Montana news. [volume] (Lewistown, Mont.) 1904-191?, 1908-05-14

ing at the present time IN the Amer
lean socialist movement in the line of
the necessity Of getting women inter
is seen in the numerous women g social
list clubs that are springing up all
over the country.
But that there is beginning to be a
new realization Of the importance of
women as an indispensable revolu-
tionary element is evidenced in another
direction; and that is the attention
that is being paid to the necessity Of
obtaining the ballot for women as web
as men.
The noble and wonderful stand that
the English women have made for the
right to express themselves in govern
ment, and the valiant fight the social
ist party has made to sustain them
seem to have fired both the woman suf-
fragists and the socialists Of America.
But, as seems TO be the case in
America with almost every practical
question which the socialist movement
attempts to take up, we are confronted
by a peculiar situation here.
Nothing Revolutionary.
There is already, Of many years.
standing, a national organization de-
voted to the achievement Of woman g
suffrage. Needless to say this organi-
zation, the National Woman Suffrage
association, is composed wholly Of
bourgeois "ultras" "radicals" and
"iberals", with a marked aversion to
any revolutionary indications in be-
half of the working class.
Socialism is an unspeakable horror.
Miss Susan b. Anthony at one time
in her career made the statement that
she would espouse any party that would
take up the woman suffrage cause.
But when the populists made the
woman vote q part OF their platform
she could not stomach the receptacle
that held the jewel, and still continued
To nail the banner of her allegiance to
the republican party mast, to which she
remained faithful throughout her life.
Elizabeth Cady Staunton was the
real revolutionary spirit within the
American movement for women. She
evidenced this in her attitude towards
religious, social customs and the work,
ing class AZ well as in her demands
that the shaekles be taken from one
half the human race.
Lucy Stone had considerable of the
same daing spirit.
The modern suffrage movement is
largely a pander to persons OF wealth
and influence.
Politics In the Union.
The Socialist Woman" Of Chicago
has an editorial in it's May number on
"To Join or Not to Join" 1t is a
discussion as to whether socialist
women, in their effort to obtain the
ballot, the fundamental requisite of
universal, democratic control, should
ally themselves with the existing
woman suffrage organizations.
In the meantime Maud Malone, who
was organizing secretary Of the
womans Progressive Suffrage Union
Of New York, has resigned from that
organization, and states her reasons in
a letter in the "New York Socialist. :"
Miss Malone is not a socialist. She
accuses the suffrage organization with
wishing to exclude the "rabble,'
being devoted to the petty ambitions
and prejudiees of a few women, and
with a nervous fear Of touching the
economic question.
The pre.entwriter can add some first
hand testimony to Miss Malone's sc-
eusations. For some time she was
one Of the national organizers Of the
National woman's Suffrage associa-
ton, and for q period extending over
about five years was engaged con-
stantly in the work Of the suffrage
movement. Entering the work at the
time the women Of Colorado were max
ing their strenuous demand for the
ballot, which resulted in women be-
coming voters in that state in 1898,
she participated in every state cam
paign since, where the question was
put before the voters, up TO the time
she entered the public work of the
socialist movement. She has been
personally associated with Miss An
thony, Miss Shaw, Mrs. Carrie Chap
man Gait, and numerous others OF the
most prominent suffrage workers in
the country, has worked with them in
state campaigns, and she has no hesi-
fancy in endorsing every accusation
that Miss Malone makes.
Bourgeois Influence.
The woman suffrage movement as it
exists today stands In fear and trem-
bling Of any interests for the working
class Mrs. Lena Morrow Lewis was