The Vancouver independent. (Vancouver, W.T. [Wash.]) 1875-1910, 1880-02-26
The Rights of Teachers.

The Argonaut, discussing in its usual
caustic, and sometimes most unjust man.
ner, the question of teachers salaries,
mentioned the fact that the women
teachers wear L" sx-button gloves and
ten-dollar boots," and declared that call
salaries should be reduced; that the
public do not see the propriety of max
ing the school department an eleemosy-
nary institution, and a married woman
should not be allowed to use it to sup
port an idle or profiigatc husband" A
correspondent of the Chronicle reviews
and rebukes these sentiments in the fol
lowing language
els $5l q month fair compensa
sation for woman who teaches even
the lowest grade9 We hear about short
hours and salaries paid during vacation.
Why are hours for teachers shorter than
those for carpenters, and why are vaca-
tions givenl Because the labor is so
severe, both for pupil and teacher, that
six hours in school is all that person
is able to endure. You have heard of
compressed articles of foodl Well, this
is compressed labor 1t would be just
as reasonable to require a carpenter
or other laboring man TO work fifteen
out of the twenty four hours of the day,
and to continue his labors through seven
days in the week, as to require teacher
to work as many hours in the day and
AS many day in the week as the carpen-
ter does. Perhaps you question my OPP
portunities for Judging OF a mans labor
since | have never worked az the car
penter's bench, but [ think if you will
look about you at the healthy faces and
hardy frames of laborers, and compare
them with the pale cheeks and dropping
forms of many class teachers who have
'labored at their desks for ten or fifteen
years, enjoying the short hours and va
cations we were speaking about, my
statement will need no further proof.
Heaven help the man who feels ag
grieved because a woman, teaching sixty
children, earns from one third to two
thirds as much as an ordinary bank
clerk. l have heard that woman can.
not fill the position Of such a clerk with
credit, but neither can he fill hers, per
haps, in even a discreditable way. Now
| ask, in the name of common sense,
what the public or the dolt that
wrote my text, means by talking about
making the School Department an elee-
mosynary institution ? When either a
man or woman has fairly earned
wages, whether for one kind of labor or
another, has he or she not a right to
spend the samel If a pretty girl, who
has the seventy or eighty dollars she has
honestly earned by hard work, entirely
at her own disposal, chooses to spend it
upon six button gloves and ten-dolar
boots, is it anybody's business At
least she does not spend it for bad whis-
ky and fast horses, as perhaps her
brother, in his masculine wisdom, does
Or if the widowed mother of children
lays out her money for their sustenance,
or spends it to support her old father, is
she to consider these objects of her care
as paupers, living at the expense Of the
city 2 Or even if she has so much stick
mess in her nature that she still clings
to what she once supposed to be tower
of strength, even after he has proven to
be vile smelling whisky cask, and lets
him pick her pocket without an objec-
ton, is he to be considered an object of
public charityl The wrong thing about
this whole matter is that number of
persons, intelligent, honest, we'll inten-
toned gentlemen, but nevertheless gen
tlemen who know nothing of teachers
work, are elected to legislaue for them.
However they may desire to do the
right thing, they are incapable. Teach
ers have rights, and the filst one is to
be directed by their peers.