Woman under socialism Part 11

asylums the mother also is taken from the new-born child. According to the French fiction, foundlings are orphans. In this way, the French capitalist cla.s.s has its illegitimate children brought up, _at the expense of the State_, as "children of the fatherland." A charming arrangement. In Germany, things bid fair to be switched on the French track. The provisions in the bill for a civil code for the German Empire contain maxims on the legal status of illegitimate children, strongly in contrast with the humane law still in force.

According to the bill, a dishonored girl--even if blameless, or seduced with the promise of subsequent marriage, or induced to consent to coition through some criminal act--has no claim against the seducer except as indemnity for the costs of delivery, and for support during the first six weeks after the birth of the child, and then only within the bounds of what is strictly necessary. Only in some of the cases of the worst crimes against morality, can a slight money indemnity be granted to the seduced girl, at the discretion of the court, and without the necessity of proving actual damages. The illegitimate child has no claim upon the seducer of his mother, except for the merest necessaries of life, and then only until its fourteenth year. All claims of the child on its father are, however, barred if, within pregnancy, any other man cohabit with its mother. The plaintiff child has, moreover, to prove that its mother has not accepted the embraces of any other man.

Menger, the expositions in whose treatise[84] we here follow, justly raises against the bill the serious charge that it only accrues to the advantage of the well-to-do, immoral men, seducers of ignorant girls, often girls who sin through poverty, but leaves these fallen girls, together with their wholly guiltless children, entirely unprotected, aye, pushes them only deeper into misery and crime. Menger cites, in this connection, the provisions of the Prussian law. According thereto, an unmarried woman or widow of good character, who is made pregnant, is to be indemnified by the man according to his means. The indemnity shall, however, not exceed one-fourth of his property. An illegitimate child has a claim upon its father for support and education, regardless of whether his mother is a person of good character: the expenditure, however, shall be no higher than the education of a legitimate child would cost to people of the peasant or of ordinary citizen walks of life. If the illicit intercourse occurred under promise of future marriage, then, according to the further provisions of Prussian law, the Judge is duly to award the woman, p.r.o.nounced innocent and a wife, the name, standing and rank of the man, together with all the rights of a divorced woman. The illegitimate child has, in such cases, all the rights of children born in wedlock. We may await with curiosity to see whether the provisions of this bill, so hostile to woman, will acquire the force of a civil code of law in Germany. But retrogression is the key-note in our legislation.

Between the years of 1830-1880, there were 8,563 cases of infanticide before the French court of a.s.sizes, the figures rising from 471 in 1831, to 980 in 1880. During the same period, 1,032 cases of abortion were tried, 41 in 1831, and in 1880 over 100. Of course, only a small part of the abortions came to the knowledge of the criminal court; as a rule, only when followed by serious illness or death. In the cases of infanticide, the country population contributed 75 per cent., in the cases of abortion the cities 65 per cent. In the city, the women have more means at command to prevent normal birth; hence, the many cases of abortion and the small number of infanticides. It is the reverse in the country.

Such is the composition of the picture presented by modern society in respect to its most intimate relations. The picture differs wide from that that poets and poetically doused phantasists love to paint it. Our picture, however, has this advantage,--it is true. And yet the picture still calls for several strokes of the brush to bring out its character in full.

In general, there can be no difference of opinion touching the present and average mental inferiority of the female s.e.x to the male. True enough, Balzac, by no means a woman-lover, claims: "The woman, who has received a male education, possesses in fact the most brilliant and fruitful qualities for the building of her own happiness and that of her husband;" and Goethe, who knew well both the men and women of his times, expresses himself in Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship (confessions of a pure soul): "Learned women were ridiculed, and also the educated ones were disliked, probably because it was considered impolite to put so many ignorant men to shame." We agree with both. Nevertheless, the fact is no wise altered that, in general, women stand intellectually behind the men. This difference is compulsory, because _woman is that which man, as her master, has made her_. The education of woman, more so than that of the working cla.s.s, has been neglected since time immemorial; nor are latter-day improvements adequate. We live in days when the aspiration after exchange of thought grows in all circles, in the family also; and there the neglected education of woman is felt as a serious fault, and it avenges itself upon the husband.

The object of the education of man--at least it is so claimed, although due to the mistaken methods, the object is often missed, perchance, also, is not meant to be reached--aims at the development of the intellect, the sharpening of the powers of thought, the broadening of the field of practical knowledge, and the invigoration of the will-power, in short, at the cultivation of the functions of the mind.

With woman, on the contrary, education, so far as at all attended to in a higher degree, is mainly aimed at the intensification of her feelings, at formality and polite culture--music, belles-letters, art, poetry--all of which only screw her nervous sensitiveness and phantasy up to a higher pitch. This is a mistaken and unhealthy policy. In it the fact transpires that the powers, which determine the measure of woman's education, are guided only by their ingrained prejudices regarding the nature of the female character, and also by the cramped position of woman. The object must not be to develop still further the sentimental and imaginative side of woman, which would only tend to heighten her natural inclination to nervousness; neither should her education be limited to etiquette and polite literature. The object, with regard to her as to man, should be to develop their intellectual activity and acquaint them with the phenomena of practical life. It would be of greatest benefit to both s.e.xes if, in lieu of a superfluity of sentiment, that often becomes positively uncanny, woman possessed a good share of sharpened wit and power for exact reasoning; if, in lieu of excessive nervous excitation and timidity, she possessed firmness of character and physical courage; in lieu of conventional, literary refinement, in so far as she at all has any, she had a knowledge of the world, of men and of the powers of Nature.

Generally speaking, what is termed the feeling and spirituality of woman has. .h.i.therto been nurtured without stint, while her intellectual development has, on the contrary, been grossly neglected and kept under. As a consequence, she suffers of hypertrophy of feeling and spirituality, hence is p.r.o.ne to superst.i.tion and miracles,--a more than grateful soil for religious and other charlataneries, a pliant tool for all reaction. Blockish men often complain when she is thus affected, but they bring no relief, because often they are themselves steeped up to the ears in prejudices.

By reason of woman's being almost generally as here sketched, she looks upon the world differently from man. Hence, again, a strong source of contrariety between the two s.e.xes.

Partic.i.p.ation in public life is to-day one of the most essential duties of a man; that many men do not yet understand this does not alter the fact. Nevertheless, the number of those is ever increasing who realize that public inst.i.tutions stand in intimate connection with the private lot of the individual; that his success or failure, together with that of his family, depend infinitely more upon the condition of public affairs than upon his own personal qualities and actions. The fact is beginning to receive recognition that the greatest efforts of the individual are powerless against evils that lie in the very condition of things, and that determine his state. On the other hand, the struggle for existence now requires much greater efforts than before. Demands are now made upon man that engage ever more his time and strength. The ignorant, indifferent wife stands dumb before him, and feels herself neglected. It may be even said that, the mental difference between man and woman is to-day greater than formerly, when the opportunities for both were slight and limited, and lay more within the reach of her restricted intellect. Furthermore, the handling of public affairs occupies to-day a large number of men to a degree before unknown; this widens their horizon; but it also withdraws them ever more from the mental sphere of their homes. The wife deems herself set back, and thus another source of friction is started. Only rarely does the husband know how to pacify his wife and convince her. When he does that, he has escaped a dangerous rock. As a rule the husband is of the opinion that what he wants does not concern his wife, she does not understand it. He takes no pains to enlighten her. "You don't understand such matters," is his stereotyped answer, the moment the wife complains that she is neglected. Lack of information on the part of wives is promoted by lack of sense on the part of most husbands. More favorable relations between husband and wife spring up in the rank of the working cla.s.s in the measure that both realize they are tugging at the same rope, and that there is but one means towards satisfactory conditions for themselves and their family,--the radical reformation of society that shall make human beings of them all. In the measure that such insight gains ground among the wives of the proletariat, then, despite want and misery, their married life is _idealized_: both now have a common aim, after which they strive; and they have an inexhaustible source of mutual encouragement in the mutual interchange of views, whereto their joint battle leads them. The number of proletarian women who reach this insight is every year larger. Herein lies a movement, that is in process of development, and that is fraught with decisive significance for the future of mankind.

In other social strata, the differences in education and views--easily overlooked at the beginning of married life, when pa.s.sion still predominates--are felt ever more with ripening years. s.e.xual pa.s.sion cools off, and its subst.i.tution with harmony of thought is all the more needful. But, leaving aside whether the husband has any idea of civic duties and attends to the same, he, at any rate, thanks to his occupation and constant intercourse with the outer world, comes into continuous touch with different elements and opinions, on all sorts of occasions, and thus floats into an intellectual atmosphere that broadens his horizon. As a rule, and in contrast with his wife, he finds himself in a state of intellectual molting, while she, on the contrary, due to her household duties, which engage her early and late, is robbed of leisure for further education, and, accordingly, becomes mentally stunted and soured.

The domestic wretchedness in which the majority of wives live to-day, is correctly depicted by the bourgeois-minded Gerhard von Amyntor in his "Marginal Notes to the Book of Life."[85] In the chapter ent.i.tled "Deadly Gnat-bites" he says among other things:

"Not the shocking events, that none remain unvisited by, and that bring, here the death of a husband, yonder the moral downfall of a beloved child; that lie, here in a long and serious illness, yonder in the wrecking of a warmly nursed plan;--not these undermine her (the housewife's) freshness and strength. It is the small, daily-recurring marrow and bone-gnawing cares.... How many millions of brave little house-mothers cook and scour away their vigor of life, their very cheeks and roguish dimples, in attending to domestic cares until they become crumpled, dried and broke-up mummies. The ever-recurring question, what shall be cooked to-day? the ever-recurring necessity of sweeping, and beating, and brushing, and dusting is the continuously falling drop that slowly, but surely, wears away mind and body. The kitchen-hearth is the place where the saddest balances are drawn up between income and expense, where the most depressing observations are forced upon the mind on the rising dearness of the necessaries of life, and on the ever increasing difficulty to earn the needed cash. On the flaming altar, where the soup kettle bubbles, youth and mental ease, beauty and good humor are sacrificed; and who recognizes in the old care-bent cook, the one-time blooming, overbearing, coy-coquette bride in the array of her myrtle crown? Already in antiquity the hearth was sacred, near it were placed the Lares and patron deities. Let us also hold sacred the hearth at which the dutiful German bourgeois house-wife dies a slow death, in order to keep the house comfortable, the table covered and the family in health." Such is the consolation offered in bourgeois society to the wife, who, under the present order of society, is miserably going to pieces.

Those women, who, thanks to their social condition, find themselves in a freer state, have, as a rule, a one-sided, superficial education, that, combined with inherited female characteristics, manifests itself with force. They generally have a taste for mere superficialities; they think only about gew-gaws and dress; and thus they seek their mission in the satisfaction of a spoiled taste, and the indulgence of pa.s.sions that demand their pay with usury. In their children and the education of these they have hardly any interest: they give them too much trouble and annoyance, hence are left to the nurses and servants, and are later pa.s.sed on to the boarding-schools. At any rate their princ.i.p.al task is to raise their daughters as show-dolls, and their sons as pupils for the _jeunesse dore_ (gilded youth) out of which dudedom recruits its ranks--that despicable cla.s.s of men that may be fairly put upon a level with procurers. This _jeunesse dore_ furnishes the chief contingent to the seducers of the daughters of the working cla.s.s. They look upon idleness and squandering as a profession.

FOOTNOTES:

[58] Mainlaender, "Philosophie der Erlosung," Frankfort-on-the-Main, 1886, E. Koenitzer.

[59] D. A. Debay, "Hygiene et Physiologue du Marriage," Paris, 1884.

Quoted in "Im Freien Reich" by Ioma v. Troll-Borostyani, Zurich, 1884.

[60] "Das Geschlechtsleben des Weibes, in physiologischer, pathologischer und therapeutischer Hinsicht dargestellt."

[61] "Die Prost.i.tution vor dem Gesetz," by Veritas. Leipsic, 1893.

[62] V. Oettingen, "Moralstatistik." Erlangen, 1882.

[63] "Lehrbuch der Psychiatrie," Vol. I, Stuttgart, 1883.

[64] Vol. II. Leipsic, 1887.

[65] "The moods and feelings in and which husband and wife approach each other, exercise, without a doubt, a definite influence upon the result of the s.e.xual act, and transmit certain characteristics to the fruit."

Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell, "The Moral Education of the Young In Relation to s.e.x." See also Goethe's "Elective Affinities," where he sketches clearly the influence exerted by the feelings of two beings who approach each other for intimate intercourse.

[66] "Denkwuerdigkeiten," Vol. I, p. 239, Leipsic, F. A. Brockhaus.

[67] "Mr. E., a manufacturer ... informed me that he employed females exclusively, at his power-looms ... gives a decided preference to married females, especially those who have families at home dependent on them for support; they are attentive, docile, more so than unmarried females, and are compelled to use their utmost exertions to procure the necessities of life. Thus are the virtues, the peculiar virtues of the female character to be perverted to her injury--thus all that is most dutiful and tender in her nature is made a means of her bondage and suffering." Speech of Lord Ashley, March 15, 1884, on the Ten Hour Factory Bill. Marx's "Capital."

[68] "Die Frau auf dem Gebiete der Nationaloekonomie."

[69] See "Fuerst Bismarck und seine Leute," Von Busch.

[70] Sections 180 and 181.

[71] "The Physiology of Love."

[72] Alexander Dumas says rightly, In "Monsieur Alfonse:" "Man has built two sorts of morals; one for himself, one for his wife; one that permits him love with all women, and one that, as indemnity for the liberty she has forfeited forever, permits her love with one man only."

[73] L. Bridel, "La Puissance Maritale," Lausanne. 1879.

[74] v. Oettingen, "Moralstatistik," Erlangen, 1882.

[75] v. Oettingen, "Moralstatistik."

[76] [According to the census of 1900, there were in the United States 198,914 divorced persons: males 84,237, females 114,677. The percentage of divorced to married persons was 0.7. The census warns, however, that "divorced persons are apt to be reported as single, and so the census returns in this respect should not be accepted as a correct measure of the prevalence of divorce throughout the country."--THE TRANSLATOR.]

[77] v. Oettingen, "Moralstatistik."

[78] In his work frequently cited by us, "Die Frauenfrage im Mittelalter," Buecher laments the decay of marriage and of family life; he condemns the increasing female labor in industry, and demands a "return" to the "real domain of woman," where she alone produces "values" in the house and the family. The endeavors of the modern friends of woman appear to him as "dilettanteism" and he hopes finally "that the movement may be switched on the right track," but he is obviously unable to point to a successful road. Neither is that possible from the bourgeois standpoint. The marriage conditions, like the condition of woman in general, have not been brought about arbitrarily.

They are the natural product of our social development. But the social development of peoples does not cut capers, nor does it perpetrate any such false reasonings in a circle; it takes its course obedient to imminent laws. It is the mission of the student of civilization to discover these laws, and, planted upon them, to show the way for the removal of existing evils.

[79] "Neue Zeit," Jahrgang 1888, p. 239.

[80] "Etudes Medicales sur l'Ancienne Rome," Paris, 1859.

[81] The above account of the United States, concerning the contrast between it and Europe, is incorrect. At the time in the nation's history when material conditions were easy, theoretically, the thought of abortion, let alone its execution, could not spring up; and it did not.

All the reports of that time, not forgetting Washington Irving's humorous account of the custom of "bundling," confirm the fact. Births were numerous, families large.

Subsequently, when conditions became less easy, and in the measure that the country entered increasingly into the sphere of the material hardships implied in advancing capitalism, theoretically, again, the thought of abortion, and, along with it, the deed, must be expected to have sprung up; and so they did. But the same development that carried the country into the material sphere of capitalism, also, and at the same time, carried its people into the sphere of capitalist affectation of morality and measuredness of language; in short, of hypocrisy. The being, that will commit the crimes of a higher civilization with the plain-spokenness of the barbarian, is a monstrosity. Capitalist United States is abreast of, and moves in even step with, capitalist Europe, not in the practice only of crime, but in the Pharisees of its condemnation and the severity of its punishment also.--THE TRANSLATOR.

[82] "Geschichte und Gefahren der Fruchtabtreibung," Dr. Ed. Reich, Leipsic, 1893.

[83] "The child conceived during marriage has the husband for father."

[84] "Das buergerliche Recht und die besitzlosen Kla.s.sen," Tuebingen, 1890.

[85] Sam. Lucas, Elberfeld.

CHAPTER II.

FURTHER CHECKS AND OBSTRUCTIONS TO MARRIAGE--NUMERICAL PROPORTION OF THE s.e.xES--ITS CAUSES AND EFFECTS.