ce, or a sense of justice, compels to walk
the stony path of reform. The _litterateurs_ often form a sort of
pseudo-intellectual aristocracy, and do not willingly affiliate
with reformers, whom they are ready to assume to be less
cultivated than themselves. Of this weakness our literary women
have not been guilty. Most of them are members of the suffrage
society.[347]

A system is now developing which will not only stimulate women to
engage in competitive industries and secure justice in rewarding
such labor, but will greatly facilitate the work of ascertaining
what part women do take in the general industries of the State.
Indiana, being mainly agricultural, is divided into sixteen
districts, each of which has organized an agricultural society.
Besides these there are also county societies. These
organizations are composed of men and women, the latter having
nominally the same powers and privileges as the former. Annually
the State Agricultural Association holds a meeting at
Indianapolis. This is a delegate body, consisting of
representatives from the district and county societies. There is
no constitutional check against sending women as delegates,
though it has not hitherto been done. One chief duty of the
primary convention is to elect a State board of agriculture. This
board consists of sixteen members, one for each agricultural
district. The managers of the Woman's State Fair Association have
called an industrial convention, whose sessions will be held at
the same time that the Agricultural Association holds its annual
meeting.[348]

If the press reflects the public, it also moulds it; and its
conservative attitude is doubtless to a very considerable degree
responsible for the tone of opinion which prevailed here up to
recent years. Papers throughout the State naturally take their
cue from the party organs published at the capital, while the few
papers identified with no party are wont to adapt themselves even
more carefully to popular opinion upon general subjects.

The citations made in the earlier part of this chapter from the
_Sentinel_ and the _Journal_ clearly show the spirit of their
management in 1869. But it must not be inferred that the
_Journal_ has through all these years maintained the position
occupied by it a