Celebrating history: 'Bad woman' won't register to vote

We return to Hingham for the 43rd installment of this series honoring the 150th anniversary of Montana Territory and the 125th anniversary of statehood.

Information comes from the October 30, 1914 issue of the Hingham Review.

Last week, we read The Box Elder Valley Press’ stance on the courthouse bond. Here is the Hingham Review’s viewpoint on the issue, complete with misspellings:

VOTE FOR THE BOND

Hill county has been created going on three years and has no court house. The court officials and county officials at present might be likened unto homeless poor folks who go about seeking shelter with indulgent friends and relatives.

The argument is advanced by those who oppose the proposition, that the county will be divided again, and that is no use to bond for a court house until the county is divided. Now, as a matter of fact, the county divisionists have had ample time to divide the county if they wanted to, and really a part of the county has been cut off, but Hill county still has no court house.

The leases on the buildings now used will soon expire, and if we went to use them longer it will be necessary to re-lease them for another three year period, at a higher rent, or get kicked out bodily into the street.

If the county is later divided the old county will have to assume the indebtedness incurred by building the court house, less depreciation, if the county is divided soon. So, what difference if we do have to be responsible for a part of this debt until the division is made?

The demands for a county building are imperative and immediate. At present we have no protection against total loss of the county records by fire. The judges do not like to hold court at Havre because there is no fit place to hold it. We are paying other counties for keeping our prisoners, besides mileage to and from such counties.

The Review favors county division. But you will remember what a long laborious task it was to divide Chouteau county, how the petitions first had to be circulated, and then circulated over again, how the supreme court ruled us not once; how the people then had to be convinced that county division was a good thing, and had to be induced to vote for it. And at present there is no county division movement organized; it has not even been thought of as a possible compaign in the immediate future. But Hill county needs a court house, and must she wait forever to get it?

The Review editor believes that the court house bond should carry. He wants you to cut out all selfishness, and prejudice against the city of Havre, if you have any, and vote “yes” on this court house bond proposition next Tuesday.

Another very important issue was on the ballot 100 years ago. Women’s suffrage was also to be voted on in Montana, and here is an article on the Review’s front page:

Suffrage Notes

The so-called “bad woman” does not register except in very small numbers. All persons in registering must swear to the residence and occupation, and this class of people does not wish to make public record of these things.

Women vote in nearly the same percentage as men. A careful examination of voting in the cities of southern California shows practically the same ratio of voting to registration. In some places the women outvote the men.

Women are working for parks, playgrounds, cleaner streets, better milk, better garbage collection and cleaner amusements. Unfranchised women are working for the same things but under far greater difficulties.

Women did not promise to institute any reforms or to support any party. They owe the ballot to the progressives of the republican, democratic and socialist parties, and to the general intelligence of the men of California.

Of course, we can’t forget the great information found in the social pages:

Local News Items

Clifford Catt has finished building a barn 20x28 ft. for J. B. Peterson on the farm.

Mr. and Mrs. C. W. Paterson are now housed in their fine new bungalow on the east side.

Miss Elizabeth Gerlach, teacher of the intermediate grades in the local schools, spent the week end at her ranch, sixteen miles north of Hingham.

International Money Orders for sale at the local postoffice.

The piano to be given away in the contest inaugurated by the Hingham Commercial Co. and the Hingham Review, has now arrived and is on exhibition at the Hingham Commercial Co.’s store. It is a first class $350 instrument of the Lyon-Taylor make.