WOMAN SUFFRAGE AND EDUCATION.
The seventh count in the Suffrage indictment declared: "He has denied her
facilities for obtaining a thorough education, all colleges being closed
against her."
Among the resolutions passed in the first Suffrage convention was one
demanding: "Equal rights in the universities," and the first petition
presented by Suffrage advocates contained a clause asking that entrance to
men's colleges be obtained for women by legal enactment. We note that this
is far from being a demand for education for women equal to that given to
men in the universities. Men have founded colleges for women, men and
women have worked together in securing for woman every facility and
opportunity for education of the highest grade; but the "barrier of sex"
is not broken down in education. But few of the older colleges for men
admit women, and those few, so far as I have learned from conversation
with members of their faculties, speak of the arrangement as an
experiment, and give the need for economy, combined with a desire to
assist women, as a reason for making that experiment. Meantime the
knocking at men's literary portals by Suffrage advocates has gone on as
vigorously as if women could obtain education in no other way.
In the first Suffrage convention ever held in Massachusetts these two
resolutions were adopted: "That political rights acknowledge no sex, and
therefore the word 'male' should be stricken from every State
constitution;" and "That every effort to educate woman, until you accord
to her her rights, and arouse her conscience by the weight of her
responsibilities, is futile, and a waste of labor."
The State in which these sentiments were uttered abounded in fine schools
for girls, among which were Mount Holyoke and Wheaton seminaries.
A rapid survey of some of the educational conditions that led to the state
of things existing when Suffrage associations were formed, will be in
place. Learning seemed incompatible with worship early in the Christian
era. The faith that worked by love was "to the Jews a stumbling-block, and
to the Greeks foolishness." That great battle between the felt and the
comprehended, which in this era we have named the conflict between science
and religion, was decided in the mind of the apostle to the Gentiles when
he wrote: "We know in part, and we prophesy in part; when that which is
perfect is come, that which is in part shall be done away." He recalled
the accusation, "Thou art beside thyself, much learning hath made thee
mad," and he hastened to assure the unlettered fishermen and the simple
and devout women who were followers of Christ, that "all knowledge" was
naught if they had not love; that even faith was vain if it led to the
rejection of the diviner wisdom that a little child could understand.
The great learning of Augustine and the Fathers brought into the Church
pagan speculations of God and morality, as well as pagan knowledge in art,
science, and literature. The Church became corrupted, and a great outcry
was made against the learning itself, which was falsely supposed to be the
cause of the degeneration of faith. Symonds says that during the Dark Ages
that followed upon this first battle between faith and sight, the meaning
of Latin words derived from the Greek was lost; that Homer and Virgil were
believed to be contemporaries, and "Orestes Tragedia" was supposed to be
the name of an author. Milman says that "at the Council of Florence in
1438, the Pope of Rome and the Patriarch of Constantinople, being
ignorant, the one of Greek, and the other of Latin, discoursed through an
interpreter." It was near the time of the Reformation that a German monk
announced in his convent that "a new language, called Greek, had been
invented, and a book had been written in it, called the New Testament."
"Beware of it," he added, "It is full of daggers and poison."
But the tradition of the love that book revealed had crept into the heart
of the world, and now awoke. Through what struggles the "spirit of all
truth" promised by Christ was leading, and would lead the world, the
history of civilization can tell. Women shared in some degree the outward
benefits of the Revival of Learning. They became in not a few instances
Doctors of Law and professors of the great universities that sprang up, as
well as teachers, transcribers, and illuminators in the great nunneries. I
could give a long and honorable list of names of woman writers and
artists, in many lands, from Mediaeval to modern times; and one of the
interesting things revealed by such a record would be the number who were
working with, or were directly inspired and helped by, a father or a
brother. The Court contained some women who, like Lady Jane Grey, upheld
the model of purity while acquiring the learning that naturally
accompanied wealth. But elegant letters had again become the associate of
moral and religious corruption in the courts, and the "ignorance of
preaching" arose to combat it, in Cromwell, the Roundheads, the
Dissenters, the Covenanters.
Yet sound learning was not to die that Christian truth might live. Of the
band of Pilgrims and Puritans that came first to our shores, about one in
thirty was college-bred. While subordinating book-knowledge to piety,
they had learned scarcely less the dangers of ignorance. Their first
college was founded because of "the dread of having an illiterate ministry
to the churches when our ministers shall lie in dust." Charles Francis
Adams says, in regard to the establishment of Harvard College: "The
records of Harvard University show that, of all the presiding officers
during the century and a half of colonial days, but two were laymen, and
not ministers of the prevailing denomination." He further says that "of
all who in early times availed themselves of such advantages as this
institution could offer, nearly half the number did so for the sake of
devoting themselves to the gospel. The prevailing notion of the purpose of
education was attended with one remarkable consequence--the cultivation of
the female mind was regarded with utter indifference."
It was attended with still another remarkable consequence, the effect of
which is felt up to this hour. Only men who were fitted for a profession
were given a college education. It is well within my memory when it began
to be seriously said: "A college education is good for a boy, whether he
intends to follow a profession or not; it will make him a better business
man, or even a better farmer." The country girl is now, as a rule, better
educated than her brother. It also happened in those earlier days, that
the artist and the musician were expected to attain knowledge by
intuition, save in technical branches.
The minister was, almost of necessity, like a magistrate in these semi-
religious colonies. The fact of the breaking up into various sects, which
we sometimes incline to look upon with regret as defeating Christian
unity, really saved the essentials of that unity by preventing the
clerical magistrate from establishing a church resting upon state
authority. It was obligatory that the civil rulers should be learned, even
at the expense of those who carried on the business and the home.
During the first two hundred years of our existence it would have been
almost absurd to expect that women would be extensively educated outside
the home. The country was poor, and struggling with new conditions, and
great financial crises swept over it. There were wars and rumors of wars.
Until after 1812-15 American independence was not an assured fact.
Whatever may be said of the present, woman's place in America then was in
the home, and nobly did she fill that place. That she had not been wholly
uninstructed in even elegant learning, is evidenced by the share she took
in literature and in the discussion of religious and public matters, and
in such personal records as that of Elder Faunce, who eulogized Alice
Southworth Bradford for "her exertions in promoting the literary
improvement and the deportment of the rising generation." Dame schools
were early established for girls, and here were often found the sons of
the farmer and the mechanic. These were established in Massachusetts in
1635. Late in 1700, girls were admitted through the summer to "Latin
schools" where boys were taught in winter, and in 1789 women began to be
associated with men as teachers. In 1771 Connecticut founded a system of
free schools in which boys and girls were taught. In 1794 the Moravians
founded a school for girls at Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Here were educated
the sisters of Peter Cooper, the mother of President Arthur, and many
women who became exponents of culture.
New England began before this to have fine private schools for girls, but
no great step was taken until Miss Hart (afterward Mrs. Willard) had
become so successful with her academy teaching in her native town of
Berlin, Connecticut, and in Hartford, that three States simultaneously
invited her to establish schools within their borders. She went to
Massachusetts, but afterward, at the solicitation of Governor Clinton, of
New York, she removed her school to Troy, in 1821. It was a new departure,
and there was ignorant prejudice to overcome. Governor Clinton, in an
appeal to the legislature for aid, said: "I trust you will not be deterred
by commonplace ridicule from extending your munificence to this
meritorious institution." They were not deterred. An act was passed for
the incorporation of the proposed institute, and another which gave to
female academies a share of the literary fund. The citizens of Troy
contributed liberally, and the success of an effort in woman's high
education was assured.
As early as 1697 the Penn Charter School was founded, and it has lived
until to-day. Provision was made "at the cost of the people called
Quakers," for "all children and servants, male and female, the rich to be
instructed at reasonable rates, the poor to be maintained and schooled for
nothing." They also provided for "instruction for both sexes in reading,
writing, work, languages, arts and sciences." The boys and girls have been
taught separately, the girls' school being much behind the boys', neither
Latin nor other ancient language forming a part of their curriculum.
Friends are just beginning to discuss giving higher education to girls.
This is a fact especially significant in our discussion, because it has
always been claimed that the Quaker doctrine that "souls have no sex" led
them to place woman on an "equality" with man before other sects had
thought of allowing that they were equals. Lucretia Mott, Susan Anthony,
Abby Kelley, and a great body of the women who adopted the resolution that
set forth the uselessness of educating woman until she could vote, and who
clamored for her entrance to men's institutions, were all of this sect
that has kept its women generally far behind in the acquisition of
knowledge.
In 1845 Mrs. Willard was invited to address the Teachers' Convention that
met in Syracuse. She prepared a paper in which she set forth the idea
that, "women, now sufficiently educated, should be employed and furnished
by the men as committees, charged with the minute cares and supervision of
the public schools," but declined the honor tendered her of delivering it
in person. Sixty gentlemen from the convention visited her at the hotel,
and, at their earnest request, she read the essay, which met with their
emphatic approval of the plan she proposed. The employment of women in the
common schools, and the system of normal schools, were projected by her.
A Teachers' Convention was held in Rochester in 1852. Miss Anthony, though
a teacher, was not in attendance upon it, but she records that she went in
and listened for a few hours to a discussion of the causes that led to
their profession being held in less esteem than those of the doctor,
lawyer, and minister. In her judgment, the kernel of the matter was not
alluded to, so she arose and said: "Mr. President." She records that "at
length President Davies stepped to the front and said in a tremulous,
mocking tone," "What will the lady have?" "I wish, sir," she said, "to
speak to the question." "What is the pleasure of the convention?" asked
Mr. Davies. A gentleman moved that she be heard; another seconded the
motion; whereupon, she records, "a discussion, pro and con, followed,
lasting full half an hour, when a vote was taken of the men only, and
permission was granted by a small majority." She adds that it was lucky
for her that the thousand women crowding that hall could not vote on the
question, for they would have given a solid "No." The president then
announced "The lady can speak." "It seems to me, gentlemen," said she,
"that none of you quite comprehend the cause of the disrespect of which
you complain. Do you not see that, so long as society says a woman is
incompetent to be a lawyer, minister, or doctor, but has ample ability to
be a teacher, every man of you who chooses this profession tacitly
acknowledges that he has no more brains than a woman? Would you exalt your
profession, exalt those who labor with you. Would you make it more
lucrative, increase the salaries of the women engaged in the noble work of
educating our future Presidents, Senators, and Congressmen."
Several thoughts arise in regard to this scene, which was so strongly in
contrast with the conduct of Mrs. Willard or any of the great educators.
Miss Anthony gave no reason for her belief that the entrance of woman upon
the other professions would raise either the status or the wages of those
engaged in the teacher's profession, and as a matter of fact they have not
done so. It was not the society that cast scorn at woman's "lack of
brains" which assisted to remove the natural prejudice against her
assuming duties that had been deemed unsuited to her physique and her
necessary work.
Meantime, one year before the Rochester meeting was held, the first
college for women had been chartered at Auburn, New York, under the name
of "Auburn Female University." In 1853 it was transferred to Elmira, and
it was formally opened in 1855. It was placed under the care of the
Congregational Church, but its charter required that it should have
representative trustees from five other denominations. Its course of study
for the degree of A. B. was essentially the same that was then pursued in
the men's colleges of the State. It was expected to rely upon endowment,
which put woman's education upon a new and more secure footing.
Suffrage leaders lose no opportunity to represent the Church as an enemy
to woman's advancement. Nothing can be further from the truth; and in
striking evidence stand the colleges, which, while unsectarian in spirit
and in method, have been established and cared for by special religious
denominations. Dr. Jacobi, in her book "Common Sense," takes up the tale
and says: "The Mount Holyoke Seminary, the immediate successor of that at
Troy, was opened in 1837 by Miss Lyon, in spite of the opposition of the
clergy." Many besides the clergy were opposed to the plan for which Miss
Lyon was endeavoring to raise money. Her idea that the entire domestic
work of the establishment could be done by pupils and teachers, was
thought unwise and hopeless. In that noble school, where thousands of
women have been educated, a great number have become missionaries. When a
Suffrage convention in session in Worcester wrote to Miss Lyon, asking her
to interest herself in the wrongs of her sex, she answered, "I cannot
leave my work." Neither was Vassar College founded from any impulse or
suggestion of Suffrage agitators, but in a spirit exactly the opposite.
The real impetus to its founding came from Milo Parker Jewett, who was
born in Vermont in 1808, and was graduated at Dartmouth College and at
Andover Theological Seminary. He was active in the formation of the
common-school system of Ohio, and in 1839 he founded The Judson Female
Institute in Marion, Alabama. He established a seminary for girls in
Poughkeepsie in 1855. He had studied law, and became the friend and legal
adviser of Matthew Vassar, who, being unmarried, was casting about for a
method of disposing of his fortune. He suggested to Mr. Vassar an endowed
college for women, and visited the universities and libraries of Europe
with a plan of organization in mind. Mr. Vassar gladly accepted this great
enlargement upon an idea that had lain dormant in his own mind, and Vassar
College was founded, Dr. Jewett becoming its first president in 1862.
I may claim to have been beside the cradle of Vassar College; for when Dr.
Jewett resigned the presidency in 1864, my father named the successor who
was appointed, Dr. John H. Raymond, his life-long friend. Dr. Raymond came
to Rochester to discuss a plan of work, and, knowing my father's interest,
I was on tiptoe to hear about the new college. At my earnest solicitation,
he and Dr. Raymond and Prest. Anderson permitted me to be present at their
discussions. I learned to comprehend the value of womanliness to the world
by the estimate that those noble educators put upon it. It was evident
that they were arranging for those for whose minds they felt respect. They
made no foolish remarks about the superiority, inferiority, or equality of
the sexes, and had no contempt to throw upon the old education of tutor,
and library, and young ladies' seminary. They did not sneer at the "female
mind," but they did talk of the feminine mind as of something as distinct
in its essence from the masculine mind as the feminine form is distinct in
its outlines. To "preserve womanliness" was a task they felt they must
fulfil, or the women for whose good they labored would one day call them
to account. The dictum so frequently in the mouths of Suffrage leaders,
"There is no sex in brain," would have been abhorrent to them. In their
view, there was as much sex in brain as in hand; and the education that
did not, through cultivation, emphasize that fact, would be a lower and
not a higher product. They laid that intellectual corner-stone in love,
and in the faith that the same womanly spirit which, when there was not
college education enough to go round, had said, "Give it to the boys,
because their work must be public," would find, through the glad return
the boys were making, a way to teach the world still higher lessons of
womanly character and influence. Since that time, college after college
has arisen without a dream on the part of the founders, faculties, or
students that "every effort to educate woman, until you accord to her the
right to vote, is futile and a waste of labor," and it may well be that
the women educated in these colleges will decide that, because political
rights do acknowledge sex, therefore the word "male" should not be
stricken from any State constitution.
Before the committee of the New York State Constitutional Convention in
1894, Mr. Edward Lauterbach, who was arguing in favor of woman suffrage,
said: "It was only after the establishment of the Willard School at Troy,
only after its noble founder, believing that women and men were formed in
the same mould, successfully tried the experiment of educating women in
the higher branches, that steps for higher education became generally
taken." If Mr. Lauterbach imagines that Mrs. Willard was in the most
distant way an advocate of woman's doing the same work as man in the same
way, he is unfamiliar with her life and work. Mrs. Willard, in setting
forth her ideal of woman's education, said "Education should be adapted to
female character and duties. To do this would raise the character of
man.... Why may not housewifery be reduced to a system as well as the
other arts? If women were properly fitted for instruction, they would be
likely to teach children better than the other sex; they could afford to
do it cheaper; and men might be at liberty to add to the wealth of the
nation by any of the thousand occupations from which women are necessarily
debarred." Old-fashioned wisdom, but choicely good. Mr. Lauterbach further
said: "What wonder that, being so fully equipped in every mental
attribute, in every intellectual qualification, they will be able not only
to cast a vote but to take practical part in the administration of the
government?"
A female Solon would be a woman still, and in a democracy the intellectual
is not the only qualification needed. This certainly was the belief of
Mrs. Willard, and in 1868, when the Suffrage leaders were holding a
convention in Washington, and were urging that Congress should pass a
sixteenth amendment admitting women to suffrage, Almira Lincoln Phelps,
sister of Mrs. Willard, herself an educator and an author of text-books,
wrote to Isabella Beecher Hooker: "Hoping you will receive kindly what I
am about to write, I will proceed without apologies. I have confidence in
your nobleness of soul, and that you know enough of me to believe in my
devotion to the best interests of woman. I can scarcely realize that you
are giving your name and influence to a cause which, with some good, but,
as I think, misguided women, numbers among its advocates others with loose
morals.... If we could with propriety petition the Almighty to change the
condition of the sexes, and let men take a turn in bearing children and in
suffering the physical ailments peculiar to women, which render them unfit
for certain positions and business, why, in this case, if we really wish
to be men, and thought God would change the established order, we might
make our petition; but why ask Congress to make us men? Circumstances drew
me from the quiet domestic life while I was yet young, but success in
labors which involved publicity, and which may have been of advantage to
society, was never considered as an equivalent to my own heart for such a
loss of retirement. In the name of my sainted sister, Emma Willard, and of
my friend Lydia Sigourney, and, I think I might say, in the name of the
women of the past generation who have been prominent as writers and
educators (the exception may be made of Mary Wollstonecraft, Frances
Wright, and a few licentious French writers) in our own country and in
Europe, let me urge the high-souled and honorable of our sex to turn their
energies into that channel which will enable them to act for the true
interests of their sex."
In a woman's club, last winter, a New York teacher, Miss Helen Dawes
Brown, a graduate of Vassar College, founder of the Woman's University
Club and also one of the founders of Barnard College, in a speech said in
part: "The young girl who doesn't dance, who doesn't play games, who can't
skate and can't row, is a girl to be pitied. She is losing a large part of
what Chesterfield calls the 'joy and titivation of youth.' If our young
girl has learned to be good, teach her not to disregard the externals of
goodness. Let our girls, in college and out, learn to be agreeable. A
girl's education should, first of all, be directed to fitting her for the
things of home. We talk of woman as if the only domestic relations were
those of wife and mother. Let us not forget that she is also a
granddaughter, a daughter, a sister, an aunt. I should like to see her
made her best in all these characters, before she undertakes public
duties. The best organization in the world is the home. Whatever in the
education of girls draws them away from that, is an injury to
civilization."
At the close of an article in the "Outlook," written by Elizabeth Fisher
Read, of Smith College, she said, speaking of their last adaptation of
athletics: "From the beginning, the policy of Smith College has been, not
to duplicate the means of development offered in men's colleges, but to
provide courses and methods of study that should do for women what the
men's courses did for them. Emphasis has been put, not on the resemblances
between men and women, but rather on the differences. The effort has not
been to turn out new women, capable of doing anything man can do, from
walking thirty miles to solving the problems of higher mathematics.
Instead of this, the college has tried to develop its students along
natural womanly lines, not along the lines that would naturally be
followed in training men."
This sounds strangely like Mrs. Willard, who would be the first to rejoice
in the new education and in the old spirit that it can develop. Of course
Suffrage claims to have the same end in view. Every college woman must
decide for herself where she will stand on the question. So far, there
never has been any open affiliation between the colleges and the Suffrage
movement. We wait to hear a final verdict.
A contributor to the Suffrage department of the Woman's Edition of the
Rochester "Post-Express," March 26, 1896, said: "Will Rochester give to
its daughters the same advantages as to its sons, or will it say to the
girls who have no money to leave home and seek in Smith and Wellesley the
culture they cannot procure here: 'You cannot be thoroughly educated; you
have no money; you can have no education; sit and spin; bake and brew--but
don't bother about higher education,' or will the University of Rochester
recognize the one splendid opportunity that awaits it, the one last chance
to take its proper place and become all that the highest American
standards demand for a University?"
The time has not yet fully come when these same sentimentalists shall say
to the faculty and trustees of Vassar, Wellesley and Smith: "Will you not
give to the boys of Poughkeepsie, Northhampton, and Wellesley the same
advantages as to the girls? Or will you say to them: 'You cannot be
thoroughly educated; you have no money; you can have no education; work in
the shop or on the farm, but don't bother about higher education.'" This
is Suffrage logic, and there is no more reason why the educational
institutions in which men study from the age of eighteen to twenty-two
should be invaded by women of that age, than why women's institutions
should be invaded by men. Yet this would be the destruction of our women's
colleges. When Miss Anthony headed a delegation that went bodily to force
co-education on Rochester University, she was told that classes open to
women had been connected with the college for years.
The kind of education best suited to the idea of Suffrage is a training in
political history and present political issues; but the women who have
talked loudly and vaguely of the right of suffrage for years have been the
last to present such knowledge. I have read their "History," attended
their conventions, glanced at their magazines, but never have come upon
the discussion of a single public issue. I think those most familiar with
it will bear me out if I make the statement that their principal
periodical, "The Woman's Journal," edited by Mary A. Livermore, Julia Ward
Howe, Mr. Blackwell, and Alice Stone Blackwell, has not contained any
presentations of questions of public policy in the past ten years.
Those whose names are signed to the Suffrage Woman's Bible, and who are
therefore responsible for that disgraceful effusion, have little right to
claim to be intelligent instructors of their sex. With an ignorance that
is monumental, Frances Ellen Burr glories in the fact that "the Revising
Committee refer to a woman's translation of the Bible as their ultimate
authority for the Greek, Latin, and Hebrew text," and they add that "Julia
Smith, this distinguished scholar," is the only person, man or woman, who
ever made a translation of the Bible without help. They say: "Wycliff made
a translation from the Vulgate assisted by Nicholas of Hereford. He was
not sufficiently familiar with Hebrew and Greek to translate from those
tongues. Coverdale's translation was not done alone. Tyndale, in his
translation, had the assistance of Frye, of William Roye, and also of
Miles Coverdale. Julia Smith translated the whole Bible absolutely alone,
without consultation with any one"! Again they say, "King James appointed
fifty-four men of learning to translate the Bible. Seven of them died, and
forty-seven carried the work on. Compare this corps of workers with one
little woman performing the Herculean task without one suggestion or word
of advice from mortal man "! Yes, compare it! Uncultured Julia Smith,
stirred by the Millerite prophecies, did the best she could to enlighten
her own mind, and should be honored for so doing; but what is to be said
of the women who in this day, in cool print, are willing to show that they
have no comprehension of her grotesque errors or of the difficulties that
beset a real scholar in his noble task? Protest at woman's educational
deprivation comes with ill-grace from those who have thus revealed their
own lack of knowledge of the oldest literature in the world, the model of
poetry and prose, the guardian of the purity of our English speech.
Educated women desire that woman should do all that strength and time
allow in the care of the public schools. The school suffrage ought to be a
boon for them. But it does not, so far, look as if women could make it so.
The figures of the school vote of women in Connecticut, for three years,
occasion serious question whether the use of the ballot is the way in
which woman is to effect anything. In Staten Island, ignorance in women
voted out education, and a tremendous effort had to be made to vote it in
again. The number of men who voted at the last general election in
Connecticut was about 164,000. The women outnumber the men, but the
following table represents the school vote in the State of Emma Willard.
It certainly does not represent the amount of interest taken in education,
nor in the common schools:
COUNTIES. 1893. 1894. 1895.
Hartford. 1293 1186 689
New Haven. 973 949 570
New London. 364 873 185
Fairneld. 273 198 126
Windham 176 182 148
Litchfield 159 85 50
Middlesex 60 136 101
Tolland 372 137 37
This gives the results from all but three or four towns in the State.
Aside from any other considerations, the uncertainty attending the vote of
an element whose first call is elsewhere than at the polls, is a menace to
the welfare of the schools as well as of republican institutions.
One of the grievances of the Suffrage leaders lay in the fact that the
literary women of the country would express no sympathy with their
efforts. Poets and authors in general were denounced. Gail Hamilton, who
had the good of woman in her heart, who was better informed on public
affairs than perhaps any woman in the United States, and whose trenchant
pen cut deep and spared not, always reprobated the cause. Mrs. Stowe stood
aloof, and so did Catherine Beecher, though urged to the contrary course
by Henry Ward Beecher and Isabella Beecher Hooker. In a letter to Mrs.
Cutler, Catherine Beecher said: "I am not opposed to women's speaking in
public to any who are willing to hear, nor am I opposed to women's
preaching, sanctioned as it is by a prophetic apostle--as one of the
millennial results. Nor am I opposed to a woman's earning her own
independence in any lawful calling, and wish many more were open to her
which are now closed. Nor am I opposed to the organization and agitation
of women, as women, to set forth the wrongs suffered by great multitudes
of our sex, which are multiform and most humiliating. Nor am I opposed to
women's undertaking to govern boys and men--they always have, and they
always will. Nor am I opposed to the claim that women have equal rights
with men. I rather claim that they have the sacred superior rights that
God and good men accord to the weak and defenceless, by which they have
the easiest work, the most safe and comfortable places, and the largest
share of all the most agreeable and desirable enjoyments of this life. My
main objection to the Woman-Suffrage organization is this, that a wrong
mode is employed to gain a right object. The right object sought is, to
remedy the wrongs and relieve the sufferings of great multitudes of our
sex; the wrong mode is that which aims to enforce by law, instead of by
love. It is one which assumes that man is the author and abettor of all
these wrongs, and that he must be restrained and regulated by
constitutions and laws, as the chief and most trustworthy methods. I hold
that the fault is as much, or more, with women than with men, inasmuch as
we have all the power we need to remedy the wrongs complained of, and yet
we do not use it for that end. It is my deep conviction that all
reasonable and conscientious men of our age, and especially of our
country, are not only willing but anxious to provide for the good of our
sex. They will gladly bestow all that is just, reasonable, and kind,
whenever we unite in asking in the proper spirit and manner. In the half a
century since I began to work for the education and relief of my sex, I
have succeeded so largely by first convincing intelligent and benevolent
women that what I aimed at was right and desirable, and then securing
their influence with their fathers, brothers, and husbands, and always
with success. Why not take the shorter course, and ask to have the men do
for us what we might do for ourselves if we had the ballot? Now if women
are all made voters, it will be their duty to vote, and also to qualify
themselves for that duty. But already women have more than they can do
well in all that appropriately belongs to them, and, to add the civil and
political duties of men, would be deemed a measure of injustice and
oppression by those who are opposed."
Miss Beecher, like Mrs. Willard and Mrs. Phelps, made text-books for the
use of her own seminaries, and her Arithmetic, and Mental and Moral
Philosophy, and Applied Theology, were among the educational forces of her
day. It is one of the significant signs of the times that science and
education, as well as philanthropy, are occupying themselves just now with
childhood and motherhood and housewifery. Mrs. Willard's high ideal of
womanliness is beginning to be set forth by the electric light of modern
thought.