Evening journal., 1913-02-17
EDITORIAL OPINION

bic into bed to sleep off the poison that
over-fatigue has produced
And it is not proposed to make
dolls out Of the working women, either.
Men find eight hours a day long
enough to labor, and two hours longer
for women is not likely to pamper
them, either as dolls or playthings. 1t
is conceded that plenty Of good honest
work is a good thing for everybody,
but too much work is not good thing.
When you need medicine, it is a good
thing, but an overdose may kill you.
Food is a good thing in moderation,
but too much of it will cause you no
end of trouble. The question is not
only one Of social justice and economic
wisdom, it is a question of race pres
ervation.
While it is true that women who do
nothing are unfit to become mothers,
it is equally true that women who are
habitually exhausted by overwork are
equally unfit for the primal function
allotted to them by nature. There is
a happy medium which involves
neither a strain of the system by too
much work, nor its degeneration by
too little. Will a woman grow habby
and unfit working ten hours a day?
Then how can pan keep in fine fet-
tie working only eight hours a day?
All this talk of interfering with in
dustry is moonshine. The same argu-
ments were used when the agitation
for reducing the hours Of labor for
men was begun; the factories would
be compelled to close down; trade
would become stagnant and the world
would come to an end But the eight
hour day was established, and nothing
particular happened Everybody who
wanted it had plenty Of work; there
was plenty Of time for play and for
sleep, and that was good thing. OF
course # didn't make everybody
happy and contented, for some of us
viii never reach that state, but every
body had the opportunity to try for
that goal-that is all the men had;
and now it is proposed to start the
women workers in the same direction,
by degrees; for we are going to work
them two hours longer than we do the
men. Yet there is kicking; and shame
on the men, the kicking is coming from
them. A nice lot of generous, able
bodied thoughtful and justice-loving
men our over-worked mothers pro-
duced. They would be proud of us
could they know how we bar the way
to those privileges Of rest and re-
cuperation for the women of today
which we have demanded and secured
for ourselves Protectors Of women, -
we proudly call ourselves. "Exploiters
of women will be better title, if
we refuse them need Of justice
that is two hours day less than the
justice we appropriate to ourselves.
We repeat that the strain of long
continued work is injurious. The
members of our Legislature had an il
lustration of this truth on last Mon
day night. Monday was the last day
for the introduction of new business,
and the volume Of work that rushed
into the two Houses kept everybody
busy from 1890 in the morning till
past midnight Among the workers
was a young woman stenographer,
and toward midnight she collapsed
and was taken home in an hysterical
condition Here the members of the
General Assembly have convincing
demonstration Of the evil they are
asked to provide against. Perhaps
no one, not even the young woman
herself, viii ever know the extent of
the injury she suffered by this over
straining, and she is only one Of thou
sands in the State who are over-tax-
ing their energies in like manner
and thus laying up trouble not only
for themselves but also for the COM
munity of which she is expected to be-
come some day a reproductive factor
This incident Of itself should afford
a convincing argument in favor of the
passage of the ten-hour law, foi
while over-work is, perhaps, rarely
carried to the extent of utter collapse
it is in many instances carried to the
point Of serious injury, and the only
way to prevent it is to provide a.laN
against it, Such a law would be only
justice to women who are compelled t'
earn living by daily labor.
HIS DEATH An ACCIDENT.