gentlemen of the House of Commons pleaded that the women ought to be protected from hearing the bad language of the colliers. As if these same colliers spoke, in the home, quite a different, and only a parliamentary, language! And as if, when you come to think of it, a man's right to swear were a more precious thing than a woman's right to work! The fact is that, in this instance, as in many others, the work was to be taken away from the women because some men wanted it, and they were not ashamed to use their political power to try to filch the work from the women, though they were ashamed to own up to the reason. Their intention was thwarted, because there were men in Parliament and out who refused to be convinced by the pretension that the restriction was for the women's good, and because the women made a tremendous fuss, came up to London, held meetings of protest, and roused the country and the press. But this was the third battle over this one position; and why should women be called upon to defend their right to earn their livelihood in honest, necessary labour? If women were to demand legislation to prohibit men from following the "unmanly" and "unhealthy" occupation of selling sarsanet over a counter, or writing accounts in a book, and "taking the bread out of the mouths of the women," there would be more to be said for it than there has been for many restrictions men have made on women's work.
What the women in the movement want is the
