e performance of
maternal functions place her at a disadvantage in the struggle
for subsistence is obvious. This is especially true when the
burdens of motherhood are upon her. Even when they are not, by
abundant testimony of the medical fraternity, continuance for a
long time on her feet at work, repeating this from day to day,
tends to injurious effects upon her body, and as healthy
mothers are essential to vigorous offspring, the physical
well-being of woman becomes an object of public interest and
care in order to preserve the strength and vigor of the race.

Nobody knowing the actual strain upon women laundry workers, no one who
had seen them lying motionless and numb with fatigue at the end of a long
day, or foregoing food itself for the sake of rest, could listen unmoved
to these thrilling words of the greatest court of our country.

The most eloquent characteristic of the Supreme Court's affirmation was
the fact that it was essentially founded simply upon clear, human truth,
firmly and widely ascertained, founded on a respect, not only for the
past, but for the future of the whole nation.

Too often does one hear that "law has nothing to do with equity," till
one might believe that law was made for law's sake, and not as a means of
deliverance from injustice. "The end of litigation is justice. We believe
that truth and justice are more sacred than any personal consideration."
Such was the conception of the office of the law expressed by Justice
Brewer twenty years before, on his appointment to the Supreme Bench. It
was this conception of law that made the determination of the Oregon case
a great decision in our country's history.

From time immemorial, women as well as men have been workers of the
world. The vital feature of the statement that six million women are now
gainfully employed in this country is not the "entrance" of multitudinous
women into industry, but the fact that their industry, being now carried
on in public instead of private, has been acknowledged and paid. This
acknowledgment has led to the establishment of juster terms for women's
labor by the Federal Supreme Court. Such an establishment, as the opinion
of the court affirmed, is surely a distinct gain, not only for women, but
for children, for men, for the race.

When the preparation of food and clothing, the traditional household
labor of women, passed in large measure from household fires a