The public have, during the past few months, been interested and perhaps
edified by the ideas and impressions put forth by Mrs. Victoria C.
Woodhull upon the broad, general subject of human government, as well as
by her subsequent nomination of herself as a candidate for the
Presidency in the election of 1872. The articles in which she has
announced these views and purposes have from time to time appeared in
the _Herald_, and to-day we present a further communication on the
question of the “Limits and Sphere of Government.” It is evident Mrs.
Woodhull is imbued with at least one very sensible idea, and that idea
is one which it would be well for large numbers of aspirants for public
positions to emulate—viz., that fitness is the first prerequisite of
qualifications entitling the seeker to enjoy the position sought for.
This it is, doubtless, which has led her not only to study and perfect
herself in the nature of the functions she seeks to exercise, and their
effect, but, in the honest belief that she does understand the question,
to give her opinions to the people, that they may judge of her ability
and the correctness of her views.
At the same time it is somewhat difficult to see what good will come out
of this particular Nazareth. Mrs. Woodhull offers herself in apparent
good faith as a candidate, and perhaps has a remote impression, or
rather hope, that she may be elected, but it seems that she is rather in
advance of her time. The public mind is not yet educated to the pitch of
universal woman’s rights. At present man, in his affection for and
kindness toward the weaker sex, is disposed to accord her any reasonable
number of privileges. Beyond that stage he pauses, because there seems
to him to be a something which is unnatural in permitting her to share
the turmoil, the excitement, the risks of competition for the glory of
governing. There is therefore but one position that may be taken in
considering the aim of this ambitious lady, and that is that, perceiving
and fully appreciating the natural obtuseness of man, she has boldly put
herself forward with a view to wearing down these scrupulous angles in
his sympathetic character and nature, and that she will, after all, be
content with the knowledge that she has done her full share in educating
him for the new order of things which shall supervene when woman, in all
matters, has equal rights and duties with him.