its Bureau of Registration and Information
for women workers that the United States Department of Labor took over
not only the files and methods of the Woman's League for Service, but
the entire staff with Miss Obenauer at its head. If imitation is the
sincerest flattery, what shall we say of complete adoption of work and
workers, with an honorable "by your leave" and outspoken praise! And
nothing could show a finer spirit of service than this yielding up of
work initiated by a civil society and the willing passing of it into
government hands.

Not only the Labor Department has established a special women's division
with a woman at its head, but the Ordnance Office of the War Department
has opened in its Industrial Service Section a woman's division, putting
Miss Mary Van Kleeck in charge.

But still our government lags behind our Allies in mobilizing woman's
power of initiative and her organizing faculty. The Woman's Committee
of the Council of National Defense, appointed soon after the outbreak of
war, still has no administrative power. As one member of the Committee
says, "We are not allowed to do anything without the consent of the
Council of National Defense. There is no appropriation for the Woman's
Committee. We are furnished with headquarters, stationery, some printing
and two stenographers, but nothing more. It is essential that we raise
money to carry on the other expenses. The great trouble is that now, as
always, men want women to do the work while they do the overseeing."

[Illustration: The women of the Motor Corps of the National League for
Woman's Service refuting the traditions that women have neither strength
nor endurance.]

Perhaps holding the helm has become second nature to men simply because
they have held the helm so long, but I am inclined to think they have a
very definite desire to have women help steer the ship. Surely the
readiness with which they are sharing their political power with women,
would seem to indicate their wish for cooperation on a plan of
perfect equality.

In any case, it is not necessary to hang on the skirts of government.
America has always shown evidence of greater gift in private enterprise
than state action. Perhaps women will demonstrate the national
characteristic. It was farsightedness and enterprise that led the
Intercollegiate Bureaus of Occupations, societies run for women by
women, to strike out in this crisis and open up new callings for their
clients, a