ABSTRACT
The history of trades-unionism among women in England is the history of the Women’s Trades-Union League, and that history ought to have a special claim on the attention of American readers, since the organization of the league in 1874 was undertaken in avowed imitation of the “friendly societies” for women which had already, it was said, done much for the working classes in the United States. It must be confessed that it would be impossible to do anything with such an income and such machinery, were it not for the self-sacrificing devotion of the chief officers. The responsible officials of a trades-union must not only be acquainted with the conditions of labour, but must also have initiative and force sufficient to deal with those conditions successfully.
