Part 2

Unselfish man has in the past been woefully handicapped. Fifty years ago he could not have said to his wife, as he can now, “Do no cooking today, but buy some baked beans or boiled ham for supper and you go to the art exhibition.” Fifty years ago there was little object in trying to relieve his wife of her household cares, for then there was little else upon which she could profitably spend her time. Now, when he wishes to be unselfish, his opportunities for accomplishing something worth while thereby are great. Of course he is always encountering his wife’s desire to be unselfish also, and to stay at home and cook the food he likes and otherwise to provide for his comfort, but the two must settle that between themselves, with due regard on the part of each for preserving the proper balance in the life of the other. In this struggle the greater possibilities in the way of development and increase of life lie with man. To woman it is given to accept a self-sacrifice which nature has mapped out for her by specializing her for childbearing and which society has mapped out for her by specializing her for housekeeping. To man it is given to map out for himself a new path into unselfishness and to secure the expansion of powers that comes from pioneering.

Nor is this higher affection merely its own reward. To the increase of life brought by love is added increase in all other directions, presupposing always ideas and ideals in woman as well as in man. With leisure created by man’s unselfishness, woman can study and secure mental development which makes her a wiser conserver of man’s health, a better comrade in his leisure, and a more intelligent helper in his labors. To use the phraseology of our definition of life, she can better assist him to secure health, to enjoy the pleasures of the senses, to learn, and to do.

He wishes health. There was a time when his work demanded life-giving, muscular exercise in the fresh air, when his house was so loosely built that it was inevitably well ventilated, when he lived so far from his neighbors that there was no danger of catching their diseases either through contamination of water supply or otherwise, when his food passed directly from garden to table, fresh and unadulterated. Then health came almost unbidden. His wife, though she could help him in many other ways, could do little for his health except to cook his food properly.

Later, things changed. He moved into the town and his neighbor’s sewage percolated into his well. His house was tightly built and admitted little air through the cracks. His work became sedentary and kept him indoors most of the time. His food was brought to him from the four corners of the earth, passing through many hands on the way, and was liable to deterioration and adulteration.

For a time he failed to see that with changed conditions his health problem had changed. If, as a result, he did not die of consumption or typhoid fever, he became anæmic and dyspeptic, his chest sank, his circulation became impaired, and his liver sluggish. Then he awoke to the fact that if he would have good air he must adopt a system of ventilation for his closed buildings; that if he would have good lung capacity, quick circulation, and an active liver, he must take regular physical exercise; that if he would have safe water, he must stir up the municipal authorities to do their duty or must himself adopt means to sterilize his drinking supply; that if he would have wholesome food, there was something necessary besides good cooking. Dairies and markets must be inspected and laws against adulteration must be made and enforced.

Scientists came to his rescue and put at his disposal an abundance of literature on hygiene, sanitation, and physical culture, but he had little time in which to read it. So it has come about that with his altered health problem there has been opened to woman the opportunity to do something more for man’s health than to cook his food. If she is intelligent and has leisure, she can study sanitation and hygiene and make practical application of their principles in her home. She can take lessons in physical culture, pass them on to her husband and exercise with him a few minutes every day, thus helping him to overcome the effects of his sedentary occupation. She can, through her clubs, stir up the town authorities to provide good water, to clean the streets and prevent disease-laden dust from blowing about, to care properly for garbage and sewage, and to inspect places where food is kept for sale. In many ways she can help in the struggle against disease which man made necessary when he became a town dweller.

Man wishes to enjoy the pleasures of the senses, among which not the least in importance is the sense of taste. This sense God gave for man’s enjoyment, and then provided for its satisfaction many delicious natural flavors. It is not, however, the man in whose house there is most cooking done who gets the greatest pleasure from taste, and it is frequently just he who gets the least enjoyment from the other senses. If a man insists upon taking his wife to see the woods when the violets are in blossom, instead of letting her stay at home to make shortcake for his supper, he loses his shortcake, but plain strawberries and cream and bread and butter often taste better after a brisk walk than shortcake does without the walk, and in this case the man gets not only the taste of the food, but also the smell of the woods, the sight of the flowers, and the sound of the birds. Nor is it the man in whose house there is most cleaning done who gets most pleasure from the sense of sight. If a man insists on or acquiesces in the reduction of the number of carpets, curtains, and draperies, because they make too much care for his wife, he loses the beauty of these furnishings, but the absence of curtains may make it possible for him to feast his eyes on the waving trees and the ever changing sky, while the reduction of care may make it possible for his wife to go with him to art gallery or concert, or to make such a study of art and music as to increase his own enjoyment and appreciation of them.

He wishes to learn. Most men do, even after their college days are over. He wishes to have a background of information in order that he may understand current events better, to know of the world and its progress, and of the relation of his special occupation to the world’s work. But alas! He has little time for general reading. Often he has not even time to go to the library. An intelligent and educated wife can often, providing she has leisure, do for him much which he would do in his own spare moments if he had them.

He wishes to do. Who is there who does not occasionally say, “If I had money, if I had time, I would do so and so?” This suggests the kind of doing that is pleasurable, that is better than leisure, and which an assured income cannot stop. It often happens that a man’s work borders on this kind of activity. He is a teacher and loves his profession, but in order to do his work satisfactorily he ought to have time for independent study and research. If there were fewer papers to correct, a little less routine, he might have time for original work which would leaven all the rest. Or perhaps he is a draftsman working all day at monotonous tasks, but amid surroundings that inspire him to do some work on his own account, and to grow in his profession. The wide-awake, educated woman has it in her power frequently to become conversant with her husband’s work, to lessen his drudgery, and, having saved him a little time for original work, to make it go further than it otherwise would because of her intelligent coöperation and assistance.

If living consists in being healthy, in enjoying the pleasures of the senses, in learning, in doing, and in loving, modern man stands a better chance of living than his predecessor did. The reasons are many, and not the least of them is the fact that his wife lives more.

Nor is the end in sight. If women’s opportunities to prepare themselves for and to enter upon careers unconnected with the home multiply in the future as they have in the past, men may be called upon to adjust themselves to much more radical changes. But the indications are that these changes will offer to them further opportunities for the expression of disinterested affection and larger lives through the expansion of the lives of those they love.

MORE LIFE FOR THE HOUSEHOLD EMPLOYEE

“I will accept nothing which all cannot have their counterpart of on the same terms.” In these words of Walt Whitman’s can all of us who cherish the democratic ideal of equality of privilege and opportunity express our feelings with regard to domestic service, for when we are able to rise above the trials and tribulations that the institution brings to ourselves and to look upon it from an impersonal point of view, we find that the chief source of our dissatisfaction with it is in the fact that it gives benefits to one class by taking their counterpart from another.

The popular toleration of domestic service is due to a misapplication of the theory that the family is the unit of society. This theory has, in the past, played an important part in social evolution by calling attention to and emphasizing the family relation. It has, however, led to many undemocratic practices. This has been not so much because of anything wrong with the theory, as because it has not been supported by a clear conception of the value of the individual life. Thus unsupported, it has, by allowing itself to become entangled with the theory that man is the logical representative of the family in society, taken from woman the incentive to, and the opportunity for, independent action, and has also been responsible for the grossest infringements of her property rights. Thus unsupported, too, it has, by emphasizing the family as an institution, rather than the right of the individual to the family relation, led to the condoning of the maintenance of certain families at the expense of the freedom of individuals to enter into the family relation. Thus in slave times the family connections of the blacks were ruthlessly shattered in order to provide the service that was thought necessary to preserve the family life of the whites.

A better working theory, and one that is less likely to lead to undemocratic practices, is the one that sees in the individual the unit, and in the family relation one of the most important means for promoting his happiness and social usefulness. Such a view of the value of the individual and of the importance of the family relation leads logically to the conception of the obligation of the individual who accepts the privileges of the family relation so to adjust his life to the lives of the other members of his family group as to preserve their individual freedom, and to coöperate with them in the effort so to adjust the group to the social order as not to interfere with the freedom of other individuals to enter into and to maintain the family relation.

In the light of this view of society, domestic service looms up most undemocratic. It is so ordered as to bring a combination of benefits to a privileged class. This combination consists of the opportunity to live in retirement with those to whom they are bound by kinship or affection or by both, and thus to transform the places where they eat and sleep into homes, and the privilege of getting rid of the multiple activities which the maintenance of separate homes involves, the cooking, cleaning, etc., and of being able to engage in activities of their choice, and to secure leisure for social intercourse.

This combination of privileges is at present secured at the expense of a corresponding combination of privileges in the serving class. The result is three distinct disabilities for this class. The first, which arises from the fact that the domestic servant has not free choice of residence, and must accept the external form of home where her employer has his real home, may be called ethical, because its most serious result is that it takes from her the opportunity for moral development that comes from home-making. The second is industrial, and arises from the fact that she must offer in exchange for wages no particular services, but her entire time, to be disposed of as her employer sees fit. The third, which arises from her intimate personal relation to her employer, is social, and results in the determination of her position in society, not by her worth nor by her qualifications for social intercourse, but by her position as a member of the serving class.

These three disabilities on the part of the servants react on the employers, and bring them three forms of inconvenience. The first is a feeling of responsibility for the sex relations of the employee, a responsibility that is not felt with reference to those with whom the relation is a purely business one, such as the butcher, the grocer, the seamstress.

The second is the difficulty of making the servants “know and keep their places.” This leads at times to such serious dilemmas as the one in which the man found himself who appealed to Marion Harland, through her queries column in one of the daily papers, to know whether he ought to recognize his family servant on the street, and if so, whether he ought to lift his hat or merely to nod his head. One can imagine this poor man staying closely within his office on Thursday afternoons, if Marion Harland was not prompt with her reply, for fear that if he ventured forth upon the street he might on turning a corner come suddenly upon his household helper, and, being still unsupplied with a code of etiquette, not know how to conduct himself.

The third inconvenience to the employer is the lack in the servant of personal responsibility for good work, the inevitable result of time service.

To remove these three disabilities from the employee and the three inconveniences from the employer, certain changes in household administration must be made. First, the relation of mistress and servant must be changed to the more democratic one of employer and employee. Second, the work of the household must be so arranged as to allow a person to perform one service, such as cleaning, for many families, instead of many services for one family. Third, the work done in the home must be reduced, and then compressed within the limits of a reasonable working day, in order that it may not interfere with the home life of the employee.

For these modifications in household administration the changes that are going on outside of the home are paving the way. Public education is removing the stigma from domestic service by refusing to recognize class distinctions in the distribution of its benefits. Commerce, industry, science, and art are coöperating to reduce the amount of work necessarily done in the home.

Central plants for the distribution of hot water for heating, cleaning, and bathing purposes are now in use in many places. One city, Colorado Springs, is said to be considering the construction of a central pneumatic cleaning plant. Central refrigerating plants are practicable.

Commercial changes are continually making it possible to buy commodities which it was formerly necessary to prepare at home. This has been referred to so often that it need only be mentioned here, although it is one of the most important of the social changes that are affecting the conditions of home life. Improved methods of transportation are bringing us fresh fruit all the year around, and thus reducing the work of preserving and of making desserts. Industrial changes are making it possible to have performed outside of the home services like laundry work, mending, and carpet cleaning, which it used to be necessary to include in household labor.

Advances in medical science are putting nursing on the plane of the professions, and making the hospital seem a better place than the private house for the care of the sick. Hygienic considerations make it seem wise that maternity cases also be cared for in hospitals.

Advances in sanitary science are making it not only desirable, but possible, to transfer one whole class of duties from the housekeeper and her assistants to the individual members of the family. These are connected with the care of the bedroom and its furnishings. Now that it seems best that each person should have a separate sleeping room, and now that knowledge of hygiene is available for all, there is no reason why every able-bodied adult should not assume full charge of his own room, having it cleaned and changing bedclothes and towels as often as he thinks necessary considering the state of his health, the amount of sun that his room receives, and the amount of dust to which it is exposed.

Kindergartens are continually taking children at a younger age. Clubrooms are being made available for private entertainments.

Art is lightening household labor by teaching a better way in house decoration and furnishing. By teaching form, color, and design it is showing that a good color on the wall, which, being vertical, sheds the dust by reason of the force of gravity, may give so much esthetic satisfaction as to take away the necessity for many of our dust-entrapping decorations; that one piece of pottery of good color and form may please the eye more than a whole mantel shelf full of nondescript articles of bric-a-brac; that plain furniture of good form may be more beautiful than that which is covered with carving and brass filigree. Plain, substantial furniture and simplicity in decoration are not only lessening work, but are making it more practicable to turn houses over to professional cleaners.

Another change should be mentioned which, though at first thought it seems to have little connection with household management, may prove to be of much significance. This change has come about through the fact that the time of preparation necessary for the professions is continually lengthening. The result of this is that there is in college towns (and with the spread of university extension and of correspondence study there is coming to be in other towns) a class of young people who are still studying, but who must and should support themselves. The young men of this class now take care of furnaces, beat rugs, and perform other such services. The young women take care of children. If it were not for the popular feeling with respect to housework, they might be employed in many other ways. There is a whole class of tasks, like the cleaning of silver, the making of beds, and the serving of meals, which require less skill and experience than cooking and less strength than the heavy cleaning. These, as Lucy Maynard Salmon says in “Domestic Service,” are frequently not well performed, yet, on the other hand, they involve no principles which an intelligent person cannot master in a very short time. After the principles have been learned the tasks become only light routine work, suitable for relaxation after brain work. These tasks might be given to the students referred to above with profit both to themselves and to housekeepers.

The changes of which mention has been made, particularly the commercial and industrial ones, have been due chiefly to man’s enterprise. This is because man’s life has given him a broad and general view of society and its needs which woman’s life has not given to her, and because his position as breadwinner has given him an incentive to anticipate human demands and to meet them with business ventures, an incentive which woman’s position as housekeeper has not given to her. Woman is now, however, fast getting the far view, and has the advantage of having also the intimate view of human needs which she has secured through her care of the family. So it is happening that while man is going on ahead and initiating great changes, woman is following close behind and directing the changes into channels which lead to the satisfaction of real human needs. Thus men, by establishing great bakeries, showed the economic advantage of having bread made in large quantities. Women, like Mrs. Brainard, of Chicago, who started the Home Delicacies Company, have followed after and shown that man’s methods could be employed in making bread that meets the demands of taste and health. Men, by establishing public laundries, showed the economic advantage of having the laundry work removed from the home. It was left for women, like the Misses White, of Brookline, Massachusetts, who started the Sunshine Laundry, to show that public laundries could make clothes really clean, and at the same time preserve them for the future use of their owners (a point which all who patronize laundries will appreciate).

This control of changes woman must continue to exercise. She must also accept the task of adjusting household work to the social changes that have already taken place. For this double work she is well prepared. As an individual she can make the adjustments in her own home. As a club member she can, in coöperation with other women, look after the social work.

She can, through her clubs, establish residence clubs where household employees can live in comparative freedom, public kitchens from which food can be sent to be served in private houses, and in which the workers will be on the same footing as the workers in any other trade, bureaus from which special helpers can be sent to work by the day or hour, and public nurseries which shall combine the bacteriological cleanliness of hospitals with the educational advantages of kindergartens. Women’s clubs are particularly well prepared to do these things, first because failure would mean no serious loss to any individual, and second, because the members are intelligent enough to make their failures as well as their successes of benefit to those who come after them, an important consideration in all progressive work.

Besides this public work, woman can arrange the work in her own home so as to give her helper a limited day’s work--of ten hours, say--and thus make her free to choose her own place of residence. This she may do by preparing her own breakfast and employing her helper from ten in the morning until eight at night, or by going out for her evening meal and employing the helper from six in the morning until four in the afternoon, or in some one of the numberless ways which special conditions will suggest. Or she can make such adjustments as shall make it possible for her to employ special helpers. In this her greatest difficulty will probably arise from the fact that one helper cannot perform the same service in several places at the same time, and the housekeeper’s time schedule will have to be changed. It will require an effort for her to realize in her conduct that difference between disorder and dirt which she recognizes with her intellect, and to act upon the belief that delay in dishwashing involves disorder, but not necessarily uncleanliness, and that beds left open in the sun for many hours are really cleaner than those which are closed up early in the morning.

With cooking done in public kitchens, with washing done in public laundries, with cleaning done by specialists, with the individual members of the family taking charge of their own rooms, with hospitals to care for the sick, and with public nurseries and kindergartens to help with the care of babies and young children, there would still be left certain connecting links of work even in families employing regular helpers for a limited number of hours each day. It is these odds and ends that the various members of the family will have to accept as their tasks and perform in payment for the privilege of preserving family life without shattering democratic ideals.