As a worker in the factories for years and as an organizer of working women for five or six years, as one who has come in contact with the working wo… - Pauline Newman

A working woman is a human being, with a heart, with desires, with aspirations, with ideas and ideals, and when we think of food and shelter we merely think of the actual necessities to cover her body and to feed her. But what about the other things? Have we thought of providing her with books, with money for amusements, and when I speak of amusements I do not speak of the five cent picture shows, I speak of amusements that a girl should go to — a good drama or refined vaudeville — few think about that. Have you thought about a girl providing herself with a good room that had plenty of air, proper ventilation, in a somewhat decent neighborhood. Do you think of all these things when we speak of a minimum wage? Do you want a girl to have a nice comfortable room?

As to the necessity of a minimum wage there is no longer any doubt in the minds of intelligent people be they socialists, social workers or merely fair minded people.

I also recall that on Sunday morning when we didn't have to go to the shop, we went to lectures. A man called Hugh Pentacost lectured at a place on Sixth Avenue and Forty-Second Street, named Merit Hall. It's no longer there. We would come at eleven o'clock, and Mr. Pentacost would lecture on current events. He was an excellent speaker. He was, as I remember, a philosophical anarchist, and we really didn't discuss his philosophy at all. We would take up current events. We were very much interested in that, and we would go there just as religious people would go to synagogue. We would go there every Sunday except on Sundays that we had to work in the shops.