Waterbury evening Democrat., 1889-05-23
WOMEN AND LICENSE.

An effort has been made by some o
 the ultra temperance workers i'll Massa-
 chusetts to secure to women the right to
 vote on the liquor license question, but
 the bill granting the privilege has been
 hung up in the senate where the indi-
 cations are that it is not gaining strength
 by suspension. Could favorable action
 law its workings would be watched
 with great deal of interest through the
 country, and would influence more or
 less the action of other states in regard
 to such law.
 We are not of those who think that
 women are filling their legitimate sphere
 in life when they go to the polls to reg
 ister political choice of opinion. And
 we certainly do not believe that women
 should be accorded partial suffrage,
 even when the matter to which that
 partial suffrage applies are moral
 questions. If women are to have the
 right to vote at all they should have that
 right in all matters that come within the
 scope of male suffrage. And nothing
 else we believe will satisfy the more ad-
 vanced advocates of female suffrage,
 whether men or women. The results
 where women have enjoyed the right to vote have not been suggestive of any ex- tended desire to exercise the right on the part of the average female, and in most cases women have failed to take adva1S tage of the privilege. In Massachusetts, where women have the right of voting on matters pertaining to the schools, they have not been accustomed to vote; and except in the late school election at Boston, when religious prejudices were brought into the contest and kind of sentimental fervor was aroused on that ground, it has been found almost impos- sible to induce women to vote. There are very few we believe who will main tain that religious prejudice is an encoura- ging basis for an honest and we'll balanced be seriously asserted therefore that the best results were attained in that elec- tion. Give women chance to vote on the license question and much the same condition Of things would ensue. Noth- ing would be easier than for temperance fanatics to influence the impressionable female mind on the subject of licenses. And experience proves that these indi- viduals would not be above resorting to such tactics. The economic side of the question would be entirely disregarded, and the solid arguments that made public opinion against prohibition in the recent election would appeal in vain to women against the moral and senti- mental urging of fanatics. It is for this reason particularly that women, if they are to be given the right of suffrage at all, should not have it restricted to a subject whose economic importance they would not be disposed to solve and the aspects of which they could only view through the laws of moral prejudice or mental derangement. The iduor license question has peculiar features of its own. and least of all fitted to study and com prehend these features are women.
 1t is not probable we think that women will secure the right to vote on the G- cense question in Massachusetts, for even the republicans, who are backing and filling as usual in the premises, do not seem disposed to grant privilege that might upset all their fine-spun cal 1 culations about prohibition. The liquor question belongs to men to settle, and they may be trusted to settle it without the intervention of women. Massachn- setts ought to keep her women from rushing in where they ought not to tread, and there is little doubt that other states where similar snares are laid by temperance eranks will follow in her ! footsteps. Women should not vote on the license question till they are on an entirely equal footing as to the suffrage with men.