The Portland daily press., 1881-05-12

posed emergence of the mind and conscience
of women from the little routine of domestic
affairs, thus ennobling her. When we look at
evils in the best society, under the most ia
vored circumstances, can we say there is no
use in the movement. In the world we find
one set of people working to perpetuate
evils, another smaller body of Christians and
philanthropists trying to prevent the first from
carrying out its objects. and between the two
the great mass of people stolidly keeping on in
the old ruts, attending only to their own sell
fish interests The Saviour chose woman to
spread over the world the doctrine of the new
faith on his emergence from the tomb.
Mrs. Ada Bowles spoke of the strides the
woman's question was making in the world to-
day, and paid high compliment to the work
the Woman's journal was doing in advancing
that work. She thought the keepers of gam
bling houses, the brewers, and the brothel-
keepers were pitted against the suffrage move
ment She paid high compliment to the
method of conducting elections in San Fran
cisco, and said surely no objection could be
made to women going to the polls if they were
managed as we'll at the east as the west. She
pictured the evils committed by iptemperauce,
and said ii the women, $4,000 in number,
prayed for the ballot in Massachusetts, to ex-
tirpate this vice, why should we not let the
women have hand in taking money from the
treasury to do needful things rather than to
have it bestowed on aldermanic suppers or buy
gold badges.
DR.. J. w. Bashford of Boston, a young man,
said one reason advanced against woman suf-
frage had been that ladies have not the time
from their duties to vote The time required
is about two hours year. If the woman is
CONSTANT church member she has to go to
church 104 times year, and yet nobody will
contend she should not be a CONSTANT church
member in order to properly educate her chill
dren Again, if women are allowed to vote,
won't foreign women, the people say, over
saugh the men in the vote. If you look at
statistics you will find that the men and wo-
men, added together of American birth, ex-
coed those of men and women of foreign birth
by some thousands. The question is, are we
going to make false distinctions between people
or sex, or prevent them to work out their des-
tiny. The question is not, can woman make
good doctor or lawyer, or man good house.
keeper.
Mrs Lucy Stone Blackwell said, what has
brought us here is to see if something cannot
be done to make an effective organization in
Maine, and she thought the proper steps were
taken for the formation of a Portland society
in the morning session. She called on DR..
Blackwell to read the constitution of the
Maine society, and ne did so. She referred to
all that had been done by the workers for wo-
man suffrage for years, and thought all fair
minded men should take hold with women in
carrying out the golden rule. She spoke of
almost all the leading men and women as
now on the side of woman suffrage. She hoped
the Portland people would organize to help the
work along. She urged that women can't es-
cape the question so long as they are taxed.
that politics is mixed up with it, and they
must be interested therefore in politics. The
law decides what the relations of a woman
shall be to her baby; if she earns a dollar what
portion of it she shall have right to; and
therefore the woman must NEEDLE with the
law Think what wrong it would be, and
how men would feel it, if some great question
came up in which they were interested and
they were held back and couldn't do ANYTHING
about it. She hardly felt her country was
made for her when she thought how little
rights she had under the flag
This morning meeting will DO held at 10
o'clock at Reception Hall for all who choose to
join the Society.