The Washington herald., 1915-01-10

allowing a few of the sex to dabbIe in
politics to their hearts content without
any responsibility. would be the most
dangerous element ever added to a
Democratic electorate.
Evils Not Great IL All Voted.
II all women used the franchise. what
ever evils resulted would come only from
the ineXperience or cmotiOnaIism ascribed
to women to greater degree than men.
II every woman voted. a high average
Of intelligence would be added to the
electorate. hut at the same time. this
would involve the very thing that suf-
fragists cannot stand-gOing into ref
erendum campaigns that kill the work
ers'' at every election.
Your wife, mother or sister for in
stance. who is busy at a woman's work
OF keeping a happy home and raising
healthy children, is thrown into the whole
furious muddle of partisan politics-cau-
Cuses, conventions. meetings. house-to-
house Canvasses, sOap-bOx oratory, and
all the rest of it,
And what is the net result? She mere
ly becomes the mathematical equal to
the free and easy lady whose vote is a
positive menace to society. There is no
such thing as unrelated man or
woman. The worst politician. the biggest
grafter-had a mother. didn't he? Also
the vicious interests" the suffraEists
pretend to be their greatest opponents.
have numerous sisters, and cousins and
aunts-and women related by ties not of
kindred-to do their bidding.
Only last week, Director of Public
Safety George d. Porter told the Min
isterial Union of Philadelphia that GER
tain notorious women were able to defy
the law and the police because they had
political pull" One, he said. had been
discharged on suspended sentence on
twenty occasions. due to such influence
Now what would it mean to give all these
women votes. ard increase their political
influence?
Voted Women Against Senator.
A San Francisco paper. Immediately
after the recall of the State senator who
originated the red light abatement law.
said the vicious interests" had voted
the feminine dcHizens CT the underworld
'in swarms" against him. 'Bathhous-
John" Of Chicago. and that part of
Chicago known as the worst ward, got
NOR votes of wor?en than his opponent
"a woman running on a reform ticket
and was able to use votes for women"
to perpetuate his political career.
Suffragists say that votes for women
would abolish the social evil-in spite of
the fact that the votes of women in suf-
frage States have been used to make
wide OPEN towns formerly closed to
liquor selling and all-night cabarets and
wine rooms. On the other hand, the
purity congress that met ia Kansas City,
and the Wisconsin commission that re-
Gently reported on this subject, both
blamed improper home influences for this
eviI-put 1t squarely up to the home
training. and therefore the woman who
gives the home training-to decide that
no more boys or girls shall go wrong.
Neither of these commissions of experts
mentioned votes for women" as desira-
BILE to this end.
Another commission of physicians re-
Gently decided that more than 60 per
cent of numl er of girls who had gone
wrong had becume mentally defective,
judgment that bears out the studies of
the scientist LombrOsso. in the woman
Criminal" The gravest error we could
commit at a time when this evil is being
fought by public opinion and education.
in which women must take the chief part.
at a time when the chief Of police of
big city complains of political pull pro-
tecting such women from the law. would
be to give them votes, to allow their de-
fective inteIligences. already swayed by
avaricious men, TO become equal at
the polls to the vote of the best wife or
mother in the land.