The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-04-13
rHn sAMn, Norrn AND souru.


 The New Bedford Standard comments at some length on recent editorial in The Richmond News-Leader anent the servant question. It declares that the problem is not sectional and is not by any means confined to the South. We copy somewhat liberally from It's edi- torial as follows.
 Some wierd stories are told about the so-called help. which Kindness forbids repeating; and wierder stories are told or the efforts of women otherwise en- tirely kind and honest and reputable to get away from their friends the oc- casional domestic who is like the good ly pearl. To such a pass has the crisis come that we verify believe there are most conscientious of mortals who would resort to Kidnapping the cooks or thelr most intimate friends If they formance. We do not know that any body in New Bedford has ever at tempted scientific investigation of reau of Labor Statistics has dipped into lt. and has issued at least one report. While as for the sociologists profess slonal and amateur they have covered tions, reflections. cogitations, and ex- nortations--all calculated to create the nnpS fra gloom in the the housekeepsrs by the fact that she never reads any of them.
 :. So tho domestic problem. whatever may be. is neither a sectional prob rem nor race problem. In New Eng land. the day when the farmers girls went out to service and married their employers sons and the day when the mandy Irish girl stepped from the i'm migrant ship to the kitchen and from the kitchen into a prosperous home, colored servitor has gone in the South ana here. as well as there. is chaos and distress, and the sound of housekeep- lamenting because they are not.
 What is going to be done about it? What. indeed? How should the mere n Nsw or Rad9e,J newspaper in Richmond or he may entertain tine Authorization thai he has useful idea, let him listen Tn sIience to the conversation of his fem si1d sHIme friends, and reflect in as much silence as he can command, on the in- sufhciency of his theories.
 As is well-known domestic servjoe was never popular among the white people of the South. and the female portion of our people always looked on it as degrading for a woman or 8 girl to seek or accept service as cook. nurse or other domestic employment. This opposition was, of course. due to the fact that all menial household work was done by the colored people, and was not looked on as proper or respectable employment for the whites In point of fact, there Is nothing de- grading in white woman doing house. hold work in respectable family but the old view of such work Is still large " dominant among us and must de- part slowly, If at all. The time may come when 1t will be considered just as proper and respectable for a white wo- man to cook or nurse for another as it Is for a white man to work on the farm or fiji the shop for another, but that time is not yet
 It has been different in most parts of the North. and especially in New Eng land. There white help" has been not only practically the only thing. but has not been considered lowering or In any degree improper. Now accord ing to The Standard. they are finding it as difficult to get reliable and satis- factory help as we are in the South. Just where or what is the remedy, if there is one. is past telling. and our cautious Yankee contemporary hesi- tates to suggest one In that 1t is per- haps wise in it's generation. The prob lem up there is a domestic one and has to do principally with the female part of the household. Down here we are not only put to it to get reliable do- nestle servants, but labor in the fields Is equally unreliable and hard to get. Perhaps time will solve the problem and find the solution.