The Jeffersonian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1907-1917, 1914-10-15

are causing VIDE comment
and discussion; as usual there are
the ''for's" and the against 81 and
each seems to feel that their side is
the only fair one.
New York has been particularly
upset at the arguments against the
married teacher who becomes a
mother. Some of those opposed to
the discrimination base their position
on peculiar grounds, one of the larg-
est daily papers taking the stand
that the mother would make the best
teacher, in every instance.
1t would seem that the angle of
argument is becoming very popular
now-a-d days, and some of those angles
resemble the isosceles triangle-the
child Of the parent being the lone
side.
To the average woman, marriage
means a home; man to care for
and who will care for her; and ulti-
mately, children, also to be cared
for. If all these things are the logi-
cal result of marriage, why should
there be any exception made for the
woman who has worked before her
marriage, and who wants to keep the
position-not for any special mission
in life, but simply for the money
that position has brought her?
In the first place, isn't it a hard
ship on the unmarried women, to
whom the position is an absolute ne
cessity? Is it fair to the man who
may be willing and able to be the
sole wage-earner in the family?
And what of the children of the
union? Have they not any rights-in
the matter? Can a woman possibly
divide her time between the posi-
ton that takes as much Of the
mental and physical force, as teach
ing, and do justice by the child she
has brought into the world?
1t is a peculiar fact that there is
just one church involved in this
struggle to dict tie to the Boards of
Education of the cities where the
question has arisen, and that is the
Roman Catholic church. AS a de-
nomination, it has denounced our
school system from the a. b. alb class,
to the graduation seniors. It has
declared in pulpit and print, that all
possible evils arise from the system
of public schools in the United
States, and yet it has made more
heroic and concentrated efforts to
keep the women of it's faith on the
pay rolls as teachers, than all the
other churches combined
Why is this? If a thing is good,
it is all good; if it is bad, it is all
bad The Roman Catholics have
claimed that the home, as they teach
it, is the bulwark; if this is SO, how
far can home be safeguarded if the
mother is absent, and her children
are in the hands Of hirelings or
strangers; even if the mother is for
tunate enough to have a relative to
care for her child, is she paying a
debt to the Nation or her State by
spending in training the children
of other people, the strength which
belongs to her own child by right?
Aside from the religious or politi-
cal phase of the question, just how
far is it right for the married wo-
man, with children, not driven by
necessity, to leave that home to con-
tinue as a wage-earner, if she has
been one before her marriage?
Theoretically, the argument of
the average woman who takes the
view that she has the right to con-
tinue to work, if it so pleases her
after she has become a mother, may
look all right-but is it? Can we
hope ever to have the old home at
mosphere restored, if that home is in
the hands Of another woman whose