Spirit of the age. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1849-1865, 1857-08-05
Woman,s Rights.

The following sensible remarks are taken
from the Ohio Farmer:
owe believe in wtman's rights, and to
prevent any misunderstanding, shall again
define our position.
In the first place, as a loborer, she has
a right to engage in any work to which
her skill and strength are equal. There IS
no reason in the world why dozen or more
fields of profitable employment, now shut
against her, should not be open to her taste
and talent-selling dry goods, setting type,
keeping accounts, engraving, model-mak-
ing &c. There are many such departments
of labor in which her success would sur
pass in skill and efficiency that of persons
who now usually gill those places.
This right to a larger field of labor being
conceded, We mention it as a second right
of woman to receive full acages for her
scork. It is disgrace to a Christalnlzed
and civilized community to pay only half
price because the work has been done bya
woman. We cannot conceive of a more
unjust thing than to pay a half
wages, because she is the weakest sex and
yet, with few exceptions, women will work
in many kinds of labor side by side with
men, and when evening comes be paid off
In half or tvo-thixRages. It might be
more unjust, but & could not be meaner,
if you required her to work for nothing.
The right of eUery acona0n Is to be pad
eqeal aooges for equal acork Nth mans.
Then. again, woman has rights as a aoitfe.
She has a right to know her husbands bu-
siness she has . right to know his friends
and habits; she has a right to his compa-
ny and respect. As a ruler of tue house,
she has a right to a convenient and confor-
table house. One-half of our wives through
the country live put only half Of their days
in health and happiness, because their kitch.
ems are not fit to HOe and work IN. Now,
re say, woman has a right to the best
kitchen that her husband can build. We
doubt whether, ordinarily, ahusbandhas an
more right to put the kitchen in a cellar
than he has to put his wife in the ~pesthouse
The wife, whose days are often spent in thu
kitchen, has a right to have it above ground
. well planned, fitted with conveniences o
! every kind for cooking, washing, ironing
' &c. She has q right, and 50 have he
daughters and dOmestics, to a wood-house
: and convenient we'll, with pumps in order
to a clothes-yard with posts, for a clothe
d line &c. No man has a right to drive hi
. "woman folks" every ~wash-day to fenc
stakes, barn doors, the neighboring orchard
or some other chance provision, to taste
n the wash-line. Let the clothes-yard hav
a well-kept tart, SO that if a piece shout
it get off the line il need not always be wasl
ed over again.
e Woman has rights, too, as a daughte
~ She has a right TO as good an education
Id her brothers receive. She should not /
Mt put off with "reading, writing, and cyphe
is ing We do not say she should ha7
er the same education, but we say as good q
= education; and if her father leaves ar
money when he dies, we moreover say tn
his daughters have a right to an equal sha
with the sons. 1t is a great mistake
suppose that because women don't smok
nor chew, nor keep fast horses, nor drin
fy &c., that daughters need only half share
up We would beg t~oasuggest another rig
om which we think a woman is entitled to, a.
NJ that is, to have something else besides Je
terry and nonsense talked to her. y
would venture to remark to our your
men, that a sensible young lady is at LEI
a as sensible as a fool of a young man p
haps, in some cases, even more so. Do
hat think yourself disagreeable, if your face
not always spoiled with a smirk, a mo
nos tache, or a shipper. The laughing bye
'ool is not the beau-ideal of every young la'
Take our advice, and vedture to talk &C
be sense, in good grammar, and with a ma
liar raj voice and countenance, to the first you
y a lady you meet it is her right to be addl
It a sed in this way, and it is your right
'lns duty to do it.
~ There are many other "woman's right
ner, WHICH we mlght nave nle~ntoneu' anu
ira which we are an advocate, Dutthese must
pre- flee for the present"
had