_WOMEN'S WORK AND ORGANISATION._
[Sidenote: Women as Compositors. Historical.]
The subdivision of labour which has broken up the original printing
"profession" into a score or so of different trades, each minutely
subdivided in turn, has been the chief cause of the employment of women
in this industry in modern times, although it appears that nuns were
engaged as compositors at the Ripoli Monastery Press in Florence towards
the end of the fifteenth century,[5] within half a century of the
introduction of printing. Only very exceptional women could obtain a
footing in a profession which embraced typefounding, ink-making,
press-carpentry, composing, folding, and bookbinding. The United States,
where, in so many respects, women have stepped in advance of European
conditions, boasts of Jenny Hirsch, who carried on a printer's business
in Boston about 1690, and during the next two centuries women printers
were common in the thirteen States. It was a woman, Mary Catherine
Goddard, who printed the first issue of the "Declaration of
Independence." The years of the French Revolution also seem to be marked
by the number of women engaged in the printing trade, whether owing to
the general emancipating impulses of the time or to the increased demand
for compositors, is not quite clear. The amiable and eccentric Thomas
Beddoes, moved by the interest he took in social affairs, and inspired
by the emancipatory movement of his time, had been struck with the
opening which the printing trades seemed to offer to women, and gave his
"Alexander's Expedition"[6] to a woman of his village, Madely, to set
up. "I know not," he wrote in the Advertisement to the book, "if women
be commonly engaged in printing, but their nimble and delicate fingers
seem extremely well adapted to the office of compositor, and it will be
readily granted that employment for females is amongst the greatest
_desiderata_ of society." In England, however, the labour of women
outside their homes continued to be extremely limited, and the printing
trades were confined to men. During the eighteenth century women seem to
have been employed in folding and sewing book and news sheets, but they
did not come into the trade in any considerable numbers until the
nineteenth century was half spent. This was very largely owing to the
heavy nature of the work and the long apprenticeship necessary to master
the varied details of the craft. The Provincial Typographical Society's
first constitution, issued in 1849, shows that at so recent a date the
typographical apprentice had to learn "printing and bookbinding" or
"printing and stationery."[7] The printing press used in 1800 was
practically the same as that used by Gutenberg in 1450.
[Footnote 5: _Printers' Register_, August 6th, 1878, quoting _Journal
für Buchdruckerkunst_.]
[Footnote 6: Published in 1792.]
[Footnote 7: Typographical Association: "Fifty Years' Record," p. 4.]
The enormous advance in the printing trades owing to the abolition of
the stamp duties and the paper tax, together with the spread of
education and improvement in the facilities for publishing, with their
resulting large demand for printed matter, speedily revolutionised these
trades and led to the introduction of the great machines. Pressmen
became differentiated from compositors, "minders" from layers-on or
takers-off, jobbers from book-hands, folders from makers-up; whilst
bookbinding finally became a separate trade altogether. Some of these
separate processes, needing but little skill and requiring no
apprenticeship, involving no heavy labour and no responsibility, offered
openings for women.
[Sidenote: Conflict between men and women.]
One of the earliest references to women made by the Typographical
Association occurs in 1860, when the Executive of the Union mentioned
them in its half-yearly report. Printing houses were then closed to
Union members on account of the employment of women. The Typographical
Society's _Monthly Circular_ for August, 1865, for instance, states that
a Bacup newspaper office was closed to members of the Typographical
Union, owing to the employment of female labour. The exact form of
employment is not given. Again, in the report for June, 1866, the
Executive of the Union refers to having trouble with an employer who
tried to employ female labour, but who had failed "to get suitable
applicants of the gentle sex." In 1886 it was agreed that women should
be admitted to both the Typographical Association and the London Society
of Compositors on the same terms as men, but only one woman has availed
herself of this resolution.[8]
[Footnote 8: She joined the London Society of Compositors on August
30th, 1892, but she has now ceased to be a member.]
[Sidenote: Printing Trades and the Women's Movement.]
At this point, the movement for the emancipation of women contributes an
interesting chapter to the history of these trades.
The printing trades were regarded by a few of the leading spirits in the
agitation for "Women's Rights" as being well adapted to women's skill
and _physique_, and in 1860 Miss Emily Faithfull not only started the
Victoria Press, in which women alone were to be employed, but directed
the attention of women generally to the openings afforded them by this
group of trades. "The compositor trades," the _Englishwoman's Journal_
(June, 1860) said, "should be in the hands of women only." Miss
Faithfull's experiments produced some considerable flutter amongst men.
At first, the men looked down upon them with the contempt of traditional
superiority; women compositors were "to die off like birds in winter"
(_cf._ _Printers' Journal_, August 5th, 1867, where a correspondent
stated that "the day is far distant when such labour can hope to
supersede our own"); but some trepidation was speedily caused when it
was found that women's shops were undercutting men's, and an alarmist
article in the _Printers' Register_ of February 6th, 1869, states that
"the exertions of the advocates of female labour in the printing
business have resulted in the establishment of a printing office where
printing can be done on lower terms than those usually charged." That
year Miss Faithfull was engaged in her libel action against Mr. Grant
for calling her an atheist, and the _Publishers' Circular_ furiously
attacked her work. By-and-by, however, the controversy died down. Miss
Faithfull's several attempts[9] to establish permanently a printing
establishment bore fruit in the still existing Women's Printing Society,
started in 1874.
[Footnote 9: 1860, 1869, 1873; in 1869 another Women's Printing Office
was started as a means of finding employment for educated ladies:
_Printers' Register_, January 6th, 1869.]
As an industrial factor, however, the "Women's Movement" has been
altogether secondary, and women have been induced to enter the trades
under review mainly because the subdivision of labour and the
application of mechanical power had created simple processes; because
they were willing to accept low wages; and because, unlike the men, who
were members of Unions, they made no efforts to interfere in the
management of the works.
[Sidenote: The London experience.]
Partly owing to the nature of the work done and partly to the power of
the London Society of Compositors, no systematic attempt seems to have
been made generally to introduce women compositors into London houses
since 1878, and it is of some significance to note that most of the
London firms which employed women compositors between 1873 and 1878--the
period when the attempt was most actively made--have since disappeared,
owing to bad equipment and the inferior character of their trade.
But the opposition to women lingered on after the attempts to introduce
them more generally had ceased. In 1879 the London Society of
Compositors decided that none of their members should finish work set up
by women, and the firm of Messrs. Smyth and Yerworth was struck by the
men's Union.[10]
[Footnote 10: It is interesting to note that in these days also the
women only set up the type and the men "made it up."]
Commenting on this trouble, the _Standard_, in a leading article
(October 8th, 1879) cynically remarked: "What women ask is not to be
allowed to compete with men, which the more sensible among them know to
be impossible, but to be allowed the chance of a small livelihood by
doing the work of men a little cheaper than men care to do it. This is
underselling of course, but it is difficult to see why, when all is said
and done, men should object to be undersold by their own wives and
daughters."
"_Capital and Labour_," as quoted by the _Victoria Magazine_,[11] put
the case for the women thus: "This work is much more remunerative, and
far less toilsome and irritating than the occupation of the average
nursery governess, and we anticipate that, with proper arrangements,
there will be a large addition to the number of women compositors. The
reasons assigned against their employment in this capacity seem to be
the outcome of pedantry, prejudice, and jealousy; and no trade rules can
be permitted to interpose obstacles to the attainment of such a
desirable object as furnishing occupation to a number of females who are
qualified by deftness of hand and mental capacity to earn in it an
honourable livelihood. What would one of the men, who chose to leave
Messrs. Smyth and Yerworth at the behest of the Union, say, if having a
daughter of his own to assist him in his occupations, she were to be
compelled to sit idle while he was made to employ a male assistant at
high wages? Yet these men, though intelligent, capable, and industrious,
deliberately throw themselves out of work, and become for the time
paupers of their Union, because it will not permit them to assist in
perfecting any processes which have been begun by women. This is the way
in which men run their heads against a brick wall."
[Footnote 11: November, 1879.]
In December, 1882, the _Printers' Register_ published the following
notice: "In a West End office, objection having been made to the
introduction of female labour, and an undue number of turnovers, a
strike appeared imminent, but the Committee of the Society succeeded in
settling the dispute to the satisfaction of both sides."
The question does not appear to have troubled the London Society again,
but in 1886, a Conference of the Typographical Societies of the United
Kingdom and Continent, held in London (October 21st-23rd), resolved:
"That while strongly of opinion that women are not physically capable of
performing the duties of a compositor, this Conference recommends their
admission to membership of the various Typographical Unions, upon the
same conditions as journeymen, provided always the females are paid
strictly in accordance with scale."
This resolution was subsequently adopted by the London Society of
Compositors as noted above, and is at present in force, with the result
that it is practically impossible for any woman to join the Society.[12]
[Footnote 12: A curious point in connection with the work being sent out
of London is that except in the case of Edinburgh the greater cheapness
of the work outside London is not due so much to cheaper labour as to
lower rent, etc. Several firms out in the country in England where there
is no question of a Union preventing them, have tried to introduce
women, but with very little success. This is put down as lack of
intelligence in the women. No doubt a girl who has had only a village
elementary education is not the best material out of which to make a
good compositor, and the wages offered are not high enough to tempt town
bred girls to undergo the tedium of country life.]
[Sidenote: Provincial experience.]
The Scottish compositors are organised in the Scottish Typographical
Association, which has no women members. Women, particularly in
Edinburgh and Perth, and to a smaller extent in Aberdeen, have been
employed to defeat the ends of the Society.[13]
[Footnote 13: See p. 45.]
The few attempts made to organise women in the printing trades have
failed. Women have been introduced into these trades at times of trouble
with the men's Unions, and are consequently not likely to form
organisations of their own. Their work has been so precarious and so
largely confined to the mechanical and lower grades of labour,[14] that
they have had no incentive to aspire to high standards of wages or other
industrial conditions. The women employed in the actual printing
processes do not seem to have regarded their work as their permanent
means of livelihood to the same extent as folders, for instance, have
done, and have been less interested, consequently, in improving their
trade conditions; and, finally, the men's Societies, for various
reasons, some well-founded and some groundless, have regarded women
printers as a form of cheap labour--"undercutters"--and have looked upon
them as dangerous intruders.
[Footnote 14: _Cf._ pp. 64-68.]
When, however, we turn to the organisation of women in the trades
dealing with printed matter, especially folding and bookbinding, we find
much greater collective activity and closer co-operation both amongst
themselves and with the men. Their Trade Union record is still but
scanty, nevertheless, the frequent and persistent efforts of women to
act jointly, without establishing a permanent organisation, form one of
the characteristic features of the trade. This apparently is almost
entirely due to the fact that women's labour in bookbinding, _e.g._, in
folding, was accepted by the men, and that in all workshop matters women
were the fellow-workers and not the rivals of the men. This distinction
between printing and bookbinding is most marked and requires to be
emphasised.
[Sidenote: Organisation amongst bookbinders.]
The bookbinders' organisation sprang up in 1779-80, as most
organisations then did, from friendly meetings in certain houses of
call. It was at first known as "The Friends." In 1786, the working day
was from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m., with certain breaks for meals, giving,
perhaps, an actual working time of twelve and a half hours per day. But
in March of that year, a Conference of the sections decided to ask for a
reduction of an hour per day, and their petition was followed by the
discharge of workmen.[15] The employers then went further, and in May,
1786, indicted twenty-four of the ringleaders for conspiracy. In a
manifesto to the public, the men complained that their wages were only
from 15_s._ to 18_s._ per week, rising in a few cases to a guinea, and
proceeded to charge the employers with having "with vindictive rage
forced into the sweet retreats of domestic felicity" wives who were
employed in the trade. This action on the part of the employers was not
prompted, however, by an objection to women, for, according to the
testimony of Mr. W. M. Hall,[16] one of the men indicted, an attempt was
made to supply the book market as a temporary makeshift during the
dispute with the imperfect work of women. He says, "I cannot remember
the exact time of striking the women. This I remember, it was on account
of them and the apprentices doing books in boards, by the booksellers
consenting to take them so for a time, I was appointed to strike Black
Jock's[17] women. I went at one o'clock to see Maria, his forewoman, who
used to dine in the shop, she being single. I told her she must inform
the other women of the injury they were doing us by continuing at work.
If they were willing to serve our interest and leave their work, they
should receive their wages for doing nothing. If we gained our cause,
they should be sure of employ, and the advantage of the hour also.
Coming downstairs, I met Mr. McKinley.
"'Well, Mr. Hall, are you coming to work again directly?'
"'Sir, if you will grant the hour----'
"'Come in here,' he says, going into his dining-room, and setting down a
large square bottle of Hollands to give me a glass, taking one himself
and pouring out another. Pat, pat, pat! came our ladies downstairs.
'What is all this about?' I was glad to make my escape. The six or seven
women were all subpoenaed against me on the trial."
[Footnote 15: In the Report of the Committee on Trades' Societies
published in 1860 by the National Association for the Promotion of
Social Science, Mr. Dunning tells the history of the London Consolidated
Society of Bookbinders. pp. 93-104.]
[Footnote 16: _The Finishers' Friendly Circular_, May, 1846, No. 4.]
[Footnote 17: An employer named John McKinley.]
The narrative of this famous struggle--one of the most important in the
history of Trade Unionism, involving persecution, imprisonment, and
death--contains no further records of the part played by women in it,
but Mr. Hall's reminiscence indicates how they behaved. The men were
successful, and in 1794, the working day was again reduced, so that it
lasted from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Presumably the women shared in these
advantages, and also in that of an afternoon tea half-hour, which was
theirs exclusively until 1806, when the men, during a period of active
trade and overtime, demanded the same privilege. James Watson, in his
"Recollections,"[18] hints that the kind indulgence of the women to the
men, permitted in some shops, made the afternoon tea half-hour a general
demand. "Their kind friends, the ladies, while preparing for their own
comfort, neglected not those of their less fortunate companions, but
contrived by making their tea to accommodate them as much as possible,
and the men, if not immediately under the eye of their employer, would
seat themselves on the end of their presses for ten minutes or so and
thus partake of it." A strike to secure the half-hour was unsuccessful,
but the men gradually won their point. Mr. Watson tells how, after the
strike, it happened that he was being engaged by one of the opposing
masters. The master, "being pressed upon the point, damned the
half-hour, but said I might come in and do as I liked. I accordingly
accepted the situation, and at tea-time, when I prepared to sit down, I
expected to be supported by the men of the shop who were well aware of
my intention, but not one of them would move. I was thus placed in an
awkward position, and could only turn to my good friends, the ladies, to
countenance my proceedings, who kindly invited me to their tea table."
In about a month, Mr. Watson informs us, every man in the place was
following his example.[19]
[Footnote 18: _British Bookmaker_, June, 1892.]
[Footnote 19: The friendly conduct of "the ladies" was long remembered
in the trade, and was celebrated as late as 1847 in a song:--
"What we enjoy we dearly bought,
And nobly they the battle fought,
Who--though the ladies' aid they sought,
Would--right or wrong--have tea.
_Chorus_
"Then let us all our voices raise,
And loudly chant to-night in praise
Of those who gained in byegone days,
The time we have for tea."]
[Sidenote: The Bible Society controversy.]
The struggle which the bookbinders fought with most pertinacity
was, however, that which they waged against the Religious
Societies--particularly the British and Foreign Bible Society--when
attempting to cheapen the production of religious literature by means
which, the bookbinders contended, involved unreasonably low rates of
pay. In this struggle women played a prominent part.
It broke out as early as 1825 when the Society for Promoting Christian
Knowledge reduced its prices and the master bookbinders working for it
reduced wages. The strike which followed collapsed for want of funds. In
1833 the contest was resumed with the British and Foreign Bible Society.
That year the five houses then employed by the Society reduced wages,
and it appears that when the dispute was about to be settled by both
sides accepting a compromise, a representative of the Bible Society
instructed the masters to hold out. The men appealed to the Society, but
were told that it could not intervene. No definite settlement was ever
arrived at.
The first petition which the men addressed to the Society in 1833 made
special reference to the condition of the women workers. "Your
memorialists beg leave to state," they wrote, "that there are a number
of females (about 200) employed in binding the books of your Society,
the whole of whose wages have been reduced in consequence of the late
alteration in the prices of these books. Their wages were before very
low. Your memorialists respectfully submit that the making it more
difficult, and in some cases impossible, for females to earn an honest
subsistence, by their labour, is in the same proportion to give potency
to the seducers of female virtue." Reply and counter-reply were made,
and the Society was heartily attacked by the Union with texts from
Scripture and reflections on applied Christianity. In the defence which
the Society issued in 1834, it is stated that its binders informed it
that "competent and industrious men in our employ earn on an average
6_d._ an hour or 30_s._ weekly when in constant work; and women in the
same description from 8_s._ to 10_s._ and upwards."
Mr. Dunning, the Union Secretary, replied that he could prove that the
scale given was an "entire falsehood," and published a second "Address
to the Religious Public," in which the wages paid by the principal firm
were given, the average for thirteen men working out at a small fraction
over a guinea per week, and of twenty-four women at 5_s._ 11_d._ per
week. In 1843 the dispute was allowed to end, when the five firms
promised to pay the women on timework at rates between 7_s._ 6_d._ and
15_s._ per week, and to work them only ten hours per day.
In 1845 the Society decided to give all its binding to one firm, the
proprietress of which was Miss Watkins, and four years later the most
famous dispute of the series broke out. The "controversy," as it is
called in the bookbinders' records, opened by an appeal addressed to the
Society on August 17th, 1849, by the journeymen bookbinders of London
and Westminster, in which it was alleged that Miss Watkins had returned
to piecework, and that the wages she was paying to women averaged only
5_s._ 6_d._ to 6_s._ per week for a longer day than ten hours. Learners
were taken on and were discharged so soon as they were entitled to
increases in wages, and a rule was said to be in operation by which, so
soon as a woman worker was qualified to be paid more than 7_s._ a week,
she was discharged. "Exorbitant" fines were also imposed. "Females,"
remarks the appeal, "often have not the power to plead their own cause
in such matters, and being helpless in many respects where their wages
are concerned, they are trodden down until a state of things such as
described in the 'Song of the Shirt' appals the mind with the enormity
of their injuries, their suffering, and their moral condition." The
appeal contained the following table, showing the difference in wages
paid to women working for the Bible Society and those working for the
Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge.
Bible Society for Promoting
Society. Christian Knowledge.
_s._ _d._ _s._ _d._
5 0 Pearl Bibles, per 100 vols. 7 6
5 1½ Ruby " " 7 0
6 10½ Large Pica Bibles, " 8 4
6 8 Small " " " 8 4
One of the grievances specially mentioned in this appeal was that women
were not allowed hot water, except between 4 and 4.30 p.m., and were
then charged 1_d._ per week for it.
Immediately (August 22nd, 1849) after the issue of the "Appeal" the
women employed by Miss Watkins were asked to sign a statement that they
were perfectly satisfied with their pay and conditions. Several signed,
not knowing the purport of the paper; others refused. On the advice of
the men's Union a counter-statement was drawn up and signed, and sent in
to the Bible Society, and on finding that the forewoman who had taken
their part, together with the active promoters of the counter-petition,
were to be discharged, the women left work, and demanded:--
1. That prices should be raised to the standard paid by the Society for
Promoting Christian Knowledge.
2. That fines should be abolished.
3. That they should have access to cold water as well as hot for tea.
4. That after the learners then employed had completed their
apprenticeship, not more than twenty learners should be employed at one
time.
About a hundred women had come out, and the men's Union organised a
relief fund.[20]
[Footnote 20: It may not be amiss to copy a few sentences from Mr.
Dunning's obituary notice in the _Bookbinder's Trade Circular_, January
21st, 1862, of the women's leader, Mary E. Zugg, an early and humble
worker in women's organisations. "Nothing could exceed the temper,
moderation and firmness she displayed. Possessing great energy, strong
sense and great acuteness of perception, detecting at a glance pretence
from reality, she was not what was termed a strong-minded woman,
commanding great respect and but little affection, for her goodness of
heart and great regard for the feelings and welfare of others endeared
her to all." She died at the age of thirty-three of consumption on
November 13th, 1861, and is buried in Bow Cemetery.]
Miss Watkins replied, denying every charge made by Mr. Dunning, and
giving 10_s._ as the earnings for a week of sixty hours. The Union
replied by asking that a deputation should be allowed to inspect the
wages books of the firm. It claimed to be in possession of the rates of
wages paid to ninety-seven folders and sewers for three weeks in August,
and gave the average as 6_s._ 2½_d._ for a sixty-hours' week, and in
other respects it supported its original charges.
The _Times_ of January 25th, 1850, contains in its advertisement columns
the report of a Committee of the Southwark Auxiliary of the Bible
Society, which examined Miss Watkins' books, and it supported her
statements. The women earned from 9_s._ to 14_s._ per week. But Mr.
Dunning was not silenced, and on March 25th he issued a long pamphlet,
the last of the "controversy" for the time. In it, it is stated that the
committee of investigation had been deceived so as to mistake wages paid
for ten days as though they were paid for a week, and a table of wages
for three weeks in September and October, for the week ending July 28th,
1849, and for the four weeks preceding the strike, was printed.[21] The
wage average of the periods was from 5_s._ 9½_d._ to 6_s._ 4½_d._ per
week of sixty hours.
[Footnote 21: See p. 184.]
The agitation failed. The women either found work elsewhere, or went
back under the conditions against which they had struck. Mr. Dunning
could only say that the dispute had arrested a downward tendency in
prices and wages.
The dispute cost the men's Union £146. This was spent mostly in printing
and postage, but it included grants amounting to £22 given to the
separate Women's Committee, which had collected an additional fund of
£650 to aid the strikers.
The finishers had strongly opposed the support which the Union had given
to the women, and their section, to the number of 150, was finally
expelled from the Union.
But whilst this unusual harmony existed between the men's Union and the
women workers, no serious attempt had been made to organise the women
permanently, either as members of the men's Society, or in one of their
own. In 1833, in an address to the London journeymen bookbinders, a Mr.
Benjamin Teasdale, of Manchester, advised the formation of a women's
Society, but nothing appears to have been done. In 1855 they were
allowed to borrow books from the men's library on the payment of 6_d._ a
quarter. It is impossible to ascertain how far the agreement between
men and masters for a nine hours' day in 1872 really affected women, as
a considerable proportion of them had been working only for nine hours
before the agreement was made.
[Sidenote: The Society of Women employed in Bookbinding.]
Not till 1874 was there a determined and successful attempt made to
organise women bookbinders into a Union. On September 12th of that year
"the first Society formed for women," the Society of Women employed in
Bookbinding, was formed by Mrs. Emma Paterson, the pioneer of women's
Trade Unions in England,[22] and in the following year Mrs. Paterson was
sent as its delegate to the Trade Union Congress meeting in Glasgow.
This was the first time that a woman had appeared at these parliaments
of Trade Unionism, which had been held annually since 1868. From the
commencement the relations between the men's and the women's Societies
were most cordial, and at the first annual meeting of the latter Mrs.
Paterson read a letter she had received "some years ago" from Mr.
Dunning, in which he advised "the formation of Trades' Societies for
women." The cordial greetings extended to the new Society by its brother
organisation did not meet it everywhere. A congratulatory resolution was
moved at the London Trades' Council, and though it received the support
of the veteran George Odger, it was met with considerable opposition.
Women's labour was cheap labour, and many of the delegates to the
Trades' Council could not get beyond that fact.
[Footnote 22: Mrs. Paterson was born in London on April 5th, 1848, and
was the daughter of H. Smith, headmaster of St. George's, Hanover
Square, parish school. In 1867 she became assistant secretary to the
Club and Institute Union, and in 1872 secretary to the Women's Suffrage
Association. Next year she married Thomas Paterson, a cabinet-maker and
wood carver. With him she visited America where she saw the Female
Umbrella Makers' Union at work. On her return to London in 1874 she
formed the Women's Protective and Provident League, the membership of
which was mainly middle class, though its object was to promote Trade
Unionism amongst women. She died December 1st, 1886, and was buried in
the Paddington Cemetery. See art. _Dictionary of National Biography_.]
It is unnecessary to detail the somewhat uneventful career of the Union.
Mrs. Paterson, at the end of eighteen months, was succeeded by Miss
Eleanor Whyte, who still occupies the position of secretary.[23] The
membership began at 66 and reached 275--of whom only 200 were financial
members--at the end of the first year. From that time till now the
membership has been exceedingly variable, and no full and reliable
records seem to exist. But from the disconnected information which is at
our disposal, it would appear that the two most successful years of the
Society were 1876 (when 63 new members were enrolled), and 1890 (when 67
were enrolled). In 1870 the membership was given at 210; in 1884 at 200;
in 1891 at 240; in 1901 at 270; the period of depression from 1883 to
1889 seems to have tried the Society very severely.
[Footnote 23: December, 1903.]
The objects of this Society are stated to be: "To maintain and protect
the rights and privileges of the trade and to grant relief to such
members as may be out of work, or afflicted with illness." The
subscription is 2_d._ per week, and an entrance fee of 1_s._ is imposed.
It can hardly be expected that a Society whose membership has probably
never exceeded 270, could have much fighting force. But agitation has
never been the policy of the Society. It has refused to join with the
men in making demands upon the employers; its representatives at Trade
Union Congresses and elsewhere have steadily resisted legal restrictions
upon labour; it has not shown itself anxious to seize what the men
regarded as opportunities to make itself felt.[24]
[Footnote 24: In 1891 the women's Society refused to support the men's
in agitating for an eight-hours' day. In 1875 Mrs. Paterson said at the
Trade Union Congress that "the more they pressed for additional
legislation the greater obstacles they threw in the way of working
women. She should rather say let them suffer a little longer the evils
of overwork and long hours." The Union's representatives, however, have
always pressed for women factory inspectors, and on this matter Mrs.
Paterson was for a good many years a voice crying in the wilderness.]
Perhaps the Union has been too willing to make requests to good
employers for better conditions, and too timorous in helping to level up
the general conditions of the trade. Employers have not been hostile.
Mr. B. Collins, the publisher, for instance, presided over the annual
meeting for 1891, and Mr. Longmans and other publishers have done the
same in other years. "I know an employer," says a writer in the _British
Bookmaker_ of September, 1891, "who will give £100 to see a good women's
Union established. Why? Because if it could be done, its effect upon
other employers would remove the gross inequalities of prices that at
present exist to his detriment." But this Union has never reached that
point of strength when it could bring pressure to bear on the trade for
the mutual advantage of the good employer and the woman worker.
As a consequence, the good relations between the men and the women in
the trade have not always been maintained, and there was considerable
ill-feeling between the two sections during the eight hours' agitation
from 1891 to 1894.[25]
[Footnote 25: It should be noted, however, that the sentiment amongst
the women as a whole was friendly during the eight hours' agitation,
although the Society was taking no part in it officially. A writer in
the _British Bookmaker_ for December, 1891, tells how all the women in
the lacing department of Messrs. Waterlow's (Hill Street) struck on a
certain job, and how "at another place as I stood with the pickets
outside, about five o'clock one cold afternoon, I saw something
descending from an upper storey and found it was a quart of hot tea for
the benumbed men on duty below, lowered out by a string from the women's
shop."]
At the present moment this Society is regarded by both men and women
mainly as a benefit club. In this respect it has been most successful
and has paid with excellent regularity.
[Sidenote: The Book-folders' Union.]
An attempt was made in 1892 to start another Union for women engaged in
folding in printing houses. The sponsor of the new Society was the
Printers' and Stationers' Warehousemen's and Cutters' Union. It is a
significant fact, and one which throws a great deal of light upon the
very little which one section of workers knows even of those working at
their elbow, that the organisers of the new Union were quite unaware of
the existence of the Women Bookbinders' Society. The new Society, which
called itself the Book-folders' Union, was started during the flood of
Trade Union sentiment which followed the London Dock Strike in 1889, and
its membership grew rapidly. Within five months of its formation it is
said to have numbered 500,[26] and later on the figure of 700 was
quoted. A popular employer, Mrs. Bond, had been elected secretary, and
an assistant was appointed at a wage of 18_s._ per week. This new Union
was determined to be as active as the older one had been inactive. It
demanded a minimum wage of 15_s._, time-and-a-quarter pay for overtime,
and "no apprentices." It also demanded exemption from the nightwork
prohibition clauses of the Factory and Workshop Acts. But the Union was
doomed to an early and ignominious end. During the absence of the
secretary the finances became hopelessly involved, and a deficit in cash
decided the members to close the whole matter.[27]
[Footnote 26: _Women's Trade Union Journal_, January 15th, 1893.]
[Footnote 27: The fact that all definite recollection of this Union is
passing away, and that for the above information we have had to rely
upon the memory of two ladies who were indirectly interested in it,
throws some light upon the carelessness in industrial matters of the
woman worker. No minutes nor other documents can be found. "The person
who had them, married," and that was taken to have settled the matter.]
The Society would not even formally amalgamate with the older Society,
partly owing to differences in method, and partly to its disgust with
its failure and disgrace.
[Sidenote: National Book-folders and Kindred Trades Union.]
One more attempt to found a fighting women's Union was made in 1894 by
the Printing and Kindred Trades Federation. All women employed in the
Printing and Kindred Trades were to be eligible for membership. The
attempt arose out of two disputes. In one, the women employed by a
certain firm had successfully struck for an increase of wages and
against certain conditions of labour; in the second, women had come out
to show their sympathy with some locked-out men.[28] In recognition of
the women's "courage and loyalty" the men promoted the Union. In a month
or two its membership stood at 100, and by March 1896, 350 members had
joined. The membership at the end of 1902 was 150, mostly book-folders,
and the following points are prominent in the Union's demands:--
1. To obtain and maintain the recognised minimum scale of pay for
every member;
2. To reduce hours of labour;
3. To regulate the relations between employers and employed.
[Footnote 28: It is interesting to note that whilst the cheapness of
women's work as compositors in Edinburgh seems to have attracted a
certain class of work from London, the men's success in keeping up wages
in the London bookbinding trade does not seem to have driven bookbinding
into the provinces. There are one or two bookbinding firms in the
provinces and in Scotland which employ girls, but mainly upon diary and
account book work, the book trade being practically untouched. _Cf._
f.n., 28-29.]
It had no sick benefits, but paid £5 at death, and offered strike pay on
condition that the strike was sanctioned by the committee. The reserve
fund in 1902 was under £100.
In 1903 the Society approached the Printers' and Stationers'
Warehousemen praying to be recognised as a branch of that Union. A
ballot of the men was taken, when 700 voted that the request be granted
and 334 that it be not. The Women's Society has therefore ceased to
exist as a separate organisation.
[Sidenote: The Manchester Society.]
A Manchester Society,[29] "The Manchester and Salford Society of Women
Employed in the Bookbinding and Printing Trades" has gained some
definite success in increasing wages during its six years of existence.
In its third Annual Report, 1899, it is stated that in May, 1898, the
Society began an attempt to increase wages to a 10_s._ minimum after a
three or four years' apprenticeship, that as a consequence the wages of
forty girls were raised in September from 9_s._ to 10_s._, and that
subsequently thirty others received the shilling advance. In its next
Report, 1899-1900, it states, without giving the number of girls
affected, that "they now all receive 11_s._ and 12_s._ per week, where,
prior to joining the Union, they earned 9_s._ and 10_s._ per week." Next
year the membership was 165, and the last issued Report, 1902, whilst
stating that "a slight increase of membership" had taken place during
the year, gives no figures. "Losses through marriage and other
circumstances," the 1901 Report says, "have been great," and the Society
is kept going mainly by the devotion of one or two persons.[30]
[Footnote 29: The existing Society is the second attempt to organise the
women in these trades in Manchester.]
[Footnote 30: The last balance sheet gives at a glance the position of
this Society, and indicates its activities:--
BALANCE SHEET FOR THE YEAR ENDING APRIL 30th, 1902.--
_Income._ £ _s._ _d._
To balance from April
30th, 1901 114 0 4½
" contributions 72 3 3
" Bank interest 2 9 11
----------------
£188 13 6½
================
_Expenditure._ £ _s._ _d._
By sick pay 29 10 0
" out-of-work pay 17 1 8
" printing 2 15 9
" postages 0 8 6
" secretary's salary 5 12 6
" collector's commission 1 9 9
" grant to Women's
Trades Council 2 0 0
" grant to treasurer 0 5 0
" auditing accounts 0 4 0
" deputation expenses 0 2 0
---- -- ----
59 9 2
" cash in Bank on
April 30th, 1902 125 2 5
" cash in hands of
secretary 4 1 11½
----------------
£188 13 6½]
================
Attempts have been made to organise women elsewhere as, for instance, in
Edinburgh, where a Union of women compositors existed for a year; also
in Birmingham, where ten years ago a Union was formed specially to
include the machine-rulers who had been introduced about ten years
previously. But the movements have failed.
Such is the record of the organisation of women in the trades with which
we are dealing. It is almost exclusively confined to London and
Manchester, and in London, out of 19,000 women connected with
bookbinding, most of whom are book and paper-folders, certainly not more
than 500 are organised. In 1901, in the seven Men's Unions covering
these trades there were 41,907 members, whilst the total membership of
the Women's Unions was well under 1,000.
[Sidenote: Maintaining standards without organisation.]
Our enquiries have discovered, however, the existence of a kind of loose
organisation of majority-rule and custom in some firms. Standards of
prices and conditions are thus kept up. It must not be forgotten that
where men and women work together all concessions won by the men's
Unions are shared by women, as for instance, when the Typographical
Association of Scotland secured a fifty hours' week for Aberdeen
compositors. This is an interesting feature of feminine methods. In one
house we came across two collating-rooms, one of which was staffed by
older hands, who stood upon their dignity and would not accept inferior
work or tolerate reductions in wages. The other room was conducted after
the methods of the ordinary employer of cheap women's labour; the
workpeople were careless and casual and the room had no traditions and
no industrial "public opinion." This force of opinion, which assumes
almost the nature of caste, is most strongly developed amongst job
hands. These women manage to keep up a comparatively high standard of
pay, and we have discovered the most unusual circumstance that in one or
two instances the wages of job women have been cut down to the Union
rates. We have been told on most trustworthy authority that the
unwritten laws of these job hands are sometimes enforced upon
recalcitrant work-women by "a hiding."
[Sidenote: Organisation in the miscellaneous trades.]
As regards organisation in the more miscellaneous trades included in our
investigation, little has to be said. A few card mounters once joined
the Women's Printing and Kindred Trades Union after a strike, but soon
fell away, and a Union started in 1890, of which little information can
now be obtained, included some envelope makers: but by 1893 it, too,
seems to have died.
No attempt has been made to organise women engaged in the preparation of
materials for printing either in London or the provinces.
[Sidenote: The attitude of employers.]
The attitude of employers and employed to Trade Unions at the present
moment is most varied. Naturally, a good many employers are in no mood
to encourage Unions, because they do not know what might happen if the
women's organisations became as strong as the men's. But, on the other
hand, a considerable number of employers working under fair conditions
and doing a trade of good quality, would welcome combination. It would
help them against their cutting competitors, and they do not object to
meet the reasonable demands of their women. In thirty-four cases
employers were not aware of the existence of a Union at all. Fourteen
forewomen knew about a Union, eleven denied its existence.[31] In no
instance in London was a non-Union woman bookbinder discovered who knew
of the existence of both the Unions, though the majority of the women
knew of the existence of one or the other.
[Footnote 31: It is important to note in connection with this point that
the power of a forewoman over women is generally more unquestioned than
that of a foreman over men.]
[Sidenote: The women's attitude.]
We were anxious to find out why they did not join. Some spoke with scorn
of the older Union because it was only a benefit Society; others said,
"No use in joining; you get nothing out of it;" others thought it
dangerous; others suspected all Unions; others frankly admitted that
marriage was sure to come along, and then they would work in factories
and workshops no longer. An eloquent commentary upon this sentiment is
to be found in the figures extracted from the Factory Inspector's Annual
Reports and printed in Chapter II. When one works out from these tables
the proportion between the males of over 18 years of age and the total
number of males employed in the various trades and compares it with
that of the females, it will be found that a comparatively excessive
percentage of the latter are under 18 years of age. The same point is
brought out with more emphasis and detail in Appendix VII. The women do
not, in fact, feel it necessary to organise themselves, and a manager of
a Co-operative Printing Works, where membership of a Union is compulsory
upon women, informed us that they grumble when they are made to join and
surrender their membership as soon as they can. The notes of some of the
conversations reported are valuable indications of the mind of the woman
wage-earner in this respect.
We can only say in conclusion that, in the first place, women do not
take that strenuous interest in their labour conditions which is
essential to successful organisation. In the second place, it appears
that, except at occasional times of dispute, their work is so well
marked off from that of men, that the men's Unions in these trades are
coming more and more to the conclusion that it does not pay them to
organise the women. In the third place, we have been surprised to find
that the great majority of employers and of their women employées assume
that wages are fixed and that any effort to alter them by organisation
will be doomed to failure.[32] Our investigators have been given
instance after instance of both increase and reduction in wages, but the
general tenor of conversation is a pessimist and listless view that
whatever _is_, is fixed.
[Footnote 32: _Cf._ p. 90.]