THE SUFFRAGETTE OUTBREAK

New Zealand Herald, Volume L, Issue 15235, 24 February 1913, Page 6

THE SUFFRAGETTE OUTBREAK

Tee suffragette outbreak lias very naturally been encouraged by the reluctance of the British Government. to deal severely with the hysterical offenders. The situation is becoming intolerable, however, for the bomb outrage seems to have been the signal for the ringleaders to encourage their followers* to increased lawlessness. Since it is hardly to be supposed that the Government will yield to violence of this character there is no alternative for the law but to wear down the anarchical outbreak. The suffragette lawbreakers persuade themselves that they are heroic, and delight to pose as martyrs when punished for destroying private and public property, and are strengthened in these delusions by the attention they attract. As a fatter of fact, however, the individuals themselves and their erratic ideas of how to convince mere man that they are right are of little importance. What is important is the reaction against women's suffrage which can hardly fail to be forming throughout the United Kingdom at the present time; also the effect of this frenzy upon the national "haracter. When complete indifference to law and order, to social conduct and to the ordinary rights of others, is preached as a gospeJ and accepted by many as a religion, the fabric of human society cannot but be loosened. Women can never gain by a revival of anarchy and lawlessness, yet such a revival is visibly assisted by the suffragette outbreak.