Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1879-03-21
NUMBER 3S.


Senator llOar, Of Massachusetts, in recent
minority report to the Senate, in favor of
woman suffrage. said that women in this
country are kept in the same subject posi-
tion which the feudalistic common law Of
England had for centuries assigned them.
The negro is freeman and citizen. But
the women are still denied equality before
the law with men,
This is the common. if not universal, mis-
statement Of the position of the case, on the
part of the advocates of woman suffrage. 1t
assumes it to be the fact-and il the assump-
tiOn is false, the statement is false-that the
women of the United States are non voters
against their will that they wish to vote /;
that they desire, and have made known their
desire, to be on terms of equality with men,
as regards voting and holding Office and
that their request has been " denied. y
Brought to the test of facts, Senator Hoar
would be obliged to admit that the request
for the ballot has come from a minority,
and IN most of the American communities
small minority, Of the women. The majority
of American women particularly desire NOT
to vote. They realize the fact that the eIten-
sion of the right of suffrage involves the
imposition Of class of serious duties and
responsibilities from which they are now
freed. The attitude of the women of the
United States is one Of unwillingness to add
such responsibilities to their present cares {;
and the attitude of very large portion Of the
men of the United States, perhaps of ma
jority, Is simply one of unwillingness to
force upon the fairer sex, duties, cares and
responsibilities from which they desire to be
exempt. This is not holding women ''in
subject position" 1t is according to them
the position which they prefer. The
women have had, and will have, we venture
to say, their own way in this matter.
When they become satisfied that they will
be the happier or the world the better for
their voting and holding office on the same
terms as men, the men of the United States
will not be found Withholding from them the
franchise.
We are aware that suggestions of this
kind are exceedingly exasperating to the
special and professional advocates OF woman
suffrage. The only view of the case most OF
them are willing to adopt or to admit that
any reas enable being can for a moment con-
slider, is that every voter out of Wyoming IS
"male tyrant," who through perverse love
of domination, by virtue of strong muscles
and ancient bad usage, wilfully and wicked
ly holds the weaker sex in absolute subjuga-
ton, withholding from her her brthrigt,
and keeping her in a condition, as to her
civil rights, little different from or better
than that of the negro slaves of twenty years
ago. To the woman who accepts this view
of the case, the thought of asking for the
suffrage, or of accepting it as granted in re-
sponse to a request, is insult 1t is now her
right, they say, and she should exercise 1t,
laws, constitutions and customs to the con-
trary Notwithstanding.
But the mass of intelligent men and wo-
men as obstinately refuse to hold this view
of the case. The birthrisht argument,
with its logical conclusion that if the right
to vote is birthright it must belong BY
virtue of birth to every human being, men,
women, children, idiots and insane persons,
they hesitate to adopt. As matters OF tact
they see that the right to vote is a franchise
conferred upon voting class, and that wo-
men are not an enslayed or abused class IN
this country. AMI if they, or the majority
of them, come to favor woman suffrage. 1t
will be because they hope that the COM
munity, as whole, will be better governed,
By extending the limits of the voting class to
admit the purer and better half of mankind, {,
and because they see that the women are
ready and willing, for the public good, to
accept the addition of political duties to
their other cares.
The experiment of women suffrage, as
tried in the Territory of Wyoming,
seems thus far, according to the best
accounts, to work well. The wo-
men vote without molestltiou or hin
drance and in some cases probably better
men have been elected than would have
been. without the vote OF the women. If it
becomes clear that Wyoming has been made
better political community, or that the
condition of woman in that community has
been improved by making her voter,
doubtless women elsewhere will be encour-
aged to undertake d like responsibility.
When they are ready for the suffrage, the
men will be found ready to extend it to
them