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The large “no” vote in several counties was due to the same character of population. The total population is 583,888, the population of foreign birth or foreign parentage is 243,835. South Dakota is one of the eight remaining states where foreigners may vote on their “first papers” and citizenship is not a qualification for a vote.
The returns offer still other food for reflection. Hutchinson county, for example, carried prohibition and lost woman suffrage. It gave 584 dry votes; 510 wet votes. It gave 432 “yes” votes on woman suffrage and 1,583 “no” votes. Thus 921 more votes were cast on the suffrage proposition than on the prohibition question. The people in this county are German-Russians and exceedingly ignorant. Apparently they were not intelligent enough to be lined up to vote “no” on both questions. Is it not likely that these votes were intended to be “wet” and that they made a mistake and picked No. 6 instead of No. 7? If not, why not?
The largest group of the foreign population of these counties are German-Russians. They migrated from Germany and found a home in Russia some 230 or more years ago, in order to escape conscription. When Russia began to enforce conscription about 1888 the entire group came to America and settled in colonies in the Western states which at the time offered free lands. They were totally illiterate then. They had not progressed as Germans in their own country had done but being clannish had remained at the point of development reached at the date of their migration. They are still clannish and have not yet escaped from the mental habits of the Middle Ages. These are the men who have denied American women the vote in South Dakota. That the women of South Dakota in very large numbers wanted the vote no one questions. During the campaign six women in Sioux Falls published an appeal to voters not to support the amendment as they did not wish to vote. Shortly after an appeal to the voters of the same city was published and was signed by 3,000 women. In every county of the state the women manifested their interest by doing all they knew how to do. West Virginia was the first Southern state to submit a referendum on woman suffrage and the vote was taken November 7, 1916. The amendment was defeated by the largest proportional majority any suffrage amendment ever received. Unlike Iowa and South Dakota, where all the educated classes with notable exceptions believe in woman suffrage, West Virginia probably has many conscientious doubters. Arguments and excuses which did service in the West twenty-five years ago were brought forward as though just formulated. The illiteracy of the state is appallingly high and the illiterate is universally an antiwomen suffragist.
