of +coöperative action on the part of women. Mrs. William H. Lough of the +Women's University Club found on investigation that thousands of tons of +good food are lost by a condemnation, necessarily rough and ready, by +the Board of Health. She secured permission to have the sound and +unsound fruits and vegetables separated and with a large committee of +women saved the food for consumption by the community by dehydrating and +other preserving processes. + +This was not as mother used to do. + +Mother's ways are being investigated and discarded the whole world +round. At last accounts half the population of Hamburg was being fed +through municipal kitchens and in Great Britain an order has been issued +by Lord Rhondda, the Food Controller, authorizing local authorities to +open kitchens as food distributing centers. The central government is to +bear twenty-five percent of the cost of equipment and lend another +twenty-five percent to start the enterprise. + +Mother's cook stove cannot bear the strain of war economies. + +Dropping their old segregation, women are going forth in fellowship with +men to meet in new ways the pressing problems of a new world. + + + + +XI + +A LAND ARMY + + +Great Britain, France and Germany have mobilized a land army of women; +will the United States do less? Not if the farmer can be brought to have +as much faith in American women as the women have in themselves. And why +should they not have faith; the farm has already tested them out, and +they have not been found wanting. In face of this fine accomplishment +the minds of some men still entertain doubt, or worse, obliviousness, to +the possible contribution of women to land service. + +The farmer knows his need and has made clear statement of the national +dilemma in the form of a memorial to the President of the United States. +In part, it is as follows: + +"If food is to win the war, as we are assured on every side, the farmers +of America must produce more food in 1918 than they did in 1917. Under +existing conditions we cannot equal the production of 1917, much less +surpass it, and this for reasons over which the farmers have no control. + +"The chief causes which will inevitably bring about a smaller crop next +year, unless promptly removed by national action, are six in number, of +which the first is the shortage of farm labor. + +"Since the war began in 1914 and before the first draft was made there +is reason to believe that more farm workers had left farms than there +are men in our army and navy together. Those men were drawn away by the +high wages paid in munition plants and other war industries, and their +places remain unfilled. In spite of the new classification, future +drafts will still further reduce the farm labor supply." + +With a million and a half men drawn out of the country and ten billion +dollars to be expended on war material, making every ammunition factory +a labor magnet, it seems like the smooth deceptions of prestidigitation +to answer the cry of the farmer with suggestion that men rejected by the +draft or high school boys be paroled to meet the exigency. The farm +can't be run with decrepit men or larking boys, nor the war won with +less than its full quota of soldiers. Legislators, government officials +and farm associations by sudden shifting of labor battalions cannot +camouflage the fact that the front line trenches of the fighting army +and labor force are undermanned. + +Women can and will be the substitutes if the experiments already made +are signs of the times. + +Groups of women from colleges and seasonal trades have ploughed and +harrowed, sowed and planted, weeded and cultivated, mowed and harvested, +milked and churned, at Vassar, Bryn Mawr and Mount Holyoke, at Newburg +and Milton, at Bedford Hills and Mahwah. It has been demonstrated that +our girls from college and city trade can do farm work, and do it with a +will. And still better, at the end of the season their health wins high +approval from the doctors and their work golden opinions from +the farmers. + +Twelve crusaders were chosen from the thirty-three students who +volunteered for dangerous service during a summer vacation on the Vassar +College farm. The twelve ventured out on a new enterprise that meant +aching muscles, sunburn and blisters, but not one of the twelve "ever +lost a day" in their eight hours at hard labor, beginning at four-thirty +each morning for eight weeks during one of our hottest summers. They +ploughed with horses, they ploughed with tractors, they sowed the seed, +they thinned and weeded the plants, they reaped, they raked, they +pitched the hay, they did fencing and milking. The Vassar farm had +bumper crops on its seven hundred and forty acres, and its +superintendent, Mr. Louis P. Gillespie, said, "A very great amount of +the work necessary for the large production was done by our students. +They hoed and cultivated sixteen acres of field corn, ten acres of +ensilage corn, five acres of beans, five acres of potatoes; carried +sheaves of rye and wheat to the shocks and shocked them; and two of the +students milked seven cows at each milking time. In the garden they laid +out a strawberry bed of two thousand plants, helped to plant corn and +beans, picked beans and other vegetables. They took great interest in +the work and did the work just as well as the average man and made good +far beyond the most sanguine expectations." + +At first the students were paid twenty-five cents an hour, the same rate +as the male farm hands. The men objected, saying that the young women +were beginners, but by the end of the summer the critics realized that +"brains tell" and said the girls were worth the higher wage, though they +had only been getting, in order to appease the masculine prejudice, +seventeen and a half cents an hour. There is no pleasing some people! If +women are paid less, they are unfair competitors, if they are paid +equally they are being petted--in short, fair competitors. + +Mt. Holyoke and Bryn Mawr have made experiments, and, like Vassar, +demonstrated not only that women can, and that satisfactorily, work on +the land, but that they will, and that cheerfully. The groups were happy +and they comprehended that they were doing transcendently important +work, were rendering a patriotic service by filling up the places left +vacant by the drafted men. + +The Women's Agricultural Camp, known popularly as the "Bedford Unit," +proved an experiment rich in practical suggestion. Barnard students, +graduates of the Manhattan Trade School, and girls from seasonal trades +formed the backbone of the group. They were housed in an old farmhouse, +chaperoned by one of the Barnard professors, fed by student dietitians +from the Household Arts Department of Teachers College, transported from +farm to farm by seven chauffeurs, and coached in the arts of Ceres by an +agricultural expert. The "day laborers" as well as the experts were +all women. + +[Illustration: An agricultural unit, in the uniform approved by the Woman's +Land Army of America.] + +In founding the camp Mrs. Charles W. Short, Jr., had three definite +ideas in mind. First, she was convinced that young women could without +ill-effect on their health, and should as a patriotic service, do all +sorts of agricultural work. Second, that in the present crisis the +opening up of new land with women as farm managers is not called for, +but rather the supply of the labor-power on farms already under +cultivation is the need. Third, that the women laborers must, in groups, +have comfortable living conditions without being a burden on the +farmer's wife, must have adequate pay, and must have regulated hours +of work. + +With these sound ideas as its foundation the camp opened at Mt. Kisco, +backed by the Committee on Agriculture of the Mayor's Committee of Women +on National Defense of New York City, under the chairmanship of Virginia +Gildersleeve, Dean of Barnard College. + +At its greatest enrolment the unit had seventy-three members. When the +prejudice of the fanners was overcome, the demand for workers was +greater than the camp could supply. Practically the same processes were +carried through as at Vassar, and the verdict of the farmer on his new +helpers was that "while less strong than men, they more than made up for +this by superior conscientiousness and quickness." Proof of the +genuineness of his estimate was shown in his willingness to pay the +management of the camp the regulation two dollars for an eight hour +working day. And it indicated entire satisfaction with the experiment, +rather than abstract faith in woman, that each farmer anxiously urged +the captain of the group at the end of his first trial to "please bring +the same young ladies tomorrow." He was sure no others so good existed. + +The unit plan seems a heaven-born solution of many of the knotty +problems of the farm. In the first place, the farmer gets cheerful and +handy helpers, and his over-worked wife does not find her domestic cares +added to in the hot summer season. The new hands house and feed +themselves. From the point of view of the worker, the advantage is that +her food at the camp is prepared by trained hands and the proverbial +farm isolation gives way to congenial companionship. + +These separate experiments growing out of the need of food production +and the shortage of labor have brought new blood to the farm, have +turned the college girl on vacation and, what is more important, being a +solution of an industrial problem, the unemployed in seasonal trades, +into recruits for an agricultural army. And by concentrating workers in +well-run camps there has been attracted to the land a higher order +of helper. + +One obstacle in the way of the immediate success of putting such women +on the land is a wholly mistaken idea in the minds of many persons of +influence in agricultural matters that the new labor can be diverted to +domestic work in the farm house. This view is urged in the following +letter to me from the head of one of our best agricultural colleges: +"The farm labor shortage is much more acute than is generally understood +and I have much confidence in the possibility of a great amount of +useful work in food production being done by women who are physically +strong enough and who can secure sufficient preliminary training to do +this with some degree of efficiency. Probably the larger measure of +service could be done by relieving women now on the farms of this State +from the double burden of indoor work and the attempt to assist in farm +operations and chores. If farm women would get satisfactory domestic +assistance within the house they could add much to the success of field +husbandry. Women who know farm conditions and who could largely take the +place of men in the management of outdoor affairs can accomplish much +more than will ever be possible by drafting city-bred women directly +into garden or other forms of field work." + +The opinions expressed in this letter are as generally held as they are +mistaken. In the first place, the theory that the country-bred woman in +America is stronger and healthier than the city-bred has long since been +exploded. The assumption cannot stand up under the facts. Statistics +show that the death rate in the United States is lower in city than in +farm communities, and if any added proof were needed to indicate that +the stamina of city populations overbalances the country it was +furnished by the draft records. Any group of college and Manhattan Trade +School girls could be pitted against a group of women from the farms and +win the laurels in staying powers. Nor must it be overlooked that we are +not dealing here with uncertainties; the mettle of the girls has +been proved. + +In any case the fact must be faced that these agricultural units will +not do domestic work. Nine-tenths of the farm houses in America are +without modern conveniences. The well-appointed barn may have running +water, but the house has not. To undertake work as a domestic helper on +the average farm is to step back into quite primitive conditions. The +farmer's wife can attract no one from city life, where so much +cooperation is enjoyed, to her extreme individualistic surroundings. + +A second obstacle to the employment of this new labor-force is due to +the government's failure to see the possibility of saving most valuable +labor-power and achieving an economic gain by dovetailing the idle +months of young women in industrial life into the rush time of +agriculture. + +One department suggests excusing farm labor from the draft, as if we had +already fulfilled our obligation in man-power to the battlefront of our +Allies. The United States Senate discusses bringing in coolie and +contract labor, as if we had not demonstrated our unfitness to deal with +less advanced peoples, and as if a republic could live comfortably with +a class of disfranchised workers. The Labor Department declares it will +mobilize for the farm an army of a million boys, as if the wise saw, +"boys will be boys," did not apply with peculiar sharpness of flavor to +the American vintage, God bless them, and as if it were not our plain +duty at this world crisis to spur up rather than check civilizing +agencies and keep our boys in school for the full term. + +Refusing to be in the least crushed by government neglect, far-seeing +women determined to organize widely and carefully their solution of the +farm-labor problem. To this end the Women's National Farm and Garden +Association, the Garden Clubs of America, the Young Women's Christian +Association, the Woman's Suffrage Party, the New York Women's University +Club, and the Committee of the Women's Agricultural Camp, met with +representatives of the Grange, of the Cornell Agricultural College, and +of the Farmingdale State School of Agriculture, and formed an advisory +council, the object of which is to "stimulate the formation of a Land +Army of Women to take the places on the farms of the men who are being +drafted for active service." This is to be on a nationwide scale. + +The Council has put lecturers in the Granges to bring to the farmer by +the spoken word and lantern slides the value of the labor of women, and +is appealing to colleges, seasonal trades and village communities to +form units for the Land Army. It is asking the coöperation of the labor +bureaus to act as media through which units may be placed where labor is +most needed. + +This mobilization of woman-power is not yet large or striking. The +effort is entirely civil. But all the more is it praiseworthy. It shows +on the part of women, clear-eyed recognition of facts as they exist and +vision as to the future. + +The mobilization of this fresh labor-power should of course be taken in +hand by the government. Not only that, it should be led by women as in +Great Britain and Germany. But the spirit in America today is the same +as in England the first year of the war,--a disposition to exclude women +from full service. + +But facts remain facts in spite of prejudice, and the Woman's Land Army, +with faith and enthusiasm in lieu of a national treasury, are +endeavoring to bring woman-power and the untilled fields together. The +proved achievement of the individual worker will win the employer, the +unit plan with its solution of housing conditions and dreary isolation +will overcome not only the opposition of the farmer's wife, but that of +the intelligent worker. When the seed time of the movement has been +lived through by anxious and inspired women, the government may step in +to reap the harvest of a nation's gratitude. + +The mobilization of woman-power on the farm is the need of the hour, and +the wise and devoted women who are trying to answer the need, deserve an +all-hail from the people of the United States and her Allies. + + + + +XII + +WOMAN'S PART IN SAVING CIVILIZATION + + +Men have played--all honor to them--the major part in the actual +conflict of the war. Women will mobilize for the major part of binding +up the wounds and conserving civilization. + +The spirit of the world might almost be supposed to have been looking +forward to this day and clearly seeing its needs, so well are women +being prepared to receive and carry steadily the burden which will be +laid on their shoulders. For three-quarters of a century schools and +colleges have given to women what they had to confer in the way of +discipline. Gainful pursuits were opened up to them, adding training in +ordered occupation and self-support. Lastly has come the Great War, with +its drill in sacrifice and economy, its larger opportunities to function +and achieve, its ideals of democracy which have directly and quickly led +to the political enfranchisement of women in countries widely separated. + +Fate has prepared women to share fully in the saving of civilization. + +Whether victory be ours in the immediate future, or whether the dangers +rising so clearly on the horizon develop into fresh alignments leading +to years of war, civilization stands in jeopardy. Political ideals and +ultimate social aims may remain intact, but the immediate, practical +maintenance of those standards of life which are necessary to ensure +strong and fruitful reactions are in danger of being swept away. + +We have been destroying the life, the wealth and beauty of the world. +The nobility of our aim in the war must not blind us to the awfulness +and the magnitude of the destruction. In the fighting forces there are +at least thirty-eight million men involved in international or civil +conflict. Over four million men have fallen, and three million have been +maimed for life. Disease has taken its toll of fighting strength and +economic power. In addition to all this human depletion, we have the +loss of life and the destruction of health and initiative in harried +peoples madly flying across their borders from invading armies. + +Starvation has swept across wide areas, and steady underfeeding rules in +every country in Europe and in the cities of America, letting loose +malnutrition, that hidden enemy whose ambushes are more serious than the +attacks of an open foe. The world is sick. + +And the world is poor. The nations have spent over a hundred billions on +the war, and that is but part of the wealth which has gone down in the +catastrophe. Thousands of square miles are plowed so deep with shot and +shell and trench that the fertile soil lies buried beneath unyielding +clay. Orchards and forests are gone. Villages are wiped out, cities are +but skeletons of themselves. In the face of all the need of +reconstruction we must admit, however much we would wish to cover the +fact,--the world is poor. + +[Illustration: A useful blending of Allied women. Miss Kathleen Burke +(Scotch) exhibiting the X-ray ambulance equipped by Mrs. Ayrlon +(English) and Madame Curie (French).] + +And still, as in no other war, the will to guard human welfare has +remained dominant. The country rose to a woman in most spirited fashion +to combat the plan to lower the standards of labor conditions in the +supposed interest of war needs. With but few exceptions the States have +strengthened their labor laws. In its summary the American Association +for Labor Legislation says: + +"Eleven States strengthened their child labor laws, by raising age +limits, extending restrictions to new employments, or shortening hours. +Texas passed a new general statute setting a fifteen-year minimum age +for factories and Vermont provided for regulations in conformity with +those of the Federal Child Labor Act. Kansas and New Hampshire +legislated on factory safeguards, Texas on fire escapes, New Jersey on +scaffolds, Montana on electrical apparatus, Delaware on sanitary +equipment, and West Virginia on mines. New Jersey forbade the +manufacture of articles of food or children's wear in tenements. + +"Workmen's compensation laws were enacted in Delaware, Idaho, New +Mexico, South Dakota, and Utah, making forty States and Territories +which now have such laws, in addition to the Federal Government's +compensation law, for its own half-million civilian employees. In more +than twenty additional States existing acts were amended, the changes +being marked by a tendency to extend the scope, shorten the working +period, and increase provision for medical care." + +The Great War, far from checking the movement for social welfare, has +quickened the public sense of responsibility. That fact opens the widest +field to women for work in which they are best prepared by nature +and training. + +Many keen thinkers are concerned over the question of population. One of +our most distinguished professors has thrown out a hint of a possibility +that considering the greater proportion of women to men some form of +plurality of wives may become necessary. The disturbed balance of the +sexes is a thing that will right itself in one generation. Need of +population will be best answered by efforts to salvage the race. The +United States loses each year five hundred thousand babies under twelve +months of age from preventable causes. An effort to save them would seem +more reasonable than a demand for more children to neglect. Life will be +so full of drive and interest, that the woman who has given no hostages +to fortune will find ample scope for her powers outside of motherhood. +The "old maid" of tomorrow will have a mission more honored and +important than was hers in the past. + +But whatever the conclusions as to the wisest method of building up +population, there is no doubt that government and individuals will make +strict valuation of the essentials and non-essentials in national life. +In our poverty we will test all things in the light of their benefit to +the race and hold fast that which is good. + +The opinions of women will weigh in this national accounting. There will +be no money to squander, and women to a unit will stand behind those men +who think a recreation field is of more value than a race track. It will +be the woman's view, there being but one choice, that it is better to +encourage fleetness and skill in boys and girls than in horses. If we +have just so much money to spend and the question arises as to whether +there shall be corner saloons or municipal kitchens, public sentiment, +made in good measure by women, will eschew the saloon. + +The things that lend themselves to the husbanding of the race will draw +as a magnet those who have borne the race. The tired world will need for +its rejuvenation a broadened and deepened medical science. Women are too +wise to permit sanitation and research to fall to a low level. On the +contrary, they will wish them to be more thorough. There will be economy +along the less essential lines to meet the cost. + +The flagging spirit needs the inspiration of art and music. To secure +them in the future, state and municipal effort will be demanded. Women +are born economizers. They have been trained to pinch each penny. With +their advent into political life, roads and public buildings will cost +less. Through careful saving, funds will be made available for the +things of the spirit. + +One of the men conductors on the New York street railways somewhat +reproachfully remarked to me, "No one ever came to look at the +recreation room and restaurant at the car barns until women were taken +on. Men don't seem to count." Is the reproach deserved? Have women been +narrow in sympathy? Perhaps we have assumed that men can look out for +themselves. They could, but in private life they never do. Women have to +do the mothering. A trade-unionist is ready enough to regulate wages and +hours, but he gives not a thought to surroundings in factory +and workshop. + +An act of protection generally starts with solicitude about a woman or +child. Factory legislation took root in their needs. There was no mercy +for the man worker. His only chance of getting better conditions was +when women entered his occupation, and the regulation meant for her +benefit indirectly served his interest. + +"Men suffer more than women in certain dangerous trades, but I did not +suppose you were generous enough to care anything about them," came in +answer to an inquiry at a labor conference at the end of a most +admirable paper on women in dangerous trades, given by one of the +doctors in the New York City Department of Health. He was speaking to an +audience of working women. I doubt if his hearers had given a thought to +men workers. + +Perhaps this is natural, since there has been going on at the same time +with the development of factory legislation in America a strong +propaganda directed especially at political freedom for women. We have +been laying stress on the wrongs of woman and demanding very +persistently and convincingly her rights. The industrial needs and +rights of the man have been overlooked. + +With increasing numbers of women entering the industrial world, with +ever widening extension of the vote to women, and the consequent +quickening of public responsibility, together with the recent experience +of Europe demonstrating the importance of care for all workers, both men +and women, there is ground for hope that even the United States, where +protective legislation is so retarded in development, will enter upon +wide and fundamental plans for conservation of all our human resources. + +Protection of the worker, housing conditions, the feeding of factory +employees and school children, play grounds and recreation centers, will +challenge the world for first consideration. These are the social +processes which command most surely the hearts and minds of women. The +churning which the war has given humanity has roused in women a +realization that upon them rests at least half the burden of saving +civilization from wreck. Here is the world, with such and such needs +for food, clothing, shelter, with such and such needs for sanitation, +hospitals, and above all, for education, for science, for the arts, if +it is not to fall back into the conditions of the Middle Ages. How can +women aid in making secure the national position? Certainly not by +idleness, inefficiency, an easy policy of laissez faire. They must +labor, economize, and pool their brains. + +Women can save civilization only by the broadest coöperative action, by +daring to think, by daring to be themselves. The world is entering an +heroic age calling for heroic women. + + + + +APPENDIX + +DOCUMENTS USED IN WOMEN'S WAR-WORK IN +ENGLAND AND FRANCE + + + + +WAAC + +WOMEN'S ARMY +AUXILIARY +CORPS + + + + +CONFIDENTIAL. Reference No: J.W. 21 [o.] + +Joint Woman's V.A.D. Department. + +DEVONSHIRE HOUSE. PICCADILLY, LONDON. W.I. + +_Return to Secretary, +V.A.D Department. +Devonshire House, +Piccadilly, S.W.I._ + +Territorial Force Associations, +British Red Cross Society. +Order of St. John of Jerusalem. + +Telegrams [unreadable] +Telephone Mayfair 4707 + +_B.R.C.S. or Order of St. John ..._ + +Sir, + +Will you kindly fill up the following form of Medical Certificate, +returning it to the address given above. + +Your communication will be received as strictly confidential. + +It is urgently requested that Members' +names and detachment numbers should +be filled in legibly. + +Yours faithfully, + +MARGARET HEMPHILL + + +MEDICAL CERTIFICATE + + 1. Name + + 2. County No. of Detachment + + 3. How long have you been acquainted with her? + + 4. Have you attended her professionally? + + 5. For what complaint? + + 6. Is she intelligent and of active habits? + + 7. General health? + + 8. Has she flat feet, hammer-toe, or any other defect? + + 9. Is her vision good in each eye? + +10. Is her hearing perfect? + +11. Has she sound teeth, and if not, have they been properly + attended to by a Dentist lately? + +12. Has she shown any tendency to Rheumatism, Anaemia, + Tuberculosis, or other illness? + +13. When? + +14. What? + +15. Has she ever had influenza? + +16. Does she suffer from headaches? + +17. Any form of fits? + +18. Heart disease or varicose veins? + +19. Is she subject to any functional disturbance? + + * * * * * + +I have on the day of 191 seen and +examined and +hereby certify that she is apparently in good health, that she +is not labouring under any deformity, and is, in my opinion, +both physically and mentally competent to undertake duty in +a Military Hospital, and is [*]A. Fit for General Service. + B. Fit for Home Service only. + C. Unfit. + +_Date (Signed) + Address_ + +[Footnote *: Kindly delete categories which do not apply.] + + + + + * * * * * + + +Reference No.: J.W. 19c. + +JOINT WOMEN'S V.A.D. DEPARTMENT. +Territorial Forces Association. British Red Cross Society. Order of St. +John of Jerusalem. +DEVONSHIRE HOUSE, PICCADILLY, LONDON. W1. + + + + * * * * * + +QUALIFICATIONS +of Members of Women's Voluntary Aid Detachments for Nursing Service or +General Service. + + * * * * * + +1. (a) Name in full (_Mrs. or Miss_). + (b) If Married state Maiden Name. + +2. Permanent Postal Address. + Present Postal Address. + +3. Telephone No. + +4. Telegraphic Address. + +5. Detachment County and No. + B.R.C.S. + St. John Brigade. + St. John Association. + +6. Name and Address of Commandant of Detachment. + +7. Rank in Detachment. + +8. Time of Service in Detachment. + +9. Age and Date of Birth. + +10. Place and Country of Birth. + +11. Nationality at Birth. + +12. Present Nationality. + +13. Height. + +14. Weight. + +15. Where Educated. + +16. At what age did you leave school? + +17. Whether Single, Married, or Widow. + +18. If not Single, state Nationality of Husband. + +19. Name and Address of Next-of-Kin or Nearest Relation + residing in the British Isles. + +20. Father's Nationality at Birth. + +21. Mother's Nationality at Birth. + +22. Father's Profession. + +23. Religion. + +24. (a) If you volunteer for nursing duties state what experience + you have had in wards. + + (b) Name and address of hospital. + + (c) Date. + +25. Certificates held. + +26. (a) Nursing. (f) Motor Driver. + (b) Kitchen. (g) Laboratory Attendant. + (c) Clerical. (h) X-Ray Attendant. + (d) Storekeeping. (i) House Work. + (e) Dispenser. (j) Pantry Work. + +27. State what experience and qualifications you have had + for Categories in No. 26. + +28. Have you been inoculated against Enteric Fever? + If so, what date? + If not, are you willing to be? + + Have you been vaccinated? + It so, what date? + If not, are you willing to be? + +29. Your usual Occupation or Profession? + Your present Occupation or Profession? + +30. Give the Names and Addresses of two British Householders with + permanent addresses in the British Isles who have known applicant for + two or more years, but are not related to applicant, to act as + References, having previously obtained their permission to use + their names. + + (a) (Mayor, Magistrate, Justice of the Peace, Minister of Religion, + Barrister, Physician, Solicitor or Notary Public). + Acquaintance dating from year ________ + (b) Lady. + Acquaintance dating from year _______ + +31. Name and Address of Head of College or School, recent Business + Employer, Head of Government Department, Secretary of Society or some + other person who can be referred to for a report on your + qualifications for the work selected. (The Quartermaster of your + V.A.D. could be given if you have worked in her department.) + + In what capacity employed? + + How long employed? + Year? + +32. Are you willing to serve at home or abroad? + +33. Are you willing to serve in Civil Hospitals from which + personnel have been withdrawn for War Service? + +34. Are you willing to serve:-- + + (a) With pay, + (b) For expenses only, + on the terms of service laid down in our terms of service? + + N. B.--Members who can afford to work for their expenses only are + urgently needed. + +35. Date after which you will be available for duty. + +36. (a) Are you pledged to serve in any other organisation? + (b) If so, what? + +37. (a) Have you served with the Women's Legion or any + similar organisation? + (b) If so, what? + +I hereby declare that the above statements are complete and correct to +the best of my knowledge and belief. + +Date .......... Usual Signature .......... + +_For Office Purposes_, please add your full Christian Names and Surname +legibly written. + +I certify that the above declaration is, to the best of my knowledge and +belief, true; and that M ............ is a fit and proper person to be +employed by the Joint V.A.D. Committee. + +REMARKS:-- + +Date .......... Signed .................... + _Commandant_. + +Date .......... Countersigned .................... + _County Director_. + +NOTE.--Commandants are held responsible for all statements on this form +being accurate so far as it is possible for them to find out, also for +the fact that the member who signs it is a British subject, and in every +way suitable for appointment by the Joint V.A.D. Committee. + +This form must be signed by the Commandant, who should then send it to +the County Director for counter signature and forwarding to +Headquarters. + + + + +_Application No._ + +_For Official use only_. + +CONFIDENTIAL. + +WOMEN'S ARMY AUXILIARY CORPS +FORM OF APPLICATION + +N.B.--No woman need apply who is not prepared to offer her services for +the duration of the war and to take up work wherever she is required. + +1. Name in Full (Mrs. or Miss). + +2. Permanent Postal Address. + +2a. State nearest Railway Station. + +3. Surname at birth, if different. + +4. For what work do you offer your services? State your + qualifications for this work. (The occupations for which women are + required are set out in the accompanying leaflet.) + +5. Are you willing to serve:-- + (a) At Home and Abroad as may be required. + (b) At Home only. + +6. If selected and enrolled how many days' notice will you require before + your services are available? + +7. Age and date of birth. + +8. Place and Country of Birth. + +9. Nationality at Birth. + +10. Present Nationality + (if naturalised give date). + +11. Whether single, married or widow. + If married state number of children, + (a) under 12 years old. + (b) " 5 " " + +12. If not single state Nationality of Husband. + (a) Is your husband serving with the Forces? + (b) If so, where? + +13. Father's Nationality at Birth. + +14. Mother's Nationality at Birth. + +15. Father's Occupation. + +16. State school or college where educated. + At what age did you leave School? + +17. Particulars of any other Training, stating Certificates held. + +18. (a) Name and Address of your present employer + (_see Note on other side_). + + N.B.--(The employer will not be referred to unless he is given as a + reference under paragraph 20 below.) + + (b) Nature of his business. + + (c) Capacity in which you are employed. + + (d) Length of your service with him. + + (e) Salary which you are now receiving. + +19. Previous business experience (if any) giving dates, salaries + received, and names of Employers. + +20. Give below for purposes of reference the names of two or more + British householders with their permanent addresses, one of whom + should be, if possible, your present or previous Employer, a Teacher, + a Town Councillor, Mayor or Provost, Justice of Peace, Minister of + Religion, Doctor or Solicitor, who has known you for two or more + years, but is not related to you. One of the references must be + a woman. + + (a) Name. + Profession or Occupation. + Address. + + (b) Name. + Profession or Occupation. + Address. + + (c) Name. + Profession or Occupation. + Address. + +An offer of Service can in no way be regarded as a final enrolment. + +_I hereby declare that the above statements are complete and correct to +the best of my knowledge and belief_. + +_Date_ ___________ _Usual Signature_ ____________ + +This Form should be filled in by the Applicant and returned +to:--Employment Exchange _________________________ + + * * * * * + +NOTE. + +Women who are already engaged in any of the following occupations will +not be accepted unless they bring with them a letter from their Employer +or Head of Department stating that they have permission to volunteer:-- + +(i) Government Service. + +(ii) Munition work. + +(iii) Work in a Controlled Establishment. + +(iv) Full-time work in an establishment engaged on contract + work for a Government Department. + +(v) V.A.D. Military Hospitals and Red Cross Hospitals. + +(vi) School Teaching. + +(vii) Local Government Service. + +No woman who is a National Service Volunteer or is employed in +Agriculture will be accepted. + +N.B.--Applicants are urged not to give up any present employment until +they are called upon to do so. + + + + +(Part of the application form used in England by the +Women's Land Army.) + + * * * * * + +WOMEN'S LAND ARMY + + * * * * * + +CONDITIONS AND TERMS. + +There are three Sections of the Women's Land Army. + +(1). AGRICULTURE. + +(2). TIMBER CUTTING. + +(3). FORAGE. + +If you sign on for A YEAR and are prepared to go wherever you are sent, +you can join which Section you like. + + +YOU PROMISE:-- + +1. To sign on in the Land Army for ONE YEAR. + +2. To come to a Selection Board when summoned. + +3. To be medically examined, free of cost. + +4. To be prepared if PASSED by the Selection Board to take up work + after due notice. + +5. TO BE WILLING TO GO TO WHATEVER PART OF THE COUNTRY YOU ARE SENT. + + + +THE GOVERNMENT PROMISES:-- + +1. A MINIMUM WAGE to workers of 18/- a week. After they have passed + an efficiency test the wages given are £1 a week and upwards. + +2. A short course of FREE INSTRUCTION if necessary. + +3. FREE UNIFORM. + +4. FREE MAINTENANCE in a Depôt for a term not exceeding 4 weeks if + the worker is OUT OF EMPLOYMENT through no fault of her own. + +5. FREE RAILWAY travelling, when taking up or changing Employment. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10080 *** |