Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 3.djvu/212

 198 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

than to children and men. Women, of course, derive benefits therefrom, but they were not class enactments. The importance of inspection is recognized by all, but the importance of women inspectors is acknowledged by only six states. Mrs. Kelley, of Illinois, an authority on such matters, holds that there should be one woman inspector for every one thousand women and children employed. 1 This claim bears its justness on its face.

Legislation prevails in many of the manufacturing states, and right-thinking people everywhere cannot much longer refuse to hear the cry of woe coming up from the female workers who form so large and important a factor in the industrial world. Their very ignorance of their own danger should be an added incentive to action. While some states are wrangling over the constitutionality or unconstitutionality of protecting women workers from long and dreary hours of drudgery, those same workers, who know not how to protect themselves, are being rendered unfit for anything by excessive toil. The question as to why they are not able to protect themselves is not a very deep one. Its answer lies chiefly in the reason that they do not under- stand the meaning of organized effort. Until lately they have not been taught how to organize and it is little wonder that they themselves have not taken initiatory measures in that direction. After a hard day's work they are too weary of body and dull of mind to do aught but rest or under the influence of stimulating excitement engage in some frivolous entertainment. Is it sur- prising that they have not risen to see the needs of organization, the lurking dangers of non-organization ?

Many of the laws are yet crude and unsatisfactory. In some cases, the mere changing of a word would render good a useless law. Take for example that of Minnesota. The law reads: " Employers shall not be permitted to compel any woman under eighteen years to work more than ten hours a day." Here the one word compel renders the law of little practical use, for it is easy to evade the matter of compulsion. The law of Illinois is a disgrace to the state. There is no check whatever upon

'Taken from HKI.I.N CAMI-MKI.I.'S Women Wage Earners, p. 264.