Rensselaer Republican, Volume 25, Number 8, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 October 1892 — ROSES AND POLITICS. [ARTICLE]

ROSES AND POLITICS.

, ' ; • 1 - f, P “ ■ - : : A PEEP INTO THE WOMEN’S RffHjß:=ff UCAN HEADQUARTERS. 4^rTfce Work Bering Done—Good Speakers, Good utorator* and Good Sentiment* for the Mas.ee—Woman la Poll tic Seems a Sneeoss Already. A sunny room with a big toy window from which one looks out over towers and spire*; the pink roues on the walls half hidden by gracefully draped flags and silken banners displaying the faces of the Republican candidates for president and vice president; palms and violets before cabinet photographs of Dudley and Allison; * crucifix twined with the stars and stripes; a word Bible and a tin plate card receiver on the desk littered with pamphlets, letters and newspaper clippings. Such is the extraordinary jumble of religions and political features at the headquarters of tiie Woman’s Republican Association of the United States. Ribbons and Boses In Politic*. Ribbons and roses in politics at last! Here we have them. Ribbons tied in tbedatotyrattaaebairs and fluttering in roseate knots on the soft, white gown of Mr*. J. Ellen Foster, president of the association. Roses on the walls, on the tables and mantel and oar the breast of this gentle woman, whose face glows with the zeal of the Puritan and from whose honest gray eyes looks the spirit of Bunker Hill. For Mrs. Foster is both a zealot and a fighter. She is of the stuff of which martyrs are made, continued with a goodly proportion of the old Adam. "College Boye and Women.” It pleases the Democratic newspapers these days to refer contemptuously to the re-enforcements of “college boys and women,” which Republicans are welcoming to their ranks. Well, college boys have votes, and women can make ballots if they can’t wield them. What is the Woman’s Republican association doing? .. Talking, writing, agitating And publishing pamphlets containing good, sound Republican doctrines; trying to unite the social and educational influence of Republican women and to enlighten “the shopping women on the McKinley bill,” for the latter have been repeatedly informed by t)ie Democratic press that Mr. McKinley is not only responsible for the awful devastation of pearl buttons and tin plates, but for tiie riot, strikes, bloodshed, the battle, murder and sudden death in this conntry, as well as the price of butter. Mr*. Foster's Literary Bureau. Mrs. Foster, who is an eloquent and convincing speaker, will stump New York for Harrison and Reid. At tiie present moment she is attending to the publication and dissemination of a series of political pamphlets. The first has already been issued, and is called “Objects and Methods.” The next will to “The American Renaissance.” Then will follow “The Immigration Question;” “Republican Contentions and Supreme Court Decisions,” written by Mrs. Foster, whose legal training eminently fits her to establish the fact that every essential principle contended for by the Republican party has been finally sustained by the supreme judiciary.

A Woman on “Finance.” Another interesting pamphlet, “Our Finances,” is written by a woman—Mrs. Margaret S. Burke, of Washington, a specialist in politics and finance. This lady is more intimately acquainted with financial questions, and especially the practical side of the tariff question, than any other woman in the country. She is as familiar with the vaults of the treasury department as an employee. Her paper will to a complete refutation of the fallacies of the People’s party theories. Mrs. Burke is the author of a book now being published in chapters in the Chicago Inter Ooean entitled “The Story of Hercules,” being a history of the financial policy of the Republican party. Scenes at Women's Republican Headquarters. Whereas at the national Republican headquarters there ia much confusion and masculine hubbub, at the women’s headquarters business is conducted with gentle deliberation and a mild feminine flutter. Mrs. Foster’s aids are pretty, refined, educated women. No one seems unsexed; no one has as yet acquired the brazen exterior popularly supposed to accompany an interest in politics. During the three hours I spent at headquarters I did not see one woman who by the mildest stretch of imagination would answer the description of a feminine “wirepuller” or “ward heeler” or shriek-* ingsister even. There was a graceful, yellow haired gill in a biscuit colored tailor frock, Miss Romeyn Shaw, of Binghamton, who will travel with Mrs. Foster; there was Mrs. Flora Oyington, of lowa, with wonderful soft little white curls framing a face of great spirituality and sweet ness, and there was Mrs. E. E. Howard, of Boston, a handsome woman with snowy hair and sad, serious, dark eyes, who wears the silver cross upon the bosom of her stern Mack gown. The rooms are constantly filled with an ever changing crowd of interested women seeking information and tracts. Of course Mrs. Foster is the most prominent figure. She is a fascinating conversationist and speaks with enthusiasm of the coming campaign. Edith Sessions Tuffer.