e business agent, Maud Sutter.

From the beginning the women delegates from Local 183 to the Packing
Trades Council of Chicago were on an equality with the men, and girl
delegates attended the convention of the National Association at
Cincinnati and also at St. Louis.

It is sad to record that through no fault of their own, the girls'
organization met an early downfall. It passed out of existence after
the stockyards' strike of 1904, being inevitably involved in the
defeat of the men, and going down with them to disaster.

The Irish leadership that produced such splendid results, is now, in
any case, not there to be called upon, as the girls now employed in
the packing-plants of Chicago are practically all immigrant girls from
eastern Europe. When the present system of unorganized labor in the
trade is abolished, as some day it must be, it will only be through a
fresh beginning among an altogether different group, that it will be
possible to reach the women.

But the spirit that permeated Local 183 has never wholly died in the
hearts of those who belonged to it, and it springs up now and then
in quarters little expected, calling to remembrance Maggie Condon's
reason for pushing the union of which she was a charter member and the
first vice-president. "Girls, we ought to organize for them that comes
after us."

IV

THE WOMEN'S TRADE UNION LEAGUE

One of the least encouraging features of trade unionism among women
in the United States has been the small need of success which has
attended efforts after organization in the past, especially the lack
of permanence in such organizations as have been formed. In the brief
historical review it has been shown how fitful were women's first
attempts in this direction, how limited the success, and how temporary
the organizations themselves.

It is true there is an essential difference between the loose and
momentary cooeperation of unorganized workers aiming at the remedying
of special grievances, and disbanding their association whenever that
particular struggle is over, and a permanent organization representing
the workers' side all the time and holding them in a bond of mutual
helpfulness. Most of the strikes of women during the first half of the
last century, like many today, sprang from impatience with intolerable
burdens, and the "temporary union," often led by some men's
organization, merely dissolved away with the ending of the strike,
whether successful or