The Industrial Workers of the World, a Labour Society with a revolutionary programme, has a large membership of unskilled workers, in textile and other industries. It doubtless includes many women, for women took part in a conflict with the city government of Spokane, Washington, over the question of free speech, the city having attempted to prevent street meetings. The workers were successful, but not without a severe struggle, in the course of which 500 men and women went to jail, many of whom adopted the hunger-strike.
In the great strike of textile workers in Lawrence, Ma.s.s., in 1912, a remarkably spontaneous effort was made by the Polish women-weavers at the Everett mill. The hours of work had been reduced by legislation from 56 to 54 per week, and the employees demanded that the same money should be paid to them as before the change. In the Everett mill about 80 per cent of the weavers were Poles. In one of the weave-rooms the Polish weavers, almost all women, stopped their looms after receiving their money on January 11, and tried to persuade the workers in some other sections of the mill to come out with them.[36] The story of this strike shows that women are fully capable of feeling the wave of cla.s.s-consciousness that brings about the development of what is called "New Unionism"; but probably the difficulty of their taking a serious part in control and management is even greater than in craft Unions. Information is, however, very scanty as to the relation of women to the I.W.W., which in its literature is quite as p.r.o.ne as the more aristocratic craft Union to ignore the part taken by women in organisation.
In 1908, when the Bureau of Labour made its enquiry into the conditions of women wage-earners in the U.S.A., the number of Unions containing ten or more female members was 546, and the number of female members was only 63,989, estimated at only 2 per cent of the total membership of the Unions.
The largest group of women Unionists are those engaged in the making of or working at men"s garments; these number over 17,000. The textile workers came next with 6000; the boot and shoe workers, hat and cap workers, and tobacco workers form three groups of over 5000 each.
This census, however, was taken at a most unfavourable moment, when many Unions were suffering from the trade depression of the previous autumn and winter. It is also true that the numbers in actual membership are not a complete measure of the numbers under the direct influence and guidance of the Unions. It has been found that the numbers of women ready to come out on strike and enrol themselves in Unions or enforce a particular demand at a particular moment are considerably in excess of the number normally enlisted.
At the same time there is little use in denying that, speaking generally, the results attained by women"s organisations, after eighty or ninety years of effort, are disappointing. Women"s Unions in America have been markedly ephemeral in character, usually organised in time of strikes, and frequently disappearing after the settlement of the conflict that brought them into being.
A great obstacle to the organisation of women is no doubt the temporary character of their employment. The ma.s.s of women-workers are young, the great majority being under twenty-five. The difficulty of organising a body of young, heedless, and impatient persons is evident, especially in the case of girls and women who do not usually consider themselves permanently in industry. In the words of the Commissioner:
To the organiser of women into Trade Unions is furnished all of the common obstacles familiar to the organiser of male wage-earners, including short-sighted individual self-interest, ignorance, poverty, indifference, and lack of co-operative training. But to the organisers of women is added another and most disconcerting problem. When men marry they usually become more definitely attached to the trade and to the community and to their labour Union. Women as a rule drop out of the trade and out of the Union when marriage takes them out of the struggle for economic independence.
Another great difficulty is the opposition of the employers. "Employers commonly and most strenuously object to a Union among the women they employ." When once an organisation has attained any size, strength, or significance, the employers almost always set themselves to break it up, and have usually succeeded. In Boston, for instance, a Union of some 800 members was broken up by the posting of a notice by the firm that its employees must either join its own employers" Union or quit work. Some employers look upon female labour as the natural resource in case of a strike, as see the case quoted by Miss Abbott (_Women in Industry_, p.
206). There are reasons why employers object even more strongly to Unions among women than among men. In a number of cases production is mainly carried on by women and girls, only a few men being required to do work requiring special strength and skill. In such instances the employers do not particularly object to the organisation of their few men, whom, as skilled workers, they would anyhow have to pay fairly well. But when it comes to organising women and demanding for them higher wages and shorter hours, the matter is much more serious.
The present unsatisfactory condition of women"s Unions is, however, only what might be expected in the early years of such a movement. Men"s Unions have all gone through a similar period of weak beginnings, and in America there are special difficulties arising from the presence of ma.s.ses of unskilled or semi-skilled workers of different races and tongues, and varying in their traditions and standard of life. There is much encouragement to be derived from the fact that the leaders in men"s Unions, both national and local, now have more faith than formerly in Unionism for women. The American Federation of Labour calls upon its members to aid and encourage with all the means at their command the organisation of women and girls, "so that they may learn the stern fact that if they desire to achieve any improvement in their condition it must be through their own self-a.s.sertion in the local Union." From 1903 onward every Convention has favoured the appointment of women organisers. Women also are developing a greater sense of comradeship with their fellows and of solidarity with the Labour Movement generally. As we have seen, there are now few Unions which discriminate against women in their const.i.tutions, and the universal Trade Union rule is "equal pay for equal work for men and women."
Even the special condition of this instability in industry, the temporary nature of women"s work, which is so great an obstacle to organisation, is thought to be changing. Within the last thirty or forty years, changes in industrial and commercial methods have opened up numerous lines of activity to women, in addition to the factory work, sewing and domestic service, which used to be her main field: "marriage is coming to be looked upon less and less as a woman"s sole career, and at the same time the att.i.tude in regard to wage-earning after marriage is changing. The tendency of these movements is to create an atmosphere of permanency and professionalism for woman as a wage-earner, especially among women in the better-paid occupations, which in time may markedly change her att.i.tude toward industrial life." Such a change of outlook and habits of mind must doubtless be slow, but there are signs that it is in progress on both sides of the Atlantic. The future of Unionism for women is therefore not without hope, however unsatisfactory the immediate prospect may be. Miss Matthews, the writer of an interesting study of women"s Unions in San Francisco, sums up her observations on the subject as follows:
Experience in contesting for their rights in Union seems to have developed leaders among the Trade Union women. Wages, hours, and shop conditions have all shown the impress of the influence exerted by the organised action of the workers. But if wages, hours, and shop conditions did not enter into the question at all, still Trade Unionism among women would show its results in a higher moral tone made possible by the security which comes from the knowledge that there are friends who will protest in time of trouble and offer hope for better days; it would display its influence in a more awakened and trained intelligence; it would make evident its effort in a happier att.i.tude towards the day"s work, arising from the fact that the worker herself has studied her industry and has partic.i.p.ated in determining the conditions under which she earns her livelihood.
In 1903-4 a Women"s Trade Union League, on the lines of the organisation of the same name in England, was formed, and is doing excellent work to promote solidarity and union among women-workers.
CHAPTER IVA.
WOMEN IN UNIONS (_continued_).
_Women"s Unions in Germany._[37]--In Germany the obstacles have been far greater than in England. The relative prevalence of "Hausindustrie" and the greater poverty stood in the way of women"s organisation, and until a few years back the law did not allow women to join political societies.
Women were not, it is true, prohibited from joining Trade Unions, but the line between political and trade societies is not in practice always easy to draw, and full membership of Unions has thus been often hindered.
The first Women"s Unions were started in the early "seventies of the last century, by middle-cla.s.s women who were also in the forefront of the battle for the Suffrage. The authorities dissolved the societies.
Women-workers did not long maintain the alliance with the "Women"s Rights"
Party. An independent organisation was formed, which greatly exceeded the previous efforts in numbers and significance. The immediate impulse to the formation of this Union was given by the proposal of the Government to put a duty on sewing-thread, which would have been a great burden on the needle-women who had to provide the thread. Three societies were formed, the first being the "Verein zur Vertretung der Interessen der Arbeiterinnen," which was followed by the "Nordverein der Berliner Arbeiterinnen" and the "Fachverein der Mantelnaherinnen," both of which were founded and controlled by working women. Investigations of the wages and conditions of working women were undertaken by these societies, in consequence of which a debate in the Reichstag took place, followed by an official enquiry into the wages of the women-workers in the manufacture of underclothing and ready-made garments, which only confirmed the conclusion already reached by private enquiry. The Truck Act was made more stringent, in response to the working women"s movement, but as a secondary result all the societies were dissolved and the leaders prosecuted. The authorities were taking fright at the increase in the Socialist vote and in the membership of Trade Unions; and the Reichstag, under the tutelage of Bismarck, in 1878 pa.s.sed the notorious Anti-Socialist Law, under which not only Socialist societies but even Trade Unions were hara.s.sed and suppressed. During the twelve years in which the law was in force, however, propaganda work was still carried on with heroic courage and perseverance, and the solidarity and cla.s.s-consciousness of the workers, both men and women, was developed and strengthened by their natural indignation against the persecution suffered.
The men"s att.i.tude towards the women-workers, which had been formerly reactionary and sometimes hostile, gradually changed, partly because of the energy and courage the women had shown, partly through a growing recognition, which was intensified by the enormous increase in women industrial workers shown in the Census Report, 1895, that exclusion of women from the men"s Unions could only exasperate industrial compet.i.tion in its worst form. In 1890 a Conference was held at Berlin at which the Central Commission of German Trade Unions was founded, and its att.i.tude towards women was indicated by the fact that a woman was a member of its Committee. Measures were taken that in the committees of societies which excluded women from membership, resolutions should be proposed for an alteration of rules, and in most cases these were adopted. Under their guidance an agitation was set on foot to induce women to join Unions. Into this agitation the women organisers put an energy, patience, and self-sacrifice that is beyond praise. Now the German Free Unions ("freie Gewerkschaften") are not identified with any political propaganda, and cannot legally spend money for political purposes if they have members under eighteen. But in practice they are largely led and controlled by members of the Social Democratic Party, and thus it has happened that working women, who were forced to abandon their own societies and to join forces with the general Labour Movement, are now largely under the influence and identified with the movement for social democracy. It is incorrect to speak of the Unions as "Social Democratic Unions," and yet in fact the two forces do work in harmony.
In the Labour Movement women found their natural allies. Their co-operation secured men against "blackleg" compet.i.tion, and on the other hand the social democrats have worked for women. In 1877 they pet.i.tioned for improvements in the working conditions of women, and in 1890, that women should have votes for the industrial councils that were then under consideration. Bebel"s _Die Frau und der Sozialismus_ appeared about this time, and made a profound sensation. In this work the relations of the social question with the woman question were a.n.a.lysed. "Nothing but economic freedom for woman," said Bebel, "could complete her political and social emanc.i.p.ation."
In 1908 some of the remaining obstacles that impeded women from taking part in political and trade societies were done away with by the Federal a.s.sociation law. The outstanding fact at the present time is the enormous relative increase in the numbers of women Unionists. Frau Gnauck gives the numbers in 1905 as 50,000 in the "Free" or social democratic Unions, 10,000 in the Christian. The figures for 1912, from the _German Statistical Year-Book_, will be found at the end of the section.[38] It will be observed that although, as with us, the largest group of organised women is in the textile trades, the members are more generally distributed, and the non-textile Unions show larger numbers, both absolutely and relatively, than is the case in England.
The centralised Unions undoubtedly owe their origin chiefly to the Social Democratic exertions, and are strongly cla.s.s-conscious. They, however, favour the view that it is the duty of the State to protect the workers by legislation from excessive exploitation, and that it is the main business of the Unions to achieve as far as possible immediate improvements in wages and labour conditions. The comparative ease with which new Unions have been built up and existing Unions amalgamated is very largely due to Social Democratic influence. Before Trade Unions existed to any extent worth mentioning, La.s.salle"s campaign for united action had taught the workers that the engineer and his helper, the bricklayer and his labourer, were of one cla.s.s and had one supreme interest in common; that there was only one working cla.s.s, and varieties of calling and degrees of skill were not the proper basis of organisation even for trade ends. The ideal no doubt is one great Union of all workers, regardless of occupation. This is in practice unattainable; but the Germans, in whom cla.s.s-consciousness is so strong, are reducing the Unions to the smallest possible number, and are also linked closely together by means of the General Commission.
The General Commission of Trade Unions has its office in Berlin. It publishes a weekly journal called a _Korrespondenzblatt_, containing information of value to Trade Unionists and students of Trade Unionism.
Connected with the Commission is a secretariat for women, the work of which is to promote organisation among women-workers. Still more recently it has been arranged that each Union with any appreciable membership of women should have a woman organiser. The rapid increase among women members is an indication of the increasing interest taken by the women themselves. Considerable diversity in the scale of contributions is one characteristic--young persons, as well as women, being admitted members along with adult males.
It is evident that the German form of organisation is much better calculated to catch the weaker and less-skilled cla.s.ses of workers than is the more aristocratic and old-fashioned craft Union of our own country.
The Germans hold that the organisation of the unskilled labourer is as important as that of the mechanic, and their great industrial combinations include all men- and women-workers within the field of operations, irrespective of their particular grade of skill. Endeavours are made to enrol all workers in big effective organisations, and the success of these tactics has been most significant. While in Germany two and a half million workers are organised in forty-eight centralised Unions, all affiliated to the General Commission as the national centre, in England there are more than a thousand separate Unions with about the same total membership. In England barely one million Unionists out of the two and a half belong to the General Federation. These facts are not without bearing on the position of women-workers. English working men complain of the compet.i.tion of women; the moral is, organise the women.
Another important field of Trade Union activity is in the education of their members. There is a Trade Union School at Berlin supported entirely by Trade Union funds and managed by Trade Unionists. Care is also taken that members of Unions should be politically educated to understand their rights and duties as citizens. Women-workers in all the "freie Gewerkschaften" enjoy the same privileges as men, and are eligible for all boards or elected bodies of their respective Unions. There are as yet, however, only two Unions in Germany which have a woman president, and the majority on the executives of the other Unions are men. This is not due to opposition by men, or to rules impeding the appointment of women on these bodies, but rather to the indifference of many women-workers, who, as in England, fail to interest themselves in the affairs of their Unions. This lack of enthusiasm on the part of women is ascribed to their position in the home and to the difficulty that they have in combining household work with wage-work, and at the same time retaining any leisure or energy to concern themselves with Union matters.
Contributions and benefits are usually somewhat lower than in the case of men, because women"s earnings are usually less. Five national Unions have, however, adopted the principle of equal scales for men and women. In these cases the amount of contribution varies according to the wages earned, and benefits are graduated to prevent the risk of women becoming a greater burden on the funds than men.
It is a patent fact that the number of organised women-workers is very small when compared with men in the same organisation, but the relative increase is great, and the spirit of a.s.sociation is said to be gaining a strong hold on women. The fact that so many German women continue work after marriage is said to be one cause of the increasing interest taken in Unions, their position as wage-earners being not merely a temporary one, to be abandoned in a few years" time.
The "Christian" Trade Unions contain no very large numbers of women compared to the "free" societies. They were also considerably later in coming into existence, and appear, though ostensibly non-political, to be largely due to reactionary political influences, and organised in opposition to the Socialist party. The Home Workers" Union is mainly philanthropic and controlled by ladies. The Christian Unions have enemies on both sides, as they are naturally regarded with considerable suspicion by the "Free" or "Central" Unions, but nevertheless are also disapproved of by the authorities of the Catholic Church. The Christian Unions started with the aim of being inter-denominational ("interkonfessionelle"), including Protestants as well as Catholics, and a considerable degree of sympathy with labour was combined with their mainly reactionary propaganda; they even considered strikes a possible and ultimate resource, although they desired to avoid them. In many cases, pressed forward perhaps by the rank and file, they have co-operated with the "Free" Unions, who are so much stronger in numbers and finance than themselves. These tendencies excited the displeasure of the strict Catholic body, and not only the German Bishops, but the Pope himself, have shown hostility to the Christian Unions, which have thus been rent by internal dissensions. Catholic Unions of a strictly denominational type have been formed in opposition to the inter-denominational Christian Unions, and though the former are of little importance as organisations, they no doubt have some effect in weakening the body from which they have branched off. However that may be, the numbers in the Christian Unions, though showing a considerable percentage increase, are insignificant compared to the large "Free" Unions. In quite recent years the Christian Unions have lent themselves to strike-breaking and are becoming discredited in the labour world. The Hirsch-Duncker Unions have only a very small number of women members, and are of little importance for the women"s labour movement. These Unions were founded and are partly controlled by middle-cla.s.s Liberals.
It may be interesting here briefly to compare the views of two distinguished German women writers on the question of Trade Unionism for women. Frau Braun, writing in 1901, says that the development of the great industry is the force that impelled men to combine successfully together, but industrially women are about a century behind men, and before they can be successfully organised, home-work must be repressed in every form, and women"s work must develop into factory industry much more completely than it has yet done. Home-work tends to perpetuate the dependence of women, enabling the home-keeping wife or daughter to carry on a bye-industry, and is therefore an evil. Again, the poverty of women is a great obstacle to their organisation. Economic history shows that well-paid workers organise more quickly and effectively than those who are isolated, oppressed and degraded. Women-workers most urgently need to be enlightened, but this cannot happen until they have been lifted out of the intense pressure of physical need; they must be given time to read, to follow the news of the day, to get beyond the horizon of their own four walls. This cannot be attained by Trade Union action alone. Legislative measures must be taken for the relief of the women-workers. English history shows that Lancashire women weavers before the Factory Act were as incapable of organisation, as easy a prey to the exploiter of their work, as the majority of women-workers are to-day. It was only after the law had restricted their hours of work that they began to organise in Trade Unions and Co-operative Societies.
In Frau Braun"s opinion women-workers will lose more than they gain by adopting the style of the women"s movement in the bourgeois sense. Save where absolutely necessary, organisation for women only is a source of weakness to the women-workers" movement. The numerous societies for women-workers" education, the independent Socialist women"s congresses, and especially the women"s Unions promoted by the advocates of "women"s rights," all these are dangerous.
A working woman"s movement fully conscious of its aims and principles will permit this cla.s.s of organisation only in the case of Unions for trades exclusively feminine, or of educational clubs or inst.i.tutes when no other is accessible to women-workers. In principle they should all be avoided, for they can only confuse the issue, and exaggerate the one-sided feminist point of view which leaves out of account the cla.s.s solidarity of workers and women-workers, the indispensable condition of any successful effort by the proletariat. And it follows from this point of view that co-operation with the bourgeois woman"s movement should be refused, whether in the form of admission to "bourgeois" women"s societies or the inclusion of "bourgeois" advocates of women"s rights in women-workers" societies. Both England and France, Frau Braun thinks, offer examples of the reactionary effect of such co-operation; the numberless work-girls" clubs, holiday homes and the like, managed by ladies of the upper and middle cla.s.ses in England are one cause of the political backwardness of the English working women. Co-operation is too apt to degenerate into tutelage. The German women"s movement has steadily refused any co-operation with the bourgeois movement, because it recognises the complete divergence of principle lying at the back of the two movements, and the difference of standpoint as well as of aim.
Not that every Socialist is sound on the woman question! Far from it. Frau Braun recognises that in many a Social democrat there lurks the old reactionary philistine feeling about woman: "Tout pour la femme, mais rien avec elle." The increase of women"s employment has considerably shaken this conviction in the Trade Unions, because the organisation of women is seen more and more to be a condition of their very existence. But more than this, they need to recognise the vast importance of educating, enlightening the working woman, binding her closer and closer to the Socialist cause. Women have the future destiny of men in their hands. They mould and shape the character of the children. If Socialism can gain the women, it will have the future with it. To bring the women into closer community with the labour movement, to translate their paper equality into living fact, is no fantastic dream; it is part of the obligation of the modern "knights of labour" in the interest of themselves and their cause.
Frau E. Gnauck-Kuhne writes in sympathy with the Catholic Unions of the older type, viz. the "Interkonfessionelle." Like Frau Braun, she greatly prefers organisation for working women along with men to separate Unions.
Separate organisations, she remarks, require double staff, double expenses of book-keeping, finance and secretarial arrangements, and are more costly, not to mention that the women"s wages are so low, the contributions they can make are so small that a sound and effective Union of women only is scarcely possible. Frau Gnauck lays stress on the psychological difficulties of organising women. For ages men have been accustomed to work in common, to subject themselves to discipline; their work brings them into relation with their fellows of the same calling, with their equals. The traditional work of women, on the contrary, has kept them in isolation; the private household was, and is still, a little world in itself, and in this world the woman has no peers--she has as housewife no relation to other housewives, and there is nothing to connect her work at home with the outside world or public matters. She is very slow to perceive the advantages of new methods, labour-saving devices, co-operation and so forth, which might so greatly lessen domestic toil if intelligently applied. With a certain sly humour Frau Gnauck points out that the housewife has no expert criticism to undergo, for her husband is often out the whole day, and understands nothing of housekeeping or the care of children if he were at home. The housewife as worker (not, be it observed, as wife) is in the position of an absolute ruler; she has no one"s opinion to consider but her own, no inspection or control to regard; she is a law unto herself. This habit of mind is not calculated to fit woman for combined action; rather does it tend to promote individualism and a lack of discipline, which hinders concerted effort in small things or in great. This is not to deny that many women are capable of the greatest devotion and sacrifice, even to the point of self-annihilation.
The loftiest courage for personal action and self-sacrifice, as Frau Gnauck keenly remarks, is nevertheless in its way an emphasis of individual will and action, a heightening of self, even though for unselfish ends. Concerted action demands a surrender of individuality, the power to find oneself in the ranks with one"s equals. Men are better trained for this kind of corporate action than women normally are. The older women are too much burdened, and continually oppressed with the thought of meeting the week"s expenses, the young ones are indifferent because they expect to get married.
Frau Gnauck, however, refuses to despair even of organising the woman-worker. We must, she says, put ourselves in her place; we must realise that as no man can see over his horizon, we must bring something that the woman worker _can_ see over her horizon, something that will strike her imagination, something that will build a bridge from her over to those large ideas, "cla.s.s-interest," "general good," which so far she has neither time, spirit, nor money enough to understand. She must be drawn at first by the prospect of some small but concrete improvement in her own condition, which will make it seem worth while to give the time and money that the Union wants. Appeal to the feeling all women have for a home of their own. Explain to them in simple language that the Union would prevent underbidding and undercutting, and thus raise men"s wages. More men could marry on these higher wages, married women need not go to work, and both the single woman and the married would benefit.
Frau Gnauck is in agreement with Frau Braun as to the advisability of common organisation, for if the women cannot join the men"s Unions, they are helpless, and if they form a Union of their own, they will probably be too weak to avoid being played off against the men. She takes, on the other hand, a much more favourable view than Frau Braun of the various philanthropic clubs and societies formed by women of a superior cla.s.s.
These organisations do not of course do anything to improve the economic position, they cannot in any way take the place of Trade Unions, but they provide a kind of preparatory stage, a training in a.s.sociation, an opportunity for discussion, and in the present circ.u.mstances, with the isolated condition in which working women and girls so often have to live, all these experiences are a means of development and an educational help to more serious organisation later on. This is borne out by Dr.
Erdmann,[39] who, whilst opposed to the Catholic Unions as reactionary, admits that even in these Unions the workers soon begin to feel the need of Trade Union organisations, and often end by joining the Socialist Union.
NUMBERS OF WOMEN IN UNIONS--GERMANY.
+--------------------------------------------------------------+ | Largest Occupation Groups. | Number.| Per cent of Total.| |---------------------------------|--------|-------------------| | FREIE GEWERKSCHAFTEN. | | | | (Total women, 216,462.) | | | |Textile workers | 53,363 | 246 | |Metal | 26,848 | 124 | |Factory workers | 25,146 | 116 | |Tobacco | 17,918 | 82 | |Bookbinders | 15,979 | 74 | | CHRISTIAN UNIONS. | | | | (Total women, 28,008.) | | | |Textile workers | 12,811 | 457 | |Home workers | 8,188 | 292 | |Tobacco | 3,088 | 110 | | HIRSCH-DUNCKER UNIONS. | | | | (Total women, 4950.) | | | |Textile workers | 1,880 | 380 | +--------------------------------------------------------------+
_The Outlook._--It will be seen from the preceding chapter and section that a general view of women in Unions presents a somewhat ambiguous and contradictory picture. In one industry, cotton, there are in England two large Unions of remarkable strength and effectiveness, in which women are organised with men, and form a majority of the Union. The women cotton weavers and card-room operatives form nearly 70 per cent of all the organised women. In the other textile industries, in the clothing trades, and some others, a comparatively small number of women are organised, either with men, or in branches closely in touch with the men"s Unions, but these Unions are of various degrees of strength, and in no case include a large proportion of the women employed. There are also some women organised in Unions of general labourers and workers, and their numbers have increased rapidly in the last few years, but are not as yet considerable. We also find many small Unions of women only in various occupations, but it is a curious fact that women have so far evolved very little organisation in their most characteristic occupations such as domestic service, nursing, dressmaking and millinery. Unions of some kind in these occupations are not unknown, but they are quite inconsiderable in comparison with the numbers employed. Yet the strategic position of the workers in some of these occupations is in some respects strong. A fairly well-organised strike of London milliners in the first week in May, or of hotel servants and waitresses along the south coast, say about the last week in July, would probably be irresistible. The same applies to women in certain factory processes when the work is a monopoly of women and cannot be done by men"s fingers. Paper-sorting is a typical instance; a paper-sorters" strike just before the Christmas present season might be highly effective. In such occupations as these, nevertheless, Unionism is mostly conspicuous by its absence.
There is little use in denying that there are special difficulties in the way of the organisation of women. The old difficulty of the hostility of men Unionists is largely a thing of the past, but many others remain.
There are difficulties from hostility and indifference on the part of the employers; long hours of work; family ties and duties; educational deficiencies among working women themselves, and the intellectual and moral effects that result from ignorance. An immense difficulty is the low rate of wages characteristic of so many women"s employments, which makes it impossible in most cases to pay contributions sufficient for adequate benefit during a strike. Compet.i.tion is another difficulty, especially in low-grade and unspecialised trades, where places can easily be filled.
There is the constant dread among workers of this cla.s.s and low-grade home workers that, if they attempt any resistance, some other woman will go behind them and take the work for still less wages. Even collecting contributions is often a considerable difficulty; if it is done at the factory it may subject the collector to disfavour and victimisation; if not, the labour is very considerable. Another great difficulty in organising women is the prospect of marriage. A girl looks upon her industrial career as merely a transition stage to getting married and having a home of her own. This need not in itself hinder her being a "good trade unionist," for after all the industrial career of a girl, beginning at twelve, thirteen, or fourteen, may well be eight or ten years long, even if she marries young, but it no doubt does tend to deflect her energies and sentiment from Unionism. The prospect of marriage, which to a young man is a steadying influence, making for thrift and for the strengthening of his cla.s.s by solidarity and corporate action, is to a young girl a distraction from industrial efficiency, an element of uncertainty and disturbance.
Again, the position of women renders them especially amenable to social influences. Social differences between different grades of workers keep them apart from one another and make combination difficult. Women are more susceptible than men to the influence of their social superiors. In the past, and even in the present, though less than formerly, no doubt, the influence of upper cla.s.s women has been and is used against the Trade Union spirit. Charity and philanthropy have tended to counterbalance the forces that have been drawing the working cla.s.s together. Miss Collet found in investigating for the Labour Commission that the homes and hostels for the working girls run by religious and benevolent societies had an atmosphere unfavourable to Trade Unionism, and influenced the girls to look coldly on agitation for improved material conditions. Lack of public spirit is, in short, the great difficulty with women. Their economic position, their training and education, the influence of the cla.s.ses considered superior, above all perhaps the pressure of custom and tradition, all these have combined to prevent or postpone corporate action and cla.s.s solidarity.
Must we admit that women are inherently incapable of organisation, which by a kind of miracle or chance has been achieved successfully in one district and in one industry only? A further consideration of the Board of Trade figures gives a rather different complexion to the matter.
In the building, mining, metal and transport trades there are practically no women unionists, but with the exception of metal there are only a very few women employed in these trades at all. In the other non-textile trades the proportion of women organised is very small, and the proportion of organised women to organised men is also small. But it happens that in most of these trades the women employed are also few compared with the men, and the men themselves are not strongly organised. In the woollen and worsted trade organisation is not strong for either s.e.x. In cotton alone do we get a really strong organisation of both men and women. It begins to dawn upon us at this point that the weak organisation of women is after all part and parcel of the general problem of organisation in those trades. No doubt it is an extremer and specially difficult form of the problem. But on the whole, with the exception of the metal trades, it holds good that where women are employed together with men, they are strongly organised where men are strongly organised, weak where men are weak. Even in metal trades the exceptions are more apparent than real. The strong Unions are in branches of work that women do not do; and a glance down the list of those metal workers who make the small wares and fittings in which women"s employment is increasing does not reveal any great strength of male Unionism, except perhaps in the bra.s.s-workers, who exceeded 7000 in 1910. Directly we realise this intimate connexion of women"s unionism with the Labour Movement as a whole, a light is thrown on many puzzling discrepancies.
In the case of women there have been in the last forty years or so two tendencies at work. One is towards the sporadic growth of small unco-ordinated Unions of women only. Financially weak and in some cases governed by a retrograde policy, numbers of such Unions spring up and die down again. A few achieve some measure of success, and occasionally a very small Union will show a very considerable degree of persistence and vitality without perceptible increase of numbers. Occasionally such Unions are competing with mixed Unions in the same occupation, each of course regarding the other as the intruder. It matters very little who is to be blamed for the overlapping. The only important thing is to recognise that such tactics mean playing into the enemy"s hands, with disastrous results for labour. Apart from such unfortunate instances, it would be foolish to deny that the small Unions of women only have provisionally at least a considerable usefulness. The women must be roped in somehow, and even the most precarious organisation may have a distinct educational value in evoking in its members the germ of a sense of cla.s.s-solidarity and membership with their fellows. I am almost tempted to say that any force that brings women consciously into a.s.sociation with aims higher than petty and personal ones is ultimately for good, however destructive it may seem to be in some of its manifestations.