The women of North Carolina have never failed to answer every call to service.

In the sixties, when the men and boys in gray marched out to man the firing line for home and country, they left behind them women who were no less heroes than they. When the thin, gray line broke, and those brave soldiers came home to rebuild a war stricken land, the women bore their part of the fight as gallantly as the men, until, through years of sacrifice, they made the waste places blossom as the rose.

When, outraged by the barbarism of Germany, our great President sounded a call to arms “that war might be no more”, the men came gladly offering themselves a willing sacrifice on the altar of a great cause. The woman came too, giving what to them was dearer than life itself, their loved ones, and then, standing with hands outstretched, begged a chance to serve. From humble cabin and stately home they came, saying, “Here are we, use us.” And glorious was the service they gave.

Today there comes again to the women a call to service, a call no less compelling than those calls of yesterday.

Though there are many of us who felt that womens’ place was not in the political field, but in the no less powerful precincts of the home, a call has come and we cannot fail to answer. The women of intelligence and character, the women who love their homes, their children and their country must meet the obligations and the opportunities of the hour. We must register early, and when the day for voting comes we must not fail to vote. The ignorant and the vicious, the selfish and the sordid will not fail to register- will not fail to vote.

“New occasions teach new duties”. Good women have always prayed for the triumph of the right. Under the new order it is as much their duty to vote for the right as to pray for the right.

We, who are mothers, have borne and reared our children to see them go out into the world where evil lurks and disease destroys. When the prohibition fight was won, it was said, “They are dead that seek the young child’s life.” True it is that one great enemy lies low, but all along the highways and hedges, the by-paths and high-roads, others, no less evil, lurk to prey upon him. This is the day of our opportunity. Ours is the privilege to join with those men who seek his welfare and bury under the world’s condemnation those things that degrade and destroy.

We are not come to the kingdom to wrest from men the reins of government, nor to be their rivals in places of power. It will be our privilege to be in the affairs of state as we have been in those of the home-- his help-meet. Together we will solve the problems that confront us, and together work to make the world a safe place for little children.

Our best work can be done in the ranks of those parties that are already organized. It is there our vote will count most. To my mind the Democratic party offers the finest field for service. Their platform is sane and progressive, and in State and Nation they have kept the faith and been true to the ideals of service. In this critical hour it would be a dangerous experiment to turn the State of North Carolina over to a party that has never demonstrated any ability to interpret the noblest impulses of our people.