SUFFRAGETTE RAIDS.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1698, 14 March 1913, Page 5

SUFFRAGETTE RAIDS.

LAW TO BE STRENGTHENED. ATTEMPTED INCENDIARISM. By Telegraph—Press Association— Copyright London, March 12. The Prime Minister, Mr. Asquith, lias announced that the Government is considering the necessity of strengthening the law to deal with suffragist outrages. Members of the Social and Political Union are parading the river-front daily during the time the University crews nro at practice. The boatmen have been instructed to "duck" them summarily if they attempt to interfere with the boat?. Half-burnt rags were opportunely discovered in a. lavatory at the British Museum. The act is attributed to suffragettes. PETHICIC LAWRENCE CASE. (Rec. March 14, 0.15 a.m.) London, March 13. ' The Treasury has issued a writ against Mr. and Mrs. Pethick Lawrence for the recovery of <£600, the balance of the costs in tho recent conspiracy .prosecution. OUT FOR VOTES. SUFFRAGETTE ACTIVITIES EXPLAINED. Some interesting facts regarding the suffragette movement in Great Britain and. elsewhere were obtained by.' _ a Dominion reporter yesterday from Miss Margaret Newcombe, a London representative of the Australian and New Zealand Women's Voters' Association, who is now on a visit to New Zealand. Asked what her impression was of the attitude taken up by New Zealand women towards the agitation now in progress in the Old Country, Miss Newcombe replied that at first she had found New Zealand women a little inclined to deprecate the violent methods followed in England. When the peculiar • difficulties of the position in the Old Country were explained to them, however, New Zealand women showed themselves extremely sympathetic. "Oyer and over again," said Miss Newcombe, "we have been requested to convey tho sympathy of the particular meeting we were addressing to those engaged in tho movement at Home."

* Scanty press reports of suffrage activities, Miss Newcombs went on to remark, have given rise to various misconceptions

in the outlying parts of the Empire. One cable message had spoken of members of the militant fraternity ,as "brainless girls," but as a fact a majority 1 of their number were grey-haired women of over fifty who had given the preceding years of their lives to social reform. One of their number, Dr. Eade, was amongst tho first women who fought for tho right to obtain degrees as medical, women. Dr. Eade had spent her life in endeavouring to help poor women in the East End of London. She now declared, Miss Newcombe stated, that she would not die until women had been granted the political rights for which they were agitating. Miss Nowcombe and Miss Hodge, who are travelling together on the present tour, were engaged at Home in educational pursuits for years, and later spent twelve years in similar activities in Aus-

tralia. Threo years ago they returned to England; Another matter to which Miss Newcombe referred was an allegation that the suffragette .agitation had been engineered mainly by propertied women and that the end these women had in view was not a broad 1 franchise, but a strictly limited one. To these charges Miss Newcombe gave an emphatic denial. • "It* is true, of course," she said, "that propertied women are doing much Of the fighting for tho simple reason that they have the means and. the leisure enabling them to do so. Now, however, poor women are taking an active part in the-movement, and' where_ more convenient arrangements are impossible, are holding their meetings and demonstrations late at night. "As to the'scope of the franchise the 6uftrngetfe .organisations arc unanimous ni\ adopting as their objective the vote for. women as it is. or may be, grantedto men." The suffragette organisations recognised, Miss. Newconlbe' stated, that, the universal franchiso would come, and welcomed _fhe prosnect. but they refrained from raising flie limitation question, because their'immediate objective was to secure for women the nolitical right now enjoyed only by men. It was because they took up this attitude that women had accepted'tho Conciliation Bill, which had now been killed largely by Mr. LloydGeorge, who had said that h« would "torpedo" it.

The present expectation of the suffragettes, Miss Newcombe • stated, is that they. may, before long, secure from a Conservative Government what they have failed to obtain from the' Liberals.

Speaking of militant methods, Miss Newcombo said that tho Women's Social and Political Union, with Mrs. Pankhurst at its head, was militant. Another strongly militant body was the Women's Freedom Leaeue. The Church League wasi also militant. In all, however, there 'were between 35 and 10 suffragette societies; and many of them were opposed to militant methods. Rome of them would even denounce sunli actions as destroying tho contents of pillar-boxes, and tlie recent attempt to blow up 'a houso supnosed to belong to, Mr. Lloyd-George. The National Union of Women'? Suffrage Sociejties was opposed to militant methods. The militant seotion, Miss Newcombe remarked in .conclusion, had only one end in view, and that was to make the public think. Tho public, experience had shown, was very unwilling to think, and .violent, methods had, In consequence, been adopted bv some of the suffragette organisations. .There was no'trace of a desire, however, to resort to violence for its own sake, or from a mere spirit, of hysteria.