Woman's Right to the Ballot

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1870 edition. Excerpt: ..._..! 5. Independence For Woman.--Again, we are told that woman needs the ballot for her own enfranchisement and independence. From the very beginning of human society woman has been trampled on, or, to use the milder term of John Stuart Mill, subjected. Once in subjection, the whole constitution of society has been shaped to keep her there, and the result has been a dwarfed and blighted nature, such as we always find in a subject and oppressed class. Under such conditions it is useless to affirm what woman can do or cannot do. She has never been proved. We have only seen f what woman in subjection is; not what she would be, enfranchised and emancipated. The ballot is the prime condition on which her emancipation turns. She is humiliated by the very fact that the ballot is denied her; even though she did not need it for her own protection and help. It is a badge of inferiority. This topic opens a wide field; only a few thoughts can be suggested. We have here again the assumption of woman's degradation and inferiority--a fact which I call in question once more. This inferiority is supposed to be evinced in the fact that in the various arts of life, the useful and the ornamental, and in works of genius, in music, painting, sculpture and poetry, woman's hand is not so conspicuous as man's. But this is asking too much. The life-work of man lies in these directions. To woman these are hut a pastime, a recreation. Let her bring from her own peculiar domain the living souls which bear God's image, impressed with truth and goodness by her plastic power and her earnest work, and the lifeless forms on canvas and in marble must take a second place. The honest question is, has woman done her-work as well as man has done his, and borne her fair share of the...