News Articles

Proclamation to be in Mrs. Duniway’s Hand Writing
When he is ready to issue a proclamation declaring the women of the state of Oregon legal voters, as a result of the recent passage of the woman suffrage measure Governor West has announced that he will request Mrs. Abigail Scott Duniway, of Portland, to write the proclamation in her own hand, and will sign it. The governor will do this as an honor to Mrs. Duniway, who is the pioneer equal suffragist of the state.
Governor West is desirous that the document declaring the women of the state voters on an equal footing with men shall go into the archives of the state house in the handwriting of Mrs. Duniway. It is required that within 30 days after election the votes on the initiative measures shall be canvassed by the secretary of state, who shall give the results to the governor, and the executive shall thereupon issue the proclamation declaring the measure a law. The governor will hasten the suffrage proclamation, so that the women of the state may participate in city elections where such are to come before the first of the year.

Women of Salem to Vote First

Equal Suffrage Law in Effect – First Election in State Under It Will Be Held in Salem December 2

City Recorder Charles F. Elgin and his help are looking forward with pleasure to the days yet intervening before the regular city election on December 2. The cause is that 2000 or 3000 women will probably visit the recorder’s office during that time to register as legal voters of the city.
The equal suffrage law goes into immediate effect, even without the proclamation of the governor, which is merely formal. However, the proclamation will be issued as soon as the complete vote is in. It will fall to the women of Salem to be the first women in the state to cast votes in any election.
City Recorder Elgin says that it will be necessary for him to employ about two additional clerks when the registration books open again the first of the week. To add to the strenuousness of the work in his office, the clerks will be required to mail to every voter in the city pamphlets explaining the measures to be voted on.

Suffrage Leaders Grateful.

Portland, Nov. 7—To the Editor of The Journal—The various equal suffrage organizations, through their representatives in the state central campaign committee, wish to extend their very cordial appreciation to the many editors throughout the state who have so materially assisted in the recent campaign by their generous support of the equal suffrage amendment.
STATE CENTRAL CAMPAIGN COMMITTEE.
By the Chairman.
Oregon State Equal Suffrage Association.
College Equal Suffrage League.
Men’s Equal Suffrage League.
Portland Equal Suffrage League.
Portland Equality Club.
Stenographers’ Equal Suffrage Club.
Civic Progress Circles.
Milwaukie-Oak Grove Equal Suffrage League.
Colored Women’s Equal Suffrage League.
Everybody’s Equal Suffrage League.

 

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    2. Because hitherto the women of this State have enjoyed exemption
from this burdensome duty, and no adequate reason has been assigned
for depriving them of that immunity.
    3. Because conferring suffrage upon the women who claim it would
impose suffrage upon the many women who neither desire it as a privilege
nor regard it their duty to seek it.
    4. Because the need of America is not an increased quantity, but
an improved quality, of the vote, and there is no adequate reason to
believe that woman’s suffrage by doubling the vote will improve its
quality.
    5. Because the household, not the individual, is the unit of the State,
and the vast majority of women are represented by household suffrage.
    6. Because the women not so represented suffer no practical injustice
which giving the suffrage will remedy. 
    7. Because equality in character does not imply similarity in func-
tion, and the duties and life of men and women are divinely ordered to
be different in the State, as in the home.
    8. Because the energies of women are engrossed by their present
duties and interests, from which men cannot relieve them, and it is
better for the community that they devote their energies to the more
efficient performance of the present work than divert them to new
fields of activity.
    9. Because political equality will deprive woman of special privileges
hitherto accorded her by the law.
    10. Because suffrage logically involves the holding of public office,
including jury duty, and office-holding is inconsistent with the duties
of most women.

OREGON STATE ASSOCIATION OPPOSED TO THE EXTENSION
OF THE SUFFRAGE TO WOMEN.
Mrs. F. J. Bailey, President, Portland.
Miss Failing, 1st Vice-President, Portland.
Mrs. R. W. Wilbur, 2nd Vice-Pres., Portland.
Mrs. Wallace McCamant, Treasurer, Portland.
Mrs. A.  E.  Rockey, Portland.        Mrs. J. W. Connell, Hillsboro.
Mrs. J. B. Montgomery, Portland.    Mrs. E. Yockey, Ashland.
Mrs. Gordon Voorhies, Portland.    Mrs. J. H. Templeton, Prineville.
Mrs. Herbert Holman, Portland.      Mrs. A. J. Richardson, Joseph.
Mrs. Robert W. Lewis, Portland.    Mrs. R. D. Carter, Baker.
Mrs. F. E. Harlow, Troutdale.        Miss Bush, Salem.
Mrs. M. E. McFarland, Airlie.        Miss Ritta Alderman, Falls City.
Mrs. E. H. Shepard, Hood River.

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That accident may throw her into this outer circle is of course true, but
it is not her natural habitat, nor is she fitted by nature to live and cir-
culate freely there. We underestimate too, the kind of experience which
is essential for intelligent citizenship in this outer circle. To know
what is wise and needed there one should circulate in it. The man at
his labor in the street, in the meeting places of men, learns unconsciously
as a rule, the code, the meaning, the need of public affairs as woman
learns those of private affairs. What it all amounts to is that the labor
of the world is naturally divided between the two different beings that
people the world. It is unfair to the woman that she be asked to do
the work of the outer circle. The man can do that satisfactorily if she
does her part, that is if she prepares him the material. Certainly, he
can never come into the inner circle and do her work.
EQUALITY NOT LIKENESS.
    “The idea that there is a kind of inequality for a woman in minding
her own business and letting man do the same, comes from our con-
fused and rather stupid notion of the meaning of equality. Popularly
we have come to regard being alike as being equal. We prove equality
by wearing the same kind of clothes, studying the same books, regard-
less of nature or capacity or future life. Insisting that women do the
same things that men do may make two exteriorly more alike—-it
does not make them more equal. Men and women are widely apart
in functions and in possibilities. They cannot be made equal by exterior
devices like trousers, ballots, the study of Greek. The effort to make
them so is much more likely to make them unequal. One only comes
to his highest power by following unconsciously and joyfully his own
nature. You run the risk of destroying the capacity for equality when
you attempt to make one human being like another human being.”
    All evidence proves that the adoption of woman suffrage brings into
evidence the bold, obtrusive woman whose conduct cheapens the sex
and deprives all women of a portion of the chivalry and respect which
are their birthright.
    Marie Corelli has well said:
    “If woman would impress man with an abiding sense of her moral
and mental power and with the purity of her intellectual influence
upon the time, she must begin to teach him in the nursery and school
room and not at the polling booth.”

OUR PROTEST
    In conclusion we, American women, citizens of the State of Oregon,
protest against the proposal to impose the obligation of suffrage upon
the women of this State, for the following, among other reasons:
    1. Because suffrage is to be regarded not as a privilege to be
enjoyed, but as a duty to be performed.