Catherine Helen Spence 1825 - 1910

For myself, I considered electoral reform on the Hare system of more value than the enfranchisement of women, and was not eager for the doubling of the electors in number, especially as the new voters would probably be more ignorant and more apathetic than the old.

...I had proposed a modification of Hare's original plan of having one huge electorate, and suggested instead the adoption of six-member districts.

...Mr. Mill wrote to me about my ..."Plea for Pure Democracy",... it gave him great pleasure to see that a new idea both of the theory and practice of politics had been taken up and expanded by a woman, and one from that Australian colony, of which he had watched and aided the beginnings, as is seen by the name of Mill terrace, North Adelaide, to-day. Indeed, both Hare and Mill told me their first converts were women;...

It is said to be human nature when special privileges or special gifts are used only for egoistic ends; but the complete development of the human being demands that altruistic ideas should also be cultivated.

I think that it is the student of arts (that English title which is as vague and unmeaning as the Scottish one of humanities)--student of ancient classical literature--who, whether man or woman, has least perception of the modern spirit or sympathy with the sorrows of the world. With all honour to the classical authors, there are two things in which they were deficient--the spirit of broad humanity and the sense of humour. All ancient literature is grave--nay, sad. It is also aristocratic for learning was the possession of the few.

When I look back on the intention of the framers of the Commonwealth Constitution to create in the Senate a States' rights House I am amazed at the remoteness of the intention from the achievment. The Senate is as much a party house as is the House of Representatives.

There has been too great a tendency on the part of women to allow reform work--particularly women's branches of it--to be done by a few disinterested and public-spirited women. Not only is the home the centre of woman's sphere, as it should be, but in too many cases it is permitted to be its limitation. The larger social life has been ignored, and women have consequently failed to have the effect on public life of which their political privilege is capable.

We have made the mistake of breaking away from old beliefs and convictions without replacing them with something better. ...I would like to see among the young people a finer conception of the duties of citizenship, ...

Her public work will remain for all time as a monument of a brave and unselfish life, but the world will never realise the inestimable value and widespread nature of her private charities and sympathies.
(Jeanne F. Young - An Autobiography Introduction)

Energetic, helpful, courageous, with broad human sympathy guided by a lofty sense of duty and reasoning powers of no mean order, she was an ideal pioneer.
(Miss Rose Scott - eulogy)

No truer friend, no better helper, no more sympathetic worker on behalf of the distressed, the deserted, and the destitute ever lived, than the "Grand Old Woman of South Australia."
(The Rev. J. Day Thompson)

To return to Homepage - click Catherine Helen Spence