Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1913-10-11
Frances Willard, Peer of Women

locations and tracts, where subjects
that men were afraid 70 tackle were
valiantly presented. This was due
largely to the wise guidance of Fran
ces E. Willard, who harnessed the
purely emotional element in the cru
SADIE and made it trot in the path of
economic determinism.
Frances Willard, with deep under
standing, knew that the saloonkeeper
is victim to the same economic con-
dition as the drunkard. And she set
about to destroy the System which pro-
duces both. She encountered within
the organization bitter resentment
whe. she insisted upon viewing the
liquor question from is root as well
as its branch. The w. c. T. u, like
other reform movements, carries its
defeat in its conservative element To-
day when nearly every Christian wom-
an feels it her duty to work for woman
suffrage, it seems impossible, though
true, that Frances Willard was pub
! licly sat upon by the chairman of a
w c. T. U. convention, when she at
t~npted to explain to her coworkers
that the suffrage was most needed to
| gain reform. Her plea met with in
slant disfavor from the type of woman
who is well-satisfied with emotional
display of her hatred of saloons, and
who considers she has done her duty
when she has shaken her tiny fist in
the face of Sampson saloonkeeper.
Frances Willard saw the underlying
economic cause for the existence of
the saloon; she saw, as does Jane Ad.
dams, that in many instances when the
saloon door is shut the only friendly
port for the forsaken is closed. She
came to believe that governmental reg
ulation Of the necessaries TO proper
existence of man was what is most
needed. and in this she went a step
further in the right direction than has
Jane Adams. From destroying the
temporary abiding place of the saloon
Frances Willard turned to the more
needed reform of adjusting the condi
ton of the working man. The closing
years of her life were devoted to this
larger cause. Her demand was that
the principal industries of the nation
the business Of providing the necessi
ties Ct life, be conducted by the com
imunity for the benefit of its members
/ Look about YOU" she said, 1.-THE
p oducts of labor are on every hand
yol could not maintain foc a moment
a weil-ordered life without them
every object in your room has in it
for discerning eyes, the mark OF in
genious tools and the pressure OF
labor's hands. But is it not the cruel
ist injustice for the wealthy, whose
lives are embellished by labor's work
to have a superabundance of this
money which represents the aggregate
of labor in any country, while The
laborer himself is kept so steadily a
work that he has no time to acquire
the education and refinement of life
that would make him and his family
agreeable companions to the rich anC
cultured.
Il believe that competition Il
doomed. The trust, whose single oh
! ject is TO abolish competition, ha'
proved that we are better without thar
with it, and the moment corporation
control the supply of any product
they combine.
The corporation of humanity shoult
control all productions. This is tn
frictionless way; it is the higher way
it eliminates the motives for a seIfisl
5 life; il enacts into cur everyday Twin
the ethics OF Christ's gospel Nothin
else can do It; nothing else can brin
!. the glad day of universal brotherhood
[ ION, that / were young again, and
would have my life. 1t is Gods wa
o out OF the wilderness and into tn
promised land. 1t is the very marro-
of Christ's gospel j. is Christianit
iappIied-"