286 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



Washington thus extended the franchise in 1910; California, in 1911; 

 and Oregon, in 1912. Previous to 1910, four western states, Wyoming, 

 Colorado, Utah and Idaho, had permitted women to vote. Now twelve 

 states have extended the franchise to women. The results of this ex- 

 tension of the suffrage are naturally of great interest. Some statistics 

 of the number of women voting have been collected in different places. 

 The relative proportions of women voting to men voting vary. Taking 

 into consideration the fact that there are more men eligible to vote than 

 women, an approximate average would show that about three quarters 

 as many women as men vote. Women's organizations are showing in- 

 creased interest in political questions. Political speakers often find that 

 women constitute more than half their audience. Coincident with the 

 voting of women is the prominence given to moral issues. Prohibition 

 and the abolition of capital punishment were voted at the 1914 election 

 in Oregon, these measures having been previously defeated at a recent 

 election in which only men voted. This does not prove that women 

 carried these measures, yet the general opinion seems to favor this con- 

 clusion. Eecent reform administrations in Portland and Seattle have 

 been attributed partly to the influence of women voters. There is also 

 evidence wliich points to the influence of women in bringing health and 

 educational measures to the fore. Two members of the Oregon state 

 legislature in 1915 are women. 



There remains to be considered legislation which does not concern 

 directly instruments of government, or laborers or women as classes; 

 this may be called welfare legislation. This class includes such topics 

 as taxation, public utilities, prisons, education, eugenics, the sale of 

 liquor and immigration. 



The system of revenue in nearly all the states is the general prop- 

 erty tax. The verdict of political economists is that it is unjust and 

 antiquated; unjust because intangible personality escapes taxation, and 

 antiquated because adapted to the relatively simple condition of a more 

 equal distribution of wealth found in newer communities. The general 

 property tax is supplemented by other forms of revenue, as inheritance 

 taxes, corporation taxes and licenses, so that some states, perhaps not 

 more than ten, have escaped much of the evil resulting from the gen- 

 eral property tax. Fewer than this number of states have definitely 

 abandoned it, having separated state and local taxation. California 

 abandoned the general property tax in 1910 and acquired the separation 

 of state and local revenues. Oregon has on two occasions voted against 

 proposals leading to the abandonment of the general property tax. 

 Every election for the last few years in Oregon has brought forth a 

 good-sized list of tax measures to be voted on ; and not many of them 

 pass. Intense interest in Oregon has centered on the single tax. The 

 single tax as discussed in Oregon means the raising of larger propor- 

 tions of revenue from land and smaller proportions from improve- 



