Many good women do not care to vote, and they give this as a reason why
equal suffrage should not be allowed. The logic is so faulty that it
really serves as a reason for the antis. A woman’s reason is often the
work of the genus male ❦ An Englishman, recently arrived in New York
City, stopped at the Hotel Majestic. After two days he notified the
proprietor that no more circulars which came by mail should be sent to
his room. “Because,” said this son of ’Appy Halbion, “I find it a task
too great for my strength to acknowledge receipt of all of them, and
have, therefore, decided not to accept any more.” When asked, “What’s
the matter with the wastebasket?” he carefully examined that useful
article and said that, so far as he could see, it was all right. “Give
decisions, but never reasons,” said the wise old judge to the young
judge ❦ “Your decisions will usually be right, but your reasons seldom.”
Women who do not want to vote should not stand in the way of women who
do. Voting is not compulsory, upon either male or female ❦ Voting is a
privilege. Voting is simply the expression of your political preferences.
Every one should have preferences, because they have opinions. We grow
through the expression of opinions and through making decisions. Voting
is deciding between this candidate and that, this policy or the other ❦
Hence, it tends to definite, logical thinking. One of the old arguments
made against Woman Suffrage was that, if women were allowed to vote, they
would be compelled to do jury duty, because the jurors are selected from
the poll-list. This is one of the piffling reasons—“woman’s reasons.”
Everything in Nature tends to adjust itself ❦ It is quite natural for
women to express themselves. In fact, they always have, if history and
experience are worth anything. But why they should be forbidden this
particular form of political expression, only the male knows, and, in
fact, to use a Hibernicism, he doesn’t. ¶ In the State of Washington, a
woman can accept the subpoena to do jury duty, or she can decline it. The
law, which is only crystallized custom, defers to her wishes ❦ If she
simply tells the deputy sheriff, “Nothing doing!” he marks her name off
the list. She is not obliged to give any reason why she does not wish to
serve as a juror, any more than she is obliged to give a reason why she
does not vote ❦ This seems eminently consistent, right, proper, and well
within human rights. Suffrage simply is a recognition by the State that
woman is a human being. Where women have served on juries, they have
been found to be eminently attentive and anxious to view the question
involved from every standpoint, and to reach a sane and just conclusion.
¶ Judge W. W. Black, of Everett, Washington, has recently said from the
bench: “My experience with the ladies in the jury-box has been that the
trial of the case has been expedited, and the whole proceedings marked
with a dignity and decency which did not before exist ❦ And the verdicts,
for the most part, were well within the legal limits, eminently just and
proper ❦ I do not find that woman’s mental ability to grasp a point in
law is inferior to that of man’s.”
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