Women's suffrage movement

“ What the National Union aimed at was the creation in each constituency of a Women's Suffrage society on non-party lines, which should by meetings, articles, and educational propaganda of all kinds create so strong a feeling in favour of women's suffrage as to make party managers on both sides realise, in choosing candidates, that they would have a better chance of success with a man who was a suffragist than with a man who was an anti-suffragist. ”

“ The loss of half a dozen seats owing to the opposition of women, while not destroying the power of the Government to carry the reforms to which they are pledged, will force the Liberal leaders to grant the Suffrage. The opposition of the Women's Social and Political Union to the Government will continue until such time as Women's Suffrage is granted, whether the Liberal women join us or not, but their co-operation would hasten the day of success. ”

“ One is the growing determination and strength of women, and the other the sympathy of the electors. The largest majority ceases to suffice for and protect a Government which has lost its hold on the country, and nothing is now more dangerous to the popularity of the Government than its treatment of the Women's Suffrage cause. ”

“ The ladies who signed The Nineteenth Century protest in 1889 were then as now—and this is the essential characteristic of the anti-suffrage movement—completely in favour of every improvement in the personal, proprietary, and political status of women that had already been gained, but against any further extension of it. The Nineteenth Century ladies were in 1889 quite in favour of women taking part in all local government elections, for women's right to do this had been won in 1870. ”

“ President, the movement for woman suffrage has passed the stage of ridicule. The pending joint resolution may not pass during this Congress, but the time is not far distant when in every State of the Union and in every Territory women will be admitted to an equal voice in the government, and that will be done whether the Federal Constitution is amended or not....
No measure involving such radical changes in our institutions and fraught with so great consequences to this country and to humanity has made such progress as the movement for woman suffrage. ”

“ The National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies endeavoured to steer an even keel. They never weakened in their conviction that constitutional agitation was not only right in itself, but would prove far more effective in the long run than any display of physical violence, as a means of converting the electorate, the general public, and, consequently, Parliament and the Government, to a belief in women's suffrage. ”

“ She has always been an earnest and profound student of social, political and religious questions, and, when she adopted the idea that women should be allowed to vote, as a fundamental right, she at once, in characteristic style, began to do what she could to bring about the great reform. She considered woman suffrage the greatest movement in the world's history, claiming that the ballot would give woman every social and intellectual, as well as political, advantage. ”

“ Others protested that it was self-evident, that women's suffrage must lead to domestic discord and the neglect of home life. Of course all the anti-suffragists were certain that women did not want the vote, and would not use it even if it were granted to them. ”

“ Some oppose Women's Suffrage avowedly because they object to the political equality of the sexes; others, less honest, argue against the immediate enfranchisement of women because they profess to believe that nothing short of complete womanhood suffrage ought to be granted. ”

“ Millions of dollars are invested in this State in breweries and distilleries, and members are elected to the legislature to watch these interests. Knowing the terrible sufferings of women and children through intemperance, they naturally infer that the ballot in the hands of women would be inimical to their interests, hence the opposition of this wealthy and powerful class to the suffrage movement. Others thought the agitation was an advantage, especially in bringing the women in the temperance movement to a sense of their helplessness to effect any reform without a voice in the laws. ”

“ But in 1891 before the suffrage was a live subject, before it had entered the region of practical politics, the women suffragists in six weeks obtained 30,000 signatures of adult women. The first and the most natural result of the anti-suffrage movement has been to bring down enquiries on the United Council from all parts of the Colony how to help Women's Suffrage. ”

“ We recognize that Woman Suffrage is no longer a theory to be debated but a condition to be met. The inevitable "votes for women" is a world movement and unless the South squarely faces the issue and takes steps to preserve the State's right the force of public opinion will make it mandatory through a National Constitutional Amendment.... ”

“ They have made use of the woman’s suffrage movement and now wish to do nothing in return. The fate of all woman’s suffrage bills introduced since 1870 (13 in number) proves that it is hopeless to have such bills introduced by private members. Women must turn their hopes to a bill introduced by the government. The present Liberal government needs only to treat the matter seriously; then a woman’s suffrage bill will be passed. ”

“ If, as we may trust, this service will be the main outcome of the suffragette phase of the women's movement, it is an outcome to be thankful for; we may then remember with gratitude the ardent enthusiasm of the suffragettes and forget the foolish and futile ways in which it was manifested. There has never been any doubt as to the ultimate adoption of women's suffrage; its gradual extension among the more progressive countries of the world sufficiently indicates that it will ultimately reach even to the most backward countries. ”

“ It is a curious anomaly that the movement for national woman suffrage in our country is most obstructed by women, and that even where the men have doubts, their natural admiration for the gentler sex almost converts them into champions. Certain it is that the Declaration of Rights of the Women of the United States that the National Woman Suffrage Association presented to the vice-president, Mr. ”

“ Questions are upon you which you can not solve without the moral sentiment of womanhood. You need us more than we need suffrage. In our large cities the vicious element rules. The reserve force is in the womanhood of the nation. Woman suffrage is necessary for the preservation of the life of the republic. To give women the ballot is to increase the intelligent and law-abiding vote. The tramp vote is entirely masculine. By enfranchising the women of this country, you enfranchise humanity. ”

“ This clamor for woman suffrage, for woman's rights, for equal representation, is extending all over the land.
I plead because my work has been combated in the cause of reform everywhere that I have tried to accomplish anything. The children that fill the houses of prostitution are not of foreign blood and race. They come from sweet American homes, and for every woman that went down some mother's heart broke. I plead by the power of the ballot to be allowed to help reform women and benefit mankind. ”

“ Resolved, That as neither free trade, finance, prohibition, capital and labor, nor any other political question, can be so vital to the existence of the Republic as the enfranchisement of women, it is clearly our duty to aid and support the great National party that shall first inscribe woman suffrage on its banner. ”

“ Until women come to see this too, and to give their united influence to this latter faith, political power in their hands would destroy even that measure of liberty which free-thinkers of both sexes have painfully established by the sacrifices of many generations. Yet I should vote for woman suffrage all the same, because it is woman's right. ”

“ Are we ready to expose the country to the demoralization, and our institutions to the strain, which would be placed upon them for the gratification of a minority of the virtuous and good of our female population at the expense of the mortification of a very large majority of the same sex?
It has been frequently urged with great earnestness by those who advocate woman suffrage that the ballot is necessary to the women to enable them to protect themselves in securing occupations, and to enable them to realize the same compensation for the like labor which is received by men. ”

“ Barring this question of democracy, I think the political arguments for woman suffrage are not the main ones. The great thing to my mind is not that women will improve politics but that politics will develop women. The political act, the nature it demands and the recognition it attracts, will alter the character and status of women in society to the benefit of themselves, their husbands, their children and their homes. ”

“ Our protest is not that all men are lifted out of the degradation of disfranchisement, but that all women are left in. The Revolution and the National Woman's Suffrage Association make woman's suffrage their test of loyalty, not negro suffrage, not Maine law or prohibition. Do you believe women should vote? is the one and only question in our catechism. In this period of reconstruction the Woman Suffrage Associations sent their first delegates to National political conventions. ”

“ As the question is likely to become a prominent theme of discussion during the next few years, the Times will now say that it is decidedly and unequivocally in favor of woman suffrage. We believe that women have the same right to vote that men have, that it is impolitic and unjust to deprive them of the right, and that its free and full bestowal would conserve the welfare of society and the good of government. ”

“ For any men who would give up the law-making power to women in order to remedy existing evils, would surely be those most ready to enact the needful laws themselves.
The woman suffrage party is so extensively organized, with such energetic and persistent leaders and such ably conducted papers and tracts, that those of our sex who are opposed to this measure begin to feel disturbed and anxious lest it should finally be consummated. ”

“ The ballot does not make those men happy nor respectable nor rich nor noble; but they guard it for themselves with sleepless jealousy, because they know it is the golden gate to every opportunity; and precisely the kind of advantage it gives to one sex, it would give to the other. It would arm it with the most powerful weapon known to political society; it would maintain the natural balance of the sexes in human affairs, and secure to each fair play within its sphere.
But, sir, the Committee tell us that the suffrage of women would be a revolutionary innovation ”

“ I believe in woman suffrage not for women alone, not for men alone, but for the advantage of both men and women. Any community, any society, any State that excludes half of its members from participating in it is only half a State, only half a city, only half a community. So, you see, woman suffrage does not interest me so much because woman is a taxpayer or because of justice as because of democracy; because I believe in the fullest, freest, most responsible democracy that it is possible to create. The city of the people will be a man and woman city. ”

“ The granting of women's suffrage would be against the disintegrating power of the other side, as women were everywhere anti-revolutionary forces.... This would add about 800,000 to the electorate. They would be, she believed, middle-aged women of property, than whom she thought they could not assemble more anti-revolutionary forces. ”

“ If it can only be done through woman’s suffrage, then woman’s suffrage must surely come, because, whether British legislators care for the good of women or not, nature does care, and as the race moves forward the working woman will have to be protected. ”

“ Anti-suffragists have abandoned the argument that working women do not wish the additional burden of the vote, and suffragists have learned to dwell far more upon the needs of working women than upon the grievances of taxpayers. Practically all advocates of woman suffrage are agreed that the working woman is in even greater need of the ballot than the woman of leisure, and that the introduction of woman suffrage is an important step in improving the condition of the working class. ”

“ We now ask Congress to do the same for women. We ask you to enfranchise the women of the District this very winter, so that next March they may go to the ballot-box, and all the people of this nation may see that it is possible for women to vote and the republic to stand. There is no reason, no argument, nothing but prejudice, against our demand ”

“ With 7,316 more women than men in this District, we call your special attention to the inconsistency and injustice of granting suffrage to a minority and withholding it from a majority, as you have done in the past. If the District is your special ward, then women, being in the majority here, have peculiar claims upon you for a consideration of their rights. The freedom of this country is only half won. The women of to-day have less freedom than our fathers of the revolution, for they were permitted local self-government, while women have no share in local, State, or general government. ”