The New York herald., 1868-05-09
IDIOTS AND wo,uEy.
Lecture by Miss Aunu f. dickinson.

MISS Anna Il. Dlcknson very clever young lady
from Philadelphia delivered her lecture, 'Idiots and
Women," at Steinway Hail last evening to an
audience Of the better class OF exceedingly free
thinkers. The speaker upon being introduced made
sudden leap into the very middle OF her subject
which was to demonsrate--a verb in pronouncng
which Miss Dickinson accents the antepenultimate-
that women constituted very aggrleved class in
that they were not permitted to vote, address pot
cal meetings in the Ninth ward and generally con-
duct themselves after the manner of men who are
not women. Miss Dickinson was OF the opinion
that there was an innate Inconsistency in
basing a government upon the principle that
all men are created free and endowed with
certain Inherent rights and still denying to women
the right to WELD the ballot. She declared tnat all
conservatives frOm time immem0rial had been Op.
posed TO any modification OF existing custom habits
ana ss lays aad been the argument OF every despot
custom, precedent and existing law In his favor and
II was not without revolution OF existing law that
are the men," interrogated the speaker, "who are
opposed TO progress and freedomr' Every one of
tnese men are s 10 opposition 70 the reodeliing Of
every one OF tese are s) favorable to the GUS
tom law, habit Just as # is But II women could not
representation is slavery" said the fathers OF the
Revolution; and upon that principle they fought
ss sssGsa soSs aqS q sasse sa A
sought to place them II woman had properly she
though she herself might have no voice in the gov.
erhnent and could notbe represented In It's councils
i @ would ~. Se said perhaps tnat men @ Represented
gave men the right to represent womcny Had
woman ever formally delegated man to make laws
her stead 2 Where could the record be foundf at
mad always been sou was replied. Granted that It
@ net eerna DGT see sas tha aways q sUad be
men were TO leave alone that which had always been
So 50 then % there WA was an end Of reforn.ot al
a thsr fn we're always
as their grandfathers thought. But were the
grandathcrs 80 very wise thai they could not Judge
wrong, legslate wrong work out injustce under the
guse OF lawf She had heard or read OF toad which
Gould be proved to have lived Thousand years In the
was one whit wiser tnaf other toads nine hundred
years younger The fact was, man was never dele
gated to legsate for anybody bur himself ana there
OF every State In the Union which were dsgracefu TO
civllizaton. A woman had no rights; II unmarried
she was nothingi and 80 the selection was between
husband or nothing, as Theodore Parker had said
between two nothfngs." But It might be said that
these obnoxious statutes were practically dead let
where they were not exactly dead letter Not long
since o man IN Wisconsin beat his wife until,
bruised, maimed, frightened for her. life, she
complaint. The Judge decided that man had
right to beat hts wife with stick no bigger than his
mS ana % the IN Sras ws was to the husbands
Philadelphia paper copies the account OF the AFFAIR
and the decision and comments upon 1t in single
word, Good" meant, OF course, to be exceedingly
witty. Dead letter on the statute books were they
Judge remands wife into the hands OF brutal
husband with permission to beat her whenever IL
suits him, and leading paper In Philadelphia, the
second city In the United States, comments Good"
Dead letter, indeed II they had been dead letter
the wife would not have been sent back to her abusive
master; if they were dead letter they should be
repealed, since they classed idiots and women
together In law IN politics and In everything else IN
which woman might be supposed TO foster any
laudable ambition. 1870.
The remainder OF the lecture was devoted to the
advocacy OF woman suffrage, the way having been
paved with the remarks preceding.