USA > Illinois > Cook County > Chicago > The Congress of Women : held in the Woman's building, World's Columbian exposition, Chicago, U.S.A., 1893 : with portraits, biographies and addresses > Part 47
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That the matriarchal spirit arose in the last century is seen by the awakened curiosity for knowledge: the Encyclopædias began to collect; the British Museum was established 1753, and interest in Oriental languages began. Rollin's ancient history told us of past nations. Excavations began, and the statues of the great Egyptian women came into view, telling us of a civilization that taught Greeks, Hebrews and Romans.
Women have risen in influence with the rise of these matriarchal methods, and this wider knowledge of higher civilizations than Europe had ever had under patri- archal rule. A republic is but a political order of a matriarchal home, as an empire is a patriarchal ideal. The evolution of our republic, as a political organization with matriarchal rather than patriarchal ideals, is a most fruitful study of human activity. The states are a family of children, each have rights and are free to develop individuality, but all must be true to the home, the union of all, the central head; and mark, this is not to obey a patriarchal will, but to adjust their way to order as in a home. It was thus that the uniting in ancient times, of many with one purpose created a greater force than even one mighty man over many slaves obeying his will.
This was the first great step in civilization, when individual passion had to curb itself to obey the law of the whole tribe. That was the work of early women in matriarchal times, and today it has to be repeated in every household by the mother teaching the child's will that it must obey the law of the family, its rules and regulations. Each family repeats the history of the world. Thus the influence and light from the great, courageous mothers of the past help women of today. We should realize that we are a part of the history of the world. Those early women were great because with no example, only their own instincts-they first taught and trained children and men in industry, economy and foresight- those traits which make us different from the brute.
346
THE CONGRESS OF WOMEN.
Civil life in a wide continent has to adopt the methods of the matriarchal system, though they are despised by patriarchs. They are based on conference, councils, arbitration, and not commands from one. A patriarch did not confer with his people. He ruled and directed by his sovereign will and his wish. He claimed to be directed by his god, or his angel, or his high priest. Women were directed by their collected reason as to what was right. Their instincts were their authority; so they established the council as authority. Because they were not strong when isolated, they invented habitations that protected them from wild beasts and from lawless persons of their own and other tribes. Their method was the motto of one of the states of our republic: " United we stand, divided we fall." It was this uniting of the mothers to secure ben- efit to their families that began the method of councils and that introduced treaties for peace. Women, not being as strong in body as men, and with the care of their young, could not take risks of starvation or fight with enemies single-handed; so, from their disability in physical strength and animal courage, they developed the defense that comes from thought and invention. For this reason the matriarchal power is older than the patriarchal. The mothers united in council and acted together. When they, from their grain fields, controlled the food supply and the sale of their baskets, trinkets and religious vestments, then they were a power; for that one is master who supplies the food and raiment. Walled cities, large armies broke the matriarchal reign and established empires.
Let us turn back four hundred years: Constantinople was taken in 1453 by Moham- medans. In 1480 Columbus was starting for Portugal. Ferdinand and Isabella were in their prime, thirty years of age. Sir Thomas More, Margaret ( daughter of Maxi- milian ), and the great Mary of Burgundy, were born this year. Sister Iladewych, a nun of Brabant, was collecting songs for the people in their own tongue, thus establishing a unity of the Dutch language. Anna Bljins, the first to write with grace and elegance that language, was writing for the good of people who could not read Latin.
From this time the matriarchal stream of thought and ideas have gradually eroded the walls and pillars of patriarchal power.
In 1480 the Continent of America was at peace, not yet found by the covetous, wrangling, fighting, stealing, persecuting Europeans. The women here on this conti- nent had their harvest festivals, gathering their corn and potatoes, weaving baskets and making pottery, worshiping what helped them in life in their temples with rev- crence to sun moon and stars: their help and yet their mystery. They had learned that they were connected in some way in guiding and blessing their every-day life with light and growth. It was from their religious island that a woman held high the sacred torch of their worship that greeted Columbus in that dark night of despair with his frail boats on the unknown ocean. The incident is preserved by art in the woman's seal of the World's Columbian Exposition It was the intuitive apprecia- tion and generosity of women that gave Columbus the ability to do his work. The accumulated charts and geographical knowledge, and the fortune and estate of his wife in Porto Santo, and wisdom of her mother, were his opportunity and inspiration. The granddaughter of the great Queen Philippa of England was the mother and inspirer of Henry II. of Portugal, who gave Perestrello, the father of Columbus' wife, his knowledge and his estate. The great women of that time are a study of them- selves. I leave them and go back a century before, to 1380, when closed the lives of two great women whose history remains to teach and inspire us today-Philippa of Hainault and St. Catherine of Sienna.
Marcus Aurelius commends the precept of Themistocles to have before the mind some of the many men of antiquity who illustrated by their lives the greatness possi- ble to men. It is equally a benefit for women. Too long we have been kept on his- tory written and illustrated by men's lives; now we want to know the spinners of the fiber of individual character; the knitters who have formed the social life; the weav- ers who have held together by principles and laws the passions of people, so that the strength of each should be the salvation of the whole. The lives of the women in each age will reveal the evolution of the growth of civil life, though men's lives may
347
THE CONGRESS OF WOMEN.
illustrate the revolutions against enemies and usurpers. Plutarch's lives of the great Greeks were powerful in inspiration to the eighteenth century. They were a renais- sance in themselves. This century needs the history of womanhood in civilization.
The study of the womanhood of women in high position, in governments, the queens and princesses of Europe, will exert a beneficial influence on all women, for they will learn that the state is but the larger household; and if the study of society, of industries, commerce, religious and educational methods, or the study of govern- ment, is elevating and ennobling for queens; if the study of how to adjust difficulties, develop and rule people is suited for royal families, then it is suited for all fami- lies in a republic where people are sovereigns. It will be a study equally elevating for American women and her family in a republic. The women who, against the prejudice of patriarchal ideals, have tried to bring into this republic recognition of womanhood and matriarchal methods, have been working on the Divine plan of Prov- idence and in the true history of mankind.
When the Spaniards came to Peru, South America, they found a learned woman- Capillano. She was born 1500-1541. Her manuscripts and paintings are in the Dominicans' Library there now. They represent ancient Peruvian monuments, with historical explanations. There are representations of their plants and the curious dissertations on their properties. The lives of such women are a part of the history of America; but more, they are part of the history of womanhood, as well as of the world. Humanity is not bound by geographical lines. We are interested in what woman has wanted to do and how she has done it. We need to study not only women like ourselves, but those placed in all the various phases of life. The means they may have employed may have been different from our ancestors, but what was their womanhood? That we need to know. There have been elect women in all days who have felt impelled to do and dare, and to bring a higher state of affairs on earth-to work out their ideals of what ought to be into a reality. Have they not always aimed for what they thought was good for mankind?
Woman has made her love "the ladder for her faith, and climbs above on the rounds of her best instincts."
We know that there were great and good women here in America in prehistoric times. Their works prove it. The fanatical discoverers were too barbaric to appreciate them. They judged a people by their ability to kill and fight and to resist an enemy.
Their temples they tried to utterly destroy, and stripped from them gold and silver adornments and sacred offerings and buried the stones, defacing them. We lose the true record of the life lived here; but the work of their hands comes forth from their hidden tombs. There is much to bear witness that there were great women who labored for beauty, for peace, comfort, and an orderly life. We want now a sacred, safe place to gather and preserve, as fast as found the record, the work of these early great women on this oldest continent. We must prove we value knowledge, that we want opportunity to compare what has been evil with what has been good. Then women in the future can write a true history.
What will the Exposition do for us? It will carry us forward to new convictions for duty and elevate the rule of life.
Here we have met companions who were truly such, who enjoy what we enjoy, and are inspiration as well as fellowship to us.
Our horizon has broadened, and the little we know is put into comparison with the infinite we do not know. This collection from all lands, from all races, with exhibition of their endeavors to civilize and attain enlightened humanity, would be a childish, summer play of the nations if it were not a profound examination of civil- ization, its causes, and its growth.
" The soul of man is widening toward the past, More largely conscious of the life that was."
" Here is the pulse of all mankind Feeding an embryo future."
THE FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE OF WOMEN. By MRS. ELLEN M. HENROTIN.
In accepting Mrs. Eagle's kind invitation to address this Congress I suggested that a few words on the financial position of women might not be uninteresting.
The entrance of women into the labor markets of the world marks a distinctly new era in her financial status, and the economic condition of woman is still a sad one. It is undeniable that the exhibits at the Columbian Exposition testify to the tremendous advance which she has made during the last half cent ury in the industrial world, but it also testifies to the fact that in this world she occupies a very subordi- nate position: not numerically, but as a skilled arti- san. In the modern world her position is relatively but little better than it was in ancient days, when she was the hewer of wood and bearer of water; and that she does not now hew wood and carry water is due to the fact that mechanical appliances perform for humanity the tasks in which primitive woman was engaged.
Little by little, woman has emerged from the home and its industries into the modern competitive labor market. It is estimated that there are six thousand women in this country who act as postmistresses; treasury department, one thousand four hundred MRS. ELLEN M. HENROTIN. women. New York City has over one hundred thou- sand women who earn their own living and are supporting families. The average weekly wages of working women in American cities is $5.24, the highest being at San Francisco, $6.91, and the lowest at Atlanta, Ga., $4.05. Over three million women are earning independent incomes in the United States. It is impossible to estimate the number of women who have independent incomes by inheritance.
Miss Grace Dodge says that there are two thousand four hundred and eighteen members of the clubs forming the New York Association. The average earnings are five dollars a week; thus, members of the New York Association earn $654,680 a year. These figures give no idea of women in the insurance business; teachers, most of whom save something and make small investments; librarians, stenographers, whose wages range from six dollars to eighteen dollars per week; but from the meager statement it is easy to judge of the truly enormous sums of money made and invested each year by women.
Why in the nineteenth century, in this land of plenty, flowing with milk and honey, she and her little children should be pushing into this struggle for existence, in which the survival of the fittest seems to be lost sight of, for bread to put in their mouths, is a sociological question which must be left for society, the church and the state to
Mrs. Ellen M. Henrotin was born in Portland, Me. Her parents were Edward Bryan Martin, Camden, Me., and Sarah Norris Martin, of that city. She waseducated in New Haven, Conn .; Shankland, Isle of Wight, England ; two years in Paris, and two years in Dresden. She has traveled all over Europe and America. She married Mr. Charles Henrotin, banker and broker, Chicago, in 1869. Her special work has been in the interest of women and social and economic institutions. Mrs. Henrotin was vice president and acting president of the Woman's Branch of the World's Congress Auxiliary, which arranged varions congressesduring the Exposition in Chicago in 1893. She filled that position with great credit to herself and profit to women in general. Her postoffice address is Chicago, Ill.
348
349
THE CONGRESS OF WOMEN.
answer. That she is in the labor market today as a permanent factor is apparent even to the most superficial observer, and the next question is, How to improve her economic and financial condition so that life may be made at least worth the living. This may seem but a poor ambition, but it is, after all, the highest possessed by the great majority: that their life may be fairly comfortable, and passed under such con- ditions that the next generation may be a little better and a little wiser.
There is no more patent sign of the times than the fact that woman is attracting the attention of the financial world, and that her large property interests are being recognized as an integral part of the so-called " Woman Question." She has always been recognized as a worker, but as a worker along the lines in which her financial rewards did not render her an object of special consideration in the moneyed world. Now, however, all this is changed, the money or the savings which she accumulates are invested in moneyed institutions, as building and loan associations, real estate, and mortgages on real estate. The amount thus invested is in the hundred millions.
Mr. Ethelbert Stewart, of the Department of Labor at Washington, sends me the following report:
" The relative numerical position of men and women as investors in building and loan associations is as one to four. That is to say, twenty-five per cent of the build- ing and loan shares of stock in the eastern and middle western states are owned by women. In New Jersey every fourth shareholder is a woman, as is seen from the figures: Total, 78,725 shareholders; 58,496 males, 19,341 females; nine hundred and eighty-eight corporations and firms: percentages, seventy-four per cent., twenty-five per cent. and one per cent. respectively. The "present value " of the shares held by women in New Jersey is $6,401,593. By present value is meant dues paid in, together with accrued profits. Of the borrowers, or those who are securing homes for themselves by means of building and loan associations: In New York State 32,699 women hold 126,874 shares of stock, having a present value of $5,935,554, and a maturity value of approximately twenty-five million dollars.
The total membership of these societies in New York is composed of twenty-four per cent. women, though only about twenty per cent. of the stock is held by women. In the city of Philadelphia 34,4000 women hold stock valued at $10,059,861, while the stock matured and withdrawn, either in money or in canceled mortgages, equals . $15,000,000 more, within the past "maturing period " of eight years.
In the State of Pennsylvania $22,200,000 worth of building and loan stock is held by 92,000 women. Of the $960,000,000, representing the net assets of building and loan associations in the United States, $192,000,000 worth is held by 2,400,000 women.
The law of Illinois, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, and probably many other states, makes building and loan stock taken out by women, and when the dues upon said stock is paid by them, to be theirs in every particular, and not subject to attachment or execution for their husbands' debts.
The question of the source from whence the dues come which are paid on shares held by women, is one that can not be answered in a very comprehensive way. One association, in New York City, visited by the writer, had sixty-three chambermaids among its membership, each earning by her own labor the money invested.
In a teachers' building and loan association in New York City ninety per cent. of the members were women earning their own money, and many of them having built several houses for rent through the association. In Buffalo, N. Y., I asked twenty- seven women who came in to pay their dues how they got the money. Twelve replied their husbands gave it to them.
One said her husband supported the family and she swept a large house for a wealthy lady twice each week and invested the earnings in building and loan stock. Another baked bread for three different families, and thus earned the money invested in dues. Five others earned the money themselves by various extra domestic jobs, such as sewing or washing for a neighbor. In all, seven married women earned their own funds; twelve did not. The remaining eight were unmarried and worked for their living.
-
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THE CONGRESS OF WOMEN.
I have attended the meetings of scores of building and loan associations and asked the female members as they came in to pay dues what their source of income was, and I believe that less than fifty per cent. of them derive their money from their husbands. That is to say, one million three hundred and fifty thousand women are investing in building and loan stock the money they earn themselves, and this self- earned money, as distinguished from the total held by women is, at a low estimate, $86,000,000. Women investors in building and loan associations are usually working women or the wives of working men. A great many clerks and school teachers invest in this manner, as building associations hold out the prospect of obtaining a home, which is the goal of woman's endeavor; for almost every woman has some one for whom she desires to create a home; if not her own children, then parents or a sister or a brother; in fact, this is the strong motive among working women, and to attain this end they walk many a weary mile and deprive themselves of many a pleasure.
Women should exercise great care and do their best to ascertain from a reliable source the financial status of the association in which they desire to invest.
The tremendous financial power which women might become in this country they have never as yet realized. At my request, Mr. Hepburn, the late comptroller of the currency, sent out to the national banks a request to furnish him with a list of women holding bank stock, and the statistics which he collected were sent to me by Mr. Eckels.
It is an interesting point that the large amount of stock in banks owned by women does not come to them as a reward of their own labor, but is usually given by some relative. The tendency of men to put their money in the hands of women is becom- ing a very pronounced one; also most husbands and fathers consider bank stock a safe investment to leave to women. It is easily managed, the income is usually an assured one, and in the present status of women's information on financial matters, it does not require very much ability to draw little slips of paper against a definite sum; conse- quently that is regarded as an easy way of disposing of their future, and this is the point of view to be combated. Were the women of this country once to realize their power, the sense of ethical responsibility born of power would rise within them. They would no longer content themselves with giving their proxy when asked for it, and never voting themselves or attending a stockholders' meeting.
There is also another side. The men are constantly saying they are overworked: this is made the excuse for the bad management of many corporations. There are a large number of intelligent women in this country, owning great financial interests; these women would make excellent directors, they are conservative; with a little exer- tion they could acquire the requisite knowledge of finance and then relieve the men of some of the tremendous burdens from which they now suffer.
Before continuing further I will give the figures of the comptroller of the currency. It must be borne in mind that these figures represent only the national banks, and not all of them. In some states the private banks do not report.
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THE CONGRESS OF WOMEN.
STATEMENT SHOWING BY STATES AND TERRITORIES THE NUMBER OF SHARES OF NATIONAL BANK STOCK OWNED BY WOMEN APRIL 15, 1893, AND PAR VALUE OF SAME. ALSO THE NUMBER OF WOMEN EMPLOYED IN NATIONAL BANKS ON SAME DATE, AND AMOUNT OF SALARIES PAID TO SAME.
STATE AND TERRITORIES.
No. of Shares Owned by Women.
Par Value of Shares No. of Women Salaries of Women
Owned by Women.
Employed.
Employed.
Maine
27,343
$ 2,540,905
6
$ 2,296
New Hampshire.
13,635
1,350,493
11
4,541
Vermont
25,633
1,719,666
6
2,550
Massachusetts
214,169
21,738,195
32
15,394
Rhode Island
126,931
6,593,770
2
1,000
Connecticut .
68,774
4,922,786
5
1,526
New York.
264,053
18,317,471
44
18,952
New Jersey
56,894
3,604,290
3
1,106
Pennsylvania
267,779
17,267,184
26
10,723
Delaware
12,768
755,075
1
360
Maryland ..
119,886
3,739,205
1
416
District of Columbia.
3,349
334,900
1
60
Virginia
7,174
717,400
West Virginia ..
4,316
422,366
North Carolina
7,351
549,250
South Carolina
3,799
379,910
Georgia
5,932
589,380
2
1,200
Florida
988
98,850
1
60
Alabama
31,962
698,700
2
1,560
Texas .
213,261
2,326,570
3
1,700
Arkansas
1,477
147,700
1
600
Kentucky.
32,331
3,085,580
6
2,680
Tennessee
15,404
1,496,400
4
3,920
Ohio
100,547
10,381,631
23
9,399
Indiana
30,255
3,025,558
24
11,510
Illinois.
58,927
5,892,780
27
14,859
Michigan
24,850
2,464,091
11
5,780
Wisconsin
11,849
108,675
12
5,116
Iowa ..
16,306
1,620,488
21
9,593
Minnesota
29,563
3,032,177
13
5,640
Missouri
30,775
3,110,650
15
9,520
Kansas
10,008
1,061,088
21
8,820
Nebraska
8,927
903,318
19
10,090
Colorado
5,187
518,700
4
2,520
Nevada
5,000
California.
12,805
1,310,375
6
5,280
Oregon
2,093
224,800
4
2,450
Arizona.
30
3,000
North Dakota.
2,102
210,200
4
1,930
South Dakota
2,988
302,820
9
4,329
Idaho.
393
39,300
1
600
Montana
2,427
242,700
3
2,900
New Mexico
1,112
111,200
Oklahoma .
79
7,900
Indian Territory
330
33,000
Utah
3,229
322,900
Wyoming
2,192
219,200
1
500
Washington.
5,098
590,213
8
4,376
Total.
1,703,759
$130,681,485
383
$185,797
Mississippi.
1,560
156,000
Louisiana
4,174
417,475
The statistics of women as bank employes show that but a small number have entered banking offices, though women are admirably fitted for such employment. The work is well systematized; the hours fixed; there is no night work, comparatively speak- ing; and they are very expert in the handling of money. The well-known bank exam-
352
THE CONGRESS OF WOMEN.
iner, Mr. Sturges, has written a paper on this subject, which will be found in the records of the Congress.
I have written to every woman bank cashier in this country, and I have received many interesting letters, among others one from Mrs. Annie Moores, President of the First National Bank of Mount Crescent, Texas. She says that she had never had her attention drawn to this point before, but that she immediately made it a subject of investigation and was perfectly amazed at the result. She happened at the time she received my letter to be in Virginia, and her investigation was in the County of Suffolk. She found eight stockholders in the bank of Monsmont were women, possessing by inheritance one-third of the stock, which they all voted by proxy. Further investiga- tion has proved that two-thirds of the National bank stock of this entire county of Suffolk is owned by women. Mrs. Simpson, who is President of the Simpson Bank of Columbus, Texas, gives very much the same figures; and adds that woman to be capable of investing funds wisely and judiciously must be possessed of three essential qualifications-to wit: A knowledge of matters of finance, self-confidence, and firm- ness.
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