The record-union., 1893-06-05
THE WOMEN OF THE DIVES.

San Francisco has entered upon a cru
SADIE against the dives, and under late
ordinance now refuses licenses to dive
keepers. If the law is enforced some
1900 or 1900 women and some 700 men
will be thrown out of dive employment.
No sympathy is expressed for the men,
but already a cry has been raised that it
is cruel to cast out these 200 women.
"What are they to do? Shall they starve?
Many Of them are the support of homes;
many have young children to maintain;
some are wives of crippled men and in
valids; others care for old fathers and
mothers and other dependents"
Now, say the sympathizers, it is
shame to throw out these women, even
admitting that their methods in the dives
are indefensible. But not all are unclean:
a good many sell liquors in dives who
keep themselves pure. In a commercial
city there always will be large class Of
men who seek dive levels. For them the
dive furnishes such social entertainment
as they are capable of approaching. To
shut up the dives will be simply to turn
these men to worse resorts and to street
drunkenness.
This argument defeats ITSELF it proceeds
from false premises; it assumes that there
are no other lines open to the displaced
women. But if it is admitted that this
assumption is sound, then the response
must be-, if society does not so provide
that these poor creatures do not starve.
then it is better that they perish than
continue the dives as recruiting stations
for thousands of other women, as the
present lot passes out of action.
The dives are not a necessity; such re-
sorts are not needed to furnish social
nutriment to a class. In fact tho dives
rob the men of this class. The saloon
pure and simple is Better for them than
the dives and its adjunct the dance hall.
But if the dives are closed. the charita-
Bile heart of San Francisco ought to pro-
vide some way for the wretched women
worthy of any thought, that the
closing will thus throw out of employ
ment, TO earn a decent living. Several
hundred women ought to be easily taken
care of to that end in San Francisco. and
we have confidence that it will be done.
If not the more shame to San Fran
CISCO
Probably 500 of the women referred to
support lazy husbands or male compan-
ions who are able to work, but prefer to
live upon the wage of the women, which
is dependent upon their ability to coax
dive patrons into purchase of drinks. So
this group of 500 need not be considered:
they are willfully enslaved to male brutes.
and it will be better for them when the
support of the latter is cut off. Fully 300
OF the 200 women are thieves. They are
in dive employment for what they can
steal; for all they can wheedle man out
OF or rob them of when drunk and
drugged. These should be put outside
tie pale of sympathy.
The remaining 400 or 800 are to be di-
vided among three classes, women who
really use their earnings to support de-
pendents who are unable to keep them
selves; women who save their earnings
aud anxiously look forward to the time
when they will be able to abandon the
business: young women who have been
led or driven into, or raised in the BUSH
ness, and know of no way of release from
it, but would accept almost any hope of
escape.
So that society has not very large
number to provide tortoise having any
worth at all being so few. AS for the
others, it will be a blessing when they
are gone. In any view of the case it is
wise police regulation to close up these
recruiting stations, and no matter what
becomes OF the women thrown out, shut
the door against the placing of new crops
OF women in these hell-holes.
MoHAMNIED ALEXANDER WEBB, the