The Labor enquirer., 1885-03-14
The Condition Of the Working
Classes How They are
Compared
By Those Who Do Not Realize
That Human Needs Grow
With Civilization.
Women Who Have Worked from Their
Babyhood, And are Now Tranping
the Highways.

pOlht 70 In0 past ana cOnRF16ulAle WORK.
ing people on their present prosperous
condition. ! People who close eyes and
ears to the wrongs and demands of man
kind because forsooth in some respects
working people may have suffered where
the working people of to-day do not
For Socialists who 60 about constantly
with aching hearts and seething brains,
over the misery they meet everywhere,
it is not only unnecessary but cruel to
picture in vivid colors the scenes of
wretchedness society presents; but if /
could catch the attention OF some of the
ease-loving, or willfully Indifferent phil
osophers I would not spare them one
miserable sight, one despairing wall, one
groan of hunger, want and misery that
everywhere burden the earth. I would
take them to the homes of miners and
other laborers-to the poor huts where
live women and children, drudging in
some dreary factory all day long while
the fatheris out "tramping," 1 would
have them follow the lives of the three
hundred thousand men out of employ
ment twho tramp, tramp all day through
cold rain and snow, poorly clad and
worse fec, and who sleep or rather endure
the night in freight cars, lumber piles
or old sheds. I would have them peep
into the police stations at night, and see
men laid out on slabs so thickly you
could not walk between Them where
they have come and craved protection
from the cold, / would have them stop
and see these men fed with a bowl of
thin soup and a crust of bread in the
morning, as they stand in a row, guarded
by policemen, to prevent them from get
ting more than their share. / would
have them go into factories and see how
hard and fast poor frail. looking women
can work, and how steadily they must
keep at il to pay for the very little that
keeps them alive. I would nave mem
watch the hundreds of little inch ed-up,
-old-looking children swarming out of
shops at six-for we would not be al.
lowed inside to see them at work and
l would ask them if these were an inn
provement on the children of the past ?
I would point to the women tramps in
the east-women, mind you, who have
been hard workers from their babyhood
up and are now "out of work. Women,
who are as sensitive and intelligent as
our own loved sisters and daughters. are
tramping from town, to town, sleeping in
barns, and begging for a mouthful to
eat. I would ask them to talk to the
people who have walked the tunnels in
this city all night to keep from freezing
to death. I would ask them to listen to
some of the stories listen to every day.
While I write woman comes to the
door and begs for little help. She has
four children and two have Just died !;
her oldest boy can find no work and
though sick she would scrub or wash if
she could get place to put her children.
She has just been turned out OF her poor
dwelling place because she could not pay
the rent; her things are living on the
sidewalk and her children are grudglngly
sheltered by neighbors. Another woman
who comes to US occasionally has three
little children and a great deal of the
time nothing for them to eat. She is
willing to work at anything she could do,
but has lame arm which prevents her
doing hard work. have just heard OF
another woman and two pretty little
girls who walked the floor all night this
bitter winter to keep from freezing to
death. An educated woman ! know is
dying with consumption, yet she runs a
sewing machine from seven in the morn
ing till ten at night, and makes but 80
cents day. And these cases are re-
peated a thousand times oyer in this city
alone. "Charity" you suggest What
can little almsgiving now and then do
with this great ocean of misery2 Want
and suffering go hand in hand through
the homes of working people. Can the
history of the past present anything
worse2 If thousands of people are
driven to death by destitution does it
matter just what form it took. Sup
pose there are some working people who
live better than the rich men of the
country hundred years ago did; in
view of the grand improvements and
wonderful inventions, mankind has a
right to expect more comfortable exist
ence; yet SO far is this from being the
case that there are millions of homeless,
penniless men where there was one q