Jasper County Democrat, Volume 15, Number 41, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 August 1912 — CIGARETTES ARE BAD FOR WOMEN [ARTICLE]

CIGARETTES ARE BAD FOR WOMEN

Mrs. Woodrow Wilson Has Decided Views on Subject A CONFUSION OF NAMES Wife of Democratic Candidate Gives Out Letter Taking Strong Stand on Smoking Habit. ? ——“ New York.—For the first time since Woodrow Wilson became the Democratic presidential candidate has Mrs. Wilson appeared. She attended in person her husband’s daily conference with reporters, although heretofore she has made special requests that she be not quoted nor written about In the papers. That Mrs. Wilson wished to have fully understood was that If she becomes the first lady of the land she will not, as has been said in a widely distributed Interview, have packages of cigarettes In her personal desk at the White House and Indulge In smoking them with her callers. Through Governor Wilson, Mrs. Wilson asked that publicity be given to a letter she had written to the editor of the State Journal at Columbus, 0., repudiating an alleged interview with her in which she defended cigarette smoking for women. The Interview had come to her in a letter signed "American Citizen," which said:

“Dear Madam—l can scarcely think of any greater calamity to the young women of the nation than to read such a preachment as your interview offers them. lam a workingman, and I see men lose their Jobs almost every day because they are Incapacitated for work by the use of the cigarette. If smoking does this for strong men what will It do for girls and women?” The "interview” was indeed a cordial Indorsement of the woman smoker. Here are some of its assuring phrases, all credited to Mrs. Wilson: “A woman writer for a syndicate of Sunday newspapers asked Mrs. Woodrow Wilson If she agreed with Gertrude Atherton’s opinion of the smoking of cigarettes by women. She smilingly exhibited three cigarette boxes plied in the corner of her desk, all but empty.

“ ‘Why shouldn’t a woman smoke if she enjoys it?” she queried. “ ‘Why hasn’t she just as much right to a cigarette as a man? Certainly I agree with Mrs. Atherton that any existing prejudice against women smoking is to the last silly and absurd. “ ‘Smoking cigarettes is a question of manners, not morals. It promotes good fellowship. “ ‘Come women feel that a cigarette calms their nerves and helps their brains Into working order. Personally smoking diffuses my thoughts instead of concentrating them. I enjoy it as I enjoy after-dinner coffee. Both are pleasant ways of ending and finishing off; both add to conviviality and good fellowship.’ ” The editor of the Ohio State Journal, it was clear, had been much incensed at the apologies for the cigarette habit among women attributed to Mrs. Wilson, so he wrote on Aug. 10 an editorial in which he called for the defeat of Governor Wilson or a repudiation from his wife. If there was no mistake about it, he wrote, “Mrs. Woodrow Wilson shouldn’t be mistress of the White House.”

If the Ohio editor was emphatic, Mrs. Wilson was certainly not less so. After the reporters had said they would gladly publish her letter to the Ohio editor she asked for an hour’s time in which to write one. This was what she prepared: “Dear Sir —I have just received a copy of the Journal with your editorial entitled ‘Smoking Women,’ and I beg leave to Indignantly deny the statement that I approve of women smoking cigarettes. The interview upon which your editorial was based is a pure invention. I intensely dislike the cigarette smoking habit for women—tn fact, so strong is my feeling on the subject that my real danger lies in being unjust and unkind in my judgment of those who differ with me in this respect

“But certainly no woman in our household ever has or ever will smoke Quite apart from the bad taste of iL I believe with you that it has an extremely Injurious effect on the nerves. “ELLEN A. WILSON. (“Mrs. Woodrow Wilson.”) Governor Wilson, in approving the letter sent out by Mrs. Wilson, offered what he thought might prove an explanation for the interview. "I do not think it was maliciously invented/’ he said. “There is a rather well known writer who signs herself Mrs. Wilson Woodrow, and she no doubt has been confused with Mrs. Wilson.” Mrs. Wilson Woodrow was formerly married to a relative of Governor Wilson, and it is understood that her views on the matter of women who smoke are different from those held in the household of the Democratic candidate.

It is reported that papers which are supporting the bull mooser have ordered extra fonts of “I’s.” Acd they will be needed when Teddy gets to talking.

Wonder how the colonel likes being aa outcast? K