property qualification was done away with in America in 1820, on the ground of ex pediency, and if women are given the suffrage it should be given them on the same basis that men have it. Many of the suffragists do not desire an educational qualification, claiming that the ballot will educate women, but how women can get a lift and learning out of a right that has not made men better or wiser is an anomaly not explained. The higher education of women is a thing entirely apart from the ballot, for women without it have obtained entrance into most men's colleges, as well as into all profes sions. They can be lawyers, doctors, min isters; in fact, one finds no business or pro fession closed to her, no barrier interposed to her development and advancement in any direction in which her sex permits her to direct her footsteps. But these advantages of higher education, and the professions are open only to the exceptional woman, while the ballot is to be opened to all women; not little by little so that they might learn to appreciate its dangers and disadvantages and avoid the rocks and reefs, but all at once the flood gates are to be opened, and the franchise given to women. She is to learn, through bitter experience, and the country is to suf fer the consequences. Some of the late arti cles written by suffragists prove conclusively by their tone that it is better for women to move slowly; that they need time in which to learn that a wisely-adjusted bit is an ex cellent thing. The mind of woman is essentially re ligious, and there is little doubt that her politics have been and would be influenced by religion. The election in Bridgeport, Conn., is a proof of this, the Protestants and Catholics both working assiduously for their own candidates, the Catholics coming off victorious. In Brookline, Mass., the only disturbance at the polls since the Aus tralian ballot system came into use, was when the A. P. A. women thronged around
the polls, begging men and women to vote for Protestants. This mingling of religion and politics can be of no good to either, as it is usually conceded that religion and poli tics are better in different channels. Women's wages, we are told, will be raised as soon as they have the ballot. This statement can be best answered by the question : If the ballot will raise women's wages, why has it not raised the wages of men? Men have been voting a long enough time, and as yet have not been able through legislation to come to any satisfac tory basis about wages. The constant strikes all over the country prove this. Women as a rule seek temporary work, hop ing soon to leave it. The average age of working women is twenty-two, as determined by government investigation. You see what this means, that women who have ob tained some degree of skill are constantly dropping out, and their places are being filled with untrained girls. The wisest and best of our women are studying what can be done for the working-girl. They hope that organization among workers and the co operation of all intelligent men and women may do much to raise the position of the working-girl. The suffragists urge the necessity of re form in legislation, which will never be reached through men, since they do not suf fer from the injuries brought about by the want of them, and here they have in mind the social evil. No legislation will ever wipe that out. Men must be refined and women strengthened before vice will disap pear. Legislation may hasten it, but in this case as in that of intemperance, when you array women against men you are antagon izing the very people you are trying to win, and adding an evil to the one you are seek ing to remove. We can only work surely by stemming the tide of evil through early education, before it has grown too strong and overpowering. The main reason, however, why suffrage
