My Two CountriesAstor, Nancy Witcher Langhorne Astor, Viscountess
General
My Two Countries
Astor, Nancy Witcher Langhorne Astor, Viscountess
Reconstruction (1914-1939); Women -- Political activity
As I understand it, you, in the League of Women Voters, are not
creating a new party--a woman’s party--to run sex candidates in
opposition to the Democratic and Republican party candidates. Some
people fear you want to do this. I am sure you are right not to do
so. I did not stand for Parliament as a sex candidate. I represent a
Division of Plymouth--one of the most important naval ports of England.
Thousands of my supporters are English sailors. But this does not
prevent me fighting, and fighting hard, for questions where there is a
woman’s point of view--questions of morality, the protection of young
girls.
Some men don’t like it. But the best men--a growing number of men, I
find--are supporting me.
You are right not to make a new political party. You are equally right
to try to lift and raise and improve the platforms of both the big
political parties by joining them. See that you send neither windbags
nor carpetbaggers to represent you.
The big contribution you can make to politics and national life is
to face and tackle the moral standard. Insist upon a single standard
of morality--not by lowering our standard; but by raising the men’s
standard to that of women. Do that in America. We are working for it
in England. If America and England do it, then all countries must
follow. In some countries women are still looked upon too much as
mere physical instead of mental companions. It is partly the fault
of the women. They will always be that until they get a higher sense
of companionship. The right-minded women want to be companions in the
truest sense of the word, and the right-minded men want to have them
so. It is easy enough to attract men; it is harder to help them. The
single moral standard not only helps women, it helps men; _it helps
nations_.
You cannot be material in your domestic life and be spiritual in your
national life. You cannot be material in your national life and be
idealistic in your international relations. Lust creates the spirit
of War; it is incompatible with the spirit of Peace. The material
man lives and dies. It is the spiritual man who never dies. So with
nations. No material nations, however powerful, have ever survived.
The peace which the world wants is not the peace which comes from
a smashing conquest--that sort of peace is apt to sow the seeds of
vengeance. I believe the women can help to bring to the world the real
peace--the spiritual peace--the Peace which passeth all understanding.
Always remember St. Paul’s words; they apply particularly to women:
“God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and
of a sound mind.” We can only bring this spirit into world politics if
we have got it in our hearts. Let us prove to all nations that we are
not only talkers, but doers.
IV[D]
“_The most practical thing in the world is common sense and common
humanity._”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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