History of Woman Suffrage Volume I Part 31

As regards voting, why should not women go to the polls? You think it a very strange desire, I know; but we have thought many things stranger which seem quite natural now. One need not live long to find strange things grow common. Why not vote, then? Is it because they have not as much power to understand what is true and right as man? If you go to the polls, and see the style of men who meet there voting, can you come away, and tell us that the women you meet are not as able to decide what is right as those men? "Ah, it will brush off every feminine grace, if woman goes to the polls." Why? "Because she must meet rude men there."

Very well, so she must meet them in the street, and they do not hurt her; nor will I believe that there is not sufficient inventive power in the Yankee intellect to overcome this difficulty. I can conceive of a broader and more generous activity in politics. I can see her drawing out all the harshness and bitterness when she goes to the polls. These three points are all I intended to touch; and I will give way to those who are to follow.

Mrs. CAROLINE H. DALL was then introduced. She said: I have observed that all public orators labor under some embarra.s.sment when they rise to speak. Not to be behind the dignity of my position, I labor under a _double_ embarra.s.sment.

The first is the "embarras des richesses." There are so many topics to touch, so many facts to relate, that it is impossible to cover them in one half hour, and the second--perhaps you will think that an embarra.s.sment of riches also; for it is an embarra.s.sment of Clarke and Phillips. The orator needs no common courage who follows the one and precedes the other. It is my duty to speak of the progress of the cause; it is impossible to keep pace with it. You may work day and night, but this thought of G.o.d outstrips you, working hourly through the life of man. Yet we must often feel discouraged. Our war is not without; our work follows us into the heart of the family. We must sustain ourselves in that dear circle against our nearest friends; against the all-pervading law, "Thus far shalt thou come, and no farther."

What have we gained since 1855? Many things, so important, that they can not be worthily treated here. I have often mentioned in my lectures, that in his first report to the French Government, Neckar gave the credit of his retrenchments to his thrifty, order-loving wife. Until this year, that acknowledgment stood alone in history. But now John Stuart Mill, the great philosopher and political economist of England, dedicates his "Essay on Liberty" to the memory of his beloved wife, who has been the _inspiration of all, and the author of much_ that was best in his writings for many years past. Still farther, in a pamphlet on "English Political Reform," treating of the extension of the suffrage, he has gone so far as to recommend that all householders, without distinction of s.e.x, be adopted into the const.i.tuency, upon proving to the registrar's officer that they have a certain income--say fifty pounds--and "that they can read, write, and calculate."

A great step was taken also in the establishment of the Inst.i.tution for the Advancement of Social Science. The s.e.xes are equal before it. It has five departments. 1. Jurisprudence, or Law Reform; 2. Education; 3. Punishment and Reformation; 4.

Public Health; 5. Social Economy.

The first meeting at Liverpool considered the woman's question; and, while it was debated, Mary Carpenter sat upon the platform, or lifted her voice side by side with Brougham, Lord John Russell, and Stanley. At the second meeting (last October), Lord John Russell was in the chair. The Lord Chancellor of Ireland presided over Law Reform; the Right Hon. W. F. Cooper, over the department of Education; the Earl of Carlyle--personally known to many on this platform--over that which concerns the Reformation of Criminals; the Earl of Shaftesbury over Public Health; and Conolly and Charles Kingsley and Tom Taylor and Rawlinson bore witness side by side with Florence Nightingale. Sir James Stephen presided over Social Economy. Isa Craig, the Burns poetess, is one of its Secretaries.

Ten communications were read at this session by women; among them, Florence Nightingale, Mary Carpenter, Isa Craig, Louisa Twining, and Mrs. Fison. Four were on Popular Education, two upon Punishment and Reformation, three on the Public Health in the Army and elsewhere, one upon Social Economy. Still another proof of progress may be seen in the examination of Florence Nightingale by the Sanitary Commission.

[In the establishment of _The Englishwoman's Journal_ with an honorable corps of writers, in the pa.s.sage of the new Divorce Bill, of the Married Woman's Property Bill in Canada, the cause had gained much; on each of which Mrs. Dall spoke at some length, especially this Property Bill, which some foolish member had shorn of its most precious clause--that which secured her earnings to the working-woman, lest, by tempting her to labor, it should create a divided interest in the family].

Do you ask me why I have dwelt on this Inst.i.tution for Social Science, cataloguing the n.o.ble names that do it honor? To strengthen the timorous hearts at the West End; to suggest to them that a coronet of G.o.d's own giving may possibly rest as secure as one of gold and jewels in the United Kingdom. I wish to draw your attention to the social distinction of the men upon that platform. No real n.o.bleness will be imperiled by impartial listening to our plea. Would you rest secure in our respect, first feel secure in your own. If ten Beacon Street ladies would go to work, and take pay for their labor, it would do more good than all the speeches that were ever made, all the conventions that were ever held. I honor women who act. That is the reason that I greet so gladly girls like Harriet Hosmer, Louisa Lander, and Margureite Foley. Whatever they do, or do not do, for Art, they do a great deal for the cause of Labor. I do not believe any one in this room has any idea of the avenues that are open to women already. Let me read you some of the results of the last census of the United Kingdom. Talk of women not being able to work! Women have been doing hard work ever since the world began.

You will see by this that they are doing as much as men now.

[Applause].

In 1841, there were engaged in agriculture, 66,329 women. In 1851, 128,418; nearly double the number. Of these, there are 64,000 dairy-women; women who lift enormous tubs, turn heavy cheeses, slap b.u.t.ter by the hundred weight. Then come market-gardeners, bee-mistresses, florists, flax producers and beaters, haymakers, reapers, and hop-pickers.

In natural connection with the soil, we find seven thousand women in the mining interest; not harnessed on all-fours to creep through the shafts, but dressers of ore, and washers and strainers of clay for the potteries. Next largest to the agricultural is one not to be exactly calculated--the fishing interest. The Pilchard fishery employs some thousands of women.

The Jersey oyster fishery alone employs one thousand. Then follow the herring, cod, whale, and lobster fisheries.

Apart from the Christie Johnstones--the aristocrats of the trade--the sea nurtures an heroic cla.s.s like Grace Darling, who stand aghast when society rewards a deed of humanity, and cry out in expostulation, "Why, every girl on the coast would have done as I did!" Then follow the kelp-burners, netters, and bathers.

The netters make the fisherman's nets; the bathers manage the machines at the watering-places.

And, before quitting this subject, I should like to allude to the French fishwomen; partly as a matter of curiosity, partly to prove that women know how to labor. In the reign of Henry IV., there existed in Paris a privileged monopoly called the United Corporation of Fishmongers and Herringers. In the reign of Louis XIV. this corporation had managed so badly as to become insolvent. The women who had hawked and vended fish took up the business, and managed so well as to become very soon a political power. They became rich, and their children married into good families. You will remember the atrocities generally ascribed to them in the first revolution. It is now known that these were committed by ruffians disguised in their dress.

To return: there are in the United Kingdom 200,000 female servants. Separate from these, brewers, custom-house searchers, matrons of jails, lighthouse-keepers, pew-openers.

I have no time to question; but should not a Christian community offer womanly ministrations to its imprisoned women? Oh, that some brave heart, in a strong body, might go on our behalf to the city jail and Charlestown! Pew-opening has never been a trade in America; but, as there are signs that it may become so in this democratic community, I would advise our women to keep an eye to that. [Laughter].

There are in the United Kingdom 500,000 business women, beer-shop keepers, butcher-wives, milk-women, hack-owners, and shoemakers.

As one item of this list, consider 26,000 butcher-wives--women who do not merely preside over a business, but buy stock, put down meat, drive a cart even if needed--butchers to all intents and purposes. There are 29,000 shop-keepers, but only 1,742 shop-women.

Telegraph reporters are increasing rapidly. Their speed and accuracy are much praised. From the Bright Festival, at Manchester, a young woman reported, at the rate of twenty-nine words a minute, six whole columns, with hardly a mistake, though the whole matter was political, such as she was supposed not to understand!

Phonographic reporters also. A year ago there were but three female phonographers in America; and two of these did not get their bread by the work. Now hundreds are qualifying themselves, all over the land; and two young girls, not out of their teens, are at this moment reporting my words. [Cheers].

I hope the phonographers will take that clapping to themselves. I wish you would make it heartier. [Repeated cheers]. Now let us turn to the American census. I must touch it lightly. Of factory operatives, I will only say, that, in 1845, there were 55,828 men and 75,710 women engaged in textile manufactures. You will be surprised at the preponderance of women: it seems to be as great in other countries. Then follow makers of gloves, makers of glue, workers in gold and silver leaf, hair-weavers, hat and cap makers, hose-weavers, workers in India rubber, lamp-makers, laundresses, leechers, milliners, morocco-workers, nurses, paper-hangers, physicians, picklers and preservers, saddlers and harness-makers, shoemakers, soda-room keepers, snuff and cigar-makers, stock and suspender-makers, truss-makers, typers and stereotypers, umbrella-makers, upholsterers, card-makers.

Cards were invented in 1361. In less than seventy years the German manufacture was in the hands of women--Elizabeth and Margaret, at Nuremberg. Then grinders of watch crystals, 7,000 women in all.

My own observation adds to this list phonographers, house and sign painters, fruit-hawkers, b.u.t.ton-makers, tobacco-packers, paper-box makers, embroiderers, and fur-sewers.

Perhaps I should say haymakers and reapers; since, for three or four years, bands of girls have been so employed in Ohio, at sixty-two and a half cents a day.

In New Haven, seven women work with seventy men in a clock factory, at half wages. If the proprietor answered honestly, when asked why he employed them, he would say, "To save money;" but he does answer, "To help our cause."

In Waltham, a watch factory has been established, whose statistics I shall use elsewhere.

In Winchester, Va., a father has lately taken a daughter into partnership; and the firm is "J. Wysong and Daughter."

[Applause]. Is it not a shame it should happen first in a slave State?

Then come registers of deeds and postmistresses. We all know that the rural post-office is chiefly in the hands of irresponsible women. Petty politicians obtain the office, take the money, and leave wives and sisters to do the work.

[Here Mrs. Dall read an interesting letter from a female machinist in Delaware; but, as it will be published in another connection, it is here withheld].

Is it easy for women to break the way into new avenues? You know it is not.

[Here Mrs. Dall referred to the opposition shown to the employment of women in watch-making, by Mr. Bennett, in London; to the school at Marlborough House; to the employment of women in printing-offices--substantiating her statements by dates and names].

When I first heard that women were employed in Staffordshire to paint pottery and china--which they do with far more taste than men--I heard, also, that the jealousy of the men refused to allow them the customary hand-rest, and so kept down their wages. I refused to believe anything so contemptible. [Applause]. Now the Edinburgh Review confirms the story. Thank G.o.d! that could never happen in this country. With us, Labor can not dictate to Capital.

But the great evils which lie at the foundation of depressed wages are:

1st. That want of respect for labor which prevents ladies from engaging in it.

2d. That want of respect for women which prevents men from valuing properly the work they do.

Women themselves must change these facts.

[Mrs. Dall here read some letters to show that wages were at a starving-point in the cities of America as well as in Europe].

I am tired of the folly of the political economist, constantly crying that wages can never rise till the laborers are fewer. You have heard of the old law in hydraulics, that water will always rise to the level of its source; but, if by a forcing-pump, you raise it a thousand feet above, or by some huge syphon drop it a thousand feet below, does that law hold? Very well, the artificial restrictions of society are such a forcing-pump--are such a syphon. Make woman equal before the law with man, and wages will adjust themselves.

But what is the present remedy? A very easy one--for employers to adopt the cash system, and be content with rational profits. In my correspondence during the past year, master-tailors tell me that they pay from eight cents to fifty cents a day for the making of pantaloons, including the heaviest doeskins. Do you suppose they would dare to tell me how they charge that work on their slowly-paying customer's bills? Not they. The eight cents swells to thirty, the fifty to a dollar or a dollar twenty-five.

Put an end to this, and master-tailors would no longer vault into Beacon Street over prostrate women's souls; but neither would women be driven to the streets for bread.

If I had time, I would show you, women, how much depends upon yourselves. As it is, we may say with the heroine of "Adam Bede,"

which you have doubtless all been reading:

"I'm not for denying that the women are foolish. G.o.d Almighty made 'em to match the men!" [Laughter].

Do you laugh? It is but a step from the ridiculous to the sublime; and Goethe, who knew women well, was of the same mind when he wrote:

"Wilt thou dare to blame the woman for her seeming sudden changes-- Swaying east and swaying westward, as the breezes shake the tree?

Fool! thy selfish thought misguides thee. Find the man that never ranges.

Woman wavers but to seek him. Is not, then, the fault in thee?"

Mrs. Dall was followed by the Rev. JOHN T. SARGENT, who said:

MADAM PRESIDENT AND FRIENDS:--I appreciate the honor of an invitation to this platform, but my words must be few; first, because the call comes to me within a few hours, and amid the cares and responsibilities of the chair on another platform, and I had no time for preconcerted forms of address; second, because the general principles of this organization, and the subject matters for discussion, are so well sifted and disposed of by previous speakers, that nothing new remains for me to say; and, third, because we are all waiting for the words of one [Wendell Phillips] whose sympathies are never wanting in any cause of truth and justice, whose versatile eloquence never hesitates on any platform where he waves aloft "the sword of the spirit" in behalf of human rights. [Applause].