Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1851-01-11
THE ANTI-SLAVERY BUGLE.


declaration that eolored women have the same
rights as tohiie wolnen,l Thnt any women
have rights will scarcely be believed. That
cotored women have rights would never have
been thought of without specific declara-
ton"
The argument of friend Pillsbury is we'll put,
and is more easily perverted than answered.
We should be sorry to believe that Mrs Swiss. !
helm is so dull that she can see no difference |
between declaring that the Women's Rights |
movement is intended for the phoie ser, without
distinction Of color, and turning the Convcn-
ticn into an abolition meeting How can she !
expect to be believed by her readers when she
affects blindness so total as thati And yet it
Is only by assuming this air of stolidity that she
can escape the more serious charge of pcrvert-
ing and misreprcsenting Mr.. Pillsbury's Lam
guage.
But Mrs. s. even represents s as admitting
that the Convention was guilty under her in
dictmentl Well, that is COOL And the skill
she exhibits in cutting out from their connec-
ton such passages Of our reply as, standing
alone, might seem to a careless reader to justify
her statement, and her adroitness in supprossing
other passages containing the point and sub
stance Of our argument, would seem to afford
conclusive evidence that she secs clearly enough
where the shoe pinches. We copied her Ian
guage in full. Why has she not done us the
same justicei Why at least has she not copied
enough to show her readers the scope and sub
stance Of our argument, instead of trying to
conceal it, "The cream of it is,' she coolly
says, "thst while this charge of abolitionism is
most Indignantly repclled as libclous, it is bold
ly admitted and defended" And how does she
attempt to substantipto this imputaton of in
consistcncy' Why, carefully suppressing the
passages which, if they had been seen by her
readers would have utterly defeated her pur-
pose, she proceeds to put our assertion "that
the Convention did not link the two subjects to-
gethcr at all, but "took tho woman question
| by ITSELF in iuxtapostion with what VIC said
about its going naturally and instinctivey
back to FIRST PnINcIrLBs-principles applicable
alike to every human bcing'-in order to find
an adequate basis for the Equality of Woman
and then she triumphantly exclaims-
In these extracts Mr.. Johnson declares
help doing. 1t could not get platform for
women without getting all the world on it
could not act for her without taking care of
the Hottentols, and yet it did its work and
did not medde with these greasy fellows If
they could not get platform for women
without making one for all the rest of man
kind, why did they not issue their call for
general transaction of business for erery child
of God"
: Y, Well, Mrs. s., we will try 20 answer that
: question so plainly this time that even you can
: understand us. And in the first place, let us
look again at the offensive resolution:
Resolved, That epery human being OF
: full age, aud resident for n proper length OF
time OH the soil of the nation, who is re-
qnired to obey the law, is entitled to q voice
4 in its enactment; that every such person,
whose property or labor is taxed for the sup
port of the government is entitled to direct
I shure in such government; therefore, that wo-
men are clearly entitled to the right of suf;
: frage, and TO be considered eligible TO office
the omission TO demand which, on their part
4 is palpable recreancy to duty; and the de-
. nial of which is gross usurpntion on the
part of inan-no longer TO be endured-and
\ that every party tchich claims 10 represent III,
. humanity and progress Of the age, is bound to
4 inscrlbe on its banners, Equality before the
n law, without distinction of sex or color"
It Now observe, that it was the one word,
color, that set Mrs. Swisshelm to scoldng thu
!, Convention; and yet, curiously enough, the
q resolution would mean precisely the same thinl
d if that word and its connecting proposition
J. were omitted. Nay, more-exccpt for the pur
a pose of greater perspicuity, even the words
y without distinction of SEX might have beel
y y dropped as superauous; for, the rights of eve
s. ry human being having been asserted, and thos
J. Of woman (whether white or black) inferre,
IT from that general principle, the words 'eqalit
le before the law could be susceptible of no sthe
u meaning than that expressed in the phras
which follows them. Mrs. Swisshclms OBJ
" lection, therefore, amounts to Just this III
Convention had no right to say one word abou
s. the rights of human beings as such, but was un
nc der an obligation, which it could not viola,
nc without breach of trust, to confinc tsclf eA
IN clusively to the Rights of Woman. There
ne just enough of truth in this proposition to 81,
n it an air of plausibility to the eye of a supe
In fetal reader, and yet as applied to the case b,
as fore US, it is a very shallow sophism. Let
IS sec.
y The object of the Convention was-and,
= you please, the exclusive object-to restore
:" woman her rights. So far We are agreed.
order to do this, however, it became necessai
% to prove that she had rights, and to show clca
"s ly what they were. And how was it possib
to do that without going back to first principle
~ W to the foundation and source of all rights :
,o Mrs. Swisshelm cannot give straight -forwa
dis answer to that question without at once Wind
ed eating the Convention and convicting herself
lth folly The Convention had an important wo
ou to do, and it felt the necessity of standing
solid ground. 1t had to encounter worlt
,nocL;n0 al onticisnn and dnrision and n folt ri