Fairly Feminine.

Maoriland Worker, Volume 2, Issue 23, 11 August 1911, Page 17

Fairly Feminine.

" fUepely IViapy

By CORA B. MONTEFJORE. Under this heading a woman contributor of "The Maoriland Worker describes the recent suffragettes' procession, in. which Mrs. Fisher ■ -and Mrs McGowen Avalked through London with 40,000 other women, as "the only good thing wafted to us from the Punch and Judy Coronation slioav." I wonder if your contributor realises that as. far as "Mary Ann" is concerned she is entirely cut out of the suffrage demands of the ladies who walked in that recent procession in order to back a Bill which Avill confer the vote only on certain persons who own property, or are able to pay sufficient rant to-qualify/but who are at the present moment debarred by reason of their sex. A Avriter in "Justice," of June 17th. explains why the Social Democratic 'women of England could not take part in the procession; and as it is important that Socialists all over the Avorld should speak avith one voice, and should haA'-e access to the facts underlying the various movements in various parts of the Avorld, I think it only right to supply the readers of "The Maoriland Worker" Avith the real truths of this capitalist movement. -The Avriter in "Justice" says: "It is alleged by the supporters of this measure that it will enfranchise the working class woman, and in order to prove the case figures have been prepared from certain towns Avhere exceptional conditions of Avomen Avorkers prevail. Noav, even if these figures Avere applicable to every town and village in Great Britain and Ireland (which they are not), even then the measure AA'ould be one which would leave the vast majority of Avorking class women unenfranchised. We presume that no person will deny that the wife of a workman is a working class woman. Yet these women, are deliberately excluded under' the Bill, even where .the Wife goes out to -work and becomes a direct bread-winner. On the other hand, any member of the governing class, by registering sufficient property in the name of his Avife, sistsft daughters, and other women members of his family, can multiply his vote in proportion to their numbers. It is asserted that the single Avorking dUs-s girl living at home, but going out to work, can get the vote — Aye presume under the lodger franchise. Noav, every political agent of any experience knows. the extreme difficulty of getting Avorkmeh's sons on the register a.s lodgers. The paucity of accommodation makes it in thousands of cases impossible for the son'to get the vote, as the revising barrister will not allow that the rooms claimed for are of the value prescribed by law. The A r ast majority of lodger voters are married men or the sons, of"well-to-do people. Again, girls living in. lodgings largely share rooms Avith a'girl friend, and; consequently, the qualification for a vote does not exist. "The Reform Bill of 1832 was carried because of the Avorking-class agitation at its back, and when the battle Avas finished the Avorkman found that his master had securely entrenched himself against giving political rights to the Avorkman. It Avas 35 years before, in 1867, household suffrage came into being, and 17 years after that, in 1884, before; this privilege Avas extended to the counties. And to-day, by reason of the long residential qualification, the trickeries of successive occupation, etc., the Avorking-class are still kept effectively out" of political power. * "We do, therefore, appeal to all Avorking-class Avomen to .have nothing Avhatever to do with'this agitation for conferring votes oil some women. The only thing Avorth agitating for is full and complete adult suffrage. ' That every man and woman' shall have the vote irrespective of avliether they pay taxes or not, and Avhether they live for a long or short period in any given place. The lessons of the past are open for all to read. Every franchise agitation has been turned aside Avith the cry of "Let us take this step forAvard," or "Wo will get in the thin end of the Avedge." Really,, this end ought to be worn, too thin already. Money is pouring into the coffers of the women's suffrage societies .like -water, and this is alleged as a reason for supporting the Conciliation Bill. ,i On the contrary, it shows the feverish anxiety of the governing, class to hoodwink the workers by backing this purely capitalist movement. -. ...--.: ; r . .... .■; "We are in favour, of for men and women because, they are men. and women. A move made now by the toadea

unions and other AA'orking-cla'ss organisations in favour of adult suffrage will succeed, but if the working man and working woman allow the five-mile procession on Saturday to befog their brains, then it means that Avhen the propertied woman gets her vote the workman's wife, sister or daughter will have to Ava.it at least another generation before their claims are even considered. Man and woman must achieve their emancipation together ; there is no antagonism between the sexes at all —both must go fonvard hand in hand to achieve the freedom of each; and, in the political sense this can be achieved by the rejection of the Conciliation Bill and the passing into law of a full and complete measure of adult suffrage." As I worked for some years before leaving England as honorary secretary of -the Adult Suffrage Society, I knoAV exactly , hoAV astute are the leaders of the limited suffrage movement, iv withholding "the whole truth," but occasionally in an unguarded moment, their real middle class purpose is disclosed. I will now give two quotations from statements made by leaders of the Limited Bill Party to shoiv how little chance adult suffrage will ever haA'e in this generation if this "ucav bulwark of property,, the so-called Conciliation Bill, is allowed to become IaAV. Mrs. Millicent Garrett FaAvcett said in the "Times," Nov. 23, 1907■: "Your leading article quotes Mr. Lloyd George as having said that Avomen's suffrage 'must come as part of a great scheme of adult suffrage.' This statement does not commend itself to any of the women's suffrage societies. Some of us do not Avish for adult suffrage." Lady Frances Balfour is reported in "The World's Work," January, 1907, as follows: "Woman's suffrage Avould •almost certainly act as a barrier against some of the extreme measures which are the hope of the .ultra-Radi-cals —Adult Suffrage, for example. Many of us, hoAvever, have the greatest objection to adult suffrage." The present basis of the franchise is so complicated, so perverse, and so class-consciously opposed to the human as distinct from the property political expression, that electoral reform specialists, among Avhom the late Sir Charles Dilke Avas most prominent, all give as their opinion that the only logical and democratic reform possible in England is adult suffrage. The Labor Party Congress, the Co-operative Congress, the Trade Union Congress, and the Social Democratic Congress all pass yearly resolutions affirming the principle of adult suffrage, and rejecting, amendments for the Limited Women Suffrage measure; but the vast sums of money, the parades, the vulgar self-advertisement of a small clique of women obscure, for those at a distance, the real issue, and mislead even Socialists in other countries into believing that these Coronation pageaiiters are striving to enfranchise all avomen. This movement is a desperate and spasmodic effort of entrenched capitalism to keep back the rising AvaA r es of democracy and. of democratic demand. If the proletarians of England are sufficiently ignorant to alloAV it to be successful- —as Avell may happen- I —, they will find, Avhen too late, that the interests of propertied .women in powerare as much opposed to the interests of the working women as are the interests of the employer opposed to the interests of the: employed. The Avomen of NeAV Zealand are enfranchised as human beings ; they must, not, through ignorance, support an agitation avliosc underlying intention is to enfranchise bricks and mortar and buttress the interests of property.