WOMEN'S INTERNATIONAL LEAGUE FOR PEACE AND FREEDOM
December 3, 1926.
My dear Miss Sheepshanks,
Your letter came just when I was in the midst of a piece of work for the National Federation of Settlements and I delayed replying until I could approach it with a freer mind. I also remembered that you wrote that you would not take up the matter seriously until Christmas.
1st. About the salary. I of course agree with you that it is small. This particular sum was decided upon because Vilma Glücklich came to Geneva to take charge of the educational work while Miss Balch was still Executive Secretary; when Miss Balch broke down and was obliged to leave in the middle of the year, Miss Glücklich, at the invitation of the Board, agreed to take the executive position temporarily at the same salary she had been receiving. This entire matter was voted upon at the meeting of the Executive Committee held at The Hague in December 1922 after our Emergency Conference there. This salary was continued until she ↑Miss Glücklich↓ left three years later.
I was personally most anxious that an American successor should not receive more than the European Secretary and [Madeleine] Doty agreed to take the position for the same amount. But there is, of course, nothing fixed about the salary and there is no reason why the Finance Committee or the Executive Board could not make an entirely new budget to take effect at the end of [Madeleine] Doty’s term, November 1st, 1927.
When Miss Balch, and Mde Ramondt ↑and I↓ made out [the] ↑a↑ budget, after the Washington Conference, (which is still retained as the basis of the present budget) we knew that the Section of the United States could not possibly send more than five hundred dollars or twenty-five hundred Swiss francs each month. ↑[written in bottom right margin] [We?] founded the budget upon this with an estimate of what the other sections would give.↓ The budget was adopted by the Executive Committee after the Washington Conference. It has not always been easy for the United States Section to meet this obligation and at certain months it has seemed almost impossible, although up-to-date we have never failed. I am quite sure that this amount could not be increased, but we will make every effort to continue it until the next Congress. ↑[written in bottom left margin [although] we did not make a pledge in Dublin as we had at Washington↓ Most of it comes from ↑inter↓ National Memberships of [page 2] which there are about seven hundred and fifty in the United States of which. It would require twelve hundred ↑members↓ to make the required amount of six thousand dollars or thirty thousand Swiss francs a year, which we now send.
I have never admired an association which paid its leading Executive a large salary with disparity as to other members of the staff and I suppose something of that sort was in our minds when we made out the present budget, founded on the previous one. A new budgeting committee would be at liberty of course to allocate this sum as they think best. Nothing would please me more than to find that our resources were so increased that various salaries could be raised and new work undertaken -- especially more traveling on the part of the Executive Secretary.
2nd. It does not seem quite a case of "living in." I am quoting from a letter from Miss Balch after she had read your letter to me. "As to living in, I think it has never been insisted upon, or even suggested as desirable. I followed my own preference and I think Vilma Glücklich and [Madeleine] [illegible] Doty have done the same. I think I never had any sitting room." I am sure she is right in this. Personally I have tried not to influence the Secretary, although it seems reasonable does it not that when we moved to Geneva for the sake of the people of International interests who come there, that the Secretary should see as many of them as possible. It ought to be quite as important as writing letters or any other form of office work and quite as useful in the way of making new plans. I suggested to [Madeleine] Doty when I was there that she delegate [Anne Zueblin] to receive people who came, keeping her own office hours as free from interruption as possible excepting when the caller seemed significant. That I think would have to be largely a matter of the arrangement which the Secretary made as regard to her own time whether she lived at the Maison or not. She certainly should keep her evenings and Sundays free if she liked. Can it technically be called "living in" when the room and board are not part of the salary and when the Secretary pays in the "Maison" just as she would pay anywhere else, asking her own decision in regard to it? I have always paid for my room and board at [page 3] Hull House as the other residents do, all of us being at liberty to live outside any time we prefer it.
3rd. The inadequacy of the staff is of course a matter for the Executive Committee to consider with the new Secretary. It seemed to me impossible to make one change which [Madeleine] Doty suggested last Fall because the employee involved had not been given sufficient time to make other arrangements. If the Executive Committee meets in the early Spring there would be ample time to make any changes in personnel, which might be considered desirable, by November 1st, 1927.
4th. I quite agree with you that the lack of moral support sometimes given to the Secretary by the National Section is quite a serious matter. It is always difficult in International Organizations to keep in close touch with the different Nations represented, as you doubtless know, and I suppose the Secretary herself must devise all sorts of ways for keeping the communication open. The use of the Maison as an International Club has been at times quite valuable in this way, much might be achieved by more frequent meetings of the Executive Board, and as you suggest, by a more thorough understanding as to the policies to be pursued at Headquarters. This I think must be discussed by the Executive Committee with the new Secretary.
In many respects the Congress at Dublin was so satisfactory that I hope its after-effects may prove valuable and of itself increase interest in various countries.
I am sending a copy of this letter, as you had done with yours, to each member of the Executive Committee, that they may follow the situation. It must of course be they or the Budget Committee whom they appoint who decide finally.
I am sure you know that I quite agree with you that it is the business of this generation of women to raise professional standards in every possible way including the payment of higher salaries, but on the other hand, in the [page 4] United States at least, women's organizations are continually going to pieces because they put up salaries without relation to their resources, and ↑that↓ is certainly a blow to the professional woman's [prestige].
I hope very much that you will decide to come and I am confident that you [wished] me to reply frankly. With all good wishes of the Season, I am
Affectionately Yours,
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