akers.

The Women's Political Union conducted a "handing on the torch"
demonstration which was quite effective. The New York Union supplied a
large torch of bronze, which Mrs. H. O. Havemeyer, representing New
York, took with her on a tugboat half way across the Hudson River,
where she was met by a New Jersey tug bearing Mrs. Van Winkle, to whom
the torch was delivered. It was sent about the State to twenty or more
towns where the Union had branches and its arrival was made the
occasion for an outdoor reception and mass meeting.

The Women's Anti-Suffrage Association was also busy. It paid the
salaries and expenses of two New Jersey speakers, Mrs. O. D. Oliphant
of Trenton and John A. Matthews of Newark, an ex-Assemblyman, and
brought in a number of outside speakers. It never claimed to have more
than fifteen local branches and 18,000 members. Among the more
prominent were the president, Mrs. E. Yarde Breese of Plainfield; Mrs.
Thomas J. Preston, Mrs. Garrett A. Hobart, Mrs. Carroll P. Bassett,
Miss Anna Dayton, Robert C. Maxwell, Miss Clara A. Vezin, Mrs.
Hamilton F. Kean, Mrs. Alexander F. Jamieson, Mrs. Charles W.
MacQuoid, Mrs. Thomas B. Adams, Miss Anne McIlvaine and Mrs. Sherman
B. Joost.

James R. Nugent of Newark, prominent as the champion of the "wets" and
the "antis," paid the salary of Edward J. Handley, an ex-newspaperman
of Newark, and gave him a suite of offices in the Wise building with
several clerks. His "publicity" kept the amendment on the front pages
of the papers and the suffragists were always able to refute and
disprove his statements. The intensive campaign carried on among the
editors for the past two or three years bore fruit and 80 per cent. of
the newspapers by actual canvass favored the amendment, and frequently
when the front page carried a story against suffrage it was
contradicted on the editorial page. Among editors who were
particularly strong friends were James Kerney and John E. Sines of the
Trenton _Evening Times_; Joseph A. Dear and Julius Grunow of the
Jersey City _Journal_; John L. Matthews of the Paterson _Press
Guardian_; George M. Hart of the Passaic _Daily News_; the Boyds of
the New Brunswick _Home News_; J. L. Clevenger of the Perth Amboy
_Evening News_; William H. Fischer of the New Jersey _Courier_; George
W. Swift of the Elizabeth _Daily Journal_ and E. A. Bristor of the
Passaic _Herald_.

Three weeks before the election President Wilson announced himself in
favor o