Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 6.djvu/125

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA III service and the like; also the letter-carriers, city and rural, railway mail clerks and such classes. It is believed that the proportion of women to men in the entire service did not change materially until the beginning of the war. When the United States entered the war, there were approximately 38,000 employees in the executive civil service in the District of Columbia, approximately two-fifths of them women. The force was increased by 80,000 during the war, of whom approximately 75 per cent were women. The force has now been reduced to about 90,000, of whom approximately 50,000 are women. The proportion of women is being constantly reduced by the return of former soldiers and sailors to civilian employment, who are allowed preference under the law. The Federal Civil Service outside the District of Columbia increased by approximately 280,000 during the war period, possibly one-third of this increase made up of women. That force numbers now about 550,000 as compared with 450,000 before the war and it seems safe to say that twenty per cent, are women. These positions are open to any who pass the civil service exami- nations but the chiefs of the bureaus and departments are appointed by the President, and Secretaries of Departments, and they have always been men. Men have succeeded also in getting the highly paid positions under civil service. No law excludes women from the District offices. There are, of course, no elections. Some officials are appointed by the President, some by the Commissioners, and the Supreme Court of the District appoints the Board of Education, three of whose members must be women. In 1920 President Wilson appointed Miss Kathryn Sellers, a member of the District bar, to be Judge of the Juvenile Court. This was largely due to the efforts of Justice William Hitz, of the District Supreme Court. The President appointed also Mrs. Clara Sears Taylor a member of the Rent Commission, created to consider rent problems grow- ing out of the war, and Miss Mabel T. Boardman as Com- missioner of the District. The Commissioners appointed two women trustees of the public library. Formerly it was neces- sary to make an effort to get women on the boards of charities, hospitals, etc., but now such places are seeking the women. Within the past ten years many women graduates of the law schools have been appointed as law clerks in various depart- ments, War Risk, Treasury, especially the income and customs ions, and in the Solicitor office for the State Department. The Interior Department appointed Miss Florence Etheridge, at one time president of the D. C. State Equal Suffrage Associa-