justice and demand greater protection than that accorded men unless they ask this protection in the name of weakness. To add this weakness, exempt as it is from military and jury service, the very foundations of our Government, can only serve to weaken this Government. Gentlemen, every successful business man will tell you that this is an age of specialization. Since, according to the last census, only 19.5 per cent of the women of the country of 21 years of age and over are unmarried, it is only natural to suppose that the great majority of women are concentrating and specializing on the American home and the American child. This is the most direct influence a woman can bring to bear upon the State. She brings it through the channels of education and religion in the quiet haven of the home. Do not force these homes and these mothers into that struggle for temporal place and power which is politics. Do not insist that the women of this Nation become partisans and combatants. The moral force of women has been great hitherto solely because they stood outside the political conflict and, being disinterested, could sit in judgment on questions of public morality. Whatever women might gain in material or practical knowledge by entering this conflict would be more than offset by the dust and grime of the struggle. Permit us rather, like the wise men, to follow the light of a star and lay whatever gifts of genius we possess at the feet of a little child. Surely a wise woman can do no nobler thing.

I thank you.

Mrs. DODGE. It has been very interesting to us who are going around the country to observe the extent to which the suffragists now are divided, among other things, on the question of legal equality. This was called to our attention by quite a number of feminist articles with which you are familiar, and particularly by some articles written by the younger suffragists. The suffragists seem to be divided into two camps on the question, the younger ones announcing publicly—and we are hearing it a good deal in our meetings in the West-announcing that they want both political and legal equality with men, and they do not hesitate to announce that they wish to give up the restrictions and privileges and special laws which have taken men and women working together for the last 60 years to get on the statute books. It goes back to 1841, when such a law was first passed in Rhode Island. It is a curious and a dangerous condition of things, and it is interesting to watch.

It seems to be a development of the younger women, and the younger women themselves say that the older suffragists are oldfashioned, that they are behind the times. It is really the first thing which has frightened us, in a certain way; but it is a fact, as has been said by the previous speaker, that this danger exists, and it is going to hit the wage-earning women first.

I am very sorry that one of our speakers, Mrs. Oliphant, did not get here, but we all had a very difficult time in getting down here from New York. Mrs. Oliphant has written a paper on feminism, and the more recent aspects of it as shown in the last six weeks, and that paper is here to-day. I can not find the author, and suppose she has not arrived from New York; so may I ask, Mr. Chairman, if you will permit us to incorporate that in the record? The CHAIRMAN. You may have that privilege.

STATEMENT OF MRS. 0. D. OLIPHANT, OF NEW JERSEY.

Mrs. OLIPHANT. Mr. Chairman, gentlemen of the committee, ladies and gentlemen, at the hearing before the Rules Committee, December 4, Mrs. A. J. George, of Boston, presented testimony from the writings and speeches of prominent leaders of the suffrage movement, showing that feminism is a live issue of the suffrage campaign. I desire to refer you to Mrs. George's testimony incorporated in the report of that hearing, and I wish to use this opportunity to supplement Mrs. George's testimony with a recital of a few facts of recent date that clearly indicate the vigorous hold the feminist doctrine has upon the adherents of woman suffrage.

In fairness to some splendid women who have been lured into the suffrage movement by constantly reiterated glittering slogans, I want to say that I do not believe they have dug beneath the surface of these slogans and realize what is the real meaning of the suffrage movement. But let me say that if they have not dug beneath the superficial crust they have no business advocating "votes for women," or anything else for women, and they stamp themselves as superficial thinkers. But if they do understand the full meaning of this movement they are a direct menace to our civilization, and their aim is the destruction of our American home. I prefer to believe that most suffragists know not what they do.

Briefly, feminism demands the economic independence of all women; its advocates regard it as a degradation for women to accept the support of father, husband, or brother; they demand equal wages with men, and they propose to use the vote as a means to attain this end; they declare that women have been hampered by her assumption of household cares and the rearing of children, and that she must be relieved from this restraint, so that she may enjoy unlimited freedom, but they offer no solution to the natural question, Who is to take woman's place as the responsible officer in the household if she gains freedom from what the feminists consider her present position of slavery?

Woman suffrage is the keystone in the arch of feminism, and feminism as outlined by the suffragists appears to be a revolt against the true duties, responsibilities, and ideals of womanhood. This issue of feminism, as defined by the suffragists, is an issue that the men of the country who have the best interests of the country at heart can not afford to ignore.

During the month of February two feminist mass meetings have been held in New York City; all the speakers were suffragists, many of them noted leaders of the "votes for women" agitation. The presiding officer of these meetings was Mrs. Marie Janney Howe, leader of the twenty-fifth assembly district for the New York State Woman Suffrage Association. From a court stenographer's report of these meetings, I will review for your consideration the issue of feminism, as advanced by the advocates of woman suffrage. Mrs. Howe, who presided at these meetings, said:

That feminism is the entire woman movement, and the reason why so many people find it difficult to understand is that they have focused their attention on one part instead of regarding the whole.

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Mrs. Howe here indicates that some suffragists have only focused their attention upon the political aspect-the gaining of the votewhile they have been guilty of not having definite knowledge of their own movement as a whole.

Miss Rose Young says:

As I see it, that old idea that motherhood takes away from general capacity must be abandoned, and all that poetic romancing about motherhood shorn ‹ its feeling of pity for women because motherhood keeps them out of other creative activities. Whatever the future may reveal, it will reveal that ele tive motherhood-not compulsory motherhood-will increase general capacity When that revelation is put upon us we shall see that the human career of woman-and when I say human career I mean the artistic career, the profes sional woman's career, the business woman's career-will not be retarded or interfered with by motherhood.

Miss Henrietta Rodman expressed her views on feminism as follows:

No selfish and no lazy woman will join it

Meaning the feminist movement—

They will call us mad because they recognize that in the long run, through feminism, they will lose many privileges they now hold, such a privilege, for instance, as that of alimony and such a privilege as that of being supported throughout life.

She further adds:

That the happiness we get through serving our families is not very great: that we ought to push out and do very much more. You know that the feminist idea or the idea is that at about half past 8 in the morning the woman starts to work at about the same time her husband does and at about the same time that the children start to school. * * Under the organization feminists propose there will be an efficient engineer in the household and this engineer will, of course, be a specialist.

*

We see that the feminist idea of the future is that children are to be engineered instead of mothered.

Mr. George Middleton, in his ardent appeal for feminism, says:

Feminism to me means trouble; trouble means agitation; agitation means movement; movement means life; life means adjustment and readjustment, and so does feminism. It demands equal pay for equal work. It says that when men and women contribute financially to a home, marriage can take place; not when the man's bank account permits it. It believes in the economic independence of all women.

He says:

Feminism, as I see it, seeks to change social opinion toward the sex relation. It asks, in other words, that men and women be judges by individual instances; it asks that the private life of either sex be not the sole test of their public efficiency. There can be no equality before the law when the sexual acts of a woman are more condemned and punished by society than the sexual acts of a man. Feminism, as I see it and believe in it, freely discusses, because it recog nizes no greater bond than freedom in marriage.

Miss Frances Perkins says:

Feminism to me means revolution, and I am first and foremost a revolutionist. Feminism is the revolution of woman against the dogma of sex, and, like all revolutions, we have got to expect the things that go with the revolution. The feminist movement, as I take it, is really based upon a theory that woman not only may, but must, ignore her sex and go about the business of life in any way she may see fit. In ignoring their sex I mean they must ignore and deny and set aside the rules and regulations which have been laid down for the conduct by one side of the community for the other in a generation and civilization long since gone into the past and buried. It means when we say

we will ignore our sex and go about the business of life in any way that we see fit, that we will ignore our sex and go about performing our social duties, our economic duties, and our physical duties without allowing ourselves to be hindered and protected by these old, time-honored rules and regulations, for these rules and regulations were a protection that no man can ask and which women should not ask, for these old rules and customs give to the woman a distinct advantage if she is willing to take it; the modern woman is not willing.

The laws on the statute books of the several States grant to women special protection and privilege because the State realizes woman's special contribution to society, but the feminists, as we have just heard, demand that woman must abrogate both protection and privilege. This may be the demand of 8 per cent of the women of the country; 92 per cent say no to this feminist doctrine.

Mr. George Creel, in his impassioned appeal for feminism, states

that

We are going to have different divorce laws; and when women stand out as their capable selves and not as slaves, to be told pretty things before marriage and allowed to do the washing afterwards, I still think we will have a finer type of companionship. And as for the home, the home that we reverence as that fine old institution surrounded with the sacredness of chivalry, it seems to me that the home will be all the finer when we leave off the chivalry and the home bunk.

Mrs. Chrystal Eastman Benedict, who spoke for the suffragists this morning, was one of the speakers of the first feminist mass meeting in New York City. She declared herself to be "An exalted and fanatical believer in feminism." She said:

To me, feminism means freedom for woman, freedom of all kinds. Freedom of choice in life and in marriage will follow economic independence, and can not come before it. Women will win their right to work, of play, and of adventure as well as men.

Max Eastman, the noted advocate of socialism, was also one of the speakers at this first feminist meeting. I desire to place before the committee this copy of the socialist paper entitled "The Masses," and of which Mr. Eastman is the editor. I secured this copy of the Masses at the headquarters of the Woman's Social and Political Union in New York City. I asked the young lady in charge for their strongest argument for woman suffrage, and she recommended the socialist paper which I have just now placed before you. Woman's Social and Political Union is an auxiliary of the National American Woman Suffrage Association. Mr. Eastman's plea for feminism was greeted with wild enthusiasm by the large audience of suffragists who were present at this meeting. Mr. Eastman's demand for feminism, as you will observe, contains a socialist threat. He

says:

The

Women should be made free from all the limitations of law, of dogma, and of custom. A woman who wants to go out into the industrial, the political, the artistic, or the romantic world for a life of adventure should be free to do it. I want woman to be free because I love liberty and believe in it. I know that women are going to grow in a new way; the women of the leisure classes are no longer going to devote all their time to matters of sex and of motherhood and of society; they are going to reform, to grow, and the women of the working classes are going to carry this struggle for human liberty to a point far beyond any that is now contemplated by the middle classes, idealists, who now occupy the platform in the woman's movement in this country. They are going to carry it so far that the women of the leisure class will have to go out and get work, whether they decide to do it or not. They are going to be on the lines in the great struggle between labor and capital, fighting shoulder to shoulder with the men for the liberty of all. That is where you will find feminists in the future.

I suppose that feminism bears about the same relationship to suffragism that syndicalism bears to socialism. It is a perfectly healthy reaction in a movement which has been so long concentrated upon politics as a means of attaining its end that it is almost ready to believe that politics is the thing itself. It is an impulse upon the part of those who believe in the liberation and development of women to be a little more direct about it. I would suggest finally as the important move to consider that we should mix in a little more direct action to it.

At a recent meeting in Trenton, N. J., Mrs. Mary Dennet Ware, corresponding secretary of the National American Woman Suffrage Association, made this statement-she was addressing the Trenton Civics and Suffrage Club at the time:

Women have too long been hampered by being held down by household cares; the time has come when she must have a more illuminating freedom.

And she finished this part of her discourse by saying:

It is unwholesome for any woman to be supported by any man.

Not a single suffragist present rose to protest against this feminist doctrine.

I hold in my hand a copy of a pamphlet entitled "Bondwomen." This pamphlet is published and issued by the National American Woman Suffrage Association, 505 Fifth Avenue, New York City. This pamphlet is one of its campaign documents. The National American Woman Suffrage Association sell at its headquarters in New York City a bibliography on woman suffrage; it is entitled "The Case for Woman Suffrage." In this bibliography they have a system of awarding "stars of praise" to their propaganda that they consider of special value. The highest number of stars of praise awarded is six, and this pamphlet is favored with three stars of praise in the "Case for woman suffrage." The author of Bondwomen is urging the economic independence of all women. says:

She

To this end she will have to strive, and that she should so strive will be well for her children. Many will say that this responsibility on the mother is too hard. What are the responsibilities of the father? Well, that is his business. Perhaps the State will have something to say to him, but the free woman's concern is to see to it that she shall be in a position to bear children if she wants them without soliciting maintenance from any man, whoever he may be, and this she can only do if she is earning money for herself or is provided for out of some common fund for a limited time. Feminism would hold that it is neither desirable nor necessary for women when they are mothers to leave their chosen money-earning work for any length of time. The fact that they so often do so largely rests on tradition, which has to be worn down. In wearing it down vast changes must take place in social conditions, in housing, nursing, kindergarten, education, cooking, cleaning, in the industrial world, and in the professions. The changes will have for their motive the accommodation of such conditions as will enable women to choose and follow a life work apart from and in addition to their natural function of reproduction.

I call the attention of the committee to an advertisement on the inside rear cover of this phamphlet, "Bondwoman," which is printed in large type and which reads:

Send for free catalogue of suffrage and feminist literature, address National American Woman Suffrage Association, 505 Fifth Avenue, New York City. That feminism is a live and vital issue of the suffrage campaign is a fact, not because I say so, but because their official campaign literature urges and demands feminism; their speakers preach feminism; their "Case for woman suffrage" praises feminism; and the