AN APPEAL TO THE WOMEN OF NEW ZEALAND BY MRS SNOWDEN.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 245, 19 November 1914, Page 11

AN APPEAL TO THE WOMEN OF NEW ZEALAND BY MRS SNOWDEN.

MRS SNOWDEN.

The women of New Zealand have tieal power. The vote is a possession* not to be lightly valued. For fifty r years the intelligent and. courageous women in the Homeland have beea struggling and sacrificing for the political rights which the women of Neyr , Zealand, have had for twenty-one years. ' The vote is a weapon. It ie the. weapon by which social evils can be abolished and temptation removed f rogot, the path of the children, the young, and the weak. The women of the Dominion have a , 'great opportunity at the - approaching or No-License and- National Prohibition. They can show that they are" worthy to bo trusted* with the power t qf ' moulding the*, conditions under which the people shall live. '•,'*• The liquor traffic is the enemy of the whole race. It is, in a special sense, an evii that women ought to, and; must, use their power to remove. Women and children are the main suf--1 ferersf rom the drink evil. It is a trade which takes and waste 3 the money the housewife and mother needs for the home. It is a traffic which destroys the, . . health of the fathers, and deprives* the children of necessary food,. and comfort* , , •«■ . Drink is-tW destroyer, of the home. The saloon, is an to the youth of the nation to fall evil ways.. ' t \ . • ■ Women are the bearers and rearers of

the race. It is their paramount duty to preserve the race. It is the duty' of the enfranchised women of New Zealand to vojte the liquor traffic out. of existence, because it ruins the- children' they beat.

. .The women in all lands are looking to see how-the women voters of New land will use their powat at the approaching poll. ' Let 'them follow the splendid example* of the women voters, of the: States of Colorado, Washington, Oregon, an&'Arizona; who have just carried State-wide Prohibition. . ETHEL SNOWDEN. -.