suffrage that they cannot gain without it, and they might meet with serious loss. In serving the principle of "the greatest good of the greatest number," man is constantly called on to disregard the feelings of particular persons, and even to outrage their dearest ties of home and family. Women cannot do this judicially. After the terrors of the law have done their work, woman steps in and binds up the wounds of the victims, and the world blesses both the avenger and the comforter.

In the practical working of woman suffrage, women would either vote in accordance with the views of their husbands and lovers or they would not. Should they do the former habitually, such suffrage becomes a farce, and the only result would be to increase the aggregate number of votes cast. Should women vote in opposition to the men to whom they are bound by ties sentimental or material, unpleasant consequences would sooner or later arise. No man would view with equanimity the spectacle of his wife or daughters nullifying his vote at the polls, or contributing their influence to sustain a policy of government which he should think injurious to his own well-being or that of the community. His purse would be more open to sustain the interests of his own political party, and if he lived in the country he would probably not furnish transportation to the polls for such members of his family as voted against him. He would not probably willingly entertain at his house persons who should be active in obtaining the votes of his wife and daughters against himself; and on the other hand the wife might refuse entertainment to the active agents of the party with which she might not be in sympathy. The unpleasantness in the social circle which comes into view with the advent of woman suffrage is formidable in the extreme, and nothing less than some necessity yet undreamed of should induce us to give entrance to such a disturber of the peace. We need no additional causes of marital infelicity. But we are told by the woman-suffrage advocate that such objections on the part of men are without good reason, and are prejudices which should be set aside. But they can

not be set aside so long as human nature remains what it is. Men may grant women anything but the right to rule them, but there they draw the line. Is it not on questions of rule that the wars of men are mostly fought, and will men yield to the weak what they only yield to irresistible force? In the settlement of all questions by force, women are only in the way.

The effect of sexual discord is bad on both sexes, but has its greatest influence for evil through women. While it does not remove her frailties it suppresses her distinctively feminine virtues. This suppression, continued for a few generations, must end in their greater or less abolition. The lower instincts would remain, the flowers which blossom on that stem would wither. No matter what their intellectuality might be, such women would produce a race of moral barbarians, which would perish ultimately through intestine strife. The highest interests and pleasures of the male man are bound up in the effective preservation of the domestic affections of his partner. When these traits are weak, he should use every effort to develop them by giving them healthy exercise. As in all evolution, disuse ultimately ends in atrophy, and the atrophy of the affections in woman is a disaster in direct proportion to its extent. It may be replied again that woman suffrage carries with it no such probable result. But I believe that it does, unless the relations of the sexes are to be reversed. But it will be difficult to reduce the male man to the condition of the drone bee (although some men seem willing to fill that rôle); or of the male spider, who is first a husband and then a meal for his spouse. We have gone too far in the opposite direction for that. It will be easier to produce a reversion to barbarism in both sexes by the loss of their mutual mental hyperæsthesia.

If women would gain anything with the suffrage that they cannot gain without it, one argument would exist in its favor to the many against it; but the cause of women has made great progress without it, and will, I hope, continue to do so. Even in the matter of obtaining greater facilities for

divorce from drunken, or insane, or brutal husbands than now exist in many states of the Union, they can compel progress by agitation. A woman's society, with this reform as its object, would obtain definite results. The supposition that woman would improve the price of her labor by legislation is not more reasonable than it is in the case of men, who have to yield to the inexorable law of supply and demand.

When we consider the losses that women would sustain with the suffrage carried into effect bona fide, the reasons in its favor dwindle out of sight. The first effect would be to render marriage more undesirable to women than it is now. A premium would be at once set on unmarried life for women, and the hetæra would become a more important person to herself and to the state, than the wife, because more independent. The number of men and women, who would adopt some system of marriage without obligation would greatly increase. Confidence and sympathy between married people would be in many instances impaired; in fact, the first and many other steps would be taken in the process of weakening home affection, and there would follow a corresponding loss of its civilizing influences and a turning backward of the current of moral progress. The intervention of women in public affairs is to be dreaded also by those who desire peace among men. Both women and their male friends resent treatment for them which men would quite disregard as applied to themselves; and woman suffrage would see the introduction of more or less women into public life.

The devotional nature of women must not be left out of the account in considering this question. While this element is of immense value to that sex and to society when expended upon ethical themes, when it is allied to theological issues it becomes an obstruction to progress of the most serious nature. Were woman suffrage granted, theological questions would at once assume a new political importance, and religious liberty and toleration would have to pass through new perils and endure the test of new strains. What

the effect would be we cannot foresee, but it could not be good. The priest would acquire a new political importance, and the availability of candidates would be greatly influenced by their church affiliations.

Many objections would be nullified if women should vote under the immediate direction of their responsible male associate, except the one based on their exemption from the execution of the laws; but, should they so vote, woman suffrage becomes a farce, as it is to that extent where it now prevails. The very essential support given by women voters to polygamy in Utah is an illustration of this. In Wyoming men load up wagons with their women to drive them to the polls to vote their own ticket, as I have had the opportunity of seeing in that territory; and so they would do everywhere. If they wished to vote otherwise, they might stay at home; and it is to be expected that women would sometimes wish to vote "otherwise."

What I have written does not include any reference to supposed inherent right to the suffrage or to any principles of representative government. This is because the view that suffrage is not a right but a privilege appears to the writer to be the most rational one, and because any system of government which tends to disturb the natural relations of the sexes I believe to be most injurious. In the absolute governments of Europe the home is safe whatever else may suffer; but a system which shall tend to the dissolution of the home is more dangerous than any form of absolutism which at the same time respects the social unit.

What America needs is not an extension, but a restriction of the suffrage.

Problem of Woman Suffrage. pp. 3-4.

Adeline Knapp.

The possibility of extending the suffrage to women must come into serious question. Our voting body is to-day so large, so unwieldy, as to form a serious menace to the institu

tions of our country. Thoughtful men and women, regarding the situation, cannot but view with apprehension any addition to this well-nigh self-defeating body. Certainly the good possible to accrue to the Nation must be very clearly shown before this step is taken so unprecedented in the history of nations, of precipitating upon the country at large bodies of voters whose legal status is that of dependents.

This brings us to the question of whether the ballot is, per se, a human right. If it is, then it must be granted that there is no reason in logic why it should not be in the hands of women as well as of men. There is, however, no Nation that has not reserved to itself the right to declare who shall exercise its suffrages. The United States government has opened widest this door, but it is a growing question among statesmen, at home as well as abroad, whether it has done wisely in this respect. It must be remembered and can be remembered, too, with pure and partiotic loyalty, that this government is still in an experimental stage. We may believe it the republican idea, the American idea if you prefer so to style it, we may love our country, none the less that we are sorely troubled for her future; we may hope earnestly to see her ride triumphantly into safe harbor, but our faith, our love, our earnest hope cannot establish the success of this experiment if the logic of time shall prove to be against it. There is no argument from the Declaration of Independence to establish the natural right of women to the ballot. This government is not based upon the Declaration of Independence, but upon the Constitution, drawn and adopted by the men who establish the government, and this Constitution defines who shall be entitled to vote.

It is claimed for the ballot that it would give to women a sense of responsibiliy which they do not now possess. It is claimed by thoughtful friends, as well as by enemies of the Nation, that a serious defect in American character is the failure to accept and to discharge grave responsibilities in matters of government, as our blood-kin, the English, for instance, accept and discharge such. The sense of responsibility toward the government is not a characteristic of voting