Atlanta Georgian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, 1913-11-01
eVXTE do not need militant
w methods in America.
Jt ,s different IN Ting

peaLeO from coast 10 coast IN the
course of discussions aroused by
Mrs. Pankhursts visit What is
the ut" which is different in
England? Somebody ought to be
able to answer.
There are variants upon the
formula. Sometimes it runs,
Things are different in Eng
land" and then one wants to
know what things. But when
certain influential women in this
country escape from indefinite
ness and explain their sympathy
with Mrs. Pankhurst and the
militants in phrase which is
now becoming common, '-The
laws are different in England" a
man like myself, reasonably ia
miliar with British law, begs for
enlightenment
In what respect to British laws
press more hardly upon British
women than American laws upon
American women in the States
where women are still unenfran-
chised?
An Important Matter.
This matter is important. Here
is Mrs. Pankhurst piedging her
self not to advocate militant
methods in this country, and
American women pouring money
into her hands for the purpose of
financing militant methods In
England, alleging as the reason
why they themselves will not be-
come militant in America while
they want women in England to
burn houses, wreck trains, throw
hatchets and explode dynamite
bombs-alleging as the reason
why they should keep themselves
safe while other women endure
imprisonment and torture-that
'the laws are different in Eng
land" 1t is fair question:
What laws?
With one reply the distin-
guished ladies referred to will be
ready: The divorce laws are I'M
equal and bad. They are. About
this there is no dispute. An
Englishman can divorce his wife
for an offense for which she can
not divorce him. And in my view
this admits Of no defense.
Yet the explanation is easy.
The Englishman is consistent and
he has the courage-it may be,
the brutal courage-of his con-
victions. The law TO which the
American man submits Is better
than the mans own convictions.
1t is the secret belief OF nine out
OF ten men in America that there
is one law Of morality for men
and another for women. He con-
dones in himself and in his own
son that which he would neither
condone nor tolerate in his wife
or his daughter. He has to sub
NIT to equal divorce laws; but the
average man is easily confident
that what is for his wife a crime
is for himself a trivial affair.
The Englishman expresses in
his law his deep convictions Of the
generations. He holds that an
offense IS a worse offense when
committed by a wife than when
committed by a husband. And so
he makes his divorce law unequal.
No Second Instance.
Yet the sense of humor is not
extinct in America. And 1t will
not be seriously held that this in
equality in the laws OF divorce
constitutes that difference"
which justifies incendiarism and
outrage and a recourse to dyna-
mite bombs!
What other laws can be quoted?
Up TO the present moment, in all
the utterances of all the Ameri-
can sympathizers with English
militants which have come under
my notice, not second instance
has been named Is there an
other?
The simple fact is that in Great
Britain the woman possesses po-
itical power far greater than that
possessed in any part of America
other than the nine woman suf-
frage States and Illinois. This is
not generally known, but It is a
fact. And the women who profess
that they sympathize with Mrs.
Pankhurst and the nilitants be-
cause "the laws are 50 different"
do not know what they are talk
ing about.
Franchise laws are not the same
in different parts of Great Britain,
any more than they are uniform
in all parts of this country. So a
little care must be exercised in
stating them. But broadly they
come to this:
T.. -