HD5113.L7T"""""""'"-"'"^^ '*fMSi'?™°''''"9 "lolhers in textile miils, 3 1924 013 929 23T'' NIGHT-WORKING MOTHERS IN TEXTILE MILLS PASSAIC, NEW JERSEY BY Agnes de Lima Research Secretary The National Consumer's League and the Consumer's League of New Jersey December, 1920 NIGHT WORKING MOTHERS IN PASSAIC, N. J. The following study, carried on during the spring and early summer of 1920, of one hundred night working mothers in Passaic, N. J., has been made for the purpose of supplying definite facts for the legislative campaign of 1921, for working women in New Jersey. Night work in factories has been discredited in England since 1844, seventy-six years ago, when women were forbidden by law to operate on night shifts; and the practice was repudiated by the civilized world in 1906, when at the Berne conference fourteen European nations signed a treaty to take effect in 1910, estabhshing a period of eleven hours rest at night for women employed in manu- facture. These countries were Austria-Hungary, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Luxemburg, Switzerland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and the Netherlands. During the next six years, the Parliaments of all the contracting states ratified except Denmark. Although the United States took no part in these delib- erations, since the Federal Government cannot bind the separate states to enact laws restricting hours of labor, and the individual states cannot participate in an international conference of this character, twelve states now forbid women in one or more occupa- tions to work at night and constitutional Hmitations against this kind of legislation have been removed by the courts since 1914. During the years 1895 to 1906, however, there was a wave of reaction in many states against protective legislation for working women. The reaction began when the Supreme Court of Illinois, in 1895, annulled the eight hours law. In consequence of that cruel and anti-social decision, it was legal in one of the greatest 'manufacturing states of the Republic for women and girls over , sixteen years of age to be required to work all night or any number \)f hours within the day or week. A slight improvement was brought about sixteen years later, when in 1911 lUinois passed a law restricting women's work to ten hours during the twenty-four "hours of any day. In New Jersey, in 1904, the legislature did what the court had done in Illinois in 1895. It deprived women of protection against night work and overwork by annulling the law of 1892, which prohibited the employment of women and minors in manufacture (except canneries, glassworks and the preservation of fruit) more than 55 hours in one week, after 6 p.m. on five days of the week, and after noon on Saturday. Again a sUght sop was thrown to enUghtened public opinion in 1912, when the laws of New Jersey (Chapter 216) declared that women may not be employed more than ten hours daily, nor more than six days, nor sixty hours weekly in any manu- facturing or mercantile estabhshment, in any bakery, laundry or restaurant. A clause to abolish night work was stricken out how- ever before the bill was reported, and efforts in 1918, 1919 and again in 1920 to end this discredited industrial practice were successively defeated. New Jersey stands alone in a group of states comprising Massa- chusetts, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania and Delaware which forbid night work by women. This is doubtless largely due to the extensive employment of women in textile mills, particularly in Passaic and the surrounding mill towns. That night work by women in this industry is extremely harm- ful was recognized by Massachusetts as far back as 1907, when a law was passed in that state prohibiting women and minors from working in any textile mill after 6 p.m. New Jersey's reactionary course is all the more disheartening in the face of Massa- chusetts' enlightened stand and the monumental evidence of the evil effects of night work upon women contained in the official reports of the adjacent state of New York. These were sufficiently overwhelming to cause the New York Court of Appeals, in 1914, to reverse its decision of 1907 and to uphold restrictive legislation on the strength of evidence accumulated in the intervening seven years that night toil by women is disastrous to their health and that of their children.* The present investigation confirms the find- ings of these preceding studies and shows conditions which New Jersey can ill afford to ignore. A Human, Not a Statistical Study The investigation followed closely the one made by the National Consumers' League in Rhode Island during 1918, f * Report of the New York State Factory Investigating Commission, 1913, Vol. I, pp. 193- 212: also The Case Against Night Work of Women, Court of Appeals, State of New York, "Summary of Facts of, Knowledge," prepared by Louis D. Brandeis and Josephine Goldmark, April, 1914. Published by the National Consumers' League and revised to March, 1918. i Journal nf Industrial Hyiime, October, 1919: "Wage Earning Women in War-Time: The Textile Industry," by Florence Kelley. Reprints may be secured from the office of the National Consumers' League. and shows the same appaUingly httle sleep, the same break-down in health of the workers, the same neglect of their children and demorahzation of their family life. While not primarily a statistical study, the number of women visited is sufficiently large to be repre- sentative. The object of the visits however, was less to present statistics than to furnish a picture of the lives of the gaunt, weary women who throng five nights each week to the mills, stand nine and a half hours at their machines and return the next morning, to take up the multitudinous duties of their homes and children. No attempt was made to secure the names from any hst or roll. They were found by knocking indiscriminately at doors of tenements or of the two or three story cottages converted to multiple use which abound in Passaic. "Take almost any house in the non- residence section," the League investigator reports, "knock at almost any door and you will find a weary, tousled woman, half dressed, doing her housework, or trying to snatch an hour or two of sleep after her long night of work in the mill. Most of these women are Poles, Hungarians or Russians, — in fact only one woman seen by the investigator was American born. They speak little English, and the information gathered from them is often most elementary. The facts are there, however for anyone to see; the hopeless and exhausted woman, her cluttered three or four rooms, the swarm of sickly and neglected children." In addition to the home visits, the investigator gathered opinions upon night work from storekeepers, petty tradespeople, passersby and neighbors of the workers. Interviews were obtained with the secretary of the Industrial Council of Passaic Wool Manu- facturers (colloquially known as the Wool Council) and with the superintendent of the largest woolen mill, which was also inspected by night. The Backgeound in Passaic and Vicinity Passaic, N. J.; has a population of 68,824 — (1920 figures), and together with the neighboring towns, ranks among the largest woolen and worsted manufacturing centers in the world. Hemmed in by the surrounding towns of Garfield, Clifton and Walhngton, Passaic has always been a texrtile center. The first cotton bleachery was established in 1813, but there was no great industrial develop- ment until 1858, when the Dundee Dam was erected. Now how- ever, as one alights from the station, almost the first sight to catch the eye is the big plate glass window, bearing the name in big letters of the Industrial Council of Passaic Wool Manufacturers. Passaic is a town of contrasts; on one side of the railroad tracks are the shaded avenues and fine residences of the well-to-do, and on the other are the great mills and their clutter of tenements and frame buildings where the operatives live. A recent survey by the United States Bureau of Education* pointed out the extraordinary fact that nearly half of the total population lived in about one-sixth the total area of the city (280.5 acres), while 9.9 per cent, lived in nearly half the total area of the city (783.9 acres). Most of these people are immigrants, for the Bureau reported that 64.8 per cent, were foreign born and 87.6 per cent, of the foreign born lived in wards 1 and 4. An ominous fact is that Passaic is one of three cities in the United States having the largest percentage of illiteracy. In 1910, the latest available census figures show 15.8 per cent, of the total population over 10 years of age to be illiterate, and of the foreign born, 23.8 per cent, were illiterate. The Bureau shows that conditions have changed little since that time. The most shocking discovery of the Bureau of Education, however, was that attempts to educate these ilhterate foreigners in public evening classes were a flat failure because of the espionage practised by certain mill owners over their employees which "creates an atmosphere of suspicion and distrust." These mill owners tried to discredit the report when published in January, 1920, even bringing pressure to bear in Washington to suppress the bulletin. At the same time they induced the city authorities to pass an or- dinance restricting free assemblage and free speech, and the chief of police broke up a number of protest and union meetings. These infringements upon fundamental American rights were not wholly the work of Passaic manufacturers. They were sanc- tioned and upheld by the Alien Property Custodian who for nine months of 1918, controlled four of the large woolen properties in Passaic, and in 1920,.still holds the largest and most important of them. Obviously his veto at any time would have put an effective stop to these practices. This federal official in his report covering the calendar year 1918, and the period ending February 15, 1919, gives details regarding the seizure. The Government held all the mills until December, 1918, when ♦Department of the Interior, Bureau of Education, Bulletin, 1920, No. 4. "The Problem of Adult Education in Passaic, N. J." the German shares were sold to Americans, except in the Botany Mills where the sale is in dispute. The report of the AUen Property Custodian states that the "Passaic Mills are large up-to-date establishments employing 15,000 persons, and occupying a position in the trade of great prestige." Nothing is said about the conditions surrounding these 15,000 persons beyond the brief statement that the "discipline among the employees reflects the typical mihtary spirit of Germany." Two inspections of the mill longest under the control of the Alien Property Custodian made by the National Consumers' League with an interval of two years, reveal an almost unbelievable disregard of the welfare of the 6,000 men, women and children employed therein and no noticea,ble improvement between 1918 and 1920. To quote directly from the latest report of the investigator following a night inspection on June 17, 1920: "The mill is conspicuously lacking in anything that might contribute to the health and efficiency of its workers. Accommodations as elementary as dressing rooms, rest rooms, adequate washing facilities and seats for women are nowhere to be found. Surrounded by a brick wall, some 15 feet high, the plant resembles nothing so much as a, mediaeval fortress. It is laid out principally in great sheds, hundreds of feet long, one story high, lighted only by skylights, and jammed to capacity with heavy machines whose combined noise is deafening. The effect of this, together with the heat and humidity, the constant standing and the high speed demanded of the operatives was evident. The workers looked beaten and crushed. That they could keep up the pace under these conditions through the long night seemed impossible." Some of the bitterest battles of the great textile strike of 1919, were fought in Passaic, where the nine weeks' strike resulted in the reduction of the working week from 55 to 48 hours, and a 15 per cent, increase in wages. A new labor organization was also estab- hshed with a Local in Passaic, the Amalgamated Textile Workers of America, modeled closely on the Amalgamated Clothing Workers, and since affiliated with it. In the spring of 1920, a second strike was threatened whose objects were to abolish the espionage and blacklist system, to secure a 44 hours week and wage increases to meet rising living costs. One argument used in favor of the proposed strike was that "hundreds of mothers are forced to work all night in the mills because the families cannot exist on the meagre wages of the men." This the Wool Council denied. In a press statement {Daily News Record, April 17, 1920), the Council said in answer to this specific charge that "the truth is that night work is preferred by many workers to day work. Night work is done five nights a week. Ten per cent, in addition to the day rate is paid for such labor." This same attitude was ex;pressed by the secretary of the Wool Council in an interview with members of the staff of the National Consumers' League. When the suggestion was made that the men should receive enough so that women could stay home with their children, he scoffed at what he called such "simple economics." An official of one of the largest mills stated that the quality of night work was inferior to day work, because the workers get so tired that they fall asleep over their machines and spoil much material. He said that by abolishing night work, the management would lose less than the women dependent upon it, "those poor people." He agreed that women chose night shifts to be with their children by day, but said that it would not be feasible to raise all men's wages to a living level. The women when questioned, almost uniformly answered that night work was unavoidable while their husbands received so little pay. Only three were found who obvioulsy did not have to go into such drudgery; two had no children, and their husbands' earnings were sufficient for their needs. One of these was saving to go to the "old country," and chose the night shift because without children to care for she found it less strenuous than the day. The working mother whose husband's wages were adequate was saving to help buy a home. The one hundred night workers represented the leading textile industries of Passaic. Fifty-three were employed in the Govern- ment controlled mill, seven in the handkerchief and cotton factories and the remainder in the other large woolen and worsted companies' plants. They were largely engaged in one of the spinning processes, although there were carders, packers and weavers also among them. Only four of the one hundred women were unmarried, and 92 of the married women had children. Of the four childless mar- ried women, one had lost two children, and another was recovering from a miscarriage. Five of the women were widowed. The average number of children was three in a family, though thirty- nine had four children or more; three had six, and six had seven children each. The women were mainly between twenty-five and forty years of age, and over half the children were under seven. Forty-one mothers had no children over that age, and in only four 8 families were there no children as young as seven. Most had babies of one, two and three years. It is the young married women with young children who work on the night shift. They are driven to it by the low wages of their hus- bands, and they choose night work in order to be with their children by day, fearing with reason the neglect and ill treatment the little ones receive at the hands of paid caretakers. The women, thus, are condemned to from eighteen to twenty hours of daily toil, for clearly no mother with three, four, five or six children can secure much rest by day. Insufficient Sleep The most casual questioning reveals how cruelly limited are the sleeping or resting hours of these night working mothers. In going through the mill, the League investigator observed a poor, driven creature, her thin shoulders bent by constant stooping, working feverishly at one of three heavy carding machines under her supervision. When asked how many hours sleep she got, she laughed rather hysterically — "maybe four," she answered. "Is that all?" the superintendent exclaimed in astonishment. The woman said she had six children, the youngest ten, the oldest still in his teens. "I lie down three, four times in day — get little pieces of sleep." She was fifty-three years old; and had been on night shifts for nine years. The superintendent, commenting on her after- ward, comfortably remarked that inquiries would probably show that she had savings laid by and did not have to work. Not one of the hundred women visited reported getting eight hours sleep daily Over two-thirds slept no more than five hours daily, forty not more than four. The seventeen who said they slept between six and seven hours thought they had "plenty" of rest. Most of the women took their rest during the day, getting up to prepare meals, to do other necessary housework, or to look after the children. Most of them did their main sleeping in the forenoon. None seemed entirely to undress but went to bed half clad, ready to jump up at any emergency. Interruptions are constant and insistent. Several women were found with a baby or two in bed with them, the only method apparently of keeping the little ones quiet and out of mischief. "But how can I sleep?" asked one mother, "this bad boy, he pull all time at bed clothes, saying, 'Mamma, get up.' " Two mothers were loudly berating lively youngsters, one of whom had cut a large slice out of the feather mattress and was scattering feathers everywhere, while the other had seized the opportunity while his parent slept, to tumble headfirst into the coal box whence he was hauled shrieking, black from head to foot. Mrs. D., found in the street in front of her home, said she supposed she ought to be upstairs trying to sleep, but what was the use when street noises were incessant, neighbors noisy, and children running in and out. Mrs. N., another worker thus described her day's routine after her night of constant walking back and forth with her heavy spinning mule: Upon arriving home at 5:30 in the morning, she "falls on the bed" from exhaustion, where she stays until eight or nine o'clock. Her husband prepares coffee for himself and for the children, and the older ones go to school, though she usually rouses herself to make sure that they get off all right. Even the little fellow of five is on the diet of coffee. When the visitor suggested that milk was better, Mrs. N. retorted that it cost too much. After the children leave for school, she tries to sleep £gain, although the restless boy left behind, bothers her a great deal. Besides she must soon be up to clean house, to wash, iron, mend, sew, and pres- ently prepare the midday meal. She sometimes snatches a few moments rest again in the afternoon, although "when you got big family, all time work. Night time in mill drag so long, so long; day time in home go so quick.'' By five she must get supper ready and dress for her night's work,- which begins at seven. A final touch to the monotony of her existence was added as the visitor was leaving. The next day was a hoUday, and for a diversion, Mrs. N. thought she would go up to the cemetery. "I got some children up there," she explained, "and same time I get some air. No, I don't go nowheres, just to the mill and then home." A man and his wife were trying to break away from the drudgery of the mills by starting a little sweater shop of their own, where they knit sweaters to order. They were intelhgent and keenly alive to the hardships of mill work. The wife had tried the night shift two years before, but had given it up after eight months, for it nearly killed her. "I use to sleep one hour maybe a day," she said, "and if I no stop, by now I be with Lord. Night work terrible for womans, anybody when they tink say same thing." Several women confirmed the statement that operatives fall asleep over their machines at night. Sometimes, one woman re- ported, the exhausted creatures sought refuge in the toilet rooms, and fell asleep there. A man, employed in the wash house of a factory, helped translate for one working mother. He himself was white and worn with fatigue. "Night shifts were bad enough for men," 10 he said, "but they kill women. Me, I can sleep all day when I like, but what a woman do with wash, with cook, with dress baby and then stan' with machine in night. Pay man's more and keep Mammas home." Mrs. P., weary and sick from overwork, was busily making communion dresses for her little girls. A neighbor interpreted and told of the ceaseless round of toil which filled the days of her friend. "Four babies and three boarders for the day, machine in the mill for the night, — no wonder, poor thing she skeeny." Annie R., a day worker, nineteen years old, shuddered when asked if she had ever tried the night shift. "Oh no," she said, "that's awful. It makes womans old and breaks their healths. I see them sometimes in the morning when they come from the mills, their eyes so red, their faces so white, like they come from the grave!" Children Neglected One heartbroken mother ascribed the death of her little baby to the fact that she had to leave it at night and her husband did not understand taking care of it. Factory toil had not improved her health, for her last child had miscarried, and the doctor had told her she could never have any more children. "Now I got on'y one left," she moaned, "and if he get run over or die what I do?" A storekeeper vigorously denounced the practice of mothers sleeping and leaving their children to their own devices. The disorder in the neighborhood is dreadful, he declared. Children run the streets, play truant, turn into petty thieves, get inadequate meals and in general are neglected. A mother who stayed home with her family was shocked at the practice. "Must children keep house for themselves?" she asked. She was particularly concerned over the thirteen years old daughter of a night working neighbor, who she thought was exposed to risks in the evening with her mother away. Mrs. B., had tried working by day and leaving her children with a neighbor whom she paid to take care of them. But she found they were sadly mistreated, the woman used to beat them, and often when the mother came home she would find them hiding under the table or bed in terror. One winter night she found one ot them in the snowdrifts outside the door. So she had changed to 12 the night shift in order to be with her children by day. "But when you mus' sleep, you can't tell what happen to them," she added. Nothing indeed is more pathetic than the sight of the aimless, neglected children of these work-driven mothers. Even when they come to no physical harm, the tragedy of their lot is reflected in their woebegone and wistful faces. Such a one was little Ganya whom the visitor inet in one of the black hallways of her tenement home. She had just run in from the back yard and stood in the doorway, a shaft of sunlight falling upon her, the most touching picture imaginable. Little bare feet, ragged dress and the tired, flat, uncared for hair of the tenement child. She was eating a dirty crust of bread. She volunteered to show where a nightworker lived, and flew up a black stairway, calling back to the visitor not to get lost. Upstairs two babies were waihng, sitting half naked on the floor. Ganya dried their tears and divided her bit of bread with them. "Mamma, she sleep," she explained, "so I be Mamma." In vivid contrast were two happy, rosy youngsters of a mother in the doorway of the neighboring house. She and the children were fat and spotlessly clean. "No, thank God, I can stay home and look after them and get my rest too. I keep them well only by watching them every second, keepin' them clean and feedin' them plenty. Some of these poor mothers leave their kids to shift for themselves hke alley cats — no food, no clothes, no soap and water, no wonder they get sick. But what else can they do? Nobody can be in the mill and at home too." The effect of the double burden on the health of the women was obvious. Before the study was completed, the investigator was able to distinguish the night workers among a group of women. Insufficient sleep leaves unmistakable traces, a strange driven look in their staring eyes, pallor, drawn hnes of exhaustion about the mouth, nervous, feverish movements made habitual by the "hurry up, hurry up" of the night foremen. Many complained of backache, headache, chest pains, and varicose veins. While a few strapping peasants with the reserve strength of old agricul- tural stock, bore up well under the strain, even after years, the majority were obviously beaten and dragged down. Over and over the comments were, "Oh me all time tired, all time work, all time walk," or "all time work, night, day, no wonder me skeeny." Two women had lately stopped, unable to stand the double burden. "If I no did stop, I go to Heaven," said one. "Plenty womans get sick, die maybe, so much work. Nightwork kills womans, 13 but what I do?" One woman said her fellow piecer on the mule, a widow with five children looked so white and thin that "some- times, when she close her eye, I think she dead." Work on a spinning mule is peculiarly exhausting. The machine gives a hideous shriek as the carriage swings back and forth, the air is usually filled with dust and the smell of oil, besides being kept very humid for the sake of the yarn. The operatives are kept incessantly in motion, running in and out with the mule carriage, stooping to piece broken strands, and reaching up to put heavy spools in place. How they can endure such work through the long hours of the night and then return to meet the insistent demands of their households by day is a mystery. "Like a horse you mus' work," said one, "but maybe you not strong fike a horse." Pregnant Women on Night Shifts The most conspicuous evil, so far as the health of workers is concerned is the prevalence of pregnant women on the night shifts. "Oh yes, plenty womans, big bellies work in the night time," one said, "shame they go, but what can do?" Two midwives who were interviewed said the abuse was general. "I order them to stop," said one of them, "but they tell me they have no money, so what can I answer?" Many mothers confessed to working up to the last few weeks or even days before the birth of their children. The watchman of the Botany mill told of a birth that had occurred six years before, one night in one of the toilets. A former foreman told of letting a woman go at sixrthirty one morning, and her baby arrived at seven thirty. Several women told of leaving the day shift, but getting jobs at night where they were less conspicuous and the bosses more tolerant. One mother defended her right to stay, saying that so long as she did her work, it was nobody's business. When the condition of some of the night workers was called to the attention of the mill superintendent, he remarked easily, "Oh you can't be sure,— all these women have such funny figures, they all look that way." In a doorway sat a pregnant woman, sickly and bloodless. She had lost her first baby from general debility. It was weak she thought because she had worked at night in the woolen mill till the day before its birth. This time the boss had told her she could stay if she wanted to, btit reminded her what had happened before, so she was not working at present, the baby being imminent any day. 14 She looked so ill that the investigator asked her if anyone had told her how to take care of herself, at which she helplessly shrugged her shoulders. A strapping, fat neighbor passed by with a bottle of milk in each hand, "Hi, you skinny," she called to the sick woman, "this is what you need, then maybe you be fat like me." Protests were general against the high cost of living. "Every- ting dear like hell," one mother bluntly said, "I mus work, one pay not enough." Much petty profiteering was going on unchecked. Rents were raised every month, and immediately following the announce- ment that a $3 weekly bonus would be paid beginning June 1st, a general advance of $2 a month was made by many landlords. "What use we get more pay," one woman exclaimed, "right away grocery man, butcher man put up price — they get it, not us." Men's Wages Insufficient Estimates corrected to May 20, 1920,* of the wage per year necessary to support a family of two adults and three children, vary from $1,716 — the estimate of the National Industrial Con- ference Board for Fall River, Mass., to $2,533, the figure of the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics for Washington, D. C. Prof. W. F. Ogburn, the expert of the War Labor Board, placed the "comfort budget" at $2,288. Three quarters of the men in the families visited in Passaic, however, were earning only at the rate of $1,560 or less, and this presupposes' steady wages ever^- working day of the year. The wages of eighty-four men were ascertained, and only twelve earned more than $30 weekly, while fifty-one received $25 or less. Twenty-two did not work in textile mills, but several of these had done so at one time or other. Of ninety-eight women who gave their earnings, only fourteen received less than $18 weekly, and seventy-two earned $20 or over. The secretary of the Passaic Wool Council stated that the average wage of women in the Botany mill was $22.50. (This was before the $3 increase took effect, but since then the workers have been on short time). These figures were borne out by an * Testimony of W. Jett Lauck before the board of arbitration in tlie wage and hour dispute between the New York State Railways and their employees, June, 1920. The estimates as originally made were as follows: National Industrial Conference Board, Fall River, Oct, 1919, 11.673; U. S. Bur. of Labor Statistics, Washington, D. C, June 1918, $2,262: Prof. Ogburn's "comfort budget" as submitted to the War Labor Board, June 1918, was SI, 700. To these figures, Mr. Lauck added the percentages of increase in the cost of living since the respective dates. 15 examination of the payroll sheets. The women's wages were comparatively high, allowance being made for the generally ac- cepted assumption that a woman has only herself to support, but the men's wages, on a family basis were low. Averages taken from payroll sheets agreed with the figures supphed by the women. This is indicated by the following samples for the week of May 24th, 1920: Male laborers average $24; male spinner helpers (worsted spinning) average $28.80; male spinners (boss), 142.25— (there are not many male boss spinners in a mill)— weavers in different loom groups, men and women, who receive equal pay, $33; $26.80, $22.20, $25.25, $30; dyers, male $31.20. The conclusion therefore is inescapable that night work for women in the Botany, the government controlled mill, as in other Passaic mills, is fostered by the low wage scale for men, coupled with a com- paratively high wage level for women, which tempts them to enter the industry. Could a more ingenious device be contrived for lowering the vitality of the wage earners than to pay men so little that their wives, during their child bearing years, must spend their nights at the most exhausting kind of factory toil and their days at the no less exacting and insistent duties of motherhood? Some Typical Homes The following experpts from the investigator's records are typical of conditions found: Mrs. S., a weaver, has three black rooms in a rear flat on the second floor of what was once a cottage. The sagging porch overflows with pale, sickly children who live inside. Seven of them belong to Mrs. S., who is still nursing the youngest, only a few months old. She earns from $19 to $24 weekly, seldom more; her husband makes $25 in a lumber yard. Worn and haggard, she sat there, the child pulhng at her breast. Her mother, who interpreted, said ''she never sleeps, — how can she with so many children?" She works up to the last moment before her babies come, and as soon as they are a month old. Mrs. L. who lives below in the same house, has just stopped work because she was pregnant, and although the boss had told her she could stay, she found the reaching on the 'heavy spinning machine too hard. Three children, ranging in ages from five to twelve years, sickly and forlorn must be cared for, and a tubercular husband, unable to work steadily, who brings in only $12 a week. During the interview he sat in a huddled heap in one corner. Two babies had died, one because she had gone to work too soon after its birth and lost her mUk. . She fed him tea and bread, "so he died." She was now planning — though obviously unfit for heavy work — ^to do day's cleaning to tide the family over the present "emergency." 16 A shoemaker, formerly a mill worker, told stories of the hard con- ditions under which the textile workers live. Before the strike many men with famihes were getting only $12 to $15 a week. Now many earned -only $22, ''and what can a man do on that money if he has five or six children?" So women must go into the mills at night and make themselves sick. "If I could be a president, first thing I do," he said, "I make law no womans shall work in the night, all mans get plenty money for their -families. When womans get vote, you bet they pass a law like that all in one minute." He told also of the spy system and the blacklist main- tained by the Wool Council. All workers must have a card from the ■central employment bureau, and no man, he declared, with anything against him — i.e., union activity — can get a job. Mr. B. was at home during his noon hour, hastily getting dinner for himself and five children so that his wife could sleep. The neglected home and children, the dejected man trying to help out, showed their struggle. He earns $25 a week in the mill, and she $17-18. "The baby," he said, "is sick most of the time and cranky. Most time he cries, mother no can sleep." A child of seven or eight, dressed in rags, with broken shoes on her httle bare feet wandered about the room. Her wasted, sickly face was fixed upon her father while he was talldng. Perhaps the most poignant thing is the expression in the faces of the children of these toiling mothers. Mrs. v., lives in a dilapidated row of small frame buildings bordering on the Dundee Silk Throwing Works. The hallways are black and squalid, the bedrooms tiny and almost as black as the halls. The stair- ways seem in perpetual danger of collapse. Mrs. V. is a carder in a large woolen mill. The work is heavy and coarse, and she gets very tired before the night is over from the constant standing and carrying heavy spools. Her husband makes $22 in the same mill; she earns from $15 to $19. On -the day of the visit she was wearily doing a big washing. Her two children, -two and four years old, dirt and sores on their Mvid faces, sat dully in a ■corner. They seemed almost as weary and lifeless as their mother, lacking ■entirely the animation and gaiety almost inextinguishable in childhood. A wretched creature was discovered on Sixth Street, living with her husband, a feebleminded daughter of fourteen and a younger child of three in one black bedroom, rented from another family. The woman was obviously afflicted with syphihs which had nearly destroyed her nose and palate, so that she could scarcely enunciate. She is a weaver making about $25 a week; her husband makes $20 in a rubber factory. It seems -incredible that the miU authorities would employ a person so diseased .as to be a serious menace to her fellow workers. The houses in this section are in extremely bad repair. A tenement- house inspector, met on his rounds two blocks away, declared they were -unfit for human habitation. Innumerable violations had been permitted to accumulate during the war, but now disobedient landlords would be haled into court. Mrs. F. is a shredder, work which covers her with dust. At the time of the visit, she lay sick in bed with a heavy cold. Her husband had asked the investigator to come in, thinking she was a nurse. The home, 17 three miserable damp rooms in the basement, was cluttered and dirty. Evidently a hard struggle against poverty was going on. Mr. F. earns only $20 in the mill, scarcely enough for his four children, all under eight years old. He was staying home from work to take care of his wife, whom he was feeding cabbage and tea! He supposed his wife got sick from working night and day, but what else could be done about it? The foregoing serve to indicate some of the effects of this unnatural and discredited industrial practice, which nearly a century of experience and the reasoned judgment of courts, commissions of inquiry, efficiency experts, factory inspectors, physicians and scientists have unanimously condemned. These manufacturers have not made a study of night work to- ascertain whether it is sufficiently productive to warrant its con- tinuance on ground of output, after the manufacturers in all lead- ing industrial countries have discovered that the product of night work is inferior to that of day work, both in quality and quantity.* Experience shows that the profits from the uninterrupted use of plants which are operated by night as well as by day are reduced,, by the increased running expenses, the wear on machinery and the lessened efficiency of workers. The prohibition of night work, by preserving the health and energies of the operatives, as well as the material equipment, tends to increase production. Great Britain, under the stress of war emergency, reestablished night work in the early years of the war. Her Health of Munition Workers' Com- mittee,! however, as a result of studies during 1917, emphasized the fact that continuous night work yields an output inferior both to all day work and to the system of alternating day and night shifts. Still less do the Passaic manufacturers seem to know about the effects of night work on their employees. The secretary of the Wool Council stated that "the women must like it, else they would not keep it up year after year." He thinks the tales of lack of sleep and effects on health exaggerated, and said, "One cannot believe what the workers tell you— everything they say is a he."' The very week when the woolen mills of Passaic were all entering upon a long period of short time, he declared that "what these people need is a sixty hours' week." While the mils are running some four and others only three days a week, women are still employed in them at night. * "The Effect of Night Work on Output" in The Case Against Night Work for Women, Court of Appeals, State of New York— ibid; p. 291. t British Ministry of Munitions, Health of Munition Workers' Committee. Interim Report, Industrial Efficiency and Fatigue, London, 1917. 18 NATIONAL CONSUMERS' LEAGUE 44 East 23rd Street, New York OFFICERS President Hon. Newton D. Baker, Washington, D. C. Vice-Presidents Miss Jane Addams, Chicago, 111. Mrs. Edward P. Costigan, Washington, D. C. Mrs. G. W. B. Gushing, East Orange, N. J. Mrs. Samuel S. Fels, Philadelphia, Pa. Mrs. R. P. Halleck, Louisville, Ky. Alice Hamilton, M.D., Boston, Mass. Miss Myrta L. Jones, Cleveland, Ohio Mrs. William Kittle, Madison, Wis. Mrs. B. B. Munford, Richmond, Va. Mrs. W. L. Murdock, Birmingham, Ala. Mrs. Frederick Nathan, New York City Mrs. M. R. Trumbull, Portland, Ore. Recording Secretary Mrs. Percy Jackson, New York City Treasurer G. Hermann Kinnicutt, New York City General Secretary Mrs. Florence Kelley Executive Director John R. Shillady Field Secretary Miss Jeannette Rankin (from Nov., 1920) Publication Secretary Miss Josephine Goldmark* Research Secretary Miss Mary W. Dewson Financial Secretary Miss Katharine R. Faulkner * On leave of absence. 19 HONORARY OFFICERS President John Graham Brooks, Cambridge, Mass. Vice-Presidents H. C. Adams, University of Michigan W. J. Ashley, Birmingham, England Marion, L. Burton, University of Michigan Richard T. Ely, University of Wisconsin James A. Field, University of Chicago J. H. Hollander, Johns Hopldns University J. W. Jenks, New York University Wm. A. Neilson, Smith College Susan M. Kingsbury, Bryn Mawr College Jessica B. Peixotto, University of California Roscoe Pound, Harvard Law School John A. Ryan, Catholic University of America E. R. A. Seligman, Columbia University Mary E. Woolley, Mt. Holyoke College CONSUMER'S LEAGUE OF NEW JERSEY 13 Central Avendb, Newark, New Jersey President Mrs. G. W. B, Gushing, East Orange, N. J. Vice-Presidents Miss Gornelia Bradford, Jersey City- Mrs, de L. Heyde, Plainfield Treasurer Mrs. Brioe Collard OUR AIM: The Welfare of Working Women and Children in State and Nation Will you not join the League f It means doing great service at little cost. ANNUAL DUES Active, 11.00; Subscribing, $2.00; Associate, 13.00; Sustaining, S25.00; Contributing, $100.00. The payment of ^1000.00 at any one time constitutes Life Membership. Name Address Send cheolc to the State Treasurer, Mrs. Brioe Collard, 29 Monticello Avenue, Jersey City. 20 "^^271 ™ I