f the State struggles
for that fulfillment in which all individuals shall be brought
into a union which shall augment a million-fold both its
individual and collective force. Therefore, don't exclude
us--don't exclude woman--don't exclude the whole half of the
human family. Receive us--begin the work in which a new era shall
dawn. In all great events we find that woman has a guiding
hand--let us stay near you now, when humanity is concerned. Man
has the spirit of truth, but woman alone has passion for it. All
creations need love--let us, therefore, celebrate a union from
which shall spring the morning of freedom for humanity. Give us
our rights in the State. Honor us as your equals, and allow us to
use the rights which belong to us, and which reason commands us
to use. Whether it be prudent to enfranchise woman, is not the
question--only whether it be right. What is positively right,
must be prudent, must be wise, and must, finally, be useful. Give
the lie to the monarchically disposed statesman, who says the
republic of the United States is only an experiment, which
earlier or later will prove a failure. Give the lie to such
hopes, I say, by carrying out the whole elevated idea of the
republic--by calling the entire, excluded half of mankind and
every being endowed with reason, to the ballot-box, which is the
people's holy palladium.

MADAME DE HERICOURT said: I wish to ask if rights have their
source in ability, in functions, in qualities? No, certainly; for
we see that all men, however they may differ in endowments, have
equal rights. What, then, is the basis of rights? Humanity.
Consequently, even if it be true that woman is inferior to man in
intelligence and social ability, it is not desirable that she
shut herself within what is called woman's sphere. In a
philosophical light, the objections brought against her have no
bearing on this question. Woman must have equal rights with man,
because she is, like him, a human being; and only in
establishing, through anatomical or biological proof, that she
does not belong to the human race, can her rights be withheld.
When such demonstration is made, my claims shall cease. In the
meantime, let me say that woman--whether useful or
useless--belonging to humanity, must have the rights of human