Thomas County cat. [volume] (Colby, Kan.) 1885-1891, 1888-02-02
IWOMAN'S DEPARTMENT.
A PLEA FOR RIGHT.

ereQ an able address on w oman OuI
frage at Nashville. Tenn. where she
attended the annual meeting of the
National w. C. T. u. She said:
Webster defines a Democracy as a
Government for the people; ours is a
Government of only half the people
SO long as woman has no voice in it
If all power inheres in the people, you
yourselves. my brothers. are shorn OF
half your power so long as woman is
not permitted to share it. In the be-
ginning it was not so. ''Male and
female created He them. and gave
them dominion" over all the earth
Here He defines the character of that
humanity He was grading in the new
made world. Here in the beginning
of the Bible we have it all in nut
shell; the closing utterances OF the
blessed book and grand prophetic Wis
ion a.,i along the pages reiterate it.
If the voice of the people is the voice
Of God. then the voice of God can
never be heard SO long as woman's
voice is silenced This must be SO, un-
less you put her outside the pale of the
humanity God planted IN Eden. A
slave mother bears slave progeny;
woman is slave to just that extent
that she is denied the privilege of
working out her own thoughts and
convictions of right as God gives her
10 sec the right The reform for which
We plead is not against man-it is pre-
cminently for the benefit of man. Oh,
my brothers. you have tunneled
mountains. comprised lands. spanned
oceans. even harnessed the lightning
to do the worlds work. God gave you
Che aggressive force. and you have
used it grandly. and laid all your
trophies at the feet of woman. Your
hand inyents machinery which sets
Our hands free from drudgery; your
steamboats, and railroads annihilate
distance for us; your telegraph brings
the worlds thought to our knowledge;
but there are moral and spiritual forces
which elude you every time-woman
alone can grasp them.
Dear sisters, when you talk about
the worship you receive from your
brothers. do you forget the two hum
dred thousand licensed schools of vice
in this country? DO you realize that
this makes your door-yard fence the
dead-line beyond which your boy passes
only at the peril of his soul? Women
of old were held accountable for ma
tional vice. 'Woc unto you women
that are at ease in Zion" Will not
God sit in Judgment against you. who.
amid brighter light and infinitely
greater privileges. sit at ease in Zion
while such snarcs are laid for souls?
Can you make no better returns 10 the
good men who have made your lives SO
sheltered and secure than darned lace
and crazy quiltsP
politics are too dirty for women to
mingle in." is another objection often
made. But it is no argument against
woman suffrage. it is one against male
suffrage. Men have always had
control of politics; if they have al
lowed them to become dirty it is time
women came to the rescue and
cleared things up. just the work in
which they are adopts. If thought
that politics were necessarily dirty
ahc unholy scramble for power into
which. too often. they degenerate
should never wish my boys to become
voters If not fit for my girls, politics
arc not fit for my boys.
the blessed Book says that they
who stay by the stuff shall share equal
ly with those who 60 out to the battle.
We stay by the stuff and guard your
snterests in your absence, and shall we
not share equally with you? But. you
object. ''there is already too much suf-
frsgc. What we need is restricted, not
suffrage" But can YOU re-
strict suffrage? This Nation will wade
in blood up to its knees before it re-
stricts suffrage. Voters realize too
well the value of suffrage to yield it ex-
ccpt with their lives. And this is we'll;
the masses are safer with the ballot
than without it. The ballot AMI the
bayonet are the only two great forces;
which do you prefer. mob armed with
ballots or with bayonet
Consider the developing power of
the ballot; look at the men of this
Nation. descended from q long line of
voting ancestry. The wo. Id shows no
0obler specimens of manhood. Com
pare them with the thousands landed
every month at Castle Garden, COM
eng from the DISTINGUISHED classes of
Europe. and you can form some idea
of this developing power of suffrage.
You can not develop q slave; develop
Ment comes only with freedom. and
keeps pace with it Our widest
dreams have not pictured what God
intends to do for this Nation when all
its people. instead Of half of them. are
reaily free.
1t Is common to attribute the Ma
lions growth and success to its broad
ncraa rich minea and ofhor n, tov;ul