, 1904-03-26
Bill on Woman Suffrage

Bill on Woman Suffrage
Narrow-miuded and bias-brained big
OTIS throughout the copper cent asst
have been throwing all sorts of ia
natical fits lately over the fact that
several Colorado women were impll.
Gated in the election frauds which cost
Congressman Shafroth of hat state
his seat. Because these women stuff.
ed ballot boxes and as repeaters voted
early and often, editorial writer's
whose wives probably have to steal
their pin-money from huDby's trousers
while the sinner sleeps-deride and
denounce female suffrage and declare
that its adopuon would tend to in
tensify rather than diminish a pollt-
ical evil. Since when were all men
honest-or all women? Did these wO-
men do aught that man had not done
before them, and from whom did they
learn the lesson?
Wyoming was the first state in the
union to give to women the right to
vote. That was over thirty years ago
since which time no man has ever
had nerve enough 10 ever suggest the
repeal of the law. The concession
was granted as a territory, and incor-
porated into our constitution as a sta,e
without a dissenting vote in the on
v%ention. We know it is a good thing
that it does purify politics. particu-
larly along the line of the selection o /
men with clean hands as candidates.
The hatChet-faced female ward-heeier
or leg-puller at the polls is an I'M
known factor in Wyoming politics.
Wyoming women yote-lnvariably, and
at every election ;Sbut they do not seek
or hold Office, and in the exercise OF
her right OF suffrage she maintains
that self-respeCt n modesty which
stamps her the world over as a Wyom-
ing Never in our history has
there been a whisper of fraud in con
nectIon with the vote OF our women;
never has there pee an instance
wherein women were insulted or mo
Tested in the exercise of that right.
Colorado is Il rotten state, polite
ally-a rich and prosperous III
wealth. with her latent resources
of development as yet although today
the envy and admiration OF the world
and yet from a political standpoint
a stinkpOt which smells to heaven
Public office in Colorado, for ten years
and more, has been a mere matter OF
lp1lnrS aud RnptS-nf HnhDIrhpi hal
lots-of grating and crime of every
degree. Dishonesty in elections and
in office has been tho rule-never an
honest election, and seldom a man
whose hands were not smirched more
or less by the smut of m~lsapplied or
misapproprlated public money. Hon
est men have waoed into the dirty pool
with good intent-but you know what
the tenderfoot was told when he first
visited Rome. 1t is OF record that al
though he left home a tetotaller he
hadn't been in town an hour before he
was fullerlnell. And after all these
long years of rape and abuse of the
ballot by the lords nj creation, what
wonder that INSCRIPTIONS women lave
gotten onto their curyes( and have
readily participated in this carnival OF
crime? That they did so is disgraceful
to both sex and state; but it is strictly
according to rule as laid down there
in all matters political, and in no wise
tend" to prove that women are not as
competent and deserving of the right
| of suffrage as men. Bad women vote;
so do bad meu-dishonest women and
dishonest men; ignorant women ond
Ignorant men; honest and good wo-
men and onest and good men-where
draw the inc. as between sex
l am not saying that we of Wyoming
are apologists for crime of any sort
We preach and practice honesty in all
things-but | am saying, and you hear
me, that no narrow-minded $l2-week
masculine moralist has license to point
the finger of scorn at the female re-
peateTs, ballot forgers, and perjurers
in Denver. 1t vas a man who taught
them their lesson.-Douglas Budget.