Woman's work in America

by Unknown

It would scarcely be conceded that, because many women have found a place to work, and work well, in the United States Treasury, Patent, and Pension Bureaus, that these departments themselves should be exclusively classed as woman’s work.

If, in our rapid march of progress over newly acquired territory, we should be found appropriating to ourselves some of the old landmarks and strongholds, a philosophical solution may perhaps be found in the familiar principles of the angles of incidence and reflection. It might be added that, presumably, the circumstance of the leadership (if so presumptuous a term may be allowed) of the Red Cross in this country having incidentally fallen to a woman’s hands has had a tendency to mislead in this direction.

Considering how very little has yet been definitely comprehended of the characteristics of this young child of their adoption, the tones of parental kindness and good feeling in which it is spoken by the people of the entire country, is touching to us who watch its course and destiny. Their very natural endeavors to square its habits and methods by those of ordinary charitable organizations, are not unfrequently perplexing to them and embarrassing to us; and their consternation at times, when this strange duckling suddenly takes to the water, is suggestive of other scenes.

The mass of correspondence constantly pouring in, asking how one shall become a member of the “order,” or proposing to organize a “chapter,” or a “branch,” or “corps,” or “section,” independent, for special use, calling for copies of the constitution and by-laws of the national to aid in forming their own, so they can go on by themselves, reveals a vagueness of ideas concerning the subject which a few words might serve to render more clear and definite. First, the Red Cross is not an “order,” and has no tendency in that direction any more than the medical department of an army, which it was instituted to assist, is an “order”; or the great movement toward the general peace of mankind through arbitration and kindly fellowship, to which it is both an advance guard and a stepping-stone, is an “order.” It is not a “secret society” any more than is the Association of Charities and Correction, Adams Express, the Western Union Telegraph, a railroad corporation or a fire company, all of which the nature of its work at times assimilates. While societies, as usually existing, seek the advancement of ideas and the general progress of the world intellectually, morally, or religiously, mainly by expression of thought and opinions analogous to their subject, the Red Cross, by its relation, must deal in active ways, mentally and physically, with people direct, and become responsible for their welfare as for funds and material for their use; and while it may properly have been designated as the culmination of the best humanities of the warring agencies of the past, finding possible expression in the latter half of the nineteenth century, it still needs to be explained that this medium of expression was the Treaty of Geneva of 1864 for the relief of the wounded and sick of armies. The Red Cross means, then, the people’s help for suffering through military necessities (a help hitherto mainly ignored), and it is the result and the direct outgrowth of an international treaty, entered into by the civilized nations of the world for the mitigation of the sufferings from war, by first eliminating from its code all needless cruelties and old-time barbarities; and, secondly, by rendering neutral and exempt from capture all disabled soldiers requiring aid, all appliances, all material, and all personnel designed for them.

It is to be borne in mind, and not for an instant lost sight of, that while other methods leading up to these points have been always the outgrowth of the grandest human sentiments of mankind, they still remained sentiments, usually individual, and, beyond this, binding on no one; or, if organized for the moment, were lost as soon; while the Red Cross, embodying all these humanities, organizes and pledges the entire world, through its governments, to the one purpose and effort, and binds the whole by the stern sacredness of an international treaty, which no government will ever be found reckless and indecent enough to violate. The non-fellowship of the world would follow such an act. Indeed, no nation has a treaty it would hold so sacred in time of need.

Following a preliminary conference of 1863, a convention, composed of delegates appointed by and representing the heads of all the governments of the world, was held at Geneva, Switzerland, for the purpose of considering some method for mitigating the horrors of war, if wars must be.

And however disdainfully we at the present moment may curl our lips over the uselessness of such a consideration in the light of better methods, however scorn every thought of any effort in behalf of the woes of those who consent to deluge the world in blood, it is to be remembered that we ourselves at that moment were not altogether exempt from the perplexing problem of war, and did not, as now, present to the world the grand and beautiful “Christian example” of arbitration and peace, of which we are at present the most advisory and conspicuous of advocates. Indeed, whoever will take down from the shelves one of the volumes of decisions of our then Minister of State, Mr. Seward, will find there recorded that the reason given for the United States having declined official representation in the Convention of Geneva was not on the ground of high moral elevation, advanced views and consequent disapproval, but rather in this wise, that we were ourselves in the midst of a cruel and relentless war, which did not admit of time for considerations of that kind. This decision was the first block over which a woman ungracefully stumbled, when, thirteen years later, an attempt was made to officially call the attention of our government to the knowledge even of the existence of such a treaty among other nations.

This convention, which occupied several days, discussed as never before the great question of an international agreement for the neutralizing of certain departments of all fields of battle, and the protection of all the personnel and material designed for them.

The establishment, as it were, of a goal in the midst of the most relentless field of animosity and strife, where those who could no longer run could touch and be safe; as if, in the midst of the wildest storm at sea, a haven could be established in mid-ocean where the disabled ships might find a harbor and rest.

The councils of this convention resulted in the formulation of a code of ten articles, which, upon solemn acceptance by the heads of each government, became the treaty of Geneva. These articles were as follows: