The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1911-05-24
WOMAN'S SUFFRAGE
 BILL PASSES SENATE
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UdIlOuS, ldSOTdUl0 TSpOTl Ou IulS pllA, which provides for the franchise for woman at municipal and town elec- tions, have not done so without giv- ing this important question serious and careful consideration and thought. Two hearings were held before your committee at which men and women alike of national reputation and state renown were heard in favor of the bill. And your committee in present. ing this favorable report desire to submit to this body some of the facts which in its opinion are sufficient req sons for the passage of the measure.
 In order to deal with this subject on broad line 1t is necessary to make reference and allude to states where full equal suffrage is granted. The right of women to vote with men on all questions has been granted in this country in six states: Colorado, Wy oming, Wisconsin, Utah, Idaho and Washington. A significant coincidence in this is that all of these states bor- nificant of the oft repeated statement that limitation is the sincerest flat .tery and evidence of meritorious worth"
 Perhaps Colorado affords us the best example of the beneficial and purifying results of the equal fran chise. This State has been an equal
 
 and if we are to believe the state ment of it's Governor and other off cials, suffrage granted to women has had a most beneficial, progressive and purifying effect upon the ballot.
 I desire to quote from the statement of the Hon. John F. Shafroth, now Governor of Colorado, who said be- frage in the U. s. Senate, 'Woman's influence has always been for good and in no sphere has this been better demonstrated than in politics The election polls, since the advent Of woman's suffrage in Colorado, have been transformed into as respectable places of meeting as public school advent of women into the political sphere the rowdy and disorderly ele- ment which frequented and remained around the polls all day has practi- cally disappeared, while the restrain ing influences of the presence of wo1n- an has also improved the tone of our political conventions"
 Departing from the State of Cobra do and the statnent of it's chief exe- cutive. I desire to quote from let ter received from the Hon. John H. Brady, former Governor of Idaho, who said in part, 'I have always been very ardent supporter of equal suf-
 
 session at the time I arrive in the East, I will be very glad to appear before your committee and tell them of the many benefits that have been derived from equal suffrage during my term as Governor of Idaho.
 I also desire to submit to you a telegram in answer to an inquiry di- rected to the Hon. Jos. M. Carey, Gov, ernor of Wyoming, on the benefits of equal franchise in his state. Gover- nor Carey has telegraphed to me as follows:
 "Electoral franchise and the right for women to hold offices has been a success in Wyoming and has resulted in good to her and the community. Our elections are of the most quiet character and women need fear no un- favorable comment. If an opportunity were given to repeal suffrage by a vote of the people I doubt if more than two per cent would vote to do this. It will never be repealed in adoption will become universal in all our States"
 This evidence of the purifying and beneficial results derived from equal franchise in our country is but a small part of the evidence which your Com mittee has had submitted to it at it's hearings. Time will not permit me to present all the facts I would like to. However, as this bill deals prin- cipally on the municipal suffrage ques- tion I deem it necessary to submit to you some statistics showing the bene- ficial result of municipal suffrage in several of the larger cities of this country.
 The claim has been made that should women receive the full municipal suf- frage franchise that it would not be exercised but by a small percentage of the total registration. It is un- fortunate that all counties in the State of Colorado do not separate the male and female vote. but in the City of Denver the vote is separated There was registered in 1908, 41,53O men of whom 6,S91 voted, and 35,620 women of whom 29,OS5 voted. These figures should set at rest the claim that won- en are not interested in municipal af- fairs Women have equal suffrage in school districts in twenty-nine states of the Union. Has not the exercise of that right made more efficient the teaching of moral instructions in such