The Bennington evening banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 19??-1961, 1913-03-13
MEN ARE ALL BAD
SAY WOMEN Of
UNDERWORLD
0utcasts Mock at Work of Vice
Commission
POOR PAY NOT RESPONSIBLE
Girls Could Live on Small Wages
If the Men Would LET Them
Alone"

Chicago, March 12.-Reformers
and unreformed-the state Senate's
vice investigation commission and
the women for whose moral downfall
and the commission is trying to de-
termine the causes-differed today in
the relation between low wages and
low morality. Letters received by
the commission from the women of
the underworld Knocked at the work
which the legislators are doing.
One OF these letters, signed *. X.
L." reads in part as follows:
ITO the Commission--Girls don't
go wrong because they are hungry or
because they need clothes. They go
wrong be .ause the. are tempted by
lies and CyC .o el by the evil in
men. 1t IS NJ ne employer. | was
good gil rked in store.
Il didn' ..,,1 money, but that
did not M lived on So week
and would be living like that now
but l met men. / didn't know men
were bad-all bad-where a girl is
concerned | thought only women
were bad. | thought all a girl had to
do TO remain good was to be truthful
with herself God pity women who
think that and who keep their trust in
men until it is too late Every day it
was some one else, always smiling at
me, always trying to give me fair
chance to be happy. In the street,
they followed me. These | could
avoid-but the friends who hung
around.
That is the big, big secret of the
thing that makes a good girl bad
Another cry from the underworld
echoed the words of this letter 1t
was more bitter though and it read in
part
You're looking for the things that
made such women as l. Low wages.
Dance halls. Hunger. Cold They all
helped a bit, but they didn't turn the
trick themselves. You're all a bunch
OF hypocrites, afraid to look the
thing in the face and afraid to learn
the truth.
Il don't know any girls who sold
themselves for money to buy bread
| or clothes. But | do know lots of
/ us who hit the road for hell because
lot of blackguards kept bounding
them with their rotten attentions.
X God help the men and not us.
We're all right when we start. All
we need is to be left alone. XXX
There are hundreds and hundreds OF
Kids and sports who hang around
State street and wait like wolves for
the tired girls to leave the store.
why don't you make the men be
good? All the wages in the world
won't help us. Make the men good
and the girls will be good.
Now they haven't got chance
and they never will have as long as
the law smiles at one and splits at
another"
This letter was signed with the in
itials L. NJ"
While these comments on the stu
alton continued to pour in, the civic
consciousness awakened by the COM
mission bestirred itself in the launch
ing of committees and private inyes-
tigating forces.
In some stores numbers of girls
approached their employers to de.
mand larger salaries. All were as
sured that they would be taken care
OF as soon as something definite had
Deen agreed upon. Several resigna-
IONS were rendered by girl employees
as result of parental advice.
A mass meeting for the discussion
OF "a living wage and a Saturday half
holiday" was scheduled by the Juven.
lie Protective association, the Con-
sumers. league and the Women's
Trade Union league for next Friday
night