Rudolf Cronau

“ As women, we have builded by the patient drudgery of the past the basic foundation of the home and of peaceful industry. We will not longer accept without a protest, that must be heard and heeded by men, that hoary evil which in an hour destroys the social structure that centuries of toil have reared.
“As women, we are called upon to start each generation onward toward a better humanity. We will not longer tolerate without determined opposition that denial of the sovereignty of reason and justice by which war and all that makes war to-day render impotent the idealism of the race. ”

“ Especially at the time of the clever Mme. de Pompadour women were everywhere the power, without which no movement could be carried through successfully. “These women,” said the famous philosophical historian Montesquieu, “form a kind of republic, whose members, always active, aid and serve one another. It is a new state within the state; and whoever observes the action of those in power, if he does not know the women who govern them, is like a man who sees the action of a machine but does not know its secret springs.” ”

“ According to conservative estimates, of the 38,000,000 wage earners of the United States, in every year 30,000 to 33,000 are killed by industrial accidents. In addition, there are approximately 2,000,000 non-fatal accidents.
Imagine a plain strewn with 35,000 corpses and two million men and women crying out under the pain of severe lacerations, burns, cuts, bruises, dislocations and fractures! Imagine the horrible sight of so many human beings with limbs torn into shreds, with faces having empty eye-holes, with breasts heaving from the effect of poisonous gases! ”

“ This is the first International Congress of Women met in the cause of peace in the necessity brought about by the greatest war the world has ever seen. For three days we have met together, so conscious of the bloodshed and desolation surrounding us, that all irrelevant and temporary matters fell away and we spoke solemnly to each other of the great and eternal issues as to those who meet around the bedside of the dying. ”

“ We grieve for the many brave young men, who have lost their lives in barbaric fratricide before even attaining their full manhood; we mourn with the poor mothers bereft of their sons; with thousands and thousands of young widows and fatherless children; we will not endure in this Twentieth Century civilization, that governments shall longer tolerate brute force as the only method of solving their international disputes. The culture of centuries standing and the progress of science must no longer be recklessly employed to perfect the implements of modern warfare. ”

“ Although the representatives knew that it would produce a long and terrific war against the most powerful and most inconsiderate government of the world, they solemnly agreed to choose liberty or death. Liberty to make their own laws and to elect their own officials, liberty of religion, liberty of speech and press, liberty of trade and commerce, liberty for man, woman and child. ”

“ We too protest against the perpetuation of a hate which was always foreign to women’s hearts. Our French sisters! It is with joy that we grasp your extended hand. We will stand and march together, in common effort for the good of mankind. On the ruins of a materialist world, founded by force and violence, on misunderstanding and hate, we women will, through death and sorrow, clear the road to the new humanity. As mothers of the coming generations, we, women of all nations, want love and understanding and peace. ”

“ It is because I know the brunt of this war, too, is falling and must fall, heaviest upon the weak and young, that I appeal now on their behalf, not merely to those who love peace, but to the great body of women who love children. Little children, more sensitive to exposure, to extremes of heat and cold, to tainted food, to starvation, and to the stench, the poisonous stench of war, quickly fade, quickly die. ”

“ Great men and great causes have always some helper of whom the outside world knows but little. These helpers and sustainers have the same quality in common—absolute devotion and unwavering faith in the individual or the cause. Seeking nothing for themselves, thinking nothing of themselves, they have all the intense power of sympathy, a noble love of giving themselves for the service of others. ”

“ And the men, brutal, conceited, looking upon woman as a piece of property, created for man’s pleasure or for his service, have been the men that opposed suffrage. Another class opposed to woman suffrage is the most dangerous class of all. That is the class that would keep in ignorance women, and men, too, if it could. Those that prey upon the ignorance and superstition of women are anxious that women shall know as little as possible. They do not want the women to vote, for voting means thinking, and thinking means freedom. ”

“ We refer to the White Slave Trade. As few people have any definite idea of its extent and terrors, some authentic facts are here given, which, at the same time, demonstrate men’s indifference as well as the urgent need of woman’s interference for its suppression.
As everybody knows, the traffic in young girls for purposes of prostitution is as old as humanity. It has flourished in all ages and in all countries. But it was during the 19th Century that it found its systematic organization and its most extensive development. ”

“ The only possible excuse for such incredible waste of human lives is that neither the employers nor the law-makers of those bygone days realized that the physical and mental abilities of the large laboring classes belong to the resources of a nation just as truly as do the water-power, the soil, the mineral deposits, the forests, and other natural means. Moreover, nobody was aware of the fact that it is one of the supreme duties of a wise government to guard these resources, so fundamentally necessary to the prosperity of a nation, from unscrupulous exploitation and possible destruction. ”

“ Ariosto said of her: “She has more eloquence and breathes more sweetness than all other women, and gives such force to her lofty words that she adorns the heavens in our day with another sun. She has not only made herself immortal by her beautiful poems and style, than which I have heard none better, but she can raise from the tomb those of whom she speaks or writes, and make them live forever.” ”

“ Yet every sentiment of pity and of civilization, leave alone Christianity, demands the effort. The victims cannot help themselves; succor must come from without.
“Relief, we know, you pour most generously, but relief cannot meet a want so colossal, neither can it touch the worst ills. Cut at the root of the evil—the war itself. A strong lead is needed. Myriads want peace; they never wanted war. In each country this is true; constant proofs reach us from Germany and France, as well as various parts of England. The press of each nation asserts that the people are unanimous for war. ”

“ During the Middle Ages innumerable women were persecuted for witchcraft, subjected to the most cruel tortures, dragged to the scaffold to be beheaded, or burnt alive at the stake.
Woman’s status to-day is the result of her own energy, efforts and ability. She overcame the prejudice and stubborn opposition of bigoted priests, pedantic scholars and reactionary statesmen, who were unable to see that the advance and emancipation of woman is synonymous with the progress and liberation of the greater part of the entire human race. ”

“ Slavery has been practiced in all parts of the world in some form. But Africa was the continent where it prevailed from time immemorial to the greatest extent and assumed the most cruel forms. Phœnicians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Turks, Spaniards, Portuguese, Italians, Frenchmen, Dutchmen, Englishmen and Americans sailed to its coasts, to capture men as well as women and children, to sell and use them for slaves.
It is impossible for human imagination to conceive the horrors and misery, caused here by heartless pirates for thousands of years. ”

“ Deep abysses of antagonism must be bridged; hate and the thirst for revenge must be quenched, and thousands of smarting wounds must be healed before humanity can hope for a better future. But women can perform these wonders. Since the organization of the “International Woman’s Peace Party” the voice of women will be heard in the council of nations, and their influence will be mighty, for the women outnumber the men. ”

“ Woman’s mission in the future will be many-sided. Paramount among all questions, that demand her utmost consideration, is the prevention of future wars. And it may be said right here that mankind, through the efforts of women, will most probably find the final realization of hopes cherished for centuries by all right-minded people. We hardly need point to the glaring contrasts between the Peace Congresses called together by women at the Hague and in Zurich, and the conferences held by men at Versailles to secure a League of Nations. ”

“ Women are forever told that their place is in the home. But what do men expect of them in the home? Merely to stay there is not enough. They are a failure unless they do certain things for the home. They must minister, as far as their means allow, to the health and welfare, moral as well as physical, of their family, and especially of the children. They, more than anybody else, are held responsible for what becomes of the children. Women are responsible for the cleanliness of the house, for the wholesomeness of the food, for their children’s health and morals. ”

“ Others were slave-dealers, making fortunes in trading negro-slaves. No doubt, the moral standard of these gentlemen was very low. Do we wonder that many of these unscrupulous men established also a regular trade in white slaves, for which the increasing exodus from Europe to America opened most alluring inducements. If smart enough, they would amass great wealth and would no longer have to make the perilous voyage to Guinea, to kidnap black people at the risk of their own lives. For the white slaves could be seduced by a bait that had a flavor of high-spirited benevolence. ”

“ As the life of the Mohammedan woman, of which her husband forms the center, is one of repose and seclusion, so she retains a child-like disposition of sentiment which is indeed touching. Unlike as it is with us, she is reared in full knowledge of the natural destination of woman. As soon as she has developed from childhood to womanhood, she is offered to a man, unknown to her, but whom she respects as the god-sent medium to impart the sacred mystery by which she may become a mother. ”

“ All paganism is at bottom a worship of Nature in some form or other, and in all pagan religions the deepest and most awe-inspiring attribute of nature was its power of reproduction. The mystery of birth and becoming was the deepest mystery of Nature; it lay at the root of all thoughtful paganism and appeared in various forms, some of a more innocent, others of a most debasing type. To ancient pagan thinkers, as well as to modern men of science the key to the hidden secret of the origin and preservation of the universe lay in the mystery of sex. ”

“ The most brilliant woman artist of the United States is without question Cecilia Beaux, a Philadelphian, who, as a portrait painter, compares with the very best of any nation. Her portrait of a “Girl in White,” owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, verifies what a critic said about her: “Miss Beaux has approached the task of painting the society woman of to-day, not as one to whom this type is known only by exterior, but with a sympathy as complete as a similar tradition and artistic temperament will allow. ”

“ So the life of a Roman woman was one of perpetual servitude. For centuries she had no control over her own person, no choice in marriage, no right to her own property, and no recourse against cruelty. Any man could beat his wife, sell her, or give her to some one else, when he was tired of her. He could even put her to death, acting as accuser, judge, jury, and executioner.
The dependent position of the women changed considerably, when the Romans came in touch with the Greeks and other nations. Marriage was made easier. ”