The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1911-07-22
SUFFRAGE NOTES

Mrs. F. NJ. Sexton of Minneapolis,
Kansas, gave a suffrage tea Friday
afternoon for Mrs. w. A. Johnston of
Topeka and Miss Helen Eacher Of
Lawrence, who have gone to Mime
apolis to assist in the organization OF
Ottawa county. It was expected that
the organization would be effected
Friday afternoon, and a report of the
meeting will be made next week.
The membership extension com
mittee of the Kansas Equal Suffrage
association are preparing set of
polling cards for distribution among
the leaders of the suffrage work in the
voting precincts. The cards will have
blanks for the name and address of
the voter-One card for each voter,
and a blank in which may be indi-
Gated whether he believes in suffrage
or not If he is against suffrage, his
opposition is indicated on the card and
his reason for his opinion. These
cards are forwarded to headquarters,
where the officers keep a record of the
attitude toward suffrage of every voter
in the district. and where such action
for the conversion Of the unconvinced
as is considered best, is directed.
Mrs. Olympia Brown of Racine,
Wis, is at work writing a history Of
the equal suffrage movement. Mrs.
Brown is one of the five persons VINO
conducted the campaign in Kansas IN
1867. the first suffrage campaign in the
world. Others who were leaders IN
that movement were: Henry Black
well, Lucy Stone, Susan B. Anthony
and Cady Stanton. Mrs. Brown is the
only one of the five still living.
Mrs. Emma Smith De Voc, presi-
dent of the Woman's Council of tie
five states which have enfranchised
their women, has written the presi-
dent of the Kansas Equal Suffrage
association, giving suggestions which
were used by the WyOsning league. of
which Mrs. De Voc was president,
when the women of that state asked
for the ballot. Mrs UeNoe has her
headquarters at present at Tacoma,
Wash, but she is now in Wisconsin,
assisting the women there in planning
their campaign. She has designed a
badge for the Association in Wiscon-
sin which consists of five forget-me-
nots in a cluster representing the rive
states in which women vote) and g
bud underneath (signifying Wisconsin
which seeks to become suffrage
state.) and beneath the cluster is
printed, November 5. 1912. The IN
depreciation of the emblem is, of
course, Forget me not November 5,
1912" Mrs. De Voc was in Kansas
during the campaign for suffrage IS
years ago.
Under the heading Experiment
Fails" an anonymous correspondent
of the Los Angeles Times makes a
venomous attack on the women OF
Kansas. He says in his article that
county officers are mistreating the
poor, and states that the blame rests
on the fact Of municipal suffrage fer
women. Under the Kansas law, the
state cares for the insane, while the
counties take care of the indigenT
poor Therefore, it is asserted, the
county officers send as many destitute
persons as they can to the state in
sane asylums rather than to the coUn-
ty almshouses, in order that the state
and not the county may bear the cost
correspondent says, the asylums arc
crowded with sane but helpless Old
men and women. What a fearful ar
raignment of the failure Of women n
politics. With the municipal suffrage
since 1887, the counties of Kansas
unloading their destitute aged on the
state as insane, to save a few paltry
dollars. Women have not done with
the ballot what they have done the
world over for home and country and
humanity without the ballot"
This is the most irrelevant accu-
sation ever made since a New Yorh
Anti some months ago intimated thai
woman suffrage could not be a good
thing as II had not rescued FinlaId
from the grip of the car, an officia
whom the women voters had no share
in putting on the throne. The charge.
against the county authorities of Kan,
sas may be true, though an anol- Y.
nous letter is worthless as evidence
But even If they are true in their en-.
tirety, the responsibility rests wholly