Woman Triumphant: The story of her struggles for freedom, education and political rights.: Dedicated to all noble-minded women by an appreciative member of the other sex.Cronau, Rudolf
History
Woman Triumphant: The story of her struggles for freedom, education and political rights.: Dedicated to all noble-minded women by an appreciative member of the other sex.
Cronau, Rudolf
Women -- History
Mothers and housekeepers need the vote to regulate the moral and
sanitary conditions under which their families must live. Women are
forever told that their place is in the home. But what do men expect of
them in the home? Merely to stay there is not enough. They are a failure
unless they do certain things for the home. They must minister, as far
as their means allow, to the health and welfare, moral as well as
physical, of their family, and especially of the children. They, more
than anybody else, are held responsible for what becomes of the
children. Women are responsible for the cleanliness of the house, for
the wholesomeness of the food, for their children’s health and morals.
But mothers cannot control these things, if the neighbors are allowed to
live in filth, if dealers are permitted to sell poor or adulterated
food, if the plumbing in the house is unsanitary, if garbage accumulates
and the halls and stairs are left dirty. They can take every care to
avoid fire, but if the house has been badly built, if the fire-escapes
are insufficient or not fire-proof, they cannot guard their children
from the horrors of being maimed or killed by fire. They can open the
windows to give the children the air that we are told is so necessary.
But if the air is laden with infection and contagious diseases, they
cannot protect the children from this danger. They can send the children
out for air and exercise, but if the conditions that surround them in
the streets are immoral and degrading, they cannot protect them from
these influences. Women alone cannot make these things right. But the
City administration can do it. The administration is elected by the
people, to protect the interests of the people. As men hold women
responsible for the conditions under which the children live, the women
should have something to say about the city’s housekeeping, even if they
must introduce an occasional house-cleaning.
What enormous influence women are able to exert in vital questions has
been demonstrated in the =Temperance Movement=; which originated in the
United States. Since the beginning of the colonization of the Western
Hemisphere Americans have been heavy consumers of rum, whiskey, and
other intoxicating liquors. “Everybody drank, and on all occasions,”
says a writer who has left us a pen picture of these bibulous days.
Drunkenness and all the evils resulting from it increased with the
gradual development of the “saloon” and the habit of “treating,” two
institutions peculiar to America and almost unknown in Europe.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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