WOMEN MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT.

White Ribbon, Volume 24, Issue 286, 19 April 1919, Page 11

WOMEN MEMBERS OF PARLIAMENT.

(By Mrs Fawcett in “Dail\ News, October jjrd, 1918.)

A question will to-day be discussed in the House of Commons which is of supreme importance to the natiton, and has for me personally a special interest, sim e it is closely connected with a cause with which 1 have for a great numbei of years been associated. That is the political equality of men and women. 1 look upon the question of the eligibility of women, not so much from the point of view of women’s lights, but from the point of view of the rights of constituencies to have as wide a choice as possible of suitable persons to represent them is Parliament. While hoping I might live* to see the clay when women could not only elect but be elected, yet 1 confess 1 am surprised to find how rapidly public opinion has advanced on this subject, and is in Great Britain today not only resigned to, but actively in favour of, the admission of women to Parliament.

It is amazing how rapidly the support of women’s claim to seats in Parliament has grown since the passing of the Representation of the People Act, and still more amazing to me how fat this support is founded on the recognition of underlying principles of justice—the only sure foundation. 1 confess to some envy of the younger generation of women who are to find their claims met with a first qu*Ty: “Is it just ” instead of the old query —of which veteran Suffragists like myself have grown so heartily sic k -“Is it expedient for our party But even in this age of enlightenment ♦he re remains as the* worst obstacle to any advance towards the emancipation of women, an attitude of mind which says: “Yes, I know that \our claims are just and reasonable. Still I cannot get rid of the feeling that women ought not to Ik* concerned with politics. After all, their interests arc well safeguarded under the* existing order.”

WOMEN AND R KCON STRUCT lON. This argument of false sentiment can only be effectively countered by an argument of necessity; and here I feel that fifty years’ close connection with the Women’s Suffrage movement enables me to speak with some author-

ity. Fifty years’ careful study of women’s politics has convinced me that women’s interests arc not and never will be properly safeguarded under the existing order, not only b<‘ cause men are not sufficiently willing and interested—though that has some times proved the case! —but because they have not, and < annot have, the specialised knowledge which enables them to legislate satisfactorily on problems chiefly affecting women. This lack of knowledge has proved serious in the past; it is vital to-day. We are on the threshold of a ne w era; and the reconstruction which the wai has necessitated has for its work to set aright not only the disclocation caused by the war, but the faults of an unsatisfactory condition of things dating back hundreds of years. It is in this reconstruction that I feel wo man’s point of view must be fully represented, nor do 1 believe that this can be adequately done unless women arc* allowed to sit in Parliament. WIIAT WOMEN CAN DO.

Consider for a moment the situa tion with which a Reconstruction Parliament must deal. Industrial questions will primarily occupy its attention. The Government is pledged to restore trade union conditions; but the restoration of these conditions means tnc exclusion of women from the countless trades in which they have reached such proficiency during the war, and on the modification of these* conditions depends the industrial futuie of women. Then the nationalitv laws will come up for revision; and the experience of the war has shown how important to women these may prove. Such panic regulations as D.O.K.A. 40D, which legalises a different moral standard for men and women, must be withdrawn; and surely women should have a voice here. There arc many other ques tions, too, such as housing, the pros and cons of a Ministry of Health, etc., where women’s experience will be directly useful, and cannot be really utilised through the medium of a House consisting of one sex only. I believe that the political instint ts of Englishmen recognise the sound ness of the constitutional principle that those who elect should also be capable of election. Experience shows 'hat where (in the case of women) this principle has been accepted and acted upon, the results have been satisfa^-

tory, and have not been attended by any of the dire calamities which are apt to haunt the anti-suffrage mind. Women have sat as members <*f S< 110 >1 Boards and as Poor 1 aw Guardians and on other locally elected bodies in our own country for close upon hft\ years, and have fully justified their position; and in other countries 'h<\ have taken then places in nati »n *1 diets and parliaments, and have dor.'* to quote a leading statesman of the last generaton, “much goml and no harm whatever.” Even in down-trod den Bohemia a Czech lady in iqi- was returned to the Diet; but the German Governor would not allow her to take her scat. Surely the British Parlia ment will not put itself on a level with this irresponsible auto* rat.