"What does labor want? We want more schoolhouses and less jails; more books and less arsenals; more learning and less vice; more leisure and less greed; more justice and less revenge; in fact, more of the opportunities to cultivate our better natures, to make manhood more noble, womanhood more beautiful, and childhood more happy and bright."
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Happy Labor Day, or Labour Day, or However You Want To Spell it (via treehugger)
I’m taking the womanhood statement as something that should be celebrated instead of subjugated.
(via thousandyearsbunny)
Yeah, in my head I retconned that last bit to read something like “…to cultivate our better natures, to make all people more noble, more beautiful, more happy and bright.”
But I appreciate the original sentiment, even if its expression was sadly sexist. (The quote is from circa 1894, by U.S. labor activist Samuel Gompers. Women in the U.S. didn’t even have suffrage widely until 1920. I’m sure the part about womanhood sounded grand to lots of people at the time.)
(via thousandyearsbunny)
