There are, and they accomplish a
notable amount of good. But their appeal is not universal; they never
have money or workers enough to cope adequately with a task like this,
and they are not built upon the sound economic basis of the trade
union.
The immigrant problem was not encountered by the first factory workers
here, who were American-born. So we find the earliest leaders in the
trade organization of women were wholly drawn from the daughters of
the native settlers. They felt and spoke always as free-women, "the
daughters of freemen." When this class of girls withdrew from the
factories, they gave place to the Irish immigrant, in some respects a
less advanced type than themselves. I have briefly traced some of the
economic reasons which affected the rise, growth and eventual passing
away of the various phases of trade unionism among women in this
country. The progress of these was radically modified by the influx
into the trades of workers from one nation after another; by the
passing from a trade or a group of trades of body after body of the
old workers, starved out or giving way before the recent arrivals,
whose pitiful power to seize the jobs of the others and earn some sort
of a living, has lain in their very weakness and helplessness.
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