26
THE CONGRESS OF WOMEN.
are to the constant weeding out of the less expert and steady hands, it is evident that women, thrown upon their own resources, have a frightful struggle to endure, especially as they have always to contend against a public sentiment which discountenances their seeking industrial employment as a means of livelihood.
The theory which exists among the conservative people, that the sphere of woman is her home—that it is unfeminine, even monstrous, for her to wish to take a place beside or to compete with men in the various lucrative industries—tells heavily against her, for manufacturers and producers take advantage of it to disparage her work and obtain her services for a nominal price, thus profiting largely by the necessities and helplessness of their victim. That so many should cling to respectable occupations while starving in following them, and should refuse to yield to discouragement and despair, shows a high quality of steadfastness and principle. These are the real heroines of life, whose handiwork we are proud to install in the Exposition, because it has been produced in factories, workshops and studios under the most adverse conditions and with the most sublime patience and endurance.
Men of the finest and most chivalric type, who have poetic theories about the sanctity of the home and the refining, elevating influence of woman in it, theories inherited from the days of romance and chivalry, which we wish might prevail forever—-these men have asked many times whether the Board of Lady Managers thinks it well to promote a sentiment which may tend to destroy the home by encouraging occupations for women which take them out of it. We feel, therefore, obliged to state our belief that every woman, who is presiding over a happy home, is fulfilling her highest and truest function, and could not be lured from it by temptations offered by factories or studios. Would that the eyes of these idealists could be thoroughly opened, that they might see, not the fortunate few of a favored class, with whom they possibly are in daily contact, but the general status of the labor market throughout the world and the relation to it of women. They might be astonished to learn that the conditions under which the vast majority of the “ gentler sex” are living, are not so ideal as they assume; that each is not “ dwelling in a home of which she is the queen, with a manly and loving arm to shield her from rough contact with life.” Because of the impossibility of reconciling their theories with the stern facts, they might possibly consent to forgive the offense of widows with dependent children and those wives of drunkards and criminals who so far forget the high standard established for them as to attempt to earn for themselves daily bread, lacking which they must perish. The necessity for their work under present conditions is too evident and too urgent to be questioned. They must work or they must starve.
We are forced, therefore, to turn from the realm of fancy to meet and deal with existing facts. The absence of a just and general appreciation of the truth concerning the position and status of women has caused us to call special attention to it and to make a point of attempting to create, by means of the Exposition, a well defined public sentiment in regard to their rights and duties, and the propriety of their becoming not only self-supporting, but able to assist in maintaining their families when necessary. We hope that the statistics which the Board of Lady Managers has been so earnestly attempting to secure may give a correct idea of the number of women—not only those without natural protectors, or those thrown suddenly upon their own resources, but the number of wives of mechanics, laborers, artists, artisans and workmen of every degree—who are forced to work shoulder to shoulder with their husbands in order to maintain the family.
There are two classes of the community who wish to restrain women from actual participation in the business of the world, and each gives apparently very strong reasons in support of its views. These are, first, the idealists, who hold the opinion already mentioned that woman should be tenderly guarded and cherished within the sacred precincts of the home, which alone is her sphere of action; and, second, certain political economists, with whom maybe ranged most of the men engaged in the profitable pursuit of the industries of the world, who object to the competition that would