Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1911-11-21
Momen Workers DoubIy Handl-
capped, Is the Assertion OF
an English Authority.
GOES DEEPLY INTO CAUSES
From Earliest Times the Weaker Sex
Has Been the Victim Of the Theory
of Wife Maintenance-Low
Level of Wage the
Result.

The possession OF the vote will not
remove the sweated woman worker
from our world, though 1t may be
made one means toward the end. The
lack of trade unions has not caused
the Industrial plight OF women. and
their institution alone will not abolish
Ii. Women are not underpaid and
oyerworked because they are physical
ly and mentally on a lower level than
men, who are comparatively well
paid; they are physically and mental
ly on a lower level because they are
underpaid and overworked. These are
not causes, they are effects reacting
again as secondary causes. The whole
truth lies beyond all these sugges-
tons, and each of them can be woven
into the fabric nf which it is the
foundation. The root cause of the Pc
culiarly unhappy condition of women
workers is that they suffer double
handicap. Men are handicapped once
as workers; women are handicapped
twice, once as workers and once as
women. Men are handicapped by cap
ital; women are handicapped first by
capital and second by man.
The burden of capital falls without
regard to sex. At the best it Is i'm
posed equally on men and women; at
the worst 1t tells more cruelty, as
with all burdens OF this nature. upon
those who are already handicapped.
But this is not because OF sex; 1t is
| because of the weakness which the
first handicap has preGuced. 1t serves
to make bad condition worse. to in
crease an initial disability. The orig
inal handicapping of women, without
which their present condition could
not be, will be found to proceed from
quite different st.urce.
In the days of primitive and domes-
tic industry women performed large
they performed 1t in the nome; and
they did not perform 1t as free agents.
The fruit of the woman's toll was the
possession of the husband-all that she
had was his, all that she made was
his. Her labor in the home made no
The law held that she was maintained
by her husband: the fruits of her
labor In the home were never regard
cd as being any concern of hers; and
as they came to her husband auto
mattcally, as matter OF course, he
regarded them as OF little account.
The value of the work of all women
was seriously deprecated by this con-
dition. Women's work was not work;
It was duty, and as such it had no
money value.
From this source has come the I'M
prepayment of women in the labor
market. Wife maintenance is theo-
retically universal, and its full credit
is counted to the man. Whether the
wife who is maintained is a parasite
or serf makes no difference to the
theory, which has sufficed to lay s.
special sex burden upon women in tie
Industrial world. The prevalence OF
this theory of wife maintenance has
set low level of wage return for
women; it has denied them training
and apprenticeship. 1t has committed
them to the most casual and imp cas-
ant employments, and 1t has provided
excuse for the employers who sweat
women and the public which permits
this sweating.-Teresa Billie gton-
Greig In the London Chronicle.