SOVIET UNION

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 75, Issue 6394, 11 July 1947, Page 3

SOVIET UNION

EQUAL RIGHTS FOR WOMEN COMPARED WITH U.S.A. A recent visitor to the much-dis-cussed Soviet Union was the presi dent of the Federation of United States Clubwomen, Lucy J. Dickinson, who gives her impressions of the war-torn areas of Russia in the following article, which appeared in the Southern Cross:

In this article I prefer giving you intimate glimpses of the details of our journey through which you may be able to catch the spirit of people working for world peace through understanding.

I' decided to take some Russian lessons, but after having two, I decided to talk to my teacher about her country and be content with speaking about five sentences. That was a great mistake. I should have spent every waking moment practising Russian.

I am determined to do all I can to urge young persons to study the Russian language, and to see that it is put into the curricula of our schools and colleges. Before we started on our tour, we attended a most thrilling sports event, in the stadium holding 90,000 people, in which some 15,000 young people from all the countries of Russia took part. We sat for six hours entranced by the beauty, the colour, the harmony, the perfect rhythm. I have never seen anything equal to the performance anywhere in this country.

On Sunday I went to the Russian Orthodox Cathedral where I stood two hours through a very impressive service. I thought that the church had been abolished in the Soviet ’Union, but that idea, like many others, proved not to be so. We visited various hospit&ls. 1 was interested to discover that 65 per cent of the doctors in the country are women and that they are given equal standing with the men,. We were shown in the hospitals how exercises are begun with babies of nine months.

I was- exceedingly interested to see the women of the Soviet Union. They have equal rights, and of course I was chagrined to have to acknowledge that such is not the case in the United States, but I felt very hopeful that before I returned the matter would be rectified. My head would have been bowed in shame had I known what was happening in the United States—that equal rights was not to be. A sad commentary on American life to-day.