women in the suffrage States responsible for conditions they
are the first to deplore. A handful of men in this city have more to do
with Western industries and their regulation than have both the men and
women. We have steel works; their policy is dictated from lower
Broadway. We have smelters; they are closed at the order of a syndicate
in this city. We have railroads, all of them controlled by your fellow
citizens, and it was the deals entered into between the representatives
of these interests and our local corporations that defeated the
eight-hour law for women, and every bit of reform legislation pledged to
the people. It was this condition, this failure of alleged democracy,
that made us go on record for real democracy, for the initiative that
makes it possible for us to enact the laws our representatives are
cajoled into pigeon-holing, for the referendum that enables us to scotch
the snake so that the people may have a chance to kill it. This was the
first great fundamental reform which the women demanded, and it was
owing to the work of education they began twenty years ago, and kept up
untiringly, that Colorado has won this great victory. Woman suffrage is
not alone for women, or to enable us to secure certain readjustments of
law. It is for our country, which cannot exist half enfranchised and
half irresponsible, half democracy and half a feudalism; half of it
privileged to shirk or exercise its civic rights, and half denied aught
but the burden of those rights. Women need the franchise if only to make
their influence, of which we hear so much, effective, but more than they
need the ballot, this nation needs the active devotion of its women to
transmute to golden fulfillment its leaden life; it needs, it must have
all that we can give it, your life and mine; if it is to go forward, its
sons and daughters must go forward--together!"

There was generous applause, and the two young men followed Miss
Holland, and she presented Dr. Earl and was about to introduce his
brother, when Miss Renner held out both hands to him.

"Hast thou found me, O mine enemy," she cried. "I'm awfully glad to see
you, Frank. I was much minded to tell how you helped me get my dove bill
through, but I feared they might hold you responsible for the defeat of
the eight-hour law and turn and rend you."

"You promised never to reveal any of my good deeds," he answered. "Keep
it out of the papers, Miss Holland. I can't afford to lose prestig