ns have been most prosperous where the greatest number of
the people have been recognized in the government. Contrast China
with Russia, England with the United States. Where the few
govern, the legislation is for the advantage of the few. Where
the many govern, the legislation will gradually become more and
more for the advantage of the many, as fast as the many know
enough to demand laws for their own benefit. This knowledge comes
from an education in politics; and a ballot in a man's hand and
the responsibility of using it, is the first step in this
education. Even if a man sells his ballot, there is power in
possessing something that a politician must have or perish. The
Southern slaves must have acquired a new dignity in the scale of
being when Judge Kelley and Senator Wilson traveled all through
the South to preach to them on political questions.

The thinking men of England, as they philosophize on the abuses
of their government, see plainly that the only way to abolish an
order of nobility, a law of primogeniture and an established
church, is to give the masses a right by their votes to pitch
this triple power into the channel; for all the bulwarks of
aristocracy will, one by one, be swept away with the education
and enfranchisement of the people. Gladstone, John Bright, and
John Stuart Mill see clearly that the privileges of the few can
be extended to the many only by the legislation of the many. All
the beneficial results of the broad principles they are
advocating to-day, may not be fully realized in a generation,
but, to the philosophical mind, they are as true now as if
already achieved. The greatest minds in this country, too, have
made most exhaustive arguments to prove the power of the ballot,
and recognized the equality of all citizens, in our Declaration
of Rights, in extending suffrage to all white men, and in the
proposition to farther extend it to all black men. The great
Republican party (in which are many of the ablest men of the
nation) declare that emancipation to the black man is a mockery,
without the suffrage. When the thinking minds on both continents
are agreed as to the power of the ballot in the hand of every
man, it is surprising to hear educated Americans ask, "What
possible value would suffrage be to woman?"