The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1914-05-29
LABEL LEAGUES
A GREAT POWER
VALUABLE IN OBTAINING
BETTER WORKING CONDI-
TIONS-LEGISLATI0N VAL
UELESS WITHOUT ECO
NOMIC ORGANIZATION.
CBy E p. Marsh. President Washing

(By E. p. Marsh, President Washing
ton State Federation of Labor)
There have been many great women
in history, women who have risen
above convention, custom and preced-
ent, and left their mark indeHbIy upon
the period in which they lived. Who
has not read of Florence Nightingale,
who dedicated her life to the relief of
suffering caused by war? Of Julia
Ward Howe, who wrote the Battle
| Hymn of the Republic, that song
which cheered the march of many a
weary, foOtsOre army? OF Harriet
Beecher Stowe, whose book crystal
lied more than the efforts of any
other one person, the feeling in the
North against chattel slavery and set
four million humans free? OF Frances
Willard, the great apostle of temper
ance, that magnetic woman whose elo-
quence, charm, culture, and love for
her fellows, stirred millions of breasts
to beating in sympathy for the down
| trodden and oppressed? Throughout
all history there have been individual
women who have led in this or that
achievement, but the history of woman
up until recent times has been the his
tory of suppression. For more years
nearly than we can count women have
been taught that their place was in
the home, ministering to the material
wants of the male. The clinging vine
idea, which some men still flaunt in
your faces when you ask for the bal
lot, is the product of many centuries
of mans domination in all the active
affairs of life and woman's passive
acceptance of that domination. Wom-
an was taught that it was her duty to
keep the home swept and garnished,
the male stomach fed and the male
mind untroubled by domestic cares,
He would attend to the bread win
ming, do all the fighting necessary to
provide f oOd, clothing and shelter.
Did she want recreation? Well, she
could do fancy work If she must
have some form of relaxation that took
her outside the four walls of her home
she could play the Lady Bountiful to
the poor in her neighborhood The
course of time brought its women's
clubs for the study Of Browning, Emer-
son, treatises on the Influence Of the
Manchu dynasty on the Chinese en-
pire," and other subjects of historic
interest, but Of doubtful present value
Bridge whist clubs took the attention
of the modern woman Of wealth and
fashion, religious and charitable work
the attention Of the woman in moder-
ate circumstances. All these energies
were indicative of a feminine unrest.
rebellion at man-made laws CON
demning woman to the eternal seclus-
ion of the home. Underneath all these
forms of activity lay deeper COM
pelling force than appeared on the sur
face, must have been, if we are to be-
ieve in the laws of natural force and
If evolution.
The enslayement of woman began
rom economic causes and will end
rom economic causes. Political power
,reated monopoly and monopoly
strikes always deadliest at the home
'ircle, Monopoly drove down wages.
ow wages, banished luXuries from the
lome, banished even the necessities
II life. As man struggled harder to
provide creature comforts for the
lome, and fought a losing battle.
woman suffered hardest and longest.
t was hers to practice economy and
nly the wife of the poorly paid wage
arner knows to what bitter extent.
Woman sensed vaguely that these
conomic hardships came to her
through the political field. a field
'hich she was forbidden to enter. 1t
5 only in comparatively recent years
hat the doors Of our universities. our
MEDICAL and law schools our profes-
ions, have been open to her The po-
tical field still more recently opened.
'et for many years woman has been
riven into industry, TO bear the bread
citing burden with the man She
aw the political field occupied by her
rother, husband and father, was but
caring down harder upon the home.
n spite of mans use of his lordly pre-
ballot-she saw 10000
hildren under IA years of age. toiling
heir little lives away in the cotton
lills of the sunny south. She saw the
rice of living constantly rising and
Continued on Page Two.