Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 5.djvu/94

 and 114 men. The Civil Service Commissioners are compelled by law to keep separate lists of men and women who have passed examinations and must certify to the appointing officers from either list as specified by the heads of the bureaus, so that it is quite possible for these to keep women out and fill the places with voters. Commissioner W. D. Foulke not long ago called the attention of the chiefs of bureaus to the fact that by taking from the men's list down to the lowest point of eligibility, while women who passed with a rank of and over were not chosen, the Government was not getting the skilled labor to which it was entitled.

The continued defeat of child labor protection laws in some of the southern States and the conditions of children working in the mines of Pennsylvania, as shown in testimony before the Coal Strike Commission, show the need of woman's help in shaping social economics and her powerlessness without the ballot.How can we get hold of the wage-earning women in mass and convince them that from their own selfish and personal standpoint, if from no other, they should join the ranks of those that are working for the ballot? Talented speakers from the ranks of wage-earners have thrilled audiences with their impetuous oratory but there has been no general rally of working women to secure the ballot for themselves.

How can we stimulate in women of wealth and opportunity, whose influence would be invaluable and whose support might give the movement the financial backing it needs, a consciousness of the solidarity of human interests, so they will see that from an impersonal, unselfish standpoint, if they have no personal need, they are under the most commanding obligation to add their strength to ours to make better conditions for working women? We might despair of reaching either the overworked, underpaid and unresponsive wageearner, or the indifferent, irresponsible and almost inaccessible woman of fortune, were it not that all along the social line we are linked by one common possession, our womanhood, which, when awakened, is the Divine Motherhood and it is to this we must appeal.

Miss Anthony presided at the Friday evening public meeting, which was opened with prayer by the Rev. Gilbert Dobbs, who said: 'We invoke Thy divine blessing, O God, upon this assembly and we rejoice that Thou hast always opened the way for Thy consecrated servants—women—to do well from the time of Miriam and of Deborah to the present. While not often has the call been to women to don armor and press on to battle, yet it may be that Thou hast reserved them for the battle of ballots, in which they can secure victory for all moral good and aid in the overthrow of every organized vice and infamy, so that there shall be a higher type of public morals and nobler methods of government."