'The Present Phase of the Woman Question"

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A MONTHLY ILLUSTRATED MAGAZINE

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MARCH—OCTOBER. 1888

, NEW YORK
THE COSMOPOLITAN MAGAZINE CO., PUBLISHERS
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ageneral uprising |
oug the line, as to indicate that a gotta!
“perolekon isimpending. The thought awak.
net lo the gecetch geet spportor testaine
“pow gives in our public schools ; the multi-
aplying of seminaries and colleges especially,

and the gradual opening up to theat of the
elder justitutions of leamming, formerly de-

ginning to bear legitimate fruit.

©. Add to these the organized “Ch tauqua”
“with its well selected course, now introduced
-into nearly every city anid village ofany note ;
“the weekly and monthly magazine, contain-
ing the well digested thought of the best
thinkers and writers, male and female, of the
day ; with the great metropolitan journals,
whose editors ard writers have their fingers
on the pnise of sixty millions of people,
ready for delivery at the homes in nearly
every remote town, by tea o'clock in the
morning, and you have irfiuences at work —
that ought to, and have quickened into life

the reasoning forces of the mass of American

women. . :
“With the light of literature, the develop-
-qnent of thought, and the growth of her own
personality, there has come to woman a de-
sire to be recognized in the fields of literature,
of journalism, and of authorship, not only as

_an inherent right, but as means to an end,

‘namely, money ‘to relieve necessities, to fur-
nish luxuries,-and to supply means for a
higher culture. a
_ To the moral, sensitive, thinking woman,
‘dependence has always been galling. Her
study has been to find a way out of this con-
- dition without losing caste,—the respect of
‘society, and that nameless deference vouch-
safed to woman since the days of the ern-
sades, that sought to make of her an angel
ora goddess,—a mythical thing, ‘still pat-
ronizved in some of the so-called, higher
walke of life, OS

- ‘Phe kindergarien is the gecmofa newerg in

&

ene Pho ey Deen :






Seige

othe ebiid at the most suscept







or roman, within the last three decades; -

woted to masculine genius only, are all be
So 8 Gng from “duce” te draw ont, to unicid bike
“the petals of a rosebud. The act of creating


















to digest
ec fe ada rat
vite Sey RGao

tp A FS. has Ca & .
ge A ethene at agee 4

Ahicking and right acting. It makes oledu-,

cation a joy, a pastime, becaus¢ the chicd at ~

‘onee Tears to create something for himset,
‘to combine colors and shapes, (0, reason, to
think. Here we have the whole

process of
education ina mutshell, the term itself com-

<=

“something, of making something thet shall
be her own handiwork, is as much of a de-

light to the little girl as to the girl grown
tall, and perhaps aiere, as she hhas cot yet

Jearned, as the older girl has dose, to com-
pare her industry with that of more skilled

artisans.

.. Already has the kindergarten, the thought
of Froebel, left its impress upon the woman-

hood of this generation ; and the free kinder-
garten now being introduced by generous
hacds into our large cities for the education
of the little boys atid girls of the poor, will
save to good citizenship, to self-help and
culture, many a poor girl. . :’

Twin sister to this,so far as women are

‘concerned, are ‘Women’s Industrial and

Educational Unions," the conception’ of
Abby Morton Diaz of Boston. This takes —
the woman adrift as it were, gives to her
shelter, culture and bread; finds her work
adapted to her education, and competent
pay ; inculcates self-respect, and gives to _
her companionship and surroundings worthy .
of respectable womanhood. When these
Unions become established in every city,
and in every considerable town, the objec-
tion made by the editor of a New York
journal, that ‘women are of little walue as
reporters because they cannot go into the
shums,’? will be overcome, because there will
be no sluus. These Unions, while they pro-
pose toenlist the sympathies, the roney and
the time of the highest, will reach down to

£. t eaeek® ee f Ete pt hs . . vugh ape fs £%
tho fawest of Ged's eveatires, and HA therm



968

‘matter how degraded, aa yet sore sod
in her, some epark of womanhood tha
be reached by kindly, sympathetic woman-

hood ; that ala itself ig the result of Igno-

These Unions act’tpon the principle also,

that those who necd help, and culture, and
sympathy, are sot always the miserably
poor, orin workhouses, almshouses or jails,

but that often they are the well-todo and
rich among whom there exists such intense
selfishness, euch a poverty of mental and
moral power, such entire neglect of heart
culture, as to make them truly objects of
charity, although the most difficult to reach.
They know that persons in jail are sot neces-
sarily criminal, any more than those outside
of itareinnocent. These Unions, as prevent-
ive and educational factors, are yet in their
infancy; but their trend, if successful, will be
to elevate, to purify, to enlighten the lower
strata of society ; to teach to the highest
that wealth and position are only the acci-
dents of life, levers to Hf the lower higher,
to ameliorate suffering, and incidentally to
elevate woman.

But while the Union is a collateral branch
of the Kindergarten, the Industrial Schoo!
for both boys and giris, or manual training
in the common school, the seminary and the
college, is to complete the revolution from the
old methods so lony in vogue inthe education
of girls, which was frequently, after years
of work, a mere smattering of the things
that ought to bx known, with an artificial:
ity of manner and hfe as unlovely as un-
profitable. Many a woman who has had
thousands of dollars spent upon her edu
cation, when suddenly thrown upon ber
own resources, although supposed to be
well educated, has found herself unable
to teach a single branch of the education
. She has followed or of the accomplish
“ments that she was supposed to have mas.
tered. She has studied as a matter of course,
without anv interest in) study,--heheving
that papa was rich, and that she was to
marry rich, go into society, and always be
supported, without rendering back ao guid
pro que for all of the benefits received. She
suddenly wakes up, but usually too late for
remedy, to the absolute helplessness of her
condition. The ravages of the late war

threw thousands of wives, mothers and

Gervhterc afr ift unas thastoveae eps at Vite tes

ing Mine between the N

TH PRES ANT PHASE OF THe HWOMAN QUESTION,

yl ‘eiptvas and pitiable condition; and the
hithe4jo false teachings of many of our
schoois, aid the false foundation upon which
socicty ‘8 At present based, has added to the
mumber. Tiving ss {t were upon the divid-
and the South,

the civilization of the East and West, with
@ reputation for some independence of
thought and action, I bave been appealed
to by hundreds of women of these various
sections for advice, for sympathy, for influ-

ence, for money, for work, for shelter, and
sometimes alas! to hide their shame, urti!
T have sought to solve the underlying cause

of the masses of helpless women in the

world. Not unfrequently have they come
to me for protection from the abuse of
drunken busbands, and sometimes alas‘
the woman herself has fallen into habits
ef drink, the opium habit or chloral. or
worse yel, the deadly morphine needi+.
Sometimes the very wretchedness of the
housekeeping, and the slatternliness of th-
wife and children have driven the husban:
to drink, and sometimes the two base
learned to drink together.

The growing tendency todrunkenness ar!
other forms of dissipation among womens:
the large cities, is something appalling A
good sister of the WoC. TT. U. told me that
over five thousand women had been inca:
ceratedin the Moyamensing Pnson. Phila
delphia, within the last few years for drunk.
enness Hut what of New York, Cincingiat
Chicago and St. Louis ?

What is the remedy?) Educate girs fer
usefulness teach them to be selfesuppart-
ing no miutter what them condition in irfe.

instruct them ano mght living instead of
making? marrage the acme of ambit:

as heretofore, teach them to earn an!
spend the: own pocketinoney, and alos

no main te pay Chere bills at lecture, theate:

or other place of amusement Commence
inoearly dife to mold the muind= of the cor
to night thinking . te look upon marrnase
not as a necessity, but as a sacred and on
violable contract into which she has no ry ht
to enter until able to be self-supporting and
that entered upon, its duties and respons:
bilities belong as much to her as to the man

so that should death or accident deprive
her and her children of the assistance of het
life partner, she may be able to take up the

Preveteeere fheet bre Joe have Grote d ane?






a |
not be thrown upon the world helpless and’
dependent. — . -

Hitherto the subjection of woman has
brought about most of the conditions
named; and her chains have been forged

by common and statute law. But at the

present time it is largely caused by that
mighty force, pudlic opinion—-old time cus-
tom, the fear of being laughed at if she has
her own ideas. But what women most
fear is to lose the admiration of men. And,
strangely enough, men in the majority of
instances, have given encouragement to
this frivolousness and sickly sentimental-
ism in the education and training of girls,

and have frowned upon and scoffed at.

any woman who in the past has had the
courage to leave the old paths of helpless-
ness, ignorance and dependence. The trades
and professions, aye, the seminaries and col-
leges have opened to her grudgingly ; and
only after repeated and long-continued
knockings ; and even yet the highest priv-
ileges of Harvard, and Yale, and Princeton
have not been accorded to her. The members
of the legal profession, always conservative,
have been especially jealous of her, and only
in recent years, and by the midst indefatigable
zeal, has she been enabled to work her
way into the profession of the law. Even
when there, the chilliness and unconge-
niality of her surroundings have often
saused her to beat a hasty retreat rather
than to fight the unequal contest of justice
for her clients, and respect for her sex.

But woman is there. The law schools
and the courts have been opened to her,
and there is no legal barrier to-day, not
even under the old common law, to prevent
her from wearing the cap and gown, or Sit-
ting on the wool-sack. And yet 1 suppose
that the Chief Executive of this nation, in
casting around for some worthy individual
to fill the high judicial chair of Chic Justice
of the United States Supreme Court, so re
cently made vacant by the unlooked-for
death of that eminent jurist and kind:
hearted gentleman, Morrison R. Waite, will
never think of elevating a woman to that
position, Wet England, to whom we have
always looked for precedents, has had two
women as Supreme Chancellors of the
Realm, who sat in the au/a@ regia, and per-
formed the duties of that important office

THE PRESENT PHASE 0."

it
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i)

THE WOMAN QUE:.TION,
FOM Aht

469

Womiun's ladvent in reedicine was ear- ©
lier, and th. contest, while shorter, was_

more bitter ind disgusting. (To-day she is —
an importan’ factor of every great city, and _

the only wonder is that she, shold have

been kept ort so long, and tHen hdve been

admitted ec grudgingly to a profession

which she i: so eminently fitted to fill.

Very chary yt are the old schdol physicians
and the old {me practitioners from counsel-
ing with he: o: recoguizing h@r work. -
Why womcn physicians havg not been ap-
pointed or elected as such to flo service in
hospitals, almshouses, insane asylums and
jails, where women compose: s0 large a

‘proportion of the inmates, and women

physicians are so much needed, isa conun- |
drum that I leave for some move astute indi- —

vidual tosol-e. I know that rupeated efforts
of committees of women physicians have
failed to secure the appointment of one of
their numbe to the Columbia ‘Hospital at
Washington I). C., an institution founded
and built by women for women.:

But there : em to be notable exceptions to
all rules, an: the faith and hope'ofa few in-
dividuals ha e often kept the human heart
from despair snd have left a beacon light for
others to follow. James A. Garfield em-
ployed Dr. Susan A. Edson as his family
physician, and the late Morrisoh R. Waite
employed Dr. Caroline B, Winslow as his
family physician. Washington has eigh-
teen registered female physicians, but Phila-
delphia and New York have many more,
and a goodly number of them have won
wealth and position.

In the pulpit, too, women have won their
way by shee persistency. They might ex-
hort, read the scripture. pray, teach the in
fant class, ar | the Bible class, but to occupy
the pulpit; t) < ordained to preach ; to ac-
tually stand in the holy of holies, caused
hands to be? .cd in holy Jhorror. But the

atl
“Women pot there, and they stay.

The popularity of this innovation is
largely due to the eloquence and persuasive-
ness of the Woman's Christian Temper-
ance Union. When these women began
their notable, commendable and ever to be
remembered reform, they selected the
churches of their several towns for their
rendezvous, generally first enlisting the
minister's wife, and later the minister him-
wot ft PU ae De nF tt

eer be asses

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470°

have been given to the women of the church,
__ And what a wonderful and blessed work it
has been! It has converted and united
churches, ramified with its organizations all
ovel the Jand, and pushed more talented
wortien to the front than all other organiza-
_ tions in the land combined. Hitherto the
church had been conservative, but the women
learned the sesame, aud not only sre churches
of every denomination granted to them, but
they are invited and urged to fill these
churches, and to-day their grand moral and
educational reform with the churches behind
them, is accomplishiag incalculable good.

But they have done more than this. As
an auxilliary to their work for the prolii-
bition of the liquor traffic ;—as a lever to con-
tro! legislation, they are almost in one Solid
phalanx demanding that badge of Amer-
ican citizenship—sée dallot. As they are
pow two hundred thousand strong, the out-
come may be foreshadowed. Women had
occupied the pulpit before, and the efforts of
Phebe A. Hannaford, Mary A. Livermore,
Olympia Brown Willis, and the sainted
Lucretia Mott, will not soon be forgotten, or
undervalued. They hewed the way - braved
the storm of censure that the innovation
called forth, but the WoC. T. U. came in
and possessed the land. '

But years before this, Hliz#beth Cady Stan-
ton and her coadjutors, who had also been
engaged in the anti-slavery reform, feeling
the burden of the law pressing heavily on
them, demanded the ballot for themselves
and their sisters. Never before or since has
any crusade in which women have been en
gaged, not even the fanious Trish Women’s
Parliament in 1609, received such a storm of
ridicule from pulpit and press as did) Unis.
The caricatures and head lines of the news:
paper press, the cautions from the pulpit to

’ 3 < a 6 * aoe i

‘

al .

WE PRESENT PHASE OF THE WOMAN QUESTION,

parishioners not to be led away by this
heresy, the delicate tarned-p noses of fine

beaux, lest their chances of matrimony
should be spoiled, were all terrorizing to the
brave women who bad dared to stand and
speak for the right. A large majority of
those who early espoused the cause beat a
hasty retreat from the field. But the specter

‘would not down. Some ofthe women brave

the tempest and died at their posts. Some
still survive, and have added thousands of
converts to the idea of woman's equality
before the law.

A few years hence the world will wonder
why women have not always voted, why
they have not always possessed property
rights, why they were so long held as sul,
jects and inferiors, instead of partaers and
equals. There is no reason in nature. There
should be none in law.

Now all along the line women are orgas-
zing for temperance work, for religions
work, for political work, for press work, fer
literary work | organizing in trades unions
in labor reforms, in building associations
Never before has there been such an exter:
sive and comprehensive demand for oolleye
courses by women as now. Never in history
has there been such a general quickening in
the woman mind, and the conception of such:
comprehensive and extensive reforms as at
this time, 7

Now Ido not expect to see the milleniic.
in a few years to come, but 1 do expect t
see oa freer and inore exalted womanhon!
and T know that there will come with it.
purer and a nobler manhood Texpect to see
the idle women working, and the laboriny
women resting and studving a little.



apt
ad stg ei

‘Jadies and leaders of the fon, the frowns of ° ere
husbands, the disclaimers of any sympathy
with the movement by young girls to their