Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1950-06-10
Lawmakers Deserved
Senator Smith S Slap
At Their Shenanigans
Tulk Demonstrated
Women's Superiority
In Common Sense
By Dorothy THOMPSON

by DOTOIHy thompson
The Senator from Maine, Mar.
garet Chase Smith, is emerging al
a figure of national Importance
The declaration of conscience
which she made in the Senate
June on behalf of seven Re.
publican Senators was overdue
and came with particular appro.
priateness from the only woman
member of that body. For, il
women have something particular
to contribute to political life, be.
yond the gifts of men, it is.
think, the combination of con.
science and common sense.
Men praise women for theil
superior intuition. I think they
are wrong. The imaginative ano
intuitive sex is the male. Senator
Mccarthy, for instance, is just
full of intuition and imagination
Women are the sex with their feet
on the ground. hate to admit it.
but there never has been woman
writer, composer, philosopher
sculptor or painter, in the five
arts calling for the highest intu-
tive imagination, to compare with
the loftiest male creators in these
fields.
What superiority women have
to a superior degree, is the sense
of balance and proportion. They
are less likely than men to indulge
in flights of fancy. Many years
ago the British author, George
Meredith, wrote a delightful "Es-
say on Comedy" in which he de-
fined comedy as that spirit which,
contemplating folly-manifest in
everything pompous, dispropor'
tionate, and overblown-throws
an oblique light on it. followed by
volleys of silvery laughter.
Noted German Weakness.
Meredith thought that it was
the peculiar function of civilized
women to bring down to earth the
overblown fantasies of men; and
observed that the chief fault OF
Germany was that it was a male
dominated society in which women
seldom laughed at men, or re-
buked them, pricking the balloons
of their inflated self-esteem, and
fhus rivi1j1inp them
It Is this quality of bombardina
nonsense plus an innate sense o.
responsibility to the race, rather
than to special interests or parties
which has made women-if gifted
with logical brains-such aston
ishingly good rulers in the few
cases where they have had oppor'
tunity to exercise the art FOL
which they are best fitted: gov
eminent.
When, by dynastic laws, they
have become queens, they have
been extraordinarily good at it
Britain's greatest eras were the
Elizabethan and Victorian. Byron
called Catherine of Russia "the
greatest of all sovereigns"-as well
as something else.
Eleanor of Acquitaine has not
disappeared from memory. Maria
Theresa was the most popular
monarch in Austrian history. And
a peasant girl called Joan Of Arc
whose chief qualities, despite her
visions, were courage, horse sense
and Judgment of people, pulled
France out of her doldrums when
a lot of pusillanimous males had
failed.
Every Woman Knows.
When to praise and when to SLAP
are things every normal woman
knows.
And Senator Smith did some
stern but kindly slapping, which
the recipients richly deserved. The
goings-on in Congress have been
too much of a muchness. and ii
was time some members of both
sides were told to go stand in q
corner. The Democratic admins
tration has, indeed, been seriously
lacking in candor regarding its
own past errors, which cannot be
covered by whitewash. Neither
can they be countered with mis-.
cellaneous smears.
When the lady Senator said
1.-THE American people are sici
and tired of seeing innocent peo'
pie smeared and guilty people
whitewashed," she told the truth
And when she said, There art
sufficient reasons to make 1t cleal
that it is time for a change.
But don't want to see the Re-
publican Party ride to victory OF
the four horsemen of calumny-
fear, ignorance, bigotry. ant
smear" she spoke for counties
would-be Republicans who. re
peatedly and disappointedly, flint
themselves unable to take wha
the Republican Party offers.
The Republican Party. is to b.
congratulated on having Sena
tor who can call a spade a spade
I am sure she spoke for the con
science and common sense of hun
dreds of thousands of POLITICAL,
Independent Americans.
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