Editor of Monroe Journal Lets Woman's Club Propose Reforms, 1916

“This Issue of the Journal,” Friday, June 16, 1916 issue of The Monroe Journal—“The Union County Paper—Everybody Read It”

It has been previously announced that this issue of The Journal would be given over to the use of the Woman’s Club of Monroe. With the exception of a little necessary run of news, matter of the articles were contributed by the club. The Journal wishes to bespeak a kindly reception for this effort of the ladies. The width of vision, the variety of subjects, and the excellence of treatment are all sufficient to stand for themselves. What we wish to speak of is the motive for the undertaking. We believe that there will be a general agreement with the statement that this motive, as well as that of the club at all times, is solely for the unselfish interest of the town. There is a deep running current now in this locality which means general advancement. The men have caught the spirit and are themselves hustling. The women themselves are responsible for this fact. They are the prime movers, and set in motion the generous rivalry which is the beginning of a new era of progress and development. Properly the men are taking up the side of the business situation, and properly the women have assumed the aggressive in the matters pertaining to the homes, the schools, the sanitation, and the cultural life of this community. So far as this paper is concerned, we cannot emphasize too often that in its opinion, this agitation and all its resultant efforts are not directed towards any individual or set of individuals, past or present, nor for the future for that matter. And we wish to ask the people of Monroe to look at it in the light of an impersonal and unselfish effort to find out better ways of doing the things that we are doing and to do new and better things toward making our town a better place here and now for ourselves and our children. In an undertaking of this kind selfishness, unkindness, and personalities are out of place, and any use of them would be unworthy, and any one who assumes them fails to catch the broad and patriotic significance of the situation. We do not remember to have heard any one accuse any past or present officer of the town of any conduct more serious than an error of judgment, and errors of judgment are what we are seeking to find out and remedy by substituting a more general interest in all movements and a greater co-operation for the general welfare. In this spirit we believe the ladies are acting, and in that spirit we have been glad to give them the use of the columns of the paper. A reception of their efforts in that spirit is what we bespeak of the readers of the paper.

                --The Journal