ference of men. With a few honorable exceptions, men do not
care one iota whether we vote or not....

Now if only men would take to betting on this question of woman
suffrage, if we could open it up as a field of speculation, if we
could manipulate it by some sort of patent process into stocks or
bonds and have it introduced into Wall Street, we should very
soon find ourselves emancipated. I keep on hoping that, by some
fortuitous chance, fate may eventually execute for us as
brilliant a _coup d'etat_ as did General Butler for the colored
slaves when he made them contraband of war, so that we shall just
tumble into freedom as they did very soon thereafter. Until then
let us trust in God, keep our powder very dry and our armies well
drilled and disciplined.

In an inspiring address on The True Daughters of the Republic, Mme.
Clara Neymann (N. Y.) pointed out the splendid material progress of
our country under the guidance of men, and urged that women should be
the power to lift it up to an equally exalted spiritual plane. The
paper of Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby (D. C.) on Wyoming, in which as a
Territory women had voted for twenty years and as a State for two
years, presented a most convincing array of statistics proving the
benefits of equal suffrage. Ex-Governor John W. Hoyt of Wyoming came
to the platform and corroborated these statements, paying a fine
tribute to the political influence of women. He was followed by Mrs.
Lida A. Meriwether (Tenn.), whose reputation as a humorist was fully
sustained in her clever portrayal of Dreams that Go by Contraries.
Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt (N. Y.) gave a brilliant address on The
Mission of a Republic.

In discussing The Value of Organizations for Women, Mrs. Elizabeth
Lyle Saxon (La.) said:

Among the various organizations of women the suffrage society
must rank first, for its demands have reached out and embraced
every reform which comes under the head of right, justice or
charity; and I am firmly persuaded that if the demand for the
ballot, the full right of citizenship, had not been made the
foundation of all other advantages, our organization would have
fallen apart and drifted into the more conservative and popular
lines along which less courageous women have successfully
worked....

Financial independence has been gained by many women, who, proud
of their