Mobilizing Woman-Power | Page 6

soldiers only. After a time it was realized
that the war would not be short, that fields must not lie untilled for
years, nor men undergo the deteriorating effects of trench warfare
continuously. The fallow field and the stale soldier were brought
together.
We have all chanced on photographs of European soldiers helping the
women plough in springtime, and reap the harvest in the autumn.
Perhaps we have regarded the scene as a mere pastoral episode in a

happy leave from the battle front, instead of realizing that it is a
snapshot illustrating a well organized plan of securing labor. The
soldiers are given a furlough and are sent where the agricultural need is
pressing. But the American soldier will not be able to lend his skill in
giving the home fields a rich seed time and harvest. The two needs, the
field for the touch of the human hand, and the soldier for labor under
calm skies, cannot in our case be coördinated.
Scarcity of labor is not only certain to grow, but the demands upon the
United States for service are increasing by leaps and bounds. America
must throw man-power into the trenches, must feed herself, must
contribute more and ever more food to the hungry populations of
Europe, must meet the old industrial obligations, and respond to a
whole range of new business requirements. And she is called upon for
this effort at a time when national prosperity is already making full use
of man-power.
When Europe went to war, the world had been suffering from
depression a year and more. Immediately on the outbreak of hostilities
whole lines of business shut down. Unemployment became serious.
There were idle hands everywhere. Germany, of all the belligerents,
rallied most quickly to meet war conditions. Unemployment gave place
to a shortage of labor sooner there than elsewhere. Great Britain did not
begin to get the pace until the middle of 1915.
The business situation in the United States upon its entrance into the
war was the antithesis of this. For over a year, depression had been
superseded by increased industry, high wages, and greater demand for
labor. The country as measured by the ordinary financial signs, by its
commerce, by its labor market, was more prosperous than it had been
for years. Tremendous requisitions were being made upon us by Europe,
and to the limit of available labor we were answering them. Then into
our economic life, with industrial forces already working at high
pressure, were injected the new demands arising from changing the
United States from a people as unprepared for effective hostilities as a
baby in its cradle, into a nation equipped for war. There was no
unemployment, but on the contrary, shortage of labor.

The country calls for everything, and all at once, like the spoiled child
on suddenly waking. It must have, and without delay, ships, coal, cars,
cantonments, uniforms, rules, and food, food, food. How can the needs
be supplied and with a million and a half of men dropping work besides?
By woman-power or coolie labor. Those are the horns of the dilemma
presented to puzzled America. The Senate of the United States directs
its Committee of Agriculture to ponder well the coolie problem, for
men hesitate to have women put their shoulder to the wheel. Trade
unionists are right in urging that a republic has no place for a
disfranchised class of imported toilers. Equally true is it that as a nation
we have shown no gift for dealing with less developed races. And yet
labor we must have. Will American women supply it, will they, loving
ease, favor contract labor from the outside, or will they accept the
optimistic view that lack of labor is not acute?
The procrastinator queries, "Cannot American man-power meet the
demand?" It can, for a time perhaps, if the draft for the army goes as
slowly in the future as it has in the past.
However, at any moment a full realization may come to us of the
significance of the fact that while the United States is putting only three
percent of its workers into the fighting forces, Great Britain has put
twenty-five percent, and is now combing its industrial army over to
find an additional five hundred thousand men to throw on the French
front. It is probable that it will be felt by this country in the near future
that such a contrast of fulfillment of obligation cannot continue without
serious reflection on our national honor. Roughly speaking, Great
Britain has twenty million persons in gainful pursuits. Of these, five
million have already been taken for the army. The contribution of
France is still greater. Her military force has reached the appalling
proportion of one-fifth of her entire population. But we who have
thirty-five million