Total population:4,035,586.
Women:1,978,457.
Men:2,057,111.
Federation of Bulgarian Women’s Clubs.

Like Servia, Bulgaria was freed from Turkish control about forty years ago. The liberation caused very little change in the life of the peasant women. But it opened new educational opportunities for the middle classes. The elementary schools naturally provide for the girls also. (In 1905-1906 there were 1800 men teachers and 800 women teachers in the villages; in the cities 415 men and 355 women.) High schools for girls have been established, but not all of them prepare for the Abiturientenexamen. The first women entered the university of Sofia in 1900. There are now about 100 women students. Since 1907, through the work of a reactionary ministry, the university has excluded women; married women teachers have been discharged. Women attend the schools of commerce, the technical schools, and the agricultural schools. Women are active as doctors (there being 56), midwives, journalists, and authors.

The men and women teachers are organized jointly. Women are employed by the state in the postal and telegraph service. The wages of these women, like those of the women laborers, are lower than those of the men. There is a factory law that protects women laborers and children working in the factories. The trade-unions are socialistic and have men and women members. The laws regulating the legal status of woman have been influenced by German laws. The wife controls her earnings. Politically the Bulgarian woman has no rights.

The Federation of Bulgarian Women’s Clubs was organized in 1899; in 1908 it joined the International Council of Women. Woman’s suffrage occupies the first place on the programme of the Federation; in 1908 it joined the International Woman’s Suffrage Affiance.

The Bulgarian women, too, have recognized woman’s suffrage as the key to all other woman’s rights. To the present time their demands have been supported by radicals and democrats (who are not very influential).

A meeting of the Federation in 1908 demanded:

1. Active and passive suffrage for women in school administration and municipal councils.

2. The reopening of the University to women. (This has been granted.)

3. The increase of the salaries of women teachers. (They are paid 10 per cent less than the men teachers.)