WOMAN SUFFRAGE.
[To THE EDITOR OP THE SPECTATOE."1 SIE,—Your correspondent "G. C." (Spectator, March 23rd) applies, I think, a false analogy to the question of woman suffrage. A woman takes her passage on a:ship of her own free will; she knows where the ship is going, and accepts the Conditions of the voyage. If these conditions, or the destina- tion of the ship, were unnecessarily altered, she would have a right to complain. No one can choose his hr her nationality ; but a voter can do something towards' altering old laws, or making new ones. The unenfranchised live under laws which they did not choose, and have no power to alter. "G. C." has yet to prove that "the ship is navigated for the common interest of all on board." Men do not ignore the interests of Women, but Members of Parliament think of their con- etituents. The demands of a class without votes can, and even must, postponed to those of voters. You yourself, Sir, assert that "there is not the slightest fear of their [women] being unjustly treated because they are nnen- franchised." Surely this needs support. You say also that women are no more in subjection than are Peers. May not a seat in one House of Parliament be reckoned as some com- pensation for the absence of a vote for the other ? Again, Toe say that "to prevent disunion through a vital disagree- ment the political franchise should only belong to one sex." To me it seems unthinkable that any practical question could ever range one sex, as a sex, against the other,—Sven this question of the enfranchisement of all men and the non- enfranchisement of all women.. If you make such .disunion Pie ultimate groundlor so grave an inequality, will you not
show that it is at least possible, not to say likely ? As far as the question of military service is concerned, a woman tax- payer does what a man taxpayer does,—she sends a substitute. And the substitute, who does the fighting, has no vote.—
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