The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1902-06-06
PLEA FOR HELP.
Mrs. Kelly Talks of Sweat Shops
to Topeka Women.
Asks Cooperation to Eradicate
the Evil.
TELLS OF HER WORK.
How the Consumers League is
Made Effective.
An Interesting Programme is
Given For the Federation.
ELLIS OF HER WORK.

Mrs. Florence Kelly's address on the
work of the National Consumers league
was the feature of greatest interest at
the June meeting of the city federation
OF women's clubs at Unity church
Thursday afternoon.
Mrs. Kelly is the corresponding sec
rotary of the league, with headquarters
in New York. She is returning to New
York from Los Angeles wnere she at
tended the biennial of the General Fed
Grafton of Women's clubs and where
she was chairman of several industrial
committees Mrs. Kelly is devOting her
life to the cause of the Industrial classes.
work for finch she has had unusual
preparation in eight years at the Huh
House settlement in Chicago and in the
four years during which she was fac
tory inspector Of Illinois. The latter po-.
sition gave her unlimited opportunities
to study the conditions of the laboring.
classes and to become thoroughly ac-
quainted with the horrors of the sweat
shop system to the abolition Of which
the National Consumers league is devo-
ted
Mrs. KelIy's subject is necessarily a
painful one, but to all who have given
it any attention it was apparent that
she made it as little narrowing as was
consistent with her wish to stir her lis
teners to an abiding interest in the
cause she represents. have in my
case, SdlQ hGliH III beginning
"a letter from a woman engaged IN the
making of fine linen shirts in New York.
She is employed by Casken & Caskel1
who manufacture the highest grade of
mems linen shirts and her work is that
of making button holes in the bosoms.
By working. every minute of ten hours
a day she is able to earn Sc a week and
in the busy season, by taking home
work q t night can run her earnings up
as high as SO a week. But the work
hoe foil - Tn
six months more the oculists tell her if
she continues at this steady and trying
work she viii be unable to see not only
the buttonholes but the shirt upon
which she is working. Her case is a Pc
culiarly unfortunate one. She was left
on orphan in her babyhood and was
brought up in one Of the great public
charitable institutions which New York
sustains at enormous expense for the
care Of destitute children and turned
out of this refuge at the age of IS with
only one slender means of support: she
could make the finest buttonholes in
the bosoms Of mems linen shirts known
to the trade. She is very nliterate as
her letter to me will prove and other
wise entirely incompetent"
Mrs Kellv's story was in illustration
of the fact that, although it is SO years
since Thomas Hood wrote his heart
which was recited by Mrs. A ". Dana
Just before Mrs. Kelly was introduced.
almost nothing has been done to amello-
rate the conditions that stirred the
poets pity SO many years ago Mrs.
Kelly said this was not becausue
people were hard hearted but be-
cause there had been until recently no
effective means of helping to correct the
sweat shop and attendant evils. This
the National Consumers league has un-
dertaken. The league is in no sense a
boycott, Mrs. Kelly explained. It makes
no attempt to persuade people not to
buy the products of the manufactures
which are not managed under humane
conditions, but it does seek to aid the
righteous manufacturer. She showed
the label Of the league which is attached
to all goods manufactured under the con-
ditions which the league demands, and
urged the practical assistance of the
women in the matter Of patronizing the
righteous manufacturer. The league
makes no demands of the manufacturer
regarding wages or hours, and its i'm
mediate aim is to extend among ali
mercantile establishments the commend
able conditions now existing in the best
The label Of the league is simply a
guarantee that the goods to which it is
attached were made in factories in
which the state factory law has been
obeyed, where overtime is not worked,