Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 5.djvu/170

 for that institution the championship in intercollegiate debating contests. In asking for a "Square Deal" Miss Laughlin said:

"'A square deal for every man.' These words of President Roosevelt were more discussed during our last presidential campaign than was any party platform plank. The growing prominence of the doctrine of a square deal is of vital significance to us who stand for equal suffrage, as we ask only for this. It has been invoked chiefly against 'trusts.' We invoke the doctrine of a square deal against the greatest 'trust' in the world—the political trust— which is the most absolute monopoly because entrenched in law itself and because it is a monopoly of the greatest thing in the world, of liberty itself. The exclusion of women from participation in governmental affairs means the going to waste of a vast force, which, if utilized, would be a great power in the advance of civilizationBut there depends on the success of the equal suffrage movement something more valuable even than national prosperity and that is the preservation of human liberty. Now, as in 1860, 'the nation cannot remain half slave and half free,' and either women must be made free or men will lose the liberty which they enjoy."

Sunday services were conducted at 4:30 in the First Congregational church by the Rev. Eleanor Gordon, pastor of the First Unitarian church of Des Moines, Ia., assisted by Dr. Shaw and the Rev. Eliza Tupper Wilkes of Los Angeles, with a special musical program. Miss Gordon had filled the Unitarian pulpit in the morning, giving an eloquent sermon on Revelations of God. Mrs. Charlotte Perkins Gilman had preached in the Congregational church in the morning and the Rev. Mrs. Blackwell in the evening. Miss Laura Clay gave a Bible reading and exposition in the Taylor Street Methodist Episcopal church in the evening. The Rev. J. Whitcomb Brougher, pastor of the White Temple, the large Baptist church, invited Miss Anthony to occupy its pulpit and expound "any doctrine she had at heart." The Oregonian said: "She took him at his word and got in some of the best words for suffrage that have been put before the Portland public. There was such enthusiasm over the venerable founder and leader of the suffrage movement that when she appeared on the rostrum the applause was as vigorous as though it had not been Sunday and the place a church. There was not room in the big Temple for another person to squeeze past the doors." The papers quoted liberally from the sermons of all and the Portland Journal said: "Each preached to a congregation that taxed the capacity of the churchThe