The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1917-05-01
SUFFRAGE WAS
 NOT CRANTEDT TO
 ENGLISH WOMEN
Situation in That Country Tentative And Prob
 lematical.

"One would imagine, to hear the suffra aeists talk, that suffrage had Ibeen extended to the women of Eng land" Mrs. George Phillips, Execu- tive member of the New York state Association Opposed to Woman Sui frage. said recently. "In reality, the woman suffrage situation in Engiano remains tentative and problemat1cal. This notwithstanding the sensational newspaper headlines of the cable d1s- patches from London of March 2S. From the earliest suffrage reform legislation in England up to the pres ent time, the extension Of suffrage always has been based upon property Io1alifications To vote one had to | pay taxes or rent of some kind. In other words, property voted, not men; although as far back as lS3o periodical attempts have been made to eliminate the property qualified tion and substitute universal male suffrage.
 Since the war there has been a general realization in England that a | wider extension of suffrage to men was desirable. That is, the English government is rapidly tending toward | a complete democracy, doing away with property qualifications and adopting universal. male suffrage.
 The United States, with universal male suffrage, is perfectly democrat lie, and is far ahead of the English | system.
 In England women already have pa1Sial suffrage they do not use to any extent-while large groups of men are unenfranchised.
 What Bill Provided
 l On March 2S, 1917, the Speakers iConference on, Electoral Reform rec ommended, among other proposed measures, ia certain measure of wo- man suffrage. 'The New York Sun of March 29 reported:
 'sAs a result of the debate the Gov ernment, as MT. Bonar Law announ- ced, will proceed with legislation of the conference. The bill will embody all of the recommendations EXCEPT PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTA- TON AND WOMEN'S SUFFRAGE. 1 These will be omitted, first because the government is still undecided on the question, and, second, because it is held that Parliament must first of all express acceptance of the prin- ciple. of women's suffrage
 In other words, woman suffrage Is to be decided by Parliament, and its consideration has been postponed un- til after the war. MT. Bonar Law said explicitly that " the Government is still undecided on the question. The English people are opposed to woman suffrage, and when their rep resentatives in Parliament vote on
 the question they will be governed by , the will of the people.
 . The Anti-Suffrage Review of Lon- don, March, 1917, explains:
 l 4In ffy~-er io%i iNc
 and their leaders do, that opposition to woman suffrage has disappeared < and at the same time to shrink from , Isubmitting the question to unfettered : judgment of the nation, is sure sign ' of a weak case. It is a maneuver tC , which the country must not fall g
 victim. The war has, without a $ doubt, brought womens work and , wonen's capacities into greater prominence; but it has in no way af- . fected the grounds on which the in troduction of woman suffrage into ! Great Britain has been opposed in the
 past. On the contrary, among think.
 ing people, the war has served. te Istrengthen their opposition.'
 Big Surplus of Women
 The contention that the women o1
 Englandb "had worked out their owr
 
 to some kind of reward could only be dictated by emotionalism or sen
 timentalism. The larger question O.
 the salvation of, the nation is involved = and that depends upon the politica
 strength and integrity of it's man
 hood. There will be an enormous
 surplus of English women after tn,
 war above the number of men; ani a if women are enfranchised the polit s cal power of men will be reduced au 5. tomatically to the vanishing point. n The woman who serves her coun y try is doing her simple duty; sh e neither asks for nor is entitled t, k anything even savoring of reward 1T The readjustments after the war e the pre-eminent problem of race De e petuation, will hinge upon the deci if sion of the English people. If the
 succumb to the doctrine of feninism e. it is inevitable that all the progres
 of the last few laborious generation s will be lost
 Is Dr. Max G. Schapp, Director .fo
 the Clearing House for Mental Defec
 tives of the City of New York, Pro
 lessor of Neuropathology at the Post Ie Graduate Hospital and at Cornel e University, has said:
 "Industrialism, and especially th l. woman in industry is ruining the race s. We are manufacturin ar things at a rate never before dreame Ia of, demanding the highest efficienc "a but paying for this stress and spec o+ in the wreck and ruin of human life ID Industrialism is the responsible fac d tor for the lowering of the birth rate a. for the tremendous increase in in m sanity for the increase in crime: fo r. the increase in the number of tn ID mentally defective; for the 1argeiy fir ed creased death rate in persons abov e. forty years of age. Because of tn es nervous strain and stress and strus if gle sustained by the female in indu. to try we are developing the instincti1
 desire for motherhood and is frt
 quently without the capacity for it m Must Heed the Warning
 Every nation at war, with it's w, It. men in ammunition and other facto
 fes. must heed this warning, or I a. swept into the limbo of dead race
 The next generation must pay il It. price. The woman in the ammun D. tton factory is not "ernancdpated'' a
 though the suffragists want to perp k- Atuate her independent" position, al