It is to be hoped that throughout the
southern, states, as formerly in Michigan, the self-governing school
district may prepare the way for the self-governing township, with its
deliberative town-meeting. Such a growth must needs be slow, inasmuch
as it requires long political training on the part of the negroes and
the lower classes of white people; but it is along such a line of
development that such political training can best be acquired; and in
no other way is complete harmony between the two races so likely to be
secured.
[Sidenote: woman suffrage.]
Dr. Edward Bemis, who in a profoundly interesting essay[13] has called
attention to this function of the school district as a stage in the
evolution of the township, remarks also upon the fact that "it is in
the local government of the school district that woman suffrage is
being tried." In several states women may vote for school committees,
or may be elected to school committees, or to sundry administrative
school offices. At present (1894) there are not less than twenty-one
states in which women have school suffrage. In Colorado and Wyoming
women have full suffrage, voting at municipal, state, and
national elections.
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