The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1922-11-06
CHALLENGE OF Times
IS CALL To VOTERS
SAYS LEAGUE CHIEF


Mrs. Maud Wood Park, president of
the National League of Women yot-
ters, In an appeal issued to the voters
OF america, declared that unless the
people awaken to the challenge of the
times' the country will be ruled by the
VICIOUS and stupid autocracy of the
polltlcal machine. She said:
Our country Is seriously imperiled
Dy Just one thing-the apathy of en-
Iranchlsed men and women. and the
danger that threatens is greater than
lne menace of any armed enemy.
destruction of our commerce. bonn
pardment OF our coast cities, invasion
OF our shores, could no wise destroy
us. Our country is too large, too
varied, too rich, ever to be conquered
but 1t can be wrecked from within. 1t
can cease to possess a Democratic gov
eminent, representative of the peoples
wishes, their ideals, their best inter
ests, and become an autocracy ruled
Dy the vicious or stupid few, and every
man or woman who fails to vote this
year contributes all that is in his DOW
er 10 such an overthrow of the institu-
tons our forefathers left to us.
In the past two months in many
states | have seen women putting their
hearts and souls into the work Of
preaching the duty of voting and l use
the word preaching advisedly for
religious fervor animates these de-
voted women. In the same states I
have heard both men and women ex-
cuse their failure to take part in the
primaries as in few days they will
excuse their failure to vote.
Coward's Speech
'Everything's in the hands of the
machine, anyway, one woman said.
My vote wouldn't count
Il call that a towards speech. II
is precisely as if a private soldier
when the charge is sounded, said.
wen, the enemy has it all planned to
peat us. | couldn't change things, I'm
only one person-Tm going to drop my
gun and quit
In war time we shoot men for act
ing ike that and while do not advo-
cate firing party at sunrise for the
Stacker voter, do hope for the day
When he-and she-can be made to
feel that TO fail to vote is to desert
In the face of the enemy.
Nothlng is surer than that we shall
make small advance toward good gov
eminent until we can bring the voter
to an understanding of his personal
ana unacceptable responsibility for the
conduct of public affairs: until we can
see voting not as mere political
privilege, but as duty no more to be
neglected than any other of the duties
winch belong to honor and a clean
conscience and right living.
All Should Vote
mere is no excuse for neglecting
TO vote. l have heard it said in one
place that both tickets are SO bad
neither deserves support. That is a
shallow and ignorant plea, for the
men on both tickets cannot be equally
undesirable. No party would dare to
put wholly bad ticket in the field
The plague on both your houses ar
utude is the attitude of the mentally
inert. 1t is clear to thinking minds
that the vote for the better man. even
II the better does not please us. is in
tlnltely more sensible than not to vote
at all. When, as it sometimes han
pens, one man on a ticket runs far
behind his party because voters will
not support him, that man seldom
comes up for election again. Voting
for the best men offered is the surest
way to improve the quality of candi-
dates in the next election and it is the
only way.
Il speak of danger to our institu-
lions but | am by no means despond-
ent. | feel that within the past few
years we have made definite advance
in public conscience. It is only a few
years since certain small political
boss used to display the suitcase in
which he carried the poll-tax receipts
of the voters he controlled. He does
not venture to do so now for we have
ceased to jest about political corrup-
ton. The tendency to take our pol
1ucs seriously is marked but the day
when political duties are universally
recognized as duties has not yet dawn
ed. We have not yet come fully TO
realize that freedom must be balanced
by personal responsibility; we do not
yet fully realize that liberty lays on
all of US obligations to which the en-
shaved are not subject, and we do not
heartily know that the only safeguard
of our freedom and our rights is con-
scientious use of the ballot"