Wichita eagle., 1889-04-13
WOMAN SUFFRAGE IN KANSAS.
The Experiment in the Late Election as
Others Saw It.

Chicago Tribune
The recent municipal elections il
Kansas subject the woman suffrag
question to the test of practice rathe
than theory. 1t is the second test of tn,
kind. The recuits reached can hardly
be thought satisfactory by the advocate:
of female suffrage. In the little Puri
tanic American village of Oskaloosa the
policy of turning the town over to the
government of female officers appears tt
have been jocularly successful. Small
| boys have to be in bed before 10 O'Clock
at night, and men are forbidden to eX-
pectorate tobacco juice on the side
walks. Various other strict police reg
ulations are enacted to the advantage
or order, morality and sobriety in the
little puritanical community. But Os-
kaloosa is small place, with no unruly
elements. The people are nearly all
Americans and church goers, and the
few unbelievers suffer social boycott.
The government of such a community
is simple matter and presents few of
the difficulties found even in Kansas
towns like Topeka, Leavenworth, and
West Kansas City. These towns have
reached considerable size and contain
a large admixture of foreign born peo-
pie. Woman suffrage has changed mat
tiers in Topeka and Leavenworth only
for the worse. and in consequence of
female votes at the recent election both
these municipalities are turned over to
the rule of the liquor element. In
Leavenworth Colonel Anthony brother
of Susan B. Anthony and champion of
the woman suffrage doctrine) was
nominated by the Republicans and
anti-saloon people against Democrat
chosen as a representative of the liquor
traffic. According TO the doctrines of
Madam Anthony the thousands of wo-
men recently admitted to the suffrage
should have gone solidly to the support
of her brother and purified and refined
local politics by scoring victory over
contrary Colonel Anthony was defeated
and the grogshop candidate elected by a
majority of 700. In like manner Topeka
was carried by the saloon. As rule
the women voted with their husbands
and the males of their families and &C
cording to party prejudice, irrespective
of any considerations of morality, tenn
perance, or the publication of politics.
The Democratic women voted for the
grogshop candidate on their regular
party ticket and seemed more
about a victory for
the side their husbands took than
about elevating and purifying the city
politics. And the Democratic women
whose prejudices carried them to the
support of saloonism and gambling seem
to have turned out in greater numbers
than their Republican sisters.
In Utah woman suffrage was given an
trial, but congress had to dis
franchise the women voters because the
Mormon women We're completely under
the control Of the church authorities and
voted solidly in favor of polygamy. In
Kansas the female voters of the cities
made an attempt to purify politics, but
as a rule voted the same way as their
husbands, fathers or brothers. Where
one woman voted against her husband
and for the better another took like free
ION and for the worse. Ip Leaven-
worth, Atchison, Wichita and Topeka
5he municipalities We're carried for mis-
rule by the votes of the women.