[A Discussion of Political Equality of Men and Women. To be
read in connection with chapter 12 of Our Androcentric
Culture.]
Here are two vital factors in human life; one a prime essential to our
existence; the other a prime essential to our progress.
Both of them we idealize in certain lines, and exploit in others.
Both of them are misinterpreted, balked of their full usefulness, and
humanity thus injured.
The human race does not get the benefit of the full powers of women, nor
of the full powers of the state.
In all civilized races to-day there is a wide and growing sense of
discontent among women; a criticism of their assigned limitations, and
a demand for larger freedom and opportunity. Under different conditions
the demand varies; it is here for higher education, there for justice
before the law; here for economic independence, and there for political
equality.
This last is at present the most prominent Issue of "the woman question"
in England and America, as the activity of the "militant suffragists"
has forced it upon the attention of the world.
Thoughtful people in general are now studying this point more seriously
than ever before, genuinely anxious to adopt the right side, and there
is an alarmed uprising of sincere objection to the political equality of
women.
Wasting no time on ignorance, prejudice, or the resistance of special
interests, let us fairly face the honest opposition, and do it justice.
The conservative position is this:
"Men and women have different spheres in life. To men belong the creation
and management of the state, and the financial maintenance of the home
and family:
"To women belong the physical burden of maternity, and the industrial
management of the home and family; these duties require all their time
and strength:
"The prosperity of the state may be sufficiently conserved by men alone;
the prosperity of the family requires the personal presence and services
of the mother in the home: if women assume the cares of the state, the
home and family will suffer:"
Some go even farther than this, and claim an essential limitation
in "the female mind" which prevents it from grasping large political
interests; holding, therefore, that if women took part in state affairs
it would be to the detriment of the community:
Others advance a theory that "society," in the special sense, is the
true sphere of larger service for women, and that those of them not
exclusively confined to "home duties" may find full occupation in
"social duties," including the time honored fields of "religion" and
"charity":
Others again place their main reliance on the statement that, as to the
suffrage, "women do not want it."
Let us consider these points in inverse order, beginning with the last
one.
We will admit that at present the majority of women are not consciously
desirous of any extension of their political rights and privileges, but
deny that this indifference is any evidence against the desirability of
such extension.
It has long been accepted that the position of women is an index of
civilization. Progressive people are proud of the freedom and honor
given their women, and our nation honestly believes itself the leader
in this line. "American women are the freest in the world!" we say; and
boast of it.
Since the agitation for women's rights began, many concessions have
been made to further improve their condition. Men, seeing the justice
of certain demands, have granted in many states such privileges as
admission to schools, colleges, universities, and special instruction
for professions; followed by admission to the bar, the pulpit, and the
practice of medicine. Married women, in many states, have now a right
to their own earnings; and in a few, mothers have an equal right in the
guardianship of their children.
We are proud and glad that our women are free to go unveiled, to travel
alone, to choose their own husbands; we are proud and glad of every
extension of justice already granted by men to women.
Now:--Have any of these concessions been granted because a majority of
women asked for them? Was it advanced in opposition to any of them that
"women did not want it?" Have as many women ever asked for these things
as are now asking for the ballot? If it was desirable to grant these
other rights and privileges without the demand of a majority, why is the
demand of a majority required before this one is granted?
The child widows of India did not unitedly demand the abolition of the
"suttee."
The tortured girl children of China did not rise in overwhelming
majority to demand free feet; yet surely no one would refuse to lift
these burdens because only a minority of progressive women insisted on
justice.
It is a sociological impossibility that a majority of an unorganized
class should unite in concerted demand for a right, a duty, which they
have never known.
The point to be decided is whether political equality is to the
advantage of women and of the state--not whether either, as a body, is
asking for it.
Now for the "society" theory. There is a venerable fiction to the
effect that women make--and manage, "society." No careful student of
comparative history can hold this belief for a moment. Whatever the
conditions of the age or place; industrial, financial, religious,
political, educational; these conditions are in the hands of men; and
these conditions dictate the "society" of that age or place.
"Society" in a constitutional monarchy is one thing; in a primitive
despotism another; among millionaires a third; but women do not make the
despotism, the monarchy, or the millions. They take social conditions
as provided by men, precisely as they take all other conditions at
their hands. They do not even modify an existing society to their own
interests, being powerless to do so. The "double standard of morals,"
ruling everywhere in "society," proves this; as does the comparative
helplessness of women to enjoy even social entertainments, without the
constant attendance and invitation of men.
Even in its great function of exhibition leading to marriage, it is the
girls who are trained and exhibited, under closest surveillance; while
the men stroll in and out, to chose at will, under no surveillance
whatever.
That women, otherwise powerful, may use "society" to further their ends,
is as true as that men do; and in England, where women, through their
titled and landed position, have always had more political power than
here, "society" is a very useful vehicle for the activities of both
sexes.
But, in the main, the opportunities of "society" to women, are merely
opportunities to use their "feminine influence" in extra domestic
lines--a very questionable advantage to the home and family, to
motherhood, to women, or to the state.
In religion women have always filled and more than filled the place
allowed them. Needless to say it was a low one. The power of the church,
its whole management and emoluments, were always in the hands of men,
save when the Lady Abbess held her partial sway; but the work of the
church has always been helped by women--the men have preached and the
women practised!
Charity, as a vocation, is directly in line with the mother instinct,
and has always appealed to women. Since we have learned how injurious
to true social development this mistaken kindness is, it might almost be
classified as a morbid by-product of suppressed femininity!
In passing we may note that charity as a virtue is ranked highest
among those nations and religions where women are held lowest. With the
Moslems it is a universal law--and in the Moslem Paradise there are no
women--save the Houries!
The playground of a man-fenced "society"; the work-ground of a
man-taught church; and this "osmosis" of social nutrition, this leakage
and seepage of values which should circulate normally, called charity;
these are not a sufficient field for the activities of women.
As for those limitations of the "feminine mind" which render her unfit
to consider the victuallage of a nation, or the justice of a tax on
sugar; it hardly seems as if the charge need be taken seriously. Yet
so able a woman as Mrs. Humphry Ward has recently advanced it in all
earnestness.
In her view women are capable of handling municipal, but not state
affairs. Since even this was once denied them; and since, in England,
they have had municipal suffrage for some time; it would seem as if
their abilities grew with use, as most abilities do; which is in truth
the real answer.
Most women spend their whole lives, and have spent their whole lives for
uncounted generations, in the persistent and exclusive contemplation of
their own family affairs. They are near-sighted, or near-minded, rather;
the trouble is not with the nature of their minds, but with the use of
them.
If men as a class had been exclusively confined to the occupation of
house-service since history began, they would be similarly unlikely to
manifest an acute political intelligence.
We may agree with Tennyson that "Woman is not undeveloped man, but
diverse;" that is _women_ are not undeveloped _men;_ but the feminine
half of humanity is undeveloped human. They have exercised their
feminine functions, but not their human-functions; at least not to their
full extent.
Here appears a distinction which needs to be widely appreciated.
We are not merely male and female--all animals are that--our chief
distinction is that of race, our humanness.
Male characteristics we share with all males, bird and beast; female
characteristics we share with all females, similarly; but human
characteristics belong to _genus homo_ alone; and are possessed by both
sexes. A female horse is just as much a horse as a male of her species;
a female human being is just as human as the male of her species--or
ought to be!
In the special functions and relations of sex there is no contest, no
possible rivalry or confusion; but in the general functions of humanity
there is great misunderstanding.
Our trouble is that we have not recognized these human functions as
such; but supposed them to be exclusively masculine; and, acting under
that idea, strove to prevent women from an unnatural imitation of men.