The morning news., 1889-01-18


The Working Women's Society will
! adopt, in all probability, label, which
when placed upon goods of any description
| will be a guarantee that starvation labor
has not been employed in their manufact
ure. Employers, as yet, are chary of TAX
ing it.
"You can't break woman" said one,
| ''of the habit of shopping round. She is an
lnveterate bargain-hunter and label
would care her off One woman would say
to another, oh, wouldn't think Of such
| thing as buying of - He pays so much
for his label he never has any cheap
goods ,"
Nevertheless, Miss Van Etten does not
despair. She believes there are women
enough who are interested in fair dealing
| toward women to make it an object to one
or more retailers, at least in every large
town, to put on the market, for instance,
ready-made underwear bearing a fair wage
mark by which customers could call for and
| identify it. A single instance will show how
| readily the experiment could be tried
There is large dry goods house in New
| York which runs factory for the manu-
facture of the underwear it sells, and which
has reputation for paying iu that factory
| better wages than the average to machine
| operators. Not long ago Miss Van Etten
called upon the head of the establishment
| to ask if ne would comply with the simple
conditions required for placing fair wage
label on his stock of garments.
I'VE pay good prices, madam, was the
response received, but what those prices
are is in our own business We could not
| give Information enough to outsiders to en-
title us to the mark. We manage things
| here without opening our books to
| strangers and are likely to continue to do
| SO. "
But suppose a dozen customers came to
| you and asked to be supplied with labelled
| goods"
'Oh, well, if your label ever becomes so
formidable as that why we will consider the
| matter"
The probabilities are that it may become
| formidable before long. A large share of
the ready made underclothing manufac-
tured for sale in the United States and
| Canada is turned out in South Fifth avenue.
| The street is full of factories which pay
| from descent to low wages to thousands of
women as factory operatives, and from low
to abyssmal wages to several times as many
| thousand who are sweated in the tenement.
| Some of the factory hands are being gath
| cred into unions, but the quarter-of-a-dol-
| lar-a-day tenement workers are the hardest
| of all women to reach. factory to be
controlled by the Working Women'S So
ciety has been talked of. A Consumers
| League is the readieSt preliminary step to
| create the popular demand that may create
| that's its members had pledged themselves
| to buy, whenever obtainable, articles made
| at fair labor rates and to patrOpiZe houses
| approved as selling them. An advance little
M re than nominal might be accepted for a
| beginning as establishing the principle. 1t
is here that the society's label would afford
| evidence indlsputable Many New York
women are interested in the project and
will do their best to obtain justice for their
| poorer siSte.s S. Next month Miss Van Etten
| will talk to SorOsiS of the cooperation of
| purchasers to ask to be served with goods
| for which living rates have been paid. The
| Brooklyn Woman's Club will hear the story
and the ladies of DR.. Heber Newton's
| church. Parlor meetings probably will be
arranged by influential women to reach as
many sets of listeners as possible. Some
| determined refusal to accept cheap gar
| ments whose makers starve is hoped for
| The plan is entirely similar to one which the
working women of London are pushing,
and their evidence already appears that an
appeal TO the sense of justice in women is
| not in vain.
1t is believed that the bill providing for
the appointment by the governor of women
| as factory inspectors, which barely failed of
| passage last year, will go through the legis-
| lature early in the present session. Miss
| Van Etten's society asked for six women
| inspectors last winter, they say eight ow.
| be revived of forming the women recon-
mended for appointment into a class for the
| systematic study Of the strength of build
lngs, machinery, etc, to give them thorough
| qualification on other points than the special
needs of their own sex, qualifications
which many factory inspectors, who are
rarely engineers, do not possess in anything
like the same degree as an average woman
who has had years of practical experience
| of work in factories
| The first branch of the Working Womens
| Society outside of New York has been or
ganized in Philadelphia, where Judge
| Kelley's daughter, Mrs Florence Kelley
| Wischnewetsky, Rachel Foster, the Cen
tury Club and other women and bodies of
women are interesting themselves in the
formation of trades unions. From across
the water inquiries and words of encourage
| ment have come from Walter Besant
1T is far better, believe" says Miss Van
| Etten, "for women to have labor 0rgani-
cations of their own. The Knights of
Labor have done something toward organ
izing them, but not great deal Beginning
with the better trades and reaching down
to the poorer | look for a great era of
womens trades unions. Women are reason
| able and conservative They wont resort
| to strikes or rash measures without good
cause but they will stand by one another
| for common relief and rescue. They will
see that Tue laws Tor the protection OF
women and children in factories are en-
| forced. They will protest against open rob-
berry by Withholding pay or undernand
theft in docking wages on trivial grounds.
| They will resent shameful indecency in the
arrangement of shops and insulting Ian
| guage to young girls"
The Working Women's Society has
started labor bureau, and will publish a
paper for working women when it is able.
II is an interesting fact-Miss Van Etten
did not tell me this, but observation does
that the woman suffrage cause is progress
| ing most rapidly just now among working
women. 1t is not the political aspects for
which they care, but their motto is equal
pay for equal work, and this, it seems to be
borne in upon them daily would be best
promoted by equality before the law.
ELIZA PUTNAM HEAToN.