ADULT SUFFRAGE.

Gisborne Times, Volume XLVIII, Issue 4475, 16 February 1917, Page 3

ADULT SUFFRAGE.

COUNTESS OF WARWICK’S PLEA The Countess of Warwick in a long plea for the institution of adult suffrage in Britain points out that “our territory will not be less after the war. It may be considerably extended, our obligations in the face of the struggle for life that must needs ensue will be of a kind hitherto unknown. It does not follow that the united effort of the nation, whether in the Old World or the New. whether in Europe, Asia, Africa, or North America, will be equal to the giant task, in view of the developments that may follow war, hut it is certain that nothing less than a united effort will avail to shoulder our responsibilities in view of the immense losses we have sustained. Therefore it seems that the field of endeavor must- he enlarged, until it embraces every man and every woman within the Empire, and that'due recognition must be extended, not only to the man who goes out into the world to play liis allotted part, hut to the woman who cheerfully risks her life to make her country richer in the greatest of all a country’s assets —the children. “War has taught women the lessons of national responsibility, it has given them the pride of citizenship, it has taught the humblest and mostobscure of them how much they may mean in the hour of trial to a country that in the piping times of peace gave them no chance at all. Citizenship has in a certain sense been thrust upon them, thev have fulfilled its obligations in a fashion that has justified the dominant position of Great Britain in the councils of the world. We know that we .have priceless national assets and immeasurable national nubilities. Wo must set. the one against the other if we are to endure if wo are to recompense the living and justify the dead.”