The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1912-02-15
START VOTE FIGHT
Kansas Women Open Campaign
for Suffrage Today.
Mrs. Johnston Chief Speaker
at Ballot Banquet.
SAME FIGHT ON WOMEN
That Was Made When Educa.
ton Was Sought
Is Being Made Against Suffrage,
She Tells Hearers.

Ou0 1C11S 11OEEoESs
Kansas City, Kan, Feb. 15.-KansaI
women here today fired the first rea
gun in their campaign for complete
suffrage. The affair was a brilliant
luncheon given at the Grund hote
by the Wyandotte Equal Suffrage as
ISOLATION to the officers of the Kan
sas State organization. Many Mis-
souri, club women lent their aid. Doz-
ems of SuffragistS from over Kansas
and from Missouri, unable to secure
seats at the crowded luncheon table
heard the speeches given later by
leading suffrage advocates of the two
states. and attended receptions held
for them.
Mrs. George F. Rose of Rosedale,
Kan, acted as toastmistress. The
program called for responses in this
/ order:
Mrs. Lucy L. Johnston. wife of the
chief justice of supreme court OF Kan
sas and president of the Kansas State
4 Equal Suffrage association.
Mrs. Genevieve H Charley, Law
renee, president second district.
Mrs. w. r. Stubs, wife of Governor
Stubs.
Mrs. Henry S. Ess, president Of the
Kansas City. Mo-. Equal Suffrage as
sociation.
Mrs william Allen White. wife of
The state headquarters at Topeka
had been closed and the women at
| tended in a body.
Others here included: Miss Helen N.
| Eacker, Lawrence, recording secre-
| tary; Mrs. Sarah A. Thurston, Topeka,
! treasurer; Mrs. Frank Strong, Law
renee; Mrs. Mitchner, Topeka, state
president w. c. T. U.
i Mrs. Johnston told of the early strug-
4 gle of women for education.
It's fhe Same Old Fight
4 ''This first step between Mary Ann
and JOHN said she, was not gained
| without a struggle with prejudice
which, in its day, was fiercer and
| stronger against equal education than
| 1t is today against equal suffrage.
/ Every argument we have made against
political liberty has been used against
educational liberty We have always
had the well satisfied anti with US.
However. it is not to the anti, but a
few women of courage who forced their
way into the university and left the
doors open for others, to whom we are
| indebted.
I I'VE have always had this justice in
! Kansas. All of our state institutions of
/ learning admit both men and women
and Kansas women have had school
! suffrage for a longer period than have
! the women of any other state. Our
Johns had an early vision of justice to
women. The Kansas teacher or college
(
in a most anomalous position for they
| have entered into the largest share of
| the fruits of the labor of those early
\ advocates who pioneered for women
equal rights in our schools.
WOmen's Votes Are Needed.
when our Kansas constitution was
framed only few women in the Unit
ed States were wage earners and
| scarcely any in our own state. Now
there are about 100000 in the Unit
ed States and near 100000 in kan
SaS. Working men are beginning to
realize that disfranchised women low
er wages in every trade they enter
and that they cannot afford to have
| 5000, 900 workers politically helpless.
We may sigh for the good old times
withopen fireplace for cooking, and
with a corner for loom and wheel, has
! its place only in show and history. We
shall see it no more. Instead We must
meet the conditions as they exist and
the outlook is good.
industrial education in our public
schools is fast bringing domestic Ia
Dor up to the honorable position it
should occupy and in the future the
one who is skilled to place before the
family food which adapted to the
needs of the human body will have &
standing equal to that of that new
woman, the professional nurse who
comes in toreplace the ills which i'm
pure food and unsanitary conditions
have caused"
Why Women Should Vote.
Mrs. Johnston declared that women
should vote:
'Becausc it would increase the num-
Der of educated voters and raise the
intellectual standing Of our govern
ment.
because it would increase the
moral and law abiding vote very
much.
Because their refining influence on
the political life of the community
would be as potent for good as is their
Christian influence in the church.
Because it will increase the proper
ton of natural born voters
Because they would see the man as
we'll as the platform upon which he
stands.
Because it is the inherent right of
every intelligent, moral citizen who is
living under and is subject to the laws
of a democratic form of government
Because it is not just that one-haIf
of the citizenship should assume THE
right and deny it to the other half
Because it would take her out of I'M
desirable company-the disfranchised
class, criminals. insane and idiotic men
THE rich and sheltered woman needs
, the ballot to keep her in sympathy with
her less favored sister and to interest
her in the betterment of the conditions
which surrounds others. She needs it