Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1895-02-25

state, though not yet adeQuateiy recos-
nized, else itWould not be so difficult to get
statistics upon this point. However, we
know there is an army of heads OF COM
mercial houses, clerks, bookkeepers, type
writer's and stenographers earning an hon,
orable independence, and help to any land
fortunate enough to possess them.
The modern business woman has demon
strated the value of an amount of business
training for all women. because business
enters everywhere and drill in business
routine gives a staying power of work that
nothing else does. So woman is bringing to
various pursuits training and system OF
which the world is feeling the value In all
orga nizatons of women. In fact, the world
would be the better if everyone were COM
PEELED to learn in some clerical capacity
how to do things.
What is to me the highest achievement of
the business woman is that she has demon
strated the need of equality. Every time a
woman takes position doing equal work
with man at lower rate of wage, she
demonstrates the wrong done to a woman,
and every time she fills position from
which a man has been ousted, because
woman is cheaper, she shows the wrong
done to man by a competition made un-
equal by the disfranchisement of the wo-
man. This is a two-edged sword cutting
both man and woman 1t does not matter
whether the business woman has sense to
see this.
mercialism is welcomed as it was not when
we were struggling in the transition period,
when 2 knight in gliStenng armor and sit
ting his horse like a centaur was receiving
pledges of love from a woman with smiles
bushes and tears. 1t has been proved that
commercialism gives scholastic supremacy
and the time for knowledge to run to and
fro upon the earth is not for the prancing
knight, but for educated commcrcialism.
If that commercial nation Phoenecia in
troduced letters into Greece this is signifi-
cant, and if the great nation of Israel must
have the credit,it must be remembered that
commercial
This is the age of woman. We wait day
by day for her achievements The poet
and the dreamer must stop short of the
reality, and when the time. which is at
hard, is fully come and our struggling sis
terhood claim their own, the business wo-
man will be no mean factor in this great
triumph.
NoTaan's True Position.
Frances E. w. Harper, a brilliantly edu-
Gated colored woman from Pennsylvania,
continued the discussion in an eloquent
plea for jister appreciation of womans
true position. Toe few avenues of useful
ness are now open to colored women, said
Mrs. Harper, yet every time colored wo-
man achieves success in any line it but
adds to the proof of he ability of her sex
and race. Mrs. Harper told of a coiored
woman she knew in Mississippi, former
slave of Jefferson Davis, who now has en-
tire charge of a plantation of 1870 acres of
land, and raises a goodly crop of cotton
every year with the labor she organizes.
In Louisiana two-thirds of all the truck
gardens are run by women, and in coIored
families the main support is frequently a
woman. One Of the most skillful sugar
makers in the state is a colored woman
about twenty-five years of age, who usu-
ally has from 20 to 40 ladders under her
direction. The speaker also related num-
Der of other instances of colored women
carrying on business ventures of one sort
and another with hattering success, shov-
hrll or ht,r,,
are latent abilities which if allowed to de-
Veiop VIII give to colored women her true
position in the business world, not as pau
pers, but as sisters in the front rank of
the wage ear;1ers of the nineteenth century
Nfudam Zen.an en- Wares.
In continuing the discussion Madam
Zeman addressed herself to the theory, ad-
vanced in a speech last week, that women
should offer to do mems work at less
wages. This was a dangerous and a false
theory, said Madam Zeman. She believed
that every woman is as good as every
ma i, and when she is doing the same work
as; well as a man she should receive the
same rewards. Ii she is not fitted for the
work and cannot do 1t WE'LL then she ought
to get out at once and find the work for
which she is fitted. When men and women
are placed on an equal footing in the bust
ness world the whole problem of equal
suffrage will be solved Men fail to see
that if they compel women to work for
less wages than they themselves receive
they are making from the female sex their
is a SIMPLE one. The very moment that
the business world finds that the same
work can be done by women at less wage
the men will be pushed to the wall.
The next speaker was Miss Virginia
CHAMBER Titcomb of New York, who said in
beginning her paper that all Organizations
of women work for the uplifting of man.
kind. What she wanted to see most of all
rni al of f,ac
Time was when we We're taught that
knowledge was power. Today money IS
power and without it women are depend
ent and helpless, ard can never rise to
their true position in the world. Married
women should have their individual bank
accounts whenever this is possible. Every
thing should be done to widen woman's
sphere of usefulness, local unions should
be formed everywhere, and Mrs. Titcomb
outlined a number of ideas which she
thought would prove Of some value in ee-
waiting the sex.
General Discussion.
At this point in the program the ques-
ton was thrown open for general discus
sion by the members of the council, and it
was opened by Miss Susan b. Anthony,
who took the ground that woman can
never expect to have equal pay for equal
work until she has equal rights before the
law, and has the ballot.
Miss Miller Of Chicago, member Of the
National Association of Women Stenogra-
piers, was the next speaker. She said
that women in the business world are
divided into two classes. those who talk
about the conditions of labor and these
who work. She belonged to the latter
class. Before women can ever hope to
have equal pay they must have equal
abilities with men, or even more, for there
is a slight prejudice against them in the
world of business. What is needed in that
world now is women who viii stop forever
talking about themselves and what they
are going to do and really go to work and
do something. Women make excellent
doctors and lawyers. They take prizes in
the law ana medical schools, but when
they begin the practice Of their profession
they ignored by the members of their
own sex, women who go to naen for their
1ceded counsel or medical advice.
Different phases of the subject under dis
cussion were developed in brief addresses
by Mrs Gates of Utah, Mrs. Isabella
Charles Davis of New York, Mrs. J. Ellen
Foster of this city, Mrs Ruth I'D. Havens,
the president of Wimodauglsis of this city,
who made a very bright and witty speech;
Mrs. Nichols of the local council of Indian
apolis and Mr.. John Bryan of Cincinnati,
one of the patrons of the council, whose
paper was read by Mrs. Davis.
At 1870, after some routine announce
ments, the council adjourned.
Future Program Today.
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