The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1911-05-04
pros AND CONS OF SUFFRAGE.

her last important published article or
woman suffrage, said, in speaking OF
its practical operation and benefits:
''The question of suffrage for wom
en- has passed out of the academic
/ stage, and has become matter OF
! practical observation and experience
in an ever-growing number OF states
and countries Experience has shat
tered, like house OF cards, all the
old predictions that it would destroy
| the home, subyert the foundations OF
society. and have a ruinous influence
on public affairs. During many years
| the opponents of women suffrage
nave been diligently gathering all the
adverse testimony they could find.
So far as appears by their published
literature, they have not found, in all
our enfranchised states put together,
a dozen respectable men, residents OF
those states. who assert over their
own names and addresses that 1t has
had any i'll effects.
The fundamental argument for
woman suffrage, of course, is its
justice; and this would be enough
were there no other But a powerful
argument can also be made for 1t
from the standpoint of expediency. 1t
ton now been proved to demonstra-
ton, not only that woman suffrage
has no bad results, but that it has
certain definite results
Mrs Howe then enumerates twelve
practical benefits of equal suffrage as
follows:
/. 1t gives women a position Of
increased dignity and influence.
2. 1t leads to improvements in the
laws.
g. 1t enables women to bring their
influence to bear on legislation more
quickly and with less labor.
A. 1t often defeats bad candidates.
s. 1t broadens women's minds.
and leads them to take more in
telligent interest in public affairs.
g. 1t makes it easier to secure
liberal appropriations for educational
and humanitarian purposes.
& 1t makes elections and political
meetings more orderly
8. 1t opens to women important
positions now closed to them because
they are not electors.
g. 1t increases the number of wom-
en- chosen to such offices as are al
ready open to them.
TO- 1t raises the average of politi-
cal honesty among the voters.
II. 1t tends to modify too eX-
clusively commercial view of public
affairs.
H. Last, but not least, it binds
the family more closely together
On the other side we have the
claims and arguments of Molly E. Sea-
we'll, who has just published book
on THE Ladies' Battle Mrs. Sea-
well marshals every argument in ia
vor of the granting of the suffrage, and
presents for each argument facts and
figures in demolition of the propagan-
da that women should have votes.
"The suffragists," she declares, come
upon the scene specifically and made
quately prepared. They propose a
stupendous governmental change with
out understanding the first principles
of government They can not, by
their Unborn lack of apprehension, diff
ferentiate political, philanthropic, So
cialistic and economic questions. Inc
most strident advocates OF suffrage
for women are always the latest to
enter the arena, and Invariably the
worst equipped for the contest raging
there. They come, not having read
the constitution of our great and glor-
ious country. and with sweetly IN
fantile ignorance of its basic primer
pies. They don't know the difference
between the American and the Engnsh
constitution, nor how men vote in
limited monarchies. Suffrage Win
them is an end, not a means. they
ignore the literature of politics, fall
to grasp the essentials of the growth
of the body of our laws, and are now
running up against the fixed majority
that favors the statu quo with all the
hvsteria and self-sufhciency OF the late
lamented Don Quixote when that
worthy pushed his Rosinante on to the
windmill.
or the venerable Dean Howells' oo-
servation that sounds so sagely at the
first blush, namely, that he had heard
many appeals against woman suffrage,
but no reason against it-of this OBJ
servation Mrs. Seawell disposes in one
time and two motions; The main
reason against woman suffrage is not
that women are not equal to men,
but that they are not identical.
Further on it is cogently shown
that while Colorado, Idaho, Wyoming,
Utah and Washington have full suf-
frage for women the women have
mot in these states affected a general
revolution. Wyoming is sparsely
settled community in which cowboys
dot the landscape Idaho and Utah
are under the control of the Mormon
church and the Mormon church has
ever been the consistent friend Of
woman suffrage. Wonder why? The
states named have the highest divorce
rate in the country All suffragists
are not Mormons, but all Mormons
are suffragists. Woman suffrage and
socialism are very closely intertwined
The facts show it
Mrs. Seawell postulates two basic
reasons against woman suffrage. First
no electorate has ever existed. evei
can exist which can not execute its