The Monitor. [volume] (Woodstown, N.J.) 1884-1892, 1889-11-15
w. c.. T. u.


in a community to take care ofall its vice.
We should thank the recent statehood
convention of Wyoming, which. after
twenty years experience, placed equal suf-
frage in its constitution by a two-thirds
vote"
On the labor question Miss Willard has
this to say:
"The wage-workers have this year given
a fresh demonstration of what total alb
stinence can do to tone down the terrors Of
the greatest strike yet known-that of the
London dockmen. There was no violence
worth mentio ming, and yet the strikers
were in want of bread. But their great
leader, John Burns, is, like Mr.. Fowderly,
totally free from the drink habit, and he
urged the men to keep clear of the GIN
shops. They even secured 1 200 signatures
to the pledge while the strike was going on
and pleaded with the men to be considerate
toward their wives and children and to lead
pure lives. l sometimes think it looks as
if modern chivalry were threatening TO
make its home with the leaders of the
modern labor movement.
''The most significant word that we,
as temperance experts, can send to our
future allies of the labor camp is this:
"tYou say that you must combine to
control legislation in your interest; but
meanwhile you support the saloon, and
that controls legislation in its own interest,
which is opposed to yours. Come with US
and let us put down the saloon as the initial
step in the mighty labor movement
The ''White Cross and White Shield"
movement then came in for a exhaustive
review. Miss Willard then urged a plan
of systematic work for the ensuing year.
Among other things she said:
Marriage as a sacrament versus marri-
age as a resource; marriage as the highest
of professions, rather than as an estate al
most wholly removed from the exercise of
free will, is the problem that lies at the
root of a question with whose flowers and
fruits this department has been thus far
mainly preoccupied. Mothers meetings
have multiplied in the last year, and un-
told good is growing out of them. If the
local Woman's Christian Temperance union
holds no other sort of meeting, l do mostly
earnestly plead that the mothers may
gather in prayerful counsel at least twelve
times a year. This department has pro-
vided a plan of study and furnished
necessary literature"
A reference to the dress-reform move
ment was then in order, and Miss Willard
went deeply into statistics. Among other
things she said:
"But woman's everlasting befrilled, be-
dizened, and bedraggled style of dress is
to-day doing more harm to children unborn,
born, and dying than all other causes that
compel public attention. With ligatured
lungs and liver as our past inheritance and
present slavery, the wonder is that such
small heads can carry all We know! Catch
Edison and construct him inside a wasp
waistcoat, and be assured you'll get no
more inventions; bind a hustle upon Bis
mark, and farewell to German unity:
coerce Robert Browning into ~corsets, and
you'll have no more epics; put Parnell in
petticoats, and home rule is a lost cause;
treat Powderly in the same fashion, and
the powder mine of failure will blow up
the labor movement. Niggardly waists
and niggardly brains 60 together. The
emancipation of one will always keep pace
with the other; a ligature around the vital
organs at the smallest diameter of the wo-
manly figure means an impoverished blood
supply in the brain, and may explain why
women scream when they see a mouse, and
why they are SO terribly afraid of term
which should be their glory, as it is that of
their brothers-viz., st~rong-minded.
"Bonneted women are not in normal con-
ditions for thought; high-heeled women are
not in normal conditions for motion; cor
seted women are not III normal condition
for motherhood. Each of the constructions
and contortions involved by these crimes
in dress is a distinct violation of loving
laws given by our Heavenly Father for our
highest happiness and growth. | wonder
that men in their broader outlook and
magisterial power do not forbid this thing
by statute, in the interest of their sons that
are to be.
"But ethics and esthetics must go side
by side in the blessed work of dress reform
for that is natures way. The pioneers did
not see this and their 'bloomers' speedily
dropped into innocuous desuetude. But
the modern-led by Mrs. Annie Jenness
Miller, That Hebe of the new fashion-plate'
have sat at natures feet, and On my re-
cent eastern trips | learned what l know to
be true in progressive Chicago-that the
best are also coming to be the bravest wo-
men, that among them there is an absolute
craze for getting rid of ~corsets, and that
the divided skirt is worn by tens of thous-
ands whom you might not suspect of so
much good sense and courage.
"Much as | am devoted to the ballot for
woman, | would to-day rather head a cru
SADIE against bandaged waists, s~treet-sweep-
ing skirts, and eamel's hump bustles than
do / live to say it?-yea, verify, than to
vote at Chicago's next election for a Sun
day.closing mayor.