Free Silver Populist movement swept the State. A majority of the votes
cast on the Suffrage question were cast in its favor, but not a majority
of all the votes cast at the election. The supreme courts have generally
held that, in so important a matter, a complete majority vote was
required, but the Supreme Court of Idaho did not so hold, and woman
suffrage is now established in that State. This, also, is hardly a success
of sound democracy.

The subject of woman suffrage has lately been dealt with by two States
that represent republican progress at its best. They are New York and
Massachusetts. In the former State a Constitutional Convention in 1894
gave an impartial hearing to the subject, and decided not to submit to the
people an amendment striking the word "male" from the State Constitution.
Massachusetts at its State election in 1895 asked the people to vote upon
the question of extending municipal suffrage to women, and the answer was
given in a heavy adverse majority. Fewer than four in one hundred women
qualified to vote on the subject voted in its favor, and half a million
women declined to vote at all. A majority of over 100,000 votes was cast
against it by men. Utah and New York, Wyoming and Massachusetts, which
States do Americans hold up as nearest their model? In which have women
made most progress, and showed themselves most likely to understand their
rights, privileges and duties?

During the late Presidential election the issues passed the boundary that
separates party politics from patriotic faith. For months preceding that
struggle the Suffrage body had conducted the most efficient campaign in
its history. When the test came, California voted for sound money against
repudiation, for authority against anarchy, by a small majority, and threw
its ballots heavily against woman suffrage. With the enthusiastic help of
its woman voters, Colorado gave its electoral voice 16 to 1 against sound