y without a right to share in the making of the laws and the
electing of all those officers who are to enforce the laws is like
asking people to make bricks without straw. It cannot be done. We must
remember that in the early days of this country a family was
practically self-supporting and independent of the rest of the
community; a man and a woman working together could provide for their
family all that was necessary for their sustenance; meats, vegetables,
grains, milk, eggs, butter, cheese, all were home products. They
provided their own lighting and controlled their own water supply. The
women spun the thread, wove the cloth, dyed it and made the garments.
In every way, if it was necessary, the family could maintain its
existence independent of the cooperation of society except in the one
matter of defense from violence. None of this is true today." Mrs.
Fitzgerald took up the questions of food, drink and clothing as
supplied at the present time and showed the great need that women
should have a voice in the legislation that controls their production.

It had been announced that all of the arguments would be made along
industrial lines. Arthur E. Holder, of the legislative committee of
the American Federation of Labor, presented for the record a series of
the very positive resolutions for woman suffrage which had been
adopted by that body at its annual conventions beginning with 1904 and
read the one passed at Toronto in 1909: "The best interests of labor
require the admission of women to full citizenship as a matter of
justice to them and as a necessary step toward insuring and raising
the scale of wages for all." He closed a strong speech by saying: "We
want the right of representation for all the people, women as well as
men. Women have been disfranchised in our country long enough and we
now ask for that measure which will constitutionally grant the right
to vote to the women of our land. We believe that women ought to be
free agents, free selectors, free voters. The law is no respecter of
persons. Women cannot shirk their responsibility because they are
women; neither should they be longer denied their normal citizenship
rights and privileges because they are women."

In a most convincing address Mrs. Elizabeth Schauss, factory inspector
of Ohio, said:

It seems almost superfluous that we should come here pleading for
the vote when we know it is the only thing which will give the
wage-earning