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From Socialist Appeal, Vol. 4 No. 49, 7 December 1940, p. 3.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for ETOL.
Almost from the beginning of American industry, women have slaved in the factories. With the development of improved machinery requiring less operating skill, the manufacturer maintained and raised his profits through employment of cheap labor, including that of women and children.
What reasons did government officials and “respectable” citizens give for colonization of women into industry? Alexander Hamilton's declaration on this question is typical: “In general women and children are rendered more useful by manufacturing establishments than they otherwise would be.”
The “respectable” citizens insisted that women were kept out of vice through employment. Instead of being destitute they were provided with “abundance for a comfortable subsistence.” In all periods the capitalist class have found one excuse as good as another to justify their exploitation of the wage worker.
It was not until 1914 with the outbreak, of the first world war, however, that women were recruited into the factories on a mass scale. From then on women assumed increasing importance as a section of the working class.
From Research Report No. 8 of the National Industrial Conference Board, we find the following: “The proportionate increase in employment of women appears to have been particularly marked in the war industries, especially in the metal and machine trades.”
In 1917, 1,366,000 women in 15 states were employed directly or indirectly in factories necessary for carrying on the war. Approximately 100,000 were employed in munitions, airplane, and metallurgical factories all of which are of predominant importance in war.
Loading lumber, wheeling and shoveling coal, and working as street car conductors were some of the other occupations performed by women during the last war.
Citing the “emergency,” the capitalists demanded suspension of labor legislation. The representatives of the capitalists in the state and federal government bowed to these demands. The government was the first to take away the eight-hour day in the Navy yards. The governor of the state of Vermont approved an Act empowering the authorities to suspend existing labor laws relating to the employment of women and children for the duration of the war, etc. etc.
What effect did the war have on the women workers? In the munitions industry they were unorganized and as a result the “munition kings” began to rob them of the eight hour day established by the men workers after long struggles.
Without organization the women were unable to offer any effective resistance to the boss. In some factories women were forced to work from 7 a.m. to 5 or 6 p.m. No more than 15 minutes was generally allowed for lunch time. Certain workers were not allowed to leave their machines even while they ate their lunches. Other girls worked 10-12 hours a day on split shifts, or on day and night shifts alternating every two weeks. Sanitation, air and light were inadequate in most factories.
Extreme pressure from the workers forced government investigations and in many factories such necessities as lavatories, washing facilities, and drinking water were finally given the workers.
Women complained that the vibrations of the big machines made them nervous and tired after a few hours work. They enjoyed no home life or recreation after work. In families where the mother and father worked different shifts they would not see each other from one day to the next. There was no chance to provide adequately for the rearing of the children.
Serious difficulties arose in many families. Of necessity small children took over the household duties of the working mother. Such cases as this were common: An eleven-year-old girl cared for three younger children one of whom was a two-year-old baby. She did the housework and fed the children. In spite of her efforts the children were undernourished, unkempt and peevish.
This was the family life the capitalist class held up as “sacred” when they slandered the Russian workers who in 1917 risked their lives to overthrow a government which bred and upheld the same “sacred” home life.
The increasing demand for more labor power forced the bosses of munitions factories to pay higher wages than the mercantile establishments. This, however, did not mean that the workers enjoyed a higher standard of living. Following a slight rise in wages the cost of living hit a new high.
Many workers were forced to live in homes which had inadequate lighting and ventilation. Improper sanitary facilities and room congestion contributed to the spread of ill health and disease. Families were broken up, wholesale evictions took place,
Today we are witnessing a repetition of 1914–1918. Roosevelt is preparing to throw the American masses into the war under the guise of “national defense.” Women will again replace the men in industry. The war mongers and profit-makers will once again try to rob women workers of favorable working conditions and labor legislation won through long and bitter struggles.
In order to fight this it is the duty of every woman worker to educate herself in the problems of the class struggle. In the coming period hers will be the tremendous task of protecting those fruits of the great struggles of the American labor movement. To do this she must not only understand the problems of the trade unions, but also profit from the lessons of the women workers of the world war.
From this she must draw the logical conclusion, and that is to recognize the important role of the working class political party. She must join the Socialist Workers Party, the only party that will lead her, along side of the working men to the victorious emancipation of the working class.
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