Show There is no sound t basis for debarring married J1i1ettfrieb wont en SJ mar-ried women by law from 11 tgpt I to o < KJLcatij I public It is employment one question whether it is wise for married women to undertake By MISS ALICE STONE BLACKWELL dertake work outside Editor Womans Journal their t 1 homes I and quite t another question whether they ought to be forbidden by law to do so In I most cases undoubtedly it is not wise and investigation shows that only two per cent of tho teachers who marry wish to keep on teaching But to make a castiron law forbidding it would be an unwarrantable interference with individual liberty and in some cases a severe hardship Two main reasons are given The first is that a married womans husband ought to support her and that if she is allowed to earn money it will be a temptation to shiftless men to let their wives maintain them This would be an argument for debarring married women not only Iron public employment but from all paid work Let tis clear our minds of cant Hundreds of women support drunken husbands by going out to wash six days in the week and no one proposes to slop them Objection to the employment of married women is raised only when the position is more or less desirable and when the salary is wanted for some one else The second reason given is that a woman who docs not need a salary ought not to hold a salaried post because she competes with some other woman who has her living to earn On this principle no unmarried woman wom-an ought to be allowed to teach if her father is able to support her and any male teacher who receives a legacy ought to be promptly dismissed No one would admit for a moment that it is wrong for a man to hold a salaried sal-aried place unless ho is dependent on the salary for his livelihood The one thing that can properly be insisted on and this not by law but by conscience and humanityis that persons who are not forced to work for a living should take advantage of that fact to offer their labor at less than the market price thereby lowering wages for their less fortunate brothers and L sisters f1t > A 6Cae es Q |