CHAPTER XIV

THE WOMAN AND THE VOTE

The Home in London—Sympathy with Woman Suffrage—The Blind Gardener—Clubs—Hatred of Flunkeyism.

[Sidenote: The Home in London.]

His belief in Woman Suffrage probably began before he met his wife. It was but a month after his marriage that he voted for Mill’s motion in favour of extending the suffrage to women, the first time the question was introduced into the House of Commons.

The hampered and restricted position of women industrially was a condition that stirred Fawcett strongly. He felt that to bring the necessary pressure upon legislation, women should have votes, and that much of the injustice from which they suffered was due to their political powerlessness.

He loved a fight, and believed in competition to determine merit, but his spirit revolted at the unjust restraint of the rights of mind and virtue by brute force. He found that many paupers were women, and that their chance to support themselves was often negligible. So few wage-earning opportunities were open to them that their employers were able to make what terms they pleased with these impoverished seekers for work. Poor women often gladly accepted wages which were insufficient to hold soul and body together. Fawcett enthusiastically advocated that women should be given a fair chance to do what work they could do well. He spoke and worked to have women admitted to the examinations at Cambridge. He did not attempt to dwell on the equality or inequality of man and woman, but consistent with his lively sense of fairness, he felt that they should be given at least an equal chance to develop whatever powers they had. The sad fate of the hundreds of women whose lives were forced into useless inactivity depressed him: he did what he could all his life to open many new fields to them.

[Sidenote: Zeal for Fair Play.]

His single-handed fight against a Bill restricting the work of adult women was in the same direction. In this he took a very independent position. He considered that restrictions on adult women were an infringement of their liberty, and that it would probably have the effect of lessening their already narrow chances of employment. His quickness to consider this second point was evidenced also in his treatment of a question arising out of the bill for the compulsory registration of teachers. A lady quite unknown to Fawcett wrote that it would tend to prevent many a young woman who was not regularly employed in teaching from adding to, or temporarily earning, her livelihood: he at once answered that that side of the question had not struck him, but that he would call upon her immediately to hear her statement of facts. Mrs. Fawcett, of course, augmented and shared her husband’s natural enthusiasm for the enfranchisement of women. When she was asked to speak at Brighton on Woman’s Suffrage some of his constituents objected, fearing that it would react unfavourably on Fawcett’s political position, but he would not hear of preventing her carrying out her plan, and did then, as always, everything to help her in her cause.

[Sidenote: Sympathy with Woman’s Suffrage.]

Since these pioneer efforts Mrs. Fawcett has been and is one of the strongest and most successful workers in a rational and dignified campaign for obtaining the suffrage for women. She and her daughter have effectively made great sacrifices for the cause which they have so much advanced by their eloquent enthusiasm and disinterested and legitimate efforts.

A most unusual honour has been accorded to Mrs. Fawcett. The portrait of Fawcett with his wife now hangs in the National Portrait Gallery, and is at this time the only portrait of a living woman, not of royal blood, in that historic collection.

[Sidenote: The Blind Gardener.]

Fawcett took his wife to live at 42 Bessborough Gardens. Later they went to live in The Lawn, Lambeth, where they stayed during the sittings of the House until his death. Despite the additional griminess due to the vicinity of Vauxhall Station, the Political Economist at once turned farmer on his estate of about three-quarters of an acre. He sent the asparagus which he raised within fifteen minutes’ walk of the House of Commons, and which he insisted was a peculiarly good variety, to his father in Salisbury as proof of the excellent climate of London. Two small greenhouses furnished opportunity for raising flowers. These were an unfailing source of pleasure to the blind man, always keenly conscious of their beauty and gratified by their perfume. He knew them all by name and took pride in showing them to his guests. The old-fashioned house was made delightful by the artistic sense of Mrs. Fawcett. The happy couple were unmindful of the lack of social distinction inherent in their neighbourhood, and felt that the nearness to the Houses of Parliament, which were within pleasant walk along the river and over Westminster Bridge, as well as the horticultural opportunities, compensated their slender purse for any other shortcomings.

[Sidenote: Radical Club.]

A most fantastic incident occurred shortly after Fawcett’s marriage which might have seriously affected his political career. His most sociable instincts had prompted him to found a club about the beginning of his first Parliament. It was called the Radical Club, and it consisted in equal numbers of politicians in and out of the House. Of course Mill joined. The club gathered influence. It met at weekly dinners, when the topics of the day were discussed. Soon afterwards Fawcett and his friends founded at Cambridge a new club, with the fearful name of Republican. It defined the name Republican as ‘Hostility to the hereditary principle as exemplified in monarchical and aristocratic institutions, and to all social and political privileges dependent upon difference of sex.’

[Sidenote: Republican Club.]

The Republican Club was the means of promoting many delightful and charming dinners and evenings among a circle of brilliant and interesting friends. It was not a dark centre of conspiracy or revolution, and its members were not concocting a nineteenth-century version of the Gunpowder Plot. Unfortunately a weird and garbled account of the Club appeared in the papers and struck terror in the hearts of Fawcett’s constituents. To them republicanism meant revolution and all the horrors depicted by Dickens in his _Tale of Two Cities_. One of Fawcett’s best friends talked of making an amendment to the usual vote of confidence at the next Liberal meeting in Brighton. Though the proposed motion was given up, Fawcett profited by the opening to state clearly his principles; he said that he adhered to ‘merit, not birth,’ and denied any revolutionary predilections for his friends or himself, or any sentiment of disloyalty.

[Sidenote: Hatred of Flunkeyism.]

Fawcett was essentially a peace-loving citizen when peace and progress could go hand in hand. He had no plans for upsetting the monarchy, though he alone objected to the dowry voted by the House to the Princess Louise. He abominated flunkeyism as an aping of loyalty, and had no more regard for distinctions of rank than for differences of creed.

It is characteristic of him that while a democrat to democrats, he did not fall into the mistake of many broad-minded people, and forget that tact and congeniality are essential in bringing people together socially. He was very keenly alive to the differences in individuals, and took care that the gatherings at his house should be congenial and harmonious. When a proposed party was being plotted out he would say, ‘Oh, don’t ask the So-and-so’s, they are such frumps.’

[Sidenote: His very own Salt Cellar.]

Mrs. Fawcett and he were delightful hosts; they liked having people at their house, and he greatly enjoyed his own as well as other folks’ dinners. He was abnormally fond of salt, and to ensure an unfailing and adequate supply, carried a little sprinkling salt cellar with him, which he had carefully filled before dinner. He appreciated his food very much, and though not in any way a gourmand, paid full tribute to the high art of the cook.

THE NEW M.P.