The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909 1910)

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Democratic government is no longer an exercise of arbitrary authority
from one above, but is an organization for public service of the people
themselves--or will be when it is really attained.

In this change government ceases to be compulsion, and becomes
agreement; law ceases to be authority and becomes co-ordination. When
we learn the rules of whist or chess we do not obey them because we fear
to be punished if we don't, but because we want to play the game. The
rules of human conduct are for our own happiness and service--any child
can see that. Every child will see it when laws are simplified, based
on sociology, and taught in schools. A child of ten should be
considered grossly uneducated who could not rewrite the main features of
the laws of his country, state, and city; and those laws should be so
simple in their principles that a child of ten could understand them.

Teacher: "What is a tax?"

Child: "A tax is the money we agree to pay to keep up our common
advantages."

Teacher: "Why do we all pay taxes?"

Child: "Because the country belongs to all of us, and we must all pay
our share to keep it up."

Teacher: "In what proportion do we pay taxes?"

Child: "In proportion to how much money we have." (_Sotto voce_: "Of
course!")

Teacher: "What is it to evade taxes?"

Child: "It is treason." (_Sotto voce_: "And a dirty mean trick.")

In masculine administration of the laws we may follow the instinctive
love of battle down through the custom of "trial by combat"--only
recently outgrown, to our present method, where each contending party
hires a champion to represent him, and these fight it out in a wordy
war, with tricks and devices of complex ingenuity, enjoying this kind of
struggle as they enjoy all other kinds.

It is the old masculine spirit of government as authority which is so
slow in adapting itself to the democratic idea of government as service.
That it should be a representative government they grasp, but
representative of what? of the common will, they say; the will of the
majority;--never thinking that it is the common good, the common
welfare, that government should represent.

It is the inextricable masculinity in our idea of government which so
revolts at the idea of women as voters. "To govern:" that means to
boss, to control, to have authority; and that only, to most minds. They
cannot bear to think of the woman as having control over even their own
affairs; to control is masculine, they assume. Seeing only
self-interest as a natural impulse, and the ruling powers of the state
as a sort of umpire, an authority to preserve the rules of the game
while men fight it out forever; they see in a democracy merely a wider
range of self interest, and a wider, freer field to fight in.

The law dictates the rules, the government enforces them, but the main
business of life, hitherto, has been esteemed as one long fierce
struggle; each man seeking for himself. To deliberately legislate for
the service of all the people, to use the government as the main engine
of that service, is a new process, wholly human, and difficult of
development under an androcentric culture.

Furthermore they put forth those naively androcentric protests,--women
cannot fight, and in case their laws were resisted by men they could not
enforce them,--_therefore_ they should not vote!

What they do not so plainly say, but very strongly think, is that women
should not share the loot which to their minds is so large a part of
politics.

Here we may trace clearly the social heredity of male government.

Fix clearly in your mind the first head-ship of man--the leader of the
pack as it were--the Chief Hunter. Then the second head-ship, the Chief
Fighter. Then the third head-ship, the Chief of the Family. Then the
long line of Chiefs and Captains, Warlords and Landlords, Rulers and
Kings.

The Hunter hunted for prey, and got it. The Fighter enriched himself
with the spoils of the vanquished. The Patriarch lived on the labor of
women and slaves. All down the ages, from frank piracy and robbery to
the measured toll of tribute, ransom and indemnity, we see the same
natural instinct of the hunter and fighter. In his hands the government
is a thing to sap and wreck, to live on. It is his essential impulse to
want something very much; to struggle and fight for it; to take all he
can get.

Set against this the giving love that comes with motherhood; the endless
service that comes of motherhood; the peaceful administration in the
interest of the family that comes of motherhood. We prate much of the
family as the unit of the state. If it is--why not run the state on
that basis? Government by women, so far as it is influenced by their
sex, would be influenced by motherhood; and that would mean care,
nurture, provision, education. We have to go far down the scale for any
instance of organized motherhood, but we do find it in the hymenoptera;
in the overflowing industry, prosperity, peace and loving service of the
ant-hill and bee-hive. These are the most highly socialized types of
life, next to ours, and they are feminine types.

We as human beings have a far higher form of association, with further
issues than mere wealth and propagation of the species. In this human
process we should never forget that men are far more advanced than
women, at present. Because of their humanness has come all the noble
growth of civilization, in spite of their maleness.

As human beings both male and female stand alike useful and honorable,
and should in our government be alike used and honored; but as creatures
of sex, the female is fitter than the male for administration of
constructive social interests. The change in governmental processes
which marks our times is a change in principle. Two great movements
convulse the world to-day, the woman's movement and the labor movement.
Each regards the other as of less moment than itself. Both are parts of
the same world-process.

We are entering upon a period of social consciousness. Whereas so far
almost all of us have seen life only as individuals, and have regarded
the growing strength and riches of the social body as merely so much the
more to fatten on; now we are beginning to take an intelligent interest
in our social nature, to understand it a little, and to begin to feel
the vast increase of happiness and power that comes of real Human Life.

In this change of systems a government which consisted only of
prohibition and commands; of tax collecting and making war; is rapidly
giving way to a system which intelligently manages our common interests,
which is a growing and improving method of universal service. Here the
socialist is perfectly right in his vision of the economic welfare to be
assured by the socialization of industry, though that is but part of the
new development; and the individualist who opposes socialism, crying
loudly for the advantage of "free competition" is but voicing the spirit
of the predacious male.

So with the opposers to the suffrage of women. They represent, whether
men or women, the male viewpoint. They see the woman only as a female,
utterly absorbed in feminine functions, belittled and ignored as her
long tutelage has made her; and they see the man as he sees himself, the
sole master of human affairs for as long as we have historic record.

This, fortunately, is not long. We can now see back of the period of
his supremacy, and are beginning to see beyond it. We are well under
way already in a higher stage of social development, conscious,
well-organized, wisely managed, in which the laws shall be simple and
founded on constructive principles instead of being a set of
ring-regulations within which people may fight as they will; and in
which the government shall be recognized in its full use; not only the
sternly dominant father, and the wisely servicable mother, but the real
union of all people to sanely and economically manage their affairs.

COMMENT AND REVIEW

There is a fine article in the June Popular Science Monthly, by Dr.
Thomas W. Salmon on "Two Preventable Causes of Insanity."

He shows how much has been done by the popular recognition of cause and
effect in checking tuberculosis, malaria and yellow fever, and urges a
similar awakening in regard to insanity. At the close of 1908 there
were 30,456 patients in the public and private institutions for the
insane in New York State, about one in 280 of the general population of
the state, he says; and then gives the new admissions for that year as
5,301. Five thousand new lunatics a year is a good many.

Dr. Salmon then shows that of this number there were "664 cases of
general paralysis (dependant on syphilis) and 638 cases of alcoholic
psychoses (due to intemperance)," or _more than one-fourth of all first
admissions due to these two preventable causes._ There is a further
most interesting fact, that this general paralysis in men is nearly
three times as great in cities as in the country, and in women, twice as
great; while alcoholic psychosis in women is seven times as great in
cities.

Most striking of all is Dr. Salmon's showing that "_42 per cent. of all
male admissions from cities were for general paralysis and the alcoholic
psychoses._" As he justly remarks, "Where are 'the nervous tension of
the cities' and 'the mad rush of modern life,' of which we speak so
glibly, compared with syphilis and drunkenness as the real dangers of
city life?" But for these two causes the ratio of insanity would be
greater in the country, where, as is well known, the largest percentage
of women lunatics comes from the lonely farm house.

Further than this we are told that many other forms of lunacy are
indirectly due to syphilis and alcoholism, through parental
transmission.

Knowledge is power. Society is but just awakening to a conscious
knowledge of itself, its pains and pleasures, and its powers. One man
may not be strong enough to resist the influences which pull and push
him into these large hells, but when society as a whole,--or even women
as a half,--waken to a realization of all this needless suffering, this
dreadful waste, then we can prevent it.

*

The gentlemen of France are distressed about the birthrate. It appears
that the men of that country do not bear enough children to keep up the
population as they desire. Therefore serious measures are proposed "to
stimulate the birthrate." They are these:

Additional military service to be imposed on bachelors over twenty-nine.

Marriage to be made obligatory to gentlemen employed by the state, at
the age of twenty-five, with supplementary salaries and pension
allowances for more than three children.

The law requiring equal distribution of estates among children to be
repealed. The dislike of Frenchmen to dividing their property is a
frequent cause of restricted families, we are told.

We trust that the gentlemen of France, spurred and encouraged by these
incentives, will now produce more children than they have hitherto.

The New York _Times_, of Friday, June 24, gives an editorial to this
news from France,--and no wonder. But it is perfectly serious in its
treatment, and offers no criticism of the measures proposed. The writer
has apparently small know]edge of biology, for he expresses astonishment
that the miserably poor "increase prodigiously" in Russia and elsewhere.
"Who shall solve these mysteries or dogmatize upon them?" he says, and
speculates further, in a vaguely awe-stricken manner, on the subject,
quoting from the vigorous Mr. Roosevelt and the gloomy Dr. Koch.

Do any of our readers, belonging to the negligible side of this race
problem see anything to smile at? Let us parallel it:

There is dismay in the poultry yard over a grave falling off in the
supply of eggs. A convocation of roosters is called to discuss it, and
to take measures to remedy the condition. They propose (a) To make all
roosters over six months old do extra scratching for food. (b) To
enforce matrimony--or its gallinaceous equivalent--on all roosters
employed by the flock. (c) To alter the custom of dividing the worms
equally among the chicks.

The simile is strained, we admit: try to apply it to some other case, as
a shortage in the milk supply--considered by a convocation of bulls.
That seems rather absurd too. Can not some one suggest a parallel which
could be taken as seriously as the Times takes this effort on the part
of Frenchmen?

*

People in general, peaceably minding their own business, do not give
much thought to their subtler enemies. A burglar, creeping in through
the window, we can see and scream at; but a Public Poisoner, a whole
array of Public Poisoners, creeping through the Legislature, we do not
notice.

In the interests of the common good we have our National Health League,
working by means of the Owen Bill for a National Department of Health
which shall safeguard the people from disease and contamination as the
Bureau of Agriculture safeguards our cattle.

Against this measure, one of most needed social service, is rising an
organized opposition called the "League for Medical Freedom." This
association defends the free practice of healing by unorthodox methods,
but its opposition to the Owen Bill is wholly ignorant, if not worse.
The Owen Bill, in urging a National Department of Health, does not seek
to regulate the practice of medicine. Its work will be to maintain pure
food, pure drugs, pure streams, and to study human health and maintain
it as assiduously as we now study the health of swine and steers.

This sudden opposition, using great sums of money to advertise in the
newspapers, seems based on the big interests of the patent medicines and
other profitable health destroyers and life takers.

Our women, within their capacity as mothers and guardians of the home,
ought to inform themselves as to the work of the National Health League.

Write to the Committee of One Hundred, Drawer 45 New Haven, Conn.

*

How many of our readers know that superb magazine, _The Englishwoman?_*

As far as I have seen them it is by far the finest woman's publication
in the world. A big, handsome, dignified monthly; 120 pages in large
clear type, a joy to the eye; and paper, a joy to the hand; the magazine
is three-quarters of an inch thick to _The Century's_ half inch, and
weighs ten ounces to _The Century's_ 18. This is not only because there
are no pictures, but because of that specially light weight paper, so
much more used in England than with us.

Thus pleasing to the eye and to the hand, it gives to the mind a clear,
strong, varied presentation of the affairs of the world to-day as they
specially affect women. Excellent writers and plenty of them furnish
the material; it is good reading straight through.

My special satisfaction in this monthly is in its breadth of view. The
need of the ballot is strongly emphasized, and due record is kept of the
progress of the equal suffrage movement; but far more ground than that
is covered. Studies are given of the previous position of women, of her
place in different countries and classes, of her connection with the
other stirring questions of the day.

Reading this, we gather an increasing sense of the real world-issues of
which the woman's movement is not only in itself an interesting part,
but one in the solution of which is shown to be that of many others.
People who shrink from "feminism" in its more intense and accentuated
forms, will find here a more proportional treatment, enlightening and
persuasive.

*"The Englishwoman." Published by Sidgwick & Jackson, 3 Adam St.,
Adelphi. London, W. C. England. Monthly, 1s. Yearly, 14s. 6d. post
free.

*

_The Woman's Journal,_* so long our best exponent of the equal rights
movement in America, is now the official organ of the National American
Women suffrage association.

This is as it should be. The association needs an organ, and _The
Woman's Journal_ has always needed and desired a wider support than the
equal suffragists gave it.

*The Woman's Journal. Saturday weekly. $1.00 yearly, No. 585 Boylston
St., Boston, Mass.

It is the earnest wish of _The Forerunner_ that every American "equal
suffragist" take the _Woman's Journal,_ and so keep in touch with the
movement. It is now but _one dollar a year,_ which, for such a weekly,
is more than reasonable.

It is also the earnest wish of The Forerunner that every American
interested in the woman's movement the world over, and its English
status in particular, should take _The Englishwoman._ That costs
fourteen shillings a year, and is worth it.

And who is to take _The Forerunner?_ Only those who like it and find it
useful.

PERSONAL PROBLEMS

Problem 1st. A woman of thirty, single and intending so to remain,
owning a tiny cottage in the woods near a large city; exhausted by ten
years' overwork and having spent her savings on doctor's bills, asks two
questions:

(a) Why cannot she stay at home and enjoy it?

(b) Can one love a man too much? (There was a man, but he went away.)

To (a) the answer is: one cannot live at home, and earn one's living
without practicing some domestic industry. Of these two obvious and
common ones are:

Take in washing:--not strong enough.

Take in sewing?--How about that?

A large city ought to furnish sewing and mending enough to keep one
woman who owns a cottage. Five dollars a week ought to do it, including
carfare.

Then comes the more various tasks; to make some one thing excellently
well, and sell it: taking orders: making a little business of one's own.

The age of domestic industry is really past; but a lone woman with no
rent to pay ought to make good, unless too ill to work at all.

If there is any ground with the cottage she could raise some food
perhaps.

Third possibility: take another woman to board: or a child, if competent
to care for children.

As to the second question: Yes, one can; one often does. If by "loving"
one means "wanting." Love, pure love, strong giving love, does not
exhaust nor injure. One can love a lifetime, without return--if it's
that kind. But to hopelessly wish for what one cannot have is an
illness. If that is the case it is time for a decided change of heart.

The world is full of people to love and serve; and a brave rational
attitude of living ought to cure and strengthen.

Sister--sit quiet in the door of the little cottage: say "I am here to
serve; to work for the world. I am willing. My own life is
desolate--well? So are the lives of many. That I must bear. There are
many years before me to be lived through--bravely and lovingly. If I
die--that's no hardship; if I live I will do the work I'm here for."

Then study out your case with dispassionate interest; _as if it were
some one else's_; and do what is wise. When you are strong enough, if
you are willing to do housework (a job always waiting) for six months,
it should give you a clear $150.00, to live another six months without
care, and to practice the art you like best. Plan _ahead;_ bear what
you have now in the determined hope of what you like better in five
years--ten years--for the rest of life.

And so enlarge your range of consciousness, thinking, talking, reading
about big human interests, that your own trouble shrinks in proportion.

Problem 2d. "Several of my professors in the University have such a
condescending attitude toward women that most of us girls find it very
hard to do our best. In some classes, we are actually, as a sex, marked
lower than the men of the class. We have found in every instance that
the wives of these professors are of the lowest tabby-cat variety,
gossipy, infantile, at times malicious.

_Q._ (a) Can you believe that these trained men would be as illogical
as to judge us all by their wives?

_Q._ (b) Is there any way even to make a start to root out this idea
that all women are cast from the same mold,"--Studiosa.

_Ans._ (a) "Trained" men are not necessarily logical men. Logic in
some fields does not imply logic in all. No matter how logical or how
much trained, most men are illogical about women. (As are most women
also.)

_Ans._ (b) Yes. The way to start,--and finish--this idea that "all
women are cast from the same mold" is to prove that they are not by
being different. The likeness men see in women is the likeness of sex.
Show them the difference in human personality.

Problem 3d. "It is almost impossible for married women to go on
teaching. Just as I am at my best, my usefulness is nullified because I
am married. Would you please outline a plan of organization among
married women who wish to continue practicing their profession, thru
which they may arouse other women, and also reach the authorities who
have control over their work?"--_E. M. K._

_Ans._ The most suitable organization among married women, and single
ones as well, whereby to "arouse other women and reach the authorities"
is political organization. That question is easily answered--by
securing equal suffrage.

Problem 4th. "Several of us girls wish to associate with our men
friends as real comrades, paying our half of theatre tickets, suppers
and the like, as we have as much money, or as little, as they. They are
fine young men, decidedly worth while. Yet they make the most
astonishingly stupid objections, as do most of the other girls. It is
not 'polite' or 'customary,' it is a man's 'privilege,' etc., etc.
Could you not give us suggestions, perhaps in story form, of how to win
the young men, and other girls too, without being too sharp-angled, over
to our side?"--_College Girl._

_Ans._ I knew of a good arrangement between a man and a woman on this
basis. If he invited her, he paid for both. If she invited him, she
paid for both. If both went on their several initiatives each paid for
him or herself.

As to how to "win over" the most conservative of beings, young men and
young women, one can only recommend the trump card in any hand,--a sweet
and winning personality;--not "feminine influence," but personal
influence. If one's company is much desired, one can dictate terms.

Further; don't be stubborn about it. Ultimate principles are one
thing,--personal application are quite another. Vary your attitude
according to the degree of intelligence and prejudice you have to deal
with.

Problem 5th. "A person is condemned to die for a crime he did not
commit. Should he as a good citizen submit peaceably to his own murder
(legal) or fight for his life, killing jailors perhaps, till
overpowered?"

_Ans._ "As a good citizen" he should submit. See Socrates.

"In answer to question under 'Personal Problems' in June Forerunner,
'Why don't people wake up and _live!_ World size?' Will submit:

_Ans._ (a) Laziness. If people knew that thirty minutes of a
healthful regimen practiced daily would double the daily pleasure of
living and add ten years to the span of life, nine out of ten would
neglect it. And (b) thoughtlessness through faulty education; the
primary function of mental culture being to teach people to think,
analyze, and solve the problems of life, and cultivate the memory; but
memory is too often given first place to the exclusion of the
others."--_A. O. H._

This is an excellent answer. There are others.--C. P. G.

THE EDITOR'S PROBLEM

To pay its running expenses this little magazine must have about three
thousand subscribers. It now has between eleven and twelve hundred.

We want, to make good measure, two thousand more. This is a bare
minimum, providing no salary to the editor. If enough people care for
the magazine to support it to that extent, the editor will do her work
for nothing--and be glad of the chance! If enough people care for it to
support her--she will be gladder.

Do you like the magazine, its spirit and purpose? Do you find genuine
interest and amusement in the novel--the short story? Do the articles
appeal to you? Do the sermons rouse thought and stir to action? Are
the problems treated such as you care to study? Does the poetry have
bones to it as well as feathers? Does it give you your dollar's worth
in the year? And do you want another dollar's worth?

Most of the people who take it like it very much. We are going to
print, a few at a time, some of the pleasant praises our readers send.
They are so cordial that we are moved to ask all those who do enjoy this
little monthly service of sermon and story, fun and fiction, poetry and
prose,

First, To renew their subscriptions.

Second, Each to get one new subscriber. (Maybe more!)

Third, To make Christmas presents of subscriptions, or of bound volumes
of the first year.

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