Progress is a magic word, and the Suffrage party has been fortunate in its
attempt to invoke the sorcery of the thought that it enfolds, and to blend
it with the claim of woman to share in the public duty of voting.
Possession of the elective franchise is a symbol of power in man's hand;
why should it not bear the same relation to woman's upward impulse and
action? Modern adherents ask, "Is not the next new force at hand in our
social evolution to come from the entrance of woman upon the political
arena?" The roots of these questions, and consequently of their answers,
lie as deep as the roots of being, and they cannot be laid bare by
superficial digging. But the laying bare of roots is not the only way, or
even the best way, to judge of the strength and beauty of a growth. We
look at the leaves, the flowers, and the fruit. "Movement" and "Progress"
are not synonymous terms. In evolution there is degeneration as well as
regeneration. Only the work that has been in accord with the highest
ideals of woman's nature is fitted to the environment of its advance, and
thus to survival and development. In order to learn whether Woman Suffrage
is in the line of advance, we must know whether the movement to obtain it
has thus far blended itself with those that have proved to be for woman's
progress and for the progress of government.

I am sure I need not emphasize the fact that, in studying some of the
principles that underlie the Suffrage movement, I am not impugning the
motives of the leaders. Nor need I dwell upon the fact that it is from the
good comradeship of men and women that has come to prevail under our free
conditions, that some women have hastily espoused a cause with which they
never have affiliated, because they supposed it to be fighting against
odds for the freedom of their sex.

The past fifty years have wrought more change in the conditions of life