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SOME PHASES OF EQUAL SUFFRAGE.
We have not undertaken to discuss in these
columns a subject which to some minds is the
burning question of the day, namely "Votes for
Women." Not only are we unwilling at the
present stage of the agitation to assume the role
of authority 011 the subject, but being involved
as it is at present in political entanglements it is
mainly outside our zone of investigation.
It appears, however, that certain contingencies
against which we were warned have failed
to materialize. In those states that have adopted
equal suffrage as a part of their organic law, the
legislative and executive branches of government
have been conducted quite as ably and
with as much consideration for the common weal
as in other states. Indeed the impression prerails
that they have taken the lead in those departments
of state government which are more
especially concerned with moral reform and so
cial betterment. Those concessions to the suffrage
movement may be safely accorded without
at all involving such questions as the ultimate
effects of equal suffrage upon thai; most sacred
and exalted of all realms of human influence
and service?the Christian home; or that related
question, the dignity, refinement and mystic potentiality
of true womanly character.
But there is a department of the general subject
with which we are concerned and which
comes within the purview of a religious
journal and upon which we would respectfully
tender some brief and, we trust, pertinent remarks.
These seem justified and indeed required
by event* of recent occurrance. One of
these events was the holding of a social function
n a hotel ball-room on a Sabbath evening by the
National Woman's Suffrage Convention which
was recently held in Philadelphia, and the saucy
reply made to a respectful protest against the
particular act of Sabbath desecration.
A member of the staff of the Philadelphia
Presbyterian refers to the fact that the Sabbath
observance laws of the state and city are good
and are well enforced, but, after expressing entire
approval of the suffrage movement and con
fidence in its final success, sayB:
For a large number of suffragists, in convention
assembled, to come into our city and defy
its cherished traditions, was an egregious blunder.
Further than that, when it was committed
or permitted, by those local leaders who were responsible
for the program, it stands without
palliation in the eyes of God's people.
Believing that any Christian who stands by
without protest, when wrong is being done, is
morally a partner in that wrong, the writer of
this article sought out the Philadelphia suffragist
who, she was told, could have this part of
the program set aside.
In thorough sympathy with the cause which
woman suffrage, unhampered by side issues, represents,
I explained to this suffragist that the
desecration of the Lord's Day by the Suffrage
Convention was a needless affront to the very
large body of Christian men and women of this
community, whose co-operation in this movement
should be sought and not alienated. I was
told that the movement *1 cared nothing for the
u|siiiiuur? ui citncr hiiuu wumcu ur sucii men;
that they "were at liberty to stay in or go out of
the great movement;" their course or their protests
mattered nothing.
Reluctantly T have come to the conclusion that
.-neb leadership is either irresponsive to or
wholly out of sympathy with the prevailing
Christian sentiment of Philadelphia and of
Pennsylvania. Their official conduct in thiR respect
has caused undue apprehension among a
large and influential class of our citizens, who
may look with suspicion upon the cause rather
than distrust the blundering leadership.
One of the plainest lessons of history is that
Sabbath observance and profound respect for
womanly character and woman's prererainent position
in the social life of any age or people, go
hand in hand. That these leaders in the National
Suffrage Convention were willing to trample
PRESBYTERIAN OF THE SO
upon the cherished usages and institution of
the community in which they were guests, revealed
a degree of indellicacy, a lack of moral
discernment and a spirit of insubordination to
established authority, strongly suggestive of in
capacity for either making laws or obeying
laws framed for the public welfare. Let these
leaders acquire but a cursory knowledge of
woman's real position, the estimate that is
placed upon her, in the republic of France today,
a Sabbath-breaking nation, and find the
convincing, final answer to their violation of
Sabbath laws,
Another incident of recent occurrence is of
still more radical significance and justifies plain
and positive strictures on the movement. For it
involves not only the violation of one of the great
commandments upon (he observance of which depend
the peace and permanence of society, but
it involves the very sources of moral obligation
and repudiates the only sanction that can justify
or make effective any statutes of merely human
enactment. According to the daily press
the following statement wafc made hv a Chicago
woman at a suffragist meeting in New York.
"We cannot accept the Bible as a divine inspiration,
because it features the male sex in
everything, almost to the exclusion of the female.
Man has usurped almost everything in religion,
as well as everything else. Tn the Bible
we know that God is represented as a man,
Christ as a man. the apostles as men, and in it
women are commanded to obey their husbands.
"Suffragists cannot accept the Bible literally
as divine inspiration. We must see that it is
written by men at a time when women were their
n-l- rr?v
.-njti hm*. i no posinon given women in the Bible
has kept them from their rights as the equa\ of
men. The Bible needs revision. Tt is not up-todate."
The most superficial readers of history will
tell us without hesitation that womian's position
in society, the esteem in which she is held, the ennobling
influence that she exerts, her recognized
agency in promoting peace, purity, intelligence
and happiness, all are the direct fruits of the
religion revealed to us in the Holy Scriptures.
It is high time that these "advanced" representatives
of the suffrage movement should spend the
time in reading the history of civilization which
they have been spending in carrying banners
and transparancies in street parades.
We would not intimate that the leaders referred
to are representative of the great mass
of those who sympathize with the suffrage
movement: there are large numbers of noble,
wise and devout women, and men, too, who give
it their cordial support, but there is danger, becoming
increasingly apparent, that the former
class will shape policies and mould sentiment far
out of r>ronortinn +/% ??? " *
, , tuuu iiujiiucrH. ir nas been
noted in communities where such tendencies
would not be suspected that women of decidedly
skeptical proclivities have been and are being
counted leaders in the equal suffrage movement.
Does that movement engender discontent
with biblical ideals and disapproval of biblical
teaching? If it does it is the enemy of the state,
the home and the Church
M .
Calling a thing a "religion" does not justify
its tolerance in a commnnity and secure its absolute
immunity from law. In a free country
like ours, religions must not be interfered with,
it is true, so far as their beliefs are concerned,
and all men are free to believe as they wish.
But if the practice of any religion interferes
With nth AT*! A.
_ me community, the
hand of the law should he laid npon those who
practice it in this injurious way% Anything ?
that endangers the life and health of the people
at larffe, or that threatens the common weal
is by that very fact shown to be evil, whether it 1
be called religion or by any other name.
U T H [January 8, 1913
DR. ORTS AFIELD.
For more than a year our readers have been
enjoying the rare privilege of reading the instructive
series of articles by Dr. Juan Orts
Gonzales on the general subject of Romanism.
Many hearty approvals of these contributions
to our columns and expressions of gratitude,
have been received from our rpnHprs VnlnnViio
light has been thrown on the subject which
probably could not have been derived from any
other available sources. Facts and documents
have been quoted by the author which were either
unknown or inaccessible to any except one
who has had the exceptional experience that
has been his. The spirit in which the articles
are written, the viewpoint from which the
subject is discussed and the well-balanced
sympathies and just judgments of the writer
are unique. Little that is vital and at the
same time new will remain to be said on the
Romish question after the series shall have
been completed and the fair judgment of all
will be that Romanism has been once more
weighed in the balance and found wanting.
Dr. Orts has made occasioned visits by invitation
to cities and smaller communities,
both South and North, where he has delivered
lectures on the Papacy to large and highly
appreciative audiences. Tt is worth of special
mention that on these occasions a striking feature
of the lectures has been the eminent fairness
of the discussion, the profound" sympathy
nf tV?n onnnl?A? Al ^ '* * *
... ...v. np^anci wiin me no in an uatnouc people,
and his manifest spirituality and zeal for
the truth as it is in Jesus. Any hesitancy that
may have existed on the part of audiences to
accord the speaker unreserved confidence on
these points has been dissipated hy the frank
kindliness of his utterance and his transparent
honesty.
Recently Dr. Orts delivered a series of leotures
in Detroit, Mich., to audiences that filled
the larerest churches --
tuv VIIJ- 1/ClIUll/ IN
counted one of the "most Catholic" cities of
America. Romanists outnumber all Protestants
three or four to one. Numbers of thera
heard the lectures and several expressed to
the lecturer their thanks for the generous spirit
of his discussions and for valuable light
thrown on the errors of the Papacy.
Of the impression made and the value of
the lectures, The Presbyterian Examiner says:
"It was a rare privilege to listen to Dr. Juan
Orts Gonzalez in his course of lectures on Romanism.
"We have heard lectures on that subject
before, 'some that stirred up all sorts of
malign influences. Dr. Gonzalez so deeply impresses
with the fact of his absolute honesty
and pure-mindedness that we all wish we were
such Protestants as he seems to have mingled
with, and we determine for ourselves at least
that he will make an honest effort to be nobler
men and women. The spirt of the man is an
inspiration. He has had a rich experience
that any man might covet. Even the most
rigid Romanist would feel compelled to respect
his arguments, for they touch all that is hiorh.
est and purest in the soul. If any minister
feared, as some did fear that the coming of
Dr. Gonzalez would precipitate a conflict between
Protestant and Romanist, he soon realized
his mistake, as he looked into the face of
a man who had in God's own presence, without
fear of man, reached conclusions that never
could be unsettled afterward, by argument or
persuasion or thro** c *
- iwi 1.1 viij man, DUt from
God, he had reached that calm persuasion of
truth that makes him such a power For righteousness."
In a similar vein of cordial commendation
Dr. William Bryant, a correspondent of the
"Herald and Presbyter," writes:
"The series of lectures, hv Di Juan Ortz