pledges for signature by women promising to vote "No" in
November,[321] but they soon became convinced that in trying to get
out a large vote of women against suffrage they had undertaken more
than they could accomplish. The Massachusetts Association Opposed to
the Further Extension of Suffrage to Women supplied in plate form to a
large number of State papers a series of articles one of which urged
women to express themselves against suffrage, warned them that
"_silence will be cited as consent_," and said: "It is our duty in any
clear and forcible way that presents itself, to say 'I am not sure
that our country should run this enormous new risk.'"

The "antis" have since asserted that in saying "in any clear and
forcible way that presents itself," they did not mean to include the
most obvious way, _i. e._, by voting "No" when given an opportunity by
the Legislature to do so. Later in the campaign they issued a
manifesto declaring that they did not urge women to register or vote,
and that _silence was not to be interpreted as consent_. And finally,
just before registration closed in Boston and the other cities, when
it was clear that the majority of women were not going to register to
vote either way, they issued another manifesto urging women _not_ to
vote against suffrage!

This was a transparent device to conceal the fewness of their numbers,
and they thus stultified all their previous professions, as they had
asserted for years that whenever women were given the right to vote on
an important question it would be their duty to do so, irrespective of
their personal inclinations, and it was in order to save women from
this burden that their enfranchisement was opposed. If they could have
brought out an overwhelming vote of women against equal suffrage, of
course they would have done so. Since they could not, it was their
policy to advise women not to express themselves and thus let the few
who were strongly opposed be confounded with the mass of those who
were indifferent. The Man Suffrage Association, which professed to be
working in full harmony with the women's organization, declared in
small and inconspicuous type that it did not urge women to take the
trouble to register, merely for the sake of expressing themselves on
the referendum, but that it did urge those who voted at all to vote
"No." It published a circular giving reasons "why women and the
friends of women should vote no," and it covered walls and fence