Political Emancipation of Women.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 170, 18 September 1886, Page 3

Political Emancipation of Women.

,At "Washington, U. 5.,, recently forty-seven'" ' l:uli<>B, repreeenting twetifcy-thfee S.tates^ the ' Union, appeared' before 'the Home / Committee of the ' Judiciary, ' and delivered. . addresses in behalf bf rights which, though ,'■ assured to them urider /the- preamble of th«» > ; Constitution,' are strangely omitted from -' t^ ! body of that important document. The -, women want a "sixteenth amendment,' ■ making thtfm the equals of negroes and'enfranchised foreigners, says the New Yo*k '1 Heroin. -For actual ability,, comprehend- . ing conciseness of statement,- and logical . ,' "treatment, the speeches of several of .the ladiea were 1 in every respect equal to any ever'made before the Committee, a The <■ 'members were surprised j at the ability > shown by the speakers. . After a-brief statement by Miss Anthony, Mrs Merri weather, and Mrs Minor wa* heard, Mrs- Eastman • ,was then introduced. . She is a woman- of • fine,' almost commanding, presence, , and , was dressed with perfect taste in. a dark > reddish brown suit. She spoke easily and , , with effect for ten minuted. She^ argued , her cause on Constitutional principles. " Whatever be the promise of government," said she, " it rests upon the fundamental doctrine, that it is managed by ' we, the people . ' Who are the people 1 One-half of the citizens are ' the people.' " Tnere weYO a score of neat epigrams in her smoothlyuttered address Mrs Nelson, of Minnesota spoke next, and with more incisivenesa than, rhetorical effect. "I was born in Conneoti- ' cut," she began, " brought up in lowa, p*y taxes in Minnesota, and teach in the South. I am a widow, because my' husband gave his life to his countiy, nnd in tKe " twenty odd years since that event I have learned what a woman has to do for herself in the fight for life. The relation between the, bread and the ballot is direct. Women are paid les.« than men for the same work. There ia more prejudice against the femala sex than against colour." Mrs Bennett, of Kentucky, daughter of Caesium M. Clay, made a brief appeal to the religions sense of the Committee. Mrs Gougar, from the Hoosier State, then made a speech. She is a toll woman; her hair' is somewhat gray, though it evidently was once yellowin colour. She was dressed in a suit of turtle-back green satin and velvet. Her speech was a revelation. There has not been an exhibition of cultivated oratorical art seen in either House of Congress this session* Any brief resume of it would utterly fail in doing justice to it. She sketched out in a doEen concise sentences the struggle for human liberty since the Magna Charta, and asked the Commirtee to report a bill to the House referring the rights of Avomen to the Legislatures of the various States. "Sufi frage," she said in closing, "needs woman to-day far more than woman needs suffrage. Look at the condition of municipal affairs in New York, Chicago, and Cincinnati. Safety from the dangerous classes is found only in the home vote - and the home vofce is the woman vote " Taken altogether, the occasion was as interesting as it was remarkable, and the real pity is that such a speech as Mra Eastman's was not made before the full House, instead of the membejra of a Committee.