And finally the thoughtful man must conclude, "Whether I like it or not, the women are going to get this political recog nition, and they are going to get it very soon."

One question remains for each of you: "Are you going to make it easy or hard? Are you going to hinder or help this inevitable step toward the fulfillment of democracy?"

In eighteen States of the Union there are men's leagues to promote woman suffrage, because men feel that this is a reform which is going to benefit not only women, but men and children—in short, humanity. I should like to see one in Indiana.

But perhaps there are some honest doubts and fears still left in your minds. Let us bring them out into the light of reason. First consider the foolish things that are always said against every step in the emancipation of women, such as, "When women vote they will lose their feminine charm, men will not marry them; they will refuse to bear children; they will neglect the home, leave the baby and let the bread burn." These notions about woman suffrage need not frighten us. The same things were said about the higher education of women fifty years ago. Both have been tried, and none of these terrible things have come to pass.

Seriously, does anyone suppose that love-making has gone out of fashion in California, or marriage fallen off in Wyoming, or the birth rate decreased in Colorado as a result of woman suffrage? The most ignorant of us know that the instincts of self-preservation and race propagation are the deepest instincts of mankind; no mere institutions of man are going to disturb the great fundamentals.

Now some pessimist says: "Women will not vote if you give them the right. What is the use of doing it?" He does not know that wherever women have been given the full fran

chise, they have voted in almost exactly the same proportions as men-if anything in a little higher proportions. Then he falls back on the fear that woman suffrage will increase the ignorant and criminal vote. But census statistics show that more girls graduate from high schools than boys, by several thousand-twenty thousand according to the last census; that there are more illiterate men in the country than there are women; and further, that of the immigrants who make up the bulk of our ignorant and purchasable vote, only one-third are women. As for the criminal vote, from four per cent to six per cent of our prison inmates are women.

Then, shifting to the last position, our imaginary obstructionist says, "All right, I grant you everything you say, but most women don't want to vote. Let's wait until they want it." But, does history count for nothing? Can't we remember that every extension of the franchise has been won, not by a unanimous request of all the people to whom it was to be extended and who were to benefit by it, but by the incessant efforts of a few tireless leaders? No reforms are brought about by everybody's getting up at once and asking for them. The women are going to want the vote after they know what it means, and that is why it is easier to convince men of the importance of women's suffrage today than it is to convince

women.

Another class of men object on frankly self-interested grounds, because they are afraid women would not vote the way they want them to. For instance, Socialists have said to me, "I would vote for woman suffrage if it came up, but I am afraid it will delay Socialism." Prosperous business men have said, "Oh, I suppose it is just; I suppose it is all right, but I am afraid it will hasten the days of Socialism and Prohibition." The old-time politicians fear the women's vote, because they

are afraid it will upset party lines. But what of it? What if it does extend county option a little bit? What if it doesn't exactly suit your interests? Where is the spirit of democracy in this country when one citizen can say to another, "You shall not vote, because your vote would be contrary to my interests?"

Finally, a practical man steps up and asks, "What good is it? In the States where women have voted, what have they accomplished with it?" Now I can't tell you that women have altogether purified politics in Colorado, that there is not any graft in Utah and Wyoming, and that all the officials of Idaho are absolutely honest, as a result of woman suffrage. No such result has come to pass, nor can it be expected. But I can say this: It is the opinion of practically every respected public man in the States where women vote that the influence of women in the electorate has been to make Legislatures and City Councils and officials pay more attention to the interests of women and children and the home. That has actually been the result of woman suffrage in every country and every State where it has been tried, and that is why you will find the men of those States and countries who care about progress, about humanitarian legislation, about conserving the life of the people on the side of woman suffrage.

Thus, all the so-called arguments against granting women the franchise disappear in the light of reason. But it is not reason that rules the world, it is feeling-sentiment. Always at the bottom of every fair-minded man's objection to woman suffrage you will find a strong feeling-a sentiment that reacts against the idea of women having anything to do with politics. I suppose sentiment is the precious thing in life. We would not lose it out of the world even if we could. But sentiments change from age to age. It was sentiment that kept the feet

It was

of the women of China cruelly bound for centuries. sentiment that opposed the higher education of women. By all means, then, let us be controlled by sentiment-but by sentiments appropriate to the age we are living in, not by those of a bygone time.

For instance, our ideal in marriage today is comradeship; the highest and noblest kind of a comradeship. As Professor Zueblin says: "Only in a family of comrades can we train children for the common life of the coming democracy." Let us not forget, then, that the only true basis of comradeship is equality.

A Historic Judicial Controversy and Some
Reflections Suggested By It

ANNUAL ADDRESS.

STEPHEN S. GREGORY, CHICAGO, ILL.

Probably most well-informed persons of the present generation associate the notion, once maintained, that a State might secede or nullify an Act of Congress, with the South and its earlier statesmen. And it is true that the resolutions drawn substantially by Jefferson and adopted by the Legislature of Kentucky in 1798, and similar resolutions drafted by Madison and adopted by the General Assembly of Virginia in the same year, together with some similar and more explicit declarations by the Legislature of the former State in 1799, seem to furnish some warrant for this impression.

Yet it seems to be well authenticated that the first real efforts to secede were made in New England; while the first formal and definite effort at nullification under solemn judicial sanction was made by the State of Wisconsin in the historic controversy to which I shall, on this occasion, particularly refer.

The first attempt at secession arose in consequence of the Louisiana Purchase. It was contended by the leaders in this movement that the annexation of Louisiana created, in fact, a new Confederacy to which the States were not bound; that it was oppressive to the interests and destructive of the influence of the northern section, whose right, and, indeed, duty, it was to secede.

It was said that as a result the evil of slave representation