Show kathleen norris says women may have to be regiment regimented ed bell syndicate service h IR ini kf M wh M W A V 1 01 kw C 1 I 1 ai 4 I 1 01 k U 11 t 41 tj ai 1 un I 1 believe shag within six months every woman and girt in the united sidles will have to register there will be training camps lor officers and no more room lor petty squabbles that threaten war work by KATHLEEN NORRIS NORMS L american women AL A wont want to help the country now thousands are enlisting for service any service nursing sewing making bandages canteen work entertaining whatever each one may do she is eager to do but american women are not drafted they are not obliged to register state age and capability and await the order to serve that hasteen has been the procedure with men for generations they expect to obey take orders work humbly in the lowest ranks until they prove their right to promotion women volunteer eagerly enough but presently they question the right of mrs wilson to give orders they dont know who ever told mary davis that she was boss they want a becoming uniform and I 1 have heard lately of many who would not report for duty until they got that uniform when an emergency cau call came for certain others who had taken nursing courses and suddenly were needed severa several 1 answered that they had engagements or were playing eyes the latter answer was actually given to the anxious superintendent who needed vital help to savo save life A san francisco paper had an editorial that Is a reproach to every woman in the state it warned women volunteers that they must pull together that they must stop fighting tor for places of power or prom indence that they must avoid duplication of service and concentration of help in certain popular areas may need regimentation does that same condition exist among the women of your you group or neighborhood it so and it if it continues the only answer is government regimentation of women as well as men when that comes every woman will do what she Is told to do the women placed in authority over her may be infinitely less capable than she Is herself but she wont be allowed to question orders or choose her own way of doing her own job she will report where she Is told to report on the minute and she will endure whatever conditions meet her without any redress we are the greatest nation in the world but wo we never have been a truculent nation looking about for excuses to make trouble lei with our neighbors and we have been rich enough to be content with the potentialities of our own magnificent land wow now that Is changed we must meet attack from without and even it if it takes us un years to get our full fighting power organized there can be no turning back now and no halfway measures and unless our women can do their share without actual military regimentation they must be prepared to bo be mobilized utmost Is exacted in every army there are temporarily at least mistakes in command it would take a superhuman commander ln in chief always to delegate authority to the right person fitness for once office Is a thing of slow growth and time Is the one thing we have not just now nevertheless in a few weeks or months the incompetent officer is moved to some less important command there is a shake up and gradually tho the ut most Is exacted from a wet weilor weil or tightly knit well controlled soldiery it if they draft women our sex will learn more about discipline and authority in six weeks than most of us experience in a lifetime life to some women will seem one long outrageous injustice how many women woman would have been silent as the hoys boys were silent over the conditions I 1 in our first enormous army camps a few months ago the conditions have been changed they are being steadily bettered but at first they meant almost constant clis discomfort comfort tor for the draftees cold boredom mud poor food uncertainties of every sort were their life but they were in the army and they took it as a matter of course are you ready as a woman for that sort of thing or cant we women do our full share of war work without being hammered into line I 1 am afraid it will have to come coma to that I 1 believe that within six months or a year every woman and girl will have to register there will be training camps tor officers and there will be no more room tor for the petty squabbles and jealousies that threaten war work today quarreled tor for power I 1 say this because of my own experience peri ence in an enormous organization of women a few years ago these women were first of all tor for pence peace and secondly almost an all mothers of sons but from the beginning they quarreled for place power and title they wrote me ma endless letters complaining of each other on several occasions they took petty cases to court once trying to prove that one of their leaders really won the fir first stone one to think of the ideals of the loague league and at another time to challenge the citizenship of a valued charter member months were wasted while they argued and threatened on the occasion of dour our first annual convention certain disaffected ro members embers threatened the delegates with warrants arrants and witmer us all by wire that our meeting would be broken up by the police the millions they were actual mil millions lionA of c peace loving members faded away men cant get along and take orders without definite unquestionable authority when the top sergeant or the pip squeak lieutenant or the unreasonable captain speaks they obey in tho the ranks of our armies today humbly taking orders are some of the boys who if they live will be our great men tomorrow the president of 1962 probably is doing KP duty turning out early and gulping his camp coffee and beans with the rest of them |