[Transcriber's Note: I have not modernized spelling that appearsconsistent within this book. ] WOMEN AS SEX VENDORS OR WHY WOMEN ARE CONSERVATIVE (Being a View of the Economic Status of Woman) By R. B. TOBIAS and MARY E. MARCY CHICAGO CHARLES H. KERR & COMPANY CO-OPERATIVE Copyright 1918 By CHARLES H. KERR & COMPANY CONTENTS PAGE WHY WOMEN ARE CONSERVATIVE 9 YOUTH AND MAID 30 THE EVOLUTION OF THE FAMILY 40 THE FUTURE 54 WOMEN AS SEX VENDORS WHY WOMEN ARE CONSERVATIVE We have often heard discussions of the reason we do not find women, as asex, in the vanguard of world affairs; why the great educators, strongfigures in progressive or revolutionary movements, are men rather thanwomen; why these movements, themselves, are made up almost entirely ofmen rather than women. People have asked over and over again why, in thefields of the arts, the sciences, in the world of "practical affairs, "men, rather than women, generally excel. We believe the answer lies in the fact that women, as a sex, are theowners of a commodity vitally necessary to the health and well-being ofman. Women occupy a more fortunate biologic, and in many countries, amore fortunate economic position, in the increasingly intensifiedstruggle for existence. And the preferred class, the biologically andeconomically favored class, or sex, has rarely been efficient-to-do, hasnever been revolutionary to attack a social system that accordsadvantage to it. As a sex, women have rarely been rebels or revolutionists. We do not seehow they can ever be as long as there exists any system of exploitationto revolt against. Revolt comes from the submerged, never from the groupoccupying a favored place. Today the revolutionist is he who has nothingto sell but his labor power. The skilled trade union group is least revolutionary among the workers. The best paid unions are not the most militant in acts calculated toimprove the conditions of even their own group, and are least aggressivein conduct for improving the conditions of the whole working class. Solong as they occupy a more favorable position in the industrial world, the trade unions will have something to conserve. They becomeconservative. We see the small, struggling farmers, who have probably very little tolose in this world save their debts and their mortgages, countingthemselves in a class of possible property owners and small exploiters, and generally throwing their support into movements promising pettyreforms, when nothing but the abolition, or downfall of the system ofprivate ownership in the means of production and distribution, canpossibly help them. The petty shop-keepers rail more against the "outrageously" high wagesand the short hours of the skilled workers than against the largebusiness organizations, like the packing interests, or the greatmonopolies, that hold them constantly on the edge of failure. Desperately and consistently, as they behold their competitors forcedout in the irresistible march of centralization, they cling to theirsinking ships, their small deceits and petty ideology in the hope of oneday winning out against the terrific odds opposed to them, and landinghigh and dry in the capitalist class. No shoe dealer in the darkest side street of the smallest village buthopes some day to leave his dingy shop behind and to climb into theclass economically above him. He counts himself a man of business, andthinks and acts and goes down to failure, individualistically. He hatesand fears his competitors, ascribes most of his wrongs to them or to thehighly paid skilled workers, and apes and envies the men whom he seesrising to wealth in the economic conflict. As a sex, women occupy a position similar to the petty shop-keeper, because they possess a commodity to sell or to barter. Men, as a sex, are buyers of, or barterers for, this commodity. The general attitude onthis question of sex may be, and in fact usually is, wholly unconscious;but the fact remains that men and women meet each other, in thecapitalist system, as buyers and sellers of, or barterers for, acommodity. Scarcely anybody recognizes this fact, and those who sense it fail tounderstand the inevitable result upon society and upon women themselves. There is no office or saloon scrub-woman so displeasing and decrepit, nostenographer so old and so unattractive, no dish-washer so sodden, thatshe does not know, tucked far away in her inner consciousness, perhaps, that, if the very worst comes and she loses her job, there is the truckdriver or the office clerk, the shaky-legged bar patron on the road toearly locomotor ataxia, or the squint-eyed out-of-town salesman, who canbe counted on to tide her over an emergency--usually for goodsdelivered. When a man is out of a job and broke, he is flat on his back. Hisappetites, his desires cry out for satisfaction exactly as they did whenhe had money in his pockets to pay for the satisfaction of theseappetites and these desires. When a woman loses a job, she has always the sale of her sex to fallback upon as a last resort. Please understand that this is in no way a criticism of the conduct ofwomen. We desire to lay no stigma upon them. We lay no stigma upon anyclass or sex or group, for down at bottom, men and women do what they dobecause they have to do it. The more we understand the economic andbiological status of any group, the more we see they are compelled toact, under the circumstances, and in the environment they occupy, precisely as they do act. In the struggle for existence today thelaurels are only to those who use any and all methods to savethemselves. We only want to point out that women =are able= to save themselves becauseof their "favored" position in the biological world. Since economicinterest and economic control are at the basis of all socialinstitutions, we want to show some of the results of this sex monopolypossessed by women, and required by men. Every group which possesses anything which is necessary to the healthand well-being of any other group, is bound to be pursued, wooed, bribed, paid. The monopolistic class, or sex, in turn, learns towithhold, to barter, to become "uncertain, coy and hard to please, " toenhance and raise the price of her commodity, even though the economicbasis of the transaction be utterly concealed or disguised. All this isexactly as natural and inevitable as a group of wage workers demandingall they can get in payment for their labor power, or the land-ownerholding up the farm renters for all the tenants will bear, or the brokerselling to the highest bidder. No one is to be blamed. The private possession of a commodity necessary to man, the lower costof living for women, are the natural causes of lower wages for womenthan for men, and explains why women are actually able to live on lowerwages, as a sex, than men. Few people speak frankly about sex matters today. And still fewerunderstand them and their economic basis. The subject of sex is clothedin pretense. We discuss women philosophically, idealistically, sometimesfrom the viewpoint of biology, but never from an economic =and= abiological standpoint, which is the only scientific basis from which toregard them. Everywhere in the animal world except among humankind, the malepossesses the gay and attractive plumage, the color and form to pleasethe eye. Naturally he should possess them. But this is not so in theworld of man. Here we find the woman decorating herself in the colorfulgarb. Woman has ceased to ask, "Is he beautiful?" She asks "What does he=own=?" or, "How much can he =pay=?" Men love to dress their women in expensive clothes, to provide them withluxurious surroundings, because this advertises to the world the factthat they are able to purchase a superior, i. E. , a higher pricedcommodity. Women give much time and spend money extravagantly inarticles of conspicuous waste for the simple reason that by so doingthey announce the fact that =they= are finer than other women, higherpriced, of a fancier brand, possessed of better wares. Everybody knows that the office clerk who aspires to the affections ofan artistically gowned, jewel decked young woman, often spends most ofhis wages upon her in the hope of winning her attention. His officeassociates may describe her as "fancy, " or speak of her as "an expensivepackage. " And so the twenty dollar-a-week clerk magnifies his "income"in order to bribe the young lady into "giving herself" to him inexchange for his name and some sort of life-long support, provided hecan produce it. How many young wives have learned, to their chagrin, of the deceits thuspracticed upon them by their husbands! Alas! The scenes that are enactedwhen it is discovered, after the ceremony, that the diamond engagementring is not yet paid for, and that the mahogany furniture in the newflat so joyously selected by the young bride-elect, was bought upon theinstallment plan! That John earns only twenty dollars a week in theshipping room instead of the fifty a week he had declared, as assistantmanager! Here the man has not paid as promised and every one feels thatthe woman has made a "bad bargain. " On the other hand, women disguise the economic basis of the deal inevery possible way; lie, cheat and compete in a life and death strugglewith others of their sex. A thousand illusions, tricks, subtleties, hypocrisies are employed to cover the bald fact that wares are beingdisplayed, are being bidden for by other men. The deal is smothered inchivalrous urbanities and sentimental verbiage. Unnumberedcircumlocutions are resorted to, to conceal the salesmanship of one whohas a commodity to sell. MONOGAMY FOR WIVES When certain strong men found themselves able to garner a larger shareof property than their fellows, they rebelled against the communisticownership of property, and the state, with the system of =private=ownership, was evolved, came into being to protect the private owners intheir private ownership =against= the community, or the mass, whichpossessed no private property. Wealthy men then began to desire to leavetheir fortunes to their own children and so the marriage system, withtheoretical monogamy for both sexes and practical monogamy for wives, arose. Men of property then felt tolerably certain that their wealthwould descend to their own sons and to the sons of no others. We are not inclined to believe this was due to the prevalence of anyso-called =paternal= instinct. Paternal instinct is, we suspect, a minus, rather than a plus, quantity. It seems to us that fathers more oftenlearn to love their children through following the conduct prescribed bygood form and pretending to love them, or through love of display, prideor by =association=, than through any "natural tendency. " The almost universality of the maternal instinct is proven by thepeoples in the world today, for scarcely anybody would have a chancefor existence if it were not for the care of the mothers. Generally the coming of children is a handicap to a woman in the marketin which Nature and the present system have placed her. Where this isthe case, it is here that society, customs and laws speak for thefamily, in ways built up, sometimes blindly, sometimes consciously, topreserve the species, and upon the old biological and economicfoundations. It is generally granted that women with children are more conservativethan women without children. We believe this is true only when they andtheir children are provided for. When a mother is left with no one tosupport her children, she becomes more predatory than other women in thepursuit of a new provider. Our jails and workhouses are full ofunsuccessful mothers of this class, convicted of crimes againstproperty. Mothers are conservative when their children are secure; more predatorywhen they are in want. Mothers often compete successfully in makingtheir wares attractive and in binding the male by habits andassociations that hold him and induce him to continue to pay. Among men, the possession of, and ability to support a woman inperpetuity, whom no other may touch, is honorific, a high sign ofdisplay. It announces to the world that such a man is able to hold atrophy in the struggle for existence. A monogamous wife is, in fact, anemblem of well-off-ness, and greatly to be desired. A man does not wish to be one among a corporation of men owning a womanany more than he desires to be owner of a sixth part of an automobile. Not because there is anything more intrinsically wrong in purchasingone-sixth than six-sixths, but because, in a world where the ownershipof private property is the greatest of all good things, individualownership denotes respectability, comfort, ability to buy outright. Hence we have monogamy for wives and mistresses in general, and polygamyfor men. For if it is honorific to possess one woman, it is still more proof ofone's buying power to support half a dozen different establishments. Besides, biologically, a man may require many women for the satisfactionof his desires. CHASTITY Why do young girls remain chaste before the importunities of theirlovers and, perhaps, against their own desires, if not for the purposeof forcing or inducing them to offer the sure and permanent price ofmatrimony? Do not all respectable and well-meaning parents (and others not sorespectable) seek gently to guide their daughters into safe matrimonialharbors where they barter themselves for a respectable meal-ticket, oran income, presumably, for life? They would be shocked beyond measure ifyou told them that back of all their exalted mummeries, they desired tosee their daughters barter their sex for the highest and most enduringstake rather than to see them selling their labor or brain power forwages, or selling their sex on the installment, or retail plan, to thechance purchaser. Yet these are the facts. And it is this hope of bartering their sex privileges for permanentsupport and the title of "wife" that keeps the girls of the workingclass in the same category as the small shop-keeper. Nearly everyordinary woman under ninety hopes some day to find a man who will marryher and support her for the rest of her days. Instead of fitting herselffor a trade or a profession, young women, and old women, devote theirtime to schemes for prevailing upon some man, to pay the ultimate priceand marry them. And so women, not every individual, but as a =sex=, are everindividualistic, ever competing among themselves, ever displaying theirwares, ever looking for a possible purchaser of the commodity they haveto sell, ever endeavoring to keep the purchaser satisfied and willing topay more. Human beings are human =animals= however much we may pretend to thecontrary. In the rest of the animal world the fact of the mating seasonis frankly acknowledged. It has never been recognized among humankindwithin the period of written history. Is it possible that when women arereleased from economic and social coercion, this periodic matinginstinct in the woman of the species may assert, or reassert, itself? Wives and mistresses often submit to their husbands or lovers onlythrough fear of losing economic security to the ever alert competitor. It is certain that when all men and all women have gained individualeconomic opportunity and security, social institutions will change also. May it not be possible that the jealousies now prevalent, because of theeconomic import or the social standing that the private claim on theindividual brings, may vanish also? WHICH IS SUPERIOR? But do not imagine for a single moment that women are inferior to men. Biology has long since proven that daughters inherit the same naturaltendencies from their fathers and their grandfathers, their mothers andtheir grandmothers that sons do. In the case of the girls it is only asit would be if the sons in a family all inherited a share in themonopoly of a commodity that half the human race requires. The son of your butcher may have all the nervous and intellectualcapacities of Thomas Edison, or Dr. E. L. Thorndyke. Perhaps he has. But the economic environment in which he is born will give him smallopportunity to so prove himself. Women are intellectually capable of all that men can do. They alwayswill be because the paternal branch of the family bequeathes to itsdaughters the same natural tendencies and capacities that are theheritage of its sons. It is biologically impossible for sons to inheritthe cumulative capacities of their fathers =alone= just as it isbiologically impossible for the daughters to inherit from their mothersalone. So that, at birth, it appears that both sexes must remain on anequal footing so far as heredity is concerned. But the social andeconomic environment differentiates. Boys and girls =learn= to differ morethan they differ physically at birth. We believe it is due to the fact that woman, biologically possessed of anecessary commodity, something to sell besides her labor power, leansand reckons upon this ownership, which prevents her, not individually, but as a sex, from taking an active and permanent part in the affairsand workshops of the world today. There are exceptions to the rule, ofcourse. And often, unconsciously, perhaps, she seeks to excel in thefields occupied by the men who surround her, for the purpose ofenhancing her wares. It is to be remembered that in nearly all phases of the relationsbetween men and women, both are almost always at least partiallyunconscious of the economic basis of the bargain they make, although, legally, marriage is a contract. Here society and social institutionsprotect the possible future mothers of the race. We are in no way denying the existence of affection between the sexes. We see undoubted instances of self-sacrifice (in the economic sense) onthe part of women everywhere. We are not gainsaying these. We onlyclaim that the root of the relation of the sexes in America is today theeconomic basis of buyers and sellers of a commodity and that this basisof sex, sold as a commodity, affects every phase of our social life, andall of our social institutions, and that we fail to recognize theseeconomic roots because of the leaves upon the social tree. Why, do you imagine, the woman who brings to a penniless husband, notonly herself but a fortune as well, is looked down upon in manycountries? Why is the woman of the streets, who spends her sex earningsupon her lover, scorned universally? Is it not because both areunconsciously violating the =code=, or the trade "understandings, " in=giving= not only of themselves, but their substance as well? These womenare selling below the market, or scabbing on the job. YOUTH AND MAID It is customary to speak of Youth as the period of rebellion or revolt. But to us it seems to be the normal age of conquest. Youth is theworld's eternal and undaunted conqueror. No matter what the odds, nomatter how slim the chances of success in any undertaking, Youth dares. Experience and wisdom =know=, fear and hesitate. Youth rushes inand--sometimes--finds a way. People speak of the colossal egotism of Youth. It is not egotism; it isunfathomable ignorance. The youth knows neither himself, the world norhis adversaries. He is unafraid because he does not know the strength ofthe forces he would conquer. But society learns from the threshingsabout of its individuals. And it is the young who thresh about. Mailedin their own ignorance, and propelled by their own marvelous energy, theyoung go forth to conquer. And so the world learns many things. Youth rebels only when it is thwarted in entering the lists and may thenturn the flood of its activities into channels of rebellion or revoltagainst authority. The boy revolts when his father declines to permithim to accomplish the impossible, to invent, discover, explore, tooverwhelm. It seems to him that if he received encouragement and helpinstead of censure at home, the son of the house would soon berecognized by the world as one of the Great Ones of the Earth. When he finds his talents unappreciated, he usually decides to write abook that will influence the whole future course of human events, or anovel that will alter dynasties and change social systems; or he decidesto become a powerful political leader, or the silver-tongued orator ofthe times. Thwarted youth may aspire to become the world's greatestrebel, or the most heroic victim of despotic authority. Even inrebellion youth aspires to conquer the heights, though it be through thedepths. A boy finds consolation in planning to become the world'sgreatest hero or martyr when he is thwarted in becoming an epoch-makinginventor, or discoverer. This on the male side of the house. The daughter aspires to beauty, lovely clothes, charm, or to stardom onthe theatrical or operatic stage, achievements and characteristics whichmean popularity and the ultimate disposal of her wares to the highestavailable bidder. Listen to a group of boys talking among themselves. You will probablyadd some useful knowledge to your mental equipment, for you will hearthem discussing feats in civil engineering, problems in electricity, mechanics, physics, chemistry, surgery, as well as events in the worldof sports. On the other hand, the conversations among girls are almostentirely on the subject of boys, men, clothes and the theatre. The psychology of the sexes in youth is totally different. The ideas ofthe average young man are those of one who expects to become some day a=producer= or at least a =worker=; the ideas of the average young womanare those of one who =expects= and =intends= (for here, too, Youth seesonly personal victory) to rise into the leisure, non-producing or=supported= class. The small boy sent forth to play with his comrades with his hair done upin curls by a fond mama, would encounter the jeers of the wholeneighborhood. From babyhood, the ribbons, curls, frills and silks arefor the girls, who are thereby rendered deeply conscious of theirappearance and taught above all things to keep themselves clean and"looking nice. " Nothing is sacred from the invasion of small boys, who climb in, andunder and over all obstacles to discover what makes the wheels goaround, while the small girls sit about and take care of their clothesand learn to count them of supreme importance. And the matter of clothes =is= a vital one to the woman of today. Clothesare the frame that enhances the picture as well as its price tag; theyare the carton wrapping the package in the show window, the case thatbest displays the jewel for sale within. All our social institutions encourage girls and young women, and allwomen up to the age of ninety, or more, in believing that it is thesupreme good for a woman to make the best possible matrimonial bargain. On the stage, in our press, and pulpit, in the books and magazinesproduced for the consumption of the young people in this country, marriage is nearly always represented as the safe, ultimate andgreatly-to-be-desired haven for a woman. Hence, young women, intent upon securing the best the world has tooffer, rarely take any sort of work seriously. They regard jobs asmerely temporary conveniences, or inconveniences. The wise employer hires ugly women stenographers, when he cannot affordto engage men, because he knows they usually possess more brains thantheir lovely sisters, and because they remain longer. The beautifulwoman sees no need for intelligence nor for understanding because shehas always been able to outstrip her less attractive competitors inmaking the best match and securing the rich husbands. And so herneurones rarely "connect, " or react, except to stimuli pertaining tothings that will enhance her charms and increase her selling price. The young man expects to accomplish something in the world, to earn muchmoney, or "high position, " in order to be able to marry the mostcharming girl. The "most charming girl, " if she be temporarily forced toearn her own living, =expects= to find somebody who will marry her, giveher more luxuries than she has been accustomed to, and lift her farabove her companions. She hopes to become a member of the leisure classeven if she never attains it. Arnold Bennett says that men usually marry through the desire to mate, while women marry for economic reasons. It seems to us that this isoften true. Women are =potential= parasites even if they never become real ones, andthis is the gist of the matter we are discussing. Why are nearly allsmall farmers reactionary, individualistic, distrustful, competitive?Because they hope some day to become gentleman farmers. Why are mostsmall business men narrow, egoistic, conservative? For the reason thatthey hope one day to become men of Big Business. The young woman inAmerica today possesses the same psychology. Being young, she not only=hopes=, she =expects=, to rise into the leisure class when some young manasks her for the privilege of supporting her through life. We are making no claim that the lot of millions of housekeeping mothers, married to working men, is more enviable than is the condition of theirhusbands. We merely wish to point out that millions of women, potentially, actually, or psychologically, =are= "of the leisure class, "and that =fact= and =expectation= keep women, as a sex, allied to theforces of reaction. When a woman is competing in a life and deathstruggle among a score of other young women, to make a permanent legalbargain which entails the promise of an income or support for life, shehas little leisure or energy to spare in making over, or revolutionizingthe present social system. The mind of the average woman today is that of the petty shop-keeper. Entertaining, ofttimes, impossible dreams, these dreams, are, nevertheless, productive of a conservative and bourgeois ideology of alife of leisure and non-productiveness. It was the machine process in production that permitted the rise of aparasitical, or leisure, class. As long as both men and women wereforced to produce things in order to live, an exploiting class, thatlives off the labor of others, was impossible. But as spinning, weaving, canning, soap-making, butter, bread, candle, clothes-making and ahundred other functions formerly performed by women in the home, wereabsorbed into the factories, the young girls often followed the old taskinto the new plant. This was also true of the boys on the farms, whoturned toward the cities and entered factories, where hogs wereslaughtered, farm machines manufactured, or where shoes were made. But the farm youths expected to become permanent producers in the shopsand mills; they sought to become able to support a woman, and, perhaps, children. The girls entering the factories, on the other hand, did so toearn money to help pay their expenses at home until they married, or inorder to buy gay and expensive clothes, unconsciously, perhaps, foradvertising as well as decorative purposes. THE EVOLUTION OF THE FAMILY Undoubtedly the early savages drew together for self-protection againsttheir forest enemies. And out of this necessity grew the love ofsociety. Man became a gregarious animal. Promiscuity in sexual intercourse among these herds was another factorfor holding the tribes, or groups together. In his "Origin of the Family, " Frederick Engels says: "The development of the family is founded on the continual contractionof the circle, originally comprising the whole tribe, within whichmarital intercourse between both sexes was general. By the continualexclusion, first of near, then of ever remoter relatives, includingfinally even those who were simply related legally, all group marriagebecomes practically impossible. At last only one couple, temporarily andloosely united, remains . .. Even from this we may infer how little thesexual love of the individual in the modern sense of the word had to dowith the origin of monogamy. " Any casual student of sociology can prove that marriage and the familyhave not always been what they are today. Lewis J. Morgan, in hiswell-known work, "Ancient Society, " says: "When the fact is accepted that the family has passed through foursuccessive forms, and is now in a fifth, the question at once ariseswhether this form can be permanent in the future. The only answer thatcan be given is that it must advance as society advances, and change associety changes, even as it has done in the past. It is the creature ofthe social system and will reflect its culture. " Engels says: "We have three main forms of the family, corresponding in general to thethree main stages of human development. For savagery group marriage, forbarbarism the pairing family, for civilization, monogamy supplemented byadultery and prostitution. " THE PAIRING FAMILY "A certain pairing for a longer or shorter term took place even duringthe group marriage or still earlier. A man had his principal wife amongother women, and he was to her the principal husband among others. .. . Such a habitual pairing would gain ground the more the gens developedand the more numerous the classes of "brothers" and "sisters" became whowere not permitted to marry one another. .. . "By this increasing complication of marriage restrictions, groupmarriage became more and more impossible; it was displaced by thepairing family. "The communistic household, in which most or all the women belong to oneand the same gens, while the husbands come from different gentes, is thecause and foundation of the general and widespread supremacy of women inprimeval times. "It is one of the most absurd notions derived from eighteenth centuryenlightenment that in the beginning of society woman was the slave ofman. Among all savages and barbarians of the lower and middle stages, sometimes even of the higher stage, women not only have freedom but areheld in high esteem. " In writing of the pairing family among the Iroquois, Arthur Wright says: "As to their families, at a time when they still lived in their old longhouses (communistic households of several families) . .. A certain clan(gens) always reigned so that the women chose their husbands from otherclans. The female part generally ruled the house; the provisions wereheld in common; but woe to the luckless husband or lover who was tooindolent or too clumsy to contribute his share to the common stock. Nomatter how many children or how much private property he had in thehouse, he was liable at any moment to receive a hint to gather up hisbelongings and get out. And he could not dare to venture any resistance;the house was made too hot for him and he had no other choice but toreturn to his own clan or, as was mostly the case, to look for anotherwife in some other clan. The women were the dominating power in theclans and everywhere else. " Bachofen discovered that in the communistic household, the supremacy ofwoman was caused by the fact that the women all belonged to the samegens while the men came from different gentes. During this period the children belonged to the same gens as the motherand took her name. At this time man's tools and weapons were yet crudeand they were his only possession. The woman owned the household goodsand utensils, the value of which for the preservation and preparation offood was very great. Bachofen has shown how women were strong factors in the demand formonogamy through this and the earlier periods. Man learned to till the soil and to domesticate animals; he capturedenemies from neighboring tribes and learned to make slaves instead offood of them. And the conqueror became a master, and the slave aninstrument of production. It was the men who were lucky enough to befirst to enslave the enemy, to acquire more precious metals and largerflocks, who evolved the state, to protect them against the commune, orthe mass, in their ownership of private property. At the death of the father his own children were disinherited, in thematriarchy. As increasing wealth strengthened the position of man, hebegan to desire to overthrow the old maternal law and to establish a newone that would permit inheritance in favor of his children. And somonogamy became the law, and descent was traced by male instead offemale lineage. Engels says that "the downfall of maternal law was thehistoric defeat of the female sex. " In order to insure the faithfulness of the wife, and the reliability ofpaternal lineage, the women were given absolutely into the power of themen. Husbands had power of life and death over their wives. In certaincountries today it is only the man who can dissolve the marriage bondsand cast off his wife. But gradually the old standards which were applied to men and women arechanging. New laws are written on our statute books. Civil lawsprotecting male rule apply only to the wealthy classes and theirintercourse with the working class. In sex relations the sentiment, inAmerica particularly, has swung around in favor of woman. Undoubtedly her growing economic independence, arising from her abilityto support herself in shop and factory, has had some influence on thissocial attitude. Also, one can imagine the feelings of the tax-payers ofa small community when the father of several small children deserted hiswife and the expenses of supporting his family devolved upon them. Itwould call for little imagination to picture these respectable membersof society scrambling to pass laws for the punishment of the errant oneand to force him back to his wife and support-producing labor. But, basically, the legal favoritism which has arisen in the past thirtyyears in America, is probably due to a desire on the part of theemploying class to protect and make secure the mothers of children forthe sake of the future labor supply. Only recently a great nationalreform body, dedicated to child welfare, declared frankly that there are"no illegitimate" children; that the misdeeds of parents can removenothing from the legality of birth and that unmarried mothers must begranted some legal status and a measure of economic security for thesake of the future supply of labor. It is evident, whether due to one cause or to many, that the law, whichusually protects those who possess bestowable favors, has graduallybuilt up strong protective measures for women. Among the rich, men andwomen find protection for their property in the laws, according to themeasure of their economic power, but among the wage working and middleclasses, woman occupies a privileged legal position. As long as a husband possesses anything, his wife may be certain ofsupport or an "adequate" income at least. The husband may be punishedfor his lack of possessions, or his failure to produce an income. THE MARRIAGE CONTRACT Of course, every one knows that marriage is a legal contract; but whomdoes it bind? Certainly not the woman, nor any woman in America. For shemay easily free herself and even divorce and penalize her husband if sheis dissatisfied either with him or his earnings; or she may evade allthe obligations she is supposed to meet, almost always with absoluteimpunity. Whatever she may do or leave undone in the marriage relation, if it butbe with sufficient pretense and discretion, in America, at least, theworld and the courts absolve her from all blame. If she be discreet, she may entertain lovers galore; she may refuse toperform any of the theoretical duties of the home; she may refuse tobear children or to surrender to her husband, without censure, and oftenwithout the knowledge of the world. If she be addicted to drunkenness, people will divine that her husband must have treated her brutally; ifshe be seen with other men, folks suspect that he neglects her. If her husband seeks satisfaction for his desires elsewhere, she maydivorce him and secure alimony; if he deserts her the law will returnhim to her side, if it can find him. If he fails to bring home thewherewithall to provide for her, she may have him sent to jail. If shediscovers that he is getting the affection and the sex life which shehas denied him, outside of his home, and if she buys a revolver andmurders him in cold blood, the jury will exonerate her. If a wife deserts her husband and her children, the law does not makeher a criminal; for wife abandonment, the husband is held criminallyliable. No matter what the offense of the woman, custom and public opiniondemand that every "decent" man permit his wife to accuse him on "justgrounds" and to secure the divorce and call on the law to force him topay her alimony for the rest of their natural lives. No matter what the provocation, legally or sentimentally, no man can beexonerated for killing a woman. No matter how little the provocation, legally or sentimentally, any woman may kill almost any man, and thejury will render a verdict of Not Guilty. She has only to say that he"deceived her. " A husband may become crippled or invalided and there is no law evensuggesting that it is the duty of his wife to support him; mostcommunities would lynch a man who neglected a sick or helpless wife, andthe law would certainly deal most harshly with him. The law throws nosafeguards about the man, to protect him against his wife's failure tolive up to her theoretical marital obligations, to protect him when heis ill, or in the enjoyment of separate maintenance, alimony, or againstnon-support or abandonment. The laws today protect the owners of property and the economicallypowerful. The more economic power a group, or a class, or a sexpossesses, the more the state throws the mantle of its protective lawsabout it. Women are owners of a commodity for which men are buyers orbarterers, and our modern laws protect woman at the expense of man. In his "Origin of the Family, " Engels says: "The supremacy of man in marriage is simply the consequence of hiseconomic superiority and will fall with the abolition of the latter. " In a large per cent of the American homes, man no longer possesses anyeconomic superiority. He has four vital needs to satisfy while woman hasonly three, and woman possesses, for barter, for sale, or for gift, thewherewithall to satisfy one of these. Few men any longer possess any property worthy of the name; hence, theyare forced to sell their labor power for wages to keep from starving. And men are not always able to secure jobs. The propertyless woman today is rarely reduced to starvation. If theprice (or wages) offered for the sale of her laboring power areunsatisfactory, she may always supplement them through the barter orsale of her sex. That there are no women hoboes in the civilized worldtoday is incontestable proof of the superiority of the economic statusof woman over man. THE FUTURE We still hear people talk about the relations of the sexes, the familyand marriage, as though these human and social relationships had alwaysbeen and were bound to remain what they are today, whereas they haveundergone far-reaching modifications within the period of our own lives. Every change taking place in industry is always bound to send outinfinite ramifications through every branch of our social institutions. The increasing specialization in industry, drawing more and more of thehousehold arts out of the home and into factory, mill and shops, and thefollowing of the jobs by women into the mills and factories, thusfreeing woman from economic dependence on man, has already coloredevery branch of our social fabric. Having become more independent, womanhas grown more exacting. She demands a better bargain when she marries, or, refusing to barter, she chooses a mate. In the early days of America, when the home was the economic unit, andalmost all industry was performed in the home and on the farm, womenwere economically dependent on men. Then woman's place was undoubtedlyin the home, since there was no place else where she could earn aliving. Modern industry has changed all that. Women compete for jobs with men today, force down wages to a lower leveland demand more from men before they will marry. And yet we see $25. 00 aweek stenographers giving up their positions to barter themselves, presumably for life, to $35. 00 a week clerks or salesmen, rarely becauseof the mating instinct, but usually because of the personal triumphthis means in the competition between members of the sex, and thesocial approbation which marriage brings. The only certain thing the wisest man may say about our socialinstitutions is that they have changed in the past and that they willcontinue to change, or be modified, or to pass away, in the future. Inone short year, the war has altered some of our old institutions beyondrecall. We believe that a continuation of the war for a considerableperiod will mean economic and social changes that will rock the world. And out of the storm and stress of things we doubt very much whether anyof our existing social institutions will emerge intact--if it emerge atall. The family as it is known in America today, the marriage contract, therelations of the sexes are bound to alter as they reflect changedeconomic conditions. Some of the old "pillars of the social structure"in Russia have already crumbled away. Women are becoming ever more necessary and important in the role theyplay in industry. With this growing economic importance, and with theincreasing need of capitalism for more children to augment the labor andmilitary supply, the power of women will probably increase marvelouslyduring the next few years. Governments will reward the surrender ofwoman to man, while employers compete among themselves for her laborpower. Much will be offered to women. This, we believe, for only a brief period, for we cannot but think thatthe final results of this war--the fruit of the present system ofproduction and distribution--will be the utter collapse of the systemitself--making way for a New Society wherein the only aristocracy shallbe that of Labor and of Merit. Undoubtedly, in the New Society, conditions will be very much changedfor women. But they will also be greatly changed for men. What thefuture sex relations will be, we do not pretend to know. Perhaps thestatement by Frederick Engels in his "Origin of the Family, " is as gooda forecast as any. He says: "What we may anticipate about the adjustment of sexual relations afterthe impending downfall of capitalist production is mainly of a negativenature and mostly confined to elements that will disappear. But whatwill be added? That will be decided after a new generation has come tomaturity: a race of men who never in their lives have had any occasionfor buying with money or other economic means of power the surrender ofa woman; a race of women who have never had any occasion forsurrendering to any man for any other reason but love, or for refusingto surrender to their lover from fear of economic consequences. Oncesuch people are in the world, they will not give a moment's thought towhat we today believe should be their course. They will follow theirown practice and fashion their own public opinion about the individualpractice of every person--only this and nothing more. "