Page:The Feminist Movement - Snowden - 1912.djvu/173

 visitors, some paid and others voluntary, to the houses of the women voters; but whatever the method of approach, the wise person will not allow herself to be greatly influenced by either result. In making a canvass everything depends upon the wording of the question as to what result is obtained. It is well known that many women signed the anti-suffragist petition under the impression that they were being asked to protest against lawlessness. Others signed it because they were invited to say if they thought the government of the country ought to be handed over to women. It is plain that a negative answer to this question might reasonably be given by one who is in absolute sympathy with granting the vote to tax-paying women.

The coming into being of an organisation to oppose woman suffrage might be thought by the superficial observer to be a catastrophe to the woman suffrage movement. On the contrary, the suffrage has made its most remarkable progress since the inauguration of the anti-suffrage campaign. Opposition is not the most serious fact in any struggle based upon principle. The most deadly thing in the prosecution of a political or moral cause is the indifference of the people most concerned. The general indifference of women to their own enfranchisement is used as an argument against woman suffrage by the anti-suffragists.