Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1909-07-03
Patriotism Of
Our Women.

| The glorious Fourth is, it is safe
wager, the one day in the year that
the small boy loves the best. 1t is a
day that the little girl welcomes with
delicious thrills of excitement and ter
ror, and the firm resolve that she will
be quite as foolhardy-pardon,- as
| coura geous-as the big boy next door.
| 1t is a day that the business man en-
joys, negligently, perhaps. And it is
| the one day in all the 365 that the
American woman most breads and
! fears.
One reason for her seeming lack of
patriotic fervor is, Of course, the fear
that the children's eyes may be blown
out and the house burned down and the
whole home and family exploded.
| The other reason is that, throughout
all history, the domestics have been
accorded the Fourth of July as an ex-
ira day out" Wherefore, though
father and the Riddles may be having
a gorgeous time putting off the fire.
works, it's mothers stern duty to put
up the meals.
| None the less, the celebration of In
dependence Day carries it's message not
only to the small boy and the daring
daughter and the long-suffering father
who sets off the Roman candles Ii,
underneath all the rash tumult and the.
| glorious" blatarcy of our celebration
of the Fourth of July, there is a grain
of thoughtfulnesss, of actual patriotic
feeling, it belongs to the American wo-
man, too.
And it is well that, once year, the
American woman should think of this,
Ishould see her duty to her husband and
her children and herself as being,
quietly but no less insistently, a duty
to her country, should understand that
rightly to bring up her children means
to make of them good citizens. The
active, patriotic, earnest and wise wo-
an CT America may or may not believe
in equal suffrage; she may or may not
devote her spare moments to efforts
for the enactment of a more stringent
child labor law, or more efficient
civil service reform; she may or may
not study the statistics of the Imni-
grafton Bureau, and go in for settle
ment work. But one thing she her
self must do, she must be herself a
good citizen; she must stand, in her
own life and the lives of the men and
women whom she influences, for
"whatsoever things" are true and hon
est and just and pure. Because the
American woman holds so high place
in American life and American civili-
cation, it is inevitable that her influence
| should be a potent thing. $50 lies the
| world in little in her heart"-in a very
wide and a very real sense-that it is
tremendously important, not only be-
cause she is a good woman, but be-
| cause she is essentially an American,
| that she should be
"Sweet as only vigor can be sweet,
And strong as only loveliness is
| strong"
! Last month the Legislature of New
| York State fought a great battle for
| the suppression of race track gambling.
The bill that made the betting booth
illegal was passed by one vote-the
vote of a man who left a sick bed,
| facing what his physicians declared
to be almost certain death, to give his
voice in favor of what he believed to
be right, not for himself and his
| friends, but for his state and his coun-
| try.
1t is actions like this, signal deeds
| of patriotism, that, as well as the sign
ing of the Declaration of Independence,
may we'll be remembered on this the
Fourth of July.
And it is in actions like this, in the
inspiration and the education and the
fine Instinct that make such things pos
sible, that the American woman's in
fuence may become a cogent force and
her patriotism be vitality powerful
Exchange.