But to the majority of women-workers
no such opportunities are open. Even the factory workers are for the
most part employed in small groups, and are dispersed in their homes.
Combination among the mass of home-workers or workers in small sweating
establishments is almost impossible. The women's Unions have hitherto
been successful in proportion as the trades are factory trades. Where
endeavours have been made to organize East End shirt-makers, milliners,
and others who work at home, very little has been achieved. In those
trades where it is possible to give out an indefinite amount of the work
to sub-contractors, or to workers to do at home, it seems impossible
that any great results can be thus attained. Even in trades where part
of the work is done in factories, the existence of reckless competition
among unorganized out-workers can be utilized by unprincipled employers
to destroy attempts at effective combination among their factory hands.
The force of public opinion which may support an organization of factory
workers by preventing outsiders from underselling, can have no effect
upon the competition of home-workers, who bid in ignorance of their
competitors, and bid often for the means of keeping life in themselves
and their children. The very poverty of the mass of women-workers, the
low industrial conditions, which Unionism seeks to relieve, form cruel
barriers to the success of their attempts. The low physical condition,
the chronic exhaustion produced by the long hours and fetid atmosphere
in which the poorer workers live, crush out the human energy required
for effective protest and combination.
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