The Feilding Star. Published Daily. THURSDAY, SEPT. 21, 1893. MEN AND WOMEN ELECTORS.

Feilding Star, Volume XV, Issue 71, 21 September 1893, Page 2

The Feilding Star. Published Daily. THURSDAY, SEPT. 21, 1893. MEN AND WOMEN ELECTORS.

Of course it is impossible for any one to anticipate the effects which ruay follow the granting of electoral rights 1 to women. Time alone can tell. Of [ one thing, however, the best friends [ of the change are certain, aad that is : the voting power of the colony ha 6 been put on a more satisfactory basis. It will be no longer possible for mere " birds of passage " to influence an election, because the actual residents in an electorate will in future be the sole arbiters of the fate of a candidate. As a contemporary puts it : " The anomaly no longer exists of a vote in the affairs of the country being denied to an intelligent woman, while the privilege is held by a dissolute vagrant." It has been openly declared that one of the first subjects which will occupy the principal attention of the women electors will be the Liquor Traffic. Already they have a powerful organisation in the Women's Christian Temperance Union, the sphere of whose operations will now, necessarily, be much extended, because that Union must in future include men on the roll of membership. If they attempt to be exclusive the main object of their existance will certainly be jeopardized. We can quite understand that women will not, in the beginning, thoroughly realise that they are political equals of men, but time will soon familiarize them with the important fact. "Within the next few weeks they will receive their initiation into political life by having to take part in the general elections which are now close at hand, and early next year in the election of Licensing Committees under tho new Liquor Bill. That they will exercise their electoral rights prudently and with common sense, we are firmly convinced. We are also assured that they will give an example of moderation and discrimination which will be worth following by those who have hitherto posed as the " The Loids of Creation, "a title they can no longer lay claim to in its entiroty. Wo hope that tho women of the colony will not forget their indebtedness to Sir John Hall for the position they now hold, and will present him with some substantial token of their gratitude.