It is now a problem which perplexes the brain of the ablest statesmen to determine how we will best preserve our republican system as against the demoralizing influence of the large class of our present citizens and voters who by reason of their illiteracy are unable to read or write the ballot they cast. Certainly no statesman who has carefully observed the situation would desire to add very largely to this burden of ignorance. But who does not apprehend the fact if universal female suffrage should be established that we will, especially in the Southern States, add a very large number to the voting population whose ignorance utterly disqualifies them for discharging the trust. If our colored population who were so recently slaves that even the males who are voters have had but little opportunity to educate themselves or to be educated, whose ignorance is now exciting the liveliest interest of our statesmen, are causes of serious apprehension, what is to be said in favor of adding to the voting population all the females of that race, who, on account of the situation in which they have been placed, have had much less opportunity to be educated than even the males of their own race. We do not say it is their fault that they are not educated, but the fact is undeniable that they are grossly ignorant, with very few exceptions, and probably not one in a hundred of them could read and write the ballot that they would be authorized to cast. What says the statesman to the propriety of adding this immense mass of ignorance to the voting population of the Union in its present condition? It may be said that their votes could be offset by the ballots of the educated and refined ladies of the white race in the same section; but who does not know that the ignorant female voters would be at the polls _en masse_, while the refined and educated, shrinking from public contact on such occasions, would remain at home and attend to their domestic and other important duties, leaving the country too often to the control of those who could afford under the circumstances to take part in the strifes of politics, and to come in contact with the unpleasant surroundings before they could reach the polls. Are we ready to expose the country to the demoralization, and our institutions to the strain, which would be placed upon them for the gratification of a minority of the virtuous and good of our female population at the expense of the mortification of a very large majority of the same sex?