The Working Women’s Society gave very valuable aid in the feather-workers’ strike.  Without the Society’s backing the women could never have had their case put before the public as it was.  Again, it was through their efforts, chiefly, that the law was passed in 1890, providing for women factory inspectors in the state of New York.  It is stated that this was the first law of the kind in the world, and that the British law, passed shortly afterwards, was founded upon its provisions.

Not limiting itself to helping in direct labor organization, and legislation, the Working Women’s Society undertook among the more fortunate classes a campaign of sorely needed education, and made upon them, at the same time, a claim for full and active cooeperation in the battle for industrial justice.

This was done through the foundation of the Consumers’ League of New York, now a branch of the National Consumers’ League, which has done good and faithful service in bringing home to many some sense of the moral responsibility of the purchaser in maintaining oppressive industrial conditions, while, on the other hand it has persistently striven for better standards of labor legislation.  It was through the Consumers’ League, and especially through the ability and industry of its notable officer, Josephine Goldmark, that the remarkable mass of information on the toxic effects of fatigue, and the legislation to check overwork already in force in other countries was brought together in such complete form, as to enable Louis Brandeis to successfully defend the ten-hour law for women, first for Oregon, and afterwards for Illinois.  The Working Women’s Society did its work at a time when organization for women was even more unpopular than today.  It did much to lessen that unpopularity, and to hearten its members for the never-ending struggle.  All its agitation told, and prepared the way for the Women’s Trade Union League, which, a decade later, took up the very same task.

In the year 1900, the status of the steam-laundry-workers of San Francisco was about as low as could possibly be imagined.  White men and girls had come into the trade about 1888, taking the place of the Chinese, who had been the first laundrymen on the West Coast.  Regarding their treatment, Miss Lillian Ruth Matthews writes: 

The conditions surrounding the employment of these first white workers were among those survivals from the eighteenth century, which still linger incongruously in our modern industrial organization.  The “living-in” system was the order, each laundry providing board and lodging for its employes.  The dormitories were wretched places, with four beds in each small room.  The food was poor and scanty, and even though the girls worked till midnight or after, no food was allowed after the evening meal at six o’clock.  Half-an-hour only was allowed for lunch.  Early in the morning, the women were routed out in no gentle manner and by