Maud Nathan
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Maud Nathan (October 20, 1862 - December 15, 1946) was an American social worker, labor activist and suffragist for women's right to vote.
Nathan was an outspoken advocate for better working conditions for women and for the right of women to vote. She is perhaps known best for her leadership and work as the president of the Consumers' League of New York City.
Maud Nathan was born in New York City, the first daughter of Annie Augusta and Robert Weeks Nathan. Her parents were descendants from one of the most distinguished Sephardic Jewish families in the United States. She was a first cousin of Emma Lazarus and Supreme Court Justice Benjamin Cardozo. Her sister, Annie Nathan Meyer, was an author and the founder of Barnard College.
Nathan was married when she was seventeen. Her only daughter died when she was eight years old. She became involved in charitable activities. She joined the board of directors of the Hebrew Free School Association, where she taught English to the Jewish immigrants.
Her many activities brought her in contact with Josephine Shaw Lowell, who interested her in helping to improve the working conditions of the New York shop-girls. In 1890, with other women, she formed the Consumers' League of New York. The league's goal was to better the working conditions of women retail clerks.
Nathan investigated the working conditions of women in retail stores and discovered that they worked sixty hours a week for two to three dollars. She was appalled by the filth in the stores, hidden from the customers, and found that there was sexual harassment on the job.
In 1897, she became the league's president, a position that she held for twenty-one years. Under her leadership, the league publicized the deplorable working conditions in the retail stores and factories. They created a "white list" which named the stores and factories that met the league standards for wages and conditions and urged the public to patronize them.
Nathan realized that lobbying in Albany was fruitless as women did not vote and they did not have any clout over the legislatures. She started to devote more time for the right for women to vote. She joined the Equal Suffrage League. Her brothers and sister were against women's suffrage and even her cousin, Benjamin Cardozo, the Supreme Court justice had second thoughts about it. She was almost sixty when the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified, giving women the right to vote.
Maud Nathan was 84 when she died in 1946. She dedicated her life to help women work under decent conditions for a fair wage and to help women obtain the right to vote.
