Kansas agitator. [volume] (Garnett, Kan.) 1890-1905, 1897-03-12
DR.. Brobst on Female Wage Farmers.

DR., Brobst on Female Wage Farmers.
Rev. Flavius Brobst's sermon at Chi
cago, Sunday, on women Wage-Earn-
ers" evoked enthusiastic applause. HE
said in part: "The honorableness OF
work was recognized by the greatest
thinkers and emphasized by Jesus
Christ. Work by women is just as
honorable as by men. All through the
past women have had to work. In
ancient times woman was held rs a
slave, and regarded as thing without
a soul. In uncivilized and pagan coun-
tries women have had to do the hard
est kind of work. She has endurance,
and Judging by the thoroughness OF
her work in the different avocations
she has entered recently she can de-
yelop the skill necessary for any field
she wishes to enter. One opening after
another has been made against the
most strenuous opposition, until now
woman is working in over nine hum
dred different avocations. In the Unit
ed States it is estimated that there are
about twenty million women working
for some kind Of wages, and in the city
of Chicago there are probably about
$50 900. What are the causes OF this
invasion? Drunkenness OF husband or
father has driven many women out to
toll. Husbands bereft of all manly
feelings desert their wives, who, left
penniless, have to do something. Vicis-
STUDIES of life over which they have
no control throw husbands or fathers
out of employment, and their wives
and daughters have to work. Men are
also entering spheres that have been
exclusively womans work. When in
Paris l talked with Worth, the man
milliner, who made no apology for
working in woman's sphere. There is
one thing certain, that women have
right to live, and also that they have
right to gain a livelihood by any
honest toll which they can perform.
Mans rights are no more sacred than
these. But women workers have far
more :mpositions practiced upon them
than men. How many of them have to
toll midst unsanitary surroundings
which sow the seeds of serious sick
nesses. Multitudes must work long
hours-sixteen and eighteen hours in
grinding toll. This long, long days
work brings to large numbers only a
beggarly pittance of rs and so cents
day, from which several human be-
ings have to be clothed, housed and
fed. Women, with their sensitive spir-
| its, have often to be abused and harsh
| ly treated by brutal overseers and en-
ployers. Again and again cases ap-
pear where they are cheated out of
their small wages. Most unjust and
outrageous fines are imposed upon
them for trifling mistakes. In very
many places they have to stand through
the long days. Then, too, working
women are subjected to temptations
subtle and powerful. Influences play
upon them from depraved women, and
depraved men employ all their wiles.
Establishments there are in this city
and offices where women are employed
which have become Infamous because
of the vicious character of the men
who manage them and the fatal coils
of sin with which they ensnare the
women there. Out Of the fair blue
sky of purity which overreaches this
city there will dart the irving and
blasting thunderbolt of righteous ven
geance upon these persons for their
betrayals. What are the remedies?
The entrance of women into all the
callings has undoubtedly complicated
the labor problem. In the first place
man should be true to his home, and
provide for them as far as possible.
In the next place man should pay