One hundred years ago
NEW ZEALAND has carried Women's Suffrage in a rather extreme form, almost any woman of full age, even if a mere visitor to the island, would have a vote, — and has carried it almost by a fluke, for it seems that a good many Members of the popular House voted for it in implicit confidence that either the Legislative Council would reject it, or that Lord Glasgow (the Governor) would reserve it for the Queen's assent. But the Legislative Council, thinking apparently that it might prove a Conser- vative measure, passed it; and Lord Glasgow thought there was no sufficient reason for reserving it for the Queen's assent. The alarm expressed when the Bill was found to be actually law was very great, — even those who had exert- ed themselves to push it through feeling exactly like children who are trying to rush a door which they believe to be barricaded, and who, finding it open without any effort at all, are conse- quently thrown on to their faces by their own precipitation. Perhaps the New Zealanders may teach us something by their rash experiment. We would not say to them, fiat experimentum in corpore viii, but rather that, as they have made so rash an experiment, in corpore hon- esto, we will, at all events, watch it care- fully before we think of following suit. New Zealand probably will not scruple to undo what it has done with so little consideration, if the Colony finds rea- son to repent it. The Spectator 18 November 1893
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