The History of Woman Suffrage Volume VI Part 78

FOOTNOTES:

[221] _History of Woman Suffrage_, Volume IV, page 124.

[222] Delegates and alternates present besides those already mentioned were Misses L. G. Heymann and Marta Zietz, Germany; Mrs. Stanton Coit, Great Britain; Mrs. Henrietta von Loenen de Bordes, Mrs. Hengeveld Garritson, Miss C. C. A. Van Dorp, Netherlands; Mrs. Vibetha Salicath, Miss Eline Hansen, Mrs. Charlotte Eilersgaard, Miss Rasmussen, Denmark; Mrs. Anna B. Wicksell, Mrs. Frigga Carlberg, Miss Jenny Wallerstedt, Sweden; Miss Fredrikke Morek, Miss Marie Scharlenberg, Norway; Mrs. Saulner, Switzerland; Mrs. Henry Dobson, Australia; Miss Rosika Schwimmer, Hungary; Mrs. Mary Wood Swift, Miss Belle Kearney, Mrs. Ida Husted Harper, Miss Lucy E. Anthony, Miss Nettie Lovisa White, Mrs. Lydia Kingsmill Commander, United States.

[223] The reports from the various countries prepared for this congress filled fifty-seven pages of the printed report and fully justified Mrs. Catt's statement.

[224] The committee which had been appointed to prepare for the congress and had been working for many months beforehand consisted of the Executive Committee of the central board of the National Suffrage a.s.sociation and the presidents of sub-committees formed for different purposes. Miss Signe Bergman acted as president, Miss Axianne Thorstenson as vice-president, Miss Anna Frisell as treasurer, Miss Nini Kohnberger and Miss Elise Carlson as secretaries. Mrs. Virgin was at the head of the Finance Committee. The work of the Press Committee was directed by Mrs. Else Kleen. Mrs. Lily Laurent was at the head of the Committee on Localities. Mrs. Lizinski Dyrssen headed the Committee for Festivities. Mrs. Ezaline Boheman was the head of the Information Bureau. Miss Lamm and Miss Anden directed the work of the thirty university students who served as pages and whose kindness and swift and silent service none will ever forget. At the head of the Travelling Committee was Dr. Malin Wester-Halberg, who arranged the journey to Lapland, gave information about all excursions, etc.

[225] International headquarters were established in London, the paper was greatly enlarged and published there under the t.i.tle, _Jus Suffragii, International Woman Suffrage News_, and Miss Mary Sheepshanks was appointed editor, a post which she filled most satisfactorily during the following six troubled years.

[226] Because of the war which devastated Europe for the next five years these pledges could not be kept and the Alliance did not meet again until 1920. Meanwhile the United States contributed enough so that the London headquarters were kept open and the paper did not miss an issue.

[227] The English church of Geneva also for the first time admitted a woman to its pulpit, which was occupied on the following Sunday, June 13, by Miss Edith Picton Turberville of Great Britain.

[228] Among the many entertainments during the congress were a reception given by the British delegation; a motor excursion by invitation of Mrs. McCormick and the American delegates; a dinner party at Hotel Beau Rivage by Lady Astor for British and American delegates; a delightful "tea" by the French delegation and a garden party by M. and Mme. Thuillier-Landry. Excursions were arranged by the Geneva Committee and visits to the schools, museums, parks and endless points of attraction in this most interesting city.

[229] These valuable accounts of the status of women in the various countries were published in full in the 252-page Report of the Congress.

[230] They called on Sir Alec Drummond, head of the Secretariat, in London. He received them cordially but said it would be impossible for the League to undertake such expenses and advised them to appoint a committee to act as a source of communication between the League and the Alliance. Thenceforth the League recognized the Alliance as an authority and accepted its recommendation to place Mrs. Anna B.

Wicksell on its Mandates Commission and Miss Henni Forchhammer on its White Slave Traffic Commission. These women had already been sent to the League meetings by Sweden and Denmark as alternate delegates.

APPENDIX.

NEBRASKA MEN'S a.s.sOCIATION OPPOSED TO WOMAN SUFFRAGE.

To the Electors of the State of Nebraska:

At a meeting of men lately held in the city of Omaha the following resolution was unanimously adopted: "Resolved, That it is the sense of this meeting that a Manifes...o...b.. prepared, issued and circulated, setting forth the reasons for our opposition to the pending const.i.tutional amendment providing for equal (woman) suffrage and requesting the cooperation of the voters of the State, and that such Manifes...o...b.. signed by all the men present."

We yield to none in our admiration, veneration and respect for woman.

We recognize in her admirable and adorable qualities and sweet and n.o.ble influences which make for the betterment of mankind and the advancement of civilization. We have ever been willing and ready to grant to woman every right and protection, even to favoritism in the law, and to give her every opportunity that makes for development and true womanhood. We have a full appreciation of all the great things which have been accomplished by women in education, in charity and in benevolent work and in other channels of duty too numerous to mention, by which both men and women have been benefited, society improved and the welfare of the human race advanced. We would take from women none of their privileges as citizens but we do not believe that women are adapted to the political work of the world.

The discussion of all questions growing out of the social and family relations and local economic conditions has no direct relationship to the right of women to partic.i.p.ate in the political affairs of government. The right of suffrage does not attach of right to the owners of property, for, if so, all other persons should be disfranchised. It is not a fundamental right of taxpayers, for a great body of men are not taxpayers, and nine-tenths of the women who would become voters, if woman suffrage were adopted, would be non-taxpayers.

It is not an inherent right of citizenship, for the time never was in the whole history of the world when the franchise was granted to all citizens.... Franchise is a privilege of government granted only to those to whom the Government sees fit to grant it. As a law-abiding people men and women alike should recognize once and for all that the right of suffrage is not a natural or inherent right of citizenship but can only come by grant from the Government. [Legal authorities quoted.]

We must also recognize that woman suffrage is inconsistent with the fundamental principles upon which our representative government was founded and to accept it now involves revolutionary changes. The framers of the Federal Const.i.tution, a body of the wisest men the country has ever produced, did not recognize or provide for woman suffrage. No one of the original thirteen States which adopted it provided in their const.i.tutions for woman suffrage. True it was permitted in New Jersey from 1776 to 1807, a period of thirty-one years, when it was taken away by statute, by reason of unsatisfactory conditions and results. After the close of the Civil War, the southern States which had gone into rebellion were admitted back into the Union under const.i.tutions limiting suffrage to men. These precedents in our governmental history were never departed from until in recent years.

The greatest danger to the Republic of the United States today, as it always has been in governments where the people rule, is in an excitable and emotional suffrage. If the women of this country would always think coolly and deliberate calmly, if they could always be controlled and act by judgment and not under pa.s.sion, they might help us to keep our inst.i.tutions "eternal as the foundations of the continent itself"; but the philosophers of history and the experience of the ages past and present tell us in unanswerable arguments and teach us by ill.u.s.trations drawn from actual experience, that governments have been overturned or endangered in periods of great excitement by emotional suffrage and the speech and writings of intolerant people....

Open that terrible page of the French Revolution and the days of terror, when the click of the guillotine and the rush of blood through the streets of Paris demonstrated to what extremities the ferocity of human nature can be driven by political pa.s.sion. Who led those bloodthirsty mobs? Who shrieked loudest in that hurricane of pa.s.sion?

Woman. Her picture upon the page of history is indelible. In the city of Paris, in those ferocious mobs, the controlling agency, nay, not agency but the controlling and princ.i.p.al power, came from those whom G.o.d had intended to be the soft and gentle angels of mercy throughout the world....

It has been said that if woman suffrage should become universal in the United States, in times of great excitement arising out of sectional questions or local conditions this country would be in danger of State insurrections and seditions and that in less than a hundred years revolutions would occur and our republican form of government would come to an end. The United States should guard against emotional suffrage. What we need is to put more logic and less feeling into public affairs. This country has already extended suffrage beyond reasonable bounds. Instead of enlarging it there are strong reasons why it should be curtailed. It would have been better for wise and safe government and the welfare of all the people if there had been some reasonable standard of fitness for the ballot.

During the intense feeling and turbulent conditions growing out of the Civil War, suffrage was so extended that many of the southern States were turned over to the political control of those not sufficiently informed to conduct good government. It has taken half-a-century of strenuous effort to correct that mistake. The granting of universal woman suffrage would greatly increase the existing evil and put it beyond the possibility of correction except by an ultimate revolution.

We hear it frequently stated that there is no argument against woman suffrage except sentiment. We can reply with equal force that there is no argument for woman suffrage except sentiment, and that often misguided and uninformed. Some suffragists insist that if woman suffrage became universal "it would set in motion the machinery of an earthly paradise." It was a woman of high standing in the literary and journalistic field who answered, "It is my opinion it would let loose the wheels of purgatory." ... Suffragists frequently ask the question, "If we want to vote why should other people object?" If it is wrong they should not ask it any more than they should ask the privilege of committing a crime. If it is a wrong against the State every other man and woman has a right to object and it is their duty to object....

There are spheres in which feeling should be paramount. There are kingdoms in which the heart should reign supreme. That kingdom belongs to woman--the realm of sentiment, the realm of love, the realm of gentler and holier and kindlier attributes that make the name of wife, mother and sister next to the name of G.o.d himself, but it is not in harmony with suffrage and has no place in government.

We submit these considerations in all candor to the men of this State.

Ultimately the decision of this question at the polls is a man's question. We ask your cooperation....

Omaha, July 6, 1914.

JOSEPH H. MILLARD, ex-U. S. Senator and president Omaha National Bank.

(Largest creditor of Willow Springs Distillery.) JOHN A. MCSHANE, ex-Congressman and retired capitalist.

JOHN LEE WEBSTER, lawyer, representing Omaha Street Railway.

LUTHER DRAKE, president Merchants' National Bank.

JOHN C. COWIN, prominent lawyer.

WILLIAM F. GURLEY, prominent lawyer.

WILLIAM D. MCHUGH, lawyer representing Standard Oil Company.

FRANK T. HAMILTON, president Omaha Gas Co. and officer Street Railway Co.

WILLIAM WALLACE, former cashier Omaha National Bank.

JOHN A. MUNROE, vice-president Union Pacific Railway Company.

FRANK BOYD, employee Omaha National Bank.

GERRIT FORT, Union Pacific Railway official.

_Joseph Barker_, insurance official.

EDWARD A. PECK, general manager Omaha Grain Elevator Company.

HENRY W. YATES, president Nebraska National Bank.

MILTON C. PETERS, president Alfalfa Milling Co.

WILLIAM H. KOENIG, of firm of Kilpatrick & Co., dry goods merchants.

W. H. BOCHOLZ, vice-president Omaha National Bank.

FRED H. DAVIS, president First National Bank.

BENJAMIN S. BAKER, lawyer.

L. F. CROFOOT, lawyer for Omaha Smelting Co. and Chicago & Milwaukee R. R.

E. E. BRUCE, wholesale druggist.

GEORGE W. HOLDREGE, manager Burlington & Missouri River R. R. Co.

FRED A. NASH, President Omaha Electric Light Co.

NELSON H. LOOMIS, General Attorney Union Pacific R. R.

EDSON RICH, a.s.sistant attorney Union Pacific R. R.

FRANK B. JOHNSON, president Omaha Printing Co.

THOMAS C. BYRNE, president Wholesale Dry Goods Co.

REV. THOMAS J. MACKAY, Minister All Saints' Church (Episcopal).

REV. JOHN W. WILLIAMS, Minister St. Barnabas' Church (Episcopal).

This Manifesto with the signatures is given almost in full because in language and in the business interests of the signers it is thoroughly typical of the open opposition to woman suffrage. The other cla.s.ses who were opposed--the "machine" politicians, the liquor interests and those directly or indirectly connected with them--for the most part worked more secretly.