Page:The Feminist Movement - Snowden - 1912.djvu/170

 No other cause and no other movement has made such progress in so short a time as the movement for the political enfranchisement of women. The chief stumbling-block in the way of Parliamentary success is the fear of politicians that their respective parties may suffer at the hands of the new voters, and that they themselves may be the first to be called upon to endure defeat at the polls when women vote. This fear, and masculine prejudice, are the two great obstacles which have to be overcome, but history reveals the fact that prejudice has been strong before, and that it has had to go down before the onslaught of enlightened public opinion.

which approaches the consummation of its hopes invariably rouses to the highest pitch of effort the forces which are against it. The battle is frequently the fiercest just before the victory is won. It is thus with the woman suffrage movement. Until the year 1908 the opposition to the political enfranchisement of women had been feeble and entirely unorganised. The most important protest was made in the Nineteenth Century in 1889, by