The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-04-23
LEGISLA AZURE WILL RECEIVE
 EQUAL SUFFRAGE AMENDMENT
By ETHEL ARMIES

1 Only the WomanS vote Will do this ln his day and generation. All men know that if all women do not. The only hope for the preservation of the home under
 conditions such as they are today lies in the woman's vote. The only chance
 for the conservation of the human race, the protection of women and children who labor lies in this equal suffrage business. "The average woman has not suffi- cient sense of responsibility to vote," say a large majority of men ''She Is so petty, silly, so emotional, so ignorant of prac- tical things and such an eternal child.' Who says that this indictment of our sex is not true?
 1t is true! Shame on women
 For that reason is woman disfranchis- ed today?
 Chased among the children and the idiots.
 She has been placed where she has belonged.
 But she is waking up. She desires to have intelligence, courage, efficiency in the same degree that q man-the best sort of man--has It. She desires to have the respect of men as a woman, a human being, not to be forever counted a child, a toy, chattel. an inferior-a subordinate. If destiny holds a home, wifehood and motherhood for her she desires the power to fill that destiny aright. What Is more sad in all this world than to see a moth CT who Is nothing but a child herself? Al impotent, futile, brainless little fooll
 And how we see it,, far and near and every where, the pitiful chlld-women who are not fit to be mothers and yet are mothersl
 Their burden lies heavy on someone else. |
 Door ltitIa xroroan who canuof tratr, their sons and daughters by true lights! With no more intelligence or common sense than herds of nanny goatsl So many thousands!
 If destiny does not hold the hearts desire for a woman, which certainly Is love and home and motherhood. then such place as their destiny decrees for them in art, or letters or the working world must be filled by them with dignity and with ability with power and far reach ing hand and soul.
 The study and the work of equal suf- frage provide the basic stones on which to build. open the mind the eyes and the heart.
 . The time is passing for the cheap news paper jbe and jeer, the vaudeville carl cature, the funny paper attitude on this grave question.
 "Who desires to be remembered asked Mary Johnston, "as throwing mud on a noble statute?" As she recalled certain of the noble women of history, workers for equal suffrage and the dark clouds | they battled through. She spoke those WordS--Sad all her i say--in the auditorium of the Chamber of Commerce here April 16. last Tuesday l evening, to an audience packed to the doors. She stod there with fine, quiet dignity, a noble figure of a woman her. self She is frail looking, little pale and tired, but with a splendid mental vlgor and natural eloquence. Her eyes burn and her voice stirs with earnestness
 and zeal for the great cause. She does | not spare her sharp steel sword, her bril- liant wit so hidden. in it's scabbard half | the time.
 No, She hits into smithereens the
 arguments, the men and women anti suffrage.
 She made the audience roar She
 brought applause such as seldom has been given in that hall of the Chamber of 1 Commerce.
 And best of all. and more than all,
 she started folks to thinking.
 The work of the Birmingham Equal Suffrage league will go forward from
 now on with even greater impetus. | Mr Weatherly was present in Mont
 gomery at the constitutional convention several years ago.
 "The amendment for equal suffrage was
 adopted, said he. ''on Saturday after
 noon and actually placed on the constf- tuition of the state of Alabama. Next
 day the newspapers spread the news and
 brought back the ahsenta delegates on Monday morning. The majority ruled 1t | off"
 At the next legislature this amendment will carry. It will be presented to ~ths legislature | by the members of the Birmingham Equal Suffrage association, which will | be by that time many thousand strong. | And it will be passed by the legislature.
 The cause being just, right democratic, | human and-common sense-no people
 anywhere will long protest against it. 1 Every modern spirited teacher politician
 and business man and lawyer in Alabama
 and elsewhere is an advocate for equal | suffrage today.