The Advance of Women.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XX, Issue 6167, 24 January 1895, Page 3

The Advance of Women.

America has at length set other countries the example of female representation, and at the next session of the Colorado Assembly there will be three women among the members of the House of Representatives. Whether they will perform their duties in the public-spirited manner demanded of them by their constituents is still an unanswered question, but there can be no doubt that their career will be watched with sympathetic eagerness by women in every part of the civilised world. The three ladies selected for this distinction have had a good deal of experience in public speaking, and they have also taken care to specially qualify themselves for their high trust by an extended study of politics. Public speaking—a task from which most of our mothers, wives, and sisters shrink in dismay—appears to be quite an ordinary accomplishment with the cultured American woman, while for her who has had to earn her own living it seems to come quite as a natural gift. The new State Superintendent of Public Instruction for Colorado is a striking example. This lady was left a widow with a little daughter when quite young, and after managing a bookseller's shop and editing a newspaper for some years, she became a capable business woman. Then,* in working with different charitable and social organisations, she obtained a strong following among women, who could not fail to be attracted by her thoroughness and ability. Later, as an organiser among the women of Colorado in the struggle to obtain representation of the County Committee, she achieved a success that won the unstinted praise of men who knew how great were the difficulties with which she had to contend. Her work was done so well that not a suggestion of mismanagement or lack of tact was ever heard during the campaign. It seems that she had the united support of all the women. It is not wonderful, after this, that the Colorado people are congratulating themselves on the election of such a capable, yet tactful, woman to the post of Superintendent of Public Instruction, and they feel confident that she will fill her office quite as well, if nob a little better, than her male predecessors.