The Ward County independent. [volume] (Minot, Ward County, N.D.) 1902-1965, 1914-10-29

I am opposed to the granting Of SUI
frage to women, because ] believe that
it would be loss to women, to all wo-
men and to every woman; and because
I believe it would be an injury to the
State, and to every man and every wo-
man in the State. 1t would be useless
to argue this if the right of suffrage
were natural right. IF it were nat
ural right, then women should have it
though the heavens fall. But if there
be any one thing settled in the long
discussion of this subject, it is that
suffrage is not a natural right, but is
simply a means of government; and
the sole question to be discussed is
whether government by the suffrage Of
men and women will be better gov
eminent than by the suffrage Of men
alone. The question is, therefore, a
question of expediency and the ques
ton Of expediency upon this subject
is not a question of tyranny, as the
gentleman from Cattaragus has said,
but a question of liberty, a question
of the preservation of free constitu-
tional government, of law, order,
peace and prosperity. Into my judg-
ment, sir, there enters no element of
the inferiority of woman. There could
not, sir, for rejoice in the tradition
and in the memory and the possession
of home where woman reigns with
acknowledged superiority in all the
nobler, and the higher attributes that
by common, by universal consent, de-
termine rank among the highest of the
children of God. No, sir. 1t is not
that woman is inferior to man, but it
is that woman is different from man;
that in the distribution of powers, of
capacities, of qualities, our Maker has
created man adapted to the perform
ance of certain functions in the econ
omy Of nature and society, and women
adapted to the performance of other
functions. One question to be deter
mined in the discussion of this sub
ject is whether the nature of woman
is such that her taking upon her the
performance of the functions implied
in suffrage will leave her in possession
and the exercise of her highest powers
or will be an abandonment of those
powers and on entering upon a field
II which, because Of her differences
from man, she is distinctly inferior.
Mr.. President, I have said that I
thought suffrage would be a loss for
women. / think so because suffrage
implies not merely the casting of the
ballot, the gentle and peaceful fall Of
the snowflake, but suffrage, if it
means anything, means entering upon
4 the field Of political life, and politics is
modified war. In politics there is
struggle, strife, contention, bitterness,
heart burning, excitement, agitation,
everything which is adverse to the true
character Of woman. Woman rules to-
day by the sweet and noble influences
Of her character. Put woman into the
arena Of conflict and she abandons
these great weapons which control the
world, and she takes into her hands,
feeble and nerveless for strife, wea-
pons with which she is unfamiliar and
which she is unable to WELD. Woman
in strife becomes hard, harsh, unlov-
able, repulsive; as far removed from
that gentle creature to whom we owe
allegiance and to whom we confess
submission as the heaven is removed
from the earth. Government, Mr..
President, is protection. The whole
science Of government is the science
Of protecting life and liberty and the
pursuit Of happiness, OF protecting our
person, our property, our homes, our
wives and our children, against for
eign aggression, against civil discus