Mississippi leader. (Jackson, Miss.) 1892-1895, 1895-04-30
WANTED--GOOD MOTHERS
Sam Jones Writes on the Great
est Forco In This Country.
He Dspiorcs tho Advent OF the New
Woman If She Comes at the Ex-
pense of tho Home-A Force
full Arraignment
fCoPYRIGHr. 1881

a frst-class mother. She lives longer
and stronger than any other character,
for she nultiplies her life by the
number uf her children. A prohibition
mother who raises ten children ought
to be equal to ten prohibitionists. The
| Christian mother who raises ten chill
dren ought to be equal to ten Chris
tians. The democratic mother who
raises ten children ought to be equal to
ten democrats, and so on. In a few
years each of these ten children be-
comes the father or mother of home,
and each in turn live in their children
the lives of their mother, and it will be
but a short time until a flrst-class
mother will be hundred times what
she is.
Mrs. Wesley was as much greater
than any one man as all her children
combined were greater than any one
man. She has truly lived with and
worked in Charles and John as she
lived with and worked in her own body.
II the women of this country will begin
to hold embarrassing conventions
and get every mother in the United
States to join, pledging herself to raise
a sober, Christian gentleman, 1t will be
but few years until the old drunlsards
and liars and thieves and whore
mongers will die off, and the sons Of
these good mothers will take their
places. / think we can breed up to a
reform quicker than we can vote up to
it-for after all we must depend upon
our good breeding for our good voting.
A genuinely patriotic woman cannot
do better thing for this government
than to multiply herself by one-half a
dozen boys. l am sorry the genuine
female woman is to be extinct. l am
sorry the whole thing is tending toward
the man. Enough of the race is wear
ing breeches now. We need more men,
but we have male material enough to
make our men if some fellow could in
vent a process for turning male things
into men. If the whole world turns to
men the thing will be very monotonous.
If the women are going to wear trou-
sers and ride astride and hold Office and
make stump speeches, and stand up in
street cars, and be bankers and clerks,
telegraph operators and railroad con-
ductors, policemen and politicians,
where are our mothers going to come
| from?
God has called women by nature to
be the mothers of the race; to be the
home-keepers. 1t is difficult thing
| for a woman to be home-kecper and
an ofice-keeper; to take care of babe
and a bank; of children and campaigns;
of cradles and candidates; of boys and
ballots; of patches and platforms. l am
heartily in favor of woman's work in
womau's sphere, and l believe IN the
enlargement of woman's sphere to the
extreme Providential limit.
| would not take from the platform
such women as Miss Frances Willard.
| l believe she is as truly a Heaven-ap-
| pointed instrument for the dissemina-
ton Of right principles as any preacher
| in this country; but l stand for the
home and believe in the home, and be-
lieve that anything that makes draft
upon the home is hurtful to our nation.
| believe there are women who can
work and ought to work in almost
every sphere of life. Their providcntial
| relations are such that when they Oc-
cupy public work their private work
does not suffer.
But the danger facing this country Is
the tendency of our women to retire
from motherhood. Our home life is be-
coming very rotten at this point. 1t
seems that women prefer to be any
thing or everything rather than the
mother of large family OF children,
| and, in my Judgment, there is no higher
and nobler sphere. The children of this
country are being raised by that class OF
| people least competent to raise children
The educated and the wealthy and the
higher classes of our people who are in
condition to give the best possible
| chances to children are the very people
| who have no children.
When we 60 on the residence streets,
where the stone mansions and the mar
BILE palaces are the pride OF the city, we
| will find here and there child, but
| when we take the back streets OF the
| cities among the poor classes, the yards
are full of ragged. dirty urchins.
Tho old proverb: "a fool for luck
! and a poor man for children seems TO
| be in full force. If the next genera
ton of our children is to come from the
lower and more ignorant classes we
| will find our reformation slow process.
| We are reforming at the top and de-
| forming at the bottom, and as fast as
our reformed die of their places are be-
ing taken by the deformed, and we
have got an endless process ahead OF us.
1t is like trying to clear spring
branch with hog wallowing in the
spring. If we will drive tho devil out
Of the spring the branch win clear IT.
self. II we will drive the devil out OF
our homes society and politics viii soon
clear up. The goddess society element
Of this country is putting premium on
childless homes and sneering at the
faithful wife and mother, until the
homes of society are becoming centers
of crime, and the little agnostical, jack
| assical doctors are lending the noble
profession of physics to the infamous
prostitution Of our race.
| Marriage is becoming merchandise
| clubs are substituted for homes, wives
arc becoming society ladies, children
are unavoidable nuisances and destruc-
ton of life habit. The few children
| who enter the home are turned over to
milk bottles and nurses in babyhood,
/ to public schools in childhood, fashion
able colleges in youth, and are given
| l,.ooo and arnnSQmRnf