Are Women People? Part 3

Lady, I my toil will divide At your side; I outside the home, you within; You shall wash and cook and spin, I'll provide the flax and food, If you're good.

Partners, lady, we shall be, You and me, Partners in the highest sense Looking for no recompense, For, the savings that we make, I shall take.

What Governments Say to Women

(The law compels a married woman to take the nationality of her husband.)

I

_In Time of War_

Help us. Your country needs you; Show that you love her, Give her your men to fight, Ay, even to fall; The fair, free land of your birth, Set nothing above her, Not husband nor son, She must come first of all.

II

_In Time of Peace_

What's this? You've wed an alien, Yet you ask for legislation To guard your nationality?

We're shocked at your demand.

A woman when she marries Takes her husband's name and nation: She should love her husband only.

What's a woman's native land?

"Oh, That 'Twere Possible!"

_With apologies to Lord Tennyson._

("The grant of suffrage to women is repugnant to instincts that strike their roots deep in the order of nature. It runs counter to human reason, it flouts the teachings of experience and the admonitions of common sense."--_N.Y. Times, Feb. 7, 1915_.)

Oh, that 'twere possible After those words inane For me to read _The Times_ Ever again!

When I was wont to read it In the early morning hours, In a mood 'twixt wrath and mirth, I exclaimed: "Alas, Ye Powers, These ideas are fainter, quainter Than anything on earth!"

A paper's laid before me.

Not thou, not like to thee.

Dear me, if it were possible _The Times_ should ever see How very far the times have moved (Spelt with a little "t").

_The Times_ Editorials

Lovely Antiques, breathing in every line The perfume of an age long pa.s.sed away, Wafting us back to 1829, Museum pieces of a by-gone day, You should not languish in the public press Where modern thought might reach and do you harm, And vulgar youth insult your h.o.a.riness, Missing the flavor of your old world charm; You should be locked, where rust cannot corrode In some old rosewood cabinet, dimmed by age, With silver-l.u.s.tre, tortoise sh.e.l.l and Spode; And all would cry, who read your yellowing page: "Yes, that's the sort of thing that men believed Before the First Reform Bill was conceived!"

CAMPAIGN MATERIAL

(_For Both Sides_)

Our Own Twelve Anti-suffragist Reasons

1. Because no woman will leave her domestic duties to vote.

2. Because no woman who may vote will attend to her domestic duties.

3. Because it will make dissension between husband and wife.

4. Because every woman will vote as her husband tells her to.

5. Because bad women will corrupt politics.

6. Because bad politics will corrupt women.

7. Because women have no power of organization.

8. Because women will form a solid party and outvote men.

9. Because men and women are so different that they must stick to different duties.

10. Because men and women are so much alike that men, with one vote each, can represent their own views and ours too.

11. Because women cannot use force.

12. Because the militants did use force.

Why We Oppose Pockets for Women

1. Because pockets are not a natural right.