greater question back of
it, of Miss Anthony's inherent right to vote we have no question, and
that after all is the more important matter. This Rochester breakwater
may damn back the stream for a while, but it is bound to come,
sweeping away all barriers. The opposition to extending the suffrage
to the other sex is founded alone on prejudice arising from social
custom. Reason and logic are both against it. Women will not be
voters possibly for some years to come; it is not desirable that the
franchise should come too quick; but they are certain to have the full
privilege of citizenship in the end.

[_The Age_, Thursday, July 31, 1873.]

KU-KLUX PRISONERS.

The Ku-Klux prisoners are, it seems, now to be released. They are
persons some of whom had committed assaults and other offenses
cognizable by the laws of the States where they lived, and the Ku-Klux
legislation by Congress was a political device as unnecessary as it
was unconstitutional. Perhaps the most ridiculous, as well as the most
unjust prosecution under the Ku-Klux law was that instituted against
Miss Anthony for voting in Rochester. Under her view of her rights,
she presented herself at the polls, and submitted her claims to the
proper officers, who decided that she had a right to vote. She
practiced no fraud or concealment of any kind. She did what every good
citizen here would do, if any doubt arose from assessment,
registration, or residence, as to his right to vote. He would state
the case to the election officers, and abide their decision. Yet this,
we are told, is a criminal offense under the Ku-Klux law, for which a
citizen who has done exactly what he ought to have done, may be fined
and imprisoned as a criminal. Nay, if, as often happens, a point of
doubt is submitted to our Court of Common Pleas and decided in favor
of the applicant, he is still liable to criminal prosecution under the
Federal Ku-Klux law, if a United States Commissioner or Judge differs
from the State Judge in the construction of the State law. Since the
victims of the Ku-Klux act are now receiving pardons, we hope the fine
of $100 unlawfully imposed on Miss Anthony may be remitted. We do not
think there was a case of more gross injustice ever practiced under
forms of law, than the conviction of that lady for a criminal offense
in voting, with the assent of the legal election officers to whom her
right was submitted. If all the victims of this unconstitutional law
were as in