South Bend news-times. (South Bend, Ind.) 1913-1938, 1915-02-24
Ignorance Combats
Equal Suffrage
Thorough Understanding of
Right of Woman to Vote
Will Bring Advocacy.

The following is only a small part
of the many convincing arguments
given by George Creel for equal suf-
frage in March 1915, Pictorial Re
view.
Congress. which rejected the re-
Guest of the commissioner of educa-
ton for $4,000 with which TO investi-
gate certain phases of child life, gave
$4,000 for the study of clam shells
at the insistence of the pearl button
makers 1t is also the case that wom-
an is Disseminated against at every
turn in the government service. Four
women pass civil service examinations
to three men, yet the appointments
are at the ratio Of two men TO one
woman. Men are also paid a much
higher annual wage than women for
identical work.
Sweeping as the assertion may
seem, it is still easily demOnstrable
that practically every public man who
insists that lovely woman" does not
need the ballot, halls from a state
that persists in the oiltwOrn feudal
attitude toward women New Mex
leo, home of Sen. Catron, names the
father as sole guardian of the chill
during minority, and to all damages
in event of death and disability. Be
tween his declarations against the
Uselessness of equal suffrage, il is TO
be hoped that the senator will find
time TO give his views on the follow
ing incident:
A deserted wife, armed only with
the dauntless courage that flows from
mother-love. took in washing, cooked,
sewed, and successfully carried her
brood TO the point where three boys
could commence to help. The Oldest,
at the very outset of his wage earning
career, had both legs cut of in rail-
road accident.
The mother sLed, and just when
things looked bright for a verdict in
her favor, the father appeared upon
the scene and compromised the suit
for $4,000. The frantic woman killed
herself; after a time the drunken
father dynamited the house in which
two Of his sons were sleeping, and
the remaining portion OF the $4,000
came in quite handily as a defense
fund.
A huge percentage of feminine Op-
position to equal suffrage is based
upon this selfsame lack Of cOmpre-
hension. No better illustration can he
had than the following speech made
at an anti-suffrage club:
I'VE shall meet yelling with music,
and parading with high c.ass enter
tainments. We mean to make this a
place where may be found the fine
and beautiful the things that suffra-
g;sts are crOwding out of life. We
shall have exquisite music on the harp
and stringed instruments. We shall
have delicate French comedies and
speakers of lofty ideas. Life is not
all politics, you know. There are
more important things to do than
clean streets and collect garbage. 1t
does a woman more good to hear a
nice harp concert than to listen to a
discussion of white slavery. If wOm-
en- would pay more attention to the
fine and noble things of life, the evil
things would cease to exist"
Abolish slums with selections from
Keats! Bring the eight-hOur day
with lectures on Etruscan pottery?
Handel's Largo" for mill women,
factory drudges. stogy makers and
scrubbersl When a factory catches
on fire and all the doors are locked,
a verse from Browning! If word
comes that the wine-rOom and the
cadet have snatched a daughter, make
no Outcry against COmmercialiZed vice,
hut buy harp Should pestilential
fevers strike down loved ones, do not
complain about garbage or an infected
water supply, but read French COM
edy!
Such a person simply does not un-
derstand. that is all! Surely, though,
for the facts stand so grim and plain, !
there will come a day when the loved
and sheltered women will soften with
comprehension of the despairs and in
justices that burden their less fOrtu-
nate sisters, and cease an opposition
that is at once so selfish and so cruel.