Debate on Woman Suffrage in the Senate of the United States,: 2d Session, 49th Congress, December 8, 1886, and January 25, 1887Various
History
Debate on Woman Suffrage in the Senate of the United States,: 2d Session, 49th Congress, December 8, 1886, and January 25, 1887
Various
Women -- Suffrage -- United States
I say to you, then, we come as one-half of the great whole. There
is an essential difference in the sexes. Mr. Parkman labored very
hard to prove what no one would deny--that there is an essential
difference in the sexes, and it is because of that very
differentiation, the union of which in home, the recognition of
which in society, brings the greatest happiness, the recognition
of which in the church brings the greatest power and influence for
good, and the recognition of which in the Government would enable
us finally, as near as it is possible for humanity, to perfect our
form of government. Probably we can never have a perfect form of
government, but the nearer we approximate to the divine the nearer
will we attain to perfection; and the divine government recognizes
neither caste, class, sex, nor nationality. The nearer we approach
to that divine ideal the nearer we will come to realizing our
hopes of finally securing at least the most perfect form of human
government that it is possible for us to secure.
I do not wish to trespass upon your time, but I have felt that
this movement is not understood by a great majority of people.
They think that we are unhappy, that we are dissatisfied, that
we are restive. That is not the case. When we look over the
statistics of our State and find that 60 per cent. of all the
crime is the result of drunkenness; when we find that 60 per cent.
of the orphan children that fill our pauper homes are the children
of drunken parents; when we find that after a certain age the
daughters of those fathers who were made paupers and drunkards by
the approbation and sanction and under the seal of the Government,
go to supply our houses of prostitution, and when we find that
the sons of these fathers go to fill up our jails and our
penitentiaries, and that the sober, law-abiding men, the
pains-taking, economical, and many of them widowed wives of this
nation have to pay taxes and bear the expenses incurred by such
legislation, do you wonder, gentlemen, that we at least want to
try our hand and see what we can do?
We may not be able to bring about that Utopian form of government
which we all desire, but we can at least make an effort. Under our
form of government the ballot is our right; it is just and proper.
When you debate about the expediency of any matter you have no
right to say that it is inexpedient to do right. Do right and
leave the result to God. You will have to decide between one
of two things: either you have no claim under our form of
Constitution for the privileges which you enjoy, or you will have
to say that we are neither citizens nor persons.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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