Manchester Democrat. [volume] (Manchester, Iowa) 1875-1930, 1917-03-28
THE SUFFRAGE STAND.

Attempts on the part of few Of
the members Of the legislature, dur
ing the debate in the senate on the
suffrage resolution, to crate the i'm
preston that the suffragists are op-
posed to submitting the question to
the women themselves of whether or
not they wish to vote because they
(the suffragists) are, afraid of the re-
suit were branded as misleading by
suffrage, workers p4se
I'VE have not favored the woman
referendum proposition in the past for
several reasons" said Miss Anna B.
Lawther, presidentgstate suffrage as
sociation, zone, of these reasons is that
the proposition has never been made
with sufficient guarantee that it would
be worth our time and money to en-
gage in such a campaign as this would
entail The legislators who have been
making this proposition know full
well that any succeeding legislature
could ignore the result Of the women
be it ever so favorable to suffrage
This fact was admitted last Wednes-
day by Senator Kimball, sponsor for
the movement to have the women vote
on whether or not they want to vote.
It is illegal to bind the next legisla-
ture to any definite course of action,
so for that reason we do. no look up
on Senator Kimball's resolution as
serving any definite result.
"The constitution of Iowa expressly
provides that the question of consti-
tutional amendments must be decided
by vote of the men, so you see no
matter if we did go to the expense of
having a woman referendum, we
would still have to go through the
very same process that we would if
we did not have such vote by the
women. There is no way of getting
around the fact that to amend the
constitution the question must be vot-
ed upon favorably by two successive
legislatures and then be submitted to
a vote of the men.
1--WE have never believed that the
sponsors of the womhn referendum
movement have studied the matter
sufficiently. The proposition has been
made with one purpose in view-to de-
lay the suffrage question as long as
possible. 1t is a significant fact that
all those speaking in favor of the Kim
ball resolution last Wednesday, with
the exception of Senator Kimball, vot-
ed against the Parker resolution un-
amended. Senator Kimball preced-
ed his vote with an eloquent speech
in which he stated he was speaking for
thousands of women who did not want
the responsibility of the vote thrust
on them. Now, we speak for tens Of
thousands of women who do want to
vote.
1--WE are confident that the ma
jority of the women of Iowa do want
to vote and we resent any charges
that we would oppose such refer
endum on the ground that we are
afraid of the vote of our sex. We have
just completed paying off the last of
an expense of $75,O0O.0O campaign
and to undertake another referendum
campaign right away would entail real
financial hardships on the women of
Iowa. It was our hope that this sum-
mer we could devote our energies to GU
campaign for the elimination of waste.
1--WE have had a favorable vote on
our suffrage resolution in the senate
and we hope for favorable vote in
the House. We believe Iowa a pro-
state, and we, feel that the
men of Iowa will be as willing to grant
heir women the right of franchise