Goldsboro weekly argus. [volume] (Goldsboro, N.C.) 1885-1909, 1894-05-17
GoLDSBoRo, N. c., MAY II, 1894
FASHIONABLE WOMEN SUI
FIR AGTSTS.

certain grade, has taken up the
woman suffrage fad with an
amount of enthusiasm which
would be much more less warm
if the opponents of the move
ment had not organized
on the other side. The argu-
ments advanced in favor of Civ
ing the ballot to woman are
mainly trite and time-worn, the
only one being that she "would
purify politics as she purified
literature and society" Good
women are a purifying element
in literature, as they T in So
cial life; but women, like men,
are fallible mortalS, and with
that literary line in mind which
runs from Sappho to the latest
American poet of passion, 1t
cannot be claimed that woman's
influence in literature is always
uplifting. Remembering lola,
Ibsen, DeMaupassant and a
whole army of male apostles Of
uncleanliness, we IRE not dis
posed to claim any pre-eminence
in decency for the ruder sex;
but between the two the diShon-
ors are about even.
Woman has not always eleva-
ted literature, and she does not,
as a rule, do much to elevate
that chemically depressed insti
tuition, the stage. AS to poll
tics, we know from local expert
ence that her advent, on a lin.
tied field, has been anything but
conducive to political purity.
OF the superior virtue of wo
man over man we have not the
slightest shadow of adoubt. Al
advocate of woman suffrage, DR.
William H. Draper, said las
week that the best men T su
perior 20 the best women, a pro
position which sincere opponents
of woman suffrage will not ad
nit. There is nothing better il
the world than a good woman
but because Of her very good
ness she is not qualified to exer
else the privilege Of suffrage
The good woman will abide III
compromise with what she deem
wrong.
A man knows when he i
whipped, and however unpleas
ant the discovery, he accept
the inevitable. A woman, wit
more noble instincts, maintain
: what she believes to be right
and like the good lady in the al
ecdote, wiggles her fingers t
signify scissors" even after sh
has been defeated and all bu
drowned.
There is another and more Sc
rious side to the question. 1t j
the social side. Whatever
higher education may effect i
the future, woman at preser
has little of the true spirit of rt
publicanism. Rarely do we hea
of an American citizens abjurin
his birthright in order to assum
a foreign title of nobility. Pc
haps the temptation has nc
come to him very often, but til
number of times in which he ha
succumbed to it in the preseI
generation could be summed II
on the thumbs of two hand,
The American woman, on tt
contrary, is proverbial for be
readiness to t'love a lord" "
have seen the cleverest wome
of our ''ferce democratic" DO
down and worship at the shrir
of a titled foreigner, simply an
solely for the sake of the tit
and nothing more.
There are no brighter wome
in America than those who max
their living by writing for tt
papers," yet they are anon
the first to PROSTATE themselve
in homage before Lady Henry
This, or the Countess of Tha
or, in default of amore imposin
title, at the small feet of "Bab
Mckee" or Baby Ruth" accorc
ing as Trojan or Tyrian may /
in the ascendant. 1t will M
tend to increase the stability
republican institutions to han
them over to the care of a Sc
which worships caste and elias
with the sincerity of a Brahmil
IT has been discovered thu
persons are right or left-hande
in sight. that is, one eve