But, again, one says votes would be unnecessarily multiplied, that women would vote just as the men do, therefore the man’s vote will answer for both. Sound logic, truly! But let us apply this rule to men. Votes are unnecessarily multiplied now by so many men voting; a few could do it all, as well as to take the mass of men from their business and their families to vote. My husband votes the republican ticket, and many other men vote just as he does; then why not let my husband’s vote suffice for all who think as he does, and send the rest about their business? What need of so many men voting when all vote just alike? Again, another says: ‘It has always been as now; women never have had equal rights, and that is proof that they should not have.’ Sound logic again! Worthy emanation from man’s superior brain! But whence did man derive his right of franchise, and how long has he enjoyed it? It is true that women never have had equal rights, because men have ever acted on the principle of oppressors that might makes right and have kept them in subjection, just as weaker nations are kept in subjection to the stronger. But must we ever continue to act on such principles? Must we continue to cling to old laws and customs because they are old? Why then did not our people remain subject to kings? How did they dare to do what was not thought of in the days of Moses and Abraham? How dared they set aside the commands of the Bible and the customs of all past ages and set up a government of their own? It is the boast of Americans that they know and do many things which their fathers neither knew nor did. Progress is the law of our nation and progress is written upon all its works. And while all else is progressing to perfection, while the lowest may attain to the position of the highest and noblest in the land, shall woman alone remain stationary? Shall she be kept in a state of vassalage because such was the condition of her sex six thousand years ago? Clearly, my friends, when the prejudice of custom is on the side of wrong and injustice in any matter we are not to be governed by it. But again it is objected that if women should be enfranchised it would lead to discord and strife in families. In other words, to come down to the simple meaning of this objection, if women would not vote just as their husbands wanted them to the husbands would quarrel with them about it! And who are the men who would do this? Surely, not those who consider and treat their wives as equals. Not those who recognize the individuality of the wife and accord to her the right to her own opinions, the right to think for herself, and to act as her own sense and judgment may dictate. With such there would be no cause for quarrels, nothing to contend about. In such families all is harmony.