Harriet Martineau and the Employment of Women in 1836 Author(s): Edith Abbott Source: Journal of Political Economy, Vol.

14, No. 10 (Dec., 1906), pp. 614-626 Published by: The University of Chicago Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1819994 . Accessed: 19/04/2014 14:27
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HARRIET MARTINEAU AND T'HE EMPLOYMENT

WOMEN IN
I8361

OF

of women'swork It is essentialto any profitable discussion womlen be distinof m.iddle-class that the gainfulemployment of the workingof wom,en employment guishedfrom, thegainful on "class distinctions" classes. This is notso muchan insistence in discussions of tne as it is a recognition of thewomanquestion classes of women whichthesetwo, factthat,whilethe problems, identity, fundamental havebeenobligedto facemayhave a certain And a failureto problems quite different. theyare as practical has led :attimesto confusion see important pointsof unlikeness results. It is, forexample, practical in theory and to unfortunate legislationin a part of the history of the strugglefor factory to grantthatthe working-woman Englandthatan unwillingness delayedthe progressolfverynecessary had peculiargrievances the resulting from theoretical reforms,2 and it has followed conof the the achievements fusionthat,in attempts to formulate of the last century to enlargethe opportunities and long efforts the which to economist German activitiesof women-efforts of a, Bewegung 3-such progressas has assume the importance without "class disbeenmadeis assumedto have beena progress and professional women tinctions"in which woirking-women briefstudy-a, study in have shared alike. In the following is economichistory and not in presentconditions-an a.ttempt
writer is under obligations to the Department of Economics of the of making the investigaCarnegie Institutionof Washington for the opportunity tion of which this is one of the results. 2 In an interesting chapter on "The Woman's Rights Opposition," Miss Hutchins and Miss Harrison point out (History of Factory Legislation, pp. I83, between the "social and customarydisabilities which have I84) the difference been placed on women's work in the professions. . . . and the restraintsplaced ... . Not exclusion but exploitaof women in industry by law on the over-work are not denied the opportunity tion is the trouble here . . . . [working-women] sisters were or are of exercising of exercising their muscles as their better-off theirbrains." Vol. III, pp. 564, 3 E. g., Conrad, Handw5rterbuchder Staatswissenschaft,
1 The

565.
6I4

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EMPLOYMENT

OF WOMEN IN 1836

615

made to presenta more detailedaccountthan has been given beforeof the industrial opportunities open to women seventy yearsago. No list of the industries in whichwomenwere then engagedthatcan lay thesmallest claimto completeness has been heretofore accessible, and ithas beeneasyto be misledintobelieving thatwe are estoppedfromobtaining any such information for a periodearlierthan i86o.4 The mostconvenient and definite statement regarding the early employment of womenis one made on the authoriity of Harriet Martineau, to the effect that,whenshe visitedAmericain 1836, but seven occupations were open;toiwomen :5 teaching, n.eedlework,keepingboarders, workin cotton-mills, booktypesetting, and domestic binding, service. Of theseonlyfour-work in cotton-mills, typesetting, and bookbinding-come within needlework, thepresent discussion of industrial It shouldbe said occupation.s. at the outset, in fairness to,Miss Martineau, that,although this is takenfrom a chapter"l on the "Occupations of Women,"it is a casual and nota carefully prepared enumeration.She does not herselfeven includedomesticservice,thoughshe oftenrefers to it; and she also m;entions that in Lynn manyof the women wereengagedin binding and trimming shoes;7 yetthisoccupation thougha vastlymore important one than bookbinding or typeis not included setting, in the list. It shouldbe added,too, that she usedthemoregeneral term "mills"8 instead of "cotton-mills," whichis used in the list as commonly quoted,and she may well have had in mind other textilefactories in operationat that time.
'In Campbell's Women Wage-Earners, a prize monographof the American Economic Association in I89I, it is said: "Defeat and discouragementattend well-nigh every step of the attemptto reach any conclusions regarding women workers in the early years of the century ... . It is to the United States Census of I86o that we must look for the firstreally definitestatementas to the occupations of women and children" (pp. 95, 96). For a similar statementsee Willett, Women in the ClothingTrades, p. 24.
'

See,

for example,

Levasseur's

p. 337, and Wright'sIndustrial Evolution of the United States, p. 202. "Harriet Martineau,Society in America (London, I837), Vol. II, pp. 7In a chapter on "Manufacturing Labor," ibid., Vol. II, pp. 249, 250.
8Ibid., p. I48.

L'ouvrier

amhricain, Adams'

Translation,
131-51.

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9 of the meager opporcasual statement Miss Martineanu's in I836 lends confor working-wonmen of employment tunities regarding generalizations and comforting colorto!va,gue venient openingsfor women that ha.s of industrial the multiplication will be madehere our yearsof progress. No; attempt comewvith new ones. It is or to;offer these generalizations to contradict the earlier regarding only hoped that more exact information forfuture discussions. ba.sis a,sa,trtistw7o,rthy maybe useful period valuable data for this early period are by no Fortunately, There are three as ha.sbeenrepresented. meansso unobtainable years for I836 and the fifteen of information sources, important Ma.ssaof census industrial is the these preceding. One of chusetts'0 folr I836-37; another is a series olfDocuments Relain I832 collected States,"1 of theUnited tiveto theMainufactures withan orderof of the trea,sury in compliance by the secretary the thirdis the United States the House of Representatives; Of these the I832 collectionis census of I822.12 industrial the mostimportant.As a,censusof manufacturunquestionably was ma,deto it ing industries wa,s a failure,and no, attempt a s,umma.ry of the results. Save in the data or prepare tabulate is given,exceptfora information little! the New Englandstates, and iron;and even likecotton, wool,gla,ss, fewleadingindustries to In 1822 the attempt are fra,gmenta.ry. forthesethe returns had been industries, preparea "digest" of the manufacturing disappointing. Niles ca,lledit a "miserableexhibit" similarly for generalpurposes a sumimary and said that "to,bringforth and were as an impossibility we esteem, of reference and remark
9Another casual statementeasy to "quote" is found in the same chapter: "Wifely and motherlyoccupations may be called the sole business of woman The only alternative. . . . is making an occupation of either there. religion or dissipation." (Ibid., Vol. II. p. 245.) '1 Statistical Tables Exhibiting the Conditions and Products of Certain Branches of Industry in Massachutsettsfor the Year Ending April i, I837
(Boston, I838).

"Executive Documents, Twenty-secondCongress, First Session, Vols. I, II. Digest of the ManufacturingEstablishmentsin the United States, issued as an additional volume of the Fourth Ceitsus (Washington: Gales and Seaton, convenientlyavailable in American State Papers, Finance, Vol. IV, pp. I823);
12 28-224.

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EMPLOYMENT

OF WOMEN IN I836

6I7

thatnone is given." 13 For our purpose, not therefore surprised valuable, because the however, these reportsare extremely of "men, vomen,and children," schedules called forthenumber insteadof the baffling "numberof persons" employed. Frequently the designation in the schedules was disregarded and onlythe"number oif butin a largeproemployees" returned; portionof cases it was faithfully observed. It is in just this respect thattheMassachusetts censusis disappointing; for,while it is, as a whole,, muchmoreaccurateand complete than either of the government the sex of the employeesis less reports, frequently distinguished. From these three reportstogether, hoxwever unsatisfactory each may be alone, it is possibleto obtaina very considerable amount of information of women regardingthe employment duringthe fifteen years which theycover. The total number olfwomenemployed in all industries or in any one industry cannot be obtainedfrom them. Neither can the list of occupations compiled be considered complete. But partialthoughit may be, it is deserving of attention, becauseit is,so muchmoredetailed thanany thatwe now have. It appears fromthese reportsthat prior to I837 women were empiloyed in more than one hundreddifferent industrial occupations. In the Documents of I832 the New Hampshire returns show that theywere employed in the manufacture of brushes, books, batting, cigars and snuffgumi, garden bobbins, seeds, glass bottles,fur and wool hats,14leatherand morocco leather musical instruments, paper,'5 starch. straw hats, roots
" Niles Register,May 3, 1823. It is added that the secretaryof state hesitated to publish the digest and did so only because it was required, and the House of Representatives "nearly resolved to destroy or suppress the books just as they came neatly done up from the binders." 14This was a very importantindustry at that time and an old one for this country. In 1831 it was estimated that 3,000 women were employed in the manufacturein various parts of the country. See the "Reports of Committees" in the Address and Proceedings of the Friends of Domestic Industry at the New York Convention,October 26, 1831 (Baltimore, I831), p. 39. 15 The manufactureof paper had long furnishedan occupation for women. Before I 789, women and girls were employed in paper-mills,and more than a thousand women and children were shown to have been employed in I822

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and herbs, tin-plating,wire, wheel-heads, whips; as well as in and o;f course in cottonprinting,tailoring, and cloth-dressing, and in "boots and shoes." and Nwoolen-mills The Connecticutinvestigationfound women also employed16 in brass foundries,in silversmithwork, in the manufacture of buttoinsand combs,'17cabinet-ware, coaches and wa,gons.,caps, and cotton-wicks,iron nails, jewelry, 8 clocks, cotto-n-webbing suspenders,20 razor strops,stone-wNTare, line twine, metal-clasps,19 and pocket-books. in the census of I837 and those Putting togetherthe retturns for Massachusetts, the list of industries is in the Docuiuneents extended to include the, manufacture of boxes, bed-coirdsand clothes-lines, blacking, children's carriages, cards, cho'colate, cigars21 and candles and soap, cork-cutters, corcdageand twvine, tobacco, chairs,22chair stuff,crackers, carpets, curtains, cheese, copperas, furs, furniture,flax, flint glass, fishingand blutter, nets, gimlets,hair cloth and hair beds, hosiery,hooks and eyes, india-rubber,lead, lead pencils, lace,23 letter-boxes,lo,cks,lookAbout (Digest of I822, and Bishop's History of Manufactures,Vol. II, p. 207). I825, paper began to be made by the use of the Fourdernier machine, and the most extensive manufactorywas said to have been at Springfield,Mass., "employingtwelve engines, more than ioo females besides the usual number of male hands" (Bishop, op. cit., p. 303). The "census" of I837 showed 605 women in the paper-millsof Massachusetts. 6 Industriesthat were on the New Hampshirelist are of course not repeated. 17 industryin Connecticutand Massachusetts,employingnearly An important a thousandwomen. " The manufactureof jewelry was more importantin Rhode Island, where I22 women were employed. " A New Britain industry, which employed I57 women. 20 The manufacture of stocks and suspendersin the two states of Connecticut to more than 700 women. and Massachusettsgave employment -"'The Documents showed 2,30 women in cigar-makingfor Massachusetts, but undoubtedlya complete investigationwould have showed many more in the industry. 22 According to the returns, ibid., 219 women were employed in chair factories. 23 Lace-making was an important "woman's industry" at this time. The Documents returned more than 5oo women engaged in it in Massachusetts; and it was said to be extensivelycarried on elsewhere, employing6oo women in Newport,R. I. (See the Report of the HarrisburgConventionin the Interests
of Domnestic Industry, a pamphlet published in 1827.)

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EMPLOYMENT

OF WOMEN IN I836

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ing-glasses, paper hangings,pails, rakes, stocks,tacks, types, windowblinds;and theywere threadand sewingsilk,umbrellas, makand mantua-making, also engagedin millinery,24 tailoring ing of instruments. wool-pulling,gold-beating,silk- and and and upholstering; wool-dyeing, lithographing, bed-binding, as silversmiths houses.25 womenwereemployed and in publishing Returnsfromotherstateswere not deta.iled enoughto add to thislist,whichwould have been greatly any otherindustries fromNew York had even approachedin extendedif returns fromMassachusetts. The Digest of 1822, completeness thoise while not so colmplete forany one sectionas thatolf1832 was for Massa.chusetts, more evenly,and coversthe whole coiuntry of industries. therefore increasesthe variety whichhad women employees duringthis period. The list26for I822 shows that of anchors, in themanufacture beer,brass womenwereemployed brushes, barboats,button-molds, buttons, nails, books,barrels, and shoes, iron,bagging (hemp), b-akery products, beds,boolts carts,earthen-ware, furniture, flour, floor-cloth, gloves,gold-leaf, iron castfurand wool hats,hardware, gunpowder, guinstocks, ings, iron work,iron (bar), iron (pig), iron (rolled), leather, lace, lumber, machinery, maple sugar, moroccoleather,medioil (flaxseed),paper,plow-line salt, cines,millstones, and ropes., and goldsaddles,saddletrees, stoves,strawhats,shovels,silvertin-ware, tobaccoand snuff, types, woolengoods, ware,saltpeter, yarn., whips, whiskey and gin.
24It was estimatedthat 6o millinersemployed420 women at $0.75 a day in Boston (Documents, Vol. I, p. 45I). The enumeratorcommentedin a rather caustic vein: "This class of manufacturersit has been found difficultto estimateas women are not generallyaccountantsand thereforeit is not easy for them to answer the questions proposed. Many of them decline giving any answer apparently from the apprehension that their statements may be considered absurd. Others refuse for the usual woman's reason because. The estimate is believed to be rather within the actual amount than to exceed it." 5 More than 300 women in Boston were engaged in bookbindingor in other work for "booksellers and publishers." "' The complete list is given here, and all industrieswhich have not already been enumeratedare italicized.

candles and soap, coaches, cheese, colmbs,cigars, cotton cloths, cordage and twine, chairs, clocks, cards, cooper's ware, clothing,

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in theselistswouldbe hard to of industries The exactnumber estimatefairly,as some of the expressionsused, are clearly it has been found,might have redundant. Other industries, of the timehad also been used as been added if the newspa.pers for many hoiwever, sourcesof information.It seemedbetter, withinthe limitsof the three the discussion reasons,to confine be possiblein the reports. Using these,all thatseemstot official is to repeatwhathas alreadybeensa.idway of a fairsummary were open to occupations industrial thatmorethanone hundred or tailoring, bindneedlework womenat thistime. Of all these, straw hats, and work in the cotton-and ing shoes, mnaking A briefstatewere by far the most important.27 wo,olen-mills so in theseindustries, of womenemployed mentof the number are ascertainable, may perhapsbe useful. far as thesenumbers where womenwere employedas Work in the cotton-mills, and whereyounggirls and dressers,28 weavers, spinners, carders, 38,927 womenin I831.30 This employed workedas doffers,29 was 75 out of everyio,ooo womenin theUnitedStatesoverten suchIo,ooo in Massachusetts.3' yearsof age, and 455 outof every the numberof of these figures the significance To understand out olfevery or industrially employed employed womengainfully cannotbe IO,ooo should also be given,but this unfortunately withaccuracyfromexistingdata. In I850, however, estimated 283.2 womenout of every IO,OOO were engaged in industrial
27 Work in paper-mills,and the manufactureof fur and wool hats, perhaps belong here. It has already been noted supra that both occupations were very too, that two of the four occupations enumeratedby important. It is significant, Miss Martineau-viz., bookbindingand typesetting-are not included.

28 Tetth 29

Census, Vol. II, p. 44, Wright's "Report on The Factory System."

Lucy Larcom worked as a dofferin the "Laurence Mills" at Lowell when she was eleven years old. See her New England Girlhood (p. io).
30

theProceedings,etc., New York Conventionof the Friends of Domestic Industry,

op. cit. This committee'sestimate was accepted as a reliable one, but at least in the South and West were said to have been omitted. thirtyestablishments The estimate is, of course, exclusive of household manufactures.

Statistics from the report of the Committeeon Cotton Manufactures for

"Nearly one-third (IO,678) chusetts.

of the women in cotton-millswere in Massa-

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OF WOMEN IN I836

62I

pursuits,32 and, if only a veryslightincreasewere allowed for, it would be sa,fe to sa,y thatone-third of the womenin industry in I83I were in the cotton-mills.Work in the woolen-mills, the country,wa,s much less while very general throughout o'f the number of women estimate important.No trustworthy in themcan be givenexceptforMassachusetts, where employed of household manufacture in I837.33 The there were 3,485 and it was said thattheproportion wool was stillveryimportant, the amount of the ra,w used in factories and in material between which was as threeto two.34 The proportion home industry was smallerfor of thetotalnumber womenformed o'femployees woolen-than forcotton-mills.35 as an occupationfor women Perhaps second in importance befolre the days of the sewwas bindingshoes. T'his was loing ing-machine, and theworkwa.sdoneby the womenin theirown byhand.36 As earlyas i8io it was reported homes, and ofcourse thatthewomen binders of Lynnhad earned$50,000 in thecourse forwomen thanemployoccupation numerically a moreimportant
'2 The number of women employed in the various manufacturing industries was not tabulated for publicationin the census of i850, but is given in a separate "Abstract of the Statistics of Manufactures according to the Returns of the Seventh Census," published in I858, Senate Documents, Thirty-fifth Congress, Second Session, Vol. X. 3

of the year.37 By I837

shoe-binding in Massachusetts was

Tables of Industry,op. cit., p. o70.

3"Proceedingsof New York Convention,op. cit., p. 79. a This statementis also true of present conditions. In I827 a prominent manufacturerof Troy wrote: "The wool business requires more man labor, and this we study to avoid. Women are much more ready to follow good regulationsand are not captious and do not clan as the men do against their overseers." (White's Life of Slater, pp. I3I, I32.) " Lucy Larcom in one of her early poems has made us familiar with this work in her pictureof Poor lone Hannah Sitting at the window, binding shoes; Faded, wrinkled, Sitting stitchingin a mournfulmuse, Spring and winter, Night and morning, Hannah's at the window, binding shoes. 37 Hurd, History of Essex County,Vol. I, p. 284.

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but in reality it was not so. Women ment in the cotton-mills, and systematiworked regulairly operativTes who were cotton-mill cally for wages tlhatwere frequentlymoiret'han $2.50 a week and occasionallyas high as $10.38 Binding shoes was a household occupation. A large' proportionof the T5,000 wolmenreported 39 worked only in the interval of other to be engaged in it, duties, and their earnings, were correspondinglysm,all.Y A good many of them, to be sure, did earn 33 or 40 cents a day, but 5o or 6o cents was probablythe maximum,;so the possibilities were very limited. Making straw braid and bonnets,and palm-leaf hats, was another occupation numerically very important. Data in the olfI832 seem tol justifyan estimateof i8,0oo women Docum,eWts prettyregularly employed in this sort oif work.41 But we are dealing again with a, household occupation,42and, while many of the returnsreportonly the numberconstantlyemployedor an equivalent, others,are obviously very loose statements,and th'e total undoubtedlyincludes a good many women who,sework was But after all possible allowance ha.s been made only casual.43
Loomn and Spindle, book of reminiscences, s Mrs. Robinson,in her interesting p. 17, says that many of the Lowell girls earned from $6 to $io a week. Comment on this statementinvolves a careful examination of wages in the cottonmills, and is reserved for a subsequent study of women's wages. Tables of Industryini Massachusetts. ' This was particularlytrue of fishingvillages like Marblehead,where shoemaking was a winteroccupation for fishermen. Frequentlytheir wives averaged only 12, and occasionally only 8 or 9, cents a day. 41In the pamphletbefore referredto, Report of the HarrisburgConventionin
3

the statementis made that the Interests of Domiestic Industry (I827), persons (nearly all females) make straw hats, etc., in Massachusetts."

"25,000

42 It was by no means exclusively a home industry. Some establishments, like that of Messrs. Montague in Boston, "constantlyemployed 300 females and looms in weaving 'material for bonnets made of silk warp and a filling 150-200 of importedTuscan straw." (Bishop, op. cit., Vol. II, p. 393.) " The followingnote fromthe Documents,Vol. I, p. 426, is typical of many

reports which failed to indicate the number of women employed in this work: done by women and "Considerable straw is braided in this town, say to $I5,000, to obtain any very accurate account of it young girls, and it is very difficult or of the number of persons employed in it. It is not a constant or regular business, but more or less of it is done in almost every familyoccasionally and

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EMPLOYMENT

OF WOMEN IN 1836

623

forcasual employment the occupation remains, a veryimportant

one.44 In I830 the annual value of the product was more than

a millionand a half do,llars.45 Boinnets were made from rve. by womenin Baxford,Mass., and sold in the citiesat from. ten to fourteen dollarseach,the costbeingonlytwo or three.46By 1837 the value of the palm-leaf hats and strawbonnets ma.dein dollars.47 million Massachusetts alonewas estimated at nearly two, of palm-lea.f The industry was notan old one. The manufacture at Baltiwas established hatsbeganin I826, butin 1824 a s,chool of theinstruction oif more"foir poo,r girlsin thevariousbranches 48 and some froim straw-plaiting simpleplaitto finisihed bonnet," had begun to,attractsome years beforethis the manufacture
attention.49

It would be futileto attempt to finda statistical expression for women'swork in the needle trades. The seamstress is a difficult statistical at anytime, and.quitean impossible proposition one in the ea,rly years. The "ready-made" had begun to b1Y manufactured on a considerable scale in I832.50 The dutyof i8i6 (30 per cent.) on ready-made clothing was raised to, 50
by part only of the day, week, month, or year, when not occupied in household and familycares. Boot and shoe and cabinet businesses are like straw."
"4At one of the Philadelphia meetings the following occurs among the reasons for opposing the tariffbill: "Because it injures the manufactureof hats, caps, and bonnets,and destroysa large amount of labor generallyconsidered a clear gain to the country, namely,that of females which in these articles alone producesan annual value of nearly$3,000,000" (Niles Register,Vol. XLII, p. 277). " Bishop, History of Manufactures,Vol. II, pp. 258, 270, 348. 4" Ibid. Fine straw and grass bonnets in imitation of Leghorn "often sold for $30 to $40 apiece" (ibid., p. 285). '7Tables of Industry,p. i8i. " Bishop, op. cit., Vol. II, p. 294.

'9 As early as I82I a Connecticut woman received fromthe London Society of Arts a silver medal for her samples of a new material of straw plait, and 20 guineas "on conditionthat she would put the society in possession of some of the seed and the process of bleaching with a descriptionof the whole treatmentof culm." (Ibid., p. 270.) " To quote from the Documents again, we find 300 men, ioo children,and I,300 women employedin tailor-shopsin Boston in I83I. It is said with reference to the Boston statistics: "The estimateof the tailoringbusiness is founded on the best information which could be obtained. It has become usual of late years for most tailors to keep on hand a large stock of ready-made clothing."

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per cent. in I828, and importsfell offnearly one-thirdin the next six years.51 There were a few establishments in New York and other importantcities at that time-some of which employed from 300 to 5oo hands-which manufacturedclothing for shipment to the southern states and to some foreign parts.52 In I837 nearly 2,500 women in Boston were engaged in making clothing, and in Groton I i,ooo garments were produced annually, employing3 men and 245 women.53 The list of pirices pa.id by the clothiersof Baltimore for various grades of needlework includes the price for fifty-six different articles, such as ladies' cloaks and mien'sand boys' clothing,most of which were evidently kept in stock and soild "ready-made."54 The manufacture of clothing for the army in these ante-sewing-machine days also gave employmenttoi a large number of women, but prices,for this work were so low tha.tthe secretaryof war was appealed to in, I829 by some influentialcitizens of Philadelphia in behalf of the 400 "industrious females."of that city who were engaged in this poorly paid work.55 Matthew Ca.rey estimated
on the most careful inquiries ....

is on their and Baltimorewhose sole dependence New York, Philadelphia, of these one-third are industry amountsto from i8 to 20 thousand.... attendants in shops, seamtayleresses, milliners, mantua-makers, colourists, stresseswho work in families, nurses,whitewashers, etc.,who are in general who take in work at are seamstresses well paid. The remainder tolerably etc.5" theirown lodgings, spoolers,shoe-binders,
51 See the account of the clothing industry in the Eighth Census, Manufactures,p. lxiii. 62 Ibid. "Tables of Industry,p. 28. 51 Journal of the American Institute, Vol. I, pp. I45, It is added: 146. "The prices in many other of our cities are much the same."

that the number of women in Boston,

did not wish to oppress "-The secretaryreplied that, while the government the "indigent but meritorious females" employed in its service, yet, he said, "the subject is found to be one of so much delicacy and is so intimatelyconinterestsand the general prices of this kind of nected with the manufacturing labor in the city of Philadelphia that the Departmenthas not felt at libertyto General of Purchase." than to address a letterto the Commissary farther interfere (Quoted in an essay on the "Public Charities of Philadelphia," by Matthew Carey in Miscellaneous Pamphlets,collected April, I83I, by M. Carey. "An open letter"To the Ladies Who Have Undertakento Establish a House of Industryin New York," M. Carey,Miscellaneous Pamphlets,op. cit.

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The sewingtrades, or custom whether in ready-made work,seem to havebeenseventy-five are today, yearsago, as they numerically the most important as well as the last hope and occupation, of the woman, degradation wage-earner. In concluding this fragmentary study.it should be emphasizedthatits, thecondition purpose o'fthe has.notbeento describe in the thirties, working-woman or to compare her situation then withthatoiftoday. It has no'teven been attempted to,compare thefield of employment thenand now. But it should, be perhaps, said that,whilea largeproportion of theenumerated occupatio'ns and were relatively employed onlya veryfewwoimen unimportant,the same comment may be made upon.the long list of women's occupations, forexample, toiday.The lastcensus, showed that women were carpenters,masons, miners, blacksmiths, and the like, whichobviouslymeans littlewhen "quarrymen," the real fieldof employment is considered. There is, moireover, greatneedthatthisfield shouldhave beenwidened. The female population over ten yearsof age has increased frolm 234,654 in 1830 to I,343,905 in igo9-nearly fivefold. No positivestatementcan be ma.de as to,whether the number of womenwho'are forindustrial competing o'utof everyone hundred employment, of thispopulation, has increased or no't. But evenhad there been no change-which is, of course,highlyimprobable-the need of new occupations wouldstillexist,unlesstheold ones had become five times as important; and there are good reasonsforsuppo'sing thatthishas notbeenthecase.57 Any attempt to presentthe conditions or the statistics of women'semployment in I836 mustbe disclaimed. The purpose of the present note has been merely to'call attention to the fact thatthefield of employment forwomenin industry was broader at thattimethanis generally supposed;so muchbroader, in fact, thatone is boundto question whether the worldhas changedas muchforthe working-class womanin the last seventy-five years as it has, fo'r example,forwomenin educational or professional work. Miss,Martineau wrotethen,in theSocietyin America:
b For a discussion of this point see the October, i906, number of this Journal, on the "History of the Industrial Employmentof Women, etc."

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JOURNAL OF POLITICAL

ECONOMY

One consequence, mournful and injurious, of the "chivalrous" taste and where it temper of a country with regard to its women is that it is difficult is not impossible for women to earn their bread. Where it is a boast that women do not labor the encouragement and rewards of labor are not provided. It is so in America. In some parts there are now so many women dependent on their exertions that the evil will give way before the force of circumstances. In the meantime the lot of the poor women is sad.

How far Miss Martineau's commentswere true then,and how far they are still true, would be perhaps a matter of op,inion. But 'one could not goi far wrong in saying that the lot oif the poor is scarce now woman is still sad. Opportunityof employmient as it was then.58 The sewing trades are still demoralized, and women's wages are still low. Now as then working-womenare unorganized and expiloited,and they still live, a.s they always have lived, in "ways known only to the poor."
EDITH
WASHINGTON,

ABBOTT

D. C.

in the Documents of I83I iS a letter "'Among the replies frommanufacturers because of his early association with from Smith Wilkinson,who is remembered Samuel Slater. An extract from this letter, written as he said, out of his years' experienceis worthquoting,not as a typicalbut as an interesttwenty-five at present is a want of females-women ing statement: "Our greatest difficulty and children-and from the great number of factories now building, have my fears that we shall not be able to operate all our machineryanother year."

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