The new Northwest. [volume] (Portland, Or.) 1871-1887, 1874-06-05
Woman's Prayers and Suffrage.

Mark Twain, writing to the London
Standard of the prayer crusade, says:
Would YOU consider the conduct of
these crusaders justifiable do-thor-
oughly justifiable. They find them
selves voiceless in the making of laws
and the election OF officers to execute
them. Born with brains, born in the
country, educated, having large inter-
ests at stake, they find their tongues
tied and their hands fettered, while
every ignorant, whisky-drinking, for
eign-born savage in the land may hold
Office, help to make the laws, degrade
the dignity of the former, and break the
latter at his own sweet will. They see
their fathers, husbands and brothers sit
namely at home and allow the scum Of
the country to assemble at the "prima-
ries," name the candidates for office
from their own vile ranks, and, unre-
buked, elect them. They live in the
midst of a country where there is no end
to the laws and no beginning to the ex-
ecutiOn of them. And when the laws,
intended to protect their SONS from de-
struction by intemperance, lie torpid
aud without sign of life, year after year,
they recognize that here is a matter
that interests them personally, a matter
which comes straight home to them.
And since they are allowed to lift no
legal voice against the outrageous state
of things they suffer under in this re-
gard, think il is no wonder that their
patience has broken down at last, and
they have tried TO persuade themselves
that they are justifiable in breaking the
law of trespass, when the laws that
should make the trespass needless, are
allowed by the voters TO lie dead and in
operative. The present crusade will,
doubtless, do but little work against in
temperance that will be really perma-
nent, but il will do what is as much, or
even more to the purpose, think.
think il will suggest to more than one
man that if women could vote they
would vote on the side of morality, even
If they did vote and speak rather fran
tically and furiOusly; and it will also
suggest that when the women once
made up their minds. that it was not
good to have the all-pOwerful ''prima-
riesl in the hands of lOafeTs, thieves and
pernicious little politicians, they would
not sit indolently at home, as their hus-
bands and brothers do now, but would
hoist their praying banners, take the
! field in force, pray the assembled politi-
cal scums back to the holes and slums
] WutIt lAlGN DGAODRF oGb VI oOhAN
candidates for decent human beings *
vote for. / dearly want the women tC
/ be raised to the political altitude of tn,
negro, the imported savage and the par
doned thief, and allowed to vote. 1t i
our last chance, 1 think. The womel
will be voting before long, and then if
demagogue can still continue to lord
in Congress; if the highest offices in tn
land can still continue to be occupied by
periurers and robbers; If another Con
gress like the FOrty-Seeond, consisting
OF fifteen honest men and two hundred
and ninety-six Of the other kind, can one
more be created, it will at last be time
l fear, to give over trying TO save tn,
country by human means, and appeal Il
Providence. Both the great parties
have failed. l wish we might have ;
woman's party now, and see how tina
would work. / feel persuaded that il
extending the suffrage to. women, thi
country could lose absolutely nothing
and might gain a great deal. Fo
thirty centuries history has been iterat
ing and reiterating that, in a mora
fight, woman is simply dauntless; anG
we all know, even with our eyes shu
upon Congress and our voters, that from
the day that Adam ate of the apple ant
told on Eve, down to the present day
man in a moral fight has pretty uni
formly shown himself to be an arran
coward.