Given the latest book I just finished (more on that later), and my experience ranging from being partially raised by my grandparents as well as having travelled and seen much of the world and its diverse people, I am coming to the conclusion that in the past, the humans that populated the Earth were generally more capable, more resilient, and had better logic function than most of the supposedly superior modern humans we fancy ourselves as being.
As exhibit A in an almost infinite series, I present to you:
When women knew they should never be allowed to vote.
COPY OF PREAMBLE AND PROTEST.
We, American women, citizens of the State of New York, protest against the proposal to impose the obligation of suffrage upon the women of this State, for the following, among other reasons:—
1. Because suffrage is to be regarded not as a privilege to be enjoyed, but as a duty to be performed.
2. Because hitherto the women of this State have enjoyed exemption from this burdensome duty, and no adequate reason has been assigned for depriving them of that immunity.
3. Because conferring suffrage upon the women who claim it would impose suffrage upon the many women who neither desire it as a privilege nor regard it as their duty.
4. Because the need of America is not an increased quantity, but an improved quality, of the vote, and there is no adequate reason to believe that woman’s suffrage by doubling the vote will improve its quality.
5. Because the household, not the individual, is the unit of the State, and the vast majority of women are represented by household suffrage.
6. Because the women not so represented suffer no practical injustice which giving the suffrage will remedy.
7. Because equality in character does not imply similarity in function, and the duties and life of men and women are divinely ordered to be different in the State, as in the home.
8. Because the energies of women are engrossed by their present duties and interests, from which men cannot relieve them, and it is better for the community that they devote their energies to the more efficient performance of their present work than to divert them to new fields of activity.
9. Because political equality will deprive women of special privileges hitherto accorded to her by the law.
10. Because suffrage logically involves the holding of public office, and office-holding is inconsistent with the duties of most women.
Copy of Preamble to the Protest prepared by Committee of Brooklyn Women, which was extensively signed, and sent to the Constitutional Convention in May, 1894.
BROOKLYN AUXILIARY,
NEW YORK STATE ASSOCIATION OPPOSED TO THE
EXTENSION OF SUFFRAGE TO WOMEN.
Source note
Printed broadside, [New York, 1894]. Held by the Library of Congress, Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Printed Ephemera Collection — digital ID rbpe.1300130a. Catalogued as: New York State Association Opposed to the Extension of Suffrage to Women. Brooklyn Auxiliary, “Copy of preamble and protest…” New York, 1894.
Online: https://www.loc.gov/resource/rbpe.1300130a/
I seriously down most women today can even read that one page and understand it, follow its reasoning, and present their case in a similarly cogent fashion, whether for or against, based, as this document itself does, on pure logic and consequences that derive from it, instead of hysteria, emotions, or hormonal issues of whatever nature.
But by all means ladies… Have at it.
This post was originally published on my Substack. Link here
