Evening star., 1924-06-01
Women's Political Plattsburgs
BY FREDERIC ]. H1SKIN.

sally applied. would revolutionize po-
litical campaigns. The rules We're:
| Have something to say. Know how
to say it. Know when 10 stop
| Mrs. Renshaw says that in the past
| America has produced few out
| standing orators. men inspired 10
| great eIoQuence by sublime idealism
| Today we live in 4 practical age
| Campaign oratory is over, but cam
paign speeches are steadily gaining
| in Importance. The successful po-
Iitical speaker today is the man or
| woman who can explain cause so
| clearly. simply and convfncingly that
| the audience is not only emotionaily
| aroused, but is also made to think
| and act.
| Spoken arguments have an advan-
| tage over written ones in that the
voice makes the words dynamic, and
| the vital contact between the speaker
and the audience is immediate
The student speakers were not al
| lowed to imagine that holding and
| winning an audience depend on luck
class took several turns at practic
| ing expression on the class, so that
experience might show her and her
fellow students what to do and what
not to do.
Some Good and Some Poor.
| Brief speeches that any seasoned
politician might envy were made.
Other trial speeches were delivered
timidly and in muffled tones. A few
speakers revealed lack of a fund
Of definite knowledge about political
matters. E'ut. one and all, the women
were there determined to learn. Their
| attitude made clear the statement of
an English expert on public speaking,
who says:
To-day the average woman is more
successful in public speaking than
the average man, for the simple rea-
son that she appreciates the fact that
nothing good is ever achieved with
| out trouble. She therefore takes far
more pains than the man and devotes
| much more time to the training of
her voice, the accumulation and prep
! aration OF matter and careful prac-
| tice in the art Of speaking"
Mrs. William Wolff Smith. who or
ganized the training school held in
this city. predicts that women will
| making IN the coming campaign. In
| past elections, she says. woman
speakers have spent much time ad-
dressing clubs and other non-politicai
organizations. This may have given
amateur speakers practice, but so far
as a party was concerned, these
speeches were not vote-getters. The
| audiences were mixed. There were
anti-sunragists; there were other
women who would fight and die for
| a certain ideal Of government and
for whatever party happened to
champion that ideal: there were
| women who were opposed to align
ing themselves with any party, and
| there were women who were Repub-
licans, Democrats and Laborites. They
all sat politely and listened, and went
away with their beliefs intact There
| was never an opportunity for the
| speaker to turn her audience of in
dfvidua1s into a single minded crowd
| and to swing that crowd by an appeal
that would reach every section Of it.
! This summer woman speakers are
| expected to campaign in larger num-
bers, and they will be more promi-
! nently featured than In the past
Many women stin have more leisure
| than men, and SO they can volunteer
their time and services. The political
women, all planned and conducted by
| the women themselves, are expected
4 to equip 100000 women for campaign
work Of various sorts.
\ So far, courses have been held in
different sections of New York State.
Cleveland, Philadelphia, Minneapolis
| and in some other cities and some
| countieA Indianapolis and Denver
are the next cities which plan to hold