IV
SOME PRACTICAL ASPECTS OF THE QUESTION
ELLEN MUDGE BURRILL
Miss Ellen Mudge Burrill, educated in the Lynn public schools, graduated from the Lynn Classical High School; now in the employ of the Commonwealth as Cashier in the Sergeant-at-Arms Department; Supervisor in the First Universalist Sunday School of Lynn; a member of the Council of the Lynn Historical Society; author of the "State House Guide Book," "Essex Trust Company of Lynn" (the successor of the Lynn Mechanics Bank,) "The Burrill Family of Lynn During the Colonial and Provincial Periods," and of "Our Church and the People Who Made Her," being a history of The First Universalist Parish, Lynn.
J. A. H.
If suffrage were a natural right, then women should have it, and at once, but it is not like the right to have person and property protected, which every man, woman and child already possesses. It is not a natural right, but a means of government, and therefore a matter of expediency. The question is, will government by the votes of men and women together produce better results than by men alone? Suffrage means more than casting a ballot; if it means anything effectual, it means entering the field of politics. Had the proposed amendment been ratified, it would have become the duty of all women to vote systematically in all primary and regular elections. Would they have done it in justifiable numbers?
Look at Public Document No. 43, giving the number of assessed polls and registered voters for the Massachusetts State election of 1914:
Assessed Polls
1,019,063
Registered Voters
610,667
Persons Voting
466,360