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Title: Domestic service
Second edition: with an additional chapter on domestic service in Europe
Author: Lucy Maynard Salmon
Release date: June 26, 2024 [eBook #73921]
Language: English
Original publication: New York: The MacMillan Company, 1897
Credits: The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DOMESTIC SERVICE ***
DOMESTIC SERVICE
[Illustration]
DOMESTIC SERVICE
BY
LUCY MAYNARD SALMON
_SECOND EDITION_
WITH AN ADDITIONAL CHAPTER ON DOMESTIC
SERVICE IN EUROPE
New York
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., LTD.
1901
_All rights reserved_
COPYRIGHT, 1897,
BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.
Set up and electrotyped February, 1897. Revised edition
printed March, 1901.
Norwood Press
J. S. Cushing & Co.—Berwick & Smith
Norwood, Mass. U.S.A.
“The reform that applies itself to the household must not be partial. It
must correct the whole system of our social living. It must come with
plain living and high thinking; it must break up caste, and put domestic
service on another foundation. It must come in connection with a true
acceptance by each man of his vocation,—not chosen by his parents or
friends, but by his genius, with earnestness and love.”
EMERSON.
PREFACE
The basis of the following discussion of the subject of domestic service
is the information obtained through a series of blanks sent out during
the years 1889 and 1890. Three schedules were prepared—one for employers,
one for employees, and one asking for miscellaneous information in
regard to the Woman’s Exchange, the teaching of household employments,
and kindred subjects.[1] These schedules were submitted for criticism
to several gentlemen prominent in statistical investigation, and after
revision five thousand sets were distributed. These were sent out in
packages containing from five to twenty-five sets through the members
of the Classes of 1888 and 1889, Vassar College, and single sets were
mailed, with a statement of the object of the work, to the members of
different associations presumably interested in such investigations.
These were the American Statistical Association, the American Economic
Association, the Association of Collegiate Alumnæ, the Vassar Alumnæ, and
the women graduates of the University of Michigan. They were also sent
to various women’s clubs, and many were distributed at the request of
persons interested in the work.
Of the five thousand sets of blanks thus sent out, 1025 were returned
filled out by employers, twenty being received after the tabulation
was completed. These gave the facts asked for with reference to 2545
employees. The returns received from employers thus bore about the same
proportion to the blanks distributed as do the returns received in
ordinary statistical investigation carried on without the aid of special
agents or legal authority. The reasons why a larger number were not
returned are the same as are found in all such inquiries, with a few
peculiar to the nature of the case. The occupation investigated is one
that does not bring either employer or employee into immediate contact
with others in the same occupation, and it is therefore believed that the
relations between employer and employee are purely personal, and thus not
a proper subject for statistical inquiry. Another reason assigned was the
fear that the agitation of the subject would cause employees to become
dissatisfied, while a third reason was the large number of questions
included in the blanks, and the fact that no immediate and possibly no
remote benefit would accrue to those filling them out. Another reason
frequently assigned was that all of the questions could not be answered,
and that, therefore, replies to others could not be of service. Several
of the questions, however, were framed with the understanding that in
many cases they could not be definitely answered; as the question, “How
many servants have you employed since you have been housekeeping?” The
fact that often no reply could be given, was as significant of the
condition of the service as a detailed statement could have been.
No success had been anticipated in securing replies from employees; but
as any study of domestic service would be incomplete without looking
at it from this point of view, the attempt was made. As a result, 719
blanks were returned filled out. In some instances employees, hearing of
the inquiry, wrote for schedules and returned them answered. In a few
cases correspondence was carried on with women who had formerly been
in domestic service. The influences that operated to prevent employers
from answering the inquiries made had even greater force in the case of
employees. In addition, there was present a hesitation to commit anything
to writing, or to sign a name to a document the import of which was not
clearly understood by them.
The limited amount of information that could be given explains the small
number of returns received to the third schedule,—about two hundred.
The returns received were sent to the Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics
of Labor, where, by the courtesy of the chief of the bureau, they
were collated during the spring and summer of 1890, under the special
direction of the chief clerk, in accordance with a previously arranged
scheme of tables. The general plan of arrangement adopted was to class
the schedules with reference to employers, first alphabetically by
states and towns, and second alphabetically by population. The schedules
were then classed with reference to employees, first by men and women,
and second by place of birth. The various statistical devices used in
the Massachusetts Bureau were employed in tabulating the material, and
greatly facilitated the work.
Fifty large tables were thus prepared, and by various combinations
numerous smaller ones were made. The classification thus adopted made it
possible to give all the results either in a general form or with special
reference to men and women employees, the native born and the foreign
born, and to all of the branches of the service. It was also possible to
study the conditions of the service geographically, and with reference to
the population and to other industrial situations.
The most detailed tables made out concerned the wage question, including
a presentation of classified wages, average wages with the percentage
of employees receiving the same wages as the average, and also more or
less than the average, a comparison of wages paid at different times
and of wages received in domestic service and in other employments.
For the purposes of comparison, the writer also classified the
salaries paid to about six thousand teachers in the public schools in
sixteen representative cities, as indicated by the reports of city
superintendents for the year during which information concerning domestic
service had been given on the schedules. Through the courtesy of a large
employment bureau in Boston, the wages received by nearly three thousand
employees were ascertained and used for comparison. The most valuable
results of the investigation possibly were those growing out of the
consensus of opinion obtained from employers and employees regarding the
nature of the service considered as an occupation. The greater proportion
of these tables can be found in Chapter V.
The question must naturally arise as to how far the returns received
through such investigation can be considered representative. It
has seemed to the writer that they could be considered fairly so.
Investigations of this character must always be considered typical
rather than comprehensive. It is difficult to fix the exact number to
be considered typical as between a partial investigation and a census
which is exhaustive. In some cases it is possible to obtain a majority
in numbers, in others it is not. If the number of returns, however,
passes the point where it would be considered trivial, the number between
this and the majority may perhaps be regarded as representative. By the
application of a similar principle, the expression at the polls of the
wishes of the twentieth part of the inhabitants of a state is recognized
as the will of the majority. But, while the returns can be considered
only fairly representative as regards numbers, they seem entirely so as
regards conditions. It is believed that every possible condition under
which domestic service exists, as regards both employer and employee, is
represented by the returns received, and that, therefore, the conclusions
drawn from these results cannot be wholly unreasonable. Moreover, the
circulars were sent out practically at random, and, therefore, do not
represent any particular class in society, except the class sufficiently
interested in the subject to answer the questions asked. If the returns
thus secured can be regarded in any sense as representative, the results
based on them may be considered as indicating certain general conditions
and tendencies, although the conclusions reached may be modified by later
and fuller researches.
The question must also arise as to what it is hoped will be accomplished
through this investigation. It is not expected that all, or even any
one of the perplexing questions connected with domestic service will be
even partially answered by it; it is not expected that any individual
housekeeper will have less trouble to-morrow than to-day in adjusting the
difficulties arising in her household; it will not enable any employer
whose incompetent cook leaves to-day without warning to secure an
efficient one without delay. It is hoped, however, that the tabulation
and presentation of the facts will afford a broader basis for general
discussion that has been possible without them, that a knowledge of the
conditions of domestic service beyond their own localities and households
will enable some housekeepers in time to decide more easily the economic
questions arising within every home, that it will do a little something
to stimulate discussion of the subject on other bases than the purely
personal one. The hope has also come that writers on economic theory
and economic conditions will recognize the place of domestic service
among other industries, and will give to the public the results of their
scientific investigations of the subject, that the great bureaus of
labor—always ready to anticipate any demand of the public—will recognize
a demand for facts in this field of work.
The writer has followed the presentation of facts by a theoretical
discussion of doubtful and possible remedies. But if fuller and more
searching official investigation, establishing a substantial basis for
discussion, should point to conclusions entirely at variance with those
here given, no one would more heartily rejoice than herself. It may
reasonably be said that in view of the character of the investigation
no conclusions at all should have been advanced by the investigator.
Three things, however, seemed to justify the intrusion of personal
views; a recognition of the prevalent anxiety to find a way out of
existing difficulties, a belief that improvement can come only as each
one is willing to make some contribution to the general discussion, and
a conviction that no one should criticise existing conditions unless
prepared to suggest others that may be substituted for them.
The following discussion would have been impossible without the hearty
co-operation of the thousand and more employers and the seven hundred
employees who filled out the schedules distributed. The great majority
of these were personally unknown to the writer, and she can express only
in this public way her deep appreciation of their kindness, as she also
wishes to do to the many friends, known and unknown, who assisted in
distributing the schedules. She also desires to express her obligation
to the Hon. Carroll D. Wright, for help received in preparing the
schedules and for the receipt of advance sheets from the Census of
1890; to the Hon. Horace G. Wadlin and Mr. Charles F. Pidgin, for the
courtesies extended at the Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor,
and also to Professor Davis R. Dewey, of the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology; to Dean Marion Talbot of the University of Chicago,
and to Professor Mary Roberts Smith, of the Leland Stanford Junior
University; to Mrs. John Wilkinson of Chicago, Mrs. John H. Converse
of Philadelphia, and Mrs. Helen Hiscock Backus of Brooklyn, for their
constant encouragement and assistance in the work. Most of all the writer
is under obligation to Miss A. Underhill for her assistance in reading
both the manuscript and the proof of the work, and for the preparation of
the Index.
Articles bearing on the subject have at different times appeared in
the _Papers of the American Statistical Association_, _The New England
Magazine_, _The Cosmopolitan_, and _The Forum_. These have been freely
used in the work, and the writer acknowledges the courtesy of the
publishers and editors of these periodicals in allowing this use of her
papers.
JANUARY 18, 1897.
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION
It has seemed advisable in sending out a second edition of this work
to add a supplementary chapter on the condition of domestic service
in Europe. This is based largely on the inquiries made in season and
out of season at different times during the past ten years of heads of
households and of housekeepers in England, France, Germany, and Italy.
It has naturally been impossible to sum up in a single chapter the mass
of information thus gleaned, but a few features common to all of these
countries have been indicated, as well as some peculiar to each. The
literature bearing directly on the subject is very meagre, but a few
titles have been indicated.
For information bearing on this part of the work, I am under special
obligation to M. Levasseur of Paris, to Miss Collet of the Labor
Department of the Board of Trade, London, to Miss E. M. Hall of Rome,
to Professor Victor Böhmert, recently of the Royal Statistical Bureau,
Dresden, and to Mrs. J. H. W. Stuckenberg of Cambridge, recently of
Berlin.
JANUARY, 1901.
CONTENTS
PAGE
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
Frequency of discussion of domestic service 1
Personal character of the discussion 2
Omission of the subject from economic discussion 2
General reasons for this omission 2
Specific reasons for this omission 4
Fundamental reason for this omission 5
Can this omission be justified? 6
CHAPTER II
HISTORICAL ASPECTS OF DOMESTIC EMPLOYMENTS
Condition of industries in the eighteenth century 7
Inventions of the latter part of the century 7
Immediate result of these inventions 8
Co-operating influences 8
Effect of inventions on household employments 9
Release of work from the household 9
Diversion of labor from the household to other places 10
Results of this diversion to other places 11
Diversion of labor from the household into other channels 11
Household labor becomes idle labor 12
Outlets for idle labor 12
General result of change of work in the household 13
Division of labor in the household only partial 13
Interdependence of all industries 15
CHAPTER III
DOMESTIC SERVICE DURING THE COLONIAL PERIOD
Domestic service has a history 16
Three periods of this history 16
The colonial period 16
Classes of servants during this period 17
Early reasons for colonizing America 17
Advantage to England of disposing of her undesirable population 17
Protests against this method of settlement 18
The freewillers 19
Proportion of redemptioners 20
Place of birth of redemptioners 20
Social condition of redemptioners 21
Methods of securing redemptioners 22
Form of indenture 22
Servants without indenture 22
Virginia law in regard to servants without indenture 23
Early condition of redemptioners 25
Subsequent improvement in condition 27
Wages of redemptioners 28
Legal regulation of wages 30
Character of service rendered by redemptioners 31
Service in Virginia 32
Service in Maine 33
Service in Massachusetts 34
Colonial legislation in regard to masters and servants 37
Laws for the protection of servants 38
Physical protection 39
Laws for the protection of masters 40
Laws in regard to runaways 40
Harboring runaways 41
Inducements to return runaways 43
Corporal punishment 44
Trading or bartering with servants 45
Miscellaneous laws protecting masters 46
Obligation of masters to community 47
Redemptioners after expiration of service 48
Indian servants 49
Negro slavery 51
General summary of character of service during the colonial period 52
CHAPTER IV
DOMESTIC SERVICE SINCE THE COLONIAL PERIOD
Second period in history of domestic service 54
Substitution for redemptioners of American “help” 54
Democratic condition of service 55
Observations of European travellers 55
Characteristics of the period 61
Third period in the history of domestic service 62
The Irish famine of 1846 62
The German revolution of 1848 63
Opening of treaty relations with China in 1844 64
Abolition of slavery in 1863 65
Effect of these movements on domestic service 65
Development of material resources 66
Effect of this on domestic service 67
Immobility of labor of women 68
Change in service indicated by history of the word “servant” 69
Early meaning of the word “servant” 69
Use of word “help” 70
Reintroduction of word “servant” 71
Impossibility of restoring previous conditions of service 72
CHAPTER V
ECONOMIC PHASES OF DOMESTIC SERVICE
Domestic service amenable to economic law 74
Many domestic employees of foreign birth 74
Geographical distribution of foreign born employees 75
Concentration of foreign born women in remunerative occupations
on domestic service 77
The foreign born seek the large cities 77
Foreign countries having the largest representation in large cities 78
Foreign countries having the largest representation in domestic
service 78
Conclusion in regard to foreign born domestic employees 80
General distribution of domestic employees 80
Domestic employees few in agricultural states 80
The number large in states with large urban population 80
The number not affected by aggregate wealth 82
The number somewhat affected by per capita wealth 82
Domestic employees found in largest numbers in large cities 83
Proportion of domestic employees varies with geographical location
and prevailing industry 84
Neither aggregate nor per capita wealth determines number of
domestic employees in cities 86
Prevailing industry of city determines number of domestic servants 87
Competition for domestics between wealth and manufacturing industries 88
Wages in domestic service 88
Conformity of wages to general economic conditions 89
Skilled labor commands higher wages than unskilled labor 89
The skilled laborer a better workman than the unskilled 90
The foreign born receive higher wages than the native born 91
Men receive higher wages in domestic service than women 92
Tendency towards increase in wages 93
Comparison of wages in domestic service with wages of women in
other occupations 93
High wages in domestic service do not counterbalance advantages
in other occupations 103
Domestic service offers few opportunities for promotion 103
Time unemployed in domestic service 104
High wages maintained without strikes 105
Conclusions in regard to wages in domestic service 106
Conclusions in regard to general economic conditions 106
CHAPTER VI
DIFFICULTIES IN DOMESTIC SERVICE FROM THE STANDPOINT OF THE EMPLOYER
Conditions of the average family 107
Difficulties in domestic service 108
Prevalence of foreign born employees 108
Restlessness among employees 109
Employment in skilled labor of unskilled laborers 112
Difficulty in changing employees 114
Recommendations of employers 114
The employment bureau 115
Indifference of employers to economic law 117
Illustrations of this indifference 117
Difference between the employers of domestic labor and other
employers 121
Difficulties considered are not personal 122
Difficulties not decreasing 125
Difficulties not confined to America 127
The question in England 127
Condition of service in Germany 128
Service in France 129
Summary of difficulties 129
CHAPTER VII
ADVANTAGES IN DOMESTIC SERVICE
Personnel in domestic service 130
Reasons why women enter domestic service 131
High wages 131
Occupation healthful 132
It gives externals of home life 133
Special home privileges 133
Free time during the week 134
Annual vacations 135
Knowledge of household affairs 137
Congenial employment 137
Legal protection 138
Summary of advantages 138
CHAPTER VIII
THE INDUSTRIAL DISADVANTAGES OF DOMESTIC SERVICE
Reasons why women do not choose domestic service 140
No opportunity for promotion 141
Work in itself not difficult 142
“Housework is never done” 142
Lack of organization 143
Irregularity of working hours 143
Work required evenings and Sundays 146
Competition with the foreign born and negroes 146
Lack of independence 147
Summary of industrial disadvantages 149
CHAPTER IX
THE SOCIAL DISADVANTAGES OF DOMESTIC SERVICE
Lack of home life 151
Lack of social opportunities 152
Lack of intellectual opportunities 153
Badges of social inferiority 154
Use of word “servant” 155
The Christian name in address 156
The cap and apron 157
Acknowledgment of social inferiority 158
Giving of fees 158
Objections to feeing system 159
Excuses made for it 161
Other phases of social inferiority 162
Social inferiority overbalances industrial advantages of the
occupation 163
Comparison of advantages and disadvantages of the occupation 165
CHAPTER X
DOUBTFUL REMEDIES
Difference of opinion in regard to remedies possible 167
General principles to be applied 168
The golden rule 169
Capability and intelligence of employer 170
Receiving the employee into the family life of the employer 170
Importation of negroes from the South 172
Importation of Chinese 176
Granting of licenses 177
German service books 178
Convention of housekeepers 179
Abolishing the public school system 179
“Servant Reform Association” 179
Training schools for servants 180
Advantages of such schools 180
Practical difficulties in the way 182
Not in harmony with present conditions 184
Co-operative housekeeping 186
Advantages of the plan 187
Objections to it 188
Practical difficulties in carrying it out 190
Co-operative boarding 191
Objections to the plan 192
Mr. Bellamy’s plan 192
Reasons for considering these proposed measures impracticable 193
CHAPTER XI
POSSIBLE REMEDIES—GENERAL PRINCIPLES
Remedies must take into account past and present conditions 194
Industrial tendencies 194
Concentration of capital and labor 194
Specialization of labor 195
Associations for mutual benefit 195
Specialization of education 195
Profit sharing 196
Industrial independence of women 196
Helping persons to help themselves 196
Publicity in business affairs 197
The question at issue 198
Impossibility of finding a panacea 199
General measures 199
Truer theoretical conception of place of household employments 199
A more just estimate of their practical importance 200
Removal of prejudice against housework 201
Correction of misconceptions in regard to remuneration for women’s
work 201
Summary of general principles 203
CHAPTER XII
POSSIBLE REMEDIES—IMPROVEMENT IN SOCIAL CONDITION
Social disadvantages 204
Possibility of removing them 204
Provision for social enjoyment 205
Abolishing the word “servant” 207
Disuse of the Christian name in address 209
Regulation of use of the cap and apron 209
Abandoning of servility of manner 210
Principles involved in freeing domestic service from social
objections 211
CHAPTER XIII
POSSIBLE REMEDIES—SPECIALIZATION OF HOUSEHOLD EMPLOYMENTS
Putting household employments on a business basis 212
Articles formerly made only in the household 212
Articles in a transitional state 213
Articles now usually made in the house 213
Removal of work from the household 215
This change in line with industrial development 215
Indications of its ultimate prevalence 216
The Woman’s Exchange 217
The opening up to women of a new occupation 218
Ultimate preparation of most articles of food outside of the
individual home 219
Advantages of this plan 219
Objections raised to it 221
These objections not valid 221
Laundry work done out of the house 222
Advantages of the plan 223
Possibility of having work done by the hour, day, or piece 223
Improved method of purchasing household supplies 225
Operation of unconscious business co-operation 226
General advantages of specialization of household employments 228
Objections raised to the plan 230
These objections not valid 231
Illustrations of success of the plan 233
CHAPTER XIV
POSSIBLE REMEDIES—PROFIT SHARING
Industrial disadvantages of domestic service 235
Industrial difficulties in other occupations still unsettled 236
Possible relief through profit sharing 236
Definition of profit sharing 236
History of profit sharing 237
Advantages of profit sharing in other occupations 237
Lessons to be learned from profit sharing 240
Domestic service wealth consuming rather than wealth producing 240
The wage system not satisfactory in the occupation 241
Application of the principle of profit sharing to the household 242
Advantages of the plan in the household 244
Its advantages in hotels, restaurants, and railroad service 244
Substitution of profit sharing for fees 244
Objections to profit sharing in the household 245
These objections do not hold 246
Experiments in profit sharing in the household 248
CHAPTER XV
POSSIBLE REMEDIES—EDUCATION IN HOUSEHOLD AFFAIRS
Lack of information one obstacle in the household 251
Difference between information and education 251
What is included in information 251
Difficulty of obtaining information in regard to the household 252
Advance in other occupations through publicity of all information
gained 252
What is included in education 252
Information and education necessary in the household 254
Progress hindered through lack of these 254
Cause of inactivity in household affairs 254
Assumption that knowledge of the household comes by instinct 254
Assumption that household affairs concern only women 256
Belief that all women have genius for household affairs 257
Theory that household affairs are best learned at home 258
Tendencies in the opposite direction 259
Establishment of school of investigation 259
Necessity for investigation before progress can be made 260
CHAPTER XVI
CONCLUSION
Summary of points considered 263
Failure to recognize industrial character of domestic service 264
Conservatism of women 264
Summary of difficulties 265
Explanation of difficulties 265
Responsibility of all employers 266
Results to be expected from investigation 266
Removal of social stigma 266
Simplification of manner of life 267
Household employments on a business basis 268
Profit sharing 268
Investigation of household affairs 269
Readjustment of work of both men and women 270
Difficulty of dealing with women as an economic factor 270
Advantages of their working for remuneration 272
Division of labor in the household 272
Reform possible only through use of existing means 273
General conclusion 274
CHAPTER XVII
DOMESTIC SERVICE IN EUROPE
Opinion held in America 275
Ideal service not found in Europe 275
Influences that affect the question 276
External conditions that affect the question 277
Architecture a factor in the problem 277
Difficulties of the European employer 278
Advantages of service in Europe 280
Baking and laundry done out of the house 280
Legal contracts in Germany 281
The German service book 284
Employment of men 286
Wages in domestic service in Europe 288
Supplementary fees and profits 290
Allowances 292
Insurance 292
Difficulty of determining exact wages 293
Character of the service 294
Other factors affecting the question 295
Social condition of the employee 296
In England 297
In France 299
In Italy 299
Benefactions for servants in Germany 299
Conclusion 301
APPENDIX I. Copy of schedules distributed 305
APPENDIX II. List of places from which replies to schedules
were received 314
APPENDIX III. Circular sent out by the social science section
of the Civic Club of Philadelphia 315
BIBLIOGRAPHY 317
INDEX 323
DOMESTIC SERVICE
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
Domestic service has been called “the great American question.” If based
on the frequency of its discussion in popular literature, foundation for
this judgment exists. Few subjects have attracted greater attention,
but its consideration has been confined to four general classes of
periodicals, each treating it from a different point of view. The popular
magazine article is theoretical in character, and often proposes remedies
for existing evils without sufficient consideration of the causes of the
difficulty. Household journals and the home departments of the secular
and the religious press usually treat only of the personal relations
existing between mistress and maid. The columns of the daily press
given to “occasional correspondents” contain narrations of personal
experiences. The humorous columns of the daily and the illustrated weekly
papers caricature, on the one side, the ignorance and helplessness of the
housekeeper, and, on the other side, the insolence and presumption of the
servant. In addition to this, in many localities it has passed into a
common proverb that, among housekeepers, with whatever topic conversation
begins, it sooner or later gravitates towards the one fixed point of
domestic service, while among domestic employees it is none the less
certain that other phases of the same general subject are agitated.
This popular discussion, which has assumed so many forms, has been almost
exclusively personal in character. A somewhat different aspect of the
case is presented when the problem is stated to be “as momentous as
that of capital and labor, and as complicated as that of individualism
and socialism.” This statement suggests that economic principles are
involved, but the question of domestic service has been almost entirely
omitted, not without reason, from theoretical, statistical, and
historical discussions of economic problems. It has been omitted from
theoretical discussions mainly because: (1) the occupation does not
involve the investment of a large amount of capital on the part of the
individual employer or employee; it therefore seems to be excluded from
theoretical discussions of the relations of capital, wages, and labor;
(2) no combinations have yet been formed among employers or employees;
it is therefore exempt from such speculations as are involved in the
consideration of trusts, monopolies, and trade unions; (3) the products
of domestic service are more transient than are the results of other
forms of labor; this fact must determine somewhat its relative position
in economic discussion. Its exclusion, as a rule, from the statistical
presentations of the labor question is also not surprising. The various
bureaus of labor, both national and state, consider only those subjects
for the investigation of which there is a recognized demand. They are the
leaders of public opinion in the accumulation of facts, but they are
its followers as regards the choice of questions to be studied. Public
opinion has not yet demanded a scientific treatise on domestic service,
and until it does the bureaus of labor cannot be expected to supply the
material for such discussion.[2] Again, it is not surprising that the
historical side of the subject has been overlooked, since household
employments have been passive recipients, not active participants, in
the industrial development of the past century. Yet it must be said that
this negative consideration of the subject by theoretical, practical,
and historical economists, and the positive treatment accorded it by
popular writers, seems an unfair and unscientific disposition to make of
an occupation in which by the Census of 1890 one and a half millions of
persons are actively engaged,[3] to whom employers pay annually at the
lowest rough estimate in cash wages more than $218,000,000,[4] for whose
support they pay at the lowest estimate an equal amount,[5] and through
whose hands passes so large a part of the finished products of other
forms of labor.[6]
It is not difficult, however, to find reasons, in addition to the
specific ones suggested, for this somewhat cavalier treatment of domestic
service. The nature of the service rendered, as well as the relation
between employer and employee, is largely personal; it is believed
therefore that all questions involved in the subject can be considered
and settled from the personal point of view. It follows from this fact
that it is extremely difficult to ascertain the actual condition of the
service outside of a single family, or, at best, a locality very narrow
in extent, and therefore that it is almost impossible to treat the
subject in a comprehensive manner. It follows as a result of the two
previous reasons that domestic service has never been considered a part
of the great labor question, and that it has not been supposed to be
affected by the political, social, and industrial development of the past
century as other occupations have been.
These various explanations of the failure to consider domestic service in
connection with other forms of labor are in reality but different phases
of a fundamental reason—the isolation that has always attended household
service and household employments. From the fact that other occupations
are largely the result of association and combination they court
investigation and the fullest and freest discussion of their underlying
principles and their influence on each other. Household service, since
it is based on the principle of isolation, is regarded as an affair of
the individual with which the public at large has no concern. Other forms
of industry are anxious to call to their assistance all the legislative,
administrative, and judicial powers of the nation, all the forces that
religion, philanthropy, society itself can exert in their behalf. The
great majority of housekeepers, if the correspondent of a leading journal
is to be trusted, “do not require outside assistance in the management
of their affairs, and consequently resent any interference in the
administration of their duties.”
The question must arise, however, in view of the interdependence of
all other forms of industry, whether it is possible to maintain this
perfect separation with regard to any one employment, whether household
employments are justified in resenting any intrusion into their domain,
whether the individual employer is right in considering household
service exclusively a personal affair. An answer to the question may
be of help in deciding whether the difficulties that are found in the
present system of domestic service arise in every case necessarily from
the personal relations which exist between employer and employee, or are
largely due to economic conditions over which the individual employer
has no control. Still further, the conclusions reached must determine
somewhat the nature of the forces to be set in motion to lessen these
difficulties.
CHAPTER II
HISTORICAL ASPECTS OF DOMESTIC EMPLOYMENTS
It is impossible to understand the condition of domestic service as
it exists to-day without a cursory glance at the changes in household
employments resulting from the inventions of the latter part of the
eighteenth century. These changes, unlike many others, came apparently
without warning. At the middle of the last century steam was a plaything,
electricity a curiosity of the laboratory, and wind and water the only
known motive powers. From time immemorial the human hand unaided, except
by the simplest machinery, had clothed the world. Iron could be smelted
only with wood, and the English parliament had seriously discussed
the suppression of the iron trade as the only means of preserving
the forests. But during the last third of the century the brilliant
inventions of Hargreaves, Arkwright, Crompton, and Cartwright had
made possible the revolutionizing of all forms of cotton and woollen
industries; Watt had given a new motive power to the world; the uses of
coal had been multiplied, and soon after its mining rendered safe; while
a thousand supplementary inventions had followed quickly in the train of
these. A new era of inventive genius had dawned, which was to rival in
importance that of the fifteenth century.
The immediate result of these inventions was seen in the rapid
transference of all the processes of cotton and woollen manufactures
from the home of the individual weaver and spinner to large industrial
centres, the centralization of important interests in the hands of a
few, and a division of labor that multiplied indefinitely the results
previously accomplished.
But the factory system of manufactures that superseded the domestic
system of previous generations has not been the product of inventions
alone. It has been pointed out by Mr. Carroll D. Wright[7] that while
these inventions have been the material forces through which the
change was accomplished, other agencies co-operated with them. These
co-operating influences have been physical, as illustrated in the
discoveries of Watt; philosophical, as seen in the works of Adam Smith;
commercial, or the industrial supremacy of England considered as a
result of the loss of the American colonies; and philanthropical, or
those connected with the work of the Wesleys, John Howard, Hannah More,
and Wilberforce. All these acting in conjunction with the material
force—invention—have operated on manufacturing industries to produce the
factory system of to-day. It is, indeed, because the factory system is
the resultant of so many forces working in the past that it touches in
the present nearly every great economic, social, political, moral, and
philanthropic question.
Although comparatively few of these inventions have been intended
primarily to lessen household labor, this era of inventive activity
has not been without its effects on household employments. A hundred
years ago the household occupations carried on in the average family
included, in addition to whatever is now ordinarily done, every form of
spinning and weaving cotton, wool and flax, carpet weaving and making,
upholstering, knitting, tailoring, the making of boots, shoes, hats,
gloves, collars, cuffs, men’s underclothing, quilts, comfortables,
mattresses, and pillows; also, the making of soap, starch, candles,
yeast, perfumes, medicines, liniments, crackers, cheese, coffee-browning,
the drying of fruits and vegetables, and salting and pickling meat.
Every article in this list, which might be lengthened, can now be made
or prepared for use out of the house of the consumer, not only better
but more cheaply by the concentration of capital and labor in large
industrial enterprises. Moreover, as a result of other forms of inventive
genius, the so-called modern improvements have taken out of the ordinary
household many forms of hard and disagreeable labor. The use of kerosene,
gas, natural gas, and electricity[8] for all purposes of lighting, and to
a certain extent for heating and cooking; the adoption of steam-cleaning
for furniture and wearing apparel; the invention of the sewing-machine
and other labor-saving contrivances; the improvement of city and village
water-works, plumbing, heat-supplying companies, city and village
sanitation measures, including the collection of ashes and garbage,—these
are all the results of modern business enterprise.
These facts are familiar, but the effects more easily escape notice.
The change from individual to collective enterprises, from the domestic
to the factory system, has released a vast amount of labor formerly done
within the house by women with three results: either this labour has
been diverted to other places, or into other channels, or has become
idle. The tendency at first was for labor thus released to be diverted
to other places. The home spinners and weavers became the spinners and
weavers in factories, and later the home workers in other lines became
the operatives in other large establishments. As machinery became more
simple, women were employed in larger numbers, until now, in several
places and in several occupations, their numbers exceed those of men
employees.[9] This fact has materially changed the condition of affairs
within the household. Under the domestic system of manufactures nearly
all women spent part of their time in their own homes in spinning,
weaving, and the making of various articles of food and clothing in
connection with their more active household duties. When women came
to be employed in factories, the division of labor made necessary a
readjustment of work so that housekeeping duties were performed by one
person giving all her time to them instead of by several persons each
giving a part of her time. The tendency of this was at first naturally to
decrease the number of women partially employed in household duties, and
to increase the demand for women giving all their time to domestic work.
This readjustment of work in the home and in the factory brought also
certain other changes that have an important bearing. The first employees
were the daughters of farmers, tradesmen, teachers, and professional men
of limited means, women of sturdy, energetic New England character. They
were women who, in their own homes, had been the spinners and the weavers
for the family and who had sometimes eked out a slender income by doing
the same work in their homes for others disqualified for it. As machinery
was simplified, and new occupations more complex in character were opened
to women, their places were taken in factories by Irish immigrants as
these in turn have been displaced by the French Canadians. All these
changes in the personnel of factory operatives have meant that while much
labor has been taken out of the household, that which remained has been
performed by fewer hands, and also that women of foreign nationalities
have been pressed into household service.
Another and later result of the change from the domestic to the factory
system was the diversion of much of the labor at first performed within
the household into entirely different channels. The anti-slavery
agitation beginning about 1830 enlisted the energies of many women, and
the discussions growing out of it were undoubtedly the occasion for the
opening of entirely new occupations to them. Oberlin College was founded
in 1833 and Mount Holyoke Seminary in 1837, thus forming the entering
wedge for the entrance of women into higher educational work. Medical
schools for women were organized and professional life made possible,
while business interests began to attract the attention of many.
Another part of the labor released by mechanical inventions and
labor-saving contrivances became in time idle labor. By idle labor is
meant not only absolute idleness, but labor which is unproductive and
adds neither to the comfort nor to the intelligence of society. Work that
had previously been performed within the home without money remuneration
came to be considered unworthy of the same women when performed for
persons outside their own household and for a fixed compensation. The era
of so-called fancy-work, which includes all forms of work in hair, wax,
leather, beads, rice, feathers, cardboard, and canvas, so offensive to
the artistic sense of to-day, was one product of this labor released from
necessary productive processes. It was a necessary result because some
outlet was needed for the energies of women, society as yet demanded that
this outlet should be within the household, and the mechanical instincts
were strong while the artistic sense had not been developed. It is an era
not to be looked upon with derision, but as an interesting phase in the
history of the evolution of woman’s occupation.[10]
Still another channel for this idle labor was found in what has been
called “intellectual fancy-work.” Literary clubs and classes sprang up
and multiplied, affording occupation to their members, but producing
nothing and giving at first only the semblance of education and culture.
Many of them became in time a stimulus for more thorough systematic
work, but in their origin they were often but a manifestation of aimless
activity, of labor released from productive channels.
The era of inventions and resulting business activity has therefore
changed materially the condition of affairs within the household.
Before this time all women shared in preparing and cooking food; they
spun, wove, and made the clothing, and were domestic manufacturers in
the sense that they changed the raw material into forms suitable for
consumption. But modern inventions and the resulting change in the
system of manufactures, as has been seen, necessarily affected household
employments. The change has been the same in kind, though not in degree,
as has come in the occupations of men. In the last analysis every man
is a tiller of the soil, but division of labor has left only a small
proportion of men in this employment. So in the last analysis every
woman is a housekeeper who “does her own work,” but division of labor
has come into the household as well as into the field, though in a more
imperfect form. It has left many women in the upper and middle classes
unemployed, while many in the lower classes are too heavily burdened;
in three of the four great industries which absorb the energies of the
majority of women working for remuneration—manufacturing, work in shops,
and teaching—the supply of workers is greater than the demand, while in
the fourth—domestic service—the reverse is the case. But it cannot be
assumed that all of those in the first three classes have necessarily
been taken from the fourth class. It has been well said that “through the
introduction of machinery, ignorant labor is utilized, not created.” Many
who under the old order would have been able to live only under the most
primitive conditions, and whose labor can be used under the new order
only in the simplest forms of manufacturing, would be entirely unfit to
have the care of an ordinary household in its present complex form.
One more effect must be noted of this transference of many forms of
household labor to large centres through the operation of inventive
genius. It has been seen that many women have thus been left
comparatively free from the necessity of labor. The pernicious theory
has therefore grown up that women who are rich or well-to-do ought not
to work, at least for compensation, since by so doing they crowd out of
remunerative employment others who need it. It is a theory that overlooks
the historical fact that every person should be in the last analysis a
producer, it is based wholly on the assumption that work is a curse and
not a blessing, and it does not take into consideration the fact that
every woman who works without remuneration, or for less than the market
rates, thereby lowers the wages of every person who is a breadwinner. It
is a theory which if applied to men engaged in business occupations would
check all industrial progress. It is equally a hindrance when applied to
women.
This revolutionizing of manufacturing processes through the substitution
of the factory for the domestic system has thus rendered necessary a
shifting of all forms of household labor. The division of labor here is
but partially accomplished, and out of this fact arises a part of the
friction that is found in household service.
Household employers and employees may be indifferent to the changes
that the industrial revolutions of a century have brought, they may be
ignorant of them all, but they have not been unaffected by them, nor
can they remain unaffected by changes that may subsequently come in
the industrial system. The interdependence of all forms of industry is
so complete, that a change cannot revolutionize one without in time
revolutionizing all. The old industrial régime cannot be restored, nor
can household employments of to-day be put back to their condition of a
hundred years ago.
CHAPTER III
DOMESTIC SERVICE DURING THE COLONIAL PERIOD
It has been seen how great a change the inventions of the past century
have made in the character of household employments. A change in the
nature of household service no less important has taken place by virtue
of the political revolutions of the century, acting in connection with
certain economic and social forces. The subject of domestic service
looms up so prominently in the foreground to-day that there is danger of
forgetting that it has a past as well as a present. Yet it is impossible
to understand its present condition without comprehending, in a measure,
the manner in which it has been affected by its own history. It is
equally impossible to forecast its future without due regard to this
history.
Domestic service in America has passed through three distinct phases. The
first extends from the early colonization to the time of the Revolution;
the second, from the Revolution to about 1850; the third, from 1850 to
the present time.
During the colonial period service of every kind was performed by
transported convicts, indented white servants or “redemptioners,” “free
willers,” negroes, and Indians.[11]
The first three classes—convicts, redemptioners, and free willers—were
of European, at first generally of English, birth. The colonization of
the new world gave opportunity for the transportation and subsequent
employment in the colonies of large numbers of persons who, as a rule,
belonged to a low class in the social scale.[12] The mother country
looked with satisfaction on this method of disposing of those “such,
as had there been no _English_ foreign Plantation in the World, could
probably never have lived at home to do service for their Country, but
must have come to be hanged, or starved, or dyed untimely of some of
those miserable Diseases, that proceed from want, and vice.”[13] She
regarded her “plantations abroad as a good effect proceeding from many
evil causes,” and congratulated herself on being freed from “such sort of
people, as their crimes and debaucheries would quickly destroy at home,
or whom their wants would confine in prisons or force to beg, and so
render them useless, and consequently a burthen to the public.”[14]
From the very first the advantage to England of this method of disposing
of her undesirable population had been urged. The author of _Nova
Britannia_ wrote in 1609: “You see it no new thing, but most profitable
for our State, to rid our multitudes of such as lie at home, pestering
the land with pestilence and penury, and infecting one another with
vice and villanie, worse than the plague it selfe.”[15] So admirable
did the plan seem in time that between the years 1661 and 1668 various
proposals were made to the King and Council to constitute an office for
transporting to the Plantations all vagrants, rogues, and idle persons
that could give no account of themselves, felons who had the benefit
of clergy, and such as were convicted of petty larceny—such persons to
be transported to the nearest seaport and to serve four years if over
twenty years of age, and seven years if under twenty.[16] Virginia and
Maryland[17] were the colonies to which the majority of these servants
were sent, though they were not unknown elsewhere.[18]
Protests were often made against this method of settlement, both by the
colonists themselves[19] and by Englishmen,[20] but it was long before
the English government abandoned the practice of transporting criminals
to the American colonies.[21]
Of the three classes of white, or Christian servants, as they were called
to distinguish them from Indians and negroes, the free willers were
evidently found only in Maryland. This class was considered even more
unfortunate than that of the indented servants or convicts. They were
received under the condition that they be allowed a certain number of
days in which to dispose of themselves to the greatest advantage. But
since servants could be procured for a trifling consideration on absolute
terms, there was no disposition to take a class of servants who wished to
make their own terms. If they did not succeed in making terms within a
certain number of days, they were sold to pay for their passage.[22] The
colonists saw very little difference between the transported criminals
and political prisoners, the free willers, and the redemptioners who sold
themselves into slavery, and as between the two classes—redemptioners and
convicted felons—they at first considered the felons the more profitable
as their term of service was for seven years, while that of the indented
servants was for five years only.[23]
It is impossible to state the proportion of servants belonging to the two
classes of transported convicts and redemptioners, but the statement is
apparently fair that the redemptioners who sold themselves into service
to pay for the cost of their passage constituted by far the larger
proportion. These were found in all the colonies, though more numerous
in the Southern and Middle colonies than in New England. In Virginia
and Maryland they outnumbered negro slaves until the latter part of the
seventeenth century.[24] In Massachusetts, apprenticed servants bound for
a term of years were sold from ships in Boston as late as 1730,[25] while
the general trade in bound white servants lasted until the time of the
Revolution,[26] and in Pennsylvania even until this century.[27]
The first redemptioners were naturally of English birth, but after a
time they were supplanted by those of other nationalities, particularly
by the Germans and Irish. As early as 1718 there was a complaint of the
Irish immigrants in Massachusetts.[28] In Connecticut “a parcel of Irish
servants, both men and women,” just imported from Dublin, was advertised
to be sold cheap in 1764.[29] In 1783 large numbers of Irish and German
redemptioners entered Maryland, and a society was formed to assist the
Germans who could not speak English.[30]
It has been said that a great majority of the redemptioners belonged
at first to a low class in the social scale. A considerable number,
however, both men and women, belonged to the respectable, even to the
so-called upper classes of society.[31] They were sent over to prevent
disadvantageous marriages,[32] to secure inheritances to other members of
a family,[33] or to further some criminal scheme.
Many of these bond servants sold themselves into servitude, others
were disposed of through emigration brokers,[34] and still others were
kidnapped, being enticed on shipboard by persons called “spirits.”[35]
The form of indenture was simple, and varied but little in the different
colonies. Stripped of its cumbersome legal phraseology, it included the
three main points of time of service, the nature of the service to be
performed, although this was usually specified to be “in any such service
as his employer shall employ him,” and the compensation to be given.[36]
It sometimes happened that servants came without indenture. In such
cases the law expressly and definitely fixed their status, though it
was found extremely difficult to decide upon a status that could be
permanent. Virginia, in particular, for a long time found it impossible
to pass a law free from objections, and its experience will illustrate
the difficulties encountered elsewhere. An early law in Virginia provided
that if a servant came without indenture, he or she was to serve four
years if more than twenty years old, five years if between twelve and
twenty years of age, and seven years if under twelve.[37] Subsequently
it was provided that all Irish servants without indenture should serve
six years if over sixteen and that all under sixteen should serve until
the age of twenty-four,[38] and this was again modified into a provision
requiring those above sixteen years to serve four years and those
under fifteen to serve until twenty-one, the Court to be the judge of
their ages.[39] It was soon found, however, that the term of six years
“carried with it both rigour and inconvenience” and that thus many were
discouraged from coming to the country, and “the peopling of the country
retarded.” It was therefore enacted that in the future no servant of any
Christian nation coming without indenture should serve longer than those
of the same age born in the country.[40] But as the law was also made
retroactive, it was soon ordained that all aliens without indenture could
serve five years if above sixteen years of age and all under that until
they were twenty-four years old, “that being the time lymitted by the
laws of England.”[41] This arrangement was equally unsatisfactory, since
it was found that under it “a servant if adjudged never soe little under
sixteene yeares pays for that small tyme three yeares service, and if he
be adjudged more the master looseth the like.” It was then resolved that
if the person were adjudged nineteen years or over he or she should serve
five years, and if under that age then as many years as he should lack
of being twenty-four.[42] This provision was apparently satisfactory,
subsequent laws varying only in minor provisions concerning the details
of the Act.[43]
The condition of the redemptioners seems to have been, for the most part,
an unenviable one. George Alsop, it is true, writes in glowing terms of
the advantages enjoyed in Maryland:
“For know,” he says, “That the Servants here in _Mary-land_ of
all Colonies, distant or remote Plantations, have the least
cause to complain, either for strictness of Servitude, want of
Provisions, or need of Apparel: Five dayes and a half in the
Summer weeks is the alotted time that they work in; and for two
months when the Sun predominates in the highest pitch of his
heat, they claim an antient and customary Priviledge, to repose
themselves three hours in the day within the house, and this is
undeniably granted to them that work in the Fields.
“In the Winter time, which lasteth three months (viz.),
_December_, _January_, and _February_, they do little or no
work or employment, save cutting of wood to make good fires to
sit by, unless their Ingenuity will prompt them to hunt the
Deer, or Bear, or recreate themselves in Fowling, to slaughter
the Swans, Geese, and Turkeys (which this Country affords in
a most plentiful manner): For every Servant has a Gun, Powder
and Shot allowed him, to sport him withall on all Holidayes and
leasurable times, if he be capable of using it, or be willing
to learn.”[44]
Hammond also says of Virginia:
“The Women are not (as is reported) put into the ground to
worke, but occupie such domestique employments and houswifery
as in _England_, that is dressing victuals, righting up the
house, milking, imployed about dayries, washing, sowing, &c.
and both men and women have times of recreations, as much or
more than in any part of the world besides.... And whereas it
is rumoured that Servants have no lodging other then on boards,
or by the Fire side, it is contrary to reason to believe it:
First, as we are Christians; next as people living under a law,
which compels as well the Master as the Servant to perform his
duty; nor can true labour be either expected or exacted without
sufficient cloathing, diet, and lodging; all which both their
Indentures (which must inviolably be observed) and the Justice
of the Country requires.”[45]
A Glasgow merchant under date of January 19, 1714, also writes: “The
servants are all well cloathed and provided with bedding as ye will see,”
adding that some servants prefer “Mariland, the reason whereof is that
Virginia is a little odious to the people here.”[46]
But these enthusiastic descriptions must be taken _cum grano salis_. The
object of Alsop’s book was to stimulate emigration to Maryland, as is
evident from the dedication to Lord Baltimore and to “all the Merchant
Adventures for Mary-land.” The object of _Leah and Rachel_ was the same,
and others who wrote in a similar strain had evidently little personal
knowledge of the condition of the redemptioners. The real life is more
truly portrayed in the accounts given by the redemptioners themselves,
and many of these are preserved.
The Anglesea Peerage Trial brings out the facts that the redemptioners
fared ill, worked hard, lived on a coarse diet, and drank only water
sweetened with a little molasses and flavored with ginger.[47] Eddis says
the redemptioners were treated worse than the negroes, since the loss of
a negro fell on his master; inflexible severity was exercised over the
European servants who “groaned beneath a worse than Egyptian bondage.”[48]
Richard Frethorne, writing from Martin’s Hundred, gives a pitiful tale of
the sufferings of the indented servants. “Oh! that you did see my daily
and hourly sighs, groans, tears and thumps that I afford my own breast,
and rue and curse the time of my birth with holy Job. I thought no head
had been able to hold so much water as hath, and doth daily flow from
mine eyes.”[49]
The maid who waited on the Sot-Weed Factor says:
“In better Times, e’re to this Land,
I was unhappily Trapann’d;
Perchance as well I did appear,
As any Lord or Lady here,
Not then a slave for twice two Year.
My Cloaths were fashionably new,
Nor were my Shifts of Linnen Blue;
But things are changed, now at the Hoe,
I daily work, and Bare-foot go,
In weeding Corn or feeding Swine,
I spend my melancholy Time.”[50]
Undoubtedly, in time, servants of all kinds received more consideration
than had at first been given them;[51] in 1704 Madame Knight even
complained of what she considered too great indulgence on the part of the
Connecticut farmers towards their slaves.[52] Yet, even at the North, the
lot of a servant was not an enviable one, though much was done by the
laws of all the colonies to mitigate the condition of the redemptioners,
as will be seen later in discussing the legal relations of masters and
servants.
The wages paid were, as a rule, small, though some complaints are found,
especially in New England, of high wages and poor service.[53] More
often the wages were a mere pittance. Elizabeth Evans came from Ireland
to serve John Wheelwright for three years. Her wages were to be three
pounds a year and passage paid.[54] Margery Batman, after five years of
service in Charlestown, was to receive a she-goat to help her in starting
life.[55] Mary Polly, according to the terms of her indenture, was to
serve ten years and then receive “three barrells of corn and one suit of
penistone and one suit of good serge with one black hood, two shifts of
dowlas and shoes and hose convenient.”[56]
Peter Kalm writes of Pennsylvania in 1748: “A servant maid gets eight
or ten pounds a year: these servants have their food besides their
wages, but must buy their own clothes, and what they get of these they
must thank their master’s goodness for.” He adds that it was cheaper to
buy indented servants since “this kind of servants may be got for half
the money, and even for less; for they commonly pay fourteen pounds
_Pennsylvania_ currency, for a person who is to serve four years.”[57]
Even at the beginning of the present century wages had scarcely risen.
Samuel Breck writes of two redemptioners whom he purchased in 1817: “I
gave for the woman seventy-six dollars, which is her passage-money, with
a promise of twenty dollars at the end of three years if she serves
me faithfully; clothing and maintenance of course. The boy had paid
twenty-six guilders toward his passage-money, which I agreed to give
him at the end of three years; in addition to which I paid fifty-three
dollars and sixty cents for his passage, and for two years he is to have
six weeks’ schooling each year.”[58]
For the protection of both masters and servants the law sometimes
interfered and attempted to regulate the matter of wages received at
the end of an indenture. In Virginia by the code of 1705 every woman
servant was to receive fifteen bushels of Indian corn and forty shillings
in money, or the value thereof in goods.[59] In 1748 it was enacted
“that every servant, male or female, not having wages, shall, at the
expiration of his, or her time of service, have and receive three pounds
ten shillings current money, for freedom dues, to be paid by his, or
her master, or owner,”[60] and in 1758 the same law was re-enacted,
but excepting convicts from the provisions of the Act.[61] In South
Carolina all women servants at the expiration of their time were to have
“a Wastcoat and Petticoat of new Half-thick or Pennistone, a new Shift
of white Linnen, a new Pair of shoes and stockings, a blue apron and
two caps of white Linnen.”[62] The laws of Pennsylvania provided that
every servant who served faithfully four years should at the expiration
of the term of servitude have a discharge and be duly clothed with two
complete suits of apparel, one of which should be new,[63] while in
Massachusetts and New York it was provided that all servants who had
served diligently and faithfully to the benefit of their masters should
not be sent away empty.[64] In North Carolina every servant not having
yearly wages was to be allowed at the expiration of the term of service
three pounds Proclamation money, besides one sufficient suit of wearing
clothes.[65] In East New Jersey the law was more liberal and gave every
servant two suits of apparel suitable for a servant, one good felling
axe, a good hoe, and seven bushels of good Indian corn.[66] West New
Jersey gave ten bushels of corn, necessary apparel, two horses, and
one axe.[67] In Maryland a woman at the expiration of her term was to
have the same provision of corn and clothes as men servants, namely, “a
good Cloath suite either of Kersey or broad Cloath, a shift of white
Linnen to be new, one new pair of shoes and stockings, two hoes one Ax
and three barrˡˡˢ of Indian corn.”[68] A later act specified that women
servants were to have “a Waist-coat and Petty-coat of new Half-thick,
or Pennistone, a new Shift of White Linen, Shoes and Stockings, a blue
Apron, Two Caps of White Linen, and Three Barrells of Indian Corn.”[69]
The test question to be applied to any system of service is—Is the
service secured through it satisfactory? It has been seen that a
considerable number of servants could be secured through the system of
indenture, though probably less than the colonists desired, and that the
wages paid them were, as a rule, remarkably low. But it must be said that
the service received from indented servants was, as a rule, what might be
expected from the class that came to America in that capacity.
It is easy to surmise the character of the service rendered at first
in Virginia and the difficulties encountered by employers. Many of
the redemptioners had been idlers and vagabonds, and for idlers and
vagabonds, there as elsewhere, stringent laws were necessary. In 1610,
under the administration of Sir Thomas Gates, various orders were passed
with reference to pilfering on the part of launderers, laundresses,
bakers, cooks, and dressers of fish.
“What man or woman soeuer, Laundrer or Laundresse appointed to
wash the foule linnen of any one labourer or souldier, or any
one else as it is their duties so to doe, performing little,
or no other seruice for their allowance out of the store, and
daily prouisions, and supply of other necessaries, vnto the
Colonie, and shall from the said labourer or souldier, or any
one else, of what qualitie whatsoeuer, either take any thing
for washing, or withhold or steale from him any such linnen
committed to her charge to wash, or change the same willingly
and wittingly, with purpose to giue him worse, old or torne
linnen for his good, and proofe shall be made thereof, she
shall be whipped for the same, and lie in prison till she make
restitution of such linnen, withheld or changed.”[70]
Even more stringent penalties are attached to purloining from the flour
and meal given out for baking purposes.[71]
But it is not alone in Virginia that perplexed employers were found. John
Winter, writing to Trelawny from Richmond Island, Maine, under date of
July 10, 1639, says of a certain Priscilla:
“You write me of some yll reports is given of my Wyfe for
beatinge the maid; yf a faire waye will not do yt, beatinge
must, sometimes, vppon such Idlle girrells as she is. Yf you
think yt fitte for my wyfe to do all the worke & the maide
sitt still, she must forbeare her hands to strike, for then
the worke will ly vndonn. She hath bin now 2 yeares ½ in the
house, & I do not thinke she hath risen 20 times before my Wyfe
hath bin vp to Call her, & many tymes light the fire before
she Comes out of her bed. She hath twize gon a mechinge in the
woodes, which we haue bin faine to send all our Company to
seeke. We Cann hardly keep her within doores after we ar gonn
to beed, except we Carry the kay of the doore to beed with us.
She never Could melke Cow nor goat since she Came hither. Our
men do not desire to haue her boyle the kittle for them she is
so sluttish. She Cannot be trusted to serue a few piggs, but
my wyfe most Commonly must be with her. She hath written home,
I heare, that she was fame to ly vppon goates skins. She might
take som goates skins to ly in her bedd, but not given to her
for her lodginge. For a yeare & quarter or more she lay with
my daughter vppon a good feather bed before my daughter being
lacke 3 or 4 daies to Sacco, the maid goes into beed with her
Cloth & stockins, & would not take the paines to plucke of her
Cloths: her bedd after was a doust bedd & she had 2 Coverletts
to ly on her, but sheets she had none after that tyme she was
found to be so sluttish. Her beating that she hath had hath
never hurt her body nor limes. She is so fatt & soggy she Cann
hardly do any worke. This I write all the Company will Justify.
Yf this maid at her lasy tymes, when she hath bin found in her
ill accyons, do not deserue 2 or 3 blowes, I pray Judge You who
hath most reason to Complaine, my wyfe or the maid.... She hath
an vnthankefull office to do this she doth, for I thinke their
was never that steward yt amonge such people as we haue Could
giue them all Content. Yt does not pleas me well being she hath
taken so much paines & Care to order things as well as she
Could, & ryse in the morning rath, & go to bed soe latte, & to
haue hard speches for yt.”[72]
Winter’s letters and reports to the London Company are as full of his
trials with his servants indoors and out, as are the conferences to-day
between perplexed employers. Even when fortune smiled on him and one
promised well, misfortune overtook her.
“The maid Tomson had a hard fortune. Yt was her Chance to be
drowned Cominge over the barr after our Cowes, & very little
water on the barr, not aboue ½ foote, & we Cannot Judge how yt
should be, accept that her hatt did blow from her head, & she
to saue her hatt stept on the side of the barr.... I thinke
yf she had lived she would haue proved a good servant in the
house: she would do more worke then 3 such maides as Pryssyllea
is.”[73]
It is true that Maine was a remote colony and the difficulty of obtaining
good servants was presumably greater than in places more accessible. Yet
the same tale of trial comes from Boston and from those whose means,
character, and position in society would seem to exempt them from the
difficulties more naturally to be expected in other places. Mrs. Mary
Winthrop Dudley writes repeatedly in 1636 to her mother, Mrs. Margaret
Winthrop, begging her to send her a maid, “on that should be a good
lusty seruant that hath skille in a dairy.”[74] But how unsatisfactory
the “lusty servant” proved a later letter of Mrs. Dudley shows:
“I thought it convenient,” she writes, “to acquaint you and my
father what a great affliction I haue met withal by my maide
servant, and how I am like through God his mercie to be freed
from it; at her first coming me she carried her selfe dutifully
as became a servant; but since through mine and my husbands
forbearance towards her for small faults, she hath got such a
head and is growen soe insolent that her carriage towards vs,
especially myselfe is vnsufferable. If I bid her doe a thinge
shee will bid me to doe it my selfe, and she sayes how shee
can give content as wel as any servant but shee will not, and
sayes if I loue not quietnes I was never so fitted in my life,
for shee would make mee haue enough of it. If I should write
to you of all the reviling speeches and filthie language shee
hath vsed towards me I should but grieue you. My husband hath
vsed all meanes for to reforme her, reasons and perswasions,
but shee doth professe that her heart and her nature will not
suffer her to confesse her faults. If I tell my husband of her
behauiour towards me, vpon examination shee will denie all that
she hath done or spoken: so that we know not how to proceede
against her: but my husband now hath hired another maide and is
resolved to put her away the next weeke.”[75]
Other members of the Winthrop family also have left an account of their
trials of this kind. A generation later, July 7, 1682, Wait Winthrop
wrote to Fitz-John Winthrop, “I feare black Tom will do but little
seruis. He used to make a show of hanging himselfe before folkes, but
I believe he is not very nimble about it when he is alone. Tis good to
haue an eye to him, and if you think it not worth while to keep him,
eyther sell him or send him to Virginia or the West Indies before
winter. He can do something as a smith.”[76] In the third generation John
Winthrop, the son of Wait Winthrop, wrote to his father from New London,
Connecticut, 1717:
“It is not convenient now to write the trouble & plague we have
had wᵗʰ this Irish creature the year past. Lying & unfaithfull;
wᵈ doe things on purpose in contradiction & vexation to her
mistress; lye out of the house anights, and have contrivances
wᵗʰ fellows that have been stealing from oʳ estate & gett
drink out of yᵉ cellar for them; saucy & impudent, as when we
have taken her to task for her wickedness she has gon away to
complain of cruell usage. I can truly say we have used this
base creature wᵗʰ a great deal of kindness & lenity. She wᵈ
frequently take her mistresses capps & stockins, hanckerchers
&c., and dress herselfe, and away wᵗʰout leave among her
companions. I may have said some time or other when she has
been in fault, that she was fitt to live nowhere butt in
Virginia, and if she wᵈ not mend her ways I should send her
thither; thô I am sure no body wᵈ give her passage thither to
have her service for 20 yeares, she is such a high spirited
pernicious jade. Robin has been run away near ten days, as you
will see by the inclosed, and this creature knew of his going
and of his carrying out 4 dozen bottles of cyder, metheglin, &
palme wine out of the cellar amongst the servants of the towne,
and meat and I know not wᵗ.”[77]
The trials of at least one Connecticut housekeeper are hinted at in an
Order of the General Court in 1645, providing that a certain “Susan C.,
for her rebellious carriage toward her mistress, is to be sent to the
house of correction and be kept to hard labor and coarse diet, to be
brought forth the next lecture day to be publicly corrected, and so to be
corrected weekly, until order be given to the contrary.”[78]
But it is undoubtedly in the legislation of the colonial period that one
finds the best reflection of colonial service, and one may say of it, as
Judge Sewall wrote to a friend when sending him a copy of the Statutes at
Large for 1684, “You will find much pleasant and profitable Reading in
it.”[79] Numerous acts were passed in all the colonies determining the
relation between masters and servants, and these laws were most explicit
in protecting the interests of both parties—a fact often indicated by the
very name of the act, as that of 1700 in Pennsylvania, entitled “For the
just encouragement of servants in the discharge of their duty, and the
prevention of their deserting their master’s or owner’s service.”[80]
In the legislation in regard to service and servants, it is impossible
always to discriminate between the general class of either bound or life
servants and the particular class of domestic employees. But the smaller
class was comprised in the larger, and household servants had the benefit
of all legislation affecting servants as a whole. Few or no laws were
passed specifically for the benefit of domestic employees.
These laws worked both ways. On the one hand, they were intended to
protect the servant from the selfishness and cruelty of those masters who
would be inclined to take advantage of their position; on the other hand,
they protected the master who had invested his capital in servants, and
asked protection for it at the hands of the law, as he sought protection
for any other form of property.
Several general classes of laws are found for the protection of servants.
The first provides that no servant, bound to serve his or her time
in a province, could be sold out of the province, without his or her
consent.[81] A second class of laws compelled masters and mistresses to
provide their servants with wholesome and sufficient food, clothing, and
lodging;[82] and a third provided that if a servant became ill during
the time of his service, his master should be under obligation to care
for him, and heavy penalties were sometimes incurred by a master who
discharged a servant when sick.[83]
The law went even further and protected servants against unjust cruelty,
especially against every form of bodily maiming. If a white servant lost
an eye or a tooth at the hands of his master or mistress, he gained his
freedom, and could sometimes recover further compensation, if the Court
so adjudged.[84] If servants fled from the cruelty of their master, they
were to be protected, though notice of such protection was to be sent
to the master and the magistrate.[85] In New York if a master or dame
tyrannically and cruelly abused a servant, the latter could complain
to the constable and overseers, who were instructed to admonish the
master on the first offence, and on the second, to protect the servant
in the house until relief could be obtained through the Courts.[86]
In North Carolina no Christian servant could be whipped without an
order from the justice of the peace; if any one presumed so to do, the
person offending was to pay forty shillings to the party injured.[87]
Immoderate punishment also subjected the master to appear before the
County Court to answer for his conduct.[88] When New Jersey became a
royal province in 1702, the instructions of the Crown to Lord Cornbury
included a provision that he should “endeavor to get a Law past for the
restraining of any inhuman Severity, which by ill Masters or Overseers,
may be used towards their Christian Servants, and their Slaves, and
that Provision be made therein, that the wilfull killing of Indians and
Negroes may be punished with Death, and that a fit Penalty be imposed
for the maiming of them.”[89] Moreover, in North Carolina complaints of
servants against their masters could be heard without formal process of
action.[90] In Pennsylvania the law of 1771 provided that every indented
servant should obtain a legal residence in the city or place where he
or she had first served his or her master sixty days, or if he had
afterwards served twelve months in any other place, he was at liberty to
choose his residence in either place. In South Carolina a master denying
a certificate at the expiration of a servant’s time was to forfeit two
pounds.[91]
Important as these provisions were in the interest of the servant, the
law protected the master even more carefully and specifically. The
great danger to him was in the loss of servants through their escaping
from service and being harbored by friendly sympathizers or rival
employers. The law dealt rigorously with both classes of offenders. In
South Carolina stubborn, refractory, and discontented servants, who ran
away before their term of service expired, were obliged to serve their
masters three times the period of their absence.[92] In Pennsylvania
every servant absenting himself without leave for one day or more was
to serve, at the expiration of his time, five days for every day’s
absence, and in addition, to give satisfaction to his master for any
damages or charges incurred through his absence.[93] In East New Jersey
runaways were to serve double the time of their absence, and also to
give satisfaction for the costs and damages caused by their absence.[94]
In North Carolina runaways who would not tell the name of their master,
either because unable to speak English or through obstinacy, were to
be committed to jail and advertised for two months. Servants absenting
themselves were to serve double time.[95] In South Carolina a servant who
ran away was to serve one week for every day’s absence, but the whole
time was not to exceed two years.[96] Servants running away with slaves
were to be considered felons. In Maryland absenting servants were to
serve additional time at the discretion of the Court, ten days, or not
exceeding that, for every day’s absence, and to give satisfaction for
costs incurred.[97]
The temptation to harbor runaways was great, not so much from
philanthropic motives as because of the scarcity of labor, and every
colony supplemented its legislation against runaways by corresponding
acts carrying penalties for harboring them. In East New Jersey the
offender was fined five pounds and was to make full satisfaction to
the master or mistress for costs and damages sustained because of the
absence, while any person who knowingly harbored or entertained a
runaway, “except of real charity,” was to pay the master or mistress of
the servant ten shillings for every day’s entertainment and concealment
and to be fined at the discretion of the Court.[98] In Connecticut the
presumption was that if servants were entertained after nine o’clock at
night they were runaways, and the head of the family so entertaining
them was to forfeit five shillings to the complainer and five shillings
to the town treasurer. Any Indian hiding a runaway was to forfeit forty
shillings for every such offence or suffer a month’s imprisonment.[99]
In South Carolina runaways were not to be harbored under a penalty of
two pounds for every day and night the servant was so entertained, but
the total amount forfeited was not to exceed treble the value of the
servant’s time remaining to be served.[100] In New York any one proved
to have connived at the absence of a servant was to forfeit twenty
pounds to the master or dame and five pounds to the Court. Any one
knowingly harboring a runaway was to forfeit ten shillings for every
day’s entertainment.[101] In Pennsylvania any one concealing a servant
forfeited twenty shillings for each day’s concealment.[102] In Rhode
Island any person entertaining a servant after nine o’clock at night
forfeited five shillings for each offence.[103] In Maryland, by an act
of 1692, persons harboring runaways were to forfeit five hundred pounds
of tobacco for every hour’s entertainment, one half to the government
and one half to the informer.[104] By a later act the person harboring
runaways was to forfeit one hundred pounds of tobacco for every hour’s
entertainment, one half to go to the public schools and one half to the
party aggrieved.[105] This was intended to meet evasions of the previous
laws on the part of those who harbored runaways a few hours at a time
and then helped them on their way. Free negroes or mulattoes harboring
runaways were to forfeit one thousand pounds of tobacco for every such
offence, one half for the use of free schools and one half to the party
aggrieved.[106] By a later act, servants harboring runaways were to be
punished by the magistrate by lashes, not to exceed thirty-nine, on the
bare back.[107]
On the other hand, every incentive was held out to assist in the return
of runaways. In North Carolina any person who assisted in taking up
runaways was rewarded, the reward being gauged by the number of miles
away from the master’s house that the servant was taken.[108] In
Pennsylvania any one apprehending a runaway servant and returning him
or her to the sheriff of the county was to receive ten shillings if the
runaway was taken within ten miles of the master’s house and twenty
shillings if at a distance of more than ten miles.[109] In Connecticut
any Indian who returned a runaway to the nearest authority was to receive
as a reward two yards of cloth.[110] In Maryland the allowance was two
hundred pounds of tobacco, while Indians were to receive a match coat or
its value.[111] Persons in Virginia, Delaware, or the northern parts of
America, who apprehended runaways from Maryland, were to receive four
hundred pounds of tobacco, and the servant was to reimburse his master
by additional servitude.[112] Every precaution to prevent runaways was
taken. Indian, negro, and mulatto servants were not to travel without
a pass,[113] nor were slaves to leave their plantation without leave,
except negroes wearing liveries.[114] In Connecticut servants were not
to go abroad after nine o’clock at night,[115] in Massachusetts they
were not to frequent public houses,[116] and in South Carolina and
Massachusetts innkeepers were not to harbor them.[117]
Yet the life under a master or mistress was often such as to tempt a
servant to escape; added to a condition that often involved hard work,
poor lodging, and insufficient food and clothing, was the infliction of
humiliating corporal punishment in case of disobedience or disorder. In
Connecticut a servant could be punished by the magistrate not to exceed
ten stripes for one offence.[118] The Rhode Island law was similar.[119]
In North Carolina runaways were to receive from the constable as many
lashes as the justice of the peace should think fit, “not exceeding
the Number of thirty-nine, well laid on, on the Back of such Runaway,”
while disobedient servants were to be punished with corporal punishment,
not to exceed twenty-one lashes. In cases where free persons suffered
punishment by being fined, servants were whipped.[120] In South Carolina
a servant for striking his master or mistress was to serve not more than
six months’ additional time, or be punished with not more than twenty-one
stripes.[121] In Massachusetts and New York any servants who had been
unfaithful, negligent, or unprofitable in their service, notwithstanding
good usage from their masters, were not to be dismissed until they had
made satisfaction according to the judgment of the civil authorities.[122]
In nearly every colony heavy penalties followed attempts to carry on
trade or barter with servants. In North Carolina a freeman trading with a
servant forfeited treble the value of the goods traded for and six pounds
in addition; if unable to pay the fine he was himself sold as a servant.
A servant trading or selling the property of his master was to serve his
master additional time, the length to be fixed by the Court.[123] In
East New Jersey the penalty was five pounds for the first offence and ten
pounds for each subsequent one; the offending servant was to be whipped
by the person to whom he had tendered such sale, the reward of half a
crown being paid by the master or mistress to the person administering
the punishment.[124] In Pennsylvania any one trading secretly with a
servant was to forfeit to the master three times the value of the goods,
and the servant at the expiration of his time was to render satisfaction
to the master to double the value of the goods, and, if black, was to
be whipped in the most public place in the township.[125] Trading with
servants was prohibited in Connecticut[126] and in Massachusetts.[127]
In South Carolina any one buying, selling, or bartering with a servant
was to forfeit treble the value of the goods and ten pounds to the
informer; the offending servant was to be whipped on the bare back in the
watch-house at Charleston.[128] In New York servants were forbidden to
trade under penalty of fine or corporal punishment. Those trading with
servants were to restore the commodities to the master and to forfeit
double their value to the poor of the parish.[129] In Maryland the
penalty was two thousand pounds of tobacco, one half to go to the king
and one half to the master.[130]
Many miscellaneous provisions in different colonies must have seemed
oppressive. In New Jersey and South Carolina servants could not marry
without the consent of their masters.[131] In Massachusetts no covenant
servant in the household with any other could be an office holder.[132]
In Pennsylvania innkeepers were forbidden to trust them.[133] In North
Carolina servants making false complaints in regard to illness were to
serve double the time lost, and the same penalty followed if they were
sent to jail for any offence.[134] No slave was to go armed in North
Carolina, and if one was found offending, the person making the discovery
was to appropriate the weapon for his own use, and the servant was to
receive twenty lashes on his or her bare back. One servant on each
plantation, however, was exempted from the law, but such an one must
carry a certificate of permission.[135] In Massachusetts servants were
to be catechised once a week[136] and were not to wear apparel exceeding
the quality and condition of their persons or estates under penalty of
admonition for the first offence, a fine of twenty shillings for the
second, and forty shillings for the third offence.[137]
The obligation of the master to a servant-owning and slave-owning
community was recognized in North Carolina in a positive law prohibiting
a master from setting free a negro or mulatto on any pretence whatsoever,
except for meritorious services to be judged and allowed by the
County Court, and even in this case a license was to be previously
obtained.[138] In Massachusetts Bay servants were not to be set free
until they had served out their time.[139] In Connecticut a slave set
free was to be maintained by his master if he came to want.[140]
In view of all these restrictions on servants of a personal, industrial,
and political character it seems strange that even any from their number
should have been able, at the expiration of their term of service, to
break away from the spirit of this bondage and reach a higher position
in the social scale; yet many of the redemptioners became in time,
especially at the North, respectable and even prominent members of the
community.[141] The women often married planters[142] and in turn became
the employers of servants. Yet these are the exceptions. For a long time
the redemptioners were considered the off-scourings of English cities,
and they formed a distinct class in the social order lower than their
masters or employers. In view of this fact, a reproach was of necessity
attached to all belonging to the class and to the designation applied to
them. Their descendants ultimately formed the class of poor whites,—the
lowest stratum in the social order whose members were held in contempt
even by the negroes.
It has been said that the redemptioners were found in all the colonies,
though they were more numerous in the Middle and Southern colonies than
in New England. But it was difficult to keep white servants for any
length of time in a country where land was cheap and the servant soon in
turn became a master.[143] It was undoubtedly this difficulty that led to
the substitution for white servants of Indians and negro slaves. Indian
servants were apparently more numerous in the New England colonies, while
negro slavery gained its strongest foothold in the South.
The employment of Indians as servants grew up naturally in New England
and was continued for at least a hundred years.[144] Their presence was
regarded as almost providential by the New Englanders, hard pressed
for assistance in house and field. When the question of the right and
wrong of the matter was suggested by the troubled conscience, an easy
answer was found: was it not sin to suffer them longer to maintain the
worship of the devil when they were needed so sorely as slaves?[145] But
like the redemptioners, their service so eagerly sought often proved
unsatisfactory. Hugh Peter wrote to John Winthrop, September 4, 1639,
“My wife desires my daughter to send to Hanna that was her mayd, now
at Charltowne, to know if shee would dwell with vs, for truly wee are
so destitute (hauing now but an Indian) that wee know not what to
doe.”[146] More unfortunate still was the young clergyman, the Rev. Peter
Thatcher. He records in his diary at Barnstable, May 7, 1679, “I bought
an Indian of Mr. Checkley and was to pay 5£ a month after I received her
and five pound more in a quarter of a year.” A week later he writes,
“Came home and found my Indian girl had liked to have knocked my Theodora
on head by letting her fall, whereupon I took a good walnut stick and
beat the Indian to purpose till she promised to do so no more.”[147]
In every section negro slavery grew up side by side with white and Indian
slavery,[148] though its hold even upon the South was far from strong
until the end of the seventeenth century. It is both unnecessary and
impossible to discuss in this place the question of slavery[149] and its
relation to the larger subject of service. The close of the colonial
period saw it firmly established at the South, where it supplanted the
system of white servitude, while at the North both black and white
slavery gave place to free labor.
The details of the history of domestic service during the colonial
period may seem unnecessary to an understanding of domestic service as
it is to-day, but an examination of them must show the existence during
that period of principles and conditions that must modify the judgment
concerning the conditions of to-day. No wish is more often expressed than
that it might be possible to return to the Arcadian days when service
was abundant, excellent, and cheap. But those days did not exist in
America during the colonial period. The conditions at that time bear
a marked resemblance to those of to-day. The social position of all
servants was lower than that of their employers, and the gulf between
the two was more difficult to span. Service was difficult to obtain and
unsatisfactory when secured. Servants complained of hard work and ill
treatment, and masters of ungrateful servants and inefficient service,
and both masters and servants were justified in their complaints. The
legal relations between master and servant were explicitly defined as
regards length of service, wages paid, and the mutual obligations of
both parties to the contract during the period of service. But this very
definiteness of the contract was due to the fact that the relationship
between the two parties was an arbitrary one and could not have been
preserved without this legal assistance. In default of a better one,
the system of white servitude may have served its age fairly well; but
its restoration, if the restoration were possible, would do nothing to
relieve in any way the strain and pressure of present conditions.
CHAPTER IV
DOMESTIC SERVICE SINCE THE COLONIAL PERIOD
It has been said that domestic service in America has passed through
three distinct phases. The second phase began about the time of the
Revolution, when at the North the indented servants as a class were
gradually supplanted by free laborers, and at the South by negro
slaves who inherited with large interest the reproach attached to the
redemptioners. The social chasm that had existed at the North between
employer and employee, under the system of bonded servants, disappeared.
The free laborers, whether employed in domestic service or otherwise,
were socially the equal of their employers, especially in New England
and in the smaller towns. They belonged by birth to the same section of
the country, probably to the same community; they had the same religious
belief, attended the same church, sat at the same fireside, ate at the
same table, had the same associates; they were often married from the
homes[150] and buried in the family lots of their employers.[151] They
were in every sense of the word “help.”[152] A survival of this condition
is seen to-day in farming communities, especially at the West. In the
South, on the contrary, the social chasm became impassable as negro
slavery entirely displaced white labor.
This democratic condition at the North seemed especially noteworthy to
European travellers,[153] and it was one to which they apparently never
became accustomed. Harriet Martineau, in planning for her American
journey, was perplexed by the difficulty of securing a travelling
companion. “It would never do,” she says, “as I was aware, to take a
servant, to suffer from the proud Yankees on the one hand and the debased
slaves on the other.”[154] On arriving here, she found “the study of
domestic service a continual amusement,” and what she saw “would fill
a volume.”[155] “Boarding-house life,” she says, “has been rendered
compulsory by the scarcity of labour,—the difficulty of obtaining
domestic service.”[156] But she was quick to appreciate the difference
between the spirit of service she found in America and that with which
she was familiar in the old world. She writes:
“I had rather suffer any inconvenience from having to work
occasionally in chambers and kitchen, and from having little
hospitable designs frustrated, than witness the subservience
in which the menial class is held in Europe. In England,
servants have been so long accustomed to this subservience; it
is so completely the established custom for the mistress to
regulate their manners, their clothes, their intercourse with
friends, and many other things which they ought to manage for
themselves, that it has become difficult to treat them any
better. Mistresses who abstain from such regulation find that
they are spoiling their servants; and heads of families who
would make friends of their domestics find them little fitted
to reciprocate the duty. In America it is otherwise: and may
it ever be so!... One of the pleasures of travelling through a
democratic country is the seeing no liveries. No such badge of
menial service is to be met with throughout the States, except
in the houses of the foreign ambassadors at Washington.”
She then gives illustrations to show “of how much higher a character
American domestic service is than any which would endure to be
distinguished by a badge.”[157]
De Tocqueville, also, found, that “the condition of domestic service
does not degrade the character of those who enter upon it, because it is
freely chosen, and adopted for a time only; because it is not stigmatized
by public opinion and creates no permanent inequality between the servant
and the master.”[158]
Francis J. Grund was also able to appreciate the difference between
external servility and true self-respect, for he writes in 1837: “There
are but few native Americans who would submit to the degradation of
wearing a livery, or any other badge of servitude. This they would
call becoming a man’s man. But, on the other hand, there are also but
few American gentlemen who would feel any happier for their servants
wearing coats of more than one color. The inhabitants of New England are
quite as willing to call their servants ‘helps,’ or ‘domestics,’ as the
latter repudiate the title of ‘master’ in their employers.” And he adds,
“Neither is an American servant that same indolent, careless, besotted
being as an European.” He has another word of praise too for the American
servants, “who work harder, and _quicker_ than even in England.”[159]
The absence of livery was a subject of constant comment. William Cobbett,
in 1828, asserts that “the man (servant) will not wear a _livery_, any
more than he will wear a halter round his neck.... Neither men nor women
will allow you to call them _servants_, and they will take especial
care not to call themselves by that name.” He explains the avoidance of
the term “servant” by the fact that slaves were called servants by the
English, who having fled from tyranny at home were shy of calling others
slaves; free men therefore would not be called servants.[160]
But while the democratic spirit that prevailed during this period found
commendation in the eyes of those of similar tendencies, it often
evoked only mild surprise or a half sneer. Mrs. Trollope found that
“the greatest difficulty in organizing a family established in Ohio,
is getting servants, or, as it is there called, ‘getting help,’ for it
is more than petty treason to the Republic to call a free citizen a
_servant_.”[161] Chevalier asserted that “on Sunday an American would
not venture to receive his friends; his servants would not consent to
it, and he can hardly secure their services for himself, at their own
hour, on that day.”[162] Samuel Breck considers that “in these United
States nothing would be wanting to make life perfectly happy (humanly
speaking) had we good servants.”[163] Isabella Bird wrote of Canada in
1854, “The great annoyance of which people complain in this pleasant land
is the difficulty of obtaining domestic servants, and the extraordinary
specimens of humanity who go out in this capacity.” “The difficulty of
procuring servants is one of the great objections to this colony. The
few there are know nothing of any individual department of work,—for
instance, there are neither cooks nor housemaids, they are strictly
‘_helps_,’—the mistress being expected to take more than her fair share
of the work.”[164] The conditions she found there were the same as in the
United States.
Thomas Grattan wrote of the condition:
“One of the subjects on which the minds of men and women in the
United States seem to be unanimously made up, is the admitted
deficiency of _help_.... Disguise it as we may, under all the
specious forms of reasoning, there is something in the mind of
every man which tells him he is humiliated in doing personal
service to another.... The servile nature of domestic duties
in Europe, and more particularly in England, is much more
likely to make servants liable to the discontent which mars
their merits, than the common understanding in America, which
makes the compact between ‘employer’ and ‘help’ a mere matter
of business, entailing no mean submission on the one hand,
and giving no right to any undue assumption of power on the
other.... Domestic service is not considered so disgraceful
in the United States, as it is felt to be in the United
Kingdom.”[165]
Grattan’s observations lead him to believe that the democratic spirit is
not always to be deplored.
“An American youth or ‘young lady’ will go to service
willingly, if they can be better paid for it than for
teaching in a village school, or working on a farm or in a
factory.... They satisfy themselves that they are _helps_, not
servants,—that they are going to work with (not for) Mr. so
and so, not going to service,—they call him and his wife their
_employers_, not their master and mistress.”[166]
But like all Europeans, he never ceases to be surprised by this spirit,
particularly by those manifestations of it that led to active work on the
part of the mistress of a home and to the use of the word “help.” “There
are no housekeepers,” he writes, “or ladies’ maids. The lady herself does
all the duties of the former.... Servants are thus really justified in
giving to themselves the favorite designation of ‘helps.’”[167] But he
closes a long and interesting chapter on the subject with the prophecy,
“They (employers) will, by degrees, give up the employment of native
servants who will be in future less likely than even now to submit to
their pretensions, and confine themselves to the fast increasing tribes
of Irish immigrants.”[168]
Curiously enough nearly forty years earlier Madame d’Arusmont had written
of friends who thought of coming to America and urged, “Let them by all
means be advised against bringing servants with them. Foreign servants
are here, without doubt, the worst; they neither understand the work
which the climate renders necessary, nor are willing to do the work
which they did elsewhere.”[169] She, like all travellers, found that
however subservient domestic servants might be when they left Europe,
the first contact with the democratic atmosphere of America wrought a
sudden change; subserviency disappeared, and the servant boasted of his
equality with all. She explains that those educated in America perceive
the difference placed between the gentleman and the laborer by education
and conditions, but the foreigner taking a superficial view of the matter
sees no difference.[170]
This second period in the history of domestic service continued from
about the time of the Revolution until 1850. It was the product of the
rapid growth of democratic ideas fostered by the Revolution and the
widespread influence of the French philosophical ideas of the latter
part of the eighteenth century. It was a period chiefly characterized by
social and industrial democracy, as the political system was also in its
spirit democratic. This democratic industrial spirit showed itself in the
universal use at the North of the term “help,” in the absence of liveries
and all distinguishing marks of service, in the intolerance on the part
of both employer and employee of servility and subserviency of manner, in
the bridging of the social chasm between master and servant as long as
the free employment of native born Americans continued, and in the hearty
spirit of willingness with which service was performed. The results of
this democratic régime were the difficulty of securing help, since new
avenues of independent work were opening out to women and the class of
indented servants had disappeared; the lack of all differentiation in
household work, since the servant conferred a favor in “going out to
work” and did what she knew how to do without troubling to learn new
kinds of work; and, most important, the subtle change that the democratic
atmosphere everywhere wrought in the servants who came from Europe.
This condition of free, democratic, native born white service at the
North and compulsory slave service at the South continued practically
unchanged until about the middle of the century. Between 1850 and 1870
four important political changes occurred which revolutionized the
personnel in domestic service and consequently its character. These
changes brought about the third period in the history of the subject.
The first of these changes was due to the Irish famine of 1846. Previous
to this time the immigration to this country from Ireland had been small,
averaging not more than twenty thousand annually between 1820 and 1846.
In the decade preceding the famine the average number of arrivals had
been less than thirty-five thousand annually. In 1846 the number was
51,752, and this was more than doubled the following year, the report
showing 105,536 arrivals in 1847. In 1851 the number of arrivals from
Ireland had risen to 221,253. Since that time the number has fluctuated,
but between fifty and seventy-five thousand annually come to this country
from Ireland.[171] A large proportion of these immigrants—forty-nine
per cent during the decade from 1870 to 1880—have been women who were
classed as “unskilled laborers.” Two occupations were open to them. One
was work in factories where as manufacturing processes became more simple
unskilled labor could be utilized. The Irish immigrants, therefore,
soon displaced in factories the New England women who had found, as
has been seen,[172] new opportunities for work of a higher grade. The
second occupation open to the Irish immigrants was household service.
Here physical strength formed a partial compensation for lack of skill
and ignorance of American ways, and the Irish soon came to form a most
numerous and important class engaged in domestic employments.[173]
A second important European change, influencing the condition of domestic
service, was the German Revolution of 1848 with the events preceding
and resulting from it. Before this period the emigration from Germany
had been insignificant, fewer than fifteen thousand having come to this
country annually between 1830 and 1840. In 1840, owing to political
reasons, the number had risen to 29,704. It soon became evident that the
hopes raised by the accession of the new monarch were without foundation,
and emigration rapidly increased until the number of emigrants coming
to America reached 74,281 in 1847. During the year of the Revolution
the number decreased, but the failure of the cause of the revolutionary
party and the political apathy that followed again increased the movement
towards America. This reached its climax in 1854, when the sympathies
of the Court had been openly expressed during the Crimean War in favor
of Russian despotism. During this year the number of Germans arriving
in this country was 215,009—a number equalled but once since that time,
although the number has averaged nearly a hundred and fifty thousand
annually during the last decade.[174] A large number of these immigrants
have been women, the proportion of women emigrating from Germany being
greater than from any other foreign country except Ireland.[175] The
ranks of domestic service have been recruited from their number also,
the Germans being second only to the Irish as regards the number and
proportion engaged in this occupation.[176]
A third political influence affecting the question was the establishment
of treaty relations between the United States and China in 1844. This
fact and the discovery of gold in California in 1848, together with the
building of the Union Pacific railroad in 1867-1869, opened the doors to
the immigration of considerable numbers of Chinese. Many of these found
their way into domestic service, and on the Pacific coast they became
formidable competitors of household servants of other nationalities.[177]
The political and economic conditions in Europe and the breaking down of
long-established customs in Asia have thus since 1850 brought to this
country large numbers of men and women who have performed the household
service previously done by native born Americans. The presence of the
Irish in the East, of the Germans in the West, of the Scandinavians
in the Northwest, and of the Chinese on the Pacific coast has thus
introduced a new social, as well as a new economic, element at the
North. It has led to a change in the relation of employer and employee;
the class line which was only faintly drawn in the early part of the
century between employer and “help” has been changed into a caste line
which many employers believe it to their interest to preserve. The native
born American fears to lose social position by entering into competition
with foreign labor.
While this change, owing to political conditions in the Old World, was
taking place at the North in the character of the service, a similar
change was taking place at the South growing out of the abolition of
slavery in 1863. The negroes who had previously performed all domestic
service for their personal expenses have since then received for the
same service a small remuneration in money. This fact prevents now as
effectually as during the slavery period any competition in domestic
service on the part of native born white employees. It does not prevent
all competition on the part of foreign born white employees, since
prejudice against the negro does not exist in Europe owing to the fact
that negro slavery has not prevailed there. The effects of these great
movements upon the nature and personnel of domestic service will be
discussed later in considering its present condition. They have had a
direct and conspicuous influence on the condition of domestic service and
even in the use of the term applied to those who engage in it.
But other political influences more subtle and possibly more far-reaching
in their effect have been at work. Our loose naturalization laws, and
the determining of the qualifications for the right of suffrage by as
many standards as there are states, have made the enormous number of men
coming to this country annually an easy prey to scheming politicians and
demagogues. The labor vote, the Irish vote, the German vote, have been
flattered and sought by party managers until the wage-earning man feels
that “like Atlas of old he carries the world on his shoulders.” If the
laboring man feels the weight of the world, his wife and daughter believe
that some share of the burden rests on them. The democratic tendencies of
the country, the political practices of the day, have everywhere broken
down the high wall of separation between employer and employee. They are
subversive even in the household of that patriarchal relationship that
has been driven from every stronghold but this.
While the political movements of the century have thus changed the
personnel of domestic service in America, the development of the material
resources of the country has affected its status. Before the present
century employees of every kind were in a sense stationary. This was due
partly to the influence of the English poor laws; partly to the system
of indenture which bound a servant for seven, five, or four years, and
to the system of slavery which bound the servant for life; partly to the
system of apprenticeship which made the servant a member of the family of
his master; partly to the custom prevailing in the country districts and
small towns for unmarried workmen in all industries to board with their
employers; and partly to the lack of facilities for cheap and easy means
of communication between different sections of the country. There was no
mobility of labor as regards either employment or place of employment—a
fact true alike of domestic service and of other occupations. But this
condition of affairs gradually changed. As has been seen, indented
servants disappeared and every employee was free to break as well as to
make an engagement for service. The establishment of the factory system
of manufactures and the consequent substitution of mechanical for skilled
processes of labor broke down the system of apprenticeship, and workmen
of every occupation, except domestic service, ceased to be members of
the families of their employers. A mobility of labor was made possible
such as could not have been secured under the old system. At a later
time the great era of railroad development and similar enterprises gave
opportunity for a certain mobility as regards place of employment. The
tide of western emigration due to the discovery of gold and the cheapness
of western land caused much shifting of labor among the non-capitalist
class, and this was increased as means of communication were rendered
more easy. The establishment of companies to encourage foreign
immigration with the object of developing the material resources of the
country was another weight in the scale in favor of greater mobility of
labor as regards both place and employment. The abolition of slavery
removed the last important legal barrier against perfect mobility.
All of these industrial movements have been important factors in changing
the condition and character of domestic service. It is true, in a general
sense, that every great change in economic conditions affects all
occupations. But domestic service has through these causes been affected
in certain specific ways. The employee who disliked housework, but to
whom no other occupation had been open, could go into a factory or a
mill, since no time was consumed in learning the simple processes of
mechanical work. Every invention formed the basis for a new occupation.
Domestic service had a hundred competitors in a field where before the
era of inventions it had stood alone. Moreover, these new occupations
required little skill, no preparation, and possessed the charm of
novelty. Again, the rapid development of railroad interests, with the
increase of competition and consequent lowering of passenger rates,
often influenced families emigrating to the West to take with them their
trusted employees. The same fact made it possible for women seeking new
employments to go from place to place in ways unthought of in the early
part of the century.
In view of these changed and changing economic conditions it may be
said that the immobility of labor, which has seemed to some economists
so great an obstacle to the industrial advancement of women,[178] has
practically ceased to exist in the case of domestic service. In fact,
industrial development has so far changed conditions that the problem has
now come to be how to make this form of labor not more mobile, but more
stable. One illustration of this is found in the fact that when seven
hundred domestic employees represented on the schedules were asked how
many of them had ever been engaged in any other occupation, twenty-seven
per cent replied that they had. The mobility as to the place of labor
was found to be even greater. Twenty-seven per cent of the native born
employees did not reside in the same state in which they were born, and
adding to these the number of foreign born, it was found that sixty-eight
per cent did not reside in their native country or state. Moreover, this
statement is below the truth as it does not take into account the number
of changes made within a single year and refers to only one change from
place of birth to present residence.[179]
An indication of these various changes in the condition of domestic
service during these different periods is seen in the history of the word
“servant.” As used in England and in law at the time of the settlement
of the American colonies it signified any employee, and no odium was in
any way attached to the word.[180] But five things led to its temporary
disuse: first, the reproach connected with the word through the character
and social rank of the redemptioners; second, the fact that when the
redemptioners gave place at the South to negro slaves the word “servant”
was transferred to this class,[181] and this alone was sufficient to
prevent its application to whites;[182] third, the levelling tendencies
that always prevail in a new country; fourth, the literal interpretation
of the preamble of the Declaration of Independence; and fifth, the new
social and political theories resulting from the introduction of French
philosophical ideas. At the North the word “help” as applied especially
to women superseded the word “servant,” while at the South the term
“servant” was applied only to the negro. From the time of the Revolution,
therefore, until about 1850 the word “servant” does not seem to have
been generally applied in either section to white persons of American
birth.[183]
Since the introduction of foreign labor at the middle of the century,
the word “servant” has again come into general use as applied to white
employees, not, however, as a survival of the old colonial word, but
as a reintroduction from Europe of a term signifying one who performs
so-called menial labor, and it is restricted in its use, except in a
legal sense, to persons who perform domestic service. The present use
of the word has come not only from the almost exclusive employment
of foreigners in domestic service, but also because of the increase
of wealth and consequent luxury in this country, the growing class
divisions, and the adoption of many European habits of living and
thinking and speaking.[184]
These simple historical facts are one explanation of the unwillingness of
American women to engage in work stigmatized by an offensive term applied
to no other class of laborers.
In studying the question of domestic service, therefore, the fact
cannot be overlooked that certain historical influences have affected
its conditions; that political revolutions have changed its personnel,
and industrial development its mobility. It is as impossible to dream
of restoring the former condition of household service as it is of
restoring former household employments, and neither is to be desired.
In each case the question is one of preparing for the next step in the
process of evolution, not of retrograding toward a condition impossible
to restore. Any attempt to secure a change for the better in the present
condition of domestic service must be ineffective if it does not take
into consideration these historic aspects of the subject.
CHAPTER V
ECONOMIC PHASES OF DOMESTIC SERVICE[185]
The attempt has been made in the foregoing chapters to indicate the
extent to which domestic employments and domestic service have been
influenced by industrial and political events arising outside of the
household, and apparently having little or no connection with it. That
domestic service is amenable to some of the general economic laws and
conditions which affect other occupations and that it is also governed
by economic laws developed within itself will perhaps be evident from an
examination of a few of these economic conditions and principles. These
may be stated for the sake of brevity in the form of propositions.
The first group of propositions to be suggested concerns the number and
distribution of persons of foreign birth engaged in domestic service.
(1) A large proportion of the domestic employees in the United States are
of foreign birth. This is evident from the following table prepared from
the schedules sent out:[186]
TABLE I
PLACE OF BIRTH OF EMPLOYEES
=================+========================+========================
| NUMBER | PER CENT
PERSON REPORTING +-------+--------+-------+-------+--------+-------
| Native| Foreign| Not | Native| Foreign| Not
| born | born | given | born | born | given
-----------------+-------+--------+-------+-------+--------+--------
Employer | 922 | 1,212 | 411 | 36.23| 47.62 | 16.15
Employee | 324 | 395 | | 45.06| 54.94 |
=================+=======+========+=======+=======+========+========
The statement may be more fully illustrated from the Eleventh Census,
which shows that the number of foreign born in domestic service is 30.86
per cent of the entire number.[187] The geographical distribution of the
different classes of domestic employees is seen from Table II on the
following page.
Another illustration of the same point is found by an examination of the
relative number of native born and foreign born domestic employees in
the individual states and territories. In nine states and territories
the number of foreign born domestic employees exceeds the number of
native born white employees,[188] in sixteen about one half of the white
domestic employees are of foreign birth,[189] in twenty-four states and
territories the number of native born white employees largely exceeds
the foreign born,[190] while in fifteen states colored employees are
in excess.[191] It will be seen that the states in which the number of
native born white domestic employees exceeds the number of the foreign
born are those states having relatively a small number of foreign born
residents.[192] A still more specific illustration is found in the
experience of one state. In Massachusetts in 1885, the foreign born
domestic servants formed 60.24 per cent of the entire number.[193]
TABLE II
DOMESTIC EMPLOYEES IN THE UNITED STATES, 1890
================+=================================+======================
| NUMBER | PER CENT
GEOGRAPHICAL +---------+-------+-------+-------+------+-------+-------
SECTION | Total |Native |Foreign|Colored|Native|Foreign|Colored
| | white | white | |white | white |
----------------+---------+-------+-------+-------+------+-------+-------
Pacific | | | | | | |
Coast[194] | 78,700| 29,576| 28,198| 20,926|37.58 | 35.83 | 26.59
Eastern[195] | 134,016| 52,419| 74,004| 7,593|39.11 | 55.22 | 5.67
Middle[196] | 394,062|176,194|175,819| 42,049|44.71 | 44.62 | 10.67
Western[197] | 388,920|233,274|128,761| 26,885|59.98 | 33.11 | 6.91
Border[198] | 251,544| 79,611| 16,649|155,284|31.65 | 6.62 | 61.73
Southern[199] | 207,549| 34,812| 6,432|166,305|16.77 | 3.10 | 80.13
+---------+-------+-------+-------+------+-------+-------
United States |1,454,791|605,886|429,863|419,042|41.65 | 29.55 | 28.80
================+=========+=======+=======+=======+======+=======+=======
These different illustrations seem to show the truth of the proposition
stated.
(2) The converse of the preceding proposition is also true—the
concentration of women of foreign birth engaged in remunerative
occupations is on domestic service.
The Eleventh Census shows that, in 1890, 59.37 per cent of all foreign
white women at work were engaged in domestic and personal service. This
leaves only 40.63 per cent to be distributed among all other gainful
occupations.[200] A specific illustration in the case of an individual
state is seen in Massachusetts. Here the percentage of the foreign born
in the entire population is 27.13, while, as stated above, the number of
foreign born women in domestic service is 60.24 per cent.[201]
(3) The foreign born population as a class seek the large cities.
In 1890 the persons of foreign birth in the United States formed 14.77
per cent of the entire population. But of the total foreign population,
44.13 per cent was found in the one hundred and twenty-four cities having
a population of twenty-five thousand or more.[202]
(4) The foreign countries having the largest absolute representation
in the largest cities are Ireland, Germany, Great Britain, Sweden, and
Canada and Newfoundland. The following table shows the relative number of
persons born in these countries who are found in the United States as a
whole, and in the large cities:
TABLE III
PROPORTION OF PERSONS OF FOREIGN BIRTH IN THE UNITED STATES
========================+=============+===========+===========
| | Number in |Per cent in
COUNTRY OF BIRTH |United States| principal | principal
| | cities | cities
------------------------+-------------+-----------+-----------
Ireland | 1,871,509 | 1,047,432 | 55.97
Germany | 2,784,894 | 1,328,675 | 47.71
Great Britain | 909,092 | 369,979 | 40.70
Canada and Newfoundland | 980,938 | 307,660 | 31.36
Sweden and Norway | 800,706 | 219,112 | 27.36
========================+=============+===========+===========
(5) The foreign countries having the largest absolute and relative
representation in domestic service are, in order, Ireland, Germany,
Sweden and Norway, Great Britain, and Canada and Newfoundland. This will
be evident from the following table, which indicates the place of birth
of all persons of foreign birth engaged in domestic service and the per
cent of each nationality so engaged:
TABLE IV
PLACE OF BIRTH OF DOMESTIC EMPLOYEES
=======================+==================+====================
|Number of foreign | Per cent of foreign
| born persons, 10 | born persons, 10
COUNTRY OF BIRTH | years of age and | years of age and
| over, in domestic| over, in domestic
| service | service
-----------------------+------------------+--------------------
Ireland | 168,993 | 37.64
Germany | 95,007 | 21.16
Sweden and Norway | 58,049 | 12.93
Great Britain | 34,537 | 7.69
Canada and Newfoundland| 31,213 | 6.95
Other countries | 61,195 | 13.63
=======================+==================+====================
Similar results were reached through individual schedules sent out. The
returns as made by employers and employees show that the place of birth
of foreign born employees and the relative percentages are as follows:
TABLE V
NUMBER OF FOREIGN BORN IN DOMESTIC SERVICE
==================+=======================================
| PERSON REPORTING
+-------------------+-------------------
PLACE OF BIRTH | EMPLOYER | EMPLOYEE
+--------+----------+--------+----------
| Number | Per cent | Number | Per cent
------------------+--------+----------+--------+----------
Ireland | 653 | 53.88 | 217 | 54.94
Sweden and Norway | 147 | 12.13 | 50 | 12.66
Germany | 128 | 10.56 | 37 | 9.37
Great Britain | 122 | 10.07 | 32 | 8.10
British America | 104 | 8.58 | 42 | 10.63
Other countries | 58 | 4.78 | 17 | 4.30
------------------+--------+----------+--------+-----------
Total | 1,212 | 100.00 | 395 | 100.00
==================+========+==========+========+===========
This group of five propositions in regard to the number and distribution
of the foreign born engaged in domestic service seems to indicate that
in this country, with the exception of the sections employing colored
servants, domestic service is as a rule performed by persons of foreign
birth belonging to a few well-defined classes as regards nationality, who
prefer city to country life. The facts given are an understatement of the
influence exerted on domestic service by persons of foreign extraction,
since they do not take into consideration the factor of foreign parentage.
A second group of propositions may be suggested in regard to the general
distribution of domestic employees.
(1) The number of domestic servants is absolutely and relatively small in
agricultural and sparsely settled states.
This will be evident by the reference to the accompanying chart, which
shows the number of persons to each domestic servant in each of the
states. The states last in the list, where the smallest relative number
of servants is employed, are all large in area, and as a rule have
the smallest population in proportion to the area of settlement. This
condition is probably due to the two facts that all housework is as a
rule performed without remuneration by housewives, since they are more
free from social and other interruptions than are women in cities, and
also to the aversion of domestics as a class to country life.
(2) The number of domestic servants is absolutely and relatively large in
those states containing a large urban population.
[Illustration: CHART SHOWING THE NUMBER OF PERSONS TO EACH DOMESTIC
EMPLOYEE IN THE VARIOUS STATES AND TERRITORIES AND THE DISTRICT OF
COLUMBIA
Dist. of Col. 13
Maryland 25
New York 28
Massachusetts 29
Virginia 29
California 30
Nevada 30
Delaware 31
New Jersey 32
Connecticut 34
Montana 34
Rhode Island 35
Minnesota 36
Pennsylvania 38
Vermont 38
Colorado 38
Wyoming 38
North Dakota 40
Washington 42
Illinois 43
Louisiana 44
Kentucky 46
Wisconsin 46
Georgia 47
Michigan 49
North Carolina 50
Ohio 50
Arizona 51
Nebraska 51
Florida 52
N. Hampshire 53
Missouri 53
Oregon 54
Tennessee 55
Maine 56
Utah 57
South Dakota 60
Alabama 61
South Carolina 61
Idaho 62
Iowa 62
Indiana 63
Mississippi 66
West Virginia 69
New Mexico 75
Texas 76
Kansas 88
Arkansas 93
Oklahoma 156]
This is also made evident by the diagram. Forty-nine of the fifty
largest cities in the United States are found in the first thirty-four
states in the list; only one of the fifty is found in the last fifteen
states. The fact is apparently most clearly shown in the case of the
District of Columbia, which has an almost exclusively urban population
and ranks first with reference to the number of servants employed. The
condition here, however, is due not so much to its urban character
as to the employment of colored help and the fact that the city
contains an abnormally large number of temporary residents requiring
a disproportionate amount of service. The truth of the proposition is
better indicated by the examples of New York, Massachusetts, and New
Jersey, which stand nearly at the head of the list and contain seventeen
of the fifty largest cities.
(3) The aggregate wealth of a state has little appreciable effect on the
relative number of domestic servants employed.
This is evident from a study of the relative true and assessed valuation
of real and personal property in the different states.[203] In more than
one half the states it has no apparent connection whatever with the
relative number of servants.
(4) The per capita wealth of a state has, with the exception of the
Southern states as a class, a somewhat important bearing on the relative
number of servants employed.
This will be seen from an examination of the per capita assessed
valuations of real and personal property in the various states.[204] The
rank of each state in the class of per capita wealth and in the relative
number of domestic servants employed, with the exception named, does
not vary materially. The variation in the Southern states is due to the
presence of negro employees. The extremely low wages paid by employers
enables them to command the services of a larger number of persons for
the same expenditure of money than is possible at the North.
These facts may be considered as indicative in a general way of the
truth of the current opinion that an increase in income generally shows
itself first in the employment of additional service. They prove nothing
absolutely on this point, however, as they are too general in character.
(5) Domestic employees are found in the largest numbers, relatively
and absolutely, in the large cities. The fifty largest cities in the
United States contain 18.04 per cent of the total population of the
country. They have, however, 32.32 per cent of the total number of
domestic servants. To put the same fact in another way, domestic servants
constitute 2.32 per cent of the total population, but 4.07 per cent of
the population of the fifty largest cities. The force of gravity exerted,
therefore, by the large cities seems to act with nearly twice the power
on the class of domestic employees that it does on the population as a
whole.
The conclusion seems to follow that in general employers in large cities
have less difficulty in securing servants than have persons living
elsewhere, but that they are practically restricted in their choice
to those of foreign birth. The conclusion does not follow that these
employers have less difficulty than have others in dealing with the
question of domestic service, since the facts given concern only the
number of servants, not the quality of service.
(6) The proportion of persons engaged in domestic service varies with
geographical location and prevailing industry.
This fact is indicated by the chart, which shows that in Southern cities,
where the colored population is large, and in New York and Boston,
which are ports of entry and therefore able to secure a large number of
foreign born servants, the proportion of servants to the total population
is large. In cities where the leading occupation is manufacturing, as
Lowell, Paterson, and Fall River, the proportion of servants is small. In
cities where the industrial conditions are similar the proportions are
similar.
[Illustration: CHART SHOWING THE NUMBER OF PERSONS TO EACH DOMESTIC
EMPLOYEE IN THE FIFTY LARGEST CITIES
Washington, D.C. 13
Richmond, Va. 13
Atlanta, Ga. 14
Memphis, Tenn. 15
Nashville, Tenn. 16
New York, N.Y. 18
Boston, Mass. 18
St. Paul, Minn. 19
Minneapolis, Minn. 19
Omaha, Neb. 19
San Francisco, Cal. 20
Baltimore, Md. 21
Louisville, Ky. 21
Worcester, Mass. 21
Reading, Pa. 22
New Orleans, La. 23
Denver, Col. 23
Philadelphia, Pa. 24
Cambridge, Mass. 24
St. Louis, Mo. 25
Cincinnati, Ohio 26
Albany, N.Y. 26
Indianapolis, Ind. 26
Chicago, Ill. 27
New Haven, Conn. 27
Providence, R.I. 27
Syracuse, N.Y. 27
Wilmington, Del. 27
Columbus, Ohio 28
Pittsburg, Pa. 28
Brooklyn, N.Y. 29
Detroit, Mich. 29
Grand Rapids, Mich. 29
Kansas City, Mo. 29
Toledo, Ohio 29
Allegheny, Pa. 30
Buffalo, N.Y. 31
Troy, N.Y. 31
Cleveland, Ohio 33
Milwaukee, Wis. 33
Rochester, N.Y. 33
Dayton, Ohio 35
Jersey City, N.J. 35
Scranton, Pa. 36
Newark, N.J. 38
Camden, N.J. 39
Trenton, N.J. 40
Lowell, Mass. 43
Paterson, N.J. 68
Fall River, Mass. 73]
The same fact may be illustrated in two other ways. In Washington,
Richmond, Atlanta, Memphis, and Nashville,—the five cities having the
largest number of domestic employees in proportion to the population,—the
domestic employees constitute in each city more than fourteen per cent
of the entire number of persons engaged in all gainful occupations.
In these five cities more than one third of all women engaged in
remunerative occupations are in domestic service. On the other hand,
in Camden, Trenton, Lowell, Paterson, and Fall River,—the five cities
having the smallest number of domestic employees in proportion to the
population,—the per cent of domestic employees with reference to the
total number of persons engaged in all gainful occupations is less than
seven, while in Lowell and Paterson only ten per cent and in Fall River
only seven per cent of all women engaged in remunerative occupations are
in domestic service. The following table will show these contrasts:
TABLE VI
DOMESTIC SERVANTS AND WOMEN COMPARED WITH THOSE IN GAINFUL OCCUPATIONS
=============+=======================+========================
| Per cent of domestic | Per cent of women in
| servants as compared | domestic service as
CITIES | with the total number | compared with the
| of persons in all | total number of women
| gainful occupations | in all gainful
| | occupations
-------------+-----------------------+------------------------
Washington | 17.10 | 40.46
Richmond | 16.66 | 40.36
Atlanta | 5.43 | 36.72
Memphis | 5.21 | 39.07
Nashville | 4.61 | 38.69
Camden | 5.89 | 26.13
Trenton | 6.13 | 26.07
Lowell | 4.48 | 10.29
Paterson | 3.34 | 10.84
Fall River | 2.82 | 6.98
=============+=======================+========================
(7) Neither per capita wealth nor aggregate wealth has an appreciable
influence in determining the number of servants in cities.
Three illustrations of this are seen: (1) Washington, Richmond, Atlanta,
Memphis, and Nashville rank respectively as regards per capita wealth,
13, 27, 19, 24, and 41, although they are the five cities that head the
list in the proportion of servants to the total population; (2) Lowell
and Fall River are at the foot of the list as regards the proportion
of servants, but rank 10 and 12 in per capita wealth; (3) Nashville
ranks fifth in the number of servants and Paterson forty-ninth, while
both rank nearly the same in point of wealth.[205] There are indeed
many instances where there is apparent connection between these two
conditions, but they seem rather to be illustrations of the following
point:
(8) The prevailing industry of a city, rather than its population or
wealth, determines the number of domestic employees.
This conclusion seems to follow naturally as a result of the two previous
propositions, but a few other facts in support of it may be mentioned. In
eleven of the fifty principal cities the proportion of domestic servants
to the total population is smaller than is the proportion in the states
in which they are severally located.[206] The leading occupation in each
of these cities is some form of manufacturing, and in each of them the
proportion of persons engaged in manufacturing processes is larger than,
with few exceptions, in the other cities. This fact explains the apparent
contradiction between this statement and the one that domestic servants
are found in the largest proportions in the largest cities.
That manufacturing industries tend to decrease the number of domestic
employees in a city is both a cause and a result. The competition in
industry draws women from domestic service, and at the same time a large
part of the population in a manufacturing city is unable or does not care
to employ large numbers of servants. It has been seen, however, that
several of the manufacturing cities rank comparatively high in per capita
wealth.
It seems possible in view of the facts stated in this second group of
propositions to draw these conclusions. In states containing a relatively
high urban population it is possible for wealth to command the services
of a large proportion of persons for work in domestic service. But in
cities where wealth comes into competition with manufacturing industries
the proportion of domestic servants is small. Where such competition does
not exist the proportion is large. In other words, persons are willing
to enter domestic service for a consideration in cities where no other
avenues of work are open to them with the qualifications they possess.
They are unwilling to do so where such openings do exist.
A third group of propositions remains to be considered concerning the
subject of wages. They may be thus stated:
(1) Wages in domestic service vary in different sections according to the
economic conditions of the several localities.
TABLE VII
AVERAGE WEEKLY WAGES BY GEOGRAPHICAL SECTION
======================+========================
| AVERAGE WEEKLY WAGES
GEOGRAPHICAL SECTION +-----------+------------
| Men | Women
----------------------+-----------+------------
Pacific coast | $7.57 | $4.57
Eastern section | 8.68 | 3.60
Middle section | 7.62 | 3.21
Western section | 6.69 | 3.00
Border section | 4.86 | 2.55
Southern section | 3.95 | 2.22
----------------------+-----------+------------
United States | $7.18 | $3.23
======================+===========+============
This principle is illustrated by Table VII on the preceding page based
on a classification of the returns received through individual schedules
relating to 2,545 employees.
The difference indicated apparently conforms to the general variation in
wages in different sections indicated by the Fourth Annual Report of the
Commissioner of Labor,[207] and by examination of a considerable number
of reports of various state bureaus of labor. The slight exception in the
case of the wages of men on the Pacific coast is accidental, owing to the
small number of returns.
(2) Skilled labor commands higher wages than unskilled labor.
This will be evident from Table VIII on the following page based on the
schedules received from employers and employees and the returns from a
Boston employment bureau.
In every instance it is seen that it is the skilled laborer—the cook—who
commands the highest wages. The general servant who is expected to unite
in herself all the functions of all the other employees named in the list
becomes, on account of this fact, an unskilled worker, and, therefore,
receives the lowest wages. The same principle holds true in the case of
the seamstress and the laundress, the gardener and the choreman. It is
difficult to make a deduction in the case of men employed in household
service, since no universal custom prevails, as with women employees, in
regard to adding to the wages paid in money, board, lodging, and other
personal expenses.
TABLE VIII
AVERAGE WEEKLY AND DAILY WAGES BY OCCUPATIONS
===============================+=================================
| WEEKLY WAGES
+---------------------+-----------
OCCUPATION | General schedule of | Boston
+----------+----------+ employment
| Employer | Employee | bureau
-------------------------------+----------+----------+-----------
WOMEN | | |
Cooks | $3.80 | $3.64 | $4.45
Parlor maids | | | 3.94
Cooks and laundresses | 3.50 | 3.27 |
Chambermaids | 3.31 | 3.47 | 3.86
Waitresses | 3.23 | 3.15 | 3.76
Second girls | 3.04 | 3.27 | 3.34
Chambermaids and waitresses | 2.99 | 3.21 |
General servants | 2.94 | 2.88 | 3.16
MEN | | |
Coachmen | 7.84 | |
Coachmen and gardeners | 6.54 | |
Butlers | 6.11 | |
Cooks | 6.08 | |
-------------------------------+----------+----------+-----------
| DAILY WAGES
-------------------------------+----------+----------+-----------
WOMEN | | |
Seamstresses | $1.01 | |
Laundresses | .82 | |
MEN | | |
Gardeners | 1.33 | |
Choremen | .87 | |
===============================+==========+==========+===========
A corollary to the proposition may be added. The skilled laborer is
a better workman than the unskilled laborer. The question was asked
of employers, “What is the nature of the service rendered? Is it
‘excellent,’ ‘good,’ ‘fair,’ or ‘poor’?” The replies show that in
proportion to the number of answers the largest percentage of service
characterized as “excellent” is rendered by cooks, while the largest
percentage characterized as “poor” is given by the general servants.
These are, it is true, matters of opinion; and without a fixed standard,
which it is impossible to secure, such judgments can have no absolute
value. But the fact is of interest as showing the opinion of a large
number of housekeepers. The following table will show the results in
regard to these two classes of employees:
TABLE IX
NATURE OF SERVICE RENDERED
==========+=======+=====+================================================
| | | KIND OF SERVICE RENDERED
|Total | +-----------+-----------+-----------+------------
OCCUPATION|number |Not | Excellent | Good | Fair | Poor
| of |answ-+------+----+------+----+------+----+------+-----
|replies|ered |Number| Per|Number| Per|Number| Per|Number| Per
| | | |cent| |cent| |cent| |cent
----------+-------+-----+------+----+------+----+------+----+------+-----
Cooks | 262 | 30 | 83 | 32 | 113 | 43 | 58 | 22 | 8 | 3
General | | | | | | | | | |
servants| 585 | 53 | 151 | 26 | 221 | 38 | 177 | 30 | 36 | 6
==========+=======+=====+======+====+======+====+======+====+======+=====
(3) The foreign born in domestic service receive higher wages than the
native born.
This was found to be true in every class of occupations, in every
section, in the case of both men and women, and in the returns made by
both employers and employees. But two trifling exceptions were found,
both accidental. The principle cannot of course be stated absolutely
as the facts at command are far from exhaustive, but so striking a
uniformity cannot be considered purely accidental. An explanation is
found in three facts: (1) the preference of the foreign born for the
large cities, where wages in domestic service are higher than in the
country; (2) the large proportion of negroes among the native born; (3)
the relatively better class of foreign born than of native born women who
enter domestic service. This statement must be made somewhat dogmatically
here, since its proof demands a discussion of the entire subject of the
unwillingness of native born women to enter domestic service.
(4) The wages of men engaged in domestic service are higher than the
wages of women.
This will be evident by reference to Table VII and to Table VIII. Two
things, however, must be borne in mind: first, that nearly all the men
classified as cooks are employed on the Pacific coast, where wages are
relatively high; second, that forty per cent of the men in domestic
service do not receive board and lodging in addition to wages in money,
while only two per cent of women so employed, principally laundresses,
do not receive board and lodging. But although these facts modify the
discrepancy between the wages of men and women, they do not wholly remove
it. Whether the difference is as great as in other occupations cannot be
stated.
(5) A tendency is found towards an increase in wages paid by employers,
as is seen in Table X on the following page.
An interesting historical illustration of the same fact is given in a
summary of wages and prices in Massachusetts from 1752 to 1860. In 1815,
the first time the work of women is mentioned specifically, domestic
servants received with board $.50 per week, while at the same time women
were able to earn as papermakers $6.50 a week.[208]
TABLE X
COMPARISON OF WAGES PAID
====================+======================+========================
| NUMBER | PER CENT
WAGES PAID +------+-------+-------+-------+--------+-------
| Men | Women | Total | Men | Women | Total
--------------------+------+-------+-------+-------+--------+-------
Same as last year | 414 | 1638 | 2052 | 87.72 | 79.02 | 80.63
More than last year | 54 | 368 | 422 | 11.44 | 17.75 | 16.58
Less than last year | 4 | 67 | 71 | .84 | 3.23 | 2.79
====================+======+=======+=======+=======+========+=======
(6) The wages received in domestic service are relatively and sometimes
absolutely higher than the average wages received in other wage-earning
occupations open to women.
A comparison may be made between the wages received by domestic employees
and by two other classes—teachers in representative city schools and
the wage-earning women included in the investigations made by the
Commissioner of Labor. As illustrating the wages received in domestic
service, the following tables are given, showing (1) the classified
weekly and daily wages received and (2) the average weekly and daily
wages with the percentages receiving more or less than the average. These
facts are taken from the general schedules. Similar tables are given
showing a somewhat higher rate of wages in all domestic occupations in
the special city of Boston.
TABLE XI
CLASSIFIED DAILY AND WEEKLY WAGES BY OCCUPATIONS
=============+===========================================================
|Under $1
| |$1, but under $2
| | |$2, but under $3
| | | |$3, but under $4
| | | | |$4, but under $5
| | | | | |$5, but under $6
| | | | | | |$6, but under $7
| | | | | | | |$7, but under $8
| | | | | | | | |$8, but under $9
| | | | | | | | | |$9, but under $10
| | | | | | | | | | |$10, but under $11
| | | | | | | | | | | |$11, but
| | | | | | | | | | | | under $12
| | | | | | | | | | | | |$12, but
| | | | | | | | | | | | | under $13
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |$13, but
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | under $14
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | |Over $14
OCCUPATION | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |Total
-------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+--+--+-----
SCHEDULE OF | EARNING WEEKLY
EMPLOYERS |
-------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+--+--+-----
WOMEN | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
General | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
servants | 1| 33|251|276| 39| 5| | 1| | | | | | | | 606
Second girls| | 17| 50| 76| 18| 4| 1| 4| | | | | | | | 170
Cooks and | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
laundresses| | 4| 21| 70| 41| 5| | | | | | | | | | 141
Cooks | 4| 6| 38|104| 86| 31| 7| | | 3| 1| | | | | 280
Chambermaids| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
and | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
waitresses | 2| 9| 44| 69| 7| 2| | | | | | | | | | 133
Chambermaids| 1| 6| 18| 45| 18| 4| | | | | | | | | | 92
Waitresses | | 3| 43| 32| 23| 2| | | | | | | | | | 103
Nurses | 1| 11| 30| 46| 18| 9| | 6| | | 4| | | | | 125
Housekeepers| | | | 1| 2| | | | 1| | | | | | | 4
-------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+--+--+-----
Total | 9| 89|495|619|252| 62| 8| 11| 1| 3| 5| | | | |1,654
-------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+--+--+-----
MEN | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Butlers | | 3| 2| 5| 3| 8| 6| 4| 3| 6| 2| 1| | 1| | 44
Coachmen and| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
gardeners | | 2| 7| 11| 18| 22| 21| 3| 12|10|11| 4| 1| 1| | 123
Coachmen | | 1| 5| 8| 10| 14| 17| 3| 9|12| 7|11| 3| 6| 3| 109
Cooks | | 1| | 1| 3| 2| 3| 3| 1| 3| | | | | | 17
-------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+--+--+-----
Total | | 7| 14| 25| 34| 46| 47| 13| 25|31|20|16| 4| 8| 3| 293
=============+===+===+===+===+===+===+===+===+===+==+==+==+==+==+==+=====
SCHEDULE OF | EARNING DAILY
EMPLOYERS |
-------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+--+--+-----
WOMEN | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Laundresses |123|121| | | | | | | | | | | | | | 244
Seamstresses| 48| 51| 6| | | | | | | | | | | | | 105
-------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+--+--+-----
Total |171|172| 6| | | | | | | | | | | | | 349
-------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+--+--+-----
MEN | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Gardeners | 26| 87| 8| 1| | | | | | | | | | | |
Choremen | 24| 14| 1| | | | | | | | | | | | |
-------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+--+--+-----
Total | 50|101| 9| 1| | | | | | | | | | | | 161
=============+===+===+===+===+===+===+===+===+===+==+==+==+==+==+==+=====
SCHEDULE OF | EARNING WEEKLY
EMPLOYEES |
-------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+--+--+-----
General | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
servants | 1| 16|152|187| 24| 3| | | | | | | | | | 383
Second girls| | | 11| 18| 10| | | | | | | | | | | 39
Cooks and | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
laundresses| | 4| 6| 22| 13| | | | | | | | | | | 45
Cooks | 1| 3| 20| 39| 23| 11| 3| 1| | | | | | | | 101
Chambermaids| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
and | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
waitresses | | | 6| 15| 1| 1| | | | | | | | | | 23
Chambermaids| | 1| 7| 9| 6| 1| | | 1| | | | | | | 25
Waitresses | | 2| 14| 16| 1| 2| 1| | | | | | | | | 36
Nurses | | 1| 5| 10| 1| 1| | | | | | | | | | 18
Housekeepers| | | | 2| 1| | | | | 1| | | | | | 4
-------------+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+--+--+--+--+--+--+-----
Total | 2| 27|221|318| 80| 19| 4| 1| 1| 1| | | | | | 674
=============+===+===+===+===+===+===+===+===+===+==+==+==+==+==+==+=====
TABLE XII[209]
AVERAGE WEEKLY AND DAILY WAGES BY OCCUPATIONS
=================+=======================================================
| PERSON REPLYING
+---------------------------+---------------------------
| EMPLOYER | EMPLOYEE
+-------+---------+---------+-------+---------+---------
OCCUPATION | | | Per cent| | |Per cent
| |Per cent |receiving| |Per cent |receiving
|Average|receiving| the |Average|receiving| the
| weekly| more | same or | weekly| more | same or
| wages|than the | less | wages| than |the less
| | average |than the | | average |than the
| | | average | | | average
-----------------+-------+---------+---------+-------+---------+---------
WOMEN | | | | | |
General servants| $2.94 | 52.97 | 47.03 | $2.88 | 55.87 | 43.13
Second girls | 3.04 | 40.00 | 60.00 | 3.27 | 53.85 | 46.15
Cooks and | | | | | |
laundresses | 3.50 | 43.97 | 56.03 | 3.27 | 53.33 | 46.67
Cooks | 3.80 | 45.71 | 54.29 | 3.64 | 43.56 | 56.44
Chambermaids and| | | | | |
waitresses | 2.99 | 58.65 | 41.35 | 3.21 | 52.17 | 47.83
Chambermaids | 3.31 | 47.83 | 52.17 | 3.47 | 32.00 | 68.00
Waitresses | 3.23 | 43.69 | 56.31 | 3.15 | 44.44 | 55.56
Nurses | 3.53 | 36.00 | 64.00 | 3.03 | 33.33 | 66.67
Housekeepers | 5.15 | 25.00 | 75.00 | 5.15 | 25.00 | 75.00
-----------------+-------+---------+---------+-------+---------+---------
Total | $3.23 | 47.88 | 52.12 | $3.11 | 50.95 | 49.05
-----------------+-------+---------+---------+-------+---------+---------
MEN | | | | | |
Butlers | $6.11 | 50.00 | 50.00 | | |
Coachmen and | | | | | |
gardeners | 6.54 | 44.72 | 55.28 | | |
Coachmen | 7.84 | 46.79 | 53.21 | | |
Cooks | 6.09 | 47.06 | 52.94 | | |
-----------------+-------+---------+---------+-------+---------+---------
Total | $6.93 | 46.42 | 53.58 | | |
-----------------+-------+---------+---------+-------+---------+---------
|Average| | | | |
| daily | | | | |
| wages | | | | |
-----------------+-------+---------+---------+-------+---------+---------
WOMEN | | | | | |
Laundresses | $0.82 | 53.28 | 46.72 | | |
Seamstresses | 1.01 | 39.05 | 60.95 | | |
-----------------+-------+---------+---------+-------+---------+---------
Total | $0.90 | 49.00 | 51.00 | | |
-----------------+-------+---------+---------+-------+---------+---------
MEN | | | | | |
Gardeners | $1.33 | 56.56 | 43.44 | | |
Choremen | .87 | 43.59 | 56.41 | | |
-----------------+-------+---------+---------+-------+---------+---------
Total | $1.29 | 53.42 | 46.58 | | |
=================+=======+=========+=========+=======+=========+=========
The following tables show the classified and average wages paid in the
principal occupations as reported by a Boston employment bureau:
TABLE XIII
CLASSIFIED WEEKLY WAGES BY OCCUPATIONS
=================+===================================================
| EARNING WEEKLY
+---------------------------------------------------
|$1, but under $2
| |$2, but under $3
| | |$3, but under $4
| | | |$4, but under $5
| | | | |$5, but under $6
| | | | | |$6, but under $7
| | | | | | |$7, but under $8
| | | | | | | |$8, but under $9
| | | | | | | | |$9, but
| | | | | | | | | under $10
| | | | | | | | | |$10, but
| | | | | | | | | | under $11
OCCUPATION | | | | | | | | | | |Total
-----------------+---+----+------+----+----+---+---+---+--+--+-------
General servants | 8| 183| 577| 143| 3| | | | | | 914
Second girls | 2| 41| 363| 69| | | | | | | 475
Cooks | 1| 3| 39| 347| 145| 28| 4| 3| | 4| 574
Chambermaids | | 3| 40| 37| 2| | | | | | 82
Waitresses | | 4| 29| 16| 1| | | | | | 50
Parlor maids | | | 11| 45| 1| | | | | | 57
Nursery maids | 7| 45| 119| 57| 3| 1| 1| | | | 233
Laundresses | | 1| 9| 27| 15| 1| | | | | 53
-----------------+---+----+------+----+----+---+---+---+--+--+-------
Total | 18| 280| 1,187| 741| 170| 30| 5| 3| | 4| 2,438
=================+===+====+======+====+====+===+===+===+==+==+=======
TABLE XIV
AVERAGE WEEKLY WAGES BY OCCUPATIONS
=================+=======+=========+=========+========+========+=======
| |Per cent |Per cent | | |
|Average|receiving|receiving| | |
OCCUPATION | weekly|more than|the same |Highest |Lowest |Total
| wages| the |or less | wages | wages |number
| |average |than the |received|received|
| | |average | | |
-----------------+-------+---------+---------+--------+--------+-------
General servants | $3.16 | 40.5 | 59.5 | $5.00 | $1.50 | 914
Second girls | 3.34 | 62.2 | 37.8 | 4.50 | 1.50 | 475
Cooks | 4.45 | 50.0 | 50.0 | 10.50 | 1.00 | 574
Chambermaids | 3.86 | 57.4 | 42.6 | 5.00 | 3.00 | 82
Waitresses | 3.76 | 48.4 | 51.6 | 5.00 | 2.50 | 50
Parlor maids | 3.94 | 80.4 | 19.6 | 5.00 | 3.50 | 57
Nursery maids | 3.26 | 51.3 | 48.7 | 7.00 | 1.00 | 233
Laundresses | 4.44 | 44.4 | 55.6 | 6.00 | 2.00 | 53
-----------------+-------+---------+---------+--------+--------+-------
Total | | | | | | 2,438
=================+=======+=========+=========+========+========+=======
It is seen from Table XII that the average weekly wages in domestic
service are $3.23—a fair average in this case, since forty-eight per
cent receive more than the average and fifty-two per cent the same or
less than the average. The average domestic employee, therefore, is
able to earn in money during the year $167.96—a fair estimate, since
in seventy-five cases out of every hundred the vacation granted women
employees during the year is given without loss of wages.[210] This
forms, however, but a part of the annual earnings. To this sum must be
added board and lodging, fuel and light. For the equivalent in quality
and quantity to that furnished by the employer the employee would in
general be obliged to pay for board, lodging, and other incidental
expenses at a reasonable estimate five dollars per week, or $250
annually, deducting board for two weeks’ vacation. The total annual
earnings of a domestic employee, therefore, amount to nearly $420. To
this the negative facts must be added that there is no expense for
laundry work, and that the work involves few personal expenses in the
way of clothing, and that these necessary expenses are often partially
met through gifts from the employer. Again, the position entails no
expenditures for car fares in going to and from work, or other demands
such as are made in a business way by other occupations, and it involves
no outlay for appliances for work, as a sewing-machine, type-writer,
text-books, etc. Moreover, no investment of capital is necessary in
learning the principles of the work, since employers have thus far been
willing to make of their own homes training-schools for employees. The
domestic employee is therefore never obliged to pay back either the
capital invested in preparing for her work or the interest on that
amount. It thus seems possible for the average household employee to save
annually nearly $150 in an occupation involving no outlay or investment
of capital in any way, and few personal expenses.
TABLE XV
CLASSIFIED ANNUAL SALARIES OF WOMEN TEACHERS
=================+=======================================================
CITY | EARNING ANNUALLY
+-------------------------------------------------------
|Under $300
| |$300, but under $400
| | |$400, but under $500
| | | |$500, but under $600
| | | | |$600, but under $700
| | | | | |$700, but under $800
| | | | | | |$800, but under $900
| | | | | | | |$900, but
| | | | | | | |under $1,000
| | | | | | | | |$1,000, but
| | | | | | | | |under $1,200
| | | | | | | | | |$1,200, but
| | | | | | | | | |under $1,500
| | | | | | | | | | |More than
| | | | | | | | | | |$1,500
| | | | | | | | | | | |Total
-----------------+---+---+-----+-----+-----+---+---+---+---+---+---+-----
Albany, N.Y. | 1| 26| 34| 153| 22| 11| 6| | | 1| | 254
Atlanta, Ga. | 7| 1| 32| 31| 3| 4| 1| | | 2| | 81
Baltimore, Md. | | | 628| 246| 101| 1| 1| 40| 3| | |1,020
Cambridge, Mass. | | 1| 22| 19| 146| 10| 3| 11| 2| | | 214
Cincinnati, Ohio | | | 26| 50| 59|359| 98| 1| 5| 19| 2| 619
Cleveland, Ohio | | | 119| 124| 269| 89| 16| 8| 14| 10| 4| 653
Detroit, Mich. | | 54| 63| 111| 20|121| 35| 5| 3| 14| 1| 427
Lawrence, Mass. | | 43| 49| 6| | 2| 1| 1| 1| | | 103
Lowell, Mass. | | | 8| 5| 155| 9| 1| | | 1| 1| 180
Milwaukee, Wis. | | 2| 76| 72| 197| 19| 7| 15| 9| 2| | 399
New Haven, Conn. | | 54| 73| 38| 107| 14| 11| | 1| 2| 1| 301
New Orleans, La. | 2|172| 174| 3| 18| 7| | 5| 1| | | 382
Paterson, N. J. | | 55| 97| 26| 8| 9| 2| | | | | 197
Rochester, N. Y. | 45| 57| 287| 3| 7| 14| 6| | 1| 2| | 422
St. Louis, Mo. | 61| 36| 182| 362| 122|133| 42| 20| 12| 13| 13| 996
Syracuse, N. Y. | | 35| 52| 139| 21| 3| 13| 1| | | | 264
-----------------+---+---+-----+-----+-----+---+---+---+---+---+---+-----
Total |116|493|1,916|1,431|1,261|803|244|107| 52| 67| 22|6,512
=================+===+===+=====+=====+=====+===+===+===+===+===+===+=====
A comparison may be made between these wages and the annual salaries
received in sixteen representative cities by the women teachers in the
public schools. Tables XV and XVI show the annual classified and average
salaries received.[211]
TABLE XVI
AVERAGE ANNUAL SALARIES OF WOMEN TEACHERS
=================+=============+====================+====================
| Average | Per cent receiving | Per cent receiving
City | salary | more than the | the same or less
| | average | than the average
-----------------+-------------+--------------------+--------------------
Albany, N.Y. | $505.73 | 27.70 | 72.30
Atlanta, Ga. | 459.05 | 48.12 | 51.88
Baltimore, Md. | 500.92 | 37.12 | 62.88
Cambridge, Mass. | 628.35 | 22.32 | 77.68
Cincinnati, Ohio | 702.87 | 20.60 | 79.40
Cleveland, Ohio | 625.60 | 43.20 | 56.80
Detroit, Mich. | 607.96 | 96.02 | 3.98
Lawrence, Mass. | 511.16 | 26.22 | 73.78
Lowell, Mass. | 608.66 | 6.71 | 93.29
Milwaukee, Wis. | 588.00 | 63.59 | 34.41
New Haven, Conn. | 536.41 | 52.96 | 47.04
New Orleans, La. | 429.78 | 28.08 | 71.92
Paterson, N.J. | 455.20 | 22.84 | 77.16
Rochester, N.Y. | 431.63 | 57.34 | 42.66
St. Louis, Mo. | 574.68 | 34.89 | 65.11
Syracuse, N.Y. | 494.98 | 67.04 | 32.96
=================+=============+====================+====================
The concentration of salaries is seen to be on those between $400 and
$500, the average salary being $545. This sum represents the full amount
of wages received. To ascertain the amount it is possible to save
annually there must be deducted at least $260 for board and lodging,
and $25 for laundry expenses, leaving a cash balance of $260. Out of
this sum, however, must come other necessary expenses, as the outfit for
work,—books, stationery, etc.,—travelling expenses, car fares, society
fees, etc., and a large item for clothing. There should also be deducted
the interest on the capital invested in securing the education demanded
in preparation for the work. If all of these items are considered, and
the greater social demands entailed by the position, it seems possible
for the average domestic employee to save at least as much money as
the average teacher in the city schools. This comparison is probably
relatively higher in favor of the teacher than it should be, since in the
average wages for domestic employees are included the wages received in
agricultural districts, where wages are lower than in cities. It is also
a comparison between skilled workers on the one hand, and on the other
hand an occupation in some of the subdivisions of which the laborers are
unskilled.
It has, unfortunately, not been possible to compare the wages received in
the same city by teachers and domestic employees. A comparison, however,
can be made between the wages received in Boston for domestic service
and by the teachers in the public schools in the neighboring city of
Cambridge.
The average wages received by a cook in a private family in Boston are,
as has been seen by Table XIV, $4.45. This judgment is based on five
hundred and seventy-four returns, and is an exact average, since fifty
per cent receive more than that amount, and fifty per cent the same or
less than that. She therefore earns annually $231.40 plus $275 for
board, lodging, fuel, light, and laundry expenses, or $506.40.
Fifty-six per cent of the teachers in the city schools in Cambridge earn
annually $620, or, deducting $285 for board, etc., for fifty-two weeks,
$335 in money. This is $103 more than is received by the Boston cook, but
out of this must come numerous expenses entailed by the position, from
which the domestic employee is exempt. The cash annual savings in the two
cases cannot vary materially.
It will also be seen by reference to Tables XV and XVI that the Boston
cook earns absolutely more than does the average city teacher in Albany,
Atlanta, Baltimore, New Orleans, Paterson, Rochester, and Syracuse.
A second comparison is suggested by the investigations conducted by
the Department of Labor. Through these it was found that the annual
cash earnings of the working-women in twenty-two typical cities are
$272.45.[212] This average takes into consideration time lost—a factor
which does not enter into domestic employments except in a casual way.
The annual earnings, therefore, of the class of women represented by
the Report are much less than those of the domestic employee. The same
point is also illustrated by a comparison of the amounts saved in the two
occupations. In eleven cities investigated by the Department of Labor the
average amount saved was less than $50; in nine cities it was $50, but
under $100, while in only two cities was it more than $100, the highest
average amount being $111.[213] As has been suggested, the highest of
these averages is small in comparison with the amount it is possible to
save in domestic service.
No question in regard to earnings saved was asked on the schedule sent
to employees, but many statements on this point were voluntarily made
by employees.[214] The question as to comparative amounts saved has
also been asked the cashiers of banks in small cities and towns where
factories are found and the personnel of depositors is known by the
officials of the banks. No records are of course kept, but the opinion
has been several times expressed that the factory employees do not save
as much, as a class, as do domestic employees. In one place, where about
two thousand factory employees are found, it was stated that no woman
employee had a sum to her credit as large as had been deposited by a
domestic.
A corollary follows from this proposition. High wages alone are not
sufficient to counterbalance the inducements offered in other occupations
where wages are relatively or absolutely lower but whose special
advantages are deemed more desirable.
(7) The wages paid in domestic service are on the average high, but the
occupation offers few opportunities for advancement in this direction.
An examination of Table XI shows but one instance, with the exception
of nurses, where the weekly cash wages reach $10.00 per week, and only
nine others where they rise above $7.00. In the two occupations the wages
in which have been compared with those in domestic service, while the
general average wages are low, it is possible to reach through promotion
a comparatively high point. The fact that the wage plane is a high one
is one inducement for women of average ability to enter the occupation.
On the other hand, the fact that the wage limit, high as it is, is soon
reached must act as a barrier in the case of others.
(8) The amount of time unemployed is less in domestic service than in
nearly every other occupation.
The element of time unemployed is an important factor in determining
annual earnings. While in nearly every occupation there is a limit to
the demand, in domestic service there is no limit and hence few persons
are necessarily without employment. The most important illustration of
this point is derived from the report of the Massachusetts Bureau of
Statistics of Labor on the unemployed in that state in 1885.[215] Of the
total number of women in the state engaged in remunerative occupations
at the time, thirty per cent were unemployed. These were distributed as
regards occupations as follows:
Manufacturing industries 78.22
Government and professional services 9.08
Domestic service 6.33
Personal service 3.99
Trade 1.98
Minor occupations .40
But if the number of unemployed is compared with the total number
employed in each industry, a still lower percentage of unemployed is
found in domestic service. A comparison with other wage earners will
make clear this point. The percentage of the unemployed in the leading
industries in which women are engaged was as follows:
Straw-workers 93.74
Boot and shoe makers 71.08
Teachers 49.58
Woollen mill operatives 45.02
Cotton mill operatives 43.59
Hosiery mill operatives 40.56
Tailoresses 32.98
Milliners 27.46
Seamstresses 27.08
Dressmakers 23.99
Paper mill operatives 21.26
Saleswomen 11.73
Book-keepers and clerks 9.19
Servants in families 6.78
Housekeepers 3.65
The demand for domestic servants varies in the different states, but
the condition of the unemployed in this occupation in Massachusetts may
perhaps be considered fairly typical of that in other localities.
(9) High wages are maintained without the aid of strikes or combinations
on the part of the employees.
In but five states are strikes reported among domestic employees;[216]
they number but twenty-two and involve less than seven hundred persons,
all of them being connected with hotels or restaurants, and nine tenths
of them men. Only two instances of permanent organization among this
class have come to notice, and neither of these has had as its object
the increase of wages. The strike in domestic service assumes the form
of a “notice,” is individual in character, and is able to accomplish
its object without the organized effort considered necessary in other
occupations where the supply of laborers is greater than the demand.
This group of nine propositions concerning wages it is believed will
suggest three conclusions: the conformity of wages in domestic service to
certain general economic laws, the fact that the wage factor alone does
not determine the number of persons in the occupation, and the existence
of a few conditions which affect, perhaps unconsciously, the willingness
of the women to engage in this work.
The three groups of propositions stated it is believed will suggest
the conclusions that the general economic condition of the country has
an appreciable influence on the condition of domestic service, both as
regards the character and number of persons engaged and the compensation
given for service required. It must follow therefore that many questions
must arise connected with the employment, which the individual employer
cannot settle from an exclusively personal point of view.
CHAPTER VI
DIFFICULTIES IN DOMESTIC SERVICE FROM THE STANDPOINT OF THE EMPLOYER
The understanding of domestic service has been seen to involve the
consideration of many historical changes both industrial and political,
and an examination of the general economic laws to which it is amenable.
It involves also a study of the economic conditions that surround the
average family, and the problems that confront it when undertaking to
deal with the question of domestic service.
The average family reached through the schedules was found to consist of
about five persons,[217] exclusive of servants. Its members have kept
house eighteen years,[218] they have boarded two years and a half,[219]
and at some time during their housekeeping experience they have been
without servants. They employ at the present time two servants and a
half, or rather, they command the full time of two persons and half the
time of the third, to whom they pay weekly for service rendered, on the
basis indicated in the schedule of average wages, $10,[220] exclusive of
board and lodging, or $500 annually, the expense of service exclusive
also of waste, breakage, and general wear and tear of household furniture
and appliances. In about one third of all the families with servants men
are employed in some capacity about the house; in one family in every
seven the number of servants is the same as the number of persons in the
family or exceeds it, while in the average family one servant renders
service to every two persons.
When the average family undertakes the task of dealing with domestic
servants the difficulties that confront it are many and serious.
It has first the task of assimilating into its domestic life those who
are of a different nationality and who consequently hold different
industrial, social, religious and political beliefs. More than one half
of all domestic employees are of foreign birth or belong to another
race,[221] who come not only from the prominent European countries but
also from the remote corners of the globe,[222] where all conditions are
totally unlike those of America. Moreover this number does not include
the very large percentage of those who are themselves native born, but
who are the children of foreign born parents and have inherited to a
certain extent un-American characteristics; 4.02 per cent of the domestic
employees in this country do not speak the English language.[223] Those
who come to this country, often with preconceived and erroneous ideas as
to the independence prevailing here, expecting high wages in return for
inexperienced and unskilled labor,[224] must be trained in all the ways
not only of American life, but of the family of the individual employer.
It has been found difficult to assimilate into our political system the
large foreign element coming here, though this system is simple and lends
itself readily to such assimilation, as our history has thus far proved.
It is far more difficult to assimilate this mass into the infinitely more
complex and delicate organism—the modern household. It is not strange
that congestion and inflammation so often result from the attempt. The
question is one also that becomes more difficult as the proportion of
foreign employees increases.
A second difficulty is that of the spirit of restlessness which
everywhere prevails among working classes, though not confined to them,
and the consequent brief tenure of service. The average length of service
of a domestic servant is found to be less than a year and a half and
this in many cases and in some localities is a high average. In the
East, in the vicinity of the great lakes, on the Pacific coast, and
in some sections of the South, proximity to popular summer or winter
resorts lessens the average duration of service. In the South, the
cotton-picking season draws many women from household work, as they are
able at that time to earn enough money to enable them to live for some
months in idleness. In other localities, the hop-picking season, the
berry-picking season, and the grape-picking season all offer temporary
inducements for girls to leave domestic service. In still other
places the canning factory, the pickle factory, and the fruit-drying
establishment successfully offer temporary competition. To the question
asked of employees, “Have you ever had any other occupation besides
domestic service?” twenty-eight per cent answered “Yes.” This at first
might seem to indicate a decided preference for domestic service, but
a closer examination shows that more often it means that housework is
taken up when the berry-picking and the fruit-canning season is over,
when the mill or the factory has closed in a dull time or when the hurry
of plantation work is ended at the South. A similar indication of this
restlessness is found in the replies given by employers to the question,
“How many servants have you employed since you have been housekeeping?”
Twenty-five per cent did not answer the question definitely and of these
one half state as their reason the fact that the number was too great to
remember. “Their name is legion,” answer fifteen housekeepers, a series
of exclamation points tells the story for others, “infinity-minus,”
writes one, and still another bids the compiler “read her answer in the
stars.”
This condition of affairs is not to be wondered at. That spirit of
restlessness, nervous discontent, and craving for excitement which
foreigners find characteristic of all who breathe American air is not
confined to business men and society women—it permeates the kitchen, the
nursery, the laundry, and every part of the household. Among employers
the mode of life tends more and more towards a winter in California, a
summer in Europe, an autumn in the mountains, and a spring in Florida. On
both sides of the Hudson there are magnificent country houses deserted
because their owners prefer the excitement of city life, the attractions
of Bar Harbor, or the society at Newport. The towns on the Hudson are
nearly stationary as regards population, though possessing every natural
advantage, while the large cities are powerful magnets drawing from
every direction. Domestic service cannot remain unaffected by these
characteristics of the age. A new situation is often like a voyage to
Europe so desired by others—it gives change, excitement, new experiences,
and it is often the only way in which these can be secured. A summer
engagement at the sea-shore, among the mountains, or at the springs is
often as eagerly sought as is the height of the season at Saratoga or
among the Berkshires by persons whose opportunities for change are far
less restricted. The occupations temporarily open at the time of the
hop-picking season, or the fruit-canning season, offer the attraction of
large numbers of fellow-workers in the company of whom “a good time” is
expected.
The tenure of service also apparently varies somewhat with the size
of the place, the average duration being longer in cities of from
ten thousand to eighty thousand inhabitants than in smaller towns or
larger cities. In small towns the desire for city life shortens the
terms of service. In the largest cities, as New York, Brooklyn, Boston,
Philadelphia, the average time is shortened by the fact that employers
are often obliged to engage as a temporary expedient persons who have
just arrived in this country; while it is also seen to be true that
there is greater difficulty than in small cities in obtaining reliable
testimonials.
It is not strange, therefore, that reasonable, intelligent, and competent
employers have difficulties to meet that lie entirely without the domain
of their own households, and that many persons who twenty-five years
ago experienced no difficulty whatever find to-day serious trouble in
retaining their employees.
A third difficulty is the fact that employers are so often obliged to
engage for skilled labor the assistance of unskilled laborers. Many who
seek employment as servants do not know even the names of the household
tools they are obliged to use—still less are they acquainted with their
uses. A part of this ignorance and lack of skill is due to the prevalence
of the old idea that anybody can do everything—a theory abandoned in most
occupations but still dominating the household. Household employments
and service are still generally considered occupations that any one can
“pick up,” but the picking-up process has resulted in the household,
as elsewhere, in unscientific, haphazard work and has seldom produced
expert workmen. The Superintendent of the Census wrote in 1880, “The
organization of domestic service in the United States is so crude that
no distinction whatever can be successfully maintained (between the
different parts of the service).”[225] In confirmation of this statement
is the testimony of a large number of employees to the effect that they
have become domestic servants because they had not education enough
to do anything else.[226] From this general conception of the nature
of household service several things result: first, few opportunities
exist for learning household duties in a systematic way; second, if the
opportunities were created, few would avail themselves of them so long as
this low estimate of the occupation prevails; third, many housekeepers
are obliged to conduct in their own households a training-school on a
limited scale; fourth, the expense is far greater than it should be,
since unskilled labor is always improvident of time and materials;[227]
fifth, the hygienic results of “instinctive cookery” and “picked up”
knowledge are often seen in ill health and a derangement of household
affairs erroneously attributed to other causes.
A fourth difficulty arises when the seemingly inevitable annual change of
employees comes. Four courses are open to the housekeeper: (1) she may
employ a new servant without asking for a recommendation, (2) she may
take the recommendation of previous employers, (3) she may consult an
employment bureau, (4) she may advertise.
Few persons are willing to adopt the first expedient and take a stranger
into their service, not to speak of their family life, without some
recommendation.[228]
But the second course open—taking the recommendation of others—is
scarcely more practicable. There must always be a difference in
standards, and “excellent” to one may mean “fair” or even “poor” to
another. It is also true that an employee may succeed in one place and be
ill adapted to meet the requirements of another. Again, it is a common
complaint that the recommendation does not always carry with it implicit
confidence in its contents. Daniel DeFoe wrote nearly two hundred years
ago:
“One of the great Evils, which lies heavily upon Families
now, in this particular Case of taking Servants, is the going
about from House to House, to take Characters and Reports of
Servants, or by Word of Mouth; and especially among the Ladies
this Usage prevails, in which the good Nature and Charity of
the Ladies to ungrateful Servants, goes so far beyond their
Justice to one another, that an ill Servant is very seldom
detected, and the Ladies yet excuse themselves by this,
_namely_, that they are loth to take away a poor Servant’s Good
Name, which is starving them; and that they may perhaps mend,
when they come to another Family, what was amiss before, which
indeed seldom happens.... The Ladies are cheating and abusing
one another, in Charity to their _Servants_. It is Time to put
an End to this unreasonable Good nature.”[229]
These words are as true a description of this phase of the subject
in America to-day as they were in England at the beginning of the
last century. It seems impossible to devise any system of personal
recommendations that will convey the truth, the whole truth, and nothing
but the truth.
The third expedient—the employment bureau—is apparently coming
into general use, especially in the large cities where some means
of communication is necessary between those desiring employees and
employment. But it is in the large city, where the greatest need for it
exists, that the employment bureau is most unsatisfactory. The bureau
lives by the fees paid to it by those desiring help and those seeking
employment. Every expedient, therefore, is used to extort fees from
both classes, and it is difficult to tell which suffers more from this
extortion. Even when numberless fees have been paid, the employer too
often finds himself without the service to which his fee presumably
entitles him. The first department abandoned by a large philanthropic
institution in Boston, was the intelligence office, “because it was found
impossible to supply well-trained servants while there was no demand for
any other.”[230] But the greatest objection to the intelligence office
is that it is often a breeding place for vice and crime. An investigation
recently made of the intelligence offices in a large city showed that
it supported one hundred and twenty, two thirds of them controlled by
foreigners, many of them managed by minor ward politicians, and four of
them under police supervision. The employees that can be found through
such agencies are not those willingly received into a respectable
family.[231] Employment bureaus in small cities are apparently more
satisfactory than those in large ones, while those offices are to be
commended which use printed forms for obtaining statements from previous
employers as to the qualifications of applicants.[232] Those agencies
patronized by an inferior class of employers and employees, especially
those that are at no pains to secure recommendation of employees from
respectable persons, are worse than useless.
Employers who adopt the fourth policy and advertise for help are forced
to open an intelligence office on a small scale in their own homes.
All of these difficulties are so great, especially that of securing
reliable testimony from responsible employers, that many persons tolerate
incompetent service rather than incur the risk of a change for the worse.
A fifth difficulty encountered by the employers of domestic service, and
probably the most serious of all, is the prevailing indifference among
housekeepers to the action of economic law—a failure to realize that
in domestic service, as in other occupations, the course followed by
one employer has an appreciable effect on the condition of service as a
whole. This can be best explained by a few concrete illustrations “drawn
from life.”
Mr. A, an employer, leaves his city home during the summer, retaining
in it two servants to care for the house and paying them their usual
wages, $16 a month. No special service is required of them, but wages
are paid in consideration of the tacit understanding that they are to
remain in his employ. On the return of Mr. A, Mr. X, who has discharged
his servants during the summer, offers the employees of Mr. A $18 a
month. This price he can afford to pay since he has been at no expense
for service during the summer. Mr. A, rather than lose his trusted
employees, pays them the advance offered by Mr. X, although the services
of neither employee are worth more than three months previous.
Mrs. B, an employer of limited means, with a natural gift for cooking
considered as a fine art, takes an inexperienced girl from Castle Garden
and teaches her after long training something of her own skill. She pays
fair wages, which are considered entirely satisfactory by the employee
in view of the instruction she has received. Mrs. Y, who ignores Mrs. B
socially and is indifferent to the matter of wages, calls on Mrs. B’s
cook and offers her $5 per week. This is much above the current rate
of wages in the place and moreover Mrs. B cannot afford to pay it. She
therefore loses her trained cook.
Mr. C, an employer in haste to reach his distant home and anxious to
secure a servant, engages in the afternoon a Swedish girl who has that
morning landed in America and of whom he knows nothing. She is to
accompany his family, which includes five children, to their Western
home, have all of her expenses of travel paid by her employers, and
receive $4.00 a week for her services as a nurse-maid.
Mrs. D, a housekeeper with a large family, moderate income, and ambitious
tastes, employs one general servant and requires, in addition to the
ordinary duties of such a servant, dining-room and chamber service.
Mrs. E, her nearest neighbor, a housekeeper with a small family, simple
tastes, and free from numerous social demands, makes all of the desserts
herself, requires no table service of her employee, and expects her
daughter to assume the care of the chambers.
Mrs. F pays full wages to her inexperienced “help,” fifteen years old,
because the latter has an invalid mother dependent on her.
Mr. G, with a family of two, prides himself on paying the highest wages
in the place to his cook, second girl, and coachman.
Mrs. H, who has inherited a large family homestead, which she occupies
with her sister, provides her three employees each with a separate
bedroom, a special dining-room, a sitting-room well furnished, and grants
many personal privileges, as the use of the horse and carriage for early
church. She does not understand how any housekeeper can have trouble
in securing and retaining competent employees. She often quotes to her
nearest neighbor, “A good mistress makes a good servant,” her neighbor
being obliged to use her back parlor with a mantel bed as a guest-room
and therefore to limit somewhat the accommodations granted her employees.
Mrs. I gives each of her employees a key to the side door and makes no
inquiries as to the hours they keep.
Mrs. J gives her servants her discarded evening dresses because “it keeps
them in good humor.”
Mrs. K, the wife of a millionaire, “burns all of her old finery,” and
makes it a special point to teach all of her twelve employees how to
dress well and economically within the wages they receive.
Mrs. L does not permit her employee to wear frizzes or bangs, disapproves
of her having company, and will not tolerate a young man caller under any
circumstances.
Mrs. M, a lifelong invalid whose physician has prescribed absolute rest
two hours every afternoon, reasons that her employee who rises two hours
earlier than herself must need the same rest and therefore sends her
every afternoon to take a nap. The latter thus never works afternoons and
is able to attend more evening entertainments than other employees in the
neighborhood.[233]
Mrs. N assists her husband in his business six hours each day and gives
her employee full control of the house during her absence.
Mrs. O requires all her employees to perform their work according to
minute directions laid down by herself and is constantly present to see
that these are not deviated from in the slightest degree.
Mrs. P discharges her nursery maid for untruthfulness and gives her
a recommendation testifying to her neatness, quickness, pleasant
disposition, and fondness for children.
Mr. Q discharges his butler for incapacity, but in view of the fact that
the latter has a widowed mother and an invalid sister dependent on him
gives him an excellent recommendation.
Mr. R discharges his housekeeper “for infirmity of temper,” as
he subsequently testifies in court, but gives her so excellent a
recommendation that she believes she has been discharged for physical
disability, and gives her testimony to this effect in the same lawsuit.
Mrs. S has a cook who drinks to excess one fourth of the time, but the
latter has no fear of dismissal because three fourths of the time she
cooks in a superior manner.
Mrs. T dislikes manual labor of every kind. Her servants therefore know
that she will tolerate inefficient and incompetent service rather than be
left for a single day without help.
Mr. U, the father of three young sons, has a coachman who swears like a
trooper, but he retains him because Mrs. U considers him the most stylish
coachman in the city.
Mrs. V applies to an employment bureau for a domestic and refuses six
applicants because they are not “pretty” and “refined.” After finding one
whose appearances are satisfactory, she parts with her because she is
unwilling to black the gentlemen’s boots.
Mrs. W engages a woman to go out of town for service, the latter to wait
a week before going and meantime to pay her own board. At the time agreed
upon she reaches the employer’s house, to learn that the former “help”
has decided to remain. She has thus lost a week’s board and wages and
more than two dollars in going and returning to the city, and all of “her
set” refuse to make engagements in the country.
The different economic, social, and moral questions connected with these
various conditions, the illustrations of which could be multiplied
indefinitely, may be, generally are, decided by each individual without
reference to society at large. Wages are too often regulated by the
employer’s bank account, hours of service by his caprice, and moral
questions by his personal convenience. The employer is too often the
autocrat in his own home. He considers that neither his neighbor nor the
general public has any more concern in the business relations existing
between himself and his domestic employees than it has in the price he
pays for a dinner service or in the color and cut of his coat.
Yet domestic service is the only employment in which economic laws are
so openly defied and all questions connected with it settled on the
personal basis. No manufacturer can from charitable motives double
the wages ordinarily paid to unskilled labor without being called to
account for it by competing manufacturers, nor can he reduce unduly the
wages of his employees without being held responsible for his course
by the employees of other establishments, nor can he prolong by one
fourth of an hour the daily period of labor without overstepping his
legal privileges. Within certain narrow limits he has freedom, but
competition, labor organizations, and the arm of the law combine to keep
him within these limits. Before domestic service is freed from all the
difficulties that attend it there must be a more widespread recognition
of the responsibility of the individual employer to those outside his own
household.[234]
Five general classes of perplexing conditions have been suggested. All
of them are independent of the personal characteristics and habits of
employer and employee and of the personal relationship that exists
between them. They do not take into account the fact that throughout
the South and wherever negroes are employed in the household the
housekeeper must be ever on the alert to guard against dishonesty and
immorality on the part of these employees, that intemperance has been
found a besetting sin of cooks and coachmen irrespective of race and
nationality, that many agree with Mr. Joseph Jefferson when he says, “I
am satisfied that domestic melancholy sets in with the butler. He is the
melodramatic villain of society.” They do not consider the tendencies
encountered here as elsewhere towards indifference, idleness, laziness,
low ideals and standards, insubordination, and a desire to obtain much
for nothing.[235] They do not include lack of harmony in the personal
relations between employees in the same household,[236] the constant
friction that necessarily arises from the presence of a stranger in
the family, the question of compatibility of disposition between the
mistress and the maid, the feeling between employees and the children
of the household. They are as prone to trouble a good mistress as a
poor one, they are independent of knowledge of household affairs, of
housekeeping experience, of good or ill treatment of employees, of any
personal element whatever in employer or employee. They are difficulties
apparently inherent in the present system of domestic service.
It is of interest to note the opinion of housekeepers on this point. The
question, “Have you found it difficult to secure good domestic servants?”
was answered with the following result:
Difficult 545
Yes 290
Very difficult 148
At times 72
Rather difficult 20
Generally 15
Not difficult 418
No 328
Not especially 34
Not generally 29
Not lately 13
Very little difficulty 8
Very seldom 6
Not answered 42
----
Total 1005
Fifty-seven per cent therefore of the housekeepers represented by the
schedules have found more or less difficulty in securing good servants.
This is, probably, an underestimate of the true condition. Many
housekeepers who see only the personal element involved in the employment
of service consider an acknowledgment of difficulty a confession of
weakness and inability on their own part to cope with the question and
are therefore silent. Others have had the experience of one who writes,
“I have had no difficulty, my cook having been with me eighteen years,
and my second girl, her daughter, ten years. But if they should leave I
should not know where to turn.” Again, the replies do not represent the
experiences of a class not represented on the schedules—the many in the
large cities who are able to employ servants only occasionally and find
them through the lowest grade of intelligence offices.
These difficulties are certainly not decreasing,[237] and the demand
for competent servants is in most places evidently greater than the
supply.[238] These difficulties are, at times, somewhat modified by
the conditions in which the employer is placed. They are apparently
less in large cities that are ports of entry or the termini of leading
railroad lines, and have comparatively few manufacturing industries in
which women are employed; they are less in small families employing a
large number of servants and paying high wages. But even all of these
favorable conditions only modify—they do not change—the nature of the
question.[239] A careful study of the returned schedules with reference
to the location, population, and prevailing industry of the towns, the
number of servants employed, size of family, and wages paid leads to this
conclusion. Of the five hundred and forty-five employers who reported
that they had difficulty in securing competent servants, only twenty-six
gave in explanation a reason that would not have been applicable in any
city, town, or village in the country, and those twenty-six had reference
to the negroes at the South and the Chinese at the West. One half of the
employees reporting state that they would go into another occupation
provided it would pay them as well,[240] although the number is very
small of those who are dissatisfied except with the disadvantages of the
position. If these difficulties are found in every place irrespective
of its size, its geographical location, its prevailing industry, the
character of its inhabitants, and the personal relations of mistress and
maid, something more is involved for the employer than “kind treatment”
and personal consideration.
The belief has apparently been general that these perplexities are
confined to our own country and that the adoption of English or German
or French methods of dealing with the subject would remove them all.
The question is undoubtedly a less difficult one in England than it is
in this country, since it is not complicated by differences of race,
religion, interests, and traditions, by foreign immigration, and possibly
not by the same ease with which labor is transferred from one employment
to another, while tradition and social custom have favored country rather
than city life and have thus eliminated one of our difficulties. But
with all these obstacles removed, DeFoe’s _Behaviour of Servants_ shows
that even in England the question is an old one, and current literature
indicates that it is far from settled.[241]
If the question is asked in Germany, “Is it easy to secure good domestic
servants here?” the almost invariable answer is, “It is very difficult,
almost impossible.” The reasons for the difficulty are precisely the same
as in America—the attractions of city life, the competition of shops and
factories, the growth of democratic ideas, the difficulty of securing,
in spite of the system of service books, unimpeachable recommendations,
and the spirit of restlessness that everywhere prevails among the working
classes. In some of the higher classes, where something of the old
patriarchal relationship between mistress and maid still exists, there
is apparently no difficulty; but each year these classes become more and
more undermined by the social democratic spirit, and must in time be
affected by the same conditions that bring perplexity to other classes.
Yet it is true in Germany as in America that servants seeking places are
always to be found, that intelligence offices are crowded with applicants
for work, and that an army of incompetents is always at hand.
In France the problem is the same. It varies in details; the proportion
of men employed in housework is far greater than in America, England, or
Germany, servility of manner is not expected as in England, and waste of
material is less common than in America. But fundamentally the conditions
are the same as elsewhere.
The difficulties that meet the employer of domestic labor both in
America and in Europe are the difficulties that arise from the attempt
to harmonize an ancient, patriarchal industrial system with the
conditions of modern life. Everywhere the employer closes his eyes to
the incongruities of the attempt and lays the blame of failure, not to
a defective system, but to the natural weaknesses in the character of
the unfortunate persons obliged to carry it out. The difficulties in the
path of both employer and employee will not only never be removed but
will increase until the subject of domestic service is regarded as a
part of the great labor question of the day and given the same serious
consideration.
CHAPTER VII
ADVANTAGES IN DOMESTIC SERVICE
The question as to who constitute the class of domestic employees has
been partially answered. One fourth are of foreign birth or belong to
a different race from that of their employers, the majority are of
foreign birth, of foreign parentage, or of a different race. Nearly
one third of the number represented on the schedules have been engaged
in other occupations besides domestic service—a fact indicating three
things: first, the spirit of restlessness that characterizes the class,
though not peculiar to it; second, the industrial independence of a
considerable number of domestic employees, since they can at any time
change not only employers but employment;[242] third, the fact that many
do not enter domestic service with the thought of making it a permanent
occupation.[243] About two thirds of those who have had other work
report that they received higher wages in these occupations than in
domestic service. In nearly every case, however, these represented the
cash weekly or monthly wages received, not the yearly earnings, nor did
they include the factor of personal expenses as in domestic service.
The reasons why women have entered domestic service are many and various.
The following classification has been made of the reasons assigned by the
employees returning the schedules:
It was most available 239
Preference for it 202
Health grounds 100
Most profitable employment 37
To earn a living 17
Prefer it to work in mills 17
To have a home 17
Gives steady employment 12
To learn how 11
More leisure time than in other work 5
No capital necessary 2
To earn money to finish education 2
Greater variety in the work 1
---
Total 662
These reasons and others demand a more detailed examination. It is true
in domestic service, as in other occupations, that many drift into it
because it is apparently the only course open to them, but there are
certain advantages and disadvantages which a person who is free to choose
always weighs before deciding for or against the occupation.
The most obvious advantage is that of high remuneration,[244] including
not only wages and expenses, but as has been seen, the factors of steady
employment, certainty of position, and the fact that no capital is
required at any stage of the work or in preparation for it.
A second advantage is that the occupation is conducive to good health,
including as it does regularity and variety of work, and involving no
personal inconvenience or discomfort.[245] In one third of the families
considered men servants are employed in some capacity, and this means
that much of the hard work is done by them.
A third advantage is the fact that it gives at least the externals of
a home. This consideration weighs especially with the foreign born and
those who have no homes of their own.[246] How varied and numerous these
home privileges are is best illustrated by the replies given by employers
to the question, “Do you grant any special privileges?” Thirty answered
“No,” and one hundred and seventy-five gave no answer. Eight hundred
enumerated special privileges, and these formed sixty-eight different
classes. The most important of these are single rooms, medical care and
attendance when sick, use of daily papers, books, and magazines, evening
instruction, sitting-room for visitors, no restrictions as to visitors,
use of bath-room and sewing-machine, use of horse and carriage when
distant from church, seat at table except when guests are present, seat
in church, and concert and theatre tickets (in the families of newspaper
reporters). Many other privileges are mentioned,—these are the most
frequently granted. Seventy per cent of the employers state that they
give a single room, but about one half of this number employ only one
domestic. In many cases a large room is given for every two domestics,
with separate furniture for each. One hundred and forty-six specify
the use of the dining-room, and ninety-four families give the use of
a special sitting-room. All of these privileges show that even if the
employee is not a member of the family, her life is as much a part of it,
with the single exception of a seat at the family table, as is that of
the average boarder.
This enumeration of privileges does not include two other classes which
have in a sense ceased to be regarded as such, but rather as prerogatives
of the position. These are freedom from work at specified times each week
and a stated vacation during the year with or without wages.
The matter of free hours at stated times each week is apparently a simple
one—there is at first thought more uniformity here among housekeepers
than in regard to any other thing; but while only three per cent of the
employers do not give some specified time during the week, there are one
hundred and twenty-three classes of combinations which housekeepers have
found it possible to make out of the seven afternoons and seven evenings
of the week, thus apparently disproving the common belief that the
custom is universal of granting Thursday afternoon and Sunday evening.
In sixty-eight of these classes one or more afternoons are included and
in fifteen others some portion of Sunday. In the case of more than one
thousand employees at least one afternoon each week is given, while more
than four hundred employers give a part of Sunday.[247]
The question in regard to vacation granted during the year was answered
with reference to nearly a thousand employees, and in only one case was
a vacation not given, the time varying from the legal holidays, which
perhaps can hardly be called a vacation, to three months. Sixty-five
per cent of employers give a vacation of from one week to three months,
twenty per cent one or two weeks, fifteen per cent less than a week, and
twenty per cent give a vacation but do not specify the length of time.
These facts apply to women employees. In the case of men the conditions
are not materially different, the facts given indicating apparently a
smaller per cent among women receiving a vacation of more than two weeks
and a larger per cent receiving less than a week. In the great majority
of cases this vacation is given without loss of wages. Tables XVII and
XVIII illustrate these facts.
A short vacation granted during the year without loss of wages has
in many localities come to be regarded by employees as one of the
prerogatives of the occupation, and not, as formerly, a special privilege
given. All things considered, it is a matter of surprise that so much
rather than that so little time is given. In other occupations a
vacation can be granted employees during a dull season without loss to
the employer. But the household machinery cannot stop action without
disaster. A vacation given household employees means that the employer
must perform a double amount of domestic work, or provide for special
assistance—often a difficult and even impossible task.
TABLE XVII
VACATION GRANTED DURING THE YEAR
===================================+===============+===============
| WOMEN | MEN
REPORTED BY EMPLOYEES +------+--------+------+--------
|Number|Per cent|Number|Per cent
-----------------------------------+------+--------+------+--------
Total number of employees | 2073 | | 472 |
Not reported | 898 | | 267 |
Not applicable (laundresses, etc.) | 203 | | 50 |
Reported and applicable | 972 | | 155 |
Vacation granted | 971 | | 153 |
Time not specified | 202 | 20.78 | 34 | 21.94
Less than one week | 127 | 13.07 | 42 | 27.10
One week | 150 | 15.43 | 18 | 11.61
More than one week, less than two | 25 | 2.57 | 5 | 3.22
Two weeks | 210 | 21.61 | 33 | 21.29
More than two weeks | 257 | 26.44 | 21 | 13.55
No vacation | 1 | .10 | 2 | 1.29
===================================+======+========+======+========
TABLE XVIII
VACATION GRANTED WITH OR WITHOUT LOSS OF WAGES
===================================+===============+===============
| WOMEN | MEN
REPORTED BY EMPLOYEES +------+--------+------+--------
|Number|Per cent|Number|Per cent
-----------------------------------+------+--------+------+--------
With loss of wages | 210 | 21.63 | 20 | 13.07
Without loss of wages | 723 | 74.46 | 133 | 86.93
Half wages | 37 | 3.81 | |
Cost of board added | 1 | .10 | |
+------+--------+------+--------
Total | 971 | | 153 |
===================================+======+========+======+========
A fourth advantage that domestic service has as an occupation is
the knowledge it gives of household affairs and the training in
them—knowledge of which every woman, whatever her station in life and
whether married or unmarried, has at times most pressing need.[248]
A fifth consideration is that it offers congenial employment to many
whose tastes lie specially in this direction.[249] It is undoubtedly true
that many persons in other occupations would honestly prefer housework if
some of its present disadvantages could be eliminated.[250]
Still another advantage is the legal protection offered domestic
employees, although as Mr. James Schouler well says, the relation
of master and servant is in theory hostile to the genius of free
institutions, since it bears the marks of social caste. “It may be
pronounced as a relation of more general importance in ancient than
in modern times and better applicable at this day to English than to
American society.”[251] But technically, the relation according to
Chancellor Kent is a legal status resting entirely on contract. One
agrees to work and the other to pay, but both are on an equality as far
as rights are concerned.[252] The legal rights accorded a servant are
freedom from physical punishment,[253] proper food and support in illness
or disability during the time of employment,[254] the right to the
enjoyment of a good character—provided she has one—and the law presumes
she has it until the contrary appears,[255] wages, if the servant has
performed his part of the contract,[256] and damages in case of discharge
before the expiration of the contract.[257]
These advantages which domestic service as an occupation has over most
other employments are patent. They would be recognized by all, whether
domestic employees or not, as the accompaniments of the service as it
exists under reasonably favorable conditions. They are advantages
which, with the exception of the home privileges, are independent of the
personal character and disposition of employers. They are apparently
inherent in the occupation, as much to be expected as are free Sundays
and evenings after six o’clock in mills and factories. They are the
inducements which, when a choice has been possible, have led intelligent
women to become household employees. They are the advantages that have
been repeatedly set forth by the press and the pulpit to sewing-women
and shop-girls working at the starvation limit of wages in large cities
to induce them to better their condition. Unquestionably many such women
would be far better off than they are now if they were in comfortable
domestic service. It has been said by the head of one of our great
labor bureaus that all questions concerning wage-earning women resolve
themselves into those of “wages, hours, health, and morals,” and domestic
service conforms to all the requirements that could be demanded under
these four heads, with the possible exception of hours under unfavorable
conditions. But, notwithstanding these advantages, women in cities still
prefer sewing, country girls drift into mills and factories, teachers’
agencies are crowded with applicants who can never secure a position and
could not fill one if obtained; there must be something else involved in
the question besides the matter of “wages, hours, health, and morals.”
CHAPTER VIII
THE INDUSTRIAL DISADVANTAGES OF DOMESTIC SERVICE
No one occupation includes every advantage and no disadvantages. There
must always be a balancing of the pros and cons, and domestic service has
its industrial disadvantages, which are as patent as its advantages, and
like them are independent of the personal relationship existing between
the employer and the employee.
The question was asked of employees, “What reasons can you give why more
women do not choose housework as a regular employment?” The reasons
assigned may be classified as follows:
Pride, social condition, and unwillingness to be called servants 157
Confinement evenings and Sundays 75
More independence in other occupations 60
Too hard and confining 42
Other work pays better 42
Lack of consideration by mistresses 38
Hours too long 38
Do not like housework 19
Do not know how to do housework 12
Can live at home by working in shops 11
Girls are too lazy 8
Health considerations 8
Girls are too restless 6
Too few privileges 6
Hard work, little pay 5
Other occupations easier 4
Different tastes 4
Bad character of some reflects on others 3
Receive no encouragement 3
Too lonely and meals alone 3
Constant change in work 3
Shop work cleaner 2
No chance for promotion 2
Miscellaneous reasons, one each 11
---
Total 562
Some of these and other reasons demand a more detailed explanation.
The first industrial disadvantage is the fact that there is little
or no opportunity for promotion in the service nor are there opening
out from it kindred occupations. An ambitious and capable seamstress
becomes a dressmaker and mistress of a shop, a successful clerk sets up
a small fancy store, the trained nurse by further study develops into
a physician, the teacher becomes the head of a school; but there are
no similar openings in household employments. Success means a slight
increase in wages, possibly an easier place, or service in a more
aristocratic neighborhood, but the differences are only slight ones
of degree, never those of kind. “Once a cook, always a cook” may be
applied in principle to every branch of the service. The only place where
promotion is in any way possible is in hotel service.[258] Those women
who would become the most efficient domestics are the ones who see most
clearly this drawback to the occupation.[259]
The second disadvantage is the paradoxical one that it is possible for
a capable woman to reach in this employment comparative perfection in a
reasonably short time. Table service is a fine art which many waitresses
never learn, but it is easily mastered by one who “mixes it with brains.”
One illustration of this is the superior service given at summer resorts
by college students without special training. The proper care of a
room is understood by few maids, but the comprehension of a few simple
principles enables an intelligent woman soon to become an expert. The
work of a cook involves much more, but because many persons cook for
years without learning how to provide a single palatable and nourishing
dish, it does not follow that the art cannot be readily acquired. This
fact taken in connection with the previous one unconsciously operates to
prevent a large number of ambitious women from becoming domestics.
A third disadvantage is the fact that “housework is never done.” In
no other occupation involving the same amount of intelligent work do
the results seem so literally ephemeral. This indeed is not the true
statement of the case—mistresses are learning slowly that cooking is a
moral and scientific question, that neatness in caring for a room is a
matter of hygiene, and that table service has æsthetic possibilities.
But if it has taken long for the most intelligent part of society to
understand that the results of housework are not transient, but as
far-reaching in their effects as are the products of any other form of
labor, it cannot be deemed strange that domestics as a class and those in
other occupations complain “in housework there’s nothing to show for your
work.”
A fourth disadvantage is the lack of organization in domestic work. The
verdict from the standpoint of the statistician has been quoted.[260] A
domestic employee sums up the question from her point of view when she
says, “Most women like to follow one particular branch of industry, such
as cooking, or chamber work, or laundry work, because it enables one to
be thorough and experienced; but when these are combined, as a general
thing the work is hard and never done.”
A fifth disadvantage is the irregularity of working hours. This is a
most serious one, since the question is complicated not only by the
irregularity that exists in every family, but also by the varying customs
in different families. The actual working hours of a general servant may
vary from one instance of five hours in Kansas to another of eighteen
hours in Georgia. They sometimes vary in the same city from seven to
seventeen hours. It is a difficult matter to ascertain with the utmost
definiteness, but a careful examination of all statements made seems to
show that the actual working hours are ten in the case of thirty-eight
per cent of women employees, thirty-seven per cent averaging more than
ten hours, and twenty-five per cent less than this. The working hours
for men average somewhat longer than the hours for women, while there
are slight differences in the various classes of servants; but they are
of too indefinite a character to be specially noted. Table XIX will
illustrate these points.
TABLE XIX
ACTUAL DAILY WORKING HOURS
========================+=================================+========+=====
| NUMBER WORKING | |
+-----+-----+-----+-------+-------+ Not |
| 10 | 11 | 12 | Less | More |answered|Total
OCCUPATION |hours|hours|hours|than 10|than 12| |
| | | | hours | hours | |
------------------------+-----+-----+-----+-------+-------+--------+-----
WOMEN | | | | | | |
General servants | 149 | 28 | 91 | 142 | 45 | 183 | 638
Second girls | 29 | 6 | 26 | 40 | 21 | 52 | 174
Cooks and laundresses | 25 | 7 | 21 | 21 | 26 | 42 | 142
Cooks | 58 | 9 | 41 | 45 | 43 | 92 | 288
Laundresses | 94 | 11 | 16 | 36 | 3 | 91 | 251
Chambermaids and | | | | | | |
waitresses | 34 | 4 | 20 | 21 | 20 | 36 | 135
Chambermaids | 23 | 3 | 10 | 17 | 6 | 37 | 96
Waitresses | 46 | 3 | 2 | 7 | 10 | 39 | 107
Nurses | 25 | 8 | 25 | 8 | 19 | 45 | 130
Seamstresses | 57 | 2 | 4 | 26 | | 18 | 107
Housekeepers | | | | 1 | | 4 | 5
------------------------+-----+-----+-----+-------+-------+--------+-----
Total | 540 | 81 | 256 | 364 | 193 | 639 |2073
------------------------+-----+-----+-----+-------+-------+--------+-----
MEN | | | | | | |
Butlers | 11 | | 10 | 5 | 7 | 13 | 46
Coachmen and gardeners| 31 | 8 | 26 | 20 | 10 | 35 | 130
Coachmen | 27 | 4 | 18 | 5 | 10 | 48 | 112
Gardeners | 52 | 6 | 12 | 23 | 8 | 25 | 126
Choremen | 7 | 1 | 2 | 11 | 3 | 17 | 41
Cooks | 7 | | 3 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 17
------------------------+-----+-----+-----+-------+-------+--------+-----
Total | 135 | 19 | 71 | 67 | 39 | 141 | 472
========================+=====+=====+=====+=======+=======+========+=====
========================+=================================
| PER CENT WORKING
+-----+-----+-----+-------+-------
| 10 | 11 | 12 | Less | More
OCCUPATION |hours|hours|hours|than 10|than 12
| | | | hours | hours
------------------------+-----+-----+-----+-------+-------
WOMEN | | | | |
General servants |32.75| 6.15|20.00| 31.21 | 9.89
Second girls |23.77| 4.92|21.31| 32.79 | 17.21
Cooks and laundresses |25.00| 7.00|21.00| 21.00 | 26.00
Cooks |29.59| 4.59|20.92| 22.97 | 21.94
Laundresses |58.75| 6.88|10.00| 22.50 | 1.87
Chambermaids and | | | | |
waitresses |34.34| 4.04|20.20| 21.21 | 20.20
Chambermaids |38.98| 5.09|16.95| 28.81 | 10.17
Waitresses |67.65| 4.41| 2.94| 10.29 | 14.71
Nurses |29.41| 9.41|29.41| 9.41 | 22.35
Seamstresses |64.04| 2.25| 4.50| 29.21 |
Housekeepers | | | | |
------------------------+-----+-----+-----+-------+-------
Total |37.66| 5.65|17.86| 25.38 | 13.45
------------------------+-----+-----+-----+-------+-------
MEN | | | | |
Butlers |33.34| |30.30| 15.15 | 21.21
Coachmen and gardeners|32.63| 8.42|27.37| 21.05 | 10.53
Coachmen |42.19| 6.25|28.13| 7.81 | 15.62
Gardeners |51.49| 5.94|11.88| 22.27 | 7.92
Choremen |29.17| 4.17| 8.33| 45.83 | 12.50
Cooks |50.00| |21.43| 21.43 | 7.14
------------------------+-----+-----+-----+-------+-------
Total |40.79| 5.74|21.45| 20.24 | 11.78
========================+=====+=====+=====+=======+=======
=========================+=======+=======
PER CENT WORKING | WOMEN | MEN
-------------------------+-------+-------
Ten hours | 37.66 | 40.79
Less than ten hours | 25.88 | 20.24
More than ten hours | 86.96 | 38.97
=========================+=======+=======
Many of these differences are inherent in the composition of the family,
and can never be removed; many of them are accidental and their number
could be lessened were employers so inclined; many of them grow out
of necessarily differing standards of living. This is seen where one
family of ten employs one general servant and another family of ten
employs eleven servants; one family of four employs nine servants, while
seventy-eight other families of the same size each employ only one
servant; one family of eight has sixteen servants, while each one of
eight other families consisting of eight persons employs one servant;
twenty-three families numbering seven each have one general servant,
while another family of seven has thirteen employees; in another
instance, three employees serve a family of one. These contrasts could
be multiplied indefinitely. They simply indicate in one way the hopeless
confusion that must exist at present in the matter of hours of service
required. The irregularities in even a well-regulated family are always
great. Many of these are apparently necessary, and the employee must
expect to meet them—they are often not so great as those that perplex
the mistress of the house in her share of the household duties, but
the fact cannot be ignored that they exist and have weight. The one
afternoon each week with generally one or more evenings after work is
done is not sufficient compensation.[261] It is the irregularity in the
distribution of working time rather than the amount of time demanded
that causes dissatisfaction on the part of employees. No complaint is
more often made than this, and the results of the investigation seem to
justify the complaint. To a young woman therefore seeking employment
the question of working hours assumes the aspect of a lottery—she may
draw a prize of seven working hours or she may draw a blank of fourteen
working hours; she cannot be blamed for making definite inquiries of a
prospective employer regarding the size of the family and the number of
other servants employed.
A sixth disadvantage closely connected with the preceding is the matter
of free time evenings and Sundays. This objection to housework is
frequently made;[262] it is one that can never be wholly obviated, since
the household machinery cannot stop at six o’clock and must be kept in
order seven days in the week, but were society so inclined the objection
could be lessened.
A seventh difficulty is presented to the American born girl when she
realizes that she must come into competition with the foreign born and
colored element.[263] Although much of this feeling is undoubtedly
unreasonable, it is not peculiar to domestic service. The fact must be
accepted, with or without excuse for it.
Another disadvantage that weighs with many is the feeling that in other
occupations there is more personal independence. This includes not only
the matter of time evenings and Sundays, which they can seldom call
unconditionally their own, but there is a dislike of interference on
the part of the employer, either with their work or with their personal
habits and tastes. This interference is often hard to bear when the
employer is an experienced housekeeper—it is intolerable in the case of
an inexperienced one. The “boss” carpenter who himself knew nothing about
the carpenter’s trade would soon have all his workmen arrayed against
him; in every occupation an employee is unwilling to be directed except
by his superior in knowledge and ability.[264] It seems unreasonable
to expect domestic service to be an exception to this universal rule.
But even experienced housekeepers often do not realize how difficult it
is for one person to work in the harness of another, and by insisting
on having work done in their own way, even by competent servants, they
sometimes unconsciously hinder the accomplishment of their own ends.[265]
There is also connected with this the preference for serving a company or
a corporation rather than a private individual. It is hard to explain
this feeling except on general grounds of prejudice, but the belief
undoubtedly exists that there is more personal independence connected
with work in a large establishment than there in serving an individual.
There is often a similar feeling of independence in working in families
employing a large number of servants, or in those occupying a high
station in life.[266]
The industrial disadvantages of the occupation are best summed up by a
young factory operative who was for a time in domestic service. In answer
to the question, “Why do girls dislike domestic service?” she writes:
“In the first place, I don’t like the idea of only one evening
a week and every other Sunday. I like to feel that I have just
so many hours’ work to do and do them, and come home and dress
up and go out or sit down and sew if I feel like it, and when
a girl is in service she has very little time for herself,
she is a servant. In the second place, a shop or factory girl
knows just what she has to do and can go ahead and do it. I
also think going out makes a girl stupid in time. She gets out
of style, so to speak. She never reads and does not know what
is going on in the world. I don’t mean to say they all get
stupid, but it makes gossips of girls that if they worked in
shops or factories would be smart girls. Then I think shop or
factory girls make the best wives. Now I don’t mean all, but
the biggest part of them, and the cleanest housekeepers. The
domestic after she gets married gets careless. She don’t take
the pride in her home that the shop-girl does. She has lived
in such fine houses that her small tenement has no beauty for
her after the first glow of married life is over. She don’t
try either to make her home attractive or herself, and gets
discouraged, and is apt to make a man disheartened with her,
and then I think she is extravagant. She has so much to do
with before she is married and so little to do with after she
don’t know how to manage. She can’t have tenderloin steak for
her breakfast and rump roast for her dinner, and pay the rent
and all other bills out of $12 a week—and that is the average
man’s pay, the kind of man we girls that work for a living
get. Of course I don’t mean to say the domestics don’t have a
good time, they do; some of them have lovely places and lay up
money, but after all, what is life if a body is always trying
to see just how much money he or she can save?”
The industrial disadvantages of the occupation certainly are many,
including as they do the lack of all opportunity for promotion, the great
amount of mere mechanical repetition involved, the lack of organization
in the service, irregularity in working hours, the limitation of free
time evenings and Sundays, competition with the foreign born and the
negro element that seems objectionable to the American born, and the
interference with work often by those less skilled than the workers
themselves. The industrial disadvantages, however, form but one class
of the two that weigh most seriously against the occupation. The social
disadvantages will be discussed in the following chapter.
CHAPTER IX
THE SOCIAL DISADVANTAGES OF DOMESTIC SERVICE
The most serious disadvantage in domestic service that remains to be
considered is the low social position the employment entails at the
present time on those who enter it. This shows itself in various ways.
The most noticeable is the lack of home privileges. It is true that
the domestic employee receives board, lodging, protection, and many
incidental privileges in the home of her employer; that these are as
a rule better than she could provide for herself elsewhere, and much
superior to those which can be secured by women working in shops and
factories. But board and lodging do not constitute a home, and the
domestic can never be a part of the family whose external life she
shares. The case is well stated by an employee who writes:
“Ladies wonder how their girls can complain of loneliness
in a house full of people, but oh! it is the worst kind of
loneliness—their share is but the work of the house, they do
not share in the pleasures and delights of a home. One must
remember that there is a difference between a _house_, a place
of shelter, and a _home_, a place where all your affections are
centred. Real love exists between my employer and myself, yet
at times I grow almost desperate from the sense of being cut
off from those pleasures to which I had always been accustomed.
I belong to the same church as my employer, yet have no share
in the social life of the church.”
This appreciation of the difference between being in a family and being
a part of it is in direct ratio to the delicacy and sensitiveness of the
organization of the employee. An American who can be considered one of
the family is the very one who most appreciates the difference between
being one of the family and like one of the family. The differences which
are most keenly felt are three. The first is the fact that a certain
amount of regulation must always be exercised by the employer in regard
to the number and character of visitors received by the employee. It is a
matter of self-protection, and is sometimes due to the employee as well.
It often does not differ in kind or in degree from the care exercised for
the other members of the household. The necessity for it is recognized
by the better class of employees.[267] Nevertheless the restraint is
irksome, the desire for independence not always unreasonable, and the
wish for a place in which to receive visitors not surprising.
Another deprivation is the lack of opportunity for receiving or showing
in even a slight degree that hospitality which can be accepted and
exercised in every other employment involving equal intelligence.[268]
The domestic employee can neither accept nor give an invitation to
supper; she cannot offer a cup of tea to a caller; she does not ask a
friend to remain to dinner, except perhaps at rare intervals a mother
or a sister. She has the privilege of using without limit for her own
necessities the food purchased by her employer, but she cannot share it
without transgressing this privilege. She cannot invite her friends for
an afternoon tea to meet a friend from another place, or give a small
dinner party or a chafing-dish supper. She can do none of these things
the desire for which is so natural and which can be gratified in a small
way in almost every other occupation. Even more than this, she is never a
sharer in the general social life of the community.[269] She is precluded
not by her character but by her condition from exercising those social
privileges which are instinctive in all persons.
Another social barrier is the failure of society to recognize the need on
the part of the employee of those opportunities for personal improvement
so freely accorded to those in other occupations. If she has a taste for
music or art she can cultivate it only at the expense of ridicule,[270]
while her need of intellectual advantages in a similar way meets with
no recognition.[271] If she is refined and cultivated, she must often
associate with those who are coarse and ignorant.[272]
But the question of social standing goes farther than this. Not only
are social advantages of every kind denied the domestic employee,
but the badge of social inferiority is put upon her in characters as
unchangeable as are the spots of a leopard. This badge assumes several
different forms. The first is the use of the word “servant.”[273] We may
prove from etymology that every person who confers a favor on another is
his servant. We may present a lawyer’s brief showing to the satisfaction
of every local and national court that every employee in the eye of the
law is a servant. We may argue from the biblical standpoint and show
without a flaw in our chain of reasoning that we are all servants of
one another. We may point to the classification of occupations made by
the national census bureau and show that clergymen, doctors, lawyers,
teachers, and domestic servants are placed together. We may quote to
every employee the proudly humble motto of the Prince of Wales, “Ich
dien,” and the example of the Pope, who calls himself “the servant of the
servants of the Lord.” We may by a social fiction subscribe ourselves a
score of times each day, “Your most humble and obedient servant.” We may
do all of these things, but just as long as common phraseology restricts
the ordinary use of the word to those persons engaged in domestic
employments for which they receive a fixed compensation, just so long
will arguments prove of no avail and the word “servant” continue to
be a mark of social degradation. The efforts of domestic employees to
substitute the terms “maid” or “working housekeeper” have as yet in many
quarters excited little more than ridicule.
A second mark of social inferiority is the use of the Christian name
in address. It may seem a very trifling matter, yet the fact again
remains that domestic employees are the only class of workers, except
day laborers, who are thus addressed. The weight that is attached
to the matter in other walks of life is seen in the policy of more
than one well-known newspaper; a strong weapon of attack in encounter
with opponents has been the reference by Christian name to those
whom the writers wish to consign to political obscurity. In no way
does advancement in age and dignity show itself sooner than in the
substitution of the surname for the Christian name. The boy shows his
sense of growing importance by dropping the Christian name in addressing
his companions. In the eyes of the débutante the first card bearing
the name “Miss Brown” throws into insignificance many other advantages
of the new position. Probably few persons would choose to go through
life addressed by even their most intimate friends, aside from kith and
kin, as are the class of domestic employees. The use of the Christian
name in address undoubtedly grew out of the close family relationship
that existed between the employer and the employee, but it has become
a badge of social inferiority since it is used alike by strangers and
friends. Any person considers himself privileged to use the familiar
address towards any employee simply by virtue of the employee’s position.
Even more objectionable is the English custom, sometimes affected in
America, of dropping the Christian name and using the surname without a
title, since it implies social inferiority even more than the familiar
address.[274]
A third badge of the position sometimes insisted on is the cap and apron.
These are not worn, as are the cap and sleeves of the trained nurse, to
indicate the completion of a regular course of scientific training; they
are not the uniform of the postman or the policeman, which shows the
recognition by national or municipal authorities of superior fitness for
the position filled and carries with it somewhat of the prestige of the
power the wearer serves; they represent necessarily no attainment on the
part of the person wearing them, nor are they, as worn, always the object
of laudable ambition. The cap and apron sometimes indicate the rise of
the employer in the social scale rather than the professional advance of
the employee. The wider the separation in any community between employer
and employee, the greater is the tendency to insist on the cap and apron.
The same principle is involved when coachmen are not permitted to wear
beards and hotel and club waiters are required to sacrifice the moustache.
A fourth badge is the fact that domestic servants are made not only to
feel but to acknowledge their social inferiority. Not only deference
but even servility of manner is demanded as of no other class, and this
in an age when social and family relationships are everywhere becoming
more democratic, when reverence and respect for authority are sometimes
considered old-fashioned virtues, when even undue freedom of speech and
manner are permitted to other classes. The domestic employee receives
and gives no word or look of recognition on the street except in meeting
those of her own class; she is seldom introduced to the guests of the
house, whom she may faithfully serve during a prolonged visit; the common
daily courtesies exchanged between the members of the household are not
always shown her; she takes no part in the general conversation around
her; she speaks only when addressed, obeys without murmur orders which
her judgment tells her are absurd, “is not expected to smile under any
circumstances,” and ministers without protest to the whims and obeys
implicitly the commands of children from whom deference to parents is
never expected.
A fifth mark of social inferiority is the fact that domestic employees,
especially those connected with boarding houses, restaurants, and hotels,
are generally given a fee for every service rendered.
A self-respecting man or woman in any other occupation is insulted by the
offer of a fee. The person who through mistake offers a fee to a person
belonging to his own station brings upon himself only ridicule and
embarrassment. The shop-girl who works for $7 a week spends half an hour
in a vain attempt to match for a customer a bit of ribbon; but she would
be justly indignant, as would be her employer, if she were offered a fee.
In hotels and restaurants, the larger the establishment and the more
the price of every article should warrant exemption from such outside
dues, the greater is felt to be the pressure for their payment. Nowhere
else is the democratic principle “first come first served” so flagrantly
violated, and nowhere else would its violation be tolerated. Feeing
is a system of begging that cannot be reached by charity organization
societies, a species of blackmail levied on all who wish good service,
for which there is no legal redress, a European and American form of
backsheesh that carries with it the taint of the soil from which it has
sprung. It has its origin in snobbishness and it results in toadyism
and flunkeyism. It is objectionable because it makes the giver feel as
humiliated in giving as the recipient ought to feel in receiving. It
puts a price on that kindness and consideration which ought to be the
“royal bounty” in connection with every paid service, it destroys genuine
sympathy and unselfishness, it creates an eye service and introduces
into every branch of domestic service an element of demoralization and
degradation that is incalculable. It takes from the person receiving it
the option of placing a value on the service rendered by him, and it is
the only occupation where fees are given that does not carry with it this
privilege. A lawyer or a physician must be the best judge of the value of
his services, but the domestic servant takes “what you please.”
One of the results of the system is indicated by a jesting paragraph
that recently went the rounds of the daily press to the effect that the
porter of the Grand Pacific Hotel, in Chicago, had retired with a fortune
of $100,000 accumulated from tips given him by guests of the house,[275]
while the men who contributed it were still struggling to keep the wolf
from the door. In tipping, as in bribery, the social odium falls on
the one who takes the tip or the bribe, not on the one who offers it.
The fortune of $100,000, more or less, would not give social position
to one who had acquired it through fees. But the fee is at bottom a
bribe offered for service for which payment is presumably made by the
employer; it is a bribe because it is an additional sum offered for quick
service or good service which a waiter will not give without this extra
compensation from the person served. As long as this form of bribery
prevails, every person who accepts the bribe is socially tainted and no
amount of financial success resulting from it can eradicate the taint.
Not only is the fee objectionable in itself, but the manner of giving
it is equally so. It is bestowed surreptitiously, as if the giver
appreciated the fact that he was doing an insulting thing and was ashamed
of it; or it is offered openly with the patronizing manner of one who
says, “I have no use for such a trifle; take it, if you wish it.” It is
folded in a napkin, tucked under a plate, slipped into the hand of a
waiter with a vain attempt to appear unconscious, left ostentatiously
on a tray, or contemptuously flung at an attendant. It can be neither
given nor received with the self-respect that accompanies any reputable
business transaction.
Two excuses for feeing are given. One, “because every one else does it
and one feels contemptible if he doesn’t do it,” an easy, good-natured
way of disposing of a serious problem. Comparatively few persons are
controlled by general principles; each acts according to what seems
most convenient at the time being. The second excuse is that employees
in hotels and restaurants and porters in drawing-room and sleeping cars
are underpaid. This is undoubtedly true, and _it will remain true as
long as the general public frees the class of hotel, restaurant, and
boarding-house proprietors, and palace and sleeping car companies, from
the responsibility of paying their own assistants_. But the general
public also knows that the saleswomen in many large stores work for
almost nothing, that street-car conductors and motor men are overworked
and underpaid, that school teachers receive but a pittance. The public,
however, pursues here a different policy; it puts on “the white list”
employers who pay their saleswomen well, it allows street-railway
employees to fight out the matter of low wages by strikes or in such
other ways as they deem fit, it permits the school teacher to struggle
on with a salary of $400 or $500 a year and patronizes a fair held for
the benefit of a pension fund. It is difficult to see why this reason
for feeing a domestic employee should not hold good in all underpaid
employments; that it does not is one reason why those in other
occupations do not fall in the social scale. That the public continues
to pay directly the employees in this occupation as it does in no other
is one explanation of the ill repute it bears among self-respecting
wage-earning men and women. Every person has a contempt for another who
accepts a fee, and the reproach extends from the individual to every
branch of the occupation he represents. No other thing has done more
to lower domestic service in the eyes of the public than this most
pernicious custom, and every person who fees a domestic employee has by
that act done something to degrade what should be an honorable occupation
into a menial service.[276]
Another phase of the social question is presented by an employer who
writes, “There is something wrong when a young girl servant is sent out
in the evening to accompany the daughter or perhaps the mistress and
return alone.” If protection is the thought, the maid needs it as much
as the mistress; if it is in deference to a social custom, the maid
must bitterly resent any custom which demands this distinction between
herself and those whom she serves. Another aspect of the same question is
suggested when it is realized what veritable dens of iniquity are some
of the intelligence offices in large cities, and how difficult it often
is for a domestic employee to come in contact with them without becoming
contaminated by the touch. These are the things that lead many to
believe that “the kitchen has become very like a social Botany Bay.”[277]
It is this social position with its accompanying marks of social
inferiority that, more than any other one thing, turns the scale against
domestic service as an occupation in the thoughts of many intelligent
and ambitious women whose tastes naturally incline them to domestic
employments. Professor Arthur T. Hadley has well said in a discussion of
comparative wages, “One thing which counts for more and costs more than
anything else is social standing.”[278] The social standing maintained by
a cash girl on $3 a week which she fears to lose by going into domestic
service ought not to be vastly superior to what is within the reach of
intelligent cooks earning $10 a week; yet undoubtedly it is; and while
this is true the number of intelligent women in domestic service will not
increase.[279]
Other objections to domestic service in addition to those enumerated
are sometimes made. Some of them arise from misconceptions,[280]
others are trivial and do not demand consideration, while others are
individual rather than general. These are the disadvantages that tell
most strongly against the occupation. They do not include the element
of ill-treatment by mistresses or their lack of consideration; or the
fact that there is sometimes much in the tone and manner of an employer
that is most irritating to a self-respecting person; or that there are
occasionally employers who feel that they rise in the social scale in
the same proportion that they make employees sensible of inferiority or
dependence; or that many mistresses demand more than can be performed;
or that some employers are unreasonable, others disagreeable, and still
others petulant and fault-finding; or that some “expect perfection
at twelve dollars a month and positive genius at thirteen.” These
conditions are found, but they are not peculiar to domestic service;
the disadvantages discussed are all independent of good or bad personal
treatment, they may be modified by the character of the family to whom
the service is rendered, but they cannot be removed by any individual
employer acting alone, however much he has at heart the interests of his
own employee or of domestic employees as a class.
In comparing the advantages and disadvantages of domestic service as
an occupation it will be obvious that the advantages are numerous,
substantial, and easily recognized; the disadvantages are many, but
they are far more subtile, intangible, and far reaching. The advantages
are those which the economic woman always sees and which take her from
unhealthy tenement houses into country air and sunshine; from overcrowded
occupations into one where the demand for workers is and always must
be unlimited; from starvation wages to peace and plenty; from long
hours of dreary mechanical toil to intelligent work; from failure in
an uncongenial occupation to success and prosperity in this; from a
life whose sufferings and privations, as yet but half told, have roused
the sympathies of all social reformers, to a life of freedom from the
sweater, the floor-walker, the officious and vulgar superintendent, the
industrial Shylocks of every occupation, to a life of comparative ease
and comfort. But while the economic woman, like the economic man, always
sees these things, the actual woman looks at another side. She does not
understand why work that society calls the most honorable a woman can do
when done in her own home without remuneration, becomes demeaning when
done in the house of another for a fixed compensation, but she recognizes
the fact; she sees that discredit comes not from the work itself but from
the conditions under which it is performed, and she does not willingly
place herself in these conditions; she sees that a class line is always
drawn as in no other occupation; she is willing and glad to pay her life
for what seems to her _life_—excitement, city ways, society of home
friends, personal independence which another might call slavery. She
does not care for those advantages which another person points out; to
her they count as nothing in comparison with the price she must pay for
them. Of five hundred and forty employees of whom the question was asked,
“Would you give up housework if you could find another occupation that
would pay you as well?” one-half answered, “Yes.” Yet the number is very
small of those who complain of ill-treatment or lack of consideration
on the part of the employer. There is, indeed, often much ground for
complaint on this score, but it must be seen that other relationships
besides the personal ones are entered into when the relation of employer
and employee is established. That which decides the question is not
always the economic advantage, not always the personal treatment, but
that subtile thing the woman calls _life_. “Wages, hours, health, and
morals” may all weigh in the scale in favor of domestic service, but
_life_ outweighs them all. The advantages are such as lead many people
to urge domestic service for the daughters of others, the disadvantages
are such as incline them to choose any occupation but this for their own
daughters.[281]
CHAPTER X
DOUBTFUL REMEDIES
The difficulties attending domestic service are so many and so pressing
that a large number of measures intended to meet them have been proposed,
all of them as varied as the personalities of those dealing with the
problem. This difference of opinion in regard to the best methods of
meeting the question is largely due to the fact that, not domestic
service as an occupation, but domestic servants as individuals have been
considered. It has also come from the fact that while the feudal castle
of the Middle Ages has shrunk to the city apartment, the attempt is made
to preserve intact the customs that had their origin in mediævalism
and ought to have died with it, overlooking the fact that every other
occupation has made at least some slight concession to economic progress.
Moreover, it must be said that the purely ethical phases of the subject
have been the ones most often kept in mind in discussing measures of
relief. This ethical side of the question is indeed important, but it is
largely based on the assumption that the relation between employer and
employee is a purely personal one. Since the discussion of the question
up to this point has been based on a different theory, namely, that
other relations besides the personal ones are established when that of
employer and employee is assumed, and that domestic service has been and
is affected by political, economic, industrial, social, and educational
questions, the present discussion of possible and impossible remedies
in domestic service cannot take into consideration the purely ethical
questions involved in the subject, but must deal with its other aspects.
Before attempting to answer the question of what can and what cannot
be done, a few general principles deduced from the consideration of
the subject up to this point must be indicated. First, since the evils
are many and complicated no panacea can be found. The patent medicine
that cures every physical ailment from consumption to chilblains is
disappearing before the scientific studies of the day; it is quite as
little to be recommended for economic and social maladies. Second, the
remedy applied must have some relation to the nature of the disease. A
sprained wrist will not yield to the treatment for dyspepsia, nor can
rheumatism and deafness be cured by the same brown pills. The principle
does not differ if moral remedies are administered for educational
diseases and economic maladies are expected to succumb to social tonics.
Third, reform in domestic service must be accomplished along the same
general economic lines as are reforms in other great departments of
labor—not at right angles to general industrial progress. Fourth,
reform in domestic service must be the result of evolution from present
conditions and tendencies—not a special creation. Fifth, no reform can
be instituted which will remove to-morrow all difficulties that exist
to-day. Domestic service cannot reach at a bound the goal towards which
other forms of labor have been moving with halting steps.
These principles are simple and will perhaps be generally accepted. A
few of the measures often suggested as affording means of relief may be
tested by them.
It is the opinion of a very large class that all difficulties can
be removed by the application of the golden rule. No belief is more
widespread than this. But it rests wholly on the assumption that the
relation between employer and employee is a personal one, and presupposes
that if this personal relationship could be made an ideal one the
question would settle itself. In so far as the connection between
mistress and maid is a personal one, the golden rule is sufficient, but
other factors are involved in the problem. The golden rule may be ever
so perfectly observed, but that fact does not eliminate the competition
of other industries where the golden rule may be observed with equal
conscientiousness, nor does it remove the distasteful competition of
American born employees with foreigners and negroes; it does not overcome
the preference for city life or the love of personal independence; it
is not always able to substitute intelligence, capability, interest,
and economy for ignorance, inefficiency, indifference, and waste; the
observance of the golden rule by the employer is not a guarantee that
it will always be followed by the employee. For moral difficulties,
moral remedies must be applied, but they will not always operate where
the maladies are in their nature economic, social, and educational. The
golden rule is a poultice that will relieve an inflammation but will not
remove the cause of the evil—a tonic that will invigorate the system but
which cannot be substituted for surgical treatment.
Another class of persons believes that the application of intelligence as
well as of ethical principles is what is required of the employer. This
position is best expressed by the correspondent of a leading journal who
says: “The capable housekeeper is quite satisfied with the performance
of her own domestic duties. If a true woman performs her whole duty,
that which lies within her sphere of action, this everlasting cry of
reform in domestic service would cease and in its place there would rise
a more satisfied race of human beings.” But intelligence, capability,
and the observance of all ethical principles must, like the golden rule,
encounter the question of free Sundays and evenings after six o’clock,
as well as that of the regularity of working hours and the possibility
of promotion found in other occupations. No system ever has been or
ever can be found that will enable a housekeeper to conduct a household
satisfactorily on the instinct or the inspiration theory, to substitute
sentiment for educated intelligence and for a knowledge of economic
conditions outside of the individual home. The ostrich is said to cover
its head in the sand and imagine that it is safe from capture; as well
may the individual employer say, “I have settled the question for myself;
it is sufficient and I am satisfied.”
A third suggestion in harmony with the two preceding is to receive the
employee into the family of the employer, giving her all of the family
privileges, including a seat at the table. This plan finds many advocates
among intelligent, conscientious employers who are earnestly trying to
find a way out of present troubles. But there are several objections
to it. One is the fact that such a policy is a distinct deviation from
all economic tendencies of the century. A hundred years ago under
the domestic system of manufactures the masterworkman received his
apprentices into his family, and no other arrangement seemed possible.
The factory system has revolutionized this manner of life, and a return
to it in manufacturing industries would be as impossible as a restoration
of the feudal system itself. The attempt to return to what was once a
common custom in many parts of the North is an attempt to restore the
patriarchal relationship between employer and employee in a generation
which looks with disfavor on paternalism in other forms of labor. Another
objection to the plan is its inherent impossibility. John Stuart Mill
could conceive of another world where two and two do not make four, but
it must in this world be at present an impossibility to conceive of a
family in which the idea of unity is not an essential feature. The very
foundation of a family is its integrity. Four plus one half can never
equal five, and no one can ever be more than a fraction in any family
into which he has not been born, married, or legally adopted. The family
circle cannot be squared, and if it could be, the curve of beauty would
be lost. Moreover, even if the plan could be carried out, it would not
meet the needs of the majority of employees or of those who would become
such if the conditions of service were more favorable. _What domestics as
a class desire is the opportunity of living their own lives in their own
way._ This is what other occupations offer to a greater degree than does
domestic service, and it is one reason for the preference for them. The
desire is not always on the part of the employees for the same friends,
the same amusements, the same privileges, the same opportunities, the
same interests, as those of their employers, but it is to have such
friends, such amusements, such privileges, such opportunities, such
interests, as they personally crave. Even what would be in themselves
the greatest advantages often cease to be such when the element of
personal choice in regard to them is removed. Still another objection is
the failure of the plan to subserve the best interests of the employer,
even granting that it is best for the employee. It grows out of the
nature of the family, as previously suggested. Comparatively few persons
are willing, except as a business necessity, to open their homes even
temporarily to those compelled to board. The privacy of home life is
destroyed to even a greater extent by the attempt to make household
employees permanently a part of it, not because those admitted within
the family circle are of this particular class, but because they are not
of the family. Marriage has been called a process of naturalization—a
difficult one when all the conditions are most favorable. The process is
infinitely more difficult when an extraneous element is introduced into a
family, not as a result of mutual choice, but of a business agreement.
A fourth proposition for lessening the difficulties in domestic service
is to increase the number of employees by bringing to the North negroes
from the South. So seriously has this plan been contemplated that
companies have in some places already been formed, and through them
colored servants have been sent to different parts of the Eastern
states. But this plan assumes that no perplexities exist where colored
servants are found, and also that there are no difficulties which
a greater supply of domestic employees will not remove. That the
former assumption cannot rightly be made is evident from many facts.
The anomalous condition is found in at least one Southern city of an
organization to assist Northern housekeepers to secure colored servants,
and of another to aid Southern housekeepers in obtaining white employees
from the North.[282] The examination of a large number of advertisements
for “help wanted” shows apparently a preference in many parts of the
South for white servants,[283] while the testimony of many employers
seems to show that service is at present in a transitional state—the
older generation is disappearing, while in the younger generation the
same tendencies are found as in other classes of employees.[284] The
second assumption, that the question is settled wherever the supply
is greater than the demand, also seems unwarranted in the judgment of
many.[285] These facts are in no sense to be regarded as an exhaustive
presentation of the condition of domestic service at the South; they only
indicate that in the opinion of many intelligent employers “the question
of negro help is as broad as the negro question itself.” If it has
proved such to those who know the negro best, there is little hope that
Northern employers would gain more than new and perplexing complications
by introducing as domestic servants large numbers of negroes from the
South.[286]
Another suggestion of the same character is the importation of Chinese
servants. While much has been said of the superiority of the Chinese as
household employees,[287] and not a few housekeepers would be glad to see
the restriction act repealed,[288] difficulties other than the present
legislative and political ones stand in the way of adopting this policy.
The Chinese, as well as the negroes, occupy in this country a social
position inferior to that of Americans or Europeans. Gresham’s law may
perhaps be applied to domestic service and the principle stated that
superior and inferior labor cannot exist side by side—the inferior must
drive out the superior. Unless employees of the lower social grade can
be imported in such numbers as to meet every call for domestic servants,
there must exist, as now, the discrepancy between supply and demand.
The old struggle between free labor and slave labor must be repeated
in miniature wherever the social chasm exists between two classes of
laborers. The introduction to any considerable extent of Chinese servants
would drive out European labor as that has in a measure driven out native
born American service.
As a means of promoting a better adjustment of the business relations
between employer and employee, it is sometimes proposed that licenses
should be granted domestic employees by municipal corporations. This
plan, however, would be a violation of the principles underlying
the granting of such licenses. A municipal body is not justified in
granting a license to any employment or industry unless such occupation
is objectionable in itself as entailing expense, or danger of expense
on the part of the taxpayers, as the sale of intoxicating liquors; or
unless it involves special use by non-taxpayers of city improvements made
at the expense of the taxpayers, as in the case of cabmen; or unless
it brings into competition with tax-paying industries trades which
contribute nothing to the general treasury, as is true of travelling
peddlers; or unless it brings special danger, as of fire in the case of
theatrical companies. The license is a tax imposed in return for special
risks incurred or privileges granted. Domestic service comes under
none of these principles, and to place it under the care of municipal
authorities as is not done with other occupations of its class would
be to degrade it in an unjustifiable way. The license, when granted in
accordance with a principle, is not more objectionable than an ordinary
tax; if granted without principle, it becomes an obnoxious and tyrannical
measure.
The system of German service books has been widely advocated as an
efficient means of securing reliable testimony as to the character and
capabilities of employees, thus removing one of the most serious of
present difficulties. But even in Germany, where obedience is man’s first
law, as order is heaven’s first law in other parts of the world, it is
impossible to obtain service books that do not need to be supplemented by
personal inquiries. The service book is of value in weeding out the most
inefficient employees, but it can do little more. As in any other form of
recommendation, the employer wishes to say the best possible thing for a
servant that he may not injure his prospects of obtaining another place.
Moreover, the law compels every employer to believe an employee innocent
until he is proved guilty. The employer must state that the servant is
honest unless he has proof positive to the contrary. He is not permitted
to say that he is suspicious, or even to leave out the word “honest.”
The policy is a necessary protection to the weaker class, but it must
vitiate somewhat the absolute reliability of the testimonials given. The
German service book has a place where all occupations are permeated by
government control, but it cannot be introduced into America. We must
work out our own system of improvement in household service as we have
worked out our own political system.
Other measures have been suggested that call for only a passing notice.
It is often proposed to call together a convention of housekeepers to
discuss the subject. But the mass must be disintegrated before anything
can be accomplished, and moreover the difficulty of calling together such
a convention and of securing through it any permanent results is the same
as is found in political circles in attempting to organize a citizens’
party.
Other housekeepers seriously advocate abolishing the public schools above
the primary grade on the ground that girls are educated above their
station, and they follow the plan of one who says, “I do not engage women
who have been beyond the third reader and the multiplication table.” The
quality of service obtained by such a policy is indicated by the remark
of the father of a remarkably stupid girl, “She ain’t good for much; I
guess she’ll have to live out.” No statement can be more fallacious than
that girls are educated above their station. There can be no so-called
“station” in a democratic country. We have given the reins to our
democratic views politically, and we must abide by the industrial and
social results.
Still other housekeepers advocate the introduction of housework into all
the public schools, and thus securing well-informed “help.” But both this
proposition and its converse overlook the fact that it is the function of
the public school _to educate_, not to supply information on technical
subjects.
In one large city a “Servant Reform Association” has been organized,
with an office on a prominent street-corner, and its name conspicuously
posted over the door and painted on all the window shades. Its clientele
is very large and embraces some of the best-known residents of the city.
Among other measures of reforming servants it plans for the establishment
of schools to be equipped with every household appliance, and “to have
for instructors women who are thoroughly schooled in the various branches
of household duties and domestic economy,” but it does not state where
such instructors are to be obtained. Nothing shows so clearly how the
times are out of joint as does the name of such an association.
The plan most widely advocated and believed to contain the greatest
possibilities for improvement in domestic service, is that of
establishing training-schools for servants, such schools to have a
regular course of study and to grant a diploma on the satisfactory
completion of the work. Much can be said in favor of the theory of
such schools. If universally established, they would greatly lessen
the ignorance and inexperience of the employees—one of the greatest
stumbling-blocks in the way of improvement in the service. The diploma
would be in effect a license without the objectionable features of the
latter, and it would be a testimonial of capability and moral character
more reliable than the personal recommendation of previous unknown
employers. It would render possible a better gradation of wages, a
more perfect organization of domestic work, and more satisfactory
business relations between employer and employee. In no occupation is
there greater need for systematic training. The army of incompetents
in domestic service is not greater than in other occupations, but
incompetency here is far more productive than elsewhere of inconvenience
and positive suffering. Without such public and regular training every
housekeeper is compelled to make a training-school of her own house,
and too often she herself lacks the necessary information she ought to
impart. But two test questions must be applied to the theory. First, as
far as it has been carried out, has it accomplished what was expected
of it? Second, is the training-school for servants in harmony with the
educational, industrial, and social tendencies of the day?
The demand for such training-schools has been almost universal, and
reports of their immediate establishment on a large scale have been
repeatedly circulated through the press. One of the most widely spread
rumors concerned a movement to be set on foot in connection with the
World’s Fair in 1893 for the organization of a national body with
branches throughout every state and county in the country, each of
these branches to establish a training-school for servants wherever
practicable, and another concerned a scarcely less extended work to
be begun in Washington. As far as can be learned, however, the number
of such schools actually established has been extremely limited, and
most of these have been discontinued for lack of success. As far as the
results have been concerned, it must be said that, while not a failure,
they have been far from commensurate with the efforts expended. In one
training-school with accommodations for twenty, where neither labor nor
expense had been spared to make it a success, there were when visited
but five persons in attendance, and these five were the most unpromising
material that could be brought together to train for such service, one
being a partial cripple, another very deaf, a third too young to take the
responsibility of a general servant, a fourth was deficient in mental
capacity, and the fifth was a Swedish girl who attended to learn English.
Another school also having accommodations for twenty reported that the
number had never been full. The most successful of them all had had, a
year or two since, total attendance of about four hundred during its ten
years’ existence.
The practical difficulties in the way of all these schools have been
many. The minimum age of admission has been fixed at sixteen, but there
has been constant pressure to make exceptions to the rule and take
girls under that age. The course has been usually one of three months,
but this time is insufficient for the thorough training of immature
girls in household duties; yet to extend the course is to decrease the
attendance. Those who enter such schools do so, not because those who
have attended them have been unusually successful in securing work and
retaining good positions, but because sent there by friends, guardians,
pastors, or city missionaries. In no instance, so far as known, has a
person entered a training-school because she found herself incompetent
to fill the position she had taken, or from a desire to perfect herself
in any branch of her work. Much has been accomplished through these
schools for the individuals attending them; personal habits have been
improved, better motives in life given,—everything that has been most
admirable in a philanthropic way. But it must be said that they have done
little or nothing towards accomplishing the object for which they were
established; the effect in elevating domestic service, in increasing
the supply of trained servants, in lessening the prevailing ignorance
of household affairs, has been infinitesimal. _The training-school for
servants is and must be a failure as long as the class for whom it was
founded will not voluntarily attend it in any considerable numbers for
the sake of the instruction it is primarily intended to give._ They
will not attend it because while there is a theoretical demand for
such schools on the part of employers there is no practical demand for
them. Young women will not spend three months in learning the details
of such work when they can receive high wages for doing it without
such instruction; not until domestic service loses its distinctive
marks of drudgery, menial servitude, and social degradation will the
training-school receive any large accession to its numbers. Moreover,
public opinion has not yet demanded that every housekeeper should have
both a general and a technical knowledge of domestic affairs before she
assumes the care of a household. The stream cannot rise higher than its
source, and the training-school for employees cannot succeed so long
as employers are content with unscientific methods in their own share
of the household duties. It is often said that by the establishment of
training-schools for nurses what was formerly a trade, held in little
repute, has become a profession second only in importance to that of the
physician, and that in a similar way the training-school for domestic
servants would elevate domestic service. But a vital difference exists
in the two cases. Until scarcely more than a generation ago the medical
profession could lay little or no claim to being an exact science. Most
medical schools were poorly equipped and had a short course of study,
while all their processes were largely experimental. But the Civil War
and the scientific studies resulting from it have made of surgery an
exact science, while rapid strides in biological investigation have gone
far towards making other branches of medicine also exact sciences. It
has been well said that “educational forces pull from the top, they do
not push from the bottom.” It has been the educational forces pulling
from the top as a result of increased scientific knowledge among the
leaders of the medical profession that have made the training-school
for nurses a necessity. Not until similar forces pull from the top in
the household through the scientific and economic investigation of the
processes carried on there, will a permanent, successful training-school
for employees be even a remote possibility.
It must be said also that the training-school for domestic servants must
be a failure as long as it is out of harmony with the tendencies in all
other fields of education and industry. Technical schools are everywhere
springing up, and the demand for them is constantly increasing. But the
technical school teaches general and fundamental principles, the wood
carver learns drawing, the plumber chemistry, the architect mathematics,
and the engineer mechanics. In each trade or profession the first step
is the principle underlying it, and the second the practical application
of the principle. In the training-school for servants with a three
months’ course, the educational idea is and must be totally different.
Those attending it are taken without examination, often they have had
no previous education whatever, they may be of varying grades of
intelligence and capability, and any attempt at classification according
to these grades is impossible. Its members must learn how to cook without
a knowledge of chemistry and physiology, to care for a room without
knowing the principles of ventilation and sanitation, and to arrange a
table in ignorance of form and color. The work must be learned by simple
mechanical repetition—a method fast disappearing from every department of
education.
Again, such a plan is in opposition to present political and social
tendencies. A training-school for servants is an anomaly in a democratic
country. No father or mother born under the Declaration of Independence
will ever send a child to be trained as a servant. A striking
illustration of this is found in recent accounts of a new building about
to be erected in a large city for the use of a woman’s organization.
Those in charge of the organization established a few years since a
kitchen garden for the children of the poor. Families recommended by the
Charity Organization Society were visited and the attendance of the young
daughters of the family solicited. “At first not a few mothers objected
on the ground that they did not wish to have their daughters trained
to be servants, even if they were poor, but when it was explained that
the object of the kitchen garden was to make the children more tidy and
useful in their own homes the objection usually disappeared.” Yet in
the face of this experience—a common one wherever kitchen gardens have
been started—the managers of the organization have provided for the
establishment of a training-school for servants.
The opposition to such schools on social grounds is not strange. No
recognized industrial aristocracy is possible in America. There are no
training-schools for masons, carpenters, day-laborers, or clerks. In the
technical school the boy learns masonry, carpentry, and brick-laying, but
in these schools there is no division of those attending into “classes
for gentlemen” and “classes for laborers.” American men will never
recognize one kind of training for a superior social class, and another
for an inferior. The training-school for servants means the introduction
of a caste system utterly at variance with democratic ideas. It has not
been possible at any time since the abolition of slavery to educate any
class in society to be servants; it will never again be possible in
America. Democracy among men and aristocracy among women cannot exist
side by side; friction is as inevitable as it was between free labor and
slave labor in the ante-bellum days. Opportunity for scientific training
in all household employments must ultimately be given in such a form that
any and all persons can obtain it, but it can never be given in a school
distinctively intended for the training of servants and called by that
name.
Another plan, perhaps less widely but even more earnestly advocated by
its supporters, is that of co-operative housekeeping. There has been much
looseness of phraseology in referring to this plan, and many experiments
have been called co-operative housekeeping which are such in no sense
of the word. Co-operative housekeeping, pure and simple, as described
by the pioneer in the movement, Mrs. Melusina Fay Peirce,[289] means
the association in a stock company of not fewer than twelve or fifteen
families. The first step is the opening of a co-operative grocery on
the plan adopted by the Rochdale Pioneers, and this to be followed by
the opening of a bakery, and later by a kitchen for cooking soups,
meats, and vegetables. The next department to be organized is that of
sewing, beginning with the establishment of a small dry-goods store, and
developing from this the making of underclothes, dresses, cloaks, and
bonnets. The last step is to organize a co-operative laundry. The main
industries pursued in every house—cooking, sewing, and laundering—are
thus to be taken out of the house and carried on at a central point,
while the profits on all the retail purchases are ultimately to accrue to
the purchasers.
The advantages in the scheme are in the saving of expense in buying,
economy in the preparation of all the materials consumed, a division
of labor on the part of the co-operators which enables each to follow
her own tastes in work, and a removal of all difficulties with the
subject of service by making the servants responsible to a corporation,
not to individuals. The essential point in the whole plan, and that
which justifies the name, is that each housekeeper is to take an active
part not only in the management, but also in the actual work of the
association, since co-operation ceases to be such if one individual or
“manager” is paid for assuming the responsibility of the business.
The Cambridge, Massachusetts, Co-operative Housekeeping Association was
organized in 1870 with forty shareholders and continued about one year.
It approached more nearly than any other experiment that has been made to
the ideal of its chief promoter, Mrs. Peirce, but failed in the opinion
of its founder for three reasons: because all the shareholders did not
patronize the co-operative store; because three departments of work—a
bakery, kitchen, and laundry—were begun at the same time instead of being
allowed to develop as experience should dictate; and because the whole
was given over to the charge of a board of seven directors, one of whom
was to be a paid officer and the manager of the entire business. The
theory in its realization, therefore, lacked some of the essentials of
a true co-operative enterprise, but even in this form it is believed to
have been the only experiment that can in any real sense of the word be
called co-operative housekeeping.
The plan of co-operative housekeeping would, if carried out successfully,
undoubtedly remove many of the difficulties of the question of service.
But it presents others, some of which are inherent in human nature
and therefore not easily or speedily removed. It presupposes that all
persons are equally endowed by nature with business instinct, which
by cultivation will develop into business success; it overlooks the
fact that ninety-five per cent of men do not succeed in business when
conducting it independently, and that these are in the employ of the few
gifted with executive talent, “one of the rarest of human endowments.”
Again, the same difficulty exists as was presented to Louis XVIII. when
he attempted to create a new order of nobility after the restoration of
the Bourbon line; history tells us that he could find many willing to
be dukes and earls but none willing to be anything less. Most persons
are willing to co-operate in the management of an association, but
modern industry, Nicholas Payne Gilman has well said, “takes on more
and more the character of a civilized warfare in which regiments of
brigadier-generals are quite out of place.”
Co-operation also requires for its success certain positive
characteristics. It implies an ability to subordinate the individual to
the general welfare, to sacrifice present comfort to future good, to
decide whether an act is right or wrong by making it general, to put all
questions on an impersonal basis. The principles on which the family
is organized and the conditions surrounding the housekeeper make these
necessary qualifications peculiarly hard to attain. Ideal co-operative
housekeeping implies ideal co-operators, and these it will be difficult
to find before the majority of the employers have more business training
and more unselfishness than are now found.
All the arguments that prevail against co-operation in ordinary business
enterprises must prevail against the system in household management. “All
that is needed is the proper person to take the charge,” it is often
explained. But it is at this very point that the theory breaks down. If
the competent manager is secured, the plan ceases to be co-operative
housekeeping. But the competent manager is the most difficult person in
the world to find. “The man we want to manage our farm has a farm of his
own,” said a city lawyer of the old family homestead; the same principle
holds in the household. It must be said too that neither productive nor
distributive co-operation has yet proved an unqualified success in other
industries where the difficulties to be encountered are far less than in
the case of that most complicated of organisms—the modern household. A
larger number of successful experiments in co-operation must have been
tried in this country in other and simpler fields before co-operative
housekeeping can prove a panacea for all the troubles attending domestic
service.
Certain practical difficulties have also been found. In all experiments
in pure or partial co-operative housekeeping it has been found impossible
to deliver cooked food hot and invariable in quality at the same hour to
all the members of the association. In one city a company was organized
as a business enterprise to furnish hot lunches to business men at
their offices and also to supply family tables. The prices charged were
double those of ordinary table-board, but the expenses were very heavy,
no dividends were ever declared, and the object was ultimately changed
to that of supplying clubs and private entertainments. That clock-like
regularity in the serving of meals, demanded alike by health and business
hours, is impossible, unless co-operation is universal, where families in
the association reside from five to twenty blocks apart.
But the most insuperable objection to co-operative housekeeping as a
remedy for the troubles with servants is the fact that the majority of
persons do not wish it. The proposition suggests to many the homely adage
of curing the disease by killing the patient. When its friends say in
its favor, “Every time an apartment house is built having one common
dining-room and one kitchen a blow is aimed at the isolated home,” the
great majority of Americans rise up in protest. The semi-co-operative
system of living is apparently rendered necessary in New York City by
reason of the enormous value of land, but wherever the detached house
having light on four sides is possible, as it is everywhere else, the
American home-lover will rally to its support. Unless the desire for
co-operative housekeeping and co-operative living becomes more general
than it is at present, some other means of relief must be sought.
Much, however, of the so-called co-operative housekeeping is in reality
co-operative boarding. This is true of “The Roby” experiment tried
successfully for a time at Decatur, Illinois.[290] Fifty-four of the
leading persons in the city formed a club, adopted a constitution and
bylaws, elected officers, and found that through this organization they
could “live off the fat of the land for $2.75 per week.” The plan in its
essence is an old one; it has been followed for years by college students
in institutions that do not provide dormitories. In many college towns
it is rendered almost necessary by virtue of the residence there of many
persons owning houses who wish to take lodgers but not boarders and of
many women without capital who wish to act as housekeepers. But probably
few college students consider it an ideal way of living, it is tolerable
only at a time of life when new experiences are always welcome, and few
have ever been known to continue it beyond college days.
Undoubtedly by a system of co-operative boarding many families could live
better, at much less expense, and at a saving of time and certain kinds
of friction. But co-operative boarding is to the employer what high wages
are to the employee—he is willing to sacrifice something for what seems
to him _life_, that is, in this case, the unity, privacy, quiet, and
independence of family life. The friction with servants is obviated since
the plan includes a housekeeper who is to stand between the co-operators
and the employees, but the common interest of desiring freedom from the
care of servants and of securing the best board at the lowest rates is
not a tie strong enough to bind together those whose interests in other
directions are most diverse. Co-operative boarding will do much for the
vast army of persons obliged to board, but all such plans should receive
their proper designation and not be called co-operative housekeeping.
For the great majority of housekeepers who do not care to give up their
individual homes, the system proposed will bring no relief.
Still a third scheme called co-operative housekeeping is that proposed
by Mr. Bellamy.[291] This is a union of co-operative housekeeping and
co-operative boarding, with the application to both of certain business
principles already recognized in the housekeeping of to-day. In so far
as it is a combination of the two plans already discussed, it is open
to the same criticisms as are its component parts, while the business
principles suggested are the result of the same unconscious, not
conscious, co-operation that governs all industries.
It must be said, therefore, that all of these various measures of relief
proposed to meet the difficulty fail, because, like the golden rule and
the admission of the employee into the family life of the employer, they
do not touch the economic, educational, and industrial difficulties; or
because, like the license, the importation of negro and Chinese labor,
the training-school for servants and co-operative housekeeping, they
run at right angles to general economic, educational, and industrial
progress. The question how to improve the present condition of domestic
service is, however, not a hopeless one, but the answer to it must
be based on an examination of the historical and economic principles
underlying the subject.
CHAPTER XI
POSSIBLE REMEDIES—GENERAL PRINCIPLES
It has been seen that any measure looking towards a lessening of the
difficulties that stand in the way of securing at all times and in all
places competent domestic employees, must fail of its object if it does
not take into consideration economic history, economic conditions, and
economic tendencies. Economic history has shown the remarkable effect
of inventive genius and business activity on all household employments,
and through them on domestic service; a study of economic conditions
has shown the nature of the perplexities surrounding both employer and
employee. What are the social and economic tendencies in accordance with
which relief from present difficulties must be sought?
The first industrial tendency to be noted is that toward the
concentration of capital and labor in large industrial enterprises. Not
only have the factory and the mill superseded the individual system of
manufactures, but the growth of “bonanza farms” and the increasing number
of tenant farms show the same tendency in agriculture; the trust is the
resort of wholesale business houses; the department stores of the day
are driving out of the retail business circles the smaller houses of a
generation ago; the pool may be considered an illustration of the same
tendency at work in transportation industries.
A second tendency, forming the converse of the preceding one, is towards
specialization in every department of labor. Adam Smith’s famous
illustration of this principle—that he found ten persons able to make
nearly five thousand pins in a day, while each person working alone could
make but one pin—can be seen in every department of work except in the
household. Everywhere the field of labor has been narrowed in order to
secure the largest and best results.
A third tendency, growing out of these two, is towards the association
and combination for mutual benefit of persons interested in special
lines of work. Nearly every class of employers has its own special
organization; the associated press, associated charities, local, state,
and national educational associations, and associations of learned
societies, show the influence of organization in other departments;
nearly every class of employees also has its trade union or mutual
benefit association; everywhere, except in the household, mutual
interests are drawing together for protection, for consultation, for
economy of forces and resources, for a score of reasons, those engaged in
the same activities.
A fourth tendency is the result of the specialization of labor in its
higher forms. As all industries become more highly organized, greater
preparation for work is required wherever labor ceases to be purely
mechanical. Trade schools, technical schools, and schools for training
in special work are everywhere demanded, and the demand must in time be
fully met. While specialization is the end, special training must be the
means to accomplish it.
A fifth tendency is towards a realization of the fact that all who share
in industrial processes should participate in the benefits resulting
from their work, that “perpendicular” rather than “horizontal divisions”
in labor should be the aim in all industry. This is seen in the various
efforts made to introduce productive and distributive co-operation,
profit sharing, and other measures intended to give employees a share
in the results of their labors, and thus to take a personal interest in
their work.
A sixth tendency is towards greater industrial independence on the part
of women. This is an inevitable result of the substitution of the factory
for the domestic system of manufactures, and of the entrance of women
into all industrial pursuits at the time of the Civil War, as well as of
the inherent demand in every person for some opportunity for honorable
work. A comparison of the different census reports shows that the
percentage of women engaged in remunerative occupations increases faster
than the percentage of men so engaged. Massachusetts shows a larger
percentage than any other state of women occupied in business industry,
while the investigations of the Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of
Labor show that the marriage rate and the birth rate in that state are
both increasing. The facts and conditions do not seem to show that the
tendency is incompatible with home life.
One other semi-social and industrial tendency must be noted. It is
the result of that systematic study of social conditions seen in the
evolution of the principles that the best way to help a person is
to help him to help himself, and that reasonable measures aim at the
amelioration of some of the conditions under which work is performed, not
at the cessation of the work itself. The application of these principles
has led to wiser charities, to the Chautauqua movement, to university
extension, to working-girls’ clubs, to enlarged opportunities everywhere
for every class. These movements springing up in every locality mean
that every individual is to have the opportunity of making the most of
himself possible, and that the responsibility of so doing is to rest
with him, not with society; they mean that ultimately the position in
society of every person is to depend not on his occupation, but on the
use he has made of these increasing opportunities for self-help and
self-improvement; they mean that in time all social stigma will be
removed from every occupation and work judged by its quality rather than
by its nature; that in time, for example, a first-class cook will receive
more honor than a second-class china decorator, or a third-rate teacher.
One general tendency in all business circles must also be mentioned—that
towards increasing publicity in all business matters. It is coming to be
recognized that society has the right to know certain general and even
specific facts in regard to the conduct of affairs formerly guarded in
jealous privacy by the individual. The National Census Bureau requires,
for the benefit of society, an answer to a large number of personal
questions, and the requirement is resisted only by the most ignorant.
The state bureaus of labor have legal authority to obtain information
in regard to the management of business enterprises which they wish
to investigate. The salaries of all public employees are officially
published, and legal inquiry is instituted when the expenses of such
employees largely exceed the salary received. The number of joint-stock
companies is increasing, and these companies are legally bound to render
full and exact accounts of all receipts and expenditures. The Chinese
wall of absolute privacy is practically retained only with reference to
household occupations.
If then the question in domestic service is this: How can the supply
of domestic servants be increased, or how can the demand for them be
lessened? the only answer must be, by bringing household employments
and household service into the current of these and other industrial
and social tendencies. To state the case in detail, the problem is not
so much how to improve the personal relationship between the employer
and the employee as it is to decrease this relationship; not how to
increase the number of household drudges, but to decrease the amount of
household drudgery; not how to do more for domestics, but how to enable
them to do more for themselves; not how to merge the individual home into
the co-operative home or boarding house, but how to keep it still more
intact by taking out of it as far possible that extraneous element—the
domestic employee; not how to restore the old household system, but how
to bring about adaptation to present conditions; not so much how to
persuade more persons to go into domestic service, as to use to better
advantage the time and strength of those already engaged in it; not how
to induce sewing women in the tenement houses of New York City to engage
in work for which they have neither the physical nor the intellectual
qualifications,[292] but how to utilize the idle labor in boarding houses
and in the homes of the so-called middle and upper classes.
The statement cannot be made with too great emphasis that no plan can
be suggested that will enable a housekeeper whose inefficient employee
leaves to-day to secure a better one to-morrow; a complicated social
malady of long standing demands time and patience to work a cure or
even a relief. Two classes of measures, however, looking towards an
improvement in the character of the service can be suggested, the first
general, the second specific. It is believed that both classes will
conform to the general industrial and social tendencies enumerated.
In the first place there must be a truer conception on the part of both
men and women of the important place that household employments occupy in
the economy of the world. The utter neglect of the subject by economic
students and writers must give place to a scientific investigation of an
employment which is at least wealth-consuming if not wealth-producing.
A very large part of the wealth produced in the world is consumed in
the household, yet neither those who produce nor those who consume know
on what principles it is done. Time-saving and labor-saving devices are
made at enormous cost for uses in production, while time and strength
incalculable are wasted through consumption. In no other occupation is
there so much waste of labor and capital; in no other would a fraction
of this waste be overlooked. It is idle to complain of poor servants and
of poor mistresses so long as domestic service is divorced from general
labor questions, and employers everywhere are ignorant of the economic
laws, principles, and conditions underlying the household. Men and women
might better give to the study of domestic service as an occupation
the time and energy that now are absorbed in considering the vices and
virtues of individual employees.
This truer conception of the place of household economics considered
from the theoretical standpoint will give rise to a more just estimate
of their place in a practical way. Those employers who “despise
housekeeping,” who “cannot endure cooking,” who “hate the kitchen,”
who “will not do menial work,” will come to regard household work in
a different light. Indeed, until the members of this class, far too
large in numbers, change either their opinion or their occupation, it
is hopeless to look for a reform in domestic service. That “dignity of
labor” so often prescribed as a panacea for the troubles in the kitchen
must first be maintained in the parlor if reform is to come. The simple
prescription of the remedy will not effect a cure. “To know the workman,”
wrote Leclaire in 1865, “one must have been a workman himself, and above
all _remember it_.” In a similar way the housekeeper must have not only
a knowledge of household affairs, but a respect for them, and being
presumably better educated and equipped, she must be the one to prove
that the interests of employer and employee are the same.
Again, more systematic study of the subject in a general way must remove
much of the ignorance, as well as of the aversion, that undoubtedly
exists in regard to this occupation. Public sentiment has not yet
demanded that when a woman assumes the care of a household she shall
possess at least a theoretical knowledge of household affairs; it is
deemed sufficient if she acquire it afterward at an enormous cost of
time, patience, energy, sometimes even of domestic happiness. But
public sentiment will make such demand when the economic functions of
housekeeping are understood. Until a larger number of housekeepers
understand at least the rudiments of the profession they have adopted, it
is to be expected that ignorant and inexperienced employees will waste
the substance of their employers, and fail to become skilled laborers,
and that able, intelligent, and ambitious girls will be unwilling
to enter an occupation in which the employers are as untrained in a
scientific way as are the employees. Water cannot rise higher than its
source. As long as inefficient service is accepted inefficient service
will be rendered; as long as mistresses are ignorant of the difference
between rights and extraordinary privileges, employees, like children,
will continue to be spoiled by careless indulgence; “as long as women
hate kitchen and household cares, and servants know that they know
more than their employers, just so long will employers everywhere have
eye-servants.”
A different conception must also come in regard to the work of woman,
especially where the factor of remuneration is involved. An explanation
is still needed for the fact that idleness is practically regarded as a
vice in men and a virtue in women;[293] that a young man is condemned
by society for saying “the world owes me a living,” while a young woman
is praised for her womanliness when she says it by her life; that a
wealthy woman must not receive remuneration for services for which
compensation would be accepted by a wealthy man or by a poor woman. This
does not mean that all women should engage in business enterprises, but
that it should be honorable for them to do so, dishonorable for them to
be ignorant of all means of self-support, and that they should receive
adequate remuneration for all public services performed when men would
be paid under the same circumstances. Household employments are too
often in effect, though less often than in theory, belittled by both
men and women, and they will continue to be until there is the freest
industrial play in all occupations for women as well as for men. As long
as household employments performed without remuneration are the only
occupations for women looked upon with favor by society at large, just
so long will this free industrial play be lacking. One effect of this
is seen in the case of very many mothers who have been overworked and
overburdened by household cares. The pendulum swings to the opposite
end of the arc, and they declare that their daughters shall never work
at all. The children therefore grow up in idleness and ultimately,
when driven to work by necessity, drift into shops and factories.
When household employments are removed from the domain of charity and
sentiment and put on a business basis, when the interests of women are
broadened, when they are better able “to distinguish between infinity and
infinitesimals,” there will be a more intelligent understanding of the
financial side of woman’s work.
The general remedies therefore must include a wider prevalence
of education in the true sense of the word, not its counterfeit,
information; that mental education which results in habits of accuracy,
precision, and observation, in the exercise of reason, judgment, and
self-control, and that education of character which results in the
ability constantly to put one’s self in the place of another. There must
be scientific training and investigation in economic theory, history,
and statistics, especially in their application to the household, and an
increased popular knowledge of all scientific subjects concerning the
home, those which secure the prevention of economic and material waste in
the household as well as those which concern the questions of production
for it. The educational forces must “pull from the top” and draw domestic
service into the general current of industrial development.
CHAPTER XII
POSSIBLE REMEDIES—IMPROVEMENT IN SOCIAL CONDITION
Certain general principles have been suggested in accordance with which
it seems reasonable to expect improvement in domestic service to be
made. Of specific remedies, the first class to be suggested concerns the
social degradation as yet entailed by the occupation. For the most part
the oppressive conditions are the lack of all social and educational
advantages, the use of an obnoxious epithet applied to the individuals of
the class, the universal use of the familiar Christian name in address,
the requirement of livery, enforced servility of manner, and the offering
of fees to several large subdivisions of the class. Every one of these
must seem a reasonable objection to one who can put himself in the place
of another; they are among the weightiest arguments against entering
the service; each one can be entirely removed, or so modified as to
become unobjectionable. It is useless to look for any improvement in the
character of domestic service until these oppressive conditions have
been removed; but it is not vain to hope for an emancipation from them
in time. The social ban has been removed from other occupations in which
women have become wage earners—it has been removed from teaching,[294]
the practice of medicine and law, and business industries—women can
engage in all of these without fear of being ostracized. The relative
social position of different occupations in which men engage has also
changed. In colonial New England, the minister, not the lawyer, had the
social precedence; in the Southern colonies the lawyer was an honored
guest, while the chaplain of the plantation was a hireling who often
married an indentured servant on the same plantation. Dentists, men “in
trade,” brewers, and veterinary surgeons have in other localities all
felt the lack of an assured place in society. Social barriers against
both men and women are everywhere breaking down in the presence of
high character, ability, education, and technical training; they will
ultimately fall before men and women engaged in domestic service, who can
bear these same tests of character, ability, education, and technical
training.
In considering the specific social disadvantages, it must be conceded
that the desire for greater social and intellectual opportunities is
most reasonable. Mr. Higginson says in answer to the question, “Why do
children dislike history?” “The father brings home to his little son,
from the public library, the first volume of Hildreth’s _United States_,
and says to him, ‘There, my son, is a book for you, and there are five
more volumes just like it.’ He then goes back to his _Sunday Herald_, and
his wife reverts to _But Yet a Woman_, or _Mr. Isaacs_.” The attitude
of society towards social opportunities for domestic employees is much
the same. Society demands the theatre, the opera, the parlor concert,
the lecture, the dinner, the afternoon tea, the yacht race, the tennis
match, the bicycle excursion, the coaching party, and expects the class
lacking at present all resources within themselves to stay quietly
at home and thus satisfy their desire for pleasure and intellectual
opportunity. Country life sometimes proves lonely and distasteful to
employers educated in the city. Is it less so to the employee lacking the
opportunity for change enjoyed by others?[295]
Comparatively little can be done in the ordinary private home to meet
these difficulties; but even if much could be done, it is at least
an open question whether this would be the true remedy. In large
establishments sitting-rooms can be provided for employees, but such
establishments are few in number, and the fact that such rooms are in the
home of another prevents that “good time,” the craving for which is so
natural. Many employers are glad to give personal instruction evenings,
but solitary instruction is even more defective for the domestic than
it is for the children of the family. Enthusiasm must always come with
numbers, and comparatively little can be done for employees through
this means. But social opportunities and intellectual advantages can
be provided, as has been done so successfully in the case of the
employees of shops and factories. Social life everywhere tends towards
clubs, societies, and organizations. Domestics can be encouraged to form
clubs and societies through which parlors can be provided for social
intercourse, and reading-rooms where intellectual needs will be met.
If the domestic employee were taken from the home of the employer and
encouraged to find for herself avenues of improvement and entertainment,
her social condition would be greatly improved. She must be made to
see that the reason why she does not rise to the social position to
which she aspires, is not because her work is degrading, but because
her conversation is often ungrammatical and lacking in interest, her
dress sometimes untidy and devoid of taste, and her manner not always
agreeable. She must do her part towards improving her social condition.
It is true, that probably at first comparatively few domestics would
avail themselves of such privileges, _but just as long as social and
intellectual advantages do not exist anywhere for this class, just so
long will the intelligent and capable young woman most needed in this
occupation shun it for others where such opportunities do exist_.
The stumbling-block in the use of the word “servant” is easily removed.
The exclusive application of this word to domestic employees must be
abolished before the class most desired in the occupation will enter it.
As has been done in every other occupation, a word like “employer” must
be substituted for “master” and “mistress,”—terms associated only with
a system of apprenticeship or slavery,—while “domestic,” “housekeeper,”
or some other descriptive term must be used for “general servant,”
the words “cook,” “waitress,” and “maid” being unobjectionable for
other classes of service.[296] As a matter of fact the word as now used
is inappropriate in characterizing the work expected of an efficient
domestic employee. Division of labor has made her in reality, though
not in position, not a menial, a drudge, a slave, but a co-operator
in the work of the household. The cook who prepares the raw material
for consumption is not more a servant than is the farmer who produces
the raw material; indeed her work is justly considered skilled labor,
while that of the agricultural laborer is often unskilled. The cook
is the co-operator with her employer in the same sense as the farmer
is a co-operator in the industrial system; and the term “servant” as
indicating a menial applies to her as little as it does to him. New words
are coined and pass into familiar usage in a short time, old words become
obsolete, new meanings are given old terms, and it is possible in the
course of a few years to substitute for the present objectionable usage
of this word a term which will describe more definitely the duties of the
position and at the same time remove one of the most serious obstacles in
the way of improving the character of the occupation.[297]
The inferiority implied in the use of the Christian name in address is
less clearly seen and less easily removed because its effects are more
subtile. It may not be possible to attempt any immediate or general
change, but a compromise is possible in giving the title to married
men and women in domestic service, since marriage is supposed to carry
with it added dignity. The Japanese custom of addressing one’s own
employees by a familiar term, but the employees of another by a title of
respect,[298] is also a possible compromise. It seems difficult to find
weighty arguments in favor of refusing to a class of self-supporting men
and women the title of respect accorded in all other occupations.
The cap and apron are in themselves not only unobjectionable, but they
have certain very definite advantages. They are conducive to neatness and
economy and moreover form a most becoming style of dress. The picturesque
effect of both is appreciated by all young women who take part in public
charitable entertainments, it was understood by the matrons of an
earlier generation, and it has formed the theme of many letters written
on foreign soil. No costume in itself could be more desirable or better
adapted to the work of the wearers, and a more general rather than a more
restricted use of this form of dress should be advocated on theoretical
grounds. But the cap and apron as worn do not always indicate a desire on
the part of the wearer for neatness, economy, and tasteful attire, nor
always an appreciation of these things on the part of the employer. They
are regarded as a traditional badge of servitude, and while so regarded
it seems unwise to force them on those unwilling to wear them. Moreover
the cap and apron while serving admirably their place within the house
have no _raison d’être_ out of doors; the cap affords no protection from
heat, cold, or storms, and the apron is inappropriate for street wear.
The cap and apron are appropriate and desirable in all places where they
would be worn by the employer under the same circumstances, they are
inappropriate elsewhere and hence out of taste. If employees as a class
would recognize the many advantages of the costume within doors and adopt
it universally, and if employers would accept its limitations out of
doors and abandon the requirement of it there at all times, the vexed
question of livery would seem to be answered.
The servility of manner demanded—at least in public—of all domestics is
an anomaly in a country where there is no enforced recognition of social
and political superiors. The price paid for it—high wages, poor service,
constant change, household friction—seems a heavy one and the excuse for
it small. As long as domestic service lacks the safety valve of personal
independence and the outward expression of self-respect, just so long is
there danger of too great repression and consequent explosion. No genuine
reform in domestic service is possible while this theory of outward
servility is enforced.
The most objectionable of all the manifestations of social
inferiority—the feeing system—has its economic as well as its social side
and will be considered by itself in the chapter on profit sharing in
domestic service.
These social barriers that now prevent so effectually the entrance into
domestic service of intelligent, well-educated, capable, and efficient
persons can all be swept away if employers as a class are willing to make
the effort. This effort will involve in some cases the relinquishing of
a favorite theory that employees can be made a part of the family with
which they are externally connected and, instead of this, assisting
them to live their own independent lives as citizens of the community
in a normal, happy way. It will involve in other cases abandoning the
assumption that domestic employees belong to a separate and obnoxious
class in society and cannot be met as individuals on the same plane as
are other persons of like attainments. It will involve in still other
cases the sacrifice of that personal vanity that is gratified by the
constant presence of those deemed to be of an inferior station. If
employers are willing to yield all of the points now often unconsciously
maintained by them in opposition to the teachings of political and
industrial history, the social objections that now hold against domestic
service as an employment will disappear. Sir Henry Sumner Maine has well
said, “The true equality of mankind lies in the future, not in the past.”
It is this true equality of the future, not the fictitious equality of
the past, that must free domestic service from the social ill-repute it
now bears.
CHAPTER XIII
POSSIBLE REMEDIES—SPECIALIZATION OF HOUSEHOLD EMPLOYMENTS
The efforts to remove the social stigma that now brands domestic service
will not alone accomplish the desired result. Another means of lessening
the difficulties in the modern household is to put all household
employments on the same business basis as all employments outside of the
household. The principles which lie at the foundation of modern business
activities are division of labor and unconscious co-operation. This
statement does not mean that both of these principles are carried out
perfectly, but that industrial progress has been made and is being made
along these lines, that the advance already made by household employments
has been in the same direction, and that the reforms proposed for the
household that diverge from these lines, however wise in themselves,
cannot lead to the best results because they are out of the current of
general progress.
In considering the historical phase of the subject, a long list of
articles was suggested[299] which were formerly made within the
household, but are now made out of the house both better and more cheaply
than they could be made at home.
A list can be drawn up of other articles made out of the house, which
if made in factories are inferior, and if purchased through the woman’s
exchanges, though as well or even better prepared, are more expensive
because the demand for such articles made in the homes of others has
up to this time been limited. The articles in this transitional state
are vegetable and fruit canning, the making of jellies, pickles, and
preserves, the baking of bread, cake, and pastry, the preparation
of soups, pressed meats, cold meats, ice-cream, and confectionery,
condensed, sterilized, and evaporated milk, and the making of butter not
yet abandoned in all rural homes. The transitional list also includes
the making of underclothes for women and children, which can be made
more cheaply out of the house but not always so well; and millinery and
dressmaking, which can be done better but at greater expense. There is
every indication that all the articles in this transitional state must
soon be enumerated among those articles made both better and more cheaply
out of the house than within.
A third list can be made of articles that are now seldom if ever
manufactured out of the house but which can be made elsewhere. This list
includes in the first place bread and cake of every description; it is
possible by taking all of this work out of the house to save, considered
in the aggregate both as regards the individual and the community, an
enormous waste of time and fuel and at the same time to secure through
the application of scientific principles articles often more uniform
and superior in quality to what can be produced in the home.[300] A
second class includes the preparation of all vegetables for cooking. It
is not sentiment but economic principle that should release the human
hand from performing this part of housework, more purely mechanical and
more justly entitled to be called drudgery than any other work carried
on in the house. A few years since coffee was roasted in every kitchen.
If it has been found that an article requiring such delicate treatment
as this can be prepared by business firms better than it can be in the
household oven, there can be no serious obstacle in the way of delivering
at the door all vegetables ready for cooking.[301] Compensation for
the additional cost at first incurred would be found in the hygienic
advantage of removing from many cellars the supply of winter vegetables.
A third class of articles includes the preparation of all cold meats,
half-cooked meats, as croquettes, all stuffed meats, as fowl and game,
all “made” dishes, as salads and cold desserts, and the cooking of all
articles which need only heating to make ready for use. The careful
study of a large number of elaborate menus as well as of more simple
bills of fare shows a very small proportion of articles which could not
be made out of the house and sent in ready for use or requiring only
the application of heat. The Aladdin oven constructed on scientific
principles renders the cooking and heating of food a most simple matter.
The sending of hot food to individual homes has in no case as far as can
be learned proved a success, but the delivery of all articles ready for
the final application of heat is possible through business enterprise and
scientific experiment.
This partial, although not entire, solution of the problem of domestic
service, by taking a large number of servants out of the house and by
having a large part of the work now done by them in the house done
elsewhere, is in direct line with the progress made in other occupations.
It was estimated by Mr. Gallatin in 1810[302] that two-thirds of
the clothing worn in the United States was the product of family
manufacturing—then in a flourishing state. During the twenty years
following, a part of this family weaving and spinning was transferred
to factories, and this transfer created the great factory industry. Its
rapid growth was due to the fact that the power loom and the factory took
the place of the hand loom and of home manufacturing. A similar change
has taken place in the manufacture of cheese. Until about 1830 all cheese
was made at home, and in 1860 not more than twenty cheese factories had
been built.[303] After that time factories multiplied rapidly, until
now practically all cheese is factory made. The demand for ready-made
clothing for men was a generation ago very small. It grew out of a demand
on the part of sailors, and was increased in large proportions at the
time of the Civil War; the manufacture of such articles is now so firmly
established in our industrial system that a return to the home system
of manufacturing, even in the most isolated and primitive communities,
would be as impossible as the revival of the spinning wheel. The demand
for ready-made clothing for women is nearly as great and is annually
increasing through the facilities offered by all large retail houses for
shopping by mail. The tailoress and the maker of shirts have disappeared
from the homes of their employers and have set up establishments of their
own, or have become responsible to large business houses; the dressmaker
and the seamstress are fast following in their footsteps, and the cook
must set her face in the same direction.
The trend in this direction can be seen in many ways. The growing
prevalence of camping has increased the demand for articles of food
ready for use, and even tea, coffee, and soups are delivered hot for the
benefit of pleasure seekers.[304] The development of Western resources
by Eastern capitalists has also increased the demand for such articles,
and at least one housekeeper among the Black Hills of South Dakota, one
hundred miles from a railroad station, speaks casually of doing her
marketing in Chicago, and a housekeeper in North Carolina gives frequent
and elaborate lunches through caterers in Philadelphia. The tendency even
among persons of moderate means is more and more towards the employment
of caterers for special afternoon and evening entertainments, although
in villages and small towns this course as yet involves the employment
of persons from large cities. The practice is not uncommon for the women
connected with church organizations to hold every Saturday afternoon
sales for the benefit of the society, of all articles of food that can be
prepared the previous day for Sunday dinners and teas.[305]
The most important medium for the sale of such commodities is the
Woman’s Exchange.[306] It has already become an economic factor of some
little importance, and it will become of still greater importance when
it is taken out of the domain of charity and sentiment and becomes
self-supporting on a business basis. One of its most valuable results
is that it has set a high standard for work and has insisted that this
standard be reached by every consignor, not only once or generally,
but invariably. It has maintained this standard in the face of hostile
criticism and the feeling that a charitable organization ought to accept
poor work if those presenting it are in need of money. It has shown that
success in work cannot be attained by a simple desire for it or need
of it pecuniarily. It has taught that accuracy, scientific knowledge,
artistic training, habits of observation, good judgment, courage,
and perseverance are better staffs in reaching success than reliance
upon haphazard methods and the compliments of flattering friends. It
has raised the standard of decorative and artistic needle work by
incorporating into its rules a refusal to accept calico patchwork, wax,
leather, hair, feather, rice, splatter, splinter, and cardboard work. It
has taught many women that a model recipe for cake is not “A few eggs,
a little milk, a lump of butter, a pinch of salt, sweetening to taste,
flour enough to thicken; give a good beating and bake according to
judgment.”
But still more it has opened up to women what has been practically a new
occupation. Domestic work within the house performed by members of the
family without fixed compensation and by those not members of the family
with compensation had been the previous rule. The Exchange has shown that
it is possible for the women of a family to prepare within the house for
sale outside many articles for table consumption, both those of necessity
and luxury. Innumerable instances are on record of women who within the
past fifteen years have supported themselves wholly or in part by making
for general sale or on orders different articles for the table.[307]
It seems inevitable that eventually all articles of food will be
prepared out of the house except those requiring the last application
of heat, and that scientific skill will reduce to a minimum the labor
and expense of this final stage of preparation. This change is in direct
line with the tendency towards specialization everywhere else found in
that it thus becomes possible for every person to do exclusively that
thing which he or she can do best; it allows the concentration of labor
and capital and thus by economizing both secures the largest results;
it permits many women to retain their home life and at the same time
engage in remunerative business; it improves the quality of all articles
consumed, since they are produced under the most favorable conditions;
it brings the work of every cook into competition with the work of
every other cook by providing a standard of measurement now lacking and
thus inciting improvement; it is the application of the principle of
unconscious co-operation and therefore in harmony with other business
activities. More definitely, as one illustration, it permits all fruits
to be canned, pickled, and preserved in every way in the locality where
they are produced at a cost ultimately less than can now be done when
fruit is shipped to cities and there sold at prices including high
rents; it prevents a glut in the market of such perishable articles by
providing for their preservation on farms and in villages and subsequent
transportation to cities at leisure; it makes it possible to utilize
many abandoned farms in the East which could be used as fruit farms but
are too remote from shipping centres to permit the transportation of
ripe fruit; it ultimately lightens the labors of many women on farms by
enabling them to purchase in cities many articles now produced by them
at a disadvantage. The canning in cities, by individual families, of
fruits, often in an over-ripe condition, is as anomalous as would be
to-day the making of dairy products in city homes. The preservation of
fruit is but one example of articles that could be prepared better and
more cheaply in the country than in the city. Miscellaneous articles of
every description, as plum-pudding, boned turkey, chicken broth, jelly,
croquettes and salad, minced meat, pressed veal, bouillon, calf’s-foot
jelly, pure fruit juices, blackberry cordial, and a score of other
articles, could be added to the list.
It is sometimes objected that this plan of taking out of the house
to as great an extent as possible all forms of cooking lessens the
individuality of the home by requiring all persons to have the same
articles of food. But the objection presupposes a limited variety of
articles, while the method suggested must result in an unlimited variety,
as has been the case in regard to articles used for wearing apparel
since the custom has been established of having so many made out of the
house. It presupposes also that individuality depends on externals. The
gentleman who wishes to preserve his individuality through his cook
could also preserve it through employing a private tailor, but he gladly
sacrifices it in the latter case for the better work of one who serves a
hundred other customers as well. Individuality is preserved when a person
builds his own house, but the doubtful benefit of the result is suggested
by Oliver Wendell Holmes when he says, “probably it is better to be
built in that way than not to be built at all.” The individuality of
the present generation is certainly not less than that of the preceding
one when all clothing worn by a family was made up in the house, or of
an earlier one when all cloth was spun and woven, as well as made up,
in the house, or of a still more remote one when our ancestors troubled
themselves comparatively little about either the weaving or the making.
The very perfection of the principle of the division of labor makes
possible the expression of the greatest individuality in that it offers
the possibility of selection from a hundred varieties whereas before no
choice was given. The ability to choose between the work of a hundred
cooks permits a truer individuality than does the command of the services
of but one. Whims, caprices, and eccentricities sometimes masquerade as
individuality and are not always entitled to respect.
Another form of work now done in the house that could be done outside
is laundry work. The inconveniences resulting from the derangement of
the household machinery according to the present method have formed the
theme of many jests; a serious consideration of the subject must lead
to the conclusion that this system results in great waste as well as in
unnecessary wear and tear of the household machinery. An objection on
hygienic grounds is sometimes made to the proposal to have articles of
clothing laundered out of the house together with articles sent by other
families. But science has already accomplished much at the bidding of
business enterprise, and this objection can be overcome. Even as it is
the question may well be asked whether the price paid is not a heavy
one for individual laundresses. The vast army of persons who board are
compelled to send out articles to be laundried, and this is apparently
done without serious results. A beginning has been made in many families
where a competent laundress cannot be secured by sending to public
laundries all starched clothing, especially all collars and cuffs.
The laundries of Troy, New York, have branches for the reception and
delivery of goods in all parts of the country, and laundry many articles
better and more cheaply than can be done at home. The amount of space
now occupied in cities for laundering purposes that could be used for
business or for homes is far from inconsiderable. It seems not altogether
unreasonable to believe that if the space now occupied by laundries
in individual homes could be used for other purposes rents would be
perceptibly lower. On economic grounds alone this generation should
relegate the washing machine and the wringer to the attic or the front
parlor, where it has already placed the spinning wheel of its ancestors.
Still another field is open for business enterprise in connection with
the household. A very large part of the work connected with it concerns
the care of the house and grounds. This includes the semi-annual
housecleaning and the cleaning of windows, floors, brass, silver, and
lamps; the sweeping, dusting, and general care of rooms, including the
special attention that must be given to books, pictures, and bric-à-brac;
the care of lawns, walks, porches, and furnaces; the repairing of
articles of clothing and furniture; table service and chamber service.
Here again economic tendencies are showing themselves. Much if not all of
this work can be done by the piece or by the hour, and men and women are
everywhere taking advantage of the fact.[308] A very large part of the
work of the household can be thus done, especially if housekeepers are
willing to waive the tradition that silver must be cleaned on Thursdays,
sweeping done on Fridays, and all sleeping-rooms put in order before nine
o’clock in the morning.
One other measure of relief concerns the purchase of supplies. Marketing
is a science and might be made a profession. At present it is usually
done in a haphazard, make-shift fashion. It is done by the head of the
household on his way to business and thus done in haste; or orders are
given through a clerk who goes from house to house and thus serves
primarily the firm he represents, while at the same time the purchaser
loses the benefit of competition in the markets; or commissions are given
by telephone and the customer has no opportunity of inspecting the goods
before purchase; or marketing is done by the mistress of the household,
who is unable to reach the markets in time to make her purchases with
the care that should be given; or it is done by the cook, who may know
the best articles to purchase but is ignorant of their money value. It
requires time, skill, and experience to purchase judiciously the supplies
for a household, and in many households time, skill, and experience are
lacking. It would seem possible for one person to do the marketing for
fifteen or twenty families, taking the orders at night and executing them
in the morning. Supplies could then be purchased in quantity, this gain
would pay the commission of the purchaser, and marketing would be done in
a much more satisfactory manner than it is at the present time. At the
same time such a plan would relieve the members of individual households
of the burden and care of a difficult part of household management.
All of these measures suggested must tend ultimately to take as far as
possible the domestic employee out of the house, letting her perform
her work through the operation of unconscious business co-operation.
This method would enable a large number of women to go into household
employments who have ability in this direction but who now drift into
other occupations which permit them to maintain their own home life. It
is generally assumed that an unmarried woman has no desire for a home
and no need of a place that she can call her own. When she goes into
domestic employment, therefore, she must merge her individual life into
that of her employer and relinquish all the social instincts, although
as strong in her as in another. But this is what many are not willing
to do. If the opportunity were presented of performing housework and
remaining at home, large numbers would in time enter the work. Many who
have no homes would still be glad to share the home of an employer, but
where no alternative is presented, as under the present system, except
where negroes are employed, the requirement of residence becomes irksome
and is a hindrance in this as it would be in any other industry. It is
also true that many employees particularly dislike to live in flats.
The sleeping accommodations are generally poor, with little light or
ventilation, and all parts of the household are cramped and crowded. To
take the employee out of the modern flat and let her go to her own home
or lodging place would be a boon to both employer and employee. The plan
proposed also lessens materially the amount of care and responsibility
now incurred by the employer, since it decreases the number of personal
employees. The presence of the employee in the family is a disadvantage
to the household of the employer as well as to the employee. Again, it
enables large numbers of women who have only a few hours each day or week
to give to outside work to do it in their own houses or in the homes of
others without neglect of their own households. Moreover, it lessens much
of the difficulty that now exists owing to the migratory habits of the
modern family. The question of what shall be done with the employees of
a household during the summer and how new ones shall be secured in the
autumn is answered in a measure if the work performed by them can be done
by the piece, hour, or season and a large part of the family supplies
can be purchased ready for use. Then, too, it renders both employer and
employee more independent. Whether the desire for independence is right
or wrong is not the question—it is a condition and must be met.
It has often been pointed out that the aristocracy of the Church broke
down at the time of the Reformation, that the aristocracy of the State
was overthrown by the Bastile mob, that aristocracy in education is
yielding to the democratic influences of university extension, and that
aristocratic economics are disappearing in the light of the industrial
discussions of the day. The aristocracy of the household must succumb to
this universal desire for personal independence on the part of employees.
The plan suggested of specializing household industries to as great an
extent as possible and encouraging the domestic employee to live in her
own home has much in its favor. It substitutes for the responsibility
to an individual employer, so irritating to many and so contrary to the
industrial spirit of the age, the responsibility to a business firm. It
throws the responsibility for success on the individual employees by
bringing them into more immediate competition with other workers in the
same field. It provides a channel through which advance becomes possible
and also independent business life if executive ability is present. It
reduces house rent in proportion as the number of employees is lessened,
or it places at the disposal of the family a larger portion of the house
than is now available for their personal uses. It simplifies the problem
in all families where there is more work than can be done by one employee
but not enough for two. It makes possible such a division of labor in
the household as will discriminate between skilled and unskilled labor.
Under the present system the employer expects to find in one individual
for $3 per week and expenses, a French chef, an Irish laundress, a
discreet waitress, a Yankee maid-of-all-work, a parlor maid a Quaker in
neatness, all this, “with the temper of a saint and the constitution of
a cowboy thrown in.” Expectations are often disappointed and the blame
is thrown, not on a bad system, but on the individual forced to carry
it out. The separation of skilled and unskilled labor permits each one
to do a few things well and prevents the friction inevitable when the
skilled workman is called upon to do unskilled work, or the unskilled
laborer to perform tasks requiring the ability of an expert. It is a
more flexible system of co-operation than the one technically known as
such, since all articles are purchased, not of a certain manufacturer
or dealer whom it has been agreed upon by contract to patronize, but
wherever it is most convenient. It is easily adapted to the present
system of living in flats and apartment houses rendered almost necessary
in some places by high rents; this way of living makes it difficult
to employ a large number of domestics, but on the other hand it makes
it possible to do without them. It enables the domestic employee to
have the daily change in going back and forth from her work which the
shop-girl and the factory-girl now have. The domestic employee now has
out-of-door exercise not oftener than once or twice a week, and the
effect is as deleterious physically, mentally, and morally as a similar
course would be in other walks of life. It must decrease that pernicious
habit, so degrading to the occupation as well as to the individual, of
discussing the personal characteristics of both employers and employees,
since the relationship between the two is changed from the personal to
the business one. It elevates to the rank of distinct occupations many
classes of housework now considered drudgery because done at odd moments
by overworked employees. It must in time result in many economic gains,
one illustration of which is the fact that the kitchen could be heated
by the furnace and all cooking done by kerosene, gas, or electricity; on
the other hand, the necessities of employers would cease to be the gauge
for measuring the minimum of work that could be done by employees without
losing their places.
Two objections are sometimes raised to this plan. The first is that the
cost of living would be increased. This would undoubtedly be the effect
at first, but it is not a valid objection to this mode of housekeeping.
The list of articles now made out of the house shows that every article
of men’s dress is made more cheaply and better than formerly when made
at home. This is due to the fact that in the transitional period men of
means were willing to pay a higher price for goods made out of the house
for the sake of obtaining a superior article. Competition subsequently
made it possible for men of moderate means to share in the same benefit.
The same tendency is seen among wage-earning women. They could make
their own dresses at less expense than they can hire them made, but it
would be done at a loss of time and strength taken from their own work,
and they prefer to employ others. Moreover cost of living is a relative
term—an increase in the family income makes it possible to employ more
service and therefore to live better than before. Families of wealth now
have two alternatives, either to employ more domestics within the home,
or to purchase more ready-made supplies. The alternative usually chosen
is the former, but if such families would choose the second and instead
of employing additional domestics would, as far as practicable, purchase
ready-made supplies for the table and have more work done by the hour,
day, or piece, as great ease of living would be secured as through the
employment of additional service within the house under the present
system. Though the cost of living might be increased, it is a price
many would be glad to pay for a release from the friction of a retinue
of domestics in the home. When it has become the custom for families
of wealth to have few or no domestics under their own roofs, the great
problem of how people of limited incomes can have comfortable homes will
be solved.
The second objection is the fact that it would take from the women of
the household much of their work. The problem, however, has not been to
provide a means of excusing from their legitimate share in the work of
the world one half of its population, but to use that labor at the least
cost of time and strength. The argument that would maintain the present
system because it provides women with work is the same as that which
destroyed the machines of Arkwright and Crompton; it is the argument that
keeps convicts in idleness lest their work should come into competition
with the work of others; it is the opposition always shown to every
change whereby the number of workers in any field is at first lessened.
But the plan proposed does not contemplate abolishing household work for
women, but changing its direction so that it may be more productive with
less expenditure than at present. It calls for specialization of work
on a business basis, rather than idleness or charity. It asks that the
woman who can bake bread better than she can sweep a room should, through
unconscious co-operation, bake bread for several families and hire her
sweeping done for her by one who can do it better than she. It asks
that the woman who likes to make cake and fancy desserts but dislikes
table service should dispose of the products of her labor to several
employers, rather than give her time to one employer and do in addition
other kinds of work in which she does not excel. It asks that the woman
who cannot afford to buy her preserves and jellies at the Woman’s
Exchange but crochets for church fairs slippers that are sold at a dollar
a pair shall dispose of the products of her industry at a remunerative
rate and buy her jellies put up in a superior manner. The plan allows the
person who has skill in arranging tables and likes dining-room work, but
dislikes cooking, to do this special kind of work, when otherwise she
would drift into some other light employment. It provides that women in
their own homes who are now dependent for support on the labors of others
shall have opened to them some remunerative occupation. The preparation
of food in small quantities always secures more satisfactory results
than when it is prepared in larger amounts. Women in their own homes
can give foods the delicate handling necessary for the best results and
at the same time use the spare hours that are now given to unprofitable
tasks. It makes every member of the family a co-operator in some form in
the general family life. What is needed indeed in the household is more
co-operation among the different members of it rather than conscious
co-operation with different families. It has been recently pointed out
that the carrying of electricity as a motive power to individual houses
may cause a partial return to the domestic system of manufacturing which
will be carried on under more favorable conditions than was the old
domestic system.[309] This is in the future—its possibility is only
hinted at. But the domestic system of housework, if that expression may
be used to distinguish it from the present individual system, and the
proposed system of unconscious co-operation, enables women to work in
their own homes and, by exchange of such commodities and services as each
can best dispose of, to contribute to the general welfare.
The plan of specialization of household employments has already been put
into partial operation by many housekeepers and its success attested by
those who have tried it.[310] Conscious co-operative housekeeping has
in nearly every case proved a practical failure, but the unconscious
co-operation that comes through business enterprise has brought relief to
the household in many directions and it is one of the lines along which
progress in the future must be made.
CHAPTER XIV
POSSIBLE REMEDIES—PROFIT SHARING
Domestic service, as has been seen, is accompanied by certain social
conditions that prevent many from entering the occupation. The present
unclassified state of household employments operates in the same way. But
in addition to this lack of organization, other industrial disadvantages
are found. These are the lack of all opportunity for promotion within
the service, the lack of kindred occupations opening out from it, the
irregularity of working hours, and confinement evenings and Sundays, the
necessary competition between those of American birth and foreign born
and colored employees, and the lack of personal independence. These, in
addition to the unorganized condition of the work, are the industrial
disadvantages that tell most strongly against the occupation; they are
the economic maladies that can be alleviated only by the application of
economic remedies.
The attempt has been made to show how the lack of organization in
household employments can be partially met by taking out of the house
a large part of the work now performed there, and having much of what
must necessarily remain done by the piece, hour, day, or season, thus
securing better specialization of work and directing it into the current
of industrial progress. The second group of industrial difficulties
enumerated must in a similar way be met by measures that have proved
successful in similar fields.
The vexed questions of wages and hours of labor in the industrial world
are still unsettled, but in certain industries some little progress
towards a solution of those difficulties has been made through the
introduction of the profit-sharing system. In order to answer the
question whether profit sharing could be introduced with advantage into
domestic service, it is necessary to consider somewhat in detail the
question, What is profit sharing, and also the question, What have been
its advantages in general economic society?
Profit sharing, as defined by Mr. Carroll D. Wright, is the term that
“may be applied to any arrangement whereby labor is rewarded in addition
to its wages, or in lieu of wages, by participation in the profits of the
business in which it is employed. Benefits of various kinds—as insurance,
schools, libraries, and beautiful surroundings, so far as maintained by
employers out of their profits and enjoyed by employees as an addition to
what their wages would purchase—would have to be regarded, in a strict
analysis, as an indirect form of profit sharing.”[311] Mr. Nicholas Payne
Gilman defines it as “the method of rewarding labor by assigning it a
share in the realized profits of business in addition to wages.”[312] Mr.
D. F. Schloss considers it “an arrangement under which an employer agrees
with his employees that they shall receive, in partial remuneration of
their labor, and in addition to their ordinary wages, a share, fixed
beforehand, in the profits of his business.”[313] The International
Congress on Profit Sharing, held in Paris, in 1889, declared it to be “a
voluntary agreement, by virtue of which an employee receives a share,
fixed beforehand, in the profits of an undertaking.”
The history of profit sharing is short, and can easily be recalled.
It began in 1842 with the _Maison Leclaire_ in Paris, and has been
subsequently introduced into many business houses in France and
Switzerland, countries where the economic conditions lend themselves
readily to its progress. Its adoption in Germany has been less extensive,
while the English industrial system has hitherto seemed hostile to it,
although Mr. D. F. Schloss in his recent Report claims that a larger
number of experiments in profit sharing have been made in England
than in any other country. Probably about one fourth of the business
establishments conducted on this principle are found in the United States.
What are the advantages that have resulted from this fifty years of more
or less extensive experience with the system? There is first the fact
that it results in the development of what Mr. Carroll D. Wright has
called “the group of industrial virtues.” This group includes diligence,
zeal, caretaking, vigilance, punctuality, fidelity, continuity of
effort, willingness to learn, a spirit of co-operation, and a personal
interest in all business affairs. In addition to these virtues, other
positive advantages have been noted by those who have tried the system.
“An appreciable percentage of the occasions of worry, which all large
employers experience, have disappeared,” writes Mr. T. W. Bushill, of
Coventry, England.[314] M. Billon, of Geneva, states as one result of
his experiment, “Superintendence became easy for us, and _from that time
we could, without fear of offending any one, show ourselves exacting in
details to which previously we were obliged to close our eyes_.”[315] The
Peace Dale Manufacturing Company began profit sharing “not to make money
in the positive sense, but to save waste.”[316] This saving of waste is
seen in the efforts to economize time and materials and in the additional
care with which machinery and all appliances for work are used. Various
English firms have been most successful in attaining this end, stating
that they find “increasing care to avoid spoilt work and waste both
of time and material”; that “waste is guarded against”; that there is
care in handling materials, and that “especially waste of raw material
is avoided.”[317] Another gain is found in the identification of the
interests of employer and employees and the consequent harmony between
capital and labor; “the occurrence of a strike in a profit-sharing
establishment is believed to have been a rare event,” says Mr.
Schloss.[318] The advantage to the employer of this identification of
interest is seen in the ability to obtain “a steadier and superior class
of workers”; in the fact that “the knowledge that there is such a scheme
brings all the best workmen” to the firm employing it; that “workers
remain year after year”; and that “it tends to secure and retain the best
workers.” Its good effects on the character of the work are seen when “an
efficient man is very soon pricked up to greater diligence by his fellow
workers”; in securing through it “the maximum of effort”; “in a steady
pulling up all around”; when it “makes the men keener after business and
sharper in keeping down expenses.”[319]
It would seem difficult to introduce the scheme into a business like
that of tea-blending, but a London firm that has practised it thirteen
years states that the effect is “to make the clerks willing to exert
themselves in an especial manner, when the occasion arises, because they
know that if they show themselves unable to cope with the mass of work
to be done, then the staff must be increased; and they do not care to
see their bonus diminished by an augmentation of the numbers entitled to
participation.”[320]
The question naturally arises as to how far these gains reimburse the
employer for the financial cost of profit sharing. The chairman of the
South Metropolitan Gas Company of London writes, “I state unhesitatingly
that the Company is recouped the whole of the amounts—some £40,000—paid
as a bonus since the system was started.”[321] The managing director of
the New Welsh Slate Quarry Company gives it as his personal belief “that
we are recouping every penny of bonus and more;” and similar testimony
comes from others.
Yet this is putting the matter on the lowest plane. The system “converts
the industrial association of employer and employees into a moral
organism, in which all the various talents, services, and desires of
the component individuals are fused into a community of purpose and
endeavor.”[322] A natural result, moreover, is a general elevation in the
standards of morals. Most of all, in an individual way it is of help to
the employee; “to assist a person in improving his condition by his own
efforts is to make a man of him.”[323]
What can be learned from these successful experiences in profit sharing
that will be of value in domestic service? The usual difficulties that
beset the employer of domestic labor are lack of interest, desire
for change, negligence, waste of time, extravagance in the use of
materials, in a word, the absence of the industrial virtues. If these
very difficulties—all of which exist elsewhere—are partially or entirely
obviated by the employer of other forms of labor through the system of
profit sharing, may it not reasonably be expected that they could be met
in domestic service by the employment of similar means?
Domestic service, it is true, is not a wealth-producing occupation,
but it is wealth-consuming probably beyond any other employment. The
profit, therefore, must be negative, that is, economy in the use of
time, materials, and appliances for work. It is in precisely these ways
that profit sharing has been most successful, and the wage system most
unsatisfactory. Under the wage system the employer of domestic labor pays
for time rather than for quality of service, and employers therefore
constantly complain that employees do not accomplish one half as much
as they should, and employees that employers exact twice as much as can
be done. Neither party to the contract under the wage system can have a
true notion of the working value or the money value of time; thus it is
not strange that the one requires more than can be performed, and the
other does less than might be reasonably demanded. The same ignorance and
carelessness prevails in the use of materials. The employer may provide
the best the markets afford, but if the cook has never had brought home
to her a realizing sense of the money value of these materials, she is
not altogether to blame if she fries doughnuts in butter costing fifty
cents a pound, and makes angel food daily when eggs are forty cents
a dozen. The employer may also provide the finest of furnishings for
the dining-room and china closet, but if the maid-of-all-work does not
associate a money value with these furnishings, she uses table napkins
for holders, and carelessly drops fine china into an iron sink. From the
selfish point of view the chief interest of the employer is to keep the
bills down and to get the greatest possible amount of service even at
the cost of the greatest expenditure of human strength; among employees,
it is to do sufficient work to retain a good place, and to use whatever
materials are most convenient.
Mr. Nicholas Payne Gilman has well said, “The deficiency in the daily
wage system as a motive power to procure the desirable maximum of effort
and performance is extreme.” Precisely the same objections that hold
in all other employments to the wage system hold as well in domestic
service. In other occupations it has been seen that the almost universal
testimony of those who have tried profit sharing is that the system
results in economy in the use of materials, care in the handling of
machinery and implements of work, and a feeling of partnership, the
spur of which as a motive “is only excelled in sharpness by complete
proprietorship.” Mr. Gilman sums up the advantages of the system when
he says, “Profit sharing advances the prosperity of an establishment by
increasing the quantity of the product, by improving the quality, by
promoting care of implements and economy of materials, and by diminishing
labor difficulties and the cost of superintendence.” In a word, whatever
arguments can be advanced in favor of profit sharing in productive
industries can be used with equal force in its favor in domestic service.
The application of the principle to the household is simple. It is
possible to allow a fixed sum, as $50, $100, or $500 per month for living
expenses, which shall include the purchase of all food for the table,
fuel, lights, ice, breakages, and the replacement of worn-out kitchen
utensils, and to allow a pro rata amount for guests during the month. If
by care in the use of food materials, fuel, and kitchen and dining-room
furniture, the expenses amount to $45, $90, or $450 per month, the $5,
$10, or $50 saved can be divided according to a ratio previously agreed
upon between the employer and the one or more employees. The cook is
in the position to save the most, and therefore ought to receive the
greatest percentage of the amount saved; but it is a part of the work
of the waitress to be careful of glass and china, of the laundress not
to waste fuel, soap, and starch, and of all, including parlor maid,
seamstress, and nursery maid, not to waste gas, fuel, or food at the
table, and therefore each employee is entitled to a share in the profits.
Thus each keeps watch over the others to prevent undue waste, and the
employees are given a personal interest in the establishment now so
often lacking. In addition to this, it is possible to allow a gardener
and a coachman who have taken special care in the improvement of lawns,
gardens, and stables a small percentage on the annual appreciation of
property. “Comprehension is wonderfully quickened by the payment of a
bonus or two in cash, and there is no more efficient instructor than
self-interest.”
Moreover, it is possible to allow a fixed sum for service, as $18 per
month, out of which the employee may choose to have a small sum spent in
hiring by the day some one to wash windows and clean verandas, or she
may choose to economize her time and strength and do this work herself.
In either case the financial outcome to the employer is the same, while
either arrangement makes the employee a partner in the domestic company
and gives her an active interest in its welfare.
It is possible to apply the principle in still other ways. If the general
servant likes to cook but dislikes other parts of housework, she may
contribute to the Woman’s Exchange and with part of the money received
hire with her employer an assistant to come in a certain number of hours
each day to care for the rooms, the silver and brass, and wait on the
table. It is possible also to give the cook a certain amount of time
for making articles to be sold at the Woman’s Exchange, the employer
furnishing capital and implements of work and receiving a certain share
in the profits. In employment bureaus it would be possible to give a
certain percentage of the profits of the bureau to all employees who have
kept their names on the books of the bureau and remained at least one
year in the place found by them through its agency.
The ways indeed are numberless in which the principle of profit sharing
can be applied; and if the ingenuity and fertility of resource possessed
by so many employers were once turned in this direction, the good
resulting would be incalculable.
Great as would be the gain for domestic service if this principle could
be adopted in private families, the advantage would be if possible
even greater could it be introduced into hotels, boarding houses, and
restaurants, and also the dining-car, parlor-car, and sleeping-car
service. In all hotels, restaurants, and public institutions the waste
is enormous—perhaps proportionately greater than in private families,
largely because as a rule the superintendents of such establishments are
also employees on wages. Ignorance is often the chief cause of waste, and
the best corrective of this ignorance is the experience gained through
profit sharing.
But the greatest advantage of profit sharing in restaurants and hotels,
dining-cars and sleeping-cars, is that through it the feeing system could
be abolished. In all such business enterprises where the feeing system is
established there is in effect a combination of the general public and
the employees of the establishments against the proprietors of them.
Such is the case because the feeing system prevents the proprietors
from receiving a fair amount of patronage unless each employee is feed
for performing the service he ought freely to give and for which he
will presumably be paid by his employer. The money profit in all these
establishments depends largely on the good service rendered by the
employees, and thus it would be possible to divide a positive profit
as well as a negative saving. The feeing system, if it prevails in
any branch of personal service, drags down with it in the social and
industrial scale every other branch of the service. The substitution
of profit sharing in hotels and restaurants and in the dining-car and
sleeping-car service for the system of fees so increasingly prevalent
would do more than any other one thing to remove the social stigma from
domestic service and make of all such employees self-respecting men and
women.
It may be urged against the proposition to introduce profit sharing into
domestic service that few employees are of such stability of character
as to warrant making the experiment. But the great desideratum is to
introduce into the service some principle that will develop the best
qualities of those already in it, that will sift out the worthless and
compel them to undertake unskilled labor, that will draw from other
occupations, where they are less needed, able persons whose natural
tastes and abilities would attract them to this. M. Levasseur is quoted
as saying that of one hundred firms that begin business, ten per
cent succeed, fifty per cent “vegetate,” and forty per cent go into
bankruptcy. The statement characterizes with possibly sufficient accuracy
the result in the case of the establishment of a corresponding number of
households. Could an industrial partnership be formed between employer
and employee, with the agreement to divide, not positive profits, but
negative savings, something might be done to save the forty per cent
who now give up housekeeping and go into the bankruptcy of hotels and
boarding houses, and also to lessen the fifty per cent who “vegetate”
through the employment in the household of obsolete industrial methods.
It may also be said that profit sharing appeals to a selfish motive and
therefore is objectionable. But much of the waste and extravagance in the
household comes from ignorance; profit sharing is one way of teaching the
value of raw materials. The comfortable theory is often entertained that
to be born poor is to be born with a knowledge of all household affairs.
As a matter of fact, there is doubtless far more waste and extravagance
in the households of the poor than in those of the rich. But extravagance
is in reality a relative term; “tenderloin steak for breakfast and rump
roast for dinner,” which may be simple fare in the household of the
employer, becomes an impossible luxury to the employee in such a family
when she goes to a home of her own. Profit sharing would be of value
in the household not because it would appeal to a selfish motive, but
because it would teach the value of materials used and incidentally do
something to prevent this prevalent waste and extravagance.
Neither of these objections to profit sharing holds in the face of all
that can be said in its favor. The general arguments for it are many.
It is usually assumed that the interests of the employer and those of
the employee are antagonistic. The introduction of profit sharing could
easily prove that this assumption in domestic service is wrong, as it
has already made similar proof in other occupations. If the employers
of other forms of labor find themselves relieved of much of the worry
and friction that have previously resulted from the mutual relation of
employer and employee, it would seem reasonable to expect a like result
in the household. If it has been found elsewhere that the extra services
called out, and the manner in which they are called out, constitute an
invaluable educational discipline, and promote zeal, efficiency, and
economy, a similar result might be looked for here. If other employees
have learned through it to be careful of their methods of work, punctual
in the performance of their duties, and economical in the use of
materials; if it has become “a moral educator, and substituted harmony
and mutual good-will for distrust and contention in the relations of
employer and employee,” then, indeed, may it not be considered, not as a
panacea, but as one measure among many that may be of help in lessening
some of the serious difficulties that now attend domestic service?
At the present time a public discussion of domestic service meets
with little else but jest and ridicule, while in private life the
social stigma is cast on all engaged in it, as is the case in no other
occupation. To attempt to dignify labor by saying, “we must dignify
labor,” savors of the old problem of trying to raise one’s self by the
boot-straps. No concrete method by which this is to be done is ever
suggested, and until some plan is adopted by which the personal dignity
and independence of the employee is recognized, and his industrial and
financial independence is secured, domestic service will continue to be
under the industrial and social ban. When this improved condition is
brought about, there will be established what Professor Jevons considers
the best of all trade-unions—that between the employer and employee.
It must be frankly said that the plan of adopting profit sharing in
the household is a theoretical one; and to say it is “mere theory” is
often considered an unanswerable argument with which to meet every
new proposition. But theory lies at the basis of all successful
action; difficulties have come in household service often because
it has been conducted without theory—in a short-sighted, haphazard,
hand-to-mouth fashion. It is known, however, that the experiment has
been tried successfully in a private family, and this perhaps saves the
proposition from the charge of being only theory. It has been tried by
Mrs. X, a university graduate, after one and a half years’ experience
in housekeeping. The experiment was made in a college town where the
cost of provisions was rather above than below the average. The family
comprised four adults, including the Irish maid rather above the average
in intelligence and ambition. The plan provided for an allowance of $40
a month for living expenses, including groceries, meats, fish, poultry,
butter, milk, cream, ice, candles, kerosene oil, and incidental expenses.
The last included breakage and the replacement of worn-out kitchen
utensils. The best materials of all kinds were purchased, and practically
nothing was ever thrown away. The food was simple but abundant. The
co-operation between employer and maid consisted on the part of the
employer in planning the menu, especially the making up of left-over
materials, the pricing of all articles in the market, and keeping the
accounts accurately; the maid gave all orders and carried them out. The
profit sharing consisted in dividing equally between employer and maid
whatever had been saved at the end of the month out of the $40 allowed
for running expenses. The results of four months’ experiment were as
follows:
Average monthly expenses before profit sharing began $41.25
Expenses first month after 36.74
” second ” 43.75[324]
” third ” 41.58[325]
” fourth ” 36.28
The plan for carrying on the dining association using the Memorial Hall
of Harvard University is essentially one of co-operation, and contains
some points that could be tried with advantage elsewhere. The steward
receives a fixed salary and in addition a small sum each week for every
person who boarded that week at the hall; but this “head money” is
proportionately diminished as the average weekly price of board exceeds
the amount agreed upon.
At Placid Club, a social club established in the Adirondacks, all fees
are prohibited, and the rule is strictly enforced; but the past season
(1896) a dividend of ten per cent on the wages received was declared out
of the profits of the club, and this was given to all house employees
who had remained throughout the season and whose services had been
satisfactory to the manager. The financial success of the club depended
largely on the efficiency, good-will, and ready co-operation of its
employees, and the dividend declared was in recognition of this fact.
Beginnings in a small way have been made elsewhere.[326] They are indeed
but beginnings, but they seem to indicate one direction in which progress
is possible.
CHAPTER XV
POSSIBLE REMEDIES—EDUCATION IN HOUSEHOLD AFFAIRS
One of the greatest obstacles in the way of improving domestic service
has been the prevailing lack of information in regard to household
affairs and of careful, systematic education of housekeepers.
Information and education are often used as synonymous terms, but the two
words carry with them entirely different ideas. Information concerning
household affairs includes a ready knowledge of the history of all
household employments and household service, of the economic basis on
which the household rests, and of the economic principles on which it is
conducted. Much of this information it is now difficult to obtain. Many
houses are found in Southern Germany without windows looking towards
the public highway. Light and air are admitted through openings in the
rear or on a court, but no chance passer-by is permitted to look within.
The household has always been constructed on the same plan. No outsider
has been permitted to know the percentage of the family income that
goes for service, fuel, gas and water-tax, groceries, meats, fruits,
and vegetables. In the great majority of households not only is there
no disposition to give others the benefit of such information, but the
information itself does not exist. Each new generation of housekeepers
practically begins its work where the previous generation began. Its only
heritage is recipes for desserts, rules for making furniture polish,
methods of dealing with moth and mildew, which are handed down like
family property from one generation to another in a way as primitive as
that in which books were preserved before writing was known. Advance
is not thus made, as is evident from the course followed in other
occupations that have shown greatest progress. A vast accumulation of
knowledge in regard to law has come through the added experience of
individual members of the profession. It is said that every lawyer owes
a debt of gratitude to his profession which can be paid only by some
personal contribution to the sum total of legal knowledge. The constant
progress made by the profession of medicine is due to the untiring
investigations carried on by its members, the wide publicity given the
results of these investigations, and the fact that every discovery made
by one member becomes the common property of all. Until every housekeeper
is willing to recognize her obligations to her profession and to share
with other members the results of her experience, of her acquired
information, and of her personal investigations, no progress in household
affairs can be expected.
Much of the information to be gained in regard to household affairs is a
direct product of education, but education includes much more. Education
gives a certain amount of information that is of direct service, and
it gives a training that is of indirect but even greater value. The
information more immediately gained comes through the study of art,
chemistry, economics, physiology, psychology, and history. The study of
art should enable the housekeeper to build and furnish her home with
taste; of chemistry, to provide for its sanitary construction and for
the proper preparation of all food materials; of economics, to manage
her household on business principles; of physiology, to study the
physical development of her children; of psychology, to observe their
mental growth and base their training upon it; of history, to know the
progress made in all these departments of knowledge and avoid repeating
as experiments what others have advanced beyond the experimental stage.
These are the gains on the side of information. The real work of
education in supplying the needs of the household is far more important.
There are constantly arising in every household emergencies for which the
housekeeper is, and must be, totally unprepared as regards the amount
of available information she possesses. There are demands made every
hour, every moment, for the exercise of reason, judgment, self-control,
alertness, observation, accuracy, ingenuity, inventive genius, fertility
of resources. The training received by the housekeeper must be such as to
prepare her to meet at any moment any emergency that may arise within her
home. In all ordinary circumstances she avails herself of the information
gained in school or college and through her general reading, but this
is of no avail in the decision of questions which arise outside of the
field of this information, and could by no possibility be anticipated
by it. If progress is to be made in the household, it must be no longer
assumed that an establishment can be well managed by a young woman whose
reasoning powers have never been cultivated, who has never been taught
self-reliance and self-control, who has no conception of accuracy, who
has never acquired the habit of observation, and whose inventive genius
and fertility of resource are expended in providing for the pleasures of
a day.
No improvement is possible in domestic service until every part of the
household comes abreast of the progress made outside of the household;
until the profession of housekeeping advances, like the so-called learned
professions, through the accumulated wisdom of its individual members;
until it ceases to be merely a passive recipient of the progress made
elsewhere, and becomes on its own part an active, creative force.
So much has progress up to this time been hindered by this inactivity in
the household, and so great is the interdependence of all parts of the
household, that it seems necessary to consider somewhat more in detail
the causes of this condition.
Inactivity in all household affairs has largely come from three things.
It has in the first place been generally believed that a knowledge of
all things pertaining to the house and home, unlike anything else,
comes by instinct. It is assumed that the housekeeper is born with an
intuitive knowledge of the right proportions of all materials to be
used in cooking—this knowledge sometimes supplemented by an inherited
cook-book and one purchased to aid a benevolent society soliciting
funds for a charitable purpose. Her knowledge of the mental, moral, and
physical training to be given her children is also to be gained through
instinct and experience and the traditions handed down with regard to
her own family. Instinct may sometimes be dormant, and experience prove
an expensive schoolmaster through the exaction of heavy fees, but no
other avenue of information has been open to her. Again, a very large
proportion of all moneys spent for legitimate household purposes passes
through the hands of housekeepers; yet no thorough investigation on an
extensive scale has ever been carried on in regard to the expenditure
made within or for the household. Few women when they assume the care
of a household know the exact value of the household plant; the amount
to be deducted each year for wear and tear; the relative proportions
expended annually for rent, fuel, food, clothing, and service; the number
of meals served and the approximate cost of each; the amount of profit,
waste, or unproductiveness that results from all expenditures made.
Every manufacturer, every business man knows the value of his plant,
its increasing or diminishing value, the cost of materials used and of
service employed. This information constitutes a part of the intellectual
capital with which he begins business; he does not acquire it by instinct
or tradition, but by careful and exact study of all the factors involved.
It is difficult to see how a household can be successfully carried on
except through the application of the same principles. If we turn to the
construction and decoration of the house, ignorance, masquerading as
instinct, quite as often prevails. It is true we have houses in which we
live, many of them expensive and artistic, yet as a rule little or no
attention is paid in their construction to the specific use each of the
several parts is to serve. Libraries are built with little or no regard
to the place to be occupied in them by book-shelves, desk, or library
table, and no attention is paid to the question of the best methods of
providing them with natural and artificial light. Drawing-rooms and
parlors are built without a place for a piano, dining-rooms without
regard to the position of a sideboard, butlers’ pantries without an
entrance to the kitchen, kitchens with absolutely no regard to the
conveniences of the work to be carried on there, and bedrooms with no
normal place for a bed, bureau, or dressing-table. Something has of
late been done in deference to public sentiment towards applying the
principles of sanitation to the construction of public and private
buildings, yet much still remains to be done, both in the investigation
of the principles and in their application. Many of our private homes
are pleasing to the eye, yet if we accept that definition of art which
considers that it is its highest province to serve best the useful,
many of the so-called artistic homes must be otherwise classed. Before
improvement can be looked for in any of these directions, the position
must be abandoned that the household, or any single part of it, can be
managed by instinct.
A second explanation of the prevailing inactivity in regard to household
affairs arises from the fact that it is always assumed that these
subjects concern only women. The husband of the family often excuses
his absolute ignorance of the affairs of his own household by the lame
apology, “I leave all these things to my wife and daughters.” It is
certainly not the intention in such remarks to belittle the affairs of
the household, yet that is the natural and inevitable result. A knowledge
of household affairs has never been considered a part of a liberal
education as is a knowledge of literature, science, and politics, but
when it is so regarded by men as well as by women a great gain will have
been made. Moreover, it must be said that the natural tastes of some
men would lead them to take up housekeeping as an occupation, as the
natural tastes of some women lead them into different kinds of business.
Inactivity in the household will cease when the arbitrary pressure is
removed that now tacitly compels many women to become housekeepers in
violence to their natural tastes, and at the same time prevents any man
whose abilities lie in this direction from giving them scope. The time
must come when each person will take up the work in life for which he or
she is best adapted, be it the care of a house for a man or business for
a woman, when it will cease to be a matter of odium for the husband to
direct the affairs of the house and for the wife to be the breadwinner.
When the fact is everywhere recognized that both men and women have a
vital concern in the affairs of the house, the relation between the
different parts of the household will become an organic one, and its
highest development reached.
A third explanation of this inactivity in the household is the belief
that all women have a natural taste for household affairs, which without
cultivation grows into positive genius for carrying them on. But a young
man with a genius for law or medicine is not only not expected, he is not
permitted, to exercise his untrained genius in legal and medical cases.
The greater the genius he gives promise of, the more careful, systematic,
and prolonged is the training he receives. In a similar way the woman
with a natural taste for housekeeping duties is the one who should have
most training in them, while in no other way can an interest in such
duties be created in women who have not an inborn love of them.
These three common errors—that a knowledge of housekeeping affairs is a
matter of inspiration, that men have no active interest in the management
of a household, and that all women have a natural love for such affairs
which supplies the place of training—are perhaps sufficient explanation
of the present lack of all opportunity for the investigation of the
household in a professional way.
It has always been assumed, and asserted without fear of contradiction,
that the best place to learn everything pertaining to the household
is the home. But the same change must come here as has already come
in the profession of medicine and in nearly every other department of
knowledge. The period is not remote when every housekeeper made, as
well as administered, the family tonics, bitters, pills, salves, and
liniments, and every household contained a copy of _Every Man his Own
Practitioner_. Happily that day has passed and the era of scientific
investigation and practice of medicine has dawned. It was once assumed
that an adequate knowledge of law could be obtained by any young man who
spent six months in reading law in any lawyer’s office. But the leading
members of the bar to-day have been trained in less haphazard ways. It
was formerly believed that any person could be fitted for a librarian
by doing the routine work of librarian’s assistant in a small country
library. Such training has been supplanted by library schools open only
to college graduates and offering a two years’ course of study. Less
than a hundred years ago boys and girls of sixteen or seventeen years
of age began teaching without even a high school education, while the
tendency to-day is everywhere to insist not only on advanced academic but
also on professional training. The system of apprenticeship is everywhere
being supplanted by systematic, technical training given by experts.
There is evidence that this same spirit is slowly invading the household.
Cooking schools are springing up that teach all the intricacies of the
science “in ten easy lessons,” while the lecturer on cooking with her
demonstration lessons has found her way into nearly every town. Sewing is
taught in the public schools, and the free kitchen garden is following
fast in the train of the free kindergarten. All this is good in its
way, but it is superficial work. No permanent advance will be made as
long as only those schools are found that teach simply the mechanical
parts of housekeeping. New recipes for salads and puddings, new ways of
cleaning brass and silver, new methods of caring for hard-wood floors—all
these may be helpful in a sense, but the knowledge of these and a
thousand other mechanical contrivances will never put the household on a
scientific basis and turn its face towards progress.
One thing, and only one thing, will turn the household into the
channels where every other occupation has made advancement. This is the
establishment of a great professional school, amply equipped for the
investigation of all matters pertaining to the household and _open only
to graduates of the leading colleges and universities of the country_.
This work cannot and should not be done by the college. The college
offers courses in physiology and hygiene, but the college graduate is
permitted to practice medicine only after a long and thorough course
in a medical school. The college offers courses in constitutional law,
but the college student is admitted to the bar only after technical
training in the law school. The college offers courses in chemistry
and economics, but the college student who expects to have the care of
a home should prepare herself for this work by technical study of all
that concerns the household. The mechanical parts of housekeeping can
be learned in the home, providing the head of the household herself
understands the intricacies of the mechanism over which she has charge,
and has the gift of imparting knowledge. These assumptions, however,
cannot always be made, nor can it be assumed that even all the mechanical
parts of housekeeping can be learned in any single home any more than
that all forms of library work can be learned from a single library.
Some of these mechanical parts of housekeeping can be learned in the
kitchen-garden, the public school, the cooking school, but progress is
never made by treadmill methods, by mechanical repetition, by giving
attention only to those things already known. Professional training and
investigation must supplement home and collegiate instruction in the case
of the housekeeper, as the professional school supplements private and
collegiate instruction for the physician, the lawyer, and the clergyman.
The household has been up to this time a _terra incognita_. Until but
yesterday absolutely nothing had been done in any educational institution
towards investigating its past history, its present condition, its future
needs. The beginning has scarcely been made, although the field for such
investigation is limitless. Comparatively little is known of artistic
house-building and furnishing, scarcely more of household sanitation[327]
and the chemistry of foods,[328] even less of the economic principles
underlying the household; fashion, not art, governs every question of
costume, while, with a few notable exceptions, Porter’s _Development of
the Human Intellect_ contains the sum and substance of our knowledge
of the mental development of children. Years of patient, laborious,
unremitting investigation must be given to all household affairs
before any appreciable advance can be made by them. The historical and
scientific investigation of all the great subjects of art, economics,
chemistry, physiology, and psychology in their application to the
household, and the publication of the results of these investigations,
would not indeed settle to-morrow all the difficulties that arise to-day
in regard to household affairs; but such investigation and publication
would take the subject out of the domain of sentiment and transfer it to
a realm where reason and judgment have the control. Household affairs
would in time come to receive the respect now accorded the learned
professions. Household service, instead of being taken up as a last
resort by those who themselves say “have not education enough to do
anything else,” would be dignified into a profession that would attract
large numbers who now seek other occupations.
It has already been said that “educational forces do not push from the
bottom, they pull from the top.” When a strong educational force exerted
from the top shall have pulled the household and all questions connected
with it out of the slough of stagnation in which it has been for so long
a time, then, and not till then, will training schools for domestic
employees be successful. Progress in every other field of human activity
has been made only through investigation and the widespread diffusion of
the results of such investigation; on similar investigations rests the
only hope of making progress in household affairs.
CHAPTER XVI
CONCLUSION
Any study of the subject of domestic service must lead to the conclusion
that household service and household employments do not occupy an
isolated position; that while they may be indifferent to the political,
industrial, and social changes constantly occurring, they cannot
by virtue of this indifference remain unaffected by them; that the
inventions of the past hundred years have revolutionized household
employments, and that the present generation must adapt itself to
these new conditions; that while a century ago domestic service had no
competitors as an occupation for women, it now has hundreds; that the
personnel in the domestic service of America has been transformed through
industrial, political, and social revolutions; that it has been affected
by the democratic tendencies of the age and by the commercial and
educational development of the country; that because of these constantly
recurring changes in the conditions surrounding domestic service the
questions connected with it vary from year to year; that it is governed
by the same general economic laws as are all other employments, and that
it has developed within itself other economic laws peculiar to it; that
the increasing wealth and luxury of the country are introducing new
complications into a problem already far from simple; that both employer
and employee are heirs of conditions which their ancestors could not
control, and that they are surrounded by difficulties which no person
single-handed and alone can hope successfully to overcome.
It has been seen that many of these difficulties arise from the failure
to recognize domestic service as a part of the great industrial questions
of the day. It is not so recognized because economic writers have not as
yet discussed the subject, and because those who come in daily contact
with it overlook its economic side. The housekeeper who completes her
round of morning shopping by a visit to an employment bureau where she
engages a new cook regards that and her other business transactions all
in the same light; she has both in shopping and in securing a cook been
guided solely by her taste, her necessities, and her bank account. The
economist must include domestic service in his discussions of the labor
question, and the housekeeper must differentiate the various parts of her
housekeeping duties before improvement is possible.
It must also be recognized that another difficulty has been the natural
conservatism of many women—a conservatism arising from the isolated,
home-centred lives many housekeepers lead, and that prevents that
intellectual hospitality which is the presager of all true progress. The
typical housekeeper, like the Turk, is a born fatalist; because things
are as they are, they must always have been so and they must continue so
to be. Many persons take pride in being “old-time housekeepers” and look
with disfavor on any change. “That plan might succeed in some families,
but it would not in mine” is for many others the final settlement of
the question. This lack of mental elasticity and the dislike of taking
the initiative in any movement must be another obstacle in the way of
immediate improvement.
It has also been seen that other causes partially explain the
difficulty—the love of ease and pleasure, the attempt to keep up
appearances, a pretentious manner of living, the frequent desire of both
employers and employees to get everything for nothing, the willingness
of mistresses to find maids who will do their work half right and of
maids to find mistresses who will treat them half right, the endeavor to
get “the largest expenditure of woman for the smallest expenditure of
money,” a natural tendency among women toward aristocracy and a dislike
of everything savoring of social democracy.
Some of the difficulty arises from conditions to be expected in a
country comparatively new and possessing great possibilities of wealth.
The growing luxury among the middle classes not only creates a demand
for more employees but it also increases the requisitions upon those
rendering service. Those who have lately acquired riches make increasing
demands upon their employees, and they must become accustomed to their
riches before these demands will be modified. Bishop Potter has said,
“Luxury has its decent limits, and we in this land are in danger in many
directions of overstepping those limits.”[329] Persons with moderate
means are the greatest sufferers from this thoughtless transgression of
the bounds of luxury. The remedy lies in such education of the wealthy
classes, especially where wealth has been suddenly acquired, as will
give a more practical knowledge of general and household economics, a
realization of the ethical as well as of the economic principle involved
in paying high wages for poor service and abnormally high wages for good
service, such an education as will result in greater simplicity in manner
of living because it will be governed by ethical, economic, and hygienic
principles.
It is true that in thousands of households no difficulty in regard to
domestic service exists, but this fact does not relieve those in charge
of such households from further responsibility in the matter. A political
club recently formed to secure better municipal government in Montreal
took as its watchword, “Every man is individually responsible for just
so much evil as his efforts might prevent.”[330] In a similar way the
responsibility of the employer does not end with his own household, but
he is responsible for as much evil in the general condition of domestic
service as he could have prevented by his investigation and discussion of
the subject.
The first result of this investigation, discussion, and action must be
the attempt to remove from domestic service the social stigma attached
to it. During the feudal period every occupation was inferior socially
to that of warfare; physicians were leeches, clergymen were held in
disrepute, bankers were usurers, and merchants and traders were tolerated
only because they could furnish the ready money necessary for military
campaigns—social position belonged only to the profession of arms. The
substitution of higher ideals for those of feudalism and the spread of
democratic ideas have removed the social ban from every occupation except
domestic service. Industrial and social evolution point to its ultimate
removal from this employment as has been the case in others.
A second result of investigation and discussion must be the working out
of ways and means for taking both work and worker out of the house of the
employer. This must result in a simplification of household management
and a greater flexibility in household employments. It simplifies the
household because it takes out of it a cumbersome, unwieldy machine
long since become antiquated. It is possible to arrange a series of
mechanical contrivances operated by electricity that will enable a
person to open any window or door in his house without rising from
his chair, but it is as a rule easier to open a window without such
assistance than it is to keep the batteries in running order. A retinue
of employees in a household becomes like a complicated mechanism used
to attain simple ends. Taking the employee out of the house of the
employer brings flexibility into household employments, since it results
in greater personal independence and in openings for specialized work.
An ambitious and energetic office boy is pushed on by his employer into
more responsible positions, but the domestic employee is held back by
impassable barriers. Industrial promotion is impossible as the occupation
at present exists. “I suppose there must be a screw loose somewhere, or
a man of his age would not be my coachman,” said a lawyer recently in
reply to a question concerning a new employee. The industrial barriers
within the occupation must be removed before domestic service will
attract large numbers of capable, efficient persons; this can be at
least partially accomplished by taking the employee out of the house
and allowing him or her to become a self-reliant, independent, business
person.
Another direction in which progress lies is in the effort to put
the employment on a business basis. This must be accomplished if
any improvement is to come. No man takes his watch to a blacksmith
to be repaired, or employs a mason as bookkeeper, or a longshoreman
as superintendent of a mill, or a hod-carrier as floor-walker, yet
practically the same thing is done when a housekeeper employs an
inexperienced young woman as seamstress, installs a girl just from
Ireland as cook, takes a tenement-house woman into her home to care for
her table linen and bric-à-brac, and then adds to the incongruity of the
situation by paying high wages for this unskilled labor. Some agreement
must be reached by employers in regard to standards of work and wages
before domestic service can be classed as skilled labor.[331]
The suggestion of profit sharing is in line with the effort to put
the occupation on a business basis. Only where there is absolute
equality, when employer and employee stand on the same business level,
can amiability of manner and a spirit of helpfulness on the part of
the employee be prevented from being interpreted as springing from a
desire to curry favor with the employer. Not until the domestic employee
feels he has no reason to court the favor of his employer for the sake
of possible perquisites will he be self-respecting, and therefore
entitled to respect from others. The practice in many private houses of
subsidizing employees by numerous and valuable gifts is as subversive of
the best interests of all concerned, as is the giving of fees in large
establishments. It fosters subserviency rather than responsibility,
and creates dissatisfaction among the employees in families where the
custom does not and perhaps cannot prevail. Profit sharing appeals not to
selfishness but to intelligence, and has in it elements that tend to make
the employee a self-respecting and therefore a better man.
Improvement in all these directions, or in other ways far better, can
come only through the investigation of all household affairs by both
men and women. Travellers in other countries often lament the sight,
still so common in some places, of a woman harnessed to a cart with a
dog, or dragging the cart by her own efforts, or weighed down by the
heavy burdens placed upon her back. But a more unfortunate condition
in such countries than the woman harnessed to a cart is the fact that
wherever this is found the highest opportunities for education are not
open to women. The woman and the cart will remain in every country where
university education is not made possible for her. Until university
investigation of domestic affairs is made possible for every one having
the proper qualifications, the woman and the cart—the overburdened,
ignorant, and hopeless worker—will remain in the household.
If progress is to be made in the same direction that it has been up to
this time, it must bring a still further readjustment of the work of both
men and women. It must result in attracting every man and woman to the
work for which he or she is best fitted. Just as other forms of work once
held in low estimation have been elevated by scientific advancement, so
the time will come when it will be honorable to do housework of any kind
for remuneration. A woman with no talent for art has been known after
four lessons in oil painting to offer for sale the products of her work
without blushing for her audacity or incompetence. But though ignorant
of art, she may have been competent in cooking, and if the way had
been open to gain an honorable support by the exercise of this talent,
she might have been saved the attempt to secure a living by means from
which nothing but failure ought to result. The mistress of a large and
costly establishment said recently, “One of the most difficult things
about housekeeping is to dispose of old fancy work.” Much of this work
represents idle labor in boarding houses, done by women in various walks
of life who will not keep house under present conditions, but who would
be glad to do so if the conditions could be made more favorable.
It is in many ways difficult to deal with woman as an economic factor,
since many elements of uncertainty enter into her life which do not
hamper men. A young man is reasonably sure of two things in his future
life,—that he will have to support himself and that he will marry. But
many young women are not certain of either marriage or the necessity of
self-support. If a young woman marries, she is not permitted by the
conventions of society to be a breadwinner; on the other hand, she may
she may obliged, without preparation for it, to provide support, not
only for herself but also for her family. If she marries and boards, she
probably finds herself obliged to become a drone, and leads an aimless
life. If, without deference to convention, she engages in business, her
occupation may be broken up through the removal of her husband’s business
to another locality. For economic reasons it is impracticable for the
married woman to engage in any industry involving the use of capital
that cannot be readily transferred, unless this business is the same as
that of her husband, or unless she bears the entire burden of support
and has unrestricted control of the business enterprises of the family.
A thorough knowledge of some one line of domestic work which would yield
compensation would often lessen many of the perplexities surrounding a
married woman. Moreover, it seems not unreasonable to consider marriage
on its practical side as a business partnership to which the woman
as well as the man is to contribute. If she contributes a practical
knowledge of housekeeping, the business agreement is a fair one; if she
does not contribute this knowledge, but brings a knowledge of other
things as valuable, it is also a fair arrangement; but if she brings no
knowledge of household affairs, and no equivalent for it, the partnership
on its business side is unfair. There should be a definite understanding
when a woman marries whether she is to keep house or not, and if so,
that she knows how. The time ought to come when, in case she marries and
boards, she will be willing and able, and society will allow her, to
contribute her share in a business capacity to the life partnership.
Thousands of ambitious and talented women in the upper and middle classes
are crying for work, as women in a lower walk cry for bread. It is
impossible for society to maintain the former in idleness and at the same
time to pay full wages for work to the army of working women. The pay of
wage-earning women will never rise above the starvation point while the
women of the upper and middle classes are permitted to live without work.
The boycotting of dealers in ready-made clothing whose names are not on
the “white list” is but a sop thrown to Cerberus,—until the cause of the
evil is removed, until women now living in idleness become co-operators
in the work of the world, all women who work for remuneration must do
their share of the work for half-pay. Women want work for all the reasons
that men want it, but as long as so many of them, when they do work,
persistently give their work for nothing, just so long will women’s work
in general be undervalued.
This readjustment of work and the willingness of larger numbers of
women to work for remuneration would be as productive of improvement in
all household affairs as division of labor has been elsewhere. A more
far-reaching benefit is suggested by Maria Mitchell when she says: “The
dressmaker should no more be a universal character than the carpenter.
Suppose every man should feel it his duty to do his own mechanical work
and _all_ kinds, would society be benefited? would the work be well done?
Yet a woman is expected to know how to do all kinds of sewing, all kinds
of cooking, all kinds of any _woman’s_ work, and the consequence is that
life is passed in learning these only, while the universe of truth beyond
remains unentered.”[332]
In seeking for some measure of relief from the present oppressive
conditions, it must be said in conclusion that little can be accomplished
except through the use of means which already exist, developing these
along lines marked out by industrial progress in other fields. In the
foregoing suggestions,—that the historical study of the subject points to
relief through the removal of the social stigma; that the specialization
of household employments in consequence of the removal of as much work
as possible and the removal of the domestic employee as well from the
home of the employer leads to a simpler and better manner of life for
both employer and employee; that the introduction of profit sharing is
one means of placing household employments on a business basis; that
the establishment in connection with one of our great universities of a
school of investigation open only to graduates of the leading reputable
colleges is the only opportunity for the scientific advancement of the
household and all questions connected with it; and that together with the
last, a recognition of the necessity for the readjustment of the work
of both men and women must result in making any form of housework for
remuneration honorable for any person, man or woman,—in these suggestions
nothing either novel or original has been presented. Progress has been
made through such means; it seems not unreasonable to believe that
further progress will be made through their use.
Yet this view of the subject does not diminish, it rather increases,
individual responsibility. Sir James Stephen said, when civil-service
reform was first agitated in England, that a moral revolution was
necessary in that country before the reform sought could become an
accomplished fact. For a reform in domestic service a moral revolution is
everywhere needed, bringing with it to every person an appreciation of
his responsibility to all connected with the employment, whether employer
or employee.
Reforms begin at the top, revolutions at the bottom. It rests with the
men and women of the so-called upper classes, whether raised to their
position by birth, wealth, intellect, education, or opportunity, to work
out in the best way a satisfactory solution of the vexed question of
domestic service.
CHAPTER XVII
DOMESTIC SERVICE IN EUROPE
It is apparently a common belief in America that there are no
difficulties in domestic service in Europe, as it is an equally common
belief in Europe that the difficulties in domestic service are greater
in America than in any other country.[333] The judgment in one case
is as extreme as it is in the other. It is indeed as unsafe to make a
generalization in regard to all the phases of domestic service in Europe
as it is to make similar generalizations concerning all sections of
America—different countries have their own peculiar problems to meet,
and these vary in details as do the problems in different sections of
America. Yet a careful examination of the question may lead to the
conclusion that the differences in the condition of domestic service
in Europe and in America are those of degree rather than those of
fundamental principles; that the situation in Europe is modified rather
than radically altered by the social and political conditions existing
there; that as these conditions in Europe and in America become more
alike even these external differences will disappear, and that an ideal
form of domestic service exists as yet only in the castles of Spain.
Any consideration of domestic service as it is found in Europe to-day
must frankly recognize at the outset that the social and political
conditions that affect the question result on the one hand from tradition
and long-established customs, and on the other from the social and
political unrest that was born of the French Revolution. The past and
the present, the present and the future, stability and unrest, blind
obedience and personal freedom, aristocracy and democracy, have been
and are perpetually at war with each other. Every political revolution
that has widened the circle of democracy, every industrial movement that
has affected large classes of workers, every modification of national
ideals of education, every social change that has shifted the relations
of classes to each other, every barrier between nations that has been
broken down or that has been put up, has changed the problem of domestic
service. In England the tendencies towards social aristocracy on the one
hand and political democracy on the other, in Germany the trend towards
the exaction of military obedience in every walk in life and the counter
influences of the social democratic party, in France the deadening hand
of bureaucracy and the opposing unrestrained passions of the multitude,
in Italy the inherited prejudice against manual labor and the necessity
of gaining a livelihood by means of it,—all these forces so diametrically
opposed to each other, and so inevitably coming into collision, are but
illustrations of conflicting forces that have entered and that must
enter into the question. Political, industrial, educational, and social
changes have made England a manufacturing nation, have made Germany
one denominated by a military spirit and a military régime, have made
Italy a land given over to petty industries, and have emphasized in
France the tendency to seek official positions, no matter how small the
salary involved, rather than embark on individual enterprises involving
initiative. Some changes that have come within scarcely more than a
hundred years have been peculiar to a single country, most of them have
been shared by all, while not a few have affected America as well as
Europe. The changes have often been wrought silently, but they have been
none the less effective because they have come unnoticed and unrecognized
alike by the employer and by the employed in domestic service.
On the other hand, domestic service is affected by many external
conditions that are apparent to the most casual observer. These often
vary in the different countries, and often explain in turn some of the
conditions that differentiate domestic service in one European country
from that in another, as well as domestic service in Europe as a whole
from that in America. One illustration is found in the varying types
of domestic architecture which grow out of the varying national ideals
of home and of social life. The typical English dwelling, whether it
is detached, semi-detached, or one of a series, is complete in itself
and cut off from all communication with its neighbors. The huge French
apartment house containing half a dozen or a dozen families, without
an elevator and dominated by its concierge, has an artery in a common
stairway leading from the _loge_ of the concierge to the upper floor
occupied by all of the domestics in the building. The small apartment
house or detached house of the German is isolated, but it is in close
proximity to a garden café. The lofty, cheerless, mediæval palace in
which the Italian finds his abode is typical of the hardness of life for
those serving and those served. These fundamental differences in the
material construction of buildings must have an influence on the question
of domestic service. Houses arranged perpendicularly as in England, or
horizontally as in France and Germany, or located in the air as in Italy,
carry with them their own peculiarities of service and of work. Countries
where ice is not freely used, and apartment houses without places for
storage, make inevitable the daily marketing and purchasing all supplies
in small quantities; the delicatessen shop and the garden café simplify
the question of the evening meal in Germany; the elimination of breakfast
from the daily meals everywhere on the continent reduces to a minimum
that problem in domestic service. The isolation of life in one country,
the simplicity of life in another, the entire absence of hospitality
in still another, all affect the question, sometimes rendering it more
simple, sometimes more complex than in America.
Yet when everything has been said, the fact remains that in all
essentials the state of domestic service is the same in Europe as in
America. Employers on both sides of the Atlantic meet with the same
serious difficulties in their efforts to secure competent household
employees, and these difficulties find their explanation in precisely
the same conditions. They have already been enumerated in the case of
the American employer,[334] and the list tallies in every particular
with the enumeration of those met by the employer in Europe. It is hard
to secure the services of women in the household because they prefer
work in factories where the hours of work are definitely prescribed
and evenings and Sundays are free; because they prefer work in shops
where their individual life is less under control than it is in the
household of an employer; because they prefer service in hotels and in
large pensions since these give opportunity for specialized work, a
life of variety and excitement, and larger wages in the form of fees;
because they prefer short engagements with large fees at summer resorts
to permanent engagements with moderate wages in families; because the
growing spirit of democracy rebels against the inferior social position
accorded household employees, even to those whose work is rightly
classed as skilled labor. Obtaining help is difficult in small villages
because employees prefer the excitement of city life; on the other
hand, employers in large cities must meet the competition of shops and
factories.
In every country, it is true, there are districts where something of the
old patriarchal relationship between master and servant still exists,
where service in a household descends from parent to child, where
democratic ideas have not penetrated, where, be it said, the railway,
the telegraph, and the automobile are as yet unknown. In such districts
the question of household service is a simple one. But each year, as
these classes become more and more affected by new social and industrial
conditions, the perplexities in domestic service increase. Moreover, it
must be remembered that every period and every country has its legend of
an antecedent time and of a mythical Utopia where ideal service for every
one has always been found. These legends concerning service in Europe are
entitled to no more credence than are similar legends in America—the time
and the place where difficulties in domestic service are not and have not
been known are as vanishing points of the compass.
There are, however, certain variations of the problem in Europe and these
must be considered.
The European employer of domestic labor is at a distinct advantage in
comparison with the employer of such labor in America in that little or
no baking is done in the individual household, and washing as a rule is
done out of the house,[335] or if done in it, is often made a serious
matter like the semi-annual housecleaning,[336] while the continental
breakfast of coffee and rolls practically reduces the first meal of the
day to a negative quantity.
It is indeed an open question whether the simplification of household
work thus secured is not more than counterbalanced by the lack of modern
conveniences for doing housework, by the absence of any system of uniform
heating and the consequent necessity of carrying fuel to every room that
is to be warmed, by the absence of elevators and the hard work thereby
entailed on employer and employee alike, and by the necessity apparently
encumbent on every member of many households of crocheting endless yards
of trimming, working on canvas, and storing away for future use countless
piles of household linen. But these are at least variations from our own
problem, and both employer and employee in Europe have certain advantages
in their work even if these are counterbalanced by corresponding
disadvantages.
The employer in Europe, especially in Germany, is at an advantage in
being able, indeed often compelled by law, to make a contract specifying
the term of service for which the employee is engaged. In Germany[337]
contracts are usually made in the city by the quarter, in the country
by the year. If the contract is made by the quarter, notice of a change
on either side must be given six weeks in advance; if made by the year,
three months’ notice must be given; where the contract is made for only
a month, notice must be given fourteen days in advance; in all cases
notice must be given before twelve o’clock at noon.[338] If an employee
is dismissed without due notice before the expiration of the contract,
the employer must pay wages and board for the remainder of the time.[339]
If an employee leaves without giving the legal notice, he can be brought
back by the police and be also subject to fine and imprisonment.[340]
Again, it is impossible for a person to engage a servant while in the
employ of another without the knowledge and consent of the latter, while
any one who entices a servant away from his place is subject to fine and
imprisonment.[341]
It must be said, however, that there is another side to the contract.
If it protects the employer in reducing to a minimum the chances of his
being left without a servant, it also makes his life a burden during
the long period that intervenes between the notice and the time when it
takes effect. The service given by a servant during this time becomes
absolutely perfunctory, while the personal relations become so strained
as to render the situation almost intolerable. The temptation besets the
housekeeper to “rather bear those ills she has than fly to others that
she knows not of,” and thus she often encourages poor work by tolerating
it, because she is unwilling to give the necessary notice, endure the
still poorer service after it has been given, and in the end incur the
risk of getting another servant no more efficient than her predecessor.
Yet undoubtedly this extreme form of government supervision in Germany
is successful there. The police officials administer many a wholesome
rebuke to both parties to the contract. If an employer is in the habit
of changing servants often, that fact is known to the police through
the service books and the notifications of change that every employer
must make. When, therefore, such an one complains to the police that
his servant is impertinent or remiss in some way where he wishes legal
redress, the officer will probably advise him not to make the attempt.
“You had better not say anything about this, every one knows that you
cannot keep a servant long.”[342] If an employee makes too frequent
complaint of ill usage at the hands of his employer, he will probably be
dismissed with a reprimand for his own shortcomings.
One form of government supervision that has been specially commended in
other countries is the German service book. This represents the most
complete safeguard that has been devised to protect employers from
imposition on the one hand and, on the other, to assist employees in
securing places. Every person before going into domestic service must
obtain from the police one of these books. A blank page is filled out by
the police, giving a description of the person about to enter service.
When the first engagement is made, the name of the employer and the date
of beginning service are entered in the book and it receives the official
stamp. When an employee leaves a place, the date with the reason for
leaving and a statement in regard to the character and efficiency of the
servant must be entered in the book by the employer and the book then
returned to the police. No domestic employee can secure a position in
Germany without one of these service books—it is a passport that must be
viséd by the government officials and previous employers before he can
enter or leave a position, and no passport regulations in any country are
more stringent than are these service-book requirements in Germany. It
would seem, therefore, that this public statement concerning an employee
and the official recognition of it by the police authorities ought to
be an unimpeachable recommendation. That this is not the case, however,
seems to be the all but universal testimony. The service book is of
value in weeding out inefficient employees, whose inefficiency, however,
would often be self-evident without the aid of a service book. It is
not only true that in this, as in every other form of recommendation,
the mistress is anxious to say the best thing possible for a maid to
help her in securing another place, but the law compels an employer to
go still farther and to say nothing that will prevent an employee from
finding employment. If an employer suspects the honesty of an employee,
he is not free to state that suspicion in the service book; if he has
positive proof of his dishonesty, he must enter legal complaint against
the employee; if he has no such evidence, he must not even hint at his
suspicions. Moreover, the law goes yet one step farther and compels
every employer to believe an employee innocent in every respect until
he is proved guilty. Not only is he not free to say that he suspects
the honesty of an employee, or to leave out the word “honest,” but he
must state positively that the employee _is_ honest.[343] This policy
is justified on the ground that it is a necessary protection to the
weaker class, but it of necessity impairs the absolute reliability of
the testimonials given, and it lessens materially the value of the
service book as far as it concerns the employer. Even in Germany with
the aid of the strong arm of the law it seems as impossible as it is in
other countries to devise any system of recommendations that will tell
the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and that will at
the same time satisfy the desire of an employer to secure a place for
an employee he can himself no longer tolerate and also the claims of an
employee to the right to turn a fresh page and try once more to give
satisfaction to a new employer. The recommendations of the previous
employers of would-be employees must be discounted in Germany as well as
in America.
This government regulation of domestic service in Germany is acquiesced
in because government regulation extends to other industries and
because obedience is man’s first law throughout the empire. In so far
as the conditions can be reached by law this regulation seems to be
successful. But there are many factors in the problem that cannot be so
reached,—infirmities of temper, the visiting soldier, the preference for
an easy place, the desire for city life. Here the German housekeeper must
depend on her own resources, and her problem is the same as that in every
other country.
Another advantage domestic service in Europe has over service in America
lies in the large number of men engaged in the employment.[344] The
reasons for this are not indeed perhaps directly apparent. But domestic
service as an occupation for men must command a higher respect in Europe
than in America for two reasons: first, the competition with those
belonging to a foreign, or to a so-called inferior race is reduced to a
minimum.[345] Household service is performed in France by Frenchmen,
in Italy by Italians, and in Germany by Germans. In England it is given
in part by Englishmen, but also to a great extent by foreigners, and
the invasion of the occupation by those not English by birth may be
one explanation why the occupation is falling into ill repute among
native-born Englishmen. That the service is better performed by the
foreigner than it is by the Englishman explains why employers seek the
services of the former rather than those of the latter,[346] and perhaps
incidentally why the native-born servant so readily leaves the field to
his rival.
Another explanation why domestic service as an occupation for men
commands a higher respect in Europe lies in the relatively higher
qualifications that men must have. Not only must a man in domestic
service have the same qualifications as would be demanded of him in
the same occupation here, but he must be able to speak from one to
half a dozen languages in addition to his own.[347] Domestic service
is for men an occupation, and they make preparation for it as for any
other technical trade. They must spend from one to two years in other
countries learning the language[348] in order to increase their market
value; the position they can command and the wages they can earn depend,
other things being equal, on the amount of capital they have invested in
themselves. The social restrictions placed on women prevent their going
from one country to another in a similar way, and thus men, for this and
other reasons, command everywhere the best places, and they probably
occupy a relatively higher social position than do men in the same
occupation in America.
From the standpoint of the employer one advantage domestic service in
Europe has, is that it apparently costs less than it does in America.
The money wages paid domestic employees are nominally much lower than
in America, apparently ranging from about three dollars a month for an
ordinary housemaid to eight dollars a month for an excellent cook,[349]
in addition to board and lodging.[350] But these wages are supplemented
in a score of ways. A present in money of from five to eight dollars is
often given at Christmas or New Year’s, another is given at Easter, and
a third on birthdays,[351] while at all times the temper of the cook
must be propitiated with gifts of clothing and the housemaid remembered
in a similar way.[352] Not only are members of the family expected to
make these additions to the nominal wages given, but guests and transient
visitors pay similar tribute.[353] Moreover, the butcher, the baker,
and the candlestickmaker all increase the monthly stipend of servants
by frequent fees given in return for trade secured through them,[354]
while no inconsiderable part of the wages received—or taken—comes in
the form of profits,[355] perquisites and “gratifications.”[356] Still
another factor must be added, the daily allowance for wine or beer, or
its money equivalent.[357] In France, according to Weber, men-servants
are paid while performing military service,—“it is an act of patriotism
and of social solidarity.”[358] In Germany girls in the country sometimes
receive part of their wages in the use granted of a small piece of land
where they can raise flax. This they spin, weave, and sell, adding thus
something to their wages. Compulsory insurance in Germany and in Belgium
materially increases the cash wages paid by the employer.[359] It is
thus extremely difficult to state with even approximate exactness the
amount of wages received by domestics in Europe, since the total amount
is affected to such an extent by the variable factors of fees and outside
perquisites.[360] It is still more difficult to compute the variations
that wages have undergone from a past to the present time.[361]
That the cost of domestic service is in many places in excess of what
it should be is indicated by the growing custom among certain classes
of employers of demanding as their right a percentage of the fees
received,[362] and the protests, as yet unavailing, on the part of
the public against the exactions of these fees by either employer or
employee.[363] It seems not unreasonable to conclude, in view of all the
various ways by which wages are augmented, that they are in reality much
greater than their face value indicates, and in many parts of the service
greatly in advance of wages in other corresponding occupations.
The question naturally arises whether the value of the service rendered
is commensurate with its cost, but it is a question that must remain
unanswered in default of any common standard by which service can be
gauged.[364] Figaro has answered the question theoretically in the
other question put to Count Almaviva, “Measured by the virtues demanded
of a servant, does your excellency know many masters worthy of being
valets?”[365]
But the wage received sums up as little in Europe as it does in America
the subject of domestic service. Even good wages do not altogether
compensate for long hours of service,[366] hardness of work[367] and of
life,[368] and entire lack of social intercourse.
It is undeniable that the social conditions that surround domestic
servants in Europe are harder than in America. They are the survivals
of the condition of serfdom, as this was in turn the survival of a
preëxisting state of slavery.[369] Literature everywhere testifies to
the social chasm that has at all times existed between master and slave,
master and servant, mistress and maid, and employer and employee, as it
also does to the manifold imperfections of both parties to the domestic
contract,[370] while on the stage as well as in the daily press it has
been the domestic servant who has always been made the butt of jest
and ridicule.[371] “Now, as before and during the Revolution,” says M.
Salomon, tersely, “it (the occupation) remains under the ban of society;
customs are not changed with laws.”[372] It is true that the domestic
servant is often apparently unconscious of the existence of this social
ban, and that even when he is conscious of it, he acquiesces in it and
accepts it as a part of the social order that he cannot and perhaps would
not change, yet this unconsciousness of it does not alter the fact of its
existence.
The social disadvantages of domestic service show themselves under the
same guise as in America, though often in a much more exaggerated form.
In England the existence of a tax on men-servants puts at once a social
chasm between the master who pays a tax on luxuries and the servant
who is an outward manifestation of that luxury, while the servility of
manner that an American finds so exasperating in an English servant is
encouraged and even demanded as the birthright inheritance of a well-born
Englishman.[373] The servants in their turn enforce among themselves
similar social distinctions and the recognition by their fellows of the
various grades of social superiority or inferiority[374]—a condition
that has its origin partly in a desire to imitate the customs and
manners of those above them in the social scale,[375] and partly in the
extreme specialization of every form of household work and the resulting
inflexibility of all parts of it.[376] It follows that in England
“domestic service provides no general bond—perhaps, indeed, rather
accentuates class indifferences,” and that, as an occupation, for this
and other reasons, “domestic service, though lucrative and in many ways
luxurious, is not popular.”[377]
In France, while the relations between employer and employee are much
more democratic than in England, the social stigma is put on the
household servant, in part because of the traditional character given
servants in French literature, in part because the construction of the
French apartment house places the rooms of all the servants in the
mansard story and thus draws a line of social demarkation between those
served and those serving, in part because of the bureaucratic character
of society.
In Italy, domestic servants have apparently no social life whatever.
This is partially explained by the long hours of work that leave them no
opportunity for it; it is in part because women servants never go out
in the evening, receive no callers, and are, as it is often explained,
“really servants,” in the sense of having no social ambitions; and it is
also because manual work in every form is considered degrading, and those
who engage in it are under the social ban—a condition that is apparently
accepted without outward protest.
Yet much is done to mitigate some of the hard features in the lot of
the domestic servant. One of the interesting features in the condition
of domestic service in Germany is the large number of benefactions
organized for the benefit of domestic employees. There are everywhere
homes for aged servants,[378] homes for servants out of work,[379] unions
for providing servants with recreation,[380] and schools and homes where
they are taught household employments.[381]
Yet when all has been said the fact remains that even in Germany the
lot of a household employee is a hard one. “Servants hate a dull place
worse than a hard one,” and when a place is both dull and hard it has
indeed little to commend it. Women in Europe as in America enter domestic
service by the line of least resistance, and this explains why in both
countries so many are found in the occupation and why so many of these
are incompetent in their work and unhappy in their lives.
In one important respect the condition of domestic service in Europe
is immeasurably behind that in America. Even more than here domestic
service and domestic servants are the targets at which are aimed the
satire and the ridicule of literature and the press, and this is not
counterbalanced by earnest study of the subject as is the case with
us. The question is everywhere discussed in America, not because the
difficulties here are greater than they are elsewhere, but because it is
coming to be recognized as a part of the great labor problem of the day.
If the future holds for us a solution of the problem, it is because we
believe it is worthy of historical study and of scientific investigation,
and in giving it this recognition we have put it on a higher plane than
the one it as yet occupies in Europe.[382]
FOOTNOTES
[1] These schedules are given in Appendix I.
[2] Partial discussions of the subject can be found in the _First
Biennial Report of the Bureau of Labor Statistics of Minnesota_, pp.
131-196; _First Biennial Report of the Bureau of Labor Statistics of
Colorado_, pp. 344-362; _Fifth Annual Report of the Bureau of Labor and
Industrial Statistics of Kansas_, pp. 281-326; _Third Biennial Report
of the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the State of California_, pp.
91-94; _Fifth Biennial Report of the Department of Statistics, State of
Indiana_, pp. 173-229. The last is especially full and excellent.
[3] The total number of domestic servants is given as 1,454,791. This
does not include launderers and laundresses, paid housekeepers in private
families and hotels, or stewards and stewardesses. It excludes also the
very large number of persons performing the same duties as domestic
servants, but without receiving a fixed compensation.
[4] This estimate is based on the supposition that the average wages paid
are $3.00 per week, and that two weeks’ vacation is given with loss of
wages. Both of these are probably underestimates, as will be seen farther
on. If the wages paid launderers and laundresses are included, and also
the fees paid for hotel and restaurant service, $300,000,000 seems a fair
estimate for the annual cash wages paid for domestic service.
[5] This estimate supposes the actual cost of board for each employee
to be $3.00 per week, which is probably less than would be paid by each
employee for table-board of the quality furnished by the employer. It
excludes the cost of house-rent furnished, and also fuel and light, all
of which are factors to be considered in computing the cost of service
received.
[6] It is difficult to estimate the value of the materials of which
domestic employees have the almost exclusive control. If the number of
domestic servants and launderers and laundresses in private families,
hotels, and restaurants is placed at 1,700,000, the number of employees
in each family as two, and the number of persons in each family,
including servants, as seven, it will be seen that at a rough estimate
the food and laundried articles of clothing of six million persons pass
through the hands of this class of employees. It was formerly a common
saying, “a servant eats her wages, breaks her wages, and wastes her
wages.” If this verdict of experience is taken as approximately true
rather than as scientifically exact, it will be seen that the actual
expense involved in domestic service is probably double that included
under the items of wages and support.
[7] _The Factory System_, Tenth Census, II., 533-537.
[8] A. E. Kennelly, “Electricity in the Household,” _Scribner’s
Magazine_, January, 1890; E. M. H. Merrill, “Electricity in the Kitchen,”
_American Kitchen Magazine_, November, 1895.
[9] In Massachusetts, in 1885, the number of women employed in
manufacturing industries exceeded the number of men in eight towns. These
were Dalton, Dudley, Easthampton, Hingham, Ipswich, Lowell, Tisbury, and
Upton. _Census of Massachusetts_, II., 176-187.
A weaver in Lawrence, Massachusetts, reported in 1882: “One of the evils
existing in this city is the gradual extinction of the male operative.”
_Fall River, Lowell, and Lawrence_, p. 10. Reprinted from _Thirteenth
Annual Report of the Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor_, p. 202.
In Massachusetts, in 1875, women predominated in fifteen occupations,
eleven of them manufacturing industries. In 1885 there were also fifteen
occupations in which women exceeded men in numbers, twelve of them
manufacturing. These were manufacturers of buttons and dress-trimmings,
carpetings, clothing, cotton goods, fancy articles, hair work, hosiery
and knit goods, linen, mixed textiles, silk and silk goods, straw and
palm-leaf goods, and worsted goods. _Report of the Bureau of Statistics
of Labor_, 1889, pp. 556-557.
[10] George Eliot in _Felix Holt_ speaks of Mrs. Transome as engaged in
“a little daily embroidery—that soothing occupation of taking stitches to
produce what neither she nor any one else wanted was then the resource of
many a well-born and unhappy woman.”
[11] Eddis, p. 63.
[12] DeFoe, _Moll Flanders_, _Colonel Jack_; Mrs. Alpha Behn, _The Widow
Ranter_.
[13] Sir Joshua Child, pp. 183-184.
[14] Charles Davenant, II., 3. Velasco, the minister of Spain to England,
writes to Philip III. from London, March 22, 1611: “Their principal
reason for colonizing these parts is to give an outlet to so many idle
and wretched people as they have in England, and thus to prevent the
dangers that might be feared from them.” Brown, p. 456.
[15] Force, _Tracts_, I., 19.
[16] _Calendar of State Papers, Colonial Series, 1661-1668._ Abstracts
101, 772, 791, 858. An admirable discussion of “British Convicts Shipped
to American Colonies,” by James D. Butler, is found in _The American
Historical Review_, October, 1896.
[17] Eddis says, p. 66, that Maryland was the only colony where convicts
were freely imported; but Virginia seems to have shared equally in the
importation.
[18] In Pennsylvania and Virginia transported criminals were so numerous
that laws were passed to prevent their importation.
[19] William Smith, _History of the Province of New York from its
Discovery to the Appointment of Governor Colden in 1762_, pp. 207-210.
John Watson, pp. 485-486, quotes from contemporaneous writers in
opposition to the practice in Pennsylvania, _circa_ 1750; Hening, II.,
509-511.
[20] “It is a shameful and unblessed thing to take the scum of people and
wicked, condemned men, to be the people with whom you plant; and not only
so, but it spoileth the plantation; for they ever live like rogues, and
not fall to work; but be lazy, and do mischief, and spend victuals, and
be quickly weary, and then certify over to their country to the discredit
of the plantation.” Bacon, _Essays_, _Of Plantations_.
[21] Bruce, I., 606, says that the order of the General Court of Virginia
prohibiting the introduction of English criminals after January 20, 1671
(Hening, II., 509-511), was confirmed by a royal order announcing that
the importation of Newgate criminals was to cease, and that this rule
was to apply to all the Colonies. But the frequent protests against the
practice found in other Colonies at a much later date would seem to show
that it could not have been generally observed.
[22] Eddis, pp. 71-75.
[23] _Ibid._, pp. 69-71.
[24] Berkeley’s Report, Hening, II., 515. Brantly, in Winsor, III., 545.
[25] “In the year 1730 ... Colonel Josiah Willard was invited to view
some transports who had just landed from Ireland. My uncle spied a boy of
some vivacity, of about ten years of age, and who was the only one in the
crew who spoke English. He bargained for him.”—“Mrs. Johnson’s Captivity”
in _Indian Narratives_, p. 130.
[26] Hildreth, III., 395.
[27] Samuel Breck writes under date of August 1, 1817, “I went on board
the ship John from Amsterdam, ... and I purchased one German Swiss for
Mrs. Ross and two French Swiss for myself.” _Recollections_, pp. 296-297.
[28] _Winthrop Papers_, Pt. VI., p. 387, note.
[29] Barber, _Connecticut Collections_, p. 166.
[30] Scharf, p. 209.
[31] Some improvement was soon seen in Virginia. “There haue beene sent
thither this last yeare, and are now presently in going, twelue hundred
persons and vpward, and there are neere one thousand more remaining of
those that were gone before. The men lately sent, haue beene most of them
choise men, borne and bred vp to labour and industry.” _Declaration of
the State of the Colonie and Affairs in Virginia_, 1620. Force, III., 5.
Hammond in _Leah and Rachel_, p. 7, also speaks of the improvement.
[32] A well-known case was that of Thomas, son of Sir Edward Verney,
who at the age of nineteen wished to marry some one of lower rank than
himself. He was sent to Virginia to prevent the marriage, not, however,
as himself a servant. _Verney Papers, Camden Society Publications_, vol.
56, pp. 160-162.
A niece of Daniel DeFoe is said to have been sent to America as a
redemptioner for the same reason.
The Sot-Weed Factor says of a maid in a Maryland inn,
“Kidnap’d and Fool’d, I hither fled,
To shun a hated Nuptial Bed,
And to my cost already find,
Worse Plagues than those I left behind.
These are the general Excuses made by _English_ Women, which are sold or
sell themselves to _Mary-land_.” p. 7.
[33] James Annesley when twelve years old was transported to
Pennsylvania. His father died soon after, and his uncle succeeded to the
peerage. The boy was sold to a planter in Newcastle County, but his title
to the peerage was subsequently proved. Anglesea Peerage Trial, Howell,
_State Trials_, XVII., 1443-1454.
[34] Neill, _Virginia Carolorum_, p. 108; _The Verney Papers, Camden
Society Publications_, vol. 56, pp. 160-162, give a long and detailed
account of the method of obtaining and transporting servants.
[35] Neill, _Terra Mariæ_, pp. 201, 202,
“In better Times, e’re to this Land,
I was unhappily Trapann’d.”
_Sot-Weed Factor_, p. 6.
A young woman in search of employment was told that by going on board
ship she would find it in Virginia, a few miles below on the Thames.
Another young woman was persuaded to enter the ship, and was then sold
into service. Cited by Bruce, I., 614, from _Interregnum Entry Book_,
vol. 106, p. 84, and _British State Papers, Colonial_, vol. XIII., No.
29, 1.
The evil of “spiriting away” both children and adults became so great
that in 1664 the Committee for Foreign Plantations interposed, and the
Council created the office of Register, charged with the duty of keeping
a record of all persons going to America as servants, and the statement
that they had voluntarily left England. This act was soon followed by
another fixing the penalty of death, without benefit of clergy, in every
case where persons were found guilty of kidnapping children or adults.
But even these extreme measures did not put an end to the evil; and it
is stated that ten thousand persons were annually kidnapped after the
passage of the act. Bruce, I., 614-619.
[36] “The Forme of Binding a Servant” is given in _A Relation of
Maryland_, pp. 62-63, and reads as follows:
This Indenture _made the ____ day of ____ in the yeere of our
Soveraigne Lord King_ Charles, _&c. betweene ____ of the one
party, and ____ on the other party_, Witnesseth, _that the
said ____ doth hereby covenant promise, and grant to, and with
the said ____ his Executors and Assignes, to serve him from
the day of the date hereof, untill his first and next arrivall
in_ Maryland; _and after for and during the tearme of ____
yeeres, in such service and imployment as the said ____ or his
assignes shall there imploy him, according to the custome of
the countrey in the like kind. In consideration whereof, the
said ____ doth promise and grant, to and with the said ____
to pay for his passing, and to find him with Meat, Drinke,
Apparell and Lodging, with other necessaries during the said
terme; and at the end of the said terme, to give him one whole
yeeres provision of Corne, and fifty acres of Land, according
to the order of the countrey. In witnesse whereof, the said
____ hath hereunto put his hand and scale, the day and yeere
above written._
_Sealed and delivered in the presence of _____
Neill, _Virginia Carolorum_, pp. 5-7, gives a similar copy. Bruce, II.,
2, gives the indenture of one Mary Polly whose master was to “maintain
ye sᵈ Mary noe other ways than he doth his own in all things as dyett,
cloathing and lodging, the sᵈ Mary to obey the sᵈ John Porter in all his
lawful commands within ye sᵈ term of years.”
[37] Hening, I., 257, 1642.
[38] Hening, I., 411, 1655.
[39] _Ibid._, I., 441-442, 1657.
[40] _Ibid._, I., 538-539, 1659.
[41] _Ibid._, II., 113-114, 1661.
[42] _Ibid._, II., 240, 1666.
[43] _Ibid._, 1705, 1748, 1753.
In North Carolina no “imported Christian” was to be considered a servant
unless the person importing him could procure an indenture. Iredell,
1741, chap. 24.
In West New Jersey servants over twenty-one without indenture were to
serve four years, and all under twenty-one to serve at the discretion of
the Court. Leaming and Spicer, 1682, chap. XI.
In Maryland servants without indenture of over twenty-one years of age
were to serve five years; if between eighteen and twenty-two, six years;
if between fifteen and eighteen, seven years; if under fifteen, until
twenty-two years old. Browne, 1692.
[44] Alsop, pp. 57-58.
[45] _Leah and Rachel_, pp. 12, 14.
[46] Neill, _Terra Mariæ_, pp. 201-202.
[47] Howell, _State Trials_, XVII., 1443-1454.
[48] Eddis, pp. 69-70.
[49] Neill, _Virginia Carolorum_, p. 58. Neill adds: “While some of
these servants were treated with kindness, others received no more
consideration than dumb, driven cattle.”
[50] P. 7.
[51] A negro servant in the family of Judge Sewall died in 1729, and the
latter writing of the funeral says: “I made a good Fire, set Chairs,
and gave Sack.” _Diary_, III., 394. _The New England Weekly Journal_,
February 24, 1729, has a detailed account of the funeral: “A long train
followed him to the grave, it’s said about 150 black, and about 50
whites, several magistrates, ministers, gentlemen, etc. His funeral was
attended with uncommon respect and his death much lamented.”
[52] She complains of the great familiarity in permitting the slaves to
sit at table with their masters “as they say to save time” and adds,
“into the dish goes the black hoof, as freely as the white hand.” She
relates a difficulty between a master and a slave which was referred
to arbitration, each party binding himself to accept the decision. The
arbitrators ordered the master to pay 40 shillings to the slave and to
acknowledge his fault. “And so the matter ended: the poor master very
honestly standing to the award.”—_The Journal of Madame Knight._
[53] John Winter writes from Maine, “I Can not Conceaue which way their
masters Can pay yt, but yf yt Continue this rates the servants will be
masters & the masters servants.” _Trelawny Papers_, p. 164. John Winthrop
makes a similar comment in narrating “a passage between one Rowley and
his servant. The master, being forced to sell a pair of oxen to pay his
servant his wages, told his servant he could keep him no longer, not
knowing how to pay him the next year. The servant answered, he would
serve him for more of his cattle. But how shall I do (saith the master)
when all my cattle are gone? The servant replied, you shall then serve
me, and so you may have your cattle again.” Winthrop gives as a reason
for high wages the fact that “the wars in England kept servants from
coming to us, so as those we had could not be hired, when their times
were out, but upon unreasonable terms, and we found it very difficult to
pay their wages to their content, (for money was very scarce).”—_History
of New England_, II., 219-220.
[54] Lechford, _Note-book_, p. 107.
[55] Lechford, _Note-book_, p. 81.
[56] Bruce, II., 2.
[57] _Travels_, I., 303-304.
[58] _Recollections_, p. 297.
“Before the Revolution no hired man or woman wore any shoes so fine as
calf-skins; course neats leather was their every day wear. Men and women
then hired by the year,—men got 16 to 20_l._, and a servant woman 8 to
10_l._ Out of that it was their custom to lay up money, to buy before
their marriage a bed and bedding, silver teaspoons, and a spinning-wheel,
&c.”—Watson, _Annals_, p. 165.
[59] Hening, III., 451.
[60] _Ibid._, V., 550.
[61] _Ibid._, VI., 359.
[62] Trott, 1736.
[63] Purdon, Act of 1700; Carey and Bioren.
[64] _Body of Liberties_, chap. 88, Laws of 1672; _Laws of the Duke of
York_.
[65] Iredell, Acts of 1741, chap. XXIV.
[66] Leaming and Spicer, Acts of 1682, chap. VIII.
[67] _Ibid._, chap. X.
[68] Browne, 1692.
[69] Bacon, 1715.
[70] Force, _Tracts_, III.: “Articles, Lavves, and Orders, Diuine,
Politique, and Martiall, for the Colony in Virginea Brittania.”
[71] “All such Bakers as are appointed to bake bread, or what else,
either for the store to be giuen out in generall, or for any one in
particular, shall not steale nor imbezell, loose, or defraud any man
of his due and proper weight and measure, nor vse any dishonest and
deceiptfull tricke to make the bread weigh heauier, or make it courser
vpon purpose to keepe backe any part or measure of the flower or meale
committed vnto him, nor aske, take, or detaine any one loafe more
or lesse for his hire or paines for so baking, since whilest he who
deliuered vnto him such meale or flower, being to attend the businesse
of the Colonie, such baker or bakers are imposed vpon no other seruice
or duties, but onely so to bake for such as do worke, and this shall
hee take notice of, vpon paine for the first time offending herein of
losing his eares, and for the second time to be condemned a yeare to the
Gallies, and for the third time offending to be condemned to the Gallies
for three yeares.” The same penalties are attached in case cooks or those
who dress fish withhold any part of the provision given them. Every
minister was to read these laws publicly every Sunday before catechising.
Force, _Tracts_, III.: “Articles ... for the Colony in Virginea.”
[72] _Trelawny Papers_, _Collections of Maine Historical Society_, III.,
166-168.
[73] _Ibid._, 169.
[74] _Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll._, Fifth Series, I., 64-67.
[75] _Ibid._, 68.
[76] _Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll._, Fifth Series, VIII., 427.
[77] _Winthrop Papers_, Pt. VI., 353-354, note.
[78] Trumbull, _Blue Laws_, p. 155.
[79] _Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll._, Sixth Series, II., 112.
[80] Purdon, _Digest_.
[81] Purdon, _Digest_, Act of 1700. In East New Jersey the privilege
was restricted to white servants. Leaming and Spicer, _Acts of East New
Jersey, 1682_. In Massachusetts no servant was to be put off for more
than a year to another master without the consent of the Court. _Body of
Liberties_, § 86, Act of 1672. In New York no servant, except one bound
for life, could be assigned to another master for more than one year,
except for good reason.—_Laws of the Duke of York._
[82] Iredell, Acts of 1741, chap. XXIV., § 4; Leaming and Spicer, _Acts
of East New Jersey, 1682_, chap. XXVI. Any white servant burdened beyond
his strength, or deprived of necessary rest and sleep, could complain to
the justice of the peace. This officer was empowered, first, to admonish
the offending master; second, to levy on his goods to an amount not
exceeding ten pounds; and third, to sell the servant’s time. Trott, Act
of 1717. In New York and Massachusetts servants were to have convenient
time for food and rest.—_Laws of the Duke of York_; Massachusetts, Act
of 1672. In Maryland the penalty for insufficient meat, drink, lodging,
and clothing, burdens beyond their strength, or more than ten lashes for
one offence, was for the first and second offence a fine of not more
than a thousand pounds of tobacco, and on the third offence the servant
recovered his liberty. Permission to exceed ten lashes could be obtained
from the Court, but the master could not inflict more than thirty-nine
lashes.—Dorsey, _Laws of 1715_, chap. LXIV.
[83] Trumbull, _Public Records_, p. 263; Massachusetts, Act of 1700;
Iredell, Acts of 1741, chap. XXIV. In North Carolina if a master did not
use means for the recovery of a servant when ill, and turned him away,
he forfeited five pounds for each servant so turned away, and if this
was not sufficient the Court was empowered to levy an additional amount.
Such servants on their recovery were to have their freedom, provided
they had not brought the illness on themselves. In Connecticut if the
injury came at the hands of the master or any member of his family, the
master was obliged to provide for the maintenance of the servant, even
after the expiration of his term of service, according to the judgment
of the Court. But if the injury “came by any providence of God without
the default of the family of the governor,” the master was released from
the obligation of providing for him after his term of service expired.
In South Carolina masters turning away sick or infirm servants were to
forfeit twenty pounds.
[84] Leaming and Spicer, _East New Jersey_, 1682; _Body of Liberties_, §
87, Act of 1672; _Laws of the Duke of York_. In Maryland the Act of 1692
freed a mulatto girl whose master had cut off both her ears.
[85] _Body of Liberties_, § 85, Act of 1672; _Laws of Connecticut_, 1673.
[86] _Laws of the Duke of York._
[87] Iredell, 1741, chap. XXIV.
[88] Leaming and Spicer, _East New Jersey, 1682_, chap. VIII.
[89] _Instructions of the Crown_, November 16, 1702.
[90] Iredell, 1741, chap. XXIV.
[91] Carey and Bioren, chap. 635.
[92] Trott, Act of 1717.
[93] Act of 1673.
[94] Leaming and Spicer, Act of 1682. This is practically the
re-enactment of a similar law in Carteret’s time, 1668, and of the law of
1675.
[95] Iredell, Act of 1741.
[96] Trott, Act of 1717.
[97] Browne, 1692; Dorsey, 1715, chap. XLIV.
[98] Leaming and Spicer, Act of 1682. The Acts of 1682 and 1675 had
similar provisions.
[99] Act _circa_ 1784; Trumbull, _Public Records_, 1665-1678.
[100] Trott, Act of 1717.
[101] _Laws of the Duke of York._
[102] Purdon, _Digest_, Act of 1700.
[103] Act of 1704.
[104] Browne, 1692; Dorsey, 1715.
[105] Bacon, 1748.
[106] Browne, 1692; Dorsey, 1715.
[107] Bacon, 1748.
[108] Iredell, Act of 1741.
[109] Carey and Bioren, Act of 1700.
[110] Trumbull, _Public Records_.
[111] Acts of 1692 and 1715.
[112] Act of 1692.
[113] Connecticut, _circa_ 1784; New York, Act of 1672; Maryland, Acts of
1692, 1715.
[114] Iredell, Act of 1741.
[115] Act _circa_ 1784.
[116] Act of 1646.
[117] Trott, 1717; Massachusetts, Act of 1698.
[118] Act of 1646.
[119] Act of 1728.
[120] Iredell, Act of 1741. But corporal punishment was not to deprive
the master of such other satisfaction as he might be entitled to by the
Act.
[121] Act of 1717.
[122] _Body of Liberties_, § 88, Act of 1672; _Laws of the Duke of York_.
[123] Iredell, 1741.
[124] Leaming and Spicer, Act of 1682.
[125] Purdon, _Digest_, 1700.
[126] Act _circa_ 1784.
[127] Laws of 1672.
[128] Act governing white servants, 1717.
[129] _Laws of the Duke of York._
[130] Browne, 1692; Dorsey, 1715.
[131] Leaming and Spicer, Acts of 1668, 1675; Trott, Act of 1717.
[132] Massachusetts Bay, Act of 1636.
[133] Carey and Bioren, Act of 1721.
[134] Iredell, 1741.
[135] _Ibid._
[136] Laws of 1672.
[137] _Ibid._
[138] Iredell, 1741.
[139] Act of 1636.
[140] Act of 1784.
[141] Neill, _Founders of Maryland_, pp. 77-79, gives the names of eighty
servants brought over by Cornwallis between 1634 and 1651; and of these,
five became members of the Assembly, one became a sheriff, and two
were signers of the Protestant Declaration. Other noteworthy instances
are found in Virginia. Neill, _Virginia Carolorum_, p. 297. Sometimes,
however, the trail of the serpent remained. R. G., in a treatise
published about 1661, says of the burgesses that they “were usually such
as went over servants thither, and though by time, and industry, they may
have attained competent estates, yet by reason of their poor and mean
condition, were unskilful in judging of a good estate, either of church
or Commonwealth, or by the means of procuring it.”—_Virginia Carolorum_,
p. 290. George Taylor, a Pennsylvania redemptioner, was one of the
signers of the Declaration of Independence.
[142] The Sot-Weed Factor describes a quarrel in which one says:
“... tho’ now so brave,
I knew you late a Four-Years Slave;
What if for Planter’s Wife you go,
Nature designed you for the Hoe.”—P. 21.
DeFoe says: “When their Time is expir’d, sometimes before it, (they) get
marri’d and settl’d; turn Planters, and by Industry grow rich; or get to
be Yearly Servants in good Families upon Terms.”—_Behaviour of Servants_,
p. 140.
[143] Elkanah Watson, writing from London in 1782, compares the silent
attention given by English servants with the volubility of those in
France, and then adds: “In America, our domestic feels the consciousness,
that he may in turn become a master. This feeling may, perhaps, impair
his usefulness as a servant, but cannot be deprecated, whilst it adds
to his self-respect as a man.”—_Men and Times of the Revolution_, pp.
169-170.
[144] Numberless advertisements are found like the following: “An Indian
maid about 19 years of Age, brought up from a Child to all sorts of
Household work, can handle her Needle very well and Sew or Flower and
ingenious about her Work: To be sold on reasonable terms.”—_Boston News
Letter_, June 8, 1719.
“An Indian Woman Aged about 30 Years fit for all manner of Household work
either for Town or Country, can Sew, Wash, Brew, Bake, Spin, and Milk
Cows, to be sold by Mr. Henry Hill.”—_Ibid._, January 4, 1720.
“A Very likely Indian Womans Time for Eleven Years and Five Months to be
disposed of; she’s a very good Servant, and can do any Household work,
either for Town or Country.”—_Ibid._, March 21, 1720.
“An Indian Woman aged Sixteen Years, that speaks good English; to be
sold.”—_Ibid._, February 20, 1715.
“A Stray Spanish Indian Woman named Sarah, Aged about 40 Years taken up,
which the Owner may have paying the Charges.”—_Ibid._, January 4, 1720.
[145] “A warr with the Narraganset is verie considerable to this
plantation, ffor I doubt whither yt be not synne in vs, hauing power
in our hands, to suffer them to maynteyne the worship of the devill
which theire paw wawes often doe; 2lie, If vpon a Just warre the Lord
should deliuer them into our hands, wee might easily haue men woemen
and children enough to exchange for Moores, which wilbe more gaynefull
pilladge for vs than wee conceive, for I doe not see how wee can
thrive vntill wee gett into a stock of slaves sufficient to doe all
our buisines, for our children’s children will hardly see this great
Continent filled with people, soe that our servants will still desire
freedome to plant for them selues, and not stay but for verie great
wages. And I suppose you know verie well how wee shall maynteyne 20
Moores cheaper than one Englishe servant.”—Emanuel Downing to John
Winthrop, 1645. _Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll._, Fourth Series, vol. VI., p. 65.
[146] _Mass. Hist. Soc. Coll._, Fourth Series, vol. VI., p. 101.
James Russell Lowell commenting on this letter says, “Let any housewife
of our day, who does not find the Keltic element in domestic life so
refreshing as to Mr. Arnold in literature, imagine a household with one
wild Pequot woman, communicated with by signs, for its maid of all work,
and take courage. Those were serious times indeed, when your cook might
give warning by taking your scalp, or _chignon_, as the case might be,
and making off with it into the woods.”—“New England Two Centuries Ago,”
in _Among My Books_, I., 263.
[147] Teele, _History of Milton, Massachusetts, 1640-1887_, Journal of
Rev. Peter Thatcher, Appendix B, pp. 641-642.
[148] _The Report of a French Protestant Refugee in Boston, 1687_,
evidently submitted to guide friends in France thinking of coming to
America, says: “You may also own negroes and negresses; there is not a
house in Boston, however small may be its means, that has not one or two.
There are those that have five or six, and all make a good living.”—Pp.
19-20.
The New England papers, even in the first part of the eighteenth century,
are full of advertisements like the following: “A Negro Wench with a Girl
Four Years old both born in the Country, used to all Family work on a
Farm, to be sold on reasonable Terms.”—_Boston News Letter_, October 5,
1719.
“A very likely young Negro Wench that can do any Household Work to be
sold, inquire of Mr. Samuel Sewall.”—_Ibid._, April 9, 1716.
“Lately arrived from Jamaica several Negro boys and girls, to be sold by
Mr. John Charnock & Co.”—_Ibid._, May 11, 1719.
Most of the advertisements describe those offered for sale as “very
likely,” and add the specially desirable qualification that he or she
“speaks good English.” Judge Sewall, in 1700, gives this account of
his first protest against negro slavery: “Having been long and much
dissatisfied with the Trade of fetching Negros from Guinea; at last I
had a strong Inclination to Write something about it; but it wore off.
At last reading Bayne, Ephes. about servants, who mentions Blackmoors; I
began to be uneasy that I had so long neglected doing anything.”—_Diary_,
II., 16.
[149] But it is of interest in passing to note two contemporaneous
judgments on the effect of slavery. Elkanah Watson, writing of his
journey through the South in 1778, says: “The influence of slavery upon
southern habits is peculiarly exhibited in the prevailing indolence of
the people. It would seem as if the poor white man had almost rather
starve than work, because the negro works.”—_Men and Times_, p. 72.
Thomas Anburey writes, “Most of the planters consign the care of their
plantations and negroes to an overseer, even the man whose house we rent,
has his overseer, though he could with ease superintend it himself; but
if they possess a few negroes, they think it beneath their dignity, added
to which, they are so abominably lazy.”—_Travels_, II., 328.
[150] A New England woman writes: “In several instances our ‘help’ was
married from our parlor with my sisters for bridesmaids. I correspond
with a woman doctor in Florida whose sister was our cook when I was a
child, and who shared her sister’s room at our home while she earned her
education, alternating work in the cotton mills and going to school.”
This is but one illustration of hundreds that have doubtless come within
the experience of most persons living in New England fifty years ago.
[151] A visit to many New England burying grounds will illustrate this
statement. It was doubtless a survival of the English custom. A curious
and interesting collection of epitaphs of servants has been made by
Arthur J. Munby.
[152] “... Help, for I love our Yankee word, teaching, as it does, the
true relation, and its being equally binding on master and servant.”—J.
R. Lowell, _Letters_, I., 105.
[153] Even Americans commented on it. John Watson writes: “One of the
remarkable incidents of our republican principles of equality is the
hirelings, who in times before the war of Independence were accustomed
to accept the names of servants and to be drest according to their
condition, will now no longer suffer the former appellation; and all
affect the dress and the air, when abroad, of genteeler people than
their business warrants. Those, therefore, who from affluence have many
dependents, find it a constant subject of perplexity to manage their
pride and assumption.”—_Annals_, p. 165.
[154] _Autobiography_, I., 331.
[155] _Society in America_, II., 248.
[156] _Society in America_, II., 245.
[157] _Ibid._, II., 254-255.
It is of interest to contrast this picture of service in America by an
Englishwoman with one given a little earlier of service in England by
an American. Elkanah Watson writes from London in 1782: “The servants
attending upon my friend’s table were neatly dressed, and extremely
active and adroit in performing their offices, and glided about the
room silent and attentive. Their silence was in striking contrast with
the volubility of the French attendants, who, to my utter astonishment,
I have often observed in France, intermingling in the conversation of
the table. Here, the servant, however cherished, is held at an awful
distance. The English servant is generally an ignorant and servile being,
who has no aspiration beyond his present condition.”—_Men and Times of
the Revolution_, p. 169.
[158] _Democracy in America_, II., 194.
[159] _The Americans in their Moral, Social, and Political Relations_,
pp. 236-237.
Thomas Grattan also says, “The native Americans are the best servants in
the country.”—_Civilized America_, I., 260.
[160] _A Year’s Residence in the United States_, p. 201.
Charles Mackay also says that “service is called ‘help,’ to avoid
wounding the susceptibility of free citizens.”—_Life and Liberty in
America_, I., 42.
[161] _Domestic Manners of the Americans_, I., 73.
[162] _Society, Manners, and Politics in the United States_, p. 284.
[163] He adds the interesting facts that cooks usually received $1.50 per
week; chambermaids, $1.25; gardeners, $11 per month, and waiters $10 per
month.—_Recollections_, pp. 299-300.
[164] _The Englishwoman in America_, pp. 43, 214.
[165] _Civilized America_, I., 256-258.
[166] _Ibid._, I., 259.
[167] _Civilized America_, I., 264.
[168] _Ibid._, I., 269.
[169] _Views of Society and Manners in America_, p. 338.
[170] _Views of Society and Manners in America_, pp. 338-342.
[171] _Arrivals of Alien Passengers and Immigrants in the United States
from 1820 to 1890_, pp. 16, 23.
By the _Census of Massachusetts_ for 1885 it is seen that forty-nine per
cent of all women in that state of foreign birth are Irish. I., 574-575.
[172] _Ante_, p. 11.
[173] Lowell says of the Irish immigration, “It is really we who have
been paying the rents over there [in Ireland], for we have to pay higher
wages for domestic service to meet the drain.”—_Letters_, II., 336.
A racy discussion of the influence of the Irish cook in the American
household is given by Mr. E. L. Godkin under the title “The Morals and
Manners of the Kitchen,” in _Reflections and Comments_, p. 56.
[174] _Arrivals of Alien Passengers and Immigrants in the United States
from 1820 to 1890_, pp. 15, 22.
[175] Women constituted 41.8 per cent of the total number of German
immigrants arriving here during the twenty-two years ending June 30,
1890; the Irish forming 48.5 per cent.—_Ibid_., p. 11.
[176] The United States Census for 1890 gives the number of domestic
servants born in Ireland as 168,993; the number born in Germany was
95,007.
[177] The number of Chinese in domestic service in 1890 was 16,439.
[178] Walker, _Wages_, pp. 376-377.
[179] An illustration of these various changes is seen in the case of one
employee, who was born in Ireland, engaged in service in New York, and
afterwards drifted to Minnesota, where the report was made.
[180] This is indicated by the various definitions given in early
dictionaries. It is a curious fact that _The New World of Words or
General English Dictionary_, large quarto, third edition, London,
1671, does not contain the word “servant.” Phillips’ _Universal
English Dictionary_, London, 1720, has “_servant_, a man or woman
who serves another.” Bailey’s _Dictionary_, London, 1721, 1737, and
1770, defines servant as “one who serves another.” _The Royal Standard
English Dictionary_, first American edition, Worcester, Massachusetts,
1788, “being the first work of the kind printed in America,” defines
_servant_ as “one who serves.” The second edition, Brookfield, 1804, has
“_servant_, one who serves for wages.”
Some interesting illustrations of this early use of the word are found in
colonial literature. Thus Thomas Morton in his _New English Canaan_, p.
179, says, “In the month of June Anno Salutis, 1622, it was my chance to
arrive in the parts of New England with thirty servants and provisions of
all sorts fit for a plantation.”
Governor Bradford in his _History of Plymouth_, pp. 235-236, speaks
of “Captaine Wolastone and with him 3. or 4. more of some eminencie,
who brought with them a great many servants, with provisions & other
implments fit for to begine a plantation.”
A “Narrative concerning the settlement of New England,” 1630, says,
“This yeare there went hence 6 shippes with 1000 people in them to the
Massachusetts having sent two yeares before betweene 3 & 400 servants
to provide howses and Corne against theire coming, to the charge of
(at least) 10,000_l._, these Servants through Idlenes & ill Government
neglected both theire building & plantinge of Corne, soe that if those 6
Shippes had not arived the plantation had ben broke & dissolved.”—_Mass.
Hist. Soc. Proc._, 1860-1862, pp. 130-131.
The same use of the word is found a number of times in the list of the
Mayflower passengers.
[181] J. F. D. Smyth says, London, 1784, “However, although I now call
this man (a backwoodsman of the Alleghanies) my servant, yet he himself
never would have submitted to such an appellation, although he most
readily performed every menial office, and indeed every service I could
desire.”—_Tour in the United States_, I., 356.
[182] Fanny Kemble writes, “They have no idea, of course, of a white
person performing any of the offices of a servant;” then follows an
amusing account of her white maid’s being taken for the master’s wife,
and her almost unavailing efforts to correct the mistake.—_Journal of a
Residence in Georgia_, pp. 44-46.
[183] An illustration of this change is seen in the different definitions
given to the word. In the _Royal Standard English Dictionary_, 1813,
a servant is “one who attends and obeys another, one in a state of
subjection.”
Johnson’s _Dictionary_, London, 1818, gives: “(1) One who attends another
and acts at his command; the correlative of master. Used of man or woman.
(2) One in a state of subjection.”
Richardson’s _New Dictionary of the English Language_, London, 1838,
defines _servant_ as the correlative of _master_.
The American usage was practically the same. The first edition of
Webster, 1828, gives: “(1) Servant, a person, male or female, that
attends another for the purpose of performing menial offices for him, or
who is employed by another for such offices, or for other labor, and is
subject to his command. _Servant_ differs from _slave_, as the servant’s
subjection to a master is voluntary, the slave’s is not. Every slave is a
servant, but every servant is not a slave.”
Worcester, 1860, says of _servant_: “(1) One who serves, whether male or
female; correlative of _master_, _mistress_, or _employer_. (2) One in a
state of subjection; a menial; a domestic; a drudge; a slave.”
These various definitions all suggest the class association of the terms
“servant” and “slave.”
[184] A curious illustration of the social position of servants in Europe
is seen in their lack of political privileges.
The French Constitution of 1791 was preceded by a bill of rights
declaring the equality and brotherhood of men, but a disqualification
for the right of suffrage, indeed, the only one, was “to be in a menial
capacity, _viz._, that of a servant receiving wages.” Title III.,
chap. 1, sec. 2. The Constitution of 1795, after a similar preamble,
states that the citizenship is suspended “by being a domestic on wages,
attending on the person or serving the house.” Title II., 13, 3. The
Constitution of 1799 has a similar disqualification. Title I., art. 5. It
is probable that these provisions were intended to punish men who would
consent to serve the nobility or the wealthy classes when it was expected
that all persons would be democratic enough to serve themselves, not to
cast discredit on domestic service _per se_.—Tripier, pp. 20, 105, 168.
During the revolutionary movement in Austria, the Hungarian Diet at its
session, in 1847-1848, passed an act providing that the qualification for
electors should be “to have attained the age of twenty years; Hungarians
by birth or naturalized; not under guardianship, nor in domestic service,
nor convicted of fraud, theft, murder, etc.” Act 5, sec. 2.—Stiles, II.,
376.
The qualifications for suffrage in England also excluded domestic
servants, but there was no discrimination against them as a class.
The Declaration of Independence, declaring all men free and equal in
the presence of African slavery, thus has its counterpart in these free
constitutions disfranchising domestic servants.
[185] Some of the figures given in this chapter have been taken from
advance sheets kindly furnished by the Census Bureau, and hence it is
impossible to give in every case page references.
[186] Preface, p. 1, and Appendix I.
[187] The percentage of foreign born as given here differs slightly from
that given on page 80, as it includes a small number of Chinese and
Japanese.
[188] Arizona, California, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New
Jersey, New York, North Dakota, Rhode Island.
[189] Colorado, District of Columbia, Illinois, Michigan, Montana,
Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Dakota,
Texas, Utah, Washington, Wisconsin, Wyoming.
[190] Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana,
Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Mississippi,
Missouri, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina,
Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia.
[191] Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida,
Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina,
South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia.
[192] _Eleventh Census_, Population, Part I., p. lxxxiii.
[193] _Census of Massachusetts_, 1885, Part II., p. 38.
[194] Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico,
Oregon, Utah, Washington, Wyoming.
[195] Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island,
Vermont.
[196] New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania.
[197] Minnesota, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Nebraska,
North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wisconsin.
[198] Delaware, District of Columbia, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri,
Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia.
[199] Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North
Carolina, Texas.
This classification is made with reference to conditions apparently
similar as regards domestic service.
[200] _Eleventh Census_, Occupations, p. 20. It is interesting to note
the increasing proportion of women of foreign birth who go into domestic
service. The Tenth Census shows that, in 1880, 49.31 per cent of all
women of foreign birth employed for pay were engaged in domestic service;
thus in ten years an increase of 10.06 per cent was made.
[201] _Census of Massachusetts_, 1885, Part II., pp. xxxvi, xxxviii. In
this statement only the number of women engaged in domestic service for
remuneration is considered.
[202] _Eleventh Census_, Population, Part I., p. lxxxix.
[203] _Eleventh Census_, Wealth, Debt, and Taxation, Part II., p. 16,
Chart.
[204] _Ibid._, p. 59.
[205] _Eleventh Census_, Wealth, Debt, and Taxation, Part II., pp.
376-403.
[206] Brooklyn, Buffalo, Camden, Fall River, Jersey City, Lowell, Newark,
Paterson, Rochester, Trenton, Troy.
[207] P. 68.
[208] _Report of the Bureau of Statistics of Labor, 1885_, pp. 196-312.
[209] In the classification in these two tables the employees in several
large boarding houses were omitted. All of those included under the term
“nurses” are nurse-maids, with the exception of the few receiving the
highest wages.
[210] _Post_, p. 136.
[211] The figures are taken from the annual reports of city
superintendents. The attempt was made to find the average salaries in
the fifty largest cities, but many cities do not publish in detail
the salaries paid. The reports used were those for the year ending in
1889,—the year for which reports were made through the schedules,—with
the exception of Paterson, where the report for 1890 was used. Half-day
teachers are omitted as far as known. In cities having separate schools
for colored and for white children, the teachers in colored schools are
included where the salaries paid are the same as those paid in white
schools of the same grade,—otherwise they are omitted.
[212] _Fourth Annual Report_, pp. 520-529.
[213] _Ibid._, p. 625.
[214] _Post_, p. 132.
[215] _Report of the Bureau, 1887_, pp. 216-219, 225.
[216] _United States Bureau of Labor, 1887_, pp. 794-797.
[217] More definitely, it numbered 4.85 persons.
[218] Forty-six per cent had kept house longer than this, averaging
nearly thirty years; while forty-four per cent had kept house for a
shorter period, averaging about eight years and a half. Seventeen reports
came from housekeepers of fifty years or more experience.
[219] Seventy per cent reported that they had boarded since marriage;
about one third of these had boarded less than the average time, and one
half had boarded from one to five years.
[220] This estimate is based on the supposition that a cook is employed
at $3.80 per week, a second girl at $3.04, and a man half a week at the
rate of 87 cents a day.
[221] Table II, p. 76.
[222] The place of birth of the employees represented by the schedules
included the following countries: Australia, Austria, the Azores, Canada,
China, Denmark, England, Finland, France, Germany, Holland, Iceland,
Ireland, Japan, New Brunswick, Norway, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Poland,
Prince Edward’s Island, Russia, Scotland, Spain, Switzerland, Sweden,
Wales, the West Indies.
[223] _Eleventh Census_, Occupations, p. 122.
[224] An employer in a large city where there is much complaint of
the inferior character of the foreign population writes: “A general
impression prevails in most foreign families that any girl, no matter
how stupid, dishonest, or untidy, can apply for and rightfully accept a
position as general servant or housemaid at current prices.” A similar
complaint comes from many other employers.
[225] _Tenth Census_, I., 708.
[226] “I went into housework because I was not educated enough for other
work.”
“I haven’t education enough to do anything else.”
“I would change my occupation if I knew enough to do anything else.”
[227] This is illustrated by the experience of one housekeeper who
frequently does her own work. At these times her ordinary kitchen
expenses come within $50 per month. This sum is exclusive of fuel, rent,
and water. When employing a servant, the same expenses amount to $80 per
month, while if fuel, light, and water were included (rent not being
affected) the difference would be still greater.
[228] Yet so great is the demand for help that this is apparently
sometimes done. In Milwaukee it is a common thing to see affixed to
houses, or standing upright in the dooryard, well-painted signs looking
as if ready for frequent use, reading “Girl wanted.”
[229] _Behaviour of Servants_, p. 298.
[230] A lady recently went to an employment bureau, and in answer to her
application for “a good cook,” received the reply, “Madam, good cooks are
an extinct race.”
One large bureau in Philadelphia reports that the demand for good
servants is twenty per cent greater than the supply.
[231] The character of some of the intelligence offices in another city
is described by F. Hunt, in _The American Kitchen Magazine_, November,
1895.
[232] An excellent blank is used by the employment bureau connected with
the Boston Young Women’s Christian Association. Seven questions are asked
the persons to whom the employee has referred:
“(1) How long have you known her?
(2) Is she temperate, honest, and respectable?
(3) Is she neat in her person, and about her work?
(4) Is she of good disposition?
(5) Is she faithful to her work, and is she trustworthy?
(6) In what capacity did she serve you, and how long?
(7) Was she capable and efficient in that capacity?”
The bureau states its aim to be “the recommendation of worthy persons
only.” The detailed form of the questions asked is more successful
in preventing an evasion of disqualifications, than is the personal
recommendation of a general character, which often tells the truth, but
not the whole truth.
One large bureau states that it formerly used blank forms, which it sent
out with each employee. Employers were asked to fill out these blanks
and return them at the end of service, and these were kept on file as
recommendations. It was soon found that employers grew lax and would not
take the pains to fill them out, and the practice was abandoned.
[233] DeFoe says, “To be a good Master is to be a Master that will do his
Servant Justice, and that will make his Servant do him Justice; he may be
kind to a Servant, that will let him sleep when he shou’d work, but then
he is not just to himself, or a good Governour to his Family.”—_Behaviour
of Servants_, p. 293.
[234] Repeated statements like the following are made by employers: “A
few wealthy families keep a large number of servants at high wages,
which wholly unfits them for general service and moderate wages, and
establishes customs and rates which cannot be met by the mass of people
with moderate incomes.”
[235] An employer recently engaged a cook at high wages with sufficient
recommendations it was supposed. The first dinner (an hour delayed)
showed her incapacity, and when questioned more closely it was found that
the only domestic work she had ever done was preparing vegetables in a
boarding house. When asked why she had engaged as a cook, the reply was,
“They told me I could get higher wages if I called myself a cook.” The
experience does not seem to be exceptional.
[236] An employer writes: “I find no place on the schedule for stating
that my cook and coachman have to-day each given notice of leaving unless
the other is discharged.”
[237] “When I began housekeeping in 1870 I had one ‘general housework
girl’ who stayed with me nine years. Now I consider myself fortunate to
retain a cook or a second girl as many weeks.”
“Thirty years ago I had no difficulty whatever. I do not think my
character has changed meantime, or my method of treating servants, or our
style of living, yet now it is almost impossible to secure servants.”
“The question is very different now from what it was forty years ago.”
“The problem in this place grows more perplexing every year.”
“Many housekeepers here are between the Scylla and Charybdis of trying to
tolerate wretched, inefficient servants, and the impossibility of getting
along with them.”
[238] “In advertising recently for a general housework girl twelve
answered the advertisement. Advertising the same week for my former
servant, twenty-two ladies applied personally and twelve others wrote
that a girl was wanted. Although I told each of the twenty-two that if
the girl were even fair I would keep her myself, only two hesitated on
that account to try to secure her.”
The report of a large employment bureau for the year 1889 is as follows:
Number of employers registered 1,512
Number of employees registered 1,541
Number of employers supplied with servants 1,366
Number of employees supplied with situations 1,375
The number of employees registered exceeds the number of employers, but
many register who are incompetent to fill the position they seek, and
therefore many employers are without servants. The bureau regrets “its
inability at times to supply with competent help the large number of
patrons.”
Another bureau reports 2,659 applications from employers, only 2,099 of
which could be filled.
Still another bureau filling about three thousand positions annually
reports that at times it has had six hundred applications from employers
in excess of the number that could be filled with competent applicants
for work.
The domestic employment bureau connected with the Boston Young Women’s
Christian Association reports for the year ending 1890:
Orders registered 2,120
Orders filled 1,753
[239] “Our committee have been greatly puzzled to know how to supply the
constantly increasing demand for good and efficient workers in small
households, where fair compensation is offered for moderate requirements.
This demand is great in the city, but more so in the suburbs and country.
It is very difficult to find a woman willing to take service in a family
living out of sight of Boston Common. It is still more difficult to
find any one who will go twenty miles into the country.”—_Report of the
Women’s Educational and Industrial Union_, Boston, 1888, p. 29.
One employer in an inland city of twenty-five thousand inhabitants, who
has a family of eight, and employs sixteen servants, writes: “It is
impossible here to secure competent servants.”
Another employer, employing thirteen servants, in a city of twelve
thousand, writes: “It is very difficult to secure servants, since women
here prefer to work in the factories.”
One employer with seven servants and a family of two, in a large
manufacturing city, says: “It is impossible to find well-trained
employees.”
[240] “This is the first time this question has been put to me directly,
and I frankly answer, Yes—to-morrow, if an opportunity were offered me.
For years it has been my wish to find employment of some kind which
would keep me from being a servant. Mrs. X has been very kind to me, and
tried to find me other work; but, of course, a girl who has been in a
kitchen for so long (thirteen years) is inexperienced in different work.
Nevertheless, I have met girls who had no better education than I, and
now hold high and respectable positions and make a fair living.”
A colored man, who has been a cook for forty years, replies with some
caution: “I don’t know, unless the other work was in sight. Can’t say,
unless somebody had done offered me another job, and I could look into
it.”
[241] See articles by Mrs. Ellen W. Darwin, _The Nineteenth Century_,
August, 1890; Miss Amy Bulley, _Westminster Review_, February, 1891;
Miss Emily Faithful, _North American Review_, July, 1891; C. J. Rowe,
_Westminster Review_, November, 1890, on the question in the Australian
colonies.
“If things go on much longer in the present state, we shall have to
introduce the American fashion, and live in huge human menageries.”—_M.
E. Braddon._
An admirable scientific presentation of the subject of domestic service
in London is given by Charles Booth and Jesse Argyle in _Life and Labour
of the People in London_, Vol. VIII.
[242] It is of interest to notice some of these occupations. The list
includes apparently nearly every form of work in every kind of mill
and factory, farm work, cigar-making, sewing, dressmaking, millinery,
tailoring, crocheting, lace-making, carpet-making, copying; places
as cash girls, saleswomen, nurses, post-office clerks, compositors,
office attendants; six have been teachers; others, ladies’ companions,
governesses, and matrons. It is of interest, also, to note that the
per cent of native born who have been engaged in other occupations
is slightly higher than the per cent of foreign born (thirty-one to
twenty-five).
[243] One employee writes, “I wanted to see for myself what it was to be
a hired girl.”
[244] An employee in Colorado, who receives $35 a month, writes: “I
choose housework in preference to any other, principally because for
that I receive better pay. The average pay for store and factory girls
is eight and nine dollars a week. After paying board and room rent,
washing, etc., very little is left, and what is left must be spent for
dress—nothing saved.”
“It pays better than other kinds of work.”
“My expenses are less than in any other kind of work.”
“I can make more. I have put $100 in the savings bank in a year and a
half. I had first $10 a month, but now I have $12.”
“I can save more.”
“I can earn more without constant change.”
“I can earn more than in anything else ($15 a month), but do not save
anything as I support my mother.”
“Any one that is industrious and saving can save a great deal by working
at housework.”
“I began to live out when I was thirteen years old, and I am now
twenty-seven. I have saved $1600 in that time. At first I had $.50
a week; now I have $3.00. One summer I earned $3.00 a day in the
hop-picking season.”
[245] “We are not as closely confined as girls who work in stores, and
are usually more healthy.”
“I chose it because I thought it was healthy work.”
“There is no healthier work for women.”
“It is healthier than most other kinds of work I could do.”
“You can have better-cooked food and a better room than most shop-girls.”
[246] “I came to a strange city and chose housework, because it afforded
me a home.”
“I am well treated by the family I am with, feel at home and under their
protection.”
“Housework fell to my lot and I have followed it up because it has
secured me a home.”
“Housework gives me a better home than I could make for myself in any
other way.”
“I have more comforts than in other work.”
“I like a quiet home in a good family better than work in a public place,
like a shop.”
“When I came to ⸺ and saw the looks of the girls in the large stores and
the familiarity of the young men, I preferred to go into a respectable
family where I could have a home.”
[247] _The New York Evening Post_, January 11, 1896, cites from _London
Truth_ an account of a bill under consideration in the New Zealand
Parliament providing that every domestic servant in the colony is to have
a half-holiday every Wednesday, and that the employer is to be fined
£5 if the domestic is deprived of this privilege. The “half-holiday”
practically means that the servant will be entitled to leave of absence
from two until ten. Inspectors are to be appointed to enforce the
provisions of this measure, if it becomes a law.
[248] “I choose housework as my regular employment for the simple reason
that young women look forward to the time when they will have housework
of their own to do. I consider that I or any one in domestic employment
will make a better housekeeper than any young woman who works in a
factory.”
“I think you can learn more in doing housework.”
“It requires both care and study and so keeps our mind in constant
thought and care, and ought to be respected.”
[249] “At home I was my mother’s help even when we had a girl of our own,
and from childhood had always loved to cook, and learned to do all kinds.”
“My mother was a housekeeper and did most of her own work and taught me
how to help her. When my father and mother died, and it became necessary
for me to earn my own living, the question was, ‘What can I do?’ The
answer was plain—housework.”
“I have a natural love for cooking, and would rather do it than anything
else in the world.”
“I like it best, was used to it at home, and it seems more natural-like.”
“I enjoy housework more than anything else.”
“I was a dressmaker several years because my mother thought dressmaking
more respectable than going out to work. But I always liked housework
better, and when my health broke down I was glad to get a place as parlor
maid.”
[250] A successful teacher says: “I have never liked teaching
particularly, and would much rather be a good cook.”
A sewing woman says: “I should prefer to do housework, but do not wish to
leave my home.”
A teacher says: “I am fond of children, and should like nothing better
than to be a nurse-girl, but I will not wear livery.”
[251] _Law of the Domestic Relations_, p. 599.
[252] _Commentaries_, II., 258.
[253] Kent, II., 260-261.
[254] Story, _On Contracts_, II., §§ 1297-1298.
[255] Starkie, _On Slander and Libel_, p. 19.
[256] Story, _On Contracts_, II., § 1304.
[257] Daly, IV., 401.
A good discussion of “The Legal Status of Servant Girls” is given by
Oliver E. Lyman, _Popular Science Monthly_, XXII., 803.
[258] An article on the last point is found in the _Boston Herald_,
November 23, 1890.
[259] “Housework soon unfits one for any other kind of work. I did not
realize what I was doing until too late.”
“I should prefer to housework a clerkship in a store or a place like that
of sewing-girl in a tailor-shop, because there would be a possibility of
learning the trade and then going into business for myself, or at least
rising to some responsible place under an employer.”
“I would give up housework if I could find another position that would
enable me to advance instead of remaining in the same rut day after day.”
[260] _Ante_, p. 113.
[261] “You are mistress of no time of your own; other occupations have
well-defined hours, after which one can do as she pleases without asking
any one.”
[262] “Women want the free use of their time evenings and Sundays.”
“If I could bear the confinement I would go into a mill where I could
have evenings and Sundays.”
“Sunday in a private family is usually anything but a day of rest to the
domestic, for on that day there are usually guests to dinner or tea or
both, which means extra work.”
“I wouldn’t mind working Sundays if it wasn’t for the extra work.”
“I suppose the reason why more women choose other work is, they
would rather work all day and be done with it, and have evenings for
themselves.”
“Some families have dinner at three o’clock Sundays and lunch at eight or
nine, and that makes it very hard for girls.”
[263] “A great many very ignorant girls can get housework to do, and a
girl who has been used to neatness and the refinement of a good home does
not like to room with a girl who has just come from Ireland and does not
know what neatness means.”
“In ⸺ they have much colored help and do not have white help, so the
white girls think any other work is better than housework.”
“In California self-respecting girls do not like to work with
Chinamen—they do not know how to treat women.”
“Before the introduction of Chinese labor a young girl never lost social
caste by doing housework; but since this element came, household service
as an occupation has fallen in the social scale.”—_Employer._
“When a native American girl goes out to housework she loses caste at
once, and can hardly find pleasure in the foreign immigrants that form
the majority of servants, and who make most of the trouble from their
ignorance and preconceived notions of America.”—_Employer._
[264] “The reason for dislike of housework is the want of liberty, and
the submission which girls have to submit to when they have to comply
with whatever rules a mistress may deem necessary. Therefore many girls
go into mechanical pursuits, that some of their life may be their own.”
“Girls in housework are bossed too much.”
“There are too many mistresses in the house when the mother and grown-up
daughters are all at home.”
“Most of us would like a little more independence, and to do our work as
we please.”
“In housework you receive orders from half a dozen persons, in a shop or
factory from but one.”
“A man doesn’t let his wife and daughters and sons interfere in the
management of his mill or factory—why does a housekeeper let everybody in
the house boss?”
[265] A description of domestic service in Japan is of value on this
point. “From the steward of your household, to your _jinrikisha_ man or
groom, every servant in your establishment does what is right in his own
eyes, and after the manner he thinks best. Mere blind obedience to orders
is not regarded as a virtue in a Japanese servant; he must do his own
thinking, and, if he cannot grasp the reason for your order, that order
will not be carried out.” “Even in the treaty ports [Japanese attendants]
have not resigned their right of private judgment, but, if faithful and
honest, seek the best good of their employer, even if his best good
involves disobedience of his orders.”—Alice M. Bacon, _Japanese Girls and
Women_, pp. 299, 301.
F. R. Feudge, in _How I Kept House by Proxy_, quotes from her Chinese
cook, who said that he could boast of forty years “of study and practice
in his profession.” “I am always willing to be told _what_ to do, but
never _how_ to execute the order—especially when in that department
I happen to know far more than my teachers.”—_Scribner’s Monthly_,
September, 1881.
[266] A shrewd young colored woman gives her version, verbally, of the
servant question. She lays great stress on her own “bringin’ up,” as “she
wa’n’t brung up by trash,” and thinks the average colored girl “only a
nigger.” She prefers to live “at service,” but insists upon “high-toned”
employers, and “can’t abide common folks.”
[267] “In some families no acquaintance can call on the servant; she may
have one or two friends, but the number is always limited, because, says
the lady of the house, not without truth, ‘Who wants a dozen strange
girls running in and out of one’s back door?’”
[268] “There are reasons why I sometimes feel dissatisfied with doing
housework for other people. I would prefer to do work where people would
say, supposing they were to give a company, ‘There is Miss So and So,
let us invite her.’” This is from an unusually intelligent employee who
says she does housework because she likes to do it best, and because a
domestic can have better-cooked food and a better-ventilated room than
most shop-girls, and who also writes, “Intelligence, brains, and good
judgment are essential in getting up a dinner for six or eight.”
[269] One illustration of this social barrier was found in a small
manufacturing city. The factory employees, all men and skilled workmen,
arranged one winter a series of evening entertainments. Invitations
were sent to the self-supporting women in the city, the list including
dressmakers, milliners, stenographers, saleswomen, and others, but the
social line was drawn at cooks.
[270] A lady was recently about to complete the engagement of a cook, a
German girl, when the head of the employment bureau said: “I fear after
all that A B will not suit you. You live in a flat, and as she wishes to
take violin lessons her practising might annoy you.” The incident was
narrated to a company of friends, and created much amusement, until one
said, “This shows how unregenerate we are; why should she not take violin
lessons?” It is not easy to find an answer.
A gentleman, whose family includes only himself and his wife, writes:
“Our maid-of-all-work is a young Swedish girl of eighteen, who recently
came to America. Three months ago she said, ‘If I had a musical
instrument and a place to practise, I would get a music teacher and
stay with you always.’ A few days later my married daughter sent us an
organ of sweet tone, which was placed in a small room little used. We
gave our maid permission to use it, and she at once secured a teacher.
This morning she said: ‘My father writes me if I am on the street much.
I write him, No, I enjoy myself better—I practise my music.’ We seem to
have solved the domestic question—at least for a time.”
[271] “I should like work where I could come in contact with more people
who would be of help to me.”
“A young woman doing housework is shut out from all society, nor can she
make any plans for pleasure or study, for her time is not her own.”
“No one seems to think a girl who works out good enough to associate
with, except those who are in domestic service themselves.”
“Domestics never have a chance to go to school or study.”
A domestic employee recently went to a public library for a book. The
attendant was about to give it to her, thinking from her manner and
appearance that she was a teacher in a neighboring school; but when
the question was asked and the answer given, “not a teacher, but a
housemaid,” the book was withheld, as servants were required to bring
recommendations.
[272] “Domestics are not admitted into any society, and are often for
want of a little pleasure driven to seek it in company that is often
coarse and vulgar.”
“It is very hard for a young, refined woman to give up a pleasant home,
and live constantly with ignorant and ill-bred people, as is very often
the case where more than one servant is kept.”
[273] “I fairly hate the word ‘servant.’”
“I don’t like to be called a ‘menial.’”
“The girls in shops call us ‘livers-out.’”
“No woman likes to be called a ‘hired girl.’”
“American girls don’t like the name ‘servants.’”
“I know many nice girls who would do housework, but they prefer doing
almost anything else rather than be called ‘servants.’”
“Some people call us ‘kitchen mechanics.’”
“I don’t know why we should be called ‘servants’ any more than other
people.”
[274] A woman who had been for years a domestic employee left her place
on account of sickness, and ultimately opened a small bakeshop. Her
former employer called on her one day, and said, “Well, Sarah, how do
you like your work?” She replied, “I never thought of it before, but now
that you speak, I think the reason I like it so well is because everybody
calls me ‘Miss Clark.’”
An employer invited her Sunday-school class to her home to spend an
evening. One of the members went into the kitchen to render some
assistance, and found there the housemaid, an unusually attractive young
woman. The employer said, “Miss M, this is Kate.” The maid, who never
before had showed the slightest consciousness of occupying an inferior
position, said, under her breath, “I am Miss, too.”
[275] That this jest has a basis of fact in England is evident from the
testimony of the footman of the Earl of Northbrook, who some time since
stated under oath, in a court of law, that although his regular wages
amounted to but $300 annually, yet he received from $2,000 to $2,500 more
each year in the shape of tips from the Earl’s guests. “Her Majesty’s
Servants,” in the _New York Tribune_, August 23, 1896.
[276] Mr. W. D. Howells has an excellent discussion of the feeing system
in _Harper’s Weekly_, May 16, 1896; also, Julia R. Tutwiler in the
_American Kitchen Magazine_, April, 1896; still a third is found in the
_Outlook_, August 8, 1896.
[277] One illustration of the fact that domestic service is never judged
by the same social canons as are other occupations, is seen in the
unwillingness shown by a young woman to enter the service of a family
having a questionable reputation. Her “squeamishness,” as it was called,
excited only laughter in a circle of women, no one of whom would have
exchanged calls with the family in question.
[278] _First Annual Report of the Bureau of Labor Statistics of
Connecticut_, 1885, p. 12.
[279] An employer writes: “I recently advertised for a young woman to
help me with the children, and be received as one of the family. The
forty answers received formed the most pathetic reading I have ever seen.
My selection was the daughter of a poor clergyman, and this was the class
from which the majority of the answers came. All desired domestic service
if unaccompanied with social degradation.”
How conscious many are of this inferior position is seen from a single
illustration. An employer recently invited her housemaid to take a
boat-ride with her. The maid replied, “I should love to go if you
wouldn’t be ashamed to be seen with me.”
[280] This is especially true in the matter of wages where wages and
annual earnings are confused, the element of time lost never being
considered. The fact is also often overlooked that when a young woman
lives at home without paying her board, her family in effect pay a part
of her wages and thus enable the employer to pay her low wages, though
nominally more than paid in housework. Thus one employee writes: “If
girls have homes where their board is given them, they can earn more
money on other kinds of work than in housework.”
[281] Domestic service, as seen by the employee, cannot be dismissed
without suggesting the fact that as many tragedies in life are found
here as elsewhere. One employee had planned to be a teacher, but sudden
deafness prevented, and domestic service was all she could do. Another
hoped to become a physician, but loss of property prevented her from
completing her education. A similar reason prevented another from
becoming a trained nurse. One had hoped to be a dressmaker, but it became
necessary to earn money at once without serving an apprenticeship. Could
the struggles and disappointments in thousands of such lives be known,
the household employee would cease to be the butt of jest and ridicule
that she sometimes is.
[282] An employer in South Carolina writes: “The difficulty here can only
be removed by the importation of competent servants.”
[283] The following table will indicate the preference:
=================+==========+============+============+==========
CITY OR STATE | NUMBER | NO | WHITE HELP | NEGROES
| EXAMINED | PREFERENCE | PREFERRED | PREFERRED
-----------------+----------+------------+------------+----------
Charleston | 259 | 143 | 65 | 51
Louisville | 200 | 104 | 80 | 16
New Orleans | 145 | 103 | 35 | 7
Savannah | 106 | 66 | 26 | 14
Texas | 67 | 31 | 35 | 1
Washington, D.C. | 135 | 61 | 54 | 20
+----------+------------+------------+----------
Total | 912 | 508 | 295 | 109
=================+==========+============+============+==========
The Charleston Employment Bureau advertises, “White help especially in
demand.” In Texas the proportion of the foreign born population is larger
than in any other of the Southern states, and advertisements from all
the leading cities in the state show a decided preference for German or
Swedish domestics. One from the _Fort Worth Gazette_ reads, “Wanted—A
white woman (German or Swede preferred) as cook in a private family.”
This illustrates a large number of “wants.” An employer writes from
Austin, “In Texas cities domestic service is furnished by Germans and
Swedes to a large extent, and the tendency to employ them is growing.”
[284] “The older generation of negroes who were trained for service have
nearly all died, and the survivors are too old to be efficient. The
younger negroes are too lazy to be of much use.”—_Brenham, Texas._
“Old colored servants that were trained before the war are now
inefficient; the younger ones will not submit to training.”—_Austin,
Texas._
“Old trained colored servants are no longer to be had,—younger
ones are not well trained, and consequently cannot do first class
work. White servants are better trained, but scarce, and therefore
independent.”—_Austin, Texas._
“We have 80,000 colored people in the city. The old trained servants of
slavery times are mostly passed away, and the younger ones have not been
properly trained.”—_Washington, D.C._
“The servants who were trained before ‘freedom’ are too old to
do good work, and they are not training their children to be
efficient.”—_Anderson, South Carolina._
“The majority of those now seeking domestic service are ignorant,
uneducated, untrustworthy.”—_Biloxi, Mississippi._
“Servants have no training.”—_Edgefield, South Carolina._
[285] “One difficulty here is the indifference of our colored servants
to what the morrow may bring forth. They are capable of living on
a very small amount, and they assist each other during the time
unoccupied.”—_Charleston, South Carolina._
“The negroes do not know how to render good service as a rule, and they
do not understand the term ‘thorough.’”—_Charleston, South Carolina._
“Colored help have to be very patiently and charitably dealt
with.”—_Washington, D.C._
“The difficulty here is the general shiftlessness and liking for changed
conditions that is characteristic of the colored race.”—_Austin, Texas._
“There is special difficulty here during the cotton-picking
season.”—_Austin, Texas._
“The majority of our servants, who are negroes, are not willing to do
steady, faithful work for reasonable wages. Their idea of freedom is to
come and go at will, and they expect full wages for light work.”—_Austin,
Texas._
“The ease with which subsistence can be obtained in this productive
climate and the high wages earned during the cotton-picking season make
the labor supply unstable.”—_Austin, Texas._
“The negroes need training, but rarely remain in one place long enough to
repay one for the trouble of teaching them.”—_Brenham, Texas._
“The negroes will do well enough if one is willing to overlook
carelessness.”—_Johnston, South Carolina._
“The colored servants do not like to be kept at steady
employment.”—_Trenton, South Carolina._
“The majority work only as a make-shift, with no idea of
remaining.”—_Biloxi, Mississippi._
“The whole colored race is in a transitional period which is full of
evils.”—_Marion, Alabama._
“Negroes are very stubborn under harsh treatment, but respond quickly to
kind treatment.”—_Crescent City, Florida._
“Most of the negroes are indifferent to improving in any way as
long as they have enough to eat, a place to sleep, and clothes to
wear.”—_Tallahassee, Florida._
[286] A southern gentleman well known as a student of social science
writes in regard to the importation of negroes to the North: “There is
nothing to hope from it. I have been reared in the South, and I know the
negro well. Speaking as one with no sectional prejudice and with the
broadest sympathy for blacks as well as whites, I must tell you that in
general negroes will not serve you as well as the Irish, Germans, or
Swedes. Personal attachment alone will secure good service from colored
people.”
[287] “I must say from my own experience and observation that
well-trained Chinese are the very best servants to be had here.”—_San
Francisco, California._
“I have grown up with Chinamen in the house, and it seems to me quite
revolting and unnatural to have in the heart of the house an alien woman
who speaks your language, knows your affairs, is even in a way dependent
on your companionship, yet is nothing to you as a friend, and would never
be asked even as a guest into the house if it rested on her personal
qualities.”—_San Francisco, California._
“Our Chinese cook is an admirable servant, invariably respectful,
and does his work beautifully; he has the self-respect to fill every
requirement of respectful and obedient behavior that the occasion calls
for.”—_San Francisco, California._
“Three Chinese were the most satisfactory servants we ever employed. In
a housekeeping experience of nearly fifty years we have employed negro,
Norwegian, and Irish servants.”—_San Francisco, California._
[288] “The difficulty can only be removed by repealing the restriction
act.”—_Centerville, California_.
“The Chinese have become very independent since the new restriction
act.”—_San Francisco, California._
“The restriction act made the Chinese very independent. They thought the
stopping of the supply would make those already here able to command
higher wages.”—_San Francisco, California._
“One difficulty is the exclusion act.”—_San Francisco, California._
[289] _Co-operative Housekeeping_. The book is now out of print, but the
original articles on which it is based can be found in the _Atlantic
Monthly_, November, 1868, to March, 1869.
[290] A full account of the plan is given in _Good Housekeeping_, July
19, 1890. It was also described in nearly all of the daily papers during
May and June, 1890.
[291] A more complete and possibly more serious account of Mr. Bellamy’s
views than that found in _Looking Backward_ is given by him in _Good
Housekeeping_, December 21, 1889.
[292] _The New York Tribune_ says of the sewing women in that city: “They
are a product of city life; a sort of vitalized machines, fitted only to
do a certain mechanical work and disabled for any other industry mainly
because they have been fastened to a sewing-machine all their lives.”
[293] “The men of my family would consider it the greatest disgrace if
one of the women connected with it were to support herself.”
[294] Mr. Charles Dudley Warner asserts that women teachers have no
social position (_Harper’s Monthly_, April, 1895). But his statements can
apply only to some of the ultra-fashionable finishing schools in two or
three large cities.
[295] It is the testimony of more than one employer that those domestics
remain longest in a place and are most content who have a taste for
sewing and reading. Those who are wholly dependent for pleasure on
excitement and change form of necessity a restless class.
[296] The word “servant” has been used many times in this work, but it
has seemed unavoidable in the absence of any other generally recognized
term.
[297] It has been suggested that the word “homemaker” be applied to
the mistress of the house and “housekeeper” to the employee; “working
housekeeper” is often used of an efficient caretaker who does her
work without direction; “domestic” and “house helper” seem wholly
unobjectionable. It certainly is not necessary in abandoning one
objectionable word to adopt another equally so. The Lynn, Massachusetts,
papers, for example, advertise under “wants” for a “forelady in stitching
room,” “a position as forewoman by a lady thoroughly familiar with all
parts of shoe stitching,” “on millinery an experienced saleslady.”
In other places one finds “a gentlewoman who desires employment at
twenty-five cents an hour.” The public has much to answer for in the
misuse of both “servant” and “lady.”
[298] _Japanese Girls and Women_, p. 304.
[299] _Ante_, Chap. II.
[300] This does not refer to ordinary baker’s bread, but to that made
according to scientific principles, such as is sold at the New England
Kitchen in Boston and by the Boston Health Food Company.
[301] A beginning in this direction has already been made in the case of
vegetables canned for winter use. In the canning factories of Western New
York an ingenious pea huller is in use which does away with much of the
laborious process hitherto necessary. In a trial of speed it was recently
found that one machine could shell twenty-eight bushels of peas in twenty
minutes. In some of the largest cities the principle has been applied,
and this vegetable is delivered ready for use; but such preparation
should be made universal and all other vegetables added to the list.
[302] Cited by Bolles, p. 413.
[303] Bolles, p. 130.
[304] The Oriental Tea Company of Boston sends out coffee and guarantees
it to maintain a temperature of 150° Fahrenheit for twenty-four hours.
The experiment has been tried of sending it from Boston to St. Louis,
with the result of maintaining a temperature of 148° at the end of three
days.
[305] The women connected with two churches in a city in Indiana
have maintained for some time such sales, and they have proved very
remunerative. In one city in New Jersey $1,200 was raised in a few weeks
to pay a church mortgage. In a Long Island village several hundred
dollars was raised for a similar purpose by the women of the church, who
took orders for cooking and sewing. In an Iowa city funds were obtained
in this way for missionary purposes. In a village of five hundred
inhabitants, in Central New York, the women of one of the churches have
sold, every Saturday afternoon for eight years, ices and ice-creams,
and have cleared annually about seventy-five dollars. In another town,
several women of limited incomes began paying their contributions to
the church by baking bread and cake for other families, and finding it
remunerative continued the work as a means of support. In one Western
city an annual sale is held at Thanksgiving time, and about one hundred
dollars netted for home missionary purposes.
[306] The Woman’s Exchange, _The Forum_, May, 1892.
[307] Many illustrations of this can be given outside of those connected
with the Exchange:
Mrs. A, in Central New York, has made a handsome living by making chicken
salad to be sold in New York City.
Mrs. B, in a small Eastern village, has for several years baked bread,
pies, and cake for her neighbors, and in this way has supported herself,
three children, and a father. She has recently built a separate
bakehouse, and bakes from thirty to one hundred loaves daily, according
to the season, and other things in proportion. She says she always had a
“knack” at baking, and that when she employs an assistant she has nearly
every afternoon to herself.
Mrs. C, in a Western city, supports herself, three children, and an
invalid husband, by making cake.
Mrs. D makes a good living by selling Saratoga potatoes to grocers.
Mrs. E has cleared $400 a year by making preserves and jellies on private
orders.
Mrs. F partially supports herself and family by making food for the sick.
Mrs. G supports a family of five by making jams and pickles.
Mrs. H has built up a large business, employing from three to five
assistants, in making cake and salad.
Mrs. I, in a small Eastern city, began by borrowing a barrel of flour,
and now has a salesroom where she sells daily from eighty to one hundred
dozen Parker House rolls, in addition to bread made in every possible
way, from every kind of grain.
Mrs. J, in a small Western city, sells salt-risings bread to the value
of $30 a week; and Mrs. K, in the same place, Boston brown bread to the
value of $75 a week.
Mrs. L, living on a farm near a Southern city, has built up “an
exceedingly remunerative business” by selling to city grocers preserves,
pickles, cakes, and pies. “One cause of her success has been the fact
that she would allow no imperfect goods to be sold; everything has been
of the best whether she has gained or lost on it.”
Mrs. M supports herself by taking orders for fancy cooking.
Mrs. N, living in a large city, sells to grocers baked beans and rolls.
Mrs. O, in New York City, has netted $1,000 a year by preparing
mince-meat and making pies of every description.
Mrs. P, in a small village on Lake Superior, has large orders from cities
in Southern Michigan for strawberry and raspberry jam.
Mrs. Q, in a country village of five hundred inhabitants, sells thirty
loaves of bread daily.
Mrs. R and two daughters last year netted $1,500 (above all expenses
except house rent) in preparing fancy lunch dishes on shortest notice,
and delicacies for invalids.
Mrs. S puts up pure fruit juices and shrubs.
Mrs. T prepares consommé in the form of jelly ready to melt and serve.
Mrs. U has made a fair income by preparing and selling fresh sweet herbs.
These illustrations can be multiplied indefinitely. They have come to
notice in nearly every state in the Union, and in places varying in
size from country villages without railroad stations to such cities as
Chicago, Philadelphia, and New York.
[308] Mrs. A has for several years gone from house to house at stated
times sweeping and dusting rooms containing fine bric-à-brac.
Mr. B cares for all of the lawns of a large number of gentlemen, each of
whom pays him a fixed sum for the season in proportion to the size of his
grounds.
Mr. C cares for all of the furnaces and clears the walks in a city block.
Mrs. D earns a partial support by arranging tables for lunches and
afternoon teas.
Mrs. E washes windows once in two weeks for a number of employers.
Mrs. F takes charge of all arrangements for afternoon teas.
Mrs. G earns $3 a day as a cook on special occasions.
Miss H waits on a table in a boarding house three hours a day.
Miss I distributes the clothes from the laundry in a large city school.
Mrs. J is kept busy as a cook, serving as a substitute in kitchens
temporarily vacant.
Mrs. K derives a considerable income from the supervision of party
suppers. “Her social position is quite unaffected by it.”
Mrs. L “makes herself generally useful” at the rate of ten cents an hour
if regularly employed and twenty cents when serving occasionally.
Mrs. M goes out as a waitress at lunches and dinners.
Mrs. N employs a young man working his way through school to keep
wood-boxes and coal-hods filled.
Many college students in cities partially pay their expenses by table
service.
Hotels and restaurants frequently send out waiters on special occasions.
One employer writes, “I think a central office in this city at which
competent waitresses could be hired by the hour would be largely
patronized.”
The Syracuse, New York, Household Economic Club publishes a _Household
Register_, giving the names and addresses of all persons in the city who
do by the piece, hour, or day all forms of household work. Thirty-five
different classes of work are enumerated.
[309] See also article on the “Revival of Hand Spinning and Weaving in
Westmoreland,” by Albert Fleming, _Century Magazine_, February, 1889.
[310] One writes, “I find it much better to employ one servant and to
hire work by the piece, and to purchase from the Exchange, rather than to
employ an extra servant.”
Another housekeeper writes: “I began housekeeping twelve years ago with
three servants and had more than enough work for all. I now have two
and have not enough work for them, although my family is larger than at
first. The change has come from putting work out of the house and hiring
much done by the piece.”
A business man writes: “Our family is happier than it ever dared hope
to be under the sway of Green Erin. We purchase all baked articles and
all cooked meats as far as possible. A caterer is employed on special
occasions, and work that cannot be done by the parents, three children,
and two aunts, who compose the family, is hired by the hour. Since we
signed our Declaration of Independence in 1886, peace has reigned.”
Still another says: “I used to employ a laundress in the house at $4
per week and board. I was also at expense in furnishing soap, starch,
bluing, and paid a large additional water tax. Now my laundress lives at
home, and does my laundry there for $4 per week, and we are both better
satisfied.”
Several small families who do “light housekeeping,” have found that they
have in this way been able to live near the business of the men of the
family, and thus have kept the family united and intact, as they could
not have done had it been necessary to employ servants.
One employee writes, “If more housework were done by the day so that more
women could be with their families in the evening, I think it would help
matters.”
[311] _Seventeenth Annual Report of the Massachusetts Bureau of
Statistics of Labor_, p. 157.
[312] _Profit Sharing between Employer and Employee_, p. 8.
[313] _Methods of Industrial Remuneration_, p. 158.
[314] Schloss, _Methods of Industrial Remuneration_, p. 173.
[315] Gilman, _Profit Sharing_, p. 189.
[316] _Seventeenth Annual Report of the Massachusetts Bureau of Labor_,
p. 178.
[317] Schloss, _Report on Profit Sharing_, p. 157.
[318] _Ibid._, p. 160.
[319] Schloss, _Report on Profit Sharing_, pp. 158-159.
[320] Schloss, _Methods of Industrial Remuneration_, pp. 173-174.
[321] Schloss, _Report_, p. 158.
[322] Wright, _Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor_, 1886, p. 231.
[323] _Ibid._, p. 172.
[324] This included the purchase of two new labor-saving appliances for
the kitchen, costing $5.70. The maid was given the choice of having the
new utensils or dividing a surplus; she chose the former.
[325] This included the presence in the family of two guests for two
weeks.
[326] One housekeeper reports that she gives her cook five cents for
every new soup, salad, made-over dish, or dessert that proves acceptable
to the majority of the family. She thus secures variety and economy in
the use of materials.
One reports that she has a German cook who understands thoroughly the
purchase and use of all household materials. The cook is given a fixed
sum each week with which to make purchases, and she keeps whatever sum
remains after these have been made. The family report that they have
never lived so well, or with so much comfort and so much economy as since
the plan has been tried.
Another states that she adds at the end of the month twenty per cent
to the wages of her waitress if no article of glass or china has been
nicked, cracked, or broken during the time.
These are all variations of the same principle.
[327] An admirable work on _Household Sanitation_ has been published by
Miss Marion Talbot and Mrs. Ellen S. Richards.
[328] The work in this direction carried on by Professor W. O. Atwater
of Wesleyan University has been of the greatest value, and indicates the
lines along which future investigation must be made.
[329] _Letter to the Clergy of the Diocese of New York_, May 15, 1886.
[330] _The Century_, June, 1894.
[331] An excellent classification of standards of work and wages has been
drawn up by the committee on Household Economics of the Civic Club of
Philadelphia. See Appendix III.
[332] Maria Mitchell, p. 26.
[333] “However grievous the ‘servant problem’ may be in some English
households, it sinks into insignificance when compared with the
conditions on the other side of the Atlantic.” Alice Zimmern, in _The
Leisure Hour_, May, 1899.
[334] _Ante_, chaps. VI., VIII., IX.
[335] This is apparently the case universally in France and in Italy. In
Italy, while the washing is always done out of the house, the ironing is
often done at home. In Lombardy “a woman of color” washes the colored
clothes and flannels, which are kept distinct from the ordinary laundry.
On the continent bed linen is often changed only once in two, three, or
even four weeks—a custom that has at least the advantage of reducing to a
minimum this part of the household work.
“In England it is becoming the rule, except in large households with
laundries of their own, and in households managed on narrow means, to
send this work out.”—Miss Collet, _Report_, p. 9.
“Washing is put out, as it is now almost impossible to get a girl who
will do it.”—Employer, cited by Miss Collet, _Report_, p. 30.
[336] In some parts of Switzerland women come in from outside every six
weeks and do all the laundry work of a household for that period.
[337] The legal relations between employer and employee are everywhere
prescribed with more or less fulness, but in Germany the laws are very
minute in character, while the contract in particular is much more rigid,
and it is carried out in much greater detail than elsewhere. The laws for
Prussia are given in Posseldt, while a summary for the Empire is given in
Braun. Each state has its own laws on the subject, but as far as I have
been able to examine them, they are practically the same in principle.
I am indebted to Mrs. John H. Converse for permission to use an
exhaustive statement of the legal relations between mistress and maid in
England prepared by Mrs. Henry C. Lea of Philadelphia.
Weber, in _Les Usages locaux_, sums up many of the points in French law.
[338] Braun, chaps. VII., XI.
“In England situations are usually subject to a month’s notice on either
side.”—Booth, VIII., 221.
No special contract is made in France, with the result that “one changes
domestics these days almost as often as political convictions.”—Weber, p.
45.
In Italy, also, no special contract is required, though a servant cannot
be turned off without giving him ten days’ notice or a week’s wages.
[339] Posseldt, p. 75. Braun, chap. XIV.
But under many circumstances, specified with great exactness, a servant
may be legally dismissed without notice. Posseldt, pp. 64-70, gives a
list of nineteen cases where this may be done in Prussia; the laws for
Saxony are very similar (pp. 28-30); Braun, chap. XII., gives twenty-one.
[340] Braun, p. 64. In Saxony he is at liberty to choose between
returning to his place, paying a fine of 30_M._, or being imprisoned for
eight days. _Gesindeordnung für das Königreich Sachsen_, p. 8.
The employee is also privileged under certain conditions to break the
contract without notice. Braun, chap. XII., enumerates seven. These are
the same in Prussia, Posseldt, pp. 70-74; Schork, p. 38, gives only five
for Baden.
[341] The fine in Saxony is a maximum one of 150_M._, and the
imprisonment the maximum one of six weeks. _Gesindeordnung_, p. 10.
[342] Weber says, “If you have serious complaints to make, either seek
legal redress or say nothing.” Pp. 53-54.
[343] In Italy the servant is protected by very stringent laws punishing
slander and defamation.
[344] In England “the majority of adult male indoor domestic servants are
in large households employing over six servants.”—Miss Collet, _Report_,
p. 23.
“Every English man-servant is apt to consider himself a specialist....
This want of elasticity has led to his gradual disappearance from all
except the most wealthy households.”—Booth, VIII., 227.
In Italy cooks are very generally men. In France nearly all domestic work
in the provincial hotels is performed by men. In Germany waiters are, as
a rule, men.
[345] This competition is not wholly unknown. In a pension in Athens the
second waiter, a Greek, left because unwilling to take orders from an
Armenian head waiter. French servants sometimes go to the French cantons
of Switzerland, and the reverse. The same is true of German and Italian
servants who are found in the German and the Italian cantons. But the
permanent migration of servants from one country to another, especially
on the continent, is very slight. The reason usually given is, “They do
not understand the ways of another country and are unhappy in it.”
[346] “Not only will the foreigner work for less wages, but he is better
educated and more thoroughly trained. Whilst in this country a waiter’s
duties are ‘picked up’ in an irregular way, in Germany or Switzerland
the work is properly taught by a regular system of apprenticeship. The
knowledge of continental language which the foreigner possesses is found
useful, and he has, moreover, a higher reputation than our own countrymen
for neatness and civility.”—Booth, VIII., 235.
[347] English, French, and German are universally spoken by waiters in
all the large hotels and pensions on the continent. Two or three other
languages in addition are often found. One waiter in a very primitive
hotel in Olympia, Greece, spoke eight. This can scarcely be considered
exceptional. “The waiting staff of the great modern hotels consists
mainly of foreigners.”—Booth, VIII., 231-232.
[348] In certain quarters of London the boarding-houses are full of
waiters who have come over from the continent to learn English. Many
waiters not French by birth took advantage of the Exposition in 1900 to
improve their French by going to Paris at that time. It is not unusual
for travellers to be asked concerning possible openings in hotels and
pensions where waiters would have an opportunity of learning a new
language.
[349] For wages in England, see Miss Collet, _Report on the Money Wages
of Indoor Domestic Servants_, and Booth, VIII., 217, 221-224, 227-228,
231-235; for wages in France, M. Bienaymé in _Journal de la Société de
Statistique de Paris_, November, 1899, and M. Salomon in _La Nouvelle
Revue_, February 1, 1886. I have been unable to find satisfactory
statistics concerning the wages paid in Germany and in Italy. Numerous
inquiries lead me to believe that they are somewhat lower in Italy and
in Spain than elsewhere (an English housekeeper residing in Spain for
twenty-five years reports that general servants in Spain receive from
$1.25 to $2.00 a month, cooks, who are considered “artists,” receiving
somewhat more), and that in Germany the variations are not so great as in
England in the wages paid in different classes of society. This, however,
is but an impression, and the judgment cannot be considered authoritative.
[350] “We understand that the plan of paying board-wages throughout the
year instead of providing food is increasing, and is usually at the rate
of 16_s._ per week for upper men-servants, 14_s._ for footmen, and 12_s._
to 14_s._ for women-servants.”—Booth, VIII., 230.
“Another disturbing feature in many Irish households is the practice
of paying ‘breakfast wages’ in some cases, and ‘full board’ wages in
others.”—Miss Collet, _Report_, p. 10.
[351] M. Babeau says that in France as far back as 1692 a good cook
expected presents at Easter and on Saint Martin’s day as well as at New
Year’s. P. 283.
“To the 600 francs (given a domestic in the fashionable quarters of
Paris) must be added gifts and New Year’s presents.”—M. Jules Simon,
cited by M. Salomon, p. 549.
“A usually substantial Christmas box is given the waiters in West-End
London clubs.”—Booth, VIII., 231.
In Germany, while a servant cannot legally claim presents at Christmas,
New Year’s, and similar times (_Welche Rechte und Pflichten haben
Herrschaft und Gesinde?_ p. 30), the custom of giving them is universal.
“I would not _dare_ to give less than thirty marks at Christmas to the
cook and twenty marks to the chambermaid.”—German housekeeper, Dresden.
It is not uncommon in Germany for housekeepers to give presents on the
anniversaries of the days their servants come to them, and medals on
special anniversaries, as the tenth or twenty-fifth. This explains the
custom of the German Housewives’ Society in New York of presenting $10
gold pieces to employees who have served faithfully for two years in the
home of a member of the society. _The Evening Post_ (New York), December
12, 1900.
“I always give my cook twenty lire at Christmas and ten lire at the fête
of the Madonna.”—Italian housekeeper, Milan.
[352] “I often give a present of two marks between times, pay often for
extra service, and give my servants a great deal of cast-off clothing.
The head of a factory is not obliged to propitiate the bad temper and
sullen moods of his employees with gifts and fees as we housekeepers have
to do.”—German housekeeper, Berlin.
“I give my cook a great deal of my husband’s cast-off clothing and the
housemaid much of my own.”—Italian housekeeper, Rome.
[353] “I would not think of leaving less than two shillings with the
housemaid when I have spent a night in a friend’s house.”—Englishwoman,
Cambridge.
“I always leave five shillings with the servant when I spend Sunday with
friends, and as she always seems glad to see me when I return I imagine
it is enough.”—Englishwoman, London.
The traditional reply ascribed to Hanway (Bouniceau-Gesmon, p. 134) in
declining an invitation from an English lord, “I am not rich enough to
dine with you,” is typical of what one often hears in England.
“Vails to servants in households where a considerable number of visitors
are entertained must be an important item in the real earnings of
servants.”—Miss Collet, _Report_, p. 29.
An admirable discussion of the whole subject of fees paid by guests is
given by W. J. Stillman in _The Nation_, October 11, 1900. See also _The
Nation_, November 8, 1900. Mr. Albert Matthews in _The Nation_, December
13, 1900, cites an extract from the London _Chronicle_ that shows that
the custom dates back certainly as far as 1765.
Babeau, pp. 301-302, discusses the abuses of the custom in France, though
they are less there than in Italy, and especially in England “where one
cannot go out to dine without encountering, on leaving, all the servants
drawn up in line and holding out their hands.”
[354] “It is very stupid, but it is generally done.”—German housekeeper,
Dresden.
“The cook makes about three marks a month in this way.”—German
housekeeper, Berlin.
“The ‘sou in the franc’ that certain tradesmen agree to give servants is
not only tolerated, but it is recognized as a right.”—M. G. Salomon, p.
549.
“In the expression ‘theft’ we do not hesitate to include the ‘dancing
of the basket’; the ‘sou in the franc’ given by some dealers does not
constitute an act of disloyalty on the part of the domestic. It is for
the master, if he would escape this tax, to levy it on the tradesmen less
clever in advertising, unless he is very sure that the merchant makes the
servant this allowance _out of his profits alone_.”—Weber, p. 47.
“In fact, the part taken by our servants in the purchase and use of
almost all articles of consumption makes a necessary increase in the
wages paid. Thus even before coming to the kitchen, provisions undergo
an increase in cost from the fact that they are bought by the mercenary
person who attends to the marketing; this does not include customary
augmentations, the sou per pound or the sou in the franc, said to be met
by the merchant, and certain others which, on account of their constant
increase, deserve special mention.”—Bienaymé, pp. 366-367.
“What is done by these servants hired for a limited time? They go to the
merchant and impose upon him the law of division of profits. The merchant
raises the price, and the stranger buys the article for more than it
should cost. These servants even levy a tax upon the eating-house keeper;
the livery-stable keeper is obliged to pay them as much as twenty sous a
day; these profits have become customary.”—Mercier, V., 156.
Bouniceau-Gesmon, pp. 107-113, cites from an unnamed English author a
long account of similar practices in England.
“My cook always gets three lire from the butcher and three from the
grocer at Christmas.”—Italian housekeeper.
[355] M. Colletet narrates the story of a young girl from the country who
was told of a situation where in addition to her regular wages she could
get various profits, such as ashes, old shoes, remnants of bread and
meat, and various tidbits.—_Le Tracas de Paris_, p. 229.
M. Babeau, p. 283, cites from Fournier, _Vanités historiques et
littéraires_, V., 243-257, the advice of an old servant to a new one as
to ways of cheating his master, such as burning much wood in order to
have many ashes, saving from articles for the table, etc. It is thus that
a cook has been able to lay up enough to buy five large farms, while her
husband, the coachman, has on his part saved out of the hay and straw
bought for the stables.
“A large number of cooks increase these profits by illicit gains, and
the tradesmen themselves, with no other reason than the fear of losing
their customers, obligingly wink at, or rather become parties in, this
trickery.”—M. Jules Simon, cited by M. Salomon, p. 549.
“The cook either brings short weight or reports paying a higher price
than he has paid—he has many dodges. The housekeeper must weigh over
again the articles purchased, or go to market to ascertain, if possible,
the real price of articles bought, or submit to imposition.”—Housekeeper
in Spain.
[356] Under this head come cast-off clothing, skins of animals, bones,
tallow, drippings, etc. A. Weber, _Les Usages locaux_, p. 48.
[357] “Beer (or beer money) is allowed at the rate of about one pint a
day for women-servants.”—Booth, VIII., 220 (1896).
Miss Collet considers it established that in England the custom of paying
beer money is dying out, many employers not only give no beer money but
also give no beer. _Report_, p. 29 (1899).
In Italy women-servants are allowed one-half pint of wine per day, and
men-servants one pint. The wine is given out each day, or the money
equivalent at the end of the month.
[358] _Les Usages locaux_, p. 52.
[359] The laws of insurance against accident, sickness, invalidism, and
old age compel the employer to pay one-half the insurance,—about three
dollars per year. It is said, however, that as a rule the employer pays
the entire amount. It is true this amount is small in families employing
but one servant and paying low wages, but where several servants are kept
and high wages given the total amount is considerable. On the other hand,
the burden is often relatively, though not absolutely, heavier in the
family with one servant on low wages, since this means a small income.
The amount of insurance varies with the wages, but the wages received by
most domestics place them in Class II. The government rates board and
lodging received by servants at 350_M._ per annum, and this with the
cash wages received puts the insurance at about three dollars annually,
an amount slightly in excess of that paid by the employees in Class I.
See _Unfallversicherungsgesetz_, _Krankenversicherungsgesetz_, and _Das
Reichsgesetz über die Invaliditäts- und Altersversicherung_. Each of the
states of the Empire has its own _Gesindeordnung_ and the conditions of
insurance are often stated in these.
[360] In France scarcely forty years ago it was considered impossible to
ascertain the wages paid domestic servants. _Statistique de la France.
Prix et salaires à diverses époques._ Paris, 1863. Cited by M. Gustave
Bienaymé in _Journal de la Société de Statistique de Paris_, November,
1899.
[361] M. Bienaymé has attempted, with the aid of information gained
through employment bureaus, personal recollections, household expense
books, and similar means, to give the wages paid in France since 1815.
The results of his investigations seem to show that wages in nearly every
branch of domestic service have steadily increased since that time,
until now the wages of an ordinary cook are 50 francs per month and a
chambermaid the same, while a general servant receives 40 francs per
month, the wages of all these classes of house servants having doubled
the past sixty years. At the same time the cost of maintenance has also
increased. He gives a table showing the increase, or in some cases the
decrease, in wages in every branch of domestic service during this
period. _Journal de la Société de Statistique de Paris_, November, 1899.
Practically the same estimates are given by M. Georges Salomon in “La
Domesticité,” _La Nouvelle Revue_, February 1, 1886. He cites a similar
opinion from M. Jules Simon.
Mr. Booth shows a gradual increase in the wages of servants as they grow
older or are advanced to better positions, but this does not necessarily
show a general increase from year to year. VIII., pt. II., _passim_.
Mr. A. E. Bateman considers it impossible to state, for England, what the
movement of wages in domestic service has been. _Journal of the Royal
Statistical Society_, LXI., 264-265.
[362] An account of the protest against this on the part of the
“Amalgamated Waiters’ Society” is given by the London correspondent of
_The Evening Post_ (New York) in the issue of December 10, 1900.
[363] A writer in _Le Matin_ (Paris) of April 15, 1900, urges the
formation of a society each member of which shall pledge himself not to
give fees.
[364] Mr. William Clarke, in _The Social Future of England_, sums up
the character of domestic service in England in saying: “It is true
that English middle-class service is bad, and even growing worse, and
this will continue so long as factory labor is preferred to domestic
service. But there is probably no country where the wealthy can secure
such efficient and fairly honest service in the butler, valet, lady’s
maid, and housekeeper lines as in England.”—_The Contemporary Review_,
December, 1900.
The historical question whether the character of the service has ever
been any better than it is at present must also remain unanswered for
the same reason. Pandolfini in _Il Governo della Famiglia_ finds the
philosophical explanation of poor service in Italy during the fifteenth
century in the tendency of servants to seek their own interests rather
than those of their masters—an explanation limited by neither time nor
place. All literature goes to show that our own age is not alone in
finding it difficult to secure those who will “carry the message to
Garcia.”
[365] _Barber of Seville_, I., 2.
[366] The employer as a rule commands absolutely the time of the
employee; for example, in Germany the employee spends her time in
knitting for the family, in working out of doors, or in similar ways. The
hours everywhere seemed to me much longer than those required in America,
largely owing to the lateness of the evening meal, which is universally
dinner in France, Italy, and England.
[367] The lack of elevators in even large apartment houses, the necessity
of storing fuel—unless bought in small quantities—in the cellar, the
absence of a common heating system, no arrangements for carrying water
to every room and the difficulty of securing an adequate supply of hot
water, the necessity of daily marketing, the little use of ice, the
punctiliousness with which the top box on the top shelf of the closet
must be dusted, especially in Germany and in Holland, the endless
scrubbing of floors and stairs and polishing of brass and copper, the use
of candles and kerosene in private houses and even in large pensions and
hotels,—these are but suggestions of ways in which domestic service is
much harder than it is in America.
[368] The living accommodations provided for employees seemed to me
everywhere distinctly inferior to those provided in America. In London,
“as far as possible the men are lodged in the basement, while the women
have their rooms at the top of the house. This arrangement, though always
desirable, often necessitates two or even three men using the servants’
hall as their bedroom, while another sleeps in the pantry, and another
beneath the stairs. Breathing space is restricted and the want of air,
and high living, coupled with the absence of hard work or exercise, lead
naturally to a demand for some form of stimulant, with the result that
numbers of men-servants ultimately take to drink.”—Booth, VIII., 228-229.
The sleeping rooms given servants are small and cheerless, hot in summer
and cold in winter, while often the only place provided for taking meals
is a corner of the kitchen table.
[369] Bouniceau-Gesmon finds a fundamental difference between slavery
and domestic service, as indeed there is, and denies that one is the
outgrowth of the other, since the two have sometimes existed side by
side. _Domestiques et Maîtres_, chap. I. But while the one is bond and
the other free, and while the labor performed in both states is the same
and should be honorable, the fact remains that the domestic servant has
inherited to a great degree the social opprobrium that attached to the
slave and the serf.
[370] Gil Blas, Figaro, and Lafleur have long stood as types of the
eighteenth century valet. Walter Scott says of the former, “as to
respect, it is the last thing which he asks at his reader’s hand.”
[_Biographical Memoir of Le Sage._] Both Dean Swift and Daniel DeFoe
sharpened their pens with infinite pains in describing the servants of
their times. At a later date the pencil of Cruikshank found employment
in illustrating Mayhew’s _Greatest Plague in Life_, while _Punch_ for
years revelled in the opportunities afforded by “servant-gallism.”
Babeau, Bouniceau-Gesmon, and Salomon show similar conditions in France.
“Stealing is an infamous thing—it is the sin of a lackey,” remarks a
priest to a pupil who confessed a theft. Cited by Babeau, p. 290. “To lie
like a lackey” is almost proverbial.
[371] There are indeed many illustrations of servants of an altogether
different character—Caleb in _The Bride of Lammermoor_ and Marcel in _The
Huguenots_ are types of the faithful servitor who alike in prosperity and
in adversity remains constant to the family in whose service he was born.
The fact remains, however, that the servant exists as a type in European
literature as he does not in that of America.
[372] _La Nouvelle Revue_, February 1, 1886.
[373] “It is, in fact, almost necessary to have an inherited aptitude for
the relationship involved—a relationship very similar in some respects
to that subsisting between sovereign and subject. From both servant and
subject there is demanded an all-pervading attitude of watchful respect,
accompanied by a readiness to respond at once to any gracious advance
that may be made without ever presuming or for a moment ‘forgetting
themselves.’”—Booth, VIII., 225.
[374] “The habits of servants in large houses and the strict observance
of etiquette give rise to some very curious customs. There are three
grades of servants, named ‘kitchen,’ ‘hall,’ and ‘room,’ after the places
in which they take their meals.”—Booth, VIII., 229.
“There is no class less open to democratic ideas than a contented
servant class. Compared with them their titled and wealthy employers are
revolutionists. They cannot bear change, their minds are saturated with
the idea of social grades and distinctions, they will not even live with
one another on terms of social equality.”—William Clarke, _Contemporary
Review_, December, 1900.
[375] Mercier speaks of establishments where valets and maids had
themselves valets and lackeys (XI., 277), and says that generally a
lackey in the upper classes takes the name of his master when he goes
with other lackeys, as he also adopts his customs, his gestures, his
manners, carries a gold watch, and wears lace; a lackey _du dernier ton_
even wears two watches like his master (II., 124).
“The maid of a visitor ranks, of course, with the upper servants. She
is addressed not by her own name, but by the surname or title of her
mistress.”—Booth, VIII., 230.
[376] “I have four servants in London who do the work two used to do in
New York.”—American housekeeper in London. Booth, VIII., 225-230 _passim_.
[377] Booth, VIII., 224.
An interesting illustration of the social stratification in England is
suggested by the sermons delivered to servants by the late Master of
Balliol. _Sermons_, pp. vii., 348. Lewis Carroll “was always ready and
willing to preach at the special service for college servants which used
to be held at Christ Church every Sunday evening.”—Collingwood, _Life and
Letters of Lewis Carroll_, p. 77.
[378] The home for aged servants in Dresden is under the immediate
patronage of the Queen. In 1892, when visited, it had accommodations for
fifteen women who must be at least sixty-two years old and give proof
of having been a servant before being admitted. It does not apparently
differ in principle from a well-conducted old ladies’ home except that
its inmates must all have been servants.
[379] There are many of these homes where girls out of employment can
have comfortable accommodations at a reasonable rate. One of the most
interesting is the “Heimatshaus für Mädchen” in Berlin. In 1892 it was
located under the “Stadtbahn” or elevated railroad of the city. Under
pressure it could accommodate two hundred and was constantly increasing
its facilities. In 1891 five thousand girls had found in it a temporary
home. They remained on an average about five days. Each occupant pays 25
pfennigs for lodging, 10 for coffee, 15 for dinner, and 10 for supper.
Even at these very low rates the home is self-supporting. The only
source of income is the fees paid to the employment bureau carried on in
connection with the home. Every employer pays 3 marks when he secures a
servant through the bureau, and every employee pays the same when a place
is secured. That the class of servants who frequent it have a family
likeness to their sisters in America was indicated by the questions
overheard asked by would-be servants of prospective employers: “How many
children are there in the family?” “How many servants do you keep?” “Is
there running water in your flat?” “How many flights up do you live?”
[380] The Sonntags-Verein has its headquarters in Berlin where in 1892 it
had twenty-nine unions under its charge, with one hundred and twenty-one
in other parts of Germany and six in Russia, England, and Austria. Its
work is almost exclusively religious in character, but entertainment is
provided consisting of music, games, and reading, and beer or tea is
served with bread and butter. About fifteen hundred girls were members of
the Berlin branches in 1892. The difficulty of starting and maintaining
these unions was very great. The free time of household employees is
every other or every third Sunday afternoon, so that attendance is very
irregular and interest correspondingly fluctuating. Employers often
discourage the attendance of their employees, saying that they need rest
rather than recreation, while the girls themselves often prefer the
coffee-houses or beer gardens. The _Deutsche Mädchen-Zeitung_ in 1892 had
been published twenty-three years in the interests of the Verein and had
a circulation of four thousand copies. These, however, were not taken by
the girls themselves, but by their employers for them. “The Germans never
wish to pay for anything themselves, they wish everything given them,”
said a German employer in explanation. The Sonntags-Verein owed its
inception to the interest in the class of household employees taken by
Frau Banquier Lösche, and since her death, four years ago, the work has
been carried on by her daughter.
[381] These usually receive young girls after they have been
confirmed,—at about fourteen years of age,—and train them in everything
pertaining to the house. They do not naturally at that age go of their
own accord, but they are taken by their parents or guardians who often
sign a contract, agreeing that the girl will remain in the school
at least one or two years, as the case may be. The schools are well
attended, and the girls apparently contented.
Edward S. Joynes, in his report on the _Industrial Education of Women in
Germany_ (Columbia, S.C., 1896), gives a full description of the training
in domestic work given in the regular German industrial schools for girls.
[382] At least two important historical studies of the topic have been
made,—one by Mr. Albert Matthews on “The Terms Hired Man and Help,” and
one by Mr. James D. Butler on “British Convicts Shipped to American
Colonies.” Statistical investigations of the subject have been carried on
by the state bureaus of labor in Minnesota, Colorado, and Indiana. The
Massachusetts bureau has collated the results of investigations made by
the Women’s Educational and Industrial Union of Boston, Miss Isabel Eaton
has made an exhaustive study of negro domestic service in the seventh
ward of the city of Philadelphia, different branches of the Association
of Collegiate Alumnæ have carried on valuable local inquiries into the
question, while the bureau of labor in Washington is about undertaking
a comprehensive study of the entire subject. The New York state library
has issued a full list of articles and books bearing on the matter, and
the city libraries of Providence, Rhode Island, and Salem, Massachusetts,
have published similar lists. In view of these facts it seems not
unreasonable to make the above claim.
APPENDICES
APPENDIX I
SCHEDULE NO. I.—EMPLOYERS
STATISTICS OF DOMESTIC SERVICE
The graduates of Vassar College, Classes of ’88 and ’89, desire to
collect statistics in regard to the subject of domestic service, and ask
your assistance.
The work has grown out of a belief that a knowledge of some of the
actual conditions of such service, as viewed from the standpoint of
both employer and employee, is essential to an intelligent discussion
of this question. It is hoped to tabulate the results obtained, showing
the average wages paid in each occupation, the length of time employed,
etc. The statistics, to be of value, must represent the experiences of
many housekeepers in many localities, and the co-operation of all who are
interested in the subject is earnestly solicited. Three schedules are
sent you upon which to supply information.
SCHEDULE NO. I.—For Employers (mistresses of households).
SCHEDULE NO. II.—For Employees (domestic servants of all kinds).
SCHEDULE NO. III.—For Educational Statistics (from teachers, etc., in the
kinds of schools specified).
These schedules are sent to all housekeepers and their employees who can
be communicated with by the members of the Classes of ’88 and ’89 and the
Department of History.
Will you please fill out the following blank and return it to the person
sending it to you, or to the address given below? Please complete all the
columns relating to each person in your employ.
Only estimates can be given in reply to Questions 7, 10, and 12.
If any question—as No. 17—is not applicable to you, this sign—X—may
be used.
A prompt reply will be considered as a special favor.
_All personal information will be treated as confidential._ The name is
asked as a guarantee of good faith, to avoid sending duplicates, and to
render possible further correspondence in regard to special points of
experience. It may, however, be omitted if desired.
Please return to—DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY,
VASSAR COLLEGE,
POUGHKEEPSIE, N. Y.
December 1, 1889.
I Number engaged in each occupation
II Place of birth. If foreign born, state the number of years each
employee has resided in this country.
III Time in your employ
IV Paid by the day, week, or month
V Amount
VI With or without board
VII Actual working hours per day
VIII Time allowed each week
IX Vacation time allowed during year
X With or without loss of wages
============+=================+=================+=======================
| NUMBER ETC. | WAGES | LABOR
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
OCCUPATIONS | I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII| IX | X
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
WOMEN | | | | | | | | | |
GENERAL | | | | | | | | | |
SERVANTS | | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
SECOND GIRLS| | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
COOKS AND | | | | | | | | | |
LAUNDRESSES| | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
COOKS | | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
LAUNDRESSES | | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
CHAMBERMAIDS| | | | | | | | | |
AND | | | | | | | | | |
WAITRESSES | | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
CHAMBERMAIDS| | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
WAITRESSES | | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
NURSES | | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
SEAMSTRESSES| | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
| | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
| | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
MEN | | | | | | | | | |
BUTLERS | | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
COACHMEN AND| | | | | | | | | |
GARDENERS | | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
COACHMEN | | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
GARDENERS | | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
| | | | | $ | | | | |
------------+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----
| | | | | $ | | | | |
============+=====+=====+=====+=====+=====+=====+=====+=====+=====+=====
1. Name of Employer, ____
2. Post Office, ____ 3. County, ____
4. State, ____ 5. Date, ____
6. Do you live in a city, in a town, or in the country? ____
7. Estimated present population of city or town, ____
8. Leading industries of city or town, ____
9. Are women and girls employed in these industries? ____
10. Estimated total number so employed, ____
11. Are women and girls employed as clerks? ____
12. Estimated total number so employed, ____
13. Length of time you have been housekeeping, ____
14. Total number of domestic servants employed during that
time, ____
15. Length of time without servants, ____
16. Length of time you have boarded, ____
17. Length of time you have boarded since marriage, ____
18. Number of persons in your family, ____
19. Name any special privileges granted your servants, such as
single rooms, the use of a sitting-room, etc., ____
20. Have you paid, as a rule, higher or lower wages this
year than last year, and in what branches of occupation,
respectively? ____
21. Nature of the service rendered. Is it “Excellent,” “Good,”
“Fair,” or “Poor”? Please specify by kinds of employment, ____
22. Have you found it difficult to obtain good domestic
servants? ____
23. What explanation of the difficulty can you give? ____
24. How do you think the difficulty can be lessened or removed?
____
SCHEDULE NO. II.—EMPLOYEES
STATISTICS OF DOMESTIC SERVICE
1. Name, ____
2. Place of birth, ____
3. Present residence (city or town, and state), ____
4. Name of present employer, ____
5. Present occupation, ____
6. Years of service in present occupation, ____
7. Years of service with present employer, ____
8. Number of previous employers (domestic occupations), ____
9. Whole number of years engaged in domestic occupations, ____
10. Present wages received, per week, $____; per month, $____
11. Highest wages received from previous employers, per week,
$____; per month, $____
12. Lowest wages received from previous employers, per week,
$____; per month, $____
13. Have you ever had any regular employment other than
housework? ____
14. Name such kinds of employment, ____
15. Highest wages received in other than domestic occupations,
per week, $____; per month, $____
16. Lowest wages received in other than domestic occupations,
per week, $____; per month, $____
17. Why do you choose housework as your regular employment? ____
18. What reasons can you give why more women do not choose
housework as a regular employment? ____
19. Would you give up housework if you could find another
occupation that would pay you as well? ____
NOTE.—All personal information will be treated as confidential.
Please return the Schedule to the person giving it to you, or
to—
DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY,
VASSAR COLLEGE,
POUGHKEEPSIE, N. Y.
December 1, 1889.
SCHEDULE NO. III.—SCHOOLS, ETC.
STATISTICS OF DOMESTIC SERVICE
SCHOOLS FOR TRAINING DOMESTIC SERVANTS
1. City or Town, and State, ____
2. Number of such schools, ____
3. How supported, ____
4. Number that can be accommodated at the present time, ____
5. Present number in attendance, ____
6. Greatest number ever in attendance, ____
7. Total number in attendance since organization, ____
PUBLIC SCHOOLS WHERE HOUSEHOLD EMPLOYMENTS ARE TAUGHT
8. City or Town, and State, ____
9. Number of such schools, ____
10. Kinds of employment taught, ____
11. Is instruction compulsory or optional? ____
12. Is the object of such instruction technical or general? ____
13. Present number receiving such instruction, ____
PRIVATE SCHOOLS WHERE HOUSEHOLD EMPLOYMENTS ARE TAUGHT
14. Names of schools, ____
15. City or Town, and State, ____
16. Present number receiving such instruction, ____
WOMEN’S EXCHANGES, ETC.
17. Please give, below, instances with which you are acquainted
of
1. Women’s exchanges.
2. Co-operative housekeeping.
3. Food prepared at home for sale outside.
4. Housework, not including ordinary day labor or sewing done
by persons other than regular servants,
and state also how far the results in these cases have been
remunerative, ____
Name, ____
Address, ____
Please return the Schedule to the person giving it to you, or to
DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY,
VASSAR COLLEGE,
POUGHKEEPSIE, N. Y.
December 1, 1889.
APPENDIX II
The following table shows the geographical distribution of the replies
received to the schedules sent out.
=================================================================
| NUMBERS
+-------------------------------------------
STATES | CITIES AND TOWNS | EMPLOYERS | EMPLOYEES
| REPRESENTED | |
---------------------+------------------+-----------+------------
Alabama | 2 | 2 | 11
California | 13 | 30 | 76
Colorado | 2 | 2 | 2
Connecticut | 18 | 37 | 86
District of Columbia | 1 | 13 | 32
Florida | 3 | 3 | 8
Illinois | 27 | 58 | 146
Indiana | 11 | 45 | 94
Iowa | 14 | 38 | 68
Kansas | 4 | 6 | 9
Kentucky | 2 | 5 | 9
Louisiana | 2 | 2 | 2
Maine | 4 | 6 | 6
Maryland | 1 | 5 | 16
Massachusetts | 53 | 199 | 486
Michigan | 21 | 45 | 80
Minnesota | 5 | 6 | 12
Mississippi | 1 | 1 | 1
Missouri | 4 | 26 | 90
Nebraska | 4 | 12 | 21
Nevada | 1 | 2 | 2
New Hampshire | 5 | 5 | 6
New Jersey | 16 | 42 | 126
New York | 58 | 231 | 606
North Carolina | 2 | 2 | 2
Ohio | 10 | 30 | 81
Pennsylvania | 18 | 58 | 202
Rhode Island | 4 | 8 | 32
South Carolina | 8 | 23 | 94
South Dakota | 2 | 2 | 2
Tennessee | 1 | 1 | 3
Texas | 5 | 31 | 72
Utah | 1 | 2 | 4
Vermont | 3 | 3 | 8
Virginia | 2 | 3 | 9
Washington | 2 | 2 | 3
Wisconsin | 9 | 19 | 38
---------------------+------------------+-----------+------------
Total | 339 | 1005 | 2545
=================================================================
APPENDIX III
The following circular letter was sent out in November, 1895, to the
members of the Civic Club of Philadelphia:
_The Committee on Household Economics to the Members of the
Civic Club_:
The following standards of work and wages are submitted by the
Committee on Household Economics to the members of the Civic
Club for their consideration, with a view to taking some action
on the subject during the next season.
If any amendments or additions suggest themselves to the
members of the Club, will they please note them in the blank
space left for that purpose, and send the paper to the Chairman
of the Household Economics at the address given below?
In case an applicant for service fails to come up to these
standards, the employer agrees to furnish instruction in the
points of failure, the employee agreeing to share half the
expense of such instruction by accepting a corresponding
reduction of weekly wages until skill is attained. It is
understood, of course, that the employer furnishes the proper
materials and utensils for the performance of the labor.
STANDARDS OF WORK AND WAGES IN HOUSEHOLD LABOR
COOKS AT $3.50 OR $4.00 PER WEEK
Must understand care of range or stove.
Must understand care of sinks and drains.
Must understand care of kitchen, cellar, and ice-chest.
Must understand care of utensils.
Must understand making bread, biscuit, muffins, and griddle cakes.
Must understand making soup stock.
Must understand roasting, boiling, and broiling meats.
Must understand dressing and cooking poultry.
Must understand cooking eggs, fish, and oysters.
Must understand cooking vegetables, fresh or canned.
Must understand making tea and coffee.
Must understand making plain desserts.
WAITRESSES AT $3.00 OR $3.50 PER WEEK
Must understand care of dining-room.
Must understand care of silver, glass, and china.
Must understand care and attention in waiting on the table.
Must understand care of parlor and halls.
Must understand answering the door-bell properly.
CHAMBERMAIDS AT $3.00 OR $3.50 PER WEEK
Must understand care of bedrooms.
Must understand care of beds and bedding.
Must understand sweeping and dusting.
Must understand care of toilet and bath-rooms.
Must understand care of hard-wood floors.
CHILD’S NURSE AT $3.00 OR $3.50 PER WEEK
Must understand washing, dressing, and feeding of children.
Must understand general care of the health and well-being of children.
LAUNDRESS AT $3.50 OR $4.00 PER WEEK
Must understand washing and ironing.
Must understand general care of bed- and table-linen and clothes.
SEAMSTRESS AT $3.50 OR $4.00 PER WEEK
Must understand plain sewing.
Must understand mending and darning.
Must understand use of sewing machine.
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ZESSER, W. _Das Reichsgesetz über die Invaliditäts- und
Altersversicherung._ Munich, 1891.
INDEX
Advertisements of Indian servants in colonial times, 49, n.
Aladdin oven, 215.
Alsop, George, on condition of redemptioners in Maryland, 25.
American Economic Association, assistance of, in obtaining
statistics, preface, vii.
American domestic employees, dislike of, of competition with foreign
born and negro elements, 147.
American Statistical Association, assistance of, in obtaining
statistics, preface, vii.
Anburey, Thomas, on effect of slavery upon people of the South, 52, n.
Anti-slavery agitation, new occupations for women opened by, 11, 12.
Apartment house, a necessary evil at the present time, 191, 229.
Aristocracy, yielding of, to democracy, 227.
Arusmont, Madame d’, on influence of democratic spirit upon domestic
employees in America, 60.
Atwater, W. O., investigations of, in chemistry of foods, 261, n.
Australia, domestic service in, 128, n.
Babeau, A., _Les artisans et les domestiques d’autrefois_, 289, n.,
290, n., 291, n., 296, n.
Bacon, Alice M., on domestic service in Japan, 148, n., 209.
Bacon, Francis, protest of, against transportation of convicts to
America, 18, 19, n.
Bakers, colonial laws in Virginia to punish pilfering of, 32, n.
Baking done out of the house in Europe, 280.
Bateman, A. E., on wages in domestic service in England, 294, n.
Batman, Margery, wages of, 29.
Bellamy, Edward, on co-operative housekeeping, 192.
Berlin, Heimatshaus für Mädchen, 300, n.;
Sonntags-Verein, 300, n.
Bienaymé, G., _Le Coût de la vie à Paris_, 288, n., 291, n., 293, n.
Billon, M., on benefit of profit sharing, 238.
Bird, Isabella, on difficulty of procuring good servants, 58, 59.
Boarding, co-operative, 191, 192.
Booth, Charles, on domestic service in London, 128, n., 282, n., 286,
n., 287, n., 289, n., 292, n., 294, n., 298, n., 299, n.
Boston, poor service in 1636 in, 35.
Boston, negro servants in, about 1700, 51, n.
Boston Health Food Company, bread made by, 213, n.
Boston Oriental Tea Company, 216.
Boston Women’s Educational and Industrial Union, 126, n.
Boston Young Women’s Christian Association, employment bureau of,
116, n., 126, n.
Bouniceau-Gesmon, _Domestiques et maîtres_, 290, n., 291, n., 296, n.
Braddon, M. E., on domestic service in England, 128.
Bradford, Governor, his use of word “servant,” 69, n.
Braun, Otto, on legal relations between employer and employee in
Germany, 281, n., 282, n.
Bread, made better and more scientifically out of the home, 213.
Breck, Samuel, purchase of redemptioners by, 20, n.;
on wages paid to redemptioners by, 29;
on scarcity of good servants, 1817, 58.
Bruce, P. A., on legal prohibition of introduction of English
criminals into colonies, 19, n.
Bulley, Amy, on domestic service in England, 128.
Bushill, Mr., of Coventry, England, on benefit of profit sharing, 238.
Butler, James D., on “British Convicts Shipped to American Colonies,”
18, n., 302, n.
Butlers, average wages of, statistics, 89, 94-96.
Cambridge, Mass., Co-operative Housekeeping Association, 187, 188.
Camping, prevalence of, has increased demand for prepared articles of
food, 216.
Canadians, Irish in factories displaced by, 11;
number of, in the United States, 78;
in domestic service, 79.
Cap and apron, as badge of servitude, 157, 210;
not mark of attainment or desire for neatness, 157, 209;
not necessarily badge of servitude, 209, 210;
regulations for wearing should be reasonable, 210.
Carroll, Lewis, on preaching to servants, 299, n.
Caterers, services of, growing in demand, 217.
Chambermaids, average wages of, statistics, 89, 94-97.
Chambermaids and waitresses, average wages of, statistics, 89, 94-96.
Charleston, S.C., Employment Bureau, 173, n.
Cheese, manufacture of, transferred from home to factories, 215.
Chevalier, Michel, on Sunday privileges of servants, 1839, 58.
Child, Sir Joshua, on benefit to England of shipping convicts to
America, 17.
Chinese, in domestic service, number of, 64, n.;
have lowered its social position, 147, n.
Chinese domestics, character of service, 176, n.
Chinese immigration, 64.
Chinese treaty, 1844, effect on domestic service in America, 64.
Choremen, average wages of, statistics, 89, 95, 96.
Christian name, use of, in case of domestic employees, 156;
applied to no other class of workers, 156;
implies lack of dignity, 156;
allows unpleasant familiarity, 156;
custom should be abandoned or modified, 209.
Church sales of articles of food, 217.
Cities, majority of foreign born found in, 77, 78;
majority of domestic employees found in, 83;
manufacturing, have smallest relative number of domestic employees,
84.
City life, attraction of, for domestic employees, 83.
Clarke, William, on domestic service in England, 294, n., 298, n.
Clothing, men’s, manufacture of, transferred from the home to
business houses, 215.
Clothing, women’s, increase of its manufacture outside the home, 213,
216.
Clubs and societies, among domestic employees, 207.
Coachmen, average wages of, statistics, 89, 94-96.
Coachmen and gardeners, average wages of, statistics, 89, 94-96.
Cobbett, William, on self-respect of servants in America, 1828, 57,
58.
Coffee, roasting of, transferred from the kitchen to business firms,
214.
Coffee, sent hot from Boston to St. Louis, 216, n.
College students, experiments of, in co-operative boarding, 191.
College students, table service performed by, 142.
Collet, C. E., on domestic service in England, 280, n., 286, n., 288,
n., 289, n., 290, n., 292, n.
Colletet, F., _Le Tracas de Paris_ quoted, 291, n.
Colonial laws, regarding servants, 22-48;
law in Virginia binding servants coming without indenture, 23, 24;
in North Carolina, 24, n.;
in Maryland, 25, n.;
in West New Jersey, 25, n.;
laws regulating wages, 30, 31;
to prevent pilfering on part of servants, 32;
laws not specifically for household employees, but for all
servants, 37;
law to protect servants against ill-treatment from masters, 38-40;
to protect masters, 40-46;
latter more specific, 40;
relate chiefly to runaways, 40;
penalties for harboring runaways, 41-43;
rewards for capture of runaways, 43, 44;
means for prevention of runaways, 44;
laws for infliction of corporal punishment upon servants, 45;
for prevention of bartering with servants, 45, 46;
examples of laws placing oppressive restrictions upon servants, 47;
laws to prohibit freeing servants, 47, 48.
Colonial period of domestic service, see Domestic service.
Colored servants, see Negro domestic employees, Negro slaves.
Competition of other industries with domestic service, 68.
Compulsory insurance adds to wages in Germany and in Belgium, 292.
Concentration of capital and labor, an industrial tendency, 194.
Connecticut, redemptioners in, 20, 28;
instances of troubles with servants in colonial times, 36;
colonial law protecting servants against injury from master, 39, n.;
fixing penalties upon those who harbored runaways, 42;
fixing reward for capturing runaways, 44;
allowing corporal punishment, 45;
to prevent barter with servants, 46;
to prevent freeing of servants, 48.
Contracts, system of, in Germany, 281-283.
Convicts, transported, among the early colonial settlers, 17, 18;
as servants, 19;
term of service, 19.
See also Redemptioners.
“Cook,” as an appellation unobjectionable, 208.
Cooks, average wages of, statistics, 89, 94-97;
receive highest wages, 90;
give better satisfaction than general servants, 91;
social ostracism of, instance, 153, n.;
as skilled workers, should not be called “servants,” 208.
Cooks and laundresses, average wages of, statistics, 89, 94-96.
Co-operation, an industrial tendency, 196.
Co-operation, in the family _versus_ co-operation with other
families, 232.
Co-operation, unconscious, characteristic of modern industry, 212;
allowed to operate by having work done out of the house, 226.
Co-operative boarding, 191, 192;
benefits of, 192.
Co-operative housekeeping, 186-193;
Mrs. Peirce’s description of, 186, 187;
advantages, 187;
Rochdale Pioneers, 187;
Cambridge, Mass. Co-operative Housekeeping Association, 187, 188;
weak points, 188-191;
does not allow for weaknesses of human nature, 188-190;
practical difficulties in serving food, 190;
not desired by majority, 190, 191;
“The Roby,” 191;
experiments usually co-operative boarding, simply, 191;
Mr. Bellamy’s scheme of, 192.
Corporal punishment of servants, colonial laws concerning, 45.
Cost of living as affected by specialization of household
employments, 230.
Darwin, Mrs. E. W., on domestic service in England, 128, n.
Davenant, Charles, on England’s good fortune in being able to ship
convicts to America, 17.
DeFoe, Daniel, _Behaviour of Servants_, 48, n., 114, 115, 120, n.,
128.
Delaware, colonial law fixing reward for capturing runaways, 44.
Democratic spirit, prevalence of, in early part of century, 61;
characteristic of native born servants of early part of century,
61;
revival of, 66, 228.
Desserts, prepared out of the house, 214.
District of Columbia, largest number of domestics employed in, 82.
Division of labor, see Labor, division of.
“Domestic” recommended as substitute for “general servant,” 207.
Domestic employees in early New England, native born and of high
character, 11;
their self-respect, 49, n.
Domestic employees in colonial period, see also Convicts,
transported, Freewillers, Indians, Negroes, Redemptioners.
Domestic employees, number of, in the United States by latest census,
3;
average wages paid, 3, n., 88, 90-98;
average cost of board for each, 4, n.;
demand for, greater than supply, 14, 125;
democratic spirit of, at the North, 54-60;
in early part of century, difficult to procure, 56, 58, 61;
democratic spirit of, a subject of complaint, 59;
compared with domestic employees in Europe, 59;
causes of democratic spirit, 61;
negro slaves at the South, 61;
changes in kind among, between 1850 and 1870, 62;
introduction of Irish, 62;
of Germans, 63;
of Chinese, 64;
a new social and a new economic element introduced by foreign
born domestic employees, 64, 65;
change in kind at the South through abolition of slavery, 65;
lack of political privileges of, in Europe, 72, n.;
mostly of foreign birth, 74-77;
geographical distribution of, in the United States, 76;
number of Irish, 79;
number of German, 79;
number of English, 79;
number of Canadian, 79;
number of Swedish and Norwegian, 79;
few in agricultural and thinly settled states, 80;
relative number large in states containing large cities, 80;
smallest relative number in Oklahoma, 81;
greatest relative number in District of Columbia, New York,
Massachusetts, and New Jersey, 82;
relative number unaffected by aggregate wealth of state, 82;
affected by per capita wealth of state, 82;
high relative number in cities, 83;
relative number most affected by prevailing industry, 84, 87, 88;
relative number small in manufacturing towns, 84;
relative number large in the South, 84;
foreign born receive higher wages than native born, 91, 92;
savings, 102, 103;
small number of unemployed, 104, 105;
number in average family, 107;
nationalities represented in schedules forming basis of this work,
108, n.;
foreign born an extraneous element difficult to assimilate into
household, 109;
brief tenure of service, 109-112;
ignorance of, 112, 113;
dislike of occupation, 127;
industrial independence of, 130;
other occupations engaged in, 130, n.;
reasons for entering service, 131;
special privileges given, 133, 134;
hours of work, 143;
_disadvantages_—_social deprivations_, 152-154;
enforced loneliness, 154, n.;
obnoxious term “servant,” 156;
address by Christian name, 156;
wearing of livery, 157;
servility of manner expected, 158;
ignored socially, 158;
required to obey absurd orders, 158;
degraded by offering of fees, 158-162;
often required to go out at night unprotected, 162;
exposed to contamination in intelligence offices, 162;
do not care to be treated as members of the family, 170-172;
desire opportunity to live their lives in their own way, 172;
their demand for more social opportunities reasonable, 206;
demand cannot be met in private home, 206;
solitary instruction unsatisfactory, 206;
social opportunities more satisfactory if provided by them than for
them, 207;
taken from the home of employer through specialization of household
employments, 213-234;
independence of, secured through specialization of household
employments, 228;
moral education acquired through profit sharing, 247;
benefactions for, in Germany, 300.
See also Hours of work, Wages.
Domestic employments, see Household employments.
Domestic service, “the great American question,” 1;
discussed frequently, in a popular manner, 1;
has been omitted from economic discussion, 2;
omitted from theoretical discussion, 2;
reasons—capital not involved, 2;
no combinations formed, 2;
products of labor transient, 2;
omitted from official statistics because of no demand by public for
its investigation, 2, 3;
references to partial discussions, 3, n.;
subject has not been considered historically, 3;
an important question, considering numbers involved, 3;
nature of, has been regarded as personal only, 4;
regarded as an isolated form of industry, 5;
difficulties in domestic service due partly to incomplete division
of labor, 15;
three phases of, in America, 16;
in the colonial period, 16-53;
implied social inferiority even more than now, 53;
unsatisfactory to both master and servant, 53;
accompanied by definite legal exactions, 53;
in New England, early part of century, 54;
described by Harriet Martineau, 55, 56;
since 1850, 62-68;
at the North, change of personnel from native born to foreign,
62-65;
at the South, no change till later, 62;
causes of change—Irish famine, 62, 63;
German Revolution, 63, 64;
treaty between United States and China, 1844, 64;
effect of change, lowering of social status, 65;
at the South, condition changed with abolition of slavery, 65;
foreign born domestics introduced, 65;
the employment as affected by development of material resources,
66, 67;
mobility of, 67-69;
new rival occupations to compete with, 68;
changes indicated by history of “servant,” 69-71;
_economic phases of domestic service_, 74-106;
the occupation includes more foreign born women than any other
occupation, 77;
includes majority of foreign born wage-earning women, 77;
employees prefer city to country life, 77, 78, 83;
nationalities most represented, 79;
effect of aggregate wealth of state upon number, 82, 83;
statistics representing effect of locality, 85;
effect of per capita wealth, 86-88;
effect of prevailing industry greatest, 87;
character of service rendered, 91;
wages higher than average wages in other occupations, 93;
average annual earnings, 98;
remuneration compared with that in teaching, 101, 102;
wage limit sooner reached, 103, 104;
offers constant occupation and least loss of time, 104, 105;
free from strikes and combinations, 105;
conforms to economic conditions, 106;
_difficulties of employer_, 107-129;
not confined to America, 128, 129;
cannot be remedied without economic treatment, 129, 264;
_advantages in domestic service_, 130-139;
reasons given for entering, 131;
high wages, 132;
healthful occupation, 132;
externals of a home, 133;
free hours and vacations without loss of wages, 134-136;
useful training, 137;
the employment congenial to many, 137;
legal protection in, 138;
legal rights—freedom from physical punishment, sufficient food,
support during illness, good character, wages, damages for
discharge, 138;
advantages are inherent in the occupation, 139;
summed up, are those of “wages, hours, health, and morals,” 139;
advantages unavailing to attract, 139;
_industrial disadvantages_, 140-150;
independent of personal relationship, 140;
list of reasons given for not entering service, 140, 141;
little chance for promotion, 141;
lack of stimulus for the efficient and ambitious, 141, 142;
“housework never done,” 142, 143;
lack of organization in housework, 143;
irregularity of working hours, 143-146;
limited free time, 146;
in case of Americans, competition with foreign born and negroes,
146, 147;
strictures on personal independence, 147-149;
summary of industrial disadvantages, 149, 150;
_social disadvantages_, 151-166, 204-211, 266, 267;
no real home life for employees, 151;
being _in_ a family and not _of_ it, 152;
regulations in regard to visitors necessary, 152;
lack of opportunity to receive or give hospitality, 152;
exclusion from general social life of community, 153;
deprivation of opportunities for personal improvement, 153, 154;
appellation of “servant,” 155;
use of Christian name in address, 156;
requirement of livery, 157;
requirement of servility of manner, 158;
custom of offering fees, 158-162;
lack of protection and exposure to vice, 162;
discrimination according to ordinary social standards not expected,
193, n.;
social inferiority weighs more than anything else against the
employment, 163;
other disadvantages, 164;
advantages and disadvantages compared, 165;
latter outweigh former, 166;
remedies adapted to nature of difficulties required, 168;
no panacea, 168;
reform must be in line with industrial progress, 168;
must be an evolution, 168;
cannot be immediate, 168, 169;
real problem of domestic service, 198;
the subject neglected by economic students and writers, 199;
its importance underestimated in public sentiment, 200, 201;
improvement dependent on wider general education and more
scientific investigation, 203;
social disadvantages can be removed or modified, 204;
removal of social barriers will remove social ban, 211;
improvement impossible, till housekeeping as a profession advances,
254;
improvement hindered by partial treatment of labor question, 264;
by conservatism of many women, 264, 265;
by tendency of women toward aristocracy, 265;
by tendency to display of wealth, 265, 266;
responsibility of introducing improvement rests on all, 266;
investigation and discussion will result in removal of social
stigma, 266, 267;
in removal of work and worker from home of employer, 267;
in placing the employment on a business basis, 268;
in readjustment of work of both men and women, 270;
suggestions as to means of attaining results, 273;
a subject of serious study and investigation in America, 302.
See also Convicts, transported, Freewillers, Redemptioners,
Remedies, Wages.
Domestic service in Europe, 275-302;
compared with domestic service in America, 275;
affected by social and political conditions, 276;
affected by domestic architecture, 277;
affected by domestic and social customs, 278;
presents practically the same problems as in America, 278-280;
_advantages_, 280-294, 300;
baking and washing done out of the house, 280;
requirement of more work in other ways counterbalances this
advantage, 281;
system of contracts in Germany, 281-283;
German service-books, 284-286;
large number of men employees, 286-288;
comparative freedom from foreign competition, 286-287;
the result a greater respect among employees for the occupation,
287-288;
apparent cheapness to the employer is deceiving, 288;
low wages supplemented by gifts, fees, “beer-money,” special
privileges, compulsory insurance, 289, 292;
_disadvantages_, 295-302;
long hours of service, 295, n.;
hardness of work, 295, n.;
hardness of life, 295, n.;
social disadvantages, 296-299;
inherits stigma of slavery and serfdom, 296, n.;
tax on men servants in England, 297;
requirement of servility, 297;
rigid class distinctions of employees observed by themselves, 298;
condition in France, 299;
condition in Italy, 299;
disadvantages partly mitigated in Germany by various benefactions,
300;
branded by ridicule in literature and the press, 301;
the subject given no earnest study, 302.
Domestic system, see Home manufactures.
Dresden, home for aged servants in, 300, n.
Dudley, Mrs. Mary Winthrop, description of a refractory servant by,
35.
Earnings of domestic employees, 98.
See also Wages.
Economic discussion of domestic service neglected, 2, 199.
Economic gains from specialization of household employments, 229.
Economic laws, disregard of, by employers of domestic service,
117-122.
Economic phases of domestic service, 74-106.
Economic tendencies, see Industrial tendencies.
Education, views of effect of, on domestic service, 179.
Education in household affairs, 251-262.
Electricity in the household, 9, 232.
“Employer,” use of, for “master” and “mistress,” 207.
Employers, their personal point of view, 4;
difficulties of, 107-129;
assimilation into household of foreign and ignorant employees, 109;
restlessness of domestic employees, 109-112;
ignorance of domestic employees, 112, 113;
the choice of a domestic a lottery, 114-117;
general disregard among employers of economic principles, 117-122;
individual irresponsibility of employers, 121, 122;
difficulties of, increasing, 125, n.;
fewer under certain conditions, 126;
difficulties also in England, Germany, and France, 127;
due to a defective and antiquated system, 129;
individual standpoint of many employers, 170;
each responsible to all, 266.
See also Housekeepers.
Employment Bureau, unsatisfactory, 115-117;
application of profit sharing to, 244.
Employments of men and women need readjustment, 270-272.
England, domestic service in, unsatisfactory, 127, 128.
English custom of using surname for domestics, 157.
English in the United States, number of, 78;
in domestic service, number of, 79.
Ethics of domestic service given too exclusive attention, 167.
Evans, Elizabeth, wages of, 28.
Extravagance of domestics checked through system of profit sharing,
241, 242.
Extravagant habits acquired in domestic service, 150.
Factory system, substituted for the domestic system, 8-15;
agencies which brought about, 8;
released labor from the home, 10;
changed personnel of domestic service, 11;
diverted labor into other channels, 11, 12;
made some labor idle, 12;
produced social prejudice against labor of women for remuneration,
12, 14;
mobility of labor introduced by, 67.
Faithful, Emily, on domestic service in England, 128, n.
Family, average, 107.
Family life marred by introduction of domestics, 171, 172.
Fancy work, as result of idle labor, 12;
George Eliot on, 12, n.;
“intellectual fancy work,” 13.
Feeing, 158-162;
effects of, 159;
humiliates giver and receiver, 159;
creates eye service, 159;
degrades and demoralizes, 159;
excuses offered for, 161, 162;
feeing of a few, brands all domestics as a class, 162, 245;
abolition of feeing, 210;
abolished through adoption of profit sharing, 244, 245.
Fees, offered to no other class of workers, 159;
undemocratic, 159;
brand the recipient socially, 160;
are bribes, 160;
objectionable manner of giving, 160, 161;
given to eke out wages of underpaid employees, 161;
same principle not practised in regard to other underpaid
employments, 161;
established customs in regard to them in Europe, 290-291.
Feudge, F. R., Chinese cook quoted by, 148, n.
Flats, custom of living in, makes it desirable to dispense with
domestics, 227, 229.
Food, list of articles of, whose preparation outside the home is
increasing, 213;
preparation of, out of the house for final application of heat,
214, 215, 219, 220;
prepared for church and missionary sales, 217, n.;
in some cases better if prepared in small quantities, 232.
Foods, chemistry of, 261.
France, domestic service in, unsatisfactory, 129.
Free laborers, indented servants at the North supplanted by, 54.
Freewillers, 19.
French constitutions, 1795 and 1799, right of suffrage denied
servants by, 72, n.
Frethorne, Richard, sufferings of indented servants described by, 27.
Fruits, canned, preparation of, outside the home increasing, 213.
Fruits better canned where they grow than after transportation, 220,
221.
Gallatin, Albert, on change from home to factory manufacture of
clothing materials, 215.
Gardeners, average wages of, statistics, 89, 94-96.
Gardeners, see Coachmen.
Gas, natural, use of, in the household, 9.
General servant, average wages of, statistics, 89, 94-97.
German immigration, 63.
German redemptioners, 20, 21.
German revolution, 1848, effect of, on domestic service in America,
63.
German service-books, their introduction proposed, 178;
their advantages and disadvantages, 284-286.
Germans in the United States, number of, 78;
in domestic service, number of, 64, n., 79.
Germany, domestic service in, unsatisfactory, 128, 129;
legal relations in, between employer and employee, 281-286;
system of contracts in, 281-283;
benefactions for domestic employees in, 300.
Gifts supplement low wages in Europe, 289, 290.
Gilman, Nicholas Payne, on modern industry, 189;
on profit sharing, 236, 238, 241, 242.
Godkin, E. L., on influence of the Irish cook, 63, n.
Golden rule, application of, inadequate to reform domestic service,
169.
Grattan, Thomas, in praise of American servants, 57, n.;
on scarcity of “help,” 59, 60.
Grund, F. J., on self-respect of American servants, 57.
Hadley, A. T., on social standing in occupations, 163.
Hammond, J., _Leah and Rachel_, 21, n., 25, 26.
Harvard University Memorial Hall, boarding at, 249.
“Help,” 55, 57, 59, 60, 61, 65, 70.
Higginson, Col. Thomas, on children’s dislike of history, 205.
Holidays and half-holidays, 134, 135, 145.
Home industries which are now obsolete, 9, 215, 216.
Home instruction in household affairs inadequate, 258, 259.
Home life secured through specialization of household employments,
220, 226, 228.
Home life, lack of, in domestic service, 151.
Home-made bread, 213.
Home-made men’s clothing the rule in 1810, 215.
Home-made cheese formerly common, 215.
“Homemaker” suggested for “mistress,” 208, n.
Home manufacture of articles of food and clothing decreasing, 213.
Home manufactures superseded by factory system, 8, 215, 216;
may be revived by introduction of electricity into household, 232.
Hotel service, the only kind offering chance of promotion, 141;
advantages of profit sharing in—waste avoided, 244;
feeing abolished, 244, 245.
Hours, free, in domestic service, 134, 145, 146.
Hours of work, varied and irregular, 143-146;
statistics, 144.
Housecleaning, done by specialists, 224.
Household affairs, education in, 251-262;
information regarding conduct of, difficult to obtain, 251, 252;
one cause of slow progress, 252;
kinds of information needed in conduct of, 252, 253;
supplementary special education needed still more, 253;
university education in, 259-262;
results of, removal of social stigma from domestic service, 266,
267;
removal of work and worker from house, 267, 268;
placing of domestic service on business basis, 268.
Household employments, isolation of, 5;
changes introduced by inventions, 7, 9;
lightened by modern improvements, 9;
preferred to other kinds of occupation, 137;
avoided on account of disadvantages, 140, 141;
mistaken idea that results are transient, 142, 143;
the only employments not officially investigated, 198;
importance of, must be better appreciated, 199, 200, 202;
performed without remuneration, honored, performed for
remuneration, scorned, 202;
_specialization of household employments_, 212-234;
preparation of food, 213-221;
takes work from home, 213-234;
opens new occupation to women, 218;
practical instances, 219, n., 220, n., 224, n., 233, n.;
the transference need not lessen individuality of the home, 221,
222;
laundry work, 222, 223;
housecleaning, sweeping, care of rooms, etc., 224;
marketing, 225;
specialization would attract more able women, 226, 227;
would reduce house rent, 228;
would raise standard of work, 228;
would make discrimination possible between skilled and unskilled
labor, 228;
a flexible system of co-operation, 229;
adapted to “apartments,” 229;
would lessen monotony of life of employee, 229;
would change personal relation of employer and employee into a
business relation, 229;
would elevate drudgery to forms of distinct occupation, 229;
economic gains from, 229;
objections raised to, 230, 231;
found successful by those who have tried it, 233;
household employments as taught in schools, mechanical, 259;
must receive their due respect, 270.
Household sanitation, 261, n.
“Housekeeper,” as substitute for “general servant,” 207, 208, n.
“Housekeeper, Working,” as substitute for “servant,” 156.
Housekeepers, average wages of, statistics, 94-96;
reluctance of some to express dissatisfaction, 124;
convention of, of little avail, 179;
need of technical and scientific training, 200;
need of information and education, 253, 254;
conservatism of many, 264, 265;
responsibility of each to all, 266.
See also Employers.
Housekeeping, small advance made in profession of, 254;
reasons for, 254-258;
belief that instinct supplies the knowledge, 254-256;
belief that men have no active interest in it, 256, 257;
that all women have an interest and need no training, 257, 258;
home instruction in, inadequate, 258, 259;
university education needed, 259-262;
co-operative, see Co-operative housekeeping.
Housework, see Household employments.
Howells, W. D., on feeing, 162, n.
Hygienic advantage in having vegetables prepared out of the house,
214.
Idle labor, 10, 12, 270.
Idleness forced upon women, 202.
Improvement, enlarged opportunities for personal, 197.
Indented servants, see Redemptioners.
Indenture, form of, 22, 23, n.;
included time of service, nature of service and compensation, 22;
cases without, provided for by law, 23;
law of, in Virginia, 23, 24.
_Indian Narratives_, 20, n.
Indian servants not allowed to travel without a pass, 44.
Indians as servants in New England, 49-51;
advertisements of, 49, n., 50, n.
Industrial changes affecting domestic service in early part of
century, 66, 67.
Industrial tendencies—concentration of capital and labor, 194;
specialization of work, 195;
association and combination of workers, 195;
increase of technical training, 195;
co-operation, profit sharing, 196;
entrance of women into business occupations, 196;
estimate of work for its quality rather than for its kind, 197;
official investigation of business relations, 197, 198.
Industries, interdependence of, 15;
some which are now obsolete, 215, 216.
Insurance, Compulsory, see Compulsory insurance.
Intelligence office, see Employment bureau.
Inventions of the 18th century, co-operating influences with,
producing factory system, 8;
effect of, on household employments, 10-15.
Irish famine, 1846, effect of, on domestic service in America, 62.
Irish immigration, 62.
Irish immigration in Connecticut, 1764, 20;
in Massachusetts, 1718, 20.
Irish in the United States, number of, 64, n., 78;
in domestic service, 79.
Japan, domestic service in, 148, n.
Japanese custom of addressing employees, 209.
Johnson, Mrs., _Captivity_, 20, n.
Joynes, E. S., on training in domestic work in Germany, 301, n.
Kalm, Peter, on wages in Pennsylvania, 1748, 29.
Kemble, Fanny, on experience of her white maid in the South, 70, n.
Kent, Chancellor, on legal relation of masters and servants, 138.
Kitchen gardens, object and experience of, 185.
Knight, Madame, on treatment of servants in 1704, 28.
Labor, division of, in women’s work, caused by factory system, 11;
has resulted in unequal distribution of work, 13, 14;
in household employments only partially accomplished, 15;
characteristic of modern industry, 212;
results in greater variety of products, 222.
Labor of women more productive through specialization of household
employments, 231, 232.
Labor question, domestic service a part of, 129, 264.
Laundresses, average wages, statistics, 89, 94-97.
See also Cooks.
Laundry work, better done out of the house, 222, 223;
done out of the house in Europe, 280.
Laws protecting domestic employees, 138.
Laws, colonial, see Colonial laws.
Leclaire, M., on knowledge of the workman, 200.
_Leclaire, Maison_, 237.
Legal relations between employer and employee in Europe, 281-286.
Legal status of domestic employees, 138.
Levasseur, M., on proportion of failures among business firms, 245.
Library strictures in regard to domestic employees, 154, n.
Licenses for domestic employees, 177, 178.
Livery, absence of, in early times at the North, 57, 61.
See also Cap and apron.
Living, cost of, affected by specialization of household employments,
230.
London, domestic service in, 128, n.
London South Metropolitan Gas Company, profit sharing in, 239.
Lowell, J. R., on Indian servants, 51, n.;
on “help,” 55;
on influx of Irish domestic employees, 63.
Lyman, O. E., on legal status of domestic employees, 138, n.
Mackay, Charles, on “help,” 58, n.
“Maid” as substitute for “servant,” 156;
unobjectionable, 208.
Maid-of-all-work, present requirements of, 228.
Maine, high wages of redemptioners in, 28, n.;
instance related by John Winter of unsatisfactory service in, 33,
34.
Maine, Sir Henry Sumner, on equality, 211.
_Maison Leclaire_, 237.
Manufacturing industries, number of women in, in Massachusetts, 10,
n.;
women employees in, largely outnumber men, 10, n.;
greater demand for servants created by increase of, 11;
manufacturing industries utilize ignorant labor, 14;
relative number of domestic employees diminished by, 87.
Marketing, made a specialty by one person for many families, 225, 226.
Martineau, Harriet, on democratic condition of service in America,
55, 56.
Maryland, transported convicts in, 18;
freewillers in, 19;
redemptioners in, 21, 25;
colonial law regulating wages of redemptioners in, 31;
to protect servants in, 38, n.;
concerning runaways in, 41;
concerning those who harbored runaways in, 43;
fixing reward for capturing runaways in, 44;
preventing barter with servants in, 46;
redemptioners who rose to distinction in, 48, n.
Massachusetts, number of women in manufacturing industries in, 10, n.;
redemptioners in, 20;
colonial law concerning wages of redemptioners in, 30;
to protect servants in, 38, n.;
in regard to punishment of servants in, 45;
to prevent barter with servants in, 46;
debarring servants from holding public office in, 47;
concerning wearing apparel of servants in, 47;
prohibiting setting servants free in, 47;
proportion of foreign born domestic employees in, 77;
large relative number of domestic employees in, 82.
Massachusetts Bureau of Labor Statistics, returns from schedules
collated by, preface, ix, x.
“Master,” as a term should be abolished, 207.
Matthews, Albert, on fees, 290, n.;
_The Terms Hired Man and Help_, 302, n.
Meats, stuffed, delivered ready for final application of heat, 214.
Men as domestic employees in Europe, 286-288.
Mercier, L. S., on profits made by servants in France, 291, n.;
on class distinctions among domestic employees, 298, n.
Michigan, University of, women graduates of, assistance of, in
obtaining statistics, preface, vii.
“Mistress,” as an appellation should be abolished, 207.
Mitchell, Maria, on woman’s work, 272.
Mobility of labor made possible, 67;
developed to an inconvenient extent, 68.
Morton, Thomas, use of word “servant,” 69, n.
Munby, A. J., _Epitaphs of Servants_, 55, n.
Music lessons, desire for, ridiculed, 153, n.;
of a domestic, 154, n.
Negro domestic employees, their increase at the North a doubtful
remedy for difficulties, 172-175;
unsatisfactory service of, in the South, 173-175;
deteriorating, 174, n.;
character of employees, 175, n.
Negro slavery, influence of, on people of the South, 1778, 52, n.
Negro slaves, not allowed to travel without pass, 44;
in colonial Boston, 51, n.;
in the South, 51, 52.
Neill, E. D., on character of redemptioners, 48, n.
New England, redemptioners in, 20;
high character of domestic employees in early, 54, 57.
See also Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island.
New England Kitchen, Boston, bread made at, 214.
New Jersey, colonial law regulating wages in, 31;
to protect servants in, 38, n., 40;
concerning runaways in, 41;
concerning those who harbored runaways in, 42;
to prevent barter with servants in, 46;
large relative number of domestic employees in, 82.
New York, colonial law concerning wages of redemptioners in, 30;
to protect servants in, 38, n., 39;
concerning those who harbored runaways in, 42;
regarding punishment of servants in, 45;
preventing barter with servants in, 46;
large relative number of domestic employees in, 82.
New Zealand, law providing half-holiday discussed, 135, n.
North, the, introduction into, of more negro domestics a doubtful
remedy, 172-175.
North Carolina, colonial law regulating wages of redemptioners in,
30, 31;
to protect servants in, 38, n., 39, 40;
concerning runaways in, 41;
fixing reward for capturing runaways in, 43;
regarding corporal punishment of servants in, 45;
to prevent barter with servants in, 45;
to punish feigning of illness or carrying of arms in, 47;
prohibiting setting a servant free in, 47.
Northbrook, Earl of, footman of, tips received by, 160, n.
Norwegians, in the United States, see Swedes and Norwegians.
Oklahoma, fewest domestics employed in, 81.
Organization in household employments, lack of, an industrial
disadvantage, 143.
Oriental Tea Company, Boston, 216, n.
_Outlook_, on feeing, 162, n.
Parlor maids, average wages of, statistics, 90, 97.
Pea-sheller, 214, n.
Peace Dale Manufacturing Company, 238.
Peirce, Mrs., on co-operative housekeeping, 186-188.
Pennsylvania, transported convicts in, 18, n.;
wages of redemptioners in, 29;
colonial law regulating wages of redemptioners in, 30;
purpose of Act of 1700 regarding servants in, 37;
colonial law to protect servants in, 40;
regarding runaways in, 41;
fixing reward for capturing runaways in, 43;
to prevent barter with servants in, 46;
forbidding innkeepers to trust servants in, 47.
Personal relation between employer and employee usually alone
regarded, 4, 167;
changed to business relation through specialization of household
employments, 229.
Philadelphia Civic Club, classification of wages by, 268, n.
Placid Club, profit sharing at, 249.
Polly, Mary, indenture of, 23, n., 29.
Poor whites descendants of redemptioners, 49.
Porter, hotel, instance of a fortune acquired by, in fees, 160.
Porters, railway, profit sharing, in case of, advantages—waste
avoided, 244;
feeing abolished, 244, 245.
Posseldt, H., on legal relations between employer and employee in
Prussia, 281, n., 282, n.
Potter, Bishop, on luxury, 265.
Privileges, special, kinds given to employees, 133, 134.
Profit sharing, an industrial tendency, 196;
defined, 236, 237;
history of, 237;
benefits of, in its trial elsewhere, 237-242;
advantages—develops “group of industrial virtues,” 237;
lessons worry, 238;
checks waste, 238;
identifies interest of employer and employee, 238, 239, 247;
not a loss to employer, 239;
applied to domestic service, 240-250, 268, 269;
secures economy of time, material, appliances, 240, 241;
application, methods of, 242-244;
in case of hotel employees and railway porters, 244, 245;
advantages—waste avoided, feeing abolished, 244, 245;
objections raised to, 245-247;
instances of its trial given, 248-250.
Promotion in domestic service rare except in hotels, 141.
Public schools said to over-educate domestics, 179;
introduction of housework into, advocated by some, 179.
Recommendations of domestic employees unsatisfactory, 114, 115.
Redemptioners, 19-49;
term of service, 19;
probably outnumbered transported convicts, 20;
more in Southern and Middle colonies than in New England, 20;
of English, German, and Irish birth, 20;
not always from lower classes, 21;
methods by which they were obtained and transported, 22;
“spirited away,” 22, n.;
form of indenture, 22, 23, n.;
easy life of some described by Alsop, 25;
unenviable condition of majority, 25-28;
wages of, 28-31;
high in New England, 28;
generally low, 28;
poor quality of their service, 31-36;
colonial laws concerning their relation to masters, 38-48;
legal protection, 38-40;
legal precaution against their escape, 40, 41;
legal punishment for harboring any who escaped, 41, 42;
legal reward for their capture when escaped, 43, 44;
laws to prevent their escape, 44;
discomforts and hard treatment, 44;
laws for corporal punishment, 45;
laws to prevent barter with, 45, 46;
restricted by minute and oppressive laws, 47;
laws to prevent their being set free, 47, 48;
a few rose to high social position, 48;
supplanted by free laborers at the North, 54;
supplanted by negro slaves at the South, 54.
See also Colonial laws, Indenture, names of colonies.
Remedies, doubtful, 167-193;
many proposed, 167;
why ineffective, 167;
application of golden rule inadequate, 169;
application of intelligence not sufficient, 170;
receiving employee into family unsatisfactory, 170-172;
bringing negroes to the North, of doubtful benefit, 172-175;
importation of Chinese domestics would tend to drive out European
domestics, 176, 177;
licenses, not applicable, 177, 178;
German service books, not feasible, 178;
abolition of higher grades of public schools, 179;
introduction of housework into public schools, 179;
“Servant Reform Association,” 179, 180;
training schools do not promise success, undemocratic, 180-186;
co-operative housekeeping, 186-193;
causes of its failure, 193.
See also Co-operative housekeeping, Training schools.
Remedies, possible, must have historical and economic basis, 193, 194;
general principles, 194-203;
must be in line with industrial tendencies, 194;
cannot be immediate in effect, 199;
creation of social opportunities, 206, 207;
abolition of term “servant,” 207, 208;
disuse or less free use of Christian name, 209;
reasonable regulations for wearing cap and apron, 210;
relinquishment of demand for servility of manner, 210;
abolition of fees, 210;
specialization of household employments, 212-234;
measures must conform to principles of division of labor and
unconscious co-operation, 212;
practice of putting work out of the house, 213-234, 267, 268;
removing worker from the house, 213-234, 267, 268;
education in household affairs, 251-262;
improvement must be an evolution, 273.
See also Industrial tendencies, Profit sharing.
Rents, possible lessening of, through removal of necessity for
laundries in individual homes, 223.
Rhode Island, colonial laws concerning those who harbored runaways,
43;
for corporal punishment of servants, 45.
Richards, Mrs. Ellen S., and Talbot, Marion, _Household Sanitation_,
261, n.
“The Roby,” 191.
Rochdale Pioneers, 187.
Rowe, C. J., on domestic service in Australia, 128, n.
Runaways, legal punishment of, 41;
legal punishment of those harboring, 42, 43;
legal rewards for capturing, 44.
Salomon, G., on domestic service in France, 288, n., 289, n., 291,
n., 292, n., 293, n., 296, n.
Sanitation, household, 261, n.
Savings of domestic employees, 103.
Schloss, D. F., on profit sharing, 237-239.
Schouler, James, on relation of master and servant, 138.
Seamstresses, average wages of, statistics, 89, 94-97.
Second girl, average wages of, statistics, 89, 94-97.
“Servant,” as an appellation, 57, 58, 69-72, 155, 208;
history of its use in America, 69-71;
term offensive to American employees, 72;
not demeaning in itself, 155;
may be applied to any one, 155;
ordinary usage restricted to one who does housework for wages, 155;
protests against the term, 155, n.;
as used at present will continue to be a mark of social
degradation, 155, 156;
should be abolished, 207.
“Servant Reform Association,” 179, 180.
Service books, see German service books.
Servility of manner, absence of, at the North, in early colonial
period, 61;
required of domestics, 158;
an anomaly in a democratic country, 210.
Sewall, Judge, description by, of funeral of his negro servant, 27,
n.;
protest of, against negro slavery, 52, n.
Sewing women of New York City, 199, n.
Slavery, abolition of, opened competition in domestic service between
negroes and foreign born, 65;
abolition of, assisted in making labor mobile, 67.
Smyth, J. F. D., on use of term “servant,” 70, n.
Social condition of domestic service, improvement in, see Remedies,
possible.
Social disadvantages of domestic service, see Domestic service,
social disadvantages.
Social opportunities for domestics, the demand for more, reasonable,
206;
cannot be met in private home, 206.
Social position of different occupations changes, 205, 266, 267.
Social stigma attached to domestic service, its greatest
disadvantage, 163.
_Sot-Weed Factor_, 21, n., 22, n., 27, 48, n.
South Carolina, colonial law regulating wages of redemptioners, 30;
to protect servants, 40;
concerning runaways, 41;
concerning those who harbored runaways, 42;
concerning punishment of servants, 45;
to prevent barter with servants, 46;
difficulty of obtaining good domestics in, 173, n.
Specialization of labor, an industrial tendency, 195.
Specialization of household employments, see Household employments.
Spinning, revival of, as home industry in Westmoreland, 232, n.
Statistics, basis of, for this work, obtained through distribution of
schedules, preface, vii-xi.
Stephen, Sir James, on civil service reform, 274.
Stillman, W. J., on fees, 290, n.
Suffrage, right of, denied domestic servants in Europe, 72, n.
Sunday, free hours on, in domestic service, 134, 146, 147.
Sunday privileges of domestics in early part of century, 58.
Swedes and Norwegians in the United States, number of, 78;
number in domestic service, 79.
Syracuse, N. Y., Household Economic Club, 225, n.
Table service an art, 142;
may be performed by specialist, 224.
Talbot, Marion, and Richards, Mrs. Ellen S., _Household Sanitation_,
261, n.
Taylor, George, signer of the Declaration of Independence, a
Pennsylvania redemptioner, 48, n.
Tea Company, Oriental, Boston, 216, n.
Teachers, wages of, compared with wages of domestics, 99-102;
salaries of, statistics, 99, 100.
Technical training, demand for, an industrial tendency, 195.
Texas, preference in, for German and Swedish domestics, 173, n.
Thatcher, Rev. Peter, Indian servant of, 51.
Tips, see Feeing.
Tocqueville, A. de, on democratic condition of service in America, 57.
Training schools for domestics, 180-186;
possible benefits from, 180, 181;
demand for, from employers, 181;
scheme for their establishment in connection with World’s Fair,
1893, 181;
few established and those unsuccessful, 181;
reasons for their failure, 182-186;
admit pupils too young, 182;
course too short, 182;
attendance not voluntary, 182, 183;
ignorance of employers, 183;
not analogous to training schools for nurses, 183, 184;
methods superficial, 184, 185;
undemocratic, 185, 186.
Trollope, Mrs., on difficulty in obtaining servants, 58.
Troy, N. Y., laundries, 223.
Tutwiler, Julia R., on feeing, 162, n.
Unconscious co-operation, characteristic of modern industry, 212.
Unemployed, number of, among domestic employees, very small, 104, 105.
University education in household affairs needed, 259-262, 269.
Vacations, of domestic employees, 135, 136.
Valet, the, in literature, 296, n.
Vassar College, Associate Alumnæ of, assistance of, in obtaining
statistics, preface, vii;
Classes of 1888 and 1889, assistance of, in obtaining statistics,
preface, vii.
Vegetables, preparation of, for cooking, 214;
canning of, 214, n.
Verney, Thomas, a redemptioner, 21, n.
Virginia, transported convicts in, 18;
General Court of, prohibits introduction of English criminals, 19,
n.;
redemptioners in, 21, n., 23, 25, 27, 48, n.;
colonial law of indenture in, 23, 24;
laws binding servants not indented in, 23, 24;
law regulating wages of redemptioners in, 30;
to punish pilfering of bakers in, 32, n.;
fixing reward for capturing runaways in, 44.
Wages in domestic service, total aggregate paid, 3, n.;
average paid in 1817, cited by Breck, 58, n.;
present average of, statistics, 88, 90, 94-97;
by geographical sections, 88;
by occupations, statistics, 90, 94-97;
highest for skilled labor, 89;
higher paid to foreign born than to native born, 91, 92;
higher paid to men than to women, 92;
tending to increase, 93;
exceed average wages in other occupations, 93;
compared with wages of teachers, 99-102;
maintained without strikes, 105;
conform to economic laws, 106;
in average family, 108;
underrated in popular estimate, 164, n.;
not officially investigated as are wages in other occupations, 198;
wages paid in Europe, 288-294.
Wages of redemptioners, 28-31.
“Waitress,” as an appellation unobjectionable, 208.
Waitresses, average wages of, statistics, 89, 94-97.
See also Chambermaids.
Warner, Charles Dudley, on social position of teachers, 205, n.
Washing, see Laundry work.
Waste lessened through profit sharing, 240, 241, 243, 244, 246.
Watson, Elkanah, on self-respect of domestic employees in America,
1782, 49, n.;
on effect of slavery upon people of the South, 52, n.;
on high character of service in America, 56, n.
Watson, John, on increase of democratic spirit in servants, 55, n.
Weaving, transferred from home to factories, 215;
revival of, as home industry in Westmoreland, 232, n.
Weber, A., on domestic service in France, 281, n., 282, n., 283, n.,
291, n., 292, n.
Winter, John, on high wages of redemptioners in Maine, 28, n.;
description of an unprofitable servant, 33, 34.
Winthrop, John, on high wages demanded by servants in New England,
28, n.
Winthrop, John, Jr., complaint of his Irish servant, 1717, 36.
Winthrop, Wait, complaint of his “black Tom,” 1682, 35.
Woman’s Exchanges, articles offered for sale at, better but more
expensive, 213;
high standard for work maintained by, 217;
management of, should be put on business basis, 217;
new occupation for women opened by, 218.
Women, as affected by the release of labor from the home through
introduction of factory system, 10-13;
number of, in manufacturing industries, 10, n.;
new opportunities for, about 1830, 12;
unwillingness of many to work for remuneration, a hindrance, 14,
202, 272;
progress of, hindered by their failure to put a just money value on
their services, 14;
foreign born wage-earning, majority of, domestic employees, 77;
wages of, in domestic service lower than wages of men, 92;
entrance of, into business occupations, 196;
can engage in many more occupations than formerly without social
ostracism, 205;
new occupation opened through Woman’s Exchange, 218;
new opportunities through specialization of household employments,
226, 227, 232;
their release from certain kinds of work through specialization of
household employments, 231;
opportunity thus opened to specialize in some branch of work on a
business basis, 231, 232;
conservatism of many, a hindrance to improvement in domestic
service, 264, 265;
tendency of many toward aristocracy, a hindrance to improvement,
265;
work of, needs readjustment, 270-273.
Work, standard of, improved by requirements of Woman’s Exchanges,
217, 218.
“Working housekeeper,” as substitute for “servant,” 156.
World’s Fair, 1893, efforts in connection with, to establish national
training schools for domestic employees, 181.
Wright, Mr. Carroll D., on agencies producing change from domestic to
factory system, 8;
on profit sharing, 236, 237, 240.
Zimmern, Alice, on domestic service in America, 275, n.
DOMESTIC SERVICE
BY
LUCY MAYNARD SALMON
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