d our
day; now you can have yours." Thus in the important decisions of life,
the choosing of a career, matrimony or the like, the average American is
much more influenced by his contemporaries than by his elders, much more
stimulated or determined by the friends of his own age than by the older
members of his family. This detaching of generations through the
evolution of conditions is inevitable in a new civilization; it is part
of the country's freedom. It adds fervour and zest and originality to
the effort of each. But it means a youth without the peace of
protection; an old age without the harvest of consolation. The man in
such a battle as life becomes under these circumstances is better
equipped than the woman, whose nature disarms her for the struggle. The
American woman is restless, dissatisfied. Society, whether among the
highest or lowest classes, has driven her toward a destiny that is not
normal. The factories are full of old maids; the colleges are full of
old maids; the ballrooms in the worldly centres are full of old maids.
For natural obligations are substituted the fictitious duties of clubs,
meetings, committees, organizations, professions, a thousand unwomanly
occupations.

I cannot attempt to touch here upon the classes who have not a direct
bearing on our subject, but the analogy is striking between them and
the factory elements of which I wish to speak. I cannot dwell upon
details that, while full of interest, are yet somewhat aside from the
present point, but I want to state a fact, the origin of whose ugly
consequences is in all classes and therefore concerns every living
American woman. Among the American born women of this country the
sterility is greater, the fecundity less than those of any other
nation in the world, unless it be France, whose anxiety regarding her
depopulation we would share in full measure were it not for the
foreign immigration to the United States, which counteracts the
degeneracy of the American.[1] The original causes for this increasing
sterility are moral and not physical. When this is known, does not the
philosophy of the American working woman become a subject of vital
interest? Among the enemies to fecundity and a natural destiny there
are two which act as potently in the lower as in the upper classes:
the triumph of individualism, the love of luxury. America is not a
democracy, the unity of effort between the man and the woman does not
exist. Men were too long in