Church the question of lay delegation. But back of the question of lay
delegation was as grave a question, and that was granting the right of
suffrage to the women of the Church. The General Conference assumed
the responsibility of giving to the women the right to vote. It may be
questioned this way; it may be explained that way; but the facts
abide that the General Conference granted to the women of the Church the
right to vote on a great and important question in ecclesiastical law.
Now if you run a parallel along the line of our government--and it has
often been said that there are parallels in the government of the United
States corresponding to lines of legislation and legislative action in
the government of the Church--you will find that the right of suffrage
in the country at the ballot-box has been a gradual growth. One of the
most sacred rights that a man, an American citizen, enjoys is the right
to cast a ballot for the man or men he would have legislate for him; and
for no trivial reason can that right, when once granted to the American
citizen, be taken away from him. Go to the State of Massachusetts, and
trace the history of citizen suffrage, and you find it commenced in this
way: First, a man could vote under the government there who was a member
of the Church. Next, he could vote if he were a freeholder. A little
later on he could vote if he paid a poll-tax. In the government, and
under the legislation of our Church, first the women were granted the
right to vote on the principle of lay delegation, not on the "plan"
of lay delegation, but on the "principle" of lay delegation. That was
decided by Bishop Simpson in the New Hampshire Conference, and by Bishop
Janes afterward in one of the New York Conferences. On the principle
of lay delegation, the women of the Church were granted the right of
suffrage; presently they appeared in the Quarterly Conference, to vote
as class-leaders, stewards, and Sunday-school superintendents; and it
created a little excitement, a feverish state of feeling in the Church,
and the General Conference simply passed a resolution or a rule