Page:Democratic Ideals (Olympia Brown).djvu/78

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The Federal Suffrage Association


posed bill has over the resolution for a national amendment, which lately has received a majority vote in the Senate, is that it would require only an Act of Congress, needing but a majority, instead of two-thirds, and would not have to be ratified by the State Legislatures. It is true that the amendment would confer the full suffrage on women, and this federal act would give only a vote for members of Congress, but if women helped to elect Senators and Representatives would they have to wait very long for the national amendment? This federal act would bring the close of the long contest into full view and there would be an end to state campaigns.

"All of the Suffrage organizations could well afford to lay aside other measures and unite on this one, and it seems strange that it has been allowed for so long to remain a side issue. It is amazing that there should have been no effort to have women inducted in Senator Poindexter's bill, if for no reason but the agitation of the fact that Congress has power to confer on women this federal vote. It was one of many great opportunities that have been lost, and this should henceforth be made a leading question."


In former years the Suffrage Amendment to the Constitution was called the Sixteenth Amendment, later the Anthony Amendment. Recently the term