Page:Wrong and Right Methods of Dealing with Social Evil - Elizabeth Blackwell (1883).djvu/81

Rh nation, or sink into a corrupt, centralized, military despotism.

We now observe that every year the strife of political parties increases in bitterness and unscrupulousness. Every municipal election is determined by party spirit, and candidates are recommended because they are Conservatives or Liberals—not because they are fitted by character and intelligence to govern a town righteously. Even School Board elections are beginning to share in this false issue.

A grand opportunity is now presented to English women. They have the power of rallying to the aid of those noble men who have vainly sought to stem the flood of political passion and prejudice, and there are signs that the opportunity will not be lost. Englishwomen as well as Englishmen are beginning to demand that at the municipal elections the first qualification required from candidates shall be intelligent morality, not political partisanship; that Watch Committees shall be held to their duty; that Town Councils shall be taught that they are responsible for that moral order of towns which is the foundation of permanent material prosperity.

It can not fail to be of service to us here in America, thus carefully to consider the progress of thought and experience in the older world. The same