The Barre daily times. (Barre, Vt.) 1897-1959, 1920-06-07
WAR GAZE FREEDOM
TO THE WOMEN
Declared Mrs. Carrie Chapman Gait,
President of the American Won
an Suffrage Association, at
Geneva Conference.

Geneva Conference.
Geneva, Switzerland, June AT tn,
opening yesterday Of the Congress d
the International Women Suffrage AL
lance, Mrs. Carrie Chapman Gait
president of the American Woman Suf
| frage association, addressed the con
gress on the progress Of the movement
throughout the world. Mrs. Gait said
in part:
For the suffragists of the world Q
few facts stand forth with great clari
! ty. The first and greatest is that the
| political liberation of women was
tossed up out of the war chaos like an
| isolated mountain when the world was
in the making. War, the undoubted
original cause of the humiliating age,
old subsection of women the world
around, war, the combined enemy OF
their emancipation, war has rendered
to the women of many lands their POI
litical freedam! Strange, bewildering
fact.
"The Latin and Oriental countries
still hold out but that will not be for
long Rumania, the first Latin country
to extend the vote to women, has al
ready led the way, the Others will fol-
low ! believe no country in Europe
except Turkey now is without wom-
all suffrage association. Women will
soon vote wherever men do. Yet while
all these old barriers are swept aside
in many lands and men and women en-
franchised, the task is not yet complet-
ed in the countries where women have
labored hardest and where Che prinei-
pie of democracy has longest been I'M
challenged.
There must be millions of women in
Europe who never hoped for political
liberty and who are now dazed by its
sudden coming The women of Nor
way, Denmark and Iceland have long
been enfranchised, but Germany has
outstripped all other nations in the
recognition of the principle of equality,
with 1877 women serving on city eoun
ellis and 81 as members Of the national
Parliament. The president Of the Ger
man National Suffrage association
comes to this congress as a member of
the city council Of Dresden.
at is not for me to interpret the
sentiments of the women of other lands
but with authority | may say that
there are millions of suffragists in the
United States who have been fairly
stupified with establishment at these
almost unaccountsble events. As all
a IrnstaI faf Of
America has been dedicated from the
first to the principle OF self govern
ment. No other nation has made the
same pronouncements.
"No other country has repudiated it's
principles and history in
its denial of votes to its women and
that is why the extension OF suffrage
to the women of all Europe has hu
inflated the women of the United
States. Women Of the United States
are not less glad that women of other
lands have won the vote but they feel
that they have been betrayed by their
own nation.
ut was in the United States that
the first woman suffrage convention was
held and the first organized woman suf
frage movement in the world begun
That was ~ years ago. Had men been
or logical, they would at
once have responded to the appeal of
lS4s with the consistent answer, Since
we are government of the people and
women are people, they must be inelud
ed in all governmental functions But
men are neither reasonable nor logical;
men are exceedingly emotional and
sentimental. The race is too near its
cave DAYS to be otherwise.
$50 liberal has the United States
been in the matter of man suffrage
that Is of the 4s states once allowed
men to vote who were not yet citizens
and several still do; and seem to see
nothing inconsistent in permitting an IL
iterate non-tax paying alien TO vote |
while denying that privilege to Ameri !
an born, intelligent tax-paying won
IN
at has been a familiar sight on cleo /
ion days when a question of woman
suffrage has been pending to see refined
aides, college graduates and women of I
Importance, standing 100 feet from the /
polling place making their appeal TO /
he voters. while men unable TO speak /
English, the language of the gallot, I'M
Lble to read in any language, uncouth 4
md unframed, marched past them TO
asst votes against their enfranchise-
nent
Incredible, you say. II Is; astound
ne and unbelievable. II staggers and
one Should you ask, why
! it, answer. there are excuses but
% defense The great, bare, bald fact
) there. For 20 years. in lang wherein
% man ever made q sacrifice for a vote,
romen have given their all to gain
/ and their country has not yet pro-
laimed their task completed
els IL not clear that the time has
assed for women TO work for the en-
Of women aloneg Why
hould not the International Woman
outrage Alliance give way to an inter
ational suffrage alliance. sending
orth its propaganda for the enfran.
Of men as well as womenf
md why should not men and women
{ democratic vision unite in this com
ION aiml Most countries have had
,an's leao1ies tn aid women SUFFRAGE.