St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1885-05-25

honorable. If they do practical work it is
dishOnOrable. That our young women may
escape the censure of doing diShOnOrable
work shall particularize. You may knit
tidy for the back of an arm chair, but by
no means make the money wherewith to
| buy the chair. You may with delicate brush
beautify mantel ornament, but die rather
than earn enough to buy marble mantel.
| You may learn artistic music until you can
squall Italian, but never sing 'Ortonville'' or
''Old Hundred" Do nothing practical if you
would in the eyes of
REFINED SOCIETY
preserve your respectability. scout these
| finical notions. tell you woman, no
more than man, has a right to occupy
place in this world unless she pays rent
| for it.
| We talk about women as though we had
resigned to her all the light work and our
selves had shouldered the e'heayier. But the
| day of judgment which will reveal the suf-
fering of the stake and inquisition, will
marshal before the throne of God and the
hierarchs of heaven the martyrs of wash
tub and needle. Now, say, if there be
any preference in occupation let woman
have it. God knows her trials are the
severest. By her acuter sensitiveness to
misfortune, by her hour of anguish, I de-
mand that no one bridge up her pathway to
a livelihood. Oh, the WEAKNESS, the
despicability of men who begrudgea woman
the right to work anywhere in any honor
able calling!
I go still further and say that woman
should have equal compensation with men.
By what principle of justice is it that
women in many of our cities get only two
thirds as much pay as men, and in many
cases only half? Here is the gigantic injus-
tce-that for work equally well, if not
better, done woman receives far less com
pensation than man. Start with the ma
tional government: women clerks in Wash
ington get 5000 for doing that for which
men receive $1,000.
THE WHEEL OF OPPRESSION
is rolling over the neeks of thousands of
women who are at this moment in despair
about what they are to do. Many of the
largest mercantile establishments of our
cities are accessory to these denominations,
and from these large establishments there
are scores of souls being pitched off into
death and their employers know it. Is
there God? Will there be judgment?
tell you if God rises up to redress woman's
wrongs, many of our large establishments
will be swallowed up quicker than South
American earthquake ever took down city.
God will catch these OppressOrs between
the two mill-stones Of his wrath and grind
them to powder! e
Why is it that female principal in a
school gets only 1895 for doing work for
which male principal gets 81, $50? hear
from all this land the wall OF wOmanhood.
Man has nothing to answer to that wall but
batteries He says she Is an angel. She
is not. She knows she is not. She is hui
man being who gets hungry when she has
no food and cold when she has no fire. Give
her no more batteries; give her justice!
There are 65, 600 sewing girls in New York
and Brooklyn. Across the sunlight comes
| their death groan. It is not such cry as
comes from those who are suddenly
HURLED OUT OF LIFE,
but slow, grinding. terrible wasting away.
Gather them before you and look into their
faces, pinched, CHASTITY, hunger-struck!
Look at their fingers, needle-picked and
od-tipped! See that premature stoOp in
the shoulders! Hear that dry, hacking,
merciless cough!
At large meeting of these women, held
| in hall at Philadelphia. grand speeches
were delivered, but a ntsdle- woman took
the stand, threw aside her faded shawl and
with her shriveled arm hurled a very thun-
derbolt Of eloquence, speaking out the hor-
rOrs of her own experience. Stand at the
corner Of street in New York at or Z
o'clock in the morning, as the women go to
their work. Many of them had no break
fast except the crumbs that were. left over
from the night before, or a crust they chew
on their way through the street. Here they
come! The working girls of1New York and
Brooklyn! These engaged in bead-work,
cling, cigar-making, beok-binding, label
ing, feather-picking. print-coloring, paper
boX-making, but, most Overworked of all and
least compensated, the sewing women. Why
do they not take the city cars on their way
up? They cannot afford the 5 cents! If,
concluding to deny herself something else,
she gets into the car, give her a seat! You
want to see how Latimer and Ridley ap-
peared in the fire; look at that woman and
behold more
HORRIBLE MARTYRDOM.
hotter fire, more ag0nizing death! Ask
that woman how much she gets for her
work and she will tell you cents for max
ing coarse shirts and finds her own thread!
Let young people prepare to excel in spheres
of work and they will be able after while
to get larger wages. 1t it can be shown
that a woman can in a store sell more goods
in year than a man, she will soon be able
not only to askbut to demand more wages
and to demand thesi. successfully. I'm
skilled and incompetent labor must take
what is given; skilled and competent labor
will eventually make its own standard.
Admitting that the law of supply and de-
mand regulate these things, Icontend that
the demand for skilled labor is very great
and the supply very small. Start with the
idea that work is honorable and that you
can do some one thing better than anybody
else. Resolve that, God helping, you will
take care of yourself. Ii you are after
while called into another relation you will
be all the better qualified for it by your
spirit of self-reliance; or if you are called
to STAY as YOU are you can be happy and
self-supporting. Poets are fond of talking
about man as an oak and woman the vine
that climbs it, but have seen manya tree
fall that not only went down itself but took
all the vines with it. can tell you OF
something stronger than an oak for the ivy
to climb on, and that is the throne OF the
GREAT JEHOVAH.
Single or affianced, that woman is strong
who leans on God and does her best. The
needle may break; the factory band may
slip; the wages may fall; but over every
good woman's head there are spread the
two great, gentle, stupendous wings Of the
Almighty.
Many of you will go single-handed
through life, and you will have to choose
between two characters. Young woman,
am sure you will turn your back upon the
useless, giggling, irresponsible nonentity
which society ignominiously acknowledges
to be woman and ask God to make you an
humble, active, earnest Christian. What
will become of that womanly disciple Of
the world? She is more thoughtful Of the
attitude she strikes upon the carpet than