A remarkable 1912 article from Georgia Kotsch who rejects the ‘mother instinct’ bestowed by Socialist men on women in the movement, rather she envisions an end to the nuclear family and collective raising of children under Socialism.

‘The Mother’s Future’ by Georgia Kotsch from The International Socialist Review. Vol. 10 No. 12. June, 1912.

She bore us in her dreaming womb,
And laughed into the face of death;
She laughed in her strange agony,—
To give her little baby breath.

Then, by some holy mystery.
She fed us from her sacred breast,
Soothed us with little birdlike words—
To rest—to rest—to rest—to rest;

Yea, softly fed us with her life,—
Her bosom like the world in May ;
Can it be true that men thus fed
Feed women—as I hear them say?

—Richard Le Gallienne.

“MAN proposes, but God disposes,” runs the old proverb. “The living form of Socialism has long been perfecting itself within the crysalis of civilization,” may be Belfort Bax’s way of expressing the same idea as it applies to the social evolution.

With the seemingly all-powerful Canute of capitalism commanding the “rising tide of Socialism” back to the deep sea caves of ignorance and helpless servility and with the occasional Socialist who now and again goes down to the beach, broom in hand, to sweep back a wave which threatens to wet the feet of a pet prejudice of which he, advanced soul though he is, has not yet rid himself, evolution goes serenely on with it “disposing” in the interest of “the living form” of the time to be.

The broom-wielders are interesting. It would be much indeed to expect that men reared under capitalism, they and their forbears for generations lapped and nurtured in its false traditions and standards should suddenly stand forth in the full stature and perfect proportions of the Socialist ideal. And so we find some of the good comrades with ideas a bit aslant in regard to woman, particularly the married woman, under Socialism.

Recently a Socialist paper which has possibly converted more people in this country to Socialism than any other one influence save Standard Oil, was asked by an anxious subscriber what would be the condition of married women under Socialism. Now, Socialists disclaim knowledge as to details of the coming commonwealth, and yet the spirit of prophecy is strong within them, and the gist of the editor’s reply was that under Socialism the husband would make enough to support the family. This, it must be acknowledged, would be a great improvement over the present state of the married woman. Now she can never be sure of the security of her master’s income; then she would have only the uncertainty as to whether he would deal fairly with her. There is, however, a point of doubt here. Women have, through long practice, learned how to get along with a slave. With a free man there might be trouble. He might be arrogant.

Listening recently, to an ultra scientific lecturer, a kind and well-intentioned man, explaining what the full social value of a man’s work under Socialism would signify, he said : “There will always be non-productive persons for whom society will have to care, mothers who are rearing children, cripples, etc.”

Here was real encouragement. Under the present regime women are classed with the imbecile, criminal, insane. Under Socialism we shall at least not be disgraced, for a cripple may be a gentleman of the highest character and attainments. The worst that can be said of him is that he is unfortunate. So mothers who are rearing children will be raised to the class of the merely unfortunate.

Opening Comrade Vail’s “Modern Socialism,” a book widely circulated for propaganda purposes because of its clear enunciation of Socialist principles and their application to the various relations of life, I find the author expatiating upon the economic independence which Socialism will bring to unmarried women, but alas, it seems that if they are so foolish as to marry it is gone. He says, “Socialists hold that it is the husband’s province to provide for the necessities of his family, and the very fact that the new order would render it easy for a man to support a family would encourage matrimony.”

Thus the vocation of wife and mother would render an independent woman dependent upon one man and this is innocently supposed to be an inducement to her to marry. Could anyone but a man have written that!

Comrade Richardson, another of our most able writers, after dealing in profound wisdom with markets, cost of commodities, exploitation and incentives, comes in due course to the woman question. Being a courageous man he scorns the only safe course for him, viz., dodging it, and tosses it off in this wise: “Woman—the complete woman—the woman who is living the life for which nature qualified her—the woman who is living the life that every true and thoroughly womanly woman is ambitious to live, is a mother and in her own home.”

In Wilshire’s, the Podunk philosopher, whose social soothsaying has a definite turn, prefaces an article in all sincerity, “The proper study of mankind is man.” Laboriously he builds up a 51 per cent, oligarchy, runs amuck against the other 49 per cent., ignominiously deserts his “man study” and clutches at the skirts of woman to save his wobbly Jericho walls from toppling and allowing the 49 per cent, jobless philistines to invade the 51 per cent, job monopoly. And what is to be woman’s reward for propping up this futile substitute of a larger for a smaller class rule, this whole monument to man’s muddling? O, that’s easy. She is to be rescued from industry and permitted to revert to the Man Hunt. In the language of the genial Fra of humbuggery, “I hope we have not lost our sense of humor.”

A glance at our national platform and these will suffice as samples of broom wielding.

The platform is a well-meaning document. That I know, Socialist men fully intend to give to woman equal opportunity—that is, the equal opportunity which man considers it wise and proper she should have.

Upon first looking over the platform I hopefully read all the hims and his-es in the generic sense, getting along very nicely until I come to, “Capitalism drags their wives from their homes to the mill and the factory,” which is equivalent to objecting that “his wife”—his property—should be dragged forth to “serve” somebody else instead of “him.” There I rebelled, being wedded to the belief that, whatever the temporary hardship, if a woman must serve a master, service in the world of industry will broaden her mental scope and develop her sense of social responsibility more than will service to one man.

Comrade Vail says, “The door to most departments of industrial employments has been opened to women and with the most baneful results.” The introduction of steam power and machinery had the most baneful results for working men, but Socialism does not propose on that account to put men back at hand work, and no more, my comrade brothers, does it propose to put woman back into the narrow walls from which she is escaping. Socialists fling the gleeful gibe at Mr. Bryan and the bourgeois trust-busters who would set back the clock of progress in the organization of industry, yet some of them would put woman back into her “sphere” after she is married.

And what will she do there? In the words of the Moor, her occupation is gone, or soon will be. The labor with which she erstwhile beguiled the day and part of the night has gone to the machine and to fingers especially trained for each specific task. The creamery has taken her dairying. She can no longer make soap or candles, weave, spin or knit in the home to advantage. Sewing, washing, ironing, the nursing of the sick, canning, preserving, baking—in a word, cooking—are rapidly going from the home. Thus is evolution “disposing.”

Dr. Luther Halsey Gulick, of the Russell Sage ‘Foundation, says. “Many functions of the old family unit are now being performed by the community in other and mainly better ways. The home is no longer the scene of activities which make up social life. The school brings about the selection of skilled individuals from the community who shall serve as models for our children, and since we are, on the whole, securing persons for school teachers who are far better patterns than the average parent, we are improving our social inheritance. This is only another step in the specialization of motherhood.”

Professor Simon N. Patten, of the University of Pennsylvania, says, “There is no longer need for woman’s labor in the home. Is she going to sit idle or is she going to make herself of use in the community? I do not question that she will make herself of use and thus solve her problem.”

Are Socialist men going to allow these capitalist-minded gentlemen to be more scientific upon an economic and social question than they?

In this transition period there are thousands of women who, not being compelled to enter the industrial field and having no training nor opportunity for usefulness in other lines, are prisoners of pettiness, living objectless and discontented lives.

The masculine psychology, in its management of women, entrenches itself in such phrases as “the mother function,” and “mother instinct,” as its last citadel. Capitalism has demonstrated that women have other important functions as well as the mother function and it does not take much of a prophet to foresee that under correct conditions the performance of the mother function need not deter her from entering into the world’s work. That she should be paid, not cared for by society as an unfortunate, while performing this function of race necessity, should never come up for question among Socialists. Mother instinct is a fine thing, provided it is guided by trained intelligence. There comes a day when the mother instinct, thus guided, says, “That baby which you call yours is not wholly yours. She has individual rights and society has a claim upon her. Henceforth you must employ time hitherto given to her in some other way. The kindergarten teacher is fitted as you are not to care for her at this stage of her life. And you surrender her to one after another of the trained educators provided by society as a whole. Other mothers surrender the feeding of their children to the cooks provided by society’ for school children.

Under Socialism shall we specialize in every other line of usefulness and shall this most important matter, the rearing of the children, be left to the haphazard chance of the individual mother, whether or not she be capable? We shall do nothing so foolish. Many mothers are not competent to rear their own children but may do other splendid work for which they are adapted.

And is the sacred home then to be destroyed? The mouthpieces of capitalism have almost bullied us into timidity when it comes to discussing the home. Let me fortify myself. Says Bax, “Socialism is the great modern protest against unreality, against the delusive shams which now masquerade as verities,” and Emerson says, “He who would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the name of goodness, but must explore if it be goodness.”

There is no sacred home where the woman is not upon an economic equality with the man. And shall home be less sacred because it is not a workshop or because its members are not thrown together so constantly that they rasp each other’s less amiable characteristics into painful prominence? With Mrs. Gilman I agree also that a “family unity which is only bound together with a table cloth is of questionable value.”

Woman is standing upon the brink of accomplishment, of joy in the world’s work and a willing sharer in its responsibilities. She is groping toward the social consciousness. She will go forward and not back, and the home, freed from grimy toil and economic compulsion, will become such a place of tender love and friendly solicitude that members of the same family will actually be polite to each other.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/isr/v10n12-jun-1910-ISR-gog-EP-f-cov.pdf