The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-02-17
SUFFRAGE FOR WOMEN.
Alice stone Blackwell Responds to
Hon. Abram :. Hewitt.

To the Editor of the indianapolis Journal:
Hon. Abram s. Hewitt. former mayor of
New York, has just published a list of his
reasons for thinking that women ought
not TO be allowed TO vote. He says that the
elevating moral influence of women will be
impaired. if not destroyed. by contact with
men in political movements, and
elections" This is hard on the many ad-
mirable women in New York who took
part in the recent successful campaign
against Tammany. For weeks they were
brought into as close contact with men in
that political movement and in its as
semblies as they could have been during
the few moments Of casting a ballot in the
actual election; and their elevating moral
influence has not been at all impaired.
Mr.. Hewitt says the duties of public Of
flee could not be performed by women
without violating the proprieties and safe
guards of female purity and delicacy." This
is hard on the women most active in oppos-
ing woman suffrage. Mrs. J. Elliot Cabot,
the president of the Massachusetts Asso-
citation Opposed TO the Further Extension
of Suffrage to Women" who has just died,
was for years an overseer of the poor, and
a member of the School Board in Brookline,
NldSS. III new 1OTk SO many VI TIE WOIien
most prominent in opposing suffrage are
oficeholders that it has been said no anti
was ever yet known TO refuse an office. In
the equal suffrage States the offices which
women hold are mostly educational and
charitable. But since the example of Queen
Victoria il is idle to say that even the
highest office may not be held by a woman
without the impairment of female purity
and delicacy.''
Mr.. Hewitt says women ought not to vote
because they cannot fight. If no persons
were allowed to vote except those who are
7 ~~'''~0 - do ~~ri'itary and police
duty, 1t would be consistent to rule out
90 ~4,n Vt4iei nOncOnDd tanUs;
but that is not the case. Massachusetts,,
California. Wyoming and a growing num-
Der of other States have an educational
qualification for suffrage. In each of these
States thousands Of able-bodied men are
excluded from suffrage because they can
not read and write; while everywhere the
old, the infirm, the halt, the lame and the
blind are freely admitted to the ballOt-bOx.
Not one of the fOrty-five States in the
Union recognizes any connection between
the ballot and the power to perform mill
tary and police duty. Either the right to
vote should depend on the power to fight or
it should not. If it should not. women can
not in fairness be excluded for that rea-
son. If it should, Mr.. Hewitt ought to be
excluded himself. For all men over forty
five are exempt from military service. and
he is long past that age.
Again. ii must be emembered that if
women do not render military service they
do render equivalent service in another
way. since IL is they who furnish all the
soldiers. Some woman risks her life for
her country every time a soldier is born
into the world. AS Lady Henry Somerset
says: She who bears soldiers does not
need TO bear arms Mr.. Hewitt predicts
that "in the great majority Of cases women
will either blindly follow dictation or sub
nit to coercion American men have a
good deal of manliness about them, and
the average man, as soon as he has got a
little accustomed to equal suffrage. no more
thinks of irving 10 COerCP the vote of his
wife than the vote of his son. The men of
the enfranchised States regard this particu-
lar objection with downright scOrn. There is
no fact about these States to which OBJ
servers bear more emphatic testimony than
to the independent voting of the women.
Mr.. Hewitt prophesies that the influence
of the baser elements of society will be
enlarged and that of the conservative ele-
ments 10 be impaired Women are more
conservative than men. and the vicious and
criminal class is much smaller among wOm-
en- than among men. This is not a matter of
speculation. but of statistics. How can IL
enlarge the influence of the baser elements
to give the ballot 90 the sex that con-
stitute more than two-thirds of the church
member and less than one-tenth of the
criminals? The baser elements themselves
do not think il would Strenthen their DOW
er. Every vicious interest i'm the community
would rather contend with woman's in
direct influence than try TO cope with wom-
ans vote.
Mr.. Hewitt predicts 1.-The unsexing of men
and women the disappearance of the
courtesies and amenities Of life" the de-
struction of the sanctity and privacy of
the family circle etc. Suppose someone
were TO PROFOUND a theory that the mixing
of -four. water and yeast would make a
dangerous explosive, like dynamite. liable
10 wreck the house. Such a theory might be
worthy of consideration If the experiment
had never been made But the experiment
has been mad in thousands OF homes, and
ii has been proved that the mixture does
not form dynamite. but only quiet domestic
bread. Mr.. Hewitt's dire prophecies might
have been worth consideration forty years
ago. But to-day women have for years
been voting. literally by hundreds OF
thousands. in many different parts OF the
En~glish-speaking world-in England. Scot
land. Ireland. New Zealand. Australia.
Canada and our own Western States; and
nothing is more certain than that the pre-
dicted disasters have not followed. To go
on predicting them in the teeth Of facts IL
Unworthy of a rational being.
ALICE STONE BLACKWELL.
Bank Wrecker spends sunday i'm Jail.
DETROIT. Feb. l6-Frank c. Andrews.