It is this battle with which we have to do; and we must go back to the
dawn of the struggle, and discover what has been its course from the
beginning, before any future outlook can be determined. The theoretical
political economist settles the matter at once. Whatever stress of want
or wrong may arise is met by the formula, "law of supply and demand." If
labor is in excess, it has simply to mobilize and seek fresh channels.
That hard immovable facts are in the way, that moral difficulties face
one at every turn, and that the ethical side of the problem is a matter
of comparatively recent consideration, makes no difference. Let us
discover what show of right is on the economist's side, and how far
present conditions are a necessity of the time. It is women on whom the
facts weigh most heavily, and whose fortunes are most tangled in this
web woven from the beginning of time, and from that beginning drenched
with the tears and stained by the blood of workers in all climes and in
every age. As women we are bound, by every law of justice, to aid all
other women in their struggle. We are equally bound to define the
nature, the necessities, and the limits of such struggle; and it is to
this end that we seek now to discover, through such light as past and
present may cast, the future for women workers the world over.




I.

A LOOK BACKWARD.


The history of women as wage-earners is actually comprised within the
limits of a few centuries; but her history as a worker runs much farther