Evening star., 1921-10-07
Editorial Digest
A Twentieth Amendment?

| While the nature of possible twen-
! tieth amendment to the Constitution
! of the United States of America has
occasioned some fearful speculation.
! in view of the revolutionary charac-
| ter of the two latest additions to that
| instrument. it has remained for the
| national woman's party actually to
draft one and secure promise of it's
! introduction in Congress. This meas
ure proposes. in brief. to abrogate lin
/ every respect the common law dis
abilities OF women" The attitude OF
| the American press toward this pro-
posed amendment ranges from ac-
logical corollary of the nineteenth
! amendment. to branding it "a silly
| joke And following the well worn
| trail of the suffrage movement. the
+, demarcation line between these two
points of view comedies pretty closely
with the Mason and Dixon line.
Now that women have been given
!! the right of ballot why should there
be any objection to giving them such
i property and other civil rights as Will
place them on an equality with men?"
asks the Canton (Ohio) News (demo-
cratic), for 1.-The archaic idea that
man should have control of his wife's
property any more than that of
another woman should be abandoned"
! American women ''are entitled TO
| Island 0llD Argus (denocratic). and
the Emporia Gazette republican)
| finds nothing in the program to
| which any man can object" 1t feels,
| therefore, that ''any denial of the full
program by any state is unfair to the
women of that state,' and that it's
passage as a federal measure should
have smooth sailing"
This magma charta of equality.
the Grand Rapids Press Gndepend-
| ent believes. has been made neces-
sary by rapidly changing conditions
| well face the fact" it says. that.
| while American women used to
! bound their whole existence by the
| limits of home duties. they now count
| the home as only an important part
| of their lives" and with this enlarge
! ment of their field of activities the
| inequalities before the law which still
obtain have become injuStices.'
| Differing somewhat from the posi-
| ton taken by most Of it's southern
| colleagues. the Lynchburg News
/ (democratic) grants that "as gem
rights duties. functions and obliga-
tions of citizenship as between the
, two sexes are consequent upon the
| conferral of suffrage. and should be
granted" At the same time the pa
per regards this attitude as sup
port of philosophy which is sound
and logical" theoretically only, and
it suggests cases and circumstances
which would inevitably arise" under
which equality of right would lead
to highly undesirable results" Many
of the so-called disabilities and in
equalities,' the Norfolk Eirsinian-
pilot independent democratic) ex-
f1nS n
concepts of marriage and reciprocal
rights and duties as between husband
and Wife" and to erase these rights
and restrictions. in the opinion OF the
paper, would cali for basic read
justment.'
This position is supported by the
Chicago Tribune independent repub-
iican). which. while predicting that
women will secure the desired legis-
lation, doubts that it will prove such
a victory" since it will carry with
it as well the justice of social
equality" If women demand equal
ity in law they must in justice, the
Tribune declares. accept equality in
fact. If they want the former they
can obtain it," but IF they get it they
will get the latter with it. whether
they want it or not. The Grand
Rapids Herald republican, also sue
gests that, while an amendment re-
moving .tall determinations against
women" is unassailable, there re-
mains a doubt as to the desirability,
from the women's own point of view,
of removing "all Determinations in
favor of women.'
The movement however. as the Sa-
vannah News (democratic) sees it. is
silly" since you cannot make men
and women equal by law any more
than you can legislate the sun and
moon out of existence The Detroit
Free Press independently has no
quarrel with the objectives of the
amendment, but the discriminatory
conditions it is intended to remove
ARE not constitutional faults" and
the paper contends that since they
are practically all matters of state
concern" the Constitution needs no
alteration to give the sex what the
woman'S party wants.