The new Northwest. [volume] (Portland, Or.) 1871-1887, 1874-03-06

position or challenge hostile criticism
These facts, however, instead of indicat-
ing a decline of public interest in behalf
of the ballot, demonstrate its rapid
growth and the strong hold it has gained
upon public confidence.
The means employed, as you well un-
derstand, by our opponents, to thin out
the ranks of the suffrage party, are nu-
merous, plausible and effective. They
scruple neither at falsehood nor detrac-
tion. Their most effective weapons are
ridicule, caricature and denunciatiOn,
trinity of influences which require a
strong will, backed by fixed moral pur-
pose, to persistently withstand and en-
dure. They urge with much of plausi-
bility and force, that woman's sphere,
from her high and delicate organization,
is essentially domestic, moral and relig-
ious, which political associations would
benumb, weaken and extinguish. They
enforce these ideas because politics are
immoral, ,debasing and degrading, and for
which the coarse, rough and hurley ma
ture of man is specially adapted. They
further insist that those women who ex-
press, either by word or act, desire to
enter the ''filthy pool of politics." pro-
claim themselves as possessed of the
coarse and strong-minded qualities of
men, and therefore are unfit to share
the socity of cultured and refined wom-
anly women.
But, to the undersigned, there is no
just reason why man should insist on
maintaining a monopoly of politics and
of the government it controls, because
he has perverted its purposes from
right, justice and humanity to subserve
the cause of corruption, robbery and OPP
presion-why he should point to the
''filthy pool' of his own creation, de-
nying woman admission, because of the
sickening miasma it exhales. 1t might
with more propriety be urged as an ar
gument for masculine political ab1ica
ton.
But politics are not necessarily i'm
moral, degrading or cOrrupting. Thei
professed object is to protect, through
! the government, the weak from tn
: aggressions of the strong, the poor from
the grasping avarice of the rich-to pro
t tect men in ''life, liberty and the pursui
l of happiness" The general aim an
| purposes of politics are not only conso
2 nant with the refinement, delicacy an
domestic nature of women, but ais
with morality and religion. 1t is alon
q by the aid of woman's influence that W
, may hope to secure the desired purity {
, our political machinery. The few VIII
Z run the political machine, having
| good thing, will scruple at no statement
however absurd, foolish or extravagant
to bewilder and confound the publ
: understanding. This cry against tn
corrupting character of politics is
dodge of their own creation, to dete
honest men from political action, and t
: frighten women out of their politica
, aspirations. Politics is the soul of soci
ety-the life blood of the State-th
p fountain of enforcing authority. 1t
history, under masculine domination,
| that of robbery, oppression and carnage
q It's future, under the corporation of tn
Y sexes and the inspiration of justice, vii
proclaim the beauties of peace and tn
. safety of beating "swords into plOugl
r shares and spears into pruning hooks
The ballot being the only key tina
A will unlock the door of politics t
o woman, she should understand the grea
value of the object of her aspirations
: itscapacity to overthrow colossal wrong
and to establish right on firm founds
n ton.
e 1t is politics which now exclud,
4 woman from the ballot box; denies he
n the right of self-government, and whil
e taxing her property, deprives her of rel
: resentation, and that, too, in the yer
= teeth of our boasted profession ths
n taxation without representation is ty
ranny."
Q 1t is politics which incorporates I'll
e professions, confers on them authorit
n to exclude women from enjoying the al
: vantages to be derived therefrom. 1t
: politics which, with money extorted b
e fear and force from women, incorporate
d and endows seminaries, colleges, un
is versities, and professional schools, al
then excludes them from managir
: authority, from occupying professor
l. chairs, and very generally from enjo,
/ ing even the humble advantages of tn
IS tiOn.
f 1t is politics which commissions pc
s. sons with legal authority to plal
D, whisky shops, beer cellars and hume
ID Gus other institutions, feeders of vice an
l. crime, on our public thoroughfares,
y tempt, corrupt, debase, disgrace and rui
socially and morally, physically an
'r spiritually, our fathers, husband
lie and brothers, and not unfrequentl
= sweeps away by their destroying Gu
rents, our mothers, wives and sisters.
10 1t is politics which denies to woma
Or the same right to manage her own pr
ID vate property, as is possessed by maj
1t the maker of the laws.
rs 1t is politics which denies to the wi
of an equal right with the husband an
IN father in the direction and manag
er ment of her olgn children.
lg It is politics which secures to the hu
Y band, on the death of his wife, the el
y, tire community property of the husbaI
+, and wife, without administration.
=