recovered and could think calmly, I knew it was not that. I was still
patient and still willing to go on working, struggling, sacrificing,
for my right to vote; but I could not forget that I lived in a land
which tolerated the things I saw that day." The women who know cannot
rise to "The Star-Spangled Banner" without a "lump in their throats,"
for they recognize the terrible fact that hidden under the beautiful
pretense of democracy is a hideous menace to our national liberties,
which no political party, no legislature, no congress, has dared to
drag out into the daylight of public knowledge.

[Footnote A: The number of states which permitted men to vote on
"first papers" was formerly fifteen. The following eight states
still perpetuate this provision: Arkansas, Delaware, Indiana, Kansas,
Missouri, Nebraska, South Dakota, Texas.]

Bear these items in mind and remember that Congress enfranchised the
Indians, assuming its authority upon the ground that they are wards of
the nation; that the Negroes were enfranchised by Federal amendment;
that the constitutions of all states not in the list of the original
thirteen, automatically extended the vote to men; that in the original
colonial territory, the chief struggle occurred over the elimination
of the land-owning qualifications and that a total vote necessary
to give the franchise to non-landowners did not exceed fifty to
seventy-five thousand in any state.

Let it also not be forgotten that the vote is the free-will offering
of our forty-eight states to any man who chooses to make this land his
home. Let it not be overlooked that millions of immigrant voters
have been added to our electorate within a generation, men mainly
uneducated and all moulded by European traditions, and let no man lose