Rensselaer Union, Volume 6, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 2 October 1873 — Woman Suffrage. [ARTICLE]

Woman Suffrage.

At the Methodist Conference in South Bend, last week, Bishop Simpson made a speech in favor of woman suffrage and took the ground that tlie evils of prostitution and intemperance "can never be overcome until women • are given tlie ballot. The Bishop evidently belongs to that el ass of superficial Thinkers who .-believe . all the ills of die world can be abolished by a few strokes of a pen, bulßisli- j op Simpson gives no good reason Tor the hope that*'is in him. We believe the woman of Utah and Wyoming .vote, but we have not heard that those communities are especially noted for their morality. There is a widespread suspicion that the irflfodnotion of women into the politics of the 1 ocal i ties meinti oned hasjhad a demoralizing effect, and the better class of all parties are Seriously thinking of retracing their steps and again restricting -suffrage to the males. Bishop Simpson and his lemale suffrage followers, who believe that.legislation can accomplish nitracTesTy" obliterating sucli evils,"as iutcMuperaneb should turn

-their attention to a certain temperance law enacted at the last session of the Indiana Legislature. This law if strictly enforced woiild entirely prohibit the sale of liquors in the, State, but it is simply impossible to enforce it, and the law is practically,a dead letter. There is more liquor sold in Indiana to-day than there was one ytpir ago- If it only required legislative enactment j to bring about the Millenium the j adoption of the Ten Command-1 inentß would settle the whole matter, but uhhapily, the effect of j legislation on the temperance question can be seen at home, and the idea that, because women would vote to make Btriiiqc.pt laws against cc rLa in evils that have e xistcd since the commencement of the world, the said evils would immediatel y disappear is simply childish twadj die and will be so considered by : every observer of the effect of our present temperance law. If the advocates of female suffrage arc e v er_goja;g to. succ e e d 'among intelligent people they must bring forward better arguments than those •for-shadowed by Bishop Simpson.— Prohibitory legislation on strictly moral questions is as ineffective as the Pope’s bull against the comet. All history lias taught this, and it is about time the advocates of women suffrage began to recognize the fact by treating moral questions from a purely moral standpoint.— Laporte Argus.