The Society of Women employed in Bookbinding.
Not till 1874 was there a determined and successful attempt made to organise women bookbinders into a Union. On September 12th of that year "the first Society formed for women," the Society of Women employed in Bookbinding, was formed by Mrs. Emma Paterson, the pioneer of women's Trade Unions in England,[22] and in the following year Mrs. Paterson was sent as its delegate to the Trade Union Congress meeting in Glasgow. This was the first time that a woman had appeared at these parliaments of Trade Unionism, which had been held annually since 1868. From the commencement the relations between the men's and the women's Societies were most cordial, and at the first annual meeting of the latter Mrs. Paterson read a letter she had received "some years ago" from Mr. Dunning, in which he advised "the formation of Trades' Societies for women." The cordial greetings extended to the new Society by its brother organisation did not meet it everywhere. A congratulatory resolution was moved at the London Trades' Council, and though it received the support of the veteran George Odger, it was met with considerable opposition. Women's labour was cheap labour, and many of the delegates to the Trades' Council could not get beyond that fact.
[22] Mrs. Paterson was born in London on April 5th, 1848, and was the daughter of H. Smith, headmaster of St. George's, Hanover Square, parish school. In 1867 she became assistant secretary to the Club and Institute Union, and in 1872 secretary to the Women's Suffrage Association. Next year she married Thomas Paterson, a cabinet-maker and wood carver. With him she visited America where she saw the Female Umbrella Makers' Union at work. On her return to London in 1874 she formed the Women's Protective and Provident League, the membership of which was mainly middle class, though its object was to promote Trade Unionism amongst women. She died December 1st, 1886, and was buried in the Paddington Cemetery. See art. Dictionary of National Biography.
It is unnecessary to detail the somewhat uneventful career of the Union. Mrs. Paterson, at the end of eighteen months, was succeeded by Miss Eleanor Whyte, who still occupies the position of secretary.[23] The membership began at 66 and reached 275—of whom only 200 were financial members—at the end of the first year. From that time till now the membership has been exceedingly variable, and no full and reliable records seem to exist. But from the disconnected information which is at our disposal, it would appear that the two most successful years of the Society were 1876 (when 63 new members were enrolled), and 1890 (when 67 were enrolled). In 1870 the membership was given at 210; in 1884 at 200; in 1891 at 240; in 1901 at 270; the period of depression from 1883 to 1889 seems to have tried the Society very severely.
[23] December, 1903.
The objects of this Society are stated to be: "To maintain and protect the rights and privileges of the trade and to grant relief to such members as may be out of work, or afflicted with illness." The subscription is 2d. per week, and an entrance fee of 1s. is imposed.
It can hardly be expected that a Society whose membership has probably never exceeded 270, could have much fighting force. But agitation has never been the policy of the Society. It has refused to join with the men in making demands upon the employers; its representatives at Trade Union Congresses and elsewhere have steadily resisted legal restrictions upon labour; it has not shown itself anxious to seize what the men regarded as opportunities to make itself felt.[24]
[24] In 1891 the women's Society refused to support the men's in agitating for an eight-hours' day. In 1875 Mrs. Paterson said at the Trade Union Congress that "the more they pressed for additional legislation the greater obstacles they threw in the way of working women. She should rather say let them suffer a little longer the evils of overwork and long hours." The Union's representatives, however, have always pressed for women factory inspectors, and on this matter Mrs. Paterson was for a good many years a voice crying in the wilderness.
Perhaps the Union has been too willing to make requests to good employers for better conditions, and too timorous in helping to level up the general conditions of the trade. Employers have not been hostile. Mr. B. Collins, the publisher, for instance, presided over the annual meeting for 1891, and Mr. Longmans and other publishers have done the same in other years. "I know an employer," says a writer in the British Bookmaker of September, 1891, "who will give £100 to see a good women's Union established. Why? Because if it could be done, its effect upon other employers would remove the gross inequalities of prices that at present exist to his detriment." But this Union has never reached that point of strength when it could bring pressure to bear on the trade for the mutual advantage of the good employer and the woman worker.
As a consequence, the good relations between the men and the women in the trade have not always been maintained, and there was considerable ill-feeling between the two sections during the eight hours' agitation from 1891 to 1894.[25]