The New Orleans crescent. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1866-1869, 1868-11-22

merely on account of her inferior physical
strength in respect to man, then man, by
parity of reasoning, must have suffered
like degradation, merely on account of his
inferior physical strength in respect to the
horse But, outside of Swft's satirical story
about the Yahoos and the Houyhnhnms, no one
has ever heard of an instance of hippocraitc
supremacy over creatures possessing even the
lowest attributes of humanity
The writer ascribes the progress made in
Europe and in America towards female eman-
cipation to the fact that, in the course of
westward emigration from the great Asiatic
hive, the excess of men over women gave the
latter an importance which could command
almost whatever concessions from the former
they might choose to exact This part of his
argument is exceedingly fallacious When
this disparity was largest, how did woman
improve the great opportunity? Let him tell
the story. cages of degradation had left
her without education, and the reaction from
a servile condition turned her head" This
SIMPLY begs the question. AS already shown,
her previous degradation is not accounted
Tor. Moreover, according to the writer's
theory this degradation must have left
the other sex in corresponding depravity
OF intellect; so that the emancipated
slave and the former master should
have started from the same point in a new
career of mental advancement and kept
abreast in the race down to this time. But
it seems that woman either did not start in
the race at all, or soon fell behind either from
choice or from inability. "Her ambition"
We are told, "was directed toward merely
glittering in society. To be the idols of |
knights, to be the toys of the court, was |
enough for those who had been in contempt |
Instead of being able to secure such educa-
tional and other permanent advantages as |
would have enabled her to maintain forever
the position gained, she FILTERED away in
frivolity the opportunity that must close with
the growth of Europe. The door was finally
shut, and these foolish virgins were left
From that time she has been, not as Black
stone says, the favorite of the English law,
butts favorite victim.
But, fortunately, remarks the same writer
another opportunity was offered to woman
by the excess of male population in the settle.
ment of America, and has not been wholly
thrown away. Hence, he argues, the frequent
admission of girls in the United States to
universities on the same footing with young
men; hence the numerous instances in the
SEINE country of regular medical education
and respectable medical practice obtained by
women; and hence the progress there of the
" woman's rights cause in the direction of
political enfranehisement. Now none of these
facts can be claimed as a sequence from the
excess of male over female population. On
the contrary, in the Eastern States, where
the whole movement took its RISE there is,
and has long been, decided excess of female
over male population.
But it does not follow that the efforts of
women to free their sex from educational
or political disabilities, ought to
be discouraged as essentially improper and I
The former confinement of
women to their so-called peculiar sphere"
vas the result of their own choice, decided
" constitutional tendencies, amid surround
ne conditions of society. There never was
lme when women, acting as a mass and with :.
common purpose, could not have accom-
lished any desired emancipation from either
visionary, legal, or political disfranchise- o.
lent. AS general rule, women have not
een s;sudents because they preferred to be
elles: and hay.S not sought to shine in the n
,strum because they preferred the glori1s of
ne social circle and have not claimed the f.
ght of suffrage because they shrank in
tinctively from its harsh responsibilities,
nd from the coarse, perhaps dangerous :
Genes attending its exercise. There is no J.
uestion, however, that changed conditions ;
society are more and more doing away with G
hese disinclinations; nor is it to be disputed
hat whenever q respectable number of intel
gent women manifest an earnest desire for
olitical Acknowledgement it will be sound
Obey as well as justice to concede the de- a
land. The political body of the country A
-ould be softened and refined by the access
ion. Grant that woman has been unfit for
ar, and therefore could not be warrior;
nat is an argument why war should cease.
rant that she has shrunk with natural re-
ugnance from politics; that is an argument p
ny politics should be purified, and if posi-
lie by her presence. For there is much force
i the remark of Madame Serault, French
ritter g" Every career from which woman is n
teadily repulsed by man, is, by this fact
lone, marked with the seal of death. The
cry repulse stigmatizes it. Man may not be s
onscious of what he does; but the career
hich is too vile for woman to enter has
READY outlived all chance of reform, and
lust perish with its abuses"
The full vote of New York-all but seven