Gentlemen, if respect for the great and wise who have viewed suffrage as a national matter did not compel us so to regard it, the plain dictates of common sense would accomplish that result. We are all ruled by the laws made by Congress, from Maine to California; we must all obey them equally, whether we like them or not. We are taxed under them; we travel according to rules laid down by the Interstate Commerce Commission under the interstate-commerce law; the remaining national resources are to be conserved by Congress; whether we have peace or war depends upon Congress. Is it of no concern who composes Congress, who votes for Members of Congress and for the President? If one State should exclude all except farmers, would it be no concern of the farmers of other States? If one State should exclude merchants, would not the merchants of other States fly to arms? No one in his right mind will claim that it is of no concern to us in New York who votes in Alabama or in Oregon. If our lives, our liberties, and our property are to be at the mercy of any legislative body, then the composition of that body is our concern; and since the composition of a body is determined by the electorate from which its members come. the electorate becomes a matter of our concern. contend otherwise would be to dethrone reason.

To

But it may be said that while the national suffrage is a national matter. State suffrage is a State matter; that while we have the undeniable right to determine the qualifications for voters for President and Congress, we have no right to intermeddle with suffrage in local matters. This is also a superficial view of the complex nature of modern civilization. In the first place, amendments to the Federal Constitution must be ratified by State legislatures. Whether or not we can amend our national frame of government to meet the needs of new times depends upon those who have the right to vote for members of the State legislatures. If we have a national interest in those who vote for President and Congress surely we have as great a national interest in the question of who shall have the right to make our fundamental law.

In the next place, the primary laws under which Members of Congress and presidential candidates are nominated are acts of State legislatures, and we all know that primary laws are fundamental. If you let me write the primary law, I care not who writes the constitutional laws. Indeed the Constitution recognizes the principle that national elections may be regulated by Congress.

In the third place, our States are merely geographical subdivisions. No insurmountable mountains or deep rivers separate Ohio and Indiana, Maryland and Pennsylvania. Our industries, our trade, our culture are national; what standards one State establishes concern us all. Our enthusiasm for the great rights of mankind, like Jefferson's enthusiasm in olden days, scorns all geographical lines.

In the face of these great facts it seems foolish for us to be arguing here the proposition that suffrage is a national matter. The constitutional law and practice of this and other federations demonstrate that all great statesmen and thinkers agree that it is a national matter. An examination of the elementary principles of political economy shows that each State in the Union is concerned in the suffrage qualifications which prevail in other States. The plain dictates of common sense and common observation show that there is no place where a line can be drawn between State and National mat

ters. Each age, each political party, confronted by new problems. must decide for itself, when a matter hitherto local and special in its treatment has become of sufficiently general concern to warrant national treatment.. As Mr. Justice Holmes has so aptly and neatly said, "Abstract propositions never decide concrete cases. The decision will depend on a judgment more subtle than any articulate major premise."

It is to that practical matter that I now propose to address myself. That suffrage is a national matter we must all admit. Has woman suffrage reached the stage of political evolution where it must become a matter of national interest? The subtle intuitions of practical statesmen always tell them that when a sufficient number of voters are behind a proposition of national concern it is time to make it a concern of the Federal Government. And what are the signs of the times? In 10 States women now vote for President of the United States, and in other States hundreds of thousands of men have gone on record by voting in favor of woman suffrage amendments. The political party that stood second in the campaign of 1912 put woman suffrage in its platform. The Socialist Party, with nearly a million votes, has declared in favor of equal suffrage. These are great national facts which no amount of political sophistry can obscure; no statesman can overlook the political forces with which he has to deal when he faces the voters at the polls. Surely an issue accepted and settled in 9 or 10 States, approved by more than one-third of the voters of the United States-adding the Progressive, the Socialist, the vote of the suffrage States, and the Democrats and Republicans who likewise approve deserves at the hands of this honorable body an earnest consideration of the problem in all of its aspects and a report to the House of its findings for approval or rejection. That is all we are asking at your hands to-day. We are not asking you to enfranchise us, but to submit an amendment to the States. You know and we know that that amendment can not go into force until ratified by three-fourths of the States. You would be simply referring to the States the proposition, "Do you believe that woman suffrage is now a national matter?"

Now, gentlemen, you can not put us off by saying the time is not ripe. In 1893 the House of Representatives-a Democratic House, if you please passed a constitutional amendment providing for popular election of United States Senators. At that time there was relatively little demand for that reform. At all events, the Senate's defeat of the measure met no stern rebuke. Few of the States had then provided for the reform by legislative action. The platform of the Democratic Party in 1892 had not indorsed it; nevertheless, the Democratic Party proposed then to dictate to the States and inform them that the time-honored system of electing Senators should be changed. If there was warrant for that action in 1893 there are a thousand warrants for the action which we seek at your hands-warrants whose outward and visible political signs you see on every hand. But we are told at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue that the matter of woman suffrage can not be taken up because the Baltimore platform did not indorse it. When the distinguished gentleman who gives us this information now was reading to us his acceptance speech he dismissed the Baltimore platform with scant notice, informing us that "a platform is not a program "; in other words, that he felt free

to make his own program. The Baltimore platform went on record in favor of exempting American ships engaged in coastwise trade from the Panama Canal tolls; but the Democrats in Congress are now invited to repudiate the express declaration of the party by repealing the exemption measure passed in 1912. The platform was not a program in Mr. Wilson's acceptance speech; any part of it may be repudiated for reason of weight; the only part of the platform that binds the party is its silence on the greatest political issue of the hour. It would be amusing if it were not tragic. And whether tragedy or comedy, the millions of women who vote for President in 1916 shall hear of it if this House denies us so reasonable a request as that which we now present. [Applause.]

One more point, and I have finished. We are told that the Baltimore platform did not indorse woman suffrage and that it is a matter for State action, therefore the House can not pay any attention to our request. We ask you, How do you square that with Democratic action in the matter of the presidential primary? Your platform specifically declared in favor of State action on that matter; the Constitution of the United States clearly announced in no uncertain terms that presidential electors shall be chosen as the legislatures of the several States may direct. Now, the Democratic Party, headed by the President-its responsible and in many respects courageous leader-proposes a national presidential primary law, taking out of the hands of the States control of that one election which the Constitution particularly specifies as a State matter. You propose to repudiate the platform and to violate the plain letter and spirit of the Constitution. Presidential electors are not to be chosen as the State legislatures may direct, but subject to the mandatory provisions of the national primary law. The method of electing the President which the Constitution makes a State matter exclusively you propose to nationalize and at a time when only a handful of States have approved the idea of a presidential primary-not more than the number that have approved woman suffrage. You do not even propose to submit the national primary law to the States for their approvalyou who are so tender of the precious rights of the States in the case of woman suffrage. [Applause.]

No, gentlemen, you can not answer us by shaking in our faces that tatterdemalion of a State's right scarecrow and then expect us not to read the newspapers when you repudiate your platform and violate express State rights in the matter of a presidential primary. You can not tell us that the platform will not allow this suffrage discussion because it is silent, but will permit the repeal of the canalexemption tolls which it expressly forbids. It is a travesty upon our reasoning faculties to suppose that we can not put two and two together. It is underestimating our strength and our financial resources to suppose that we can not put these plain facts into the hands of 15,000,000 voters, including over 3,000,000 free women. To take away from the States the right to determine how presidential electors shall be chosen, is upholding the Constitution and the precious rights of the States; but to consider the proposition to submit to the States an amendment permitting them to decide for themselves whether they want woman suffrage for the Nation is a violent usurpation of State rights.

Gentlemen, we can not follow your logic. If you come out frankly and tell us that you do not believe in woman suffrage, as such, we greet you cordially and argue with you on that ground. If you come out boldly and tell us that you do not think woman suffrage of any importance, we respect your opinions. Our only reply is that the political party which will enter into possession of the Federal Government on March 4, 1917, will believe that woman suffrage is a matter of national concern and of transcendent national importance. We present the facts and the decision is yours. [Applause.].

Mrs. EVANS. Mr. Chairman, do the gentlemen of the committee desire to ask the last speaker any question?

Mr. DYER. I think she covered the ground pretty well.

Mr. McCoy. Mrs. Beard had some remarks she was unable to read. Do you want those incorporated in the record?

Mrs. EVANS. A large part, and I should be very glad if she would be allowed to print it in the record.

The CHAIRMAN. She will have that privilege. Of course, the ladies will understand in revising their remarks, and adding to them, they will do so in a reasonable way, which they have always done heretofore in these hearings. The ladies have always been very fair and proper about it when the committee has allowed them to extend their remarks, and we will do that in this instance.

Mrs. EVANS. Surely, Mr. Chairman, if previous committees have been as attentive and courteous as this, I am sure the ladies must be much indebted.

I will now ask Dr. Cora Smith King, of Seattle, Wash., to speak to you. I understand she will speak upon the political power to women in the West.

STATEMENT OF DR. CORA SMITH KING, OF SEATTLE, WASH., REPRESENTING THE NATIONAL COUNCIL OF WOMEN VOTERS.

How

Dr. KING. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives, I am a voter, like yourselves. [Applause.] I am not straining a point when I say that I am eligible to become a Member of Congress, like any one of you. ever, Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, I do not stand before you to-day as one voter only, but to remind you that there are nearly 4,000,000 women voters in the United States to-day.

I represent an organization called the National Council of Women Voters, organized in every State of the 10 States where women vote on equal terms with men. These States, and you know, and have doubtless been many times reminded this morning, are Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, Idaho, Washington, California, Oregon, Kansas, Arizona, and Illinois.

The object of the Council of Women Voters-there are three objects: One is educating ourselves in the exercise of our citizenship; the second is to aid in our own States where we vote in putting upon the statute books laws beneficial to men and women, children, and the home; and our third object, Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, is the object which brings me here this morning-to aid in the further extension of suffrage to women. [Applause.]

The gentleman of your committee from Kansas and the gentleman from Illinois will bear me out in saying that there are thousands of women voters in our 10 States who have not yet made their party alignment. I desire to call the attention of the committee to those many thousands of women who have only recently won the battle which they have fought so earnestly, as I have done from the time that I attained my majority; and these women who were recently enfranchised and who have not yet forgotten what it cost, and who have not forgotten what it means, have their ears attuned to the plea of their sisters in the other States, where the women are still unenfranchised. And I remind you, gentlemen, that they may not prove unheeding to the pleas of their sisters in the other States when they request them to vote for the men who are favorable to the further extension of suffrage. [Applause.]

Gentlemen, your committee has often been called the graveyard committee. [Laughter.] When I look into the faces of the present committee I do not quite understand how that can be; it must have referred to the previous committees. [Applause.] I trust, Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, that this present committee will not keep up the former cry of being a graveyard for so many good suffrage bills. I warn you, gentlemen, that ghosts may walk. [Laughter.]

And while we are speaking of the dead, I will remind you of the story of the teacher who was talking to her children, a small primary class in numbers. I believe they call it now. She said, "Children, if there were four flies on a table and I killed one of them, how many flies would be left on the table?" and a bright little Irish girl put up her hand and said, "One; the dead one." [Laughter.]

Gentlemen of the committee, don't be a dead one. [Applause.]

In the States where women have been recently enfranchised, I assure you we can not find anyone who was ever opposed to woman suffrage except the dead ones. [Laughter.]

Mrs. EVANS. Mr. Chairman, I will now call upon Mrs. William Kent, the wife of Congressman Kent, of California.

STATEMENT OF MRS. WILLIAM KENT, OF CALIFORNIA.

Mrs. KENT. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, women vote in California in about the same proportion as men vote. They are proving themselves good citizens there as they are proving themselves good citizens in all the States and countries where women have the vote. And, after all, we are here; we are one-half of the human race, and here in this country where government by the people is the law of the land, ought we to be compelled to come before committees of men to urge that we are people; that we want to share in making the laws that we, too, must live under? Ought we to have to continue to prove that the women voters have brought no catastrophies; that children in suffrage States are as tenderly and lovingly cared for and homes as devotedly administered as in the other States?

But as a suffrage State seems, however unjustly, to be on trial. before the world, I will speak of certain laws passed by our California Legislature. The suffrage societies in California, after the vote was won, turned into civic leagues, and those leagues carefully studied pending legislation and stood solidly back of 17 bills before

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