Los Angeles herald., 1909-09-28
Where Women Do Cast Their Vote

proven by the fact that the birth rate
in Colorado is as high as under CORE
spending conditions elsewhere. Also
that woman's feminine personality mas
not been changed by the act of casting
the ballot is evident to any one who
walks the streets of our cities ana
smaller towns, since it is the woman
of normal appearance and conduct VINO
is everywhere in evidence. The woman
who indulges in masculine attire is not
Indigenous to Colorado and neither Is
she of the cigarette habit, and when
found here usually proves to be an in
vader from some non-voting eastern
community.
The anti-suffrage writer's have laid
great stress upon the fact that IN
places where women have been ad-
mitted to a limited suffrage they have
not taken advantage of the opportu-
nifty, but this argument lacks weight
since the majority of intelligent wom-
en-, as a matter of principle refuse ad-
mission to the half-loaf where they
believe the whole to be their right.
And in connection with this the charge
that women do not vote is usually pre-
ceded by an appeal to all lovers Of the
home to protect it from being wrecked
by the universal entrance into politics
that would follow woman's being given
the ballot. And as this statement of
the antis that women do not vote
where they have the right Is accom-
panied by the argument that enfran-
chising women will cause the wreck
age of the home through the wholesale
migration into politics Of its chief pill
lars, it may be well to state that after
careful questioning of judges and law
yers, it has been ascertained that not
one case of divorce based upon evils
caused by the woman's participation in
political life has been found.
But it would seem that to her critics
for the woman citizen to vote or not
to vote equally proves the absolute
failure of woman's suffrage. Like the
old ditty on foreordination,
She shall and she shant
She will and she won't
She is damned If she does
And damned If she don't.
It is doubtless true that some women
in Colorado do not vote, and not all OF
the men of Colorado exercise the priv
ilege. That any men or women in Col
| orado do not vote is shame to their
citizenship as it is a shame to that of
those 10000 men of Boston who at the
time of the election not long ago stayed
away from the polls, and of corre-
spending number in all cities 1t is time
that this especial charge that the
women of our state do not generally
vote were dropped. as in all localities
in this state the contrary fact has been
| repeatedly proved.
The voting woman of Colorado is
amazed at the character of the political
work done by women in some other
parts of the world-for example, in
England where women long ago prac-
ticed such electioneering tactics as
those recorded of the duchess of Dew
onshire. who kissed butcher for his
vote, and the present-d day election
methods related of herself and others
by Lady Randolph Churchill in her
memoirs, the lady being, nevertheless,
one of the most active members of the
English anti-suffrage association. 1t
is hardly consistent to tolerate such
practices, Objectionable to women in
general and yet revolt from the
thought of casting the ballot. The du-
ties of citizenship do not necessarily
involve being the politician militant.
An impartial consideration of the
progress of our state during the past
fifteen years would seem to prove that
woman's impersonal human interest
has been augmented by her use of the
ballot. And aside from the value of
the legislation accomplished, partially
by the aid of the women, and the value
of the laws to the classes concerned is
the fact that there has been created
an intelligence concerning the prin-
ciples involved in the measures on the
part of the women of the state, wheth-
er directly participating in politics or
not, and in consequence the Colorado
woman has a broader understanding
of the life around her and sympathy
with the needs of humanity in general.
Surely our state is richer because of
the additional weight of conscience and
intelligence gained by the admission OF
women to her governing powers.
HELEN l.. GRENFELL.