From 1880 the organisation of women again progressed in the labour movement of the Knights of Labour. For the first time in American Labour history women found themselves encouraged to line up with men on equal terms in a large general organisation. They could also form their own Unions in alliance with the Knights of Labour, and almost every considerable branch of women's industry was represented in these organisations, the most prominent being the Daughters of St. Crispin (shoe-workers). The first women's assembly under the Knights of Labour was held in September 1881. From its first institution this association had realised the necessity of including women. The preamble to this constitution, adopted by the first national convention of the Knights of Labour in January 1878, included on this subject two significant provisions. One called for the prohibition of the employment of children in workshops, mines and factories before attaining their fourteenth year. The other gave as one of the principal objects of the order: "To secure for both sexes equal pay for equal work." And the founder of the Order, at the second national convention in 1879, asked for the formulation of an emphatic utterance on the subject of equal pay for equal work. "Perfected machinery," he said, "persistently seeks cheap labour and is supplied mainly by women and children. Adult male labour is thus crowded out of employ, and swells the ranks of the unemployed, or at least the underpaid." The women not only demanded better wages but appealed for protective legislation. The numbers increased steadily till May 1886, when twenty-seven local branches, entirely composed of women, were added in a month. But a decline set in, and in the next following six years, the whole strength of female Unionism under the Knights of Labour disappeared. It had probably never exceeded 50,000.[34] The policy of labour organisations generally has, however, considerably developed in regard to the affiliation and membership of women. The General Federation of Trade Unions, which formerly had been indifferent or hostile to women-workers, had come to recognise even in the 'eighties that women occupied a permanent place in industry, and that it was both necessary and desirable that they should be organised. The position was summarised in an article in the _Detroit Free Press_.[35] _An Equal Chance._