ith men. Also, in
all the privileges and immunities, save those of the jury box and ballot
box, the two fundamental privileges on which rest all the others. The
United States government not only taxes, fines, imprisons and hangs
women, but it allows them to pre-empt lands, register ships, and take
out passport and naturalization papers. Not only does the law permit
single women and widows to the right of naturalization, but Section 2
says: "A married woman may be naturalized without the concurrence of her
husband." (I wonder the fathers were not afraid of creating discord in
the families of foreigners); and again: "When an alien, having complied
with the law, and declared his intention to become a citizen, dies
before he is actually naturalized, his widow and children shall be
considered citizens, entitled to all rights and privileges as such, on
taking the required oath." If a foreign born woman by becoming a
naturalized citizen, is entitled to all the rights and privileges of
citizenship, is not a native born woman, by her national citizenship,
possessed of equal rights and privileges?

The question of the masculine pronouns, yes and nouns, too, has been
settled by the United States Supreme Court, in the Case of _Silver
versus Ladd_, December, 1868, in a decision as to whether a woman was
entitled to lands, under the Oregon donation law of 1850. Elizabeth
Cruthers, a widow, settled upon a claim, and received patents. She died,
and her son was heir. He died. Then Messrs. Ladd & Nott took possession,
under the general pre-emption law, December, 1861. The administrator,
E.P. Silver, applied for a writ of ejectment at the land office in
Oregon City. Both the Register and Receiver decided that an unmarried
woman could not hold land under that law. The Commissioner of the
General Land Office, at Washington, and the Secretary of the Interior,
also gave adverse opinions. Here patents were issued to Ladd & Nott, and
duly recorded. Then a suit was brought to set aside Ladd's patent, and
it was carried through all the State Courts and the Supreme Court of
Oregon, each, in turn, giving adverse decisions. At last, in the United
States Supreme Court, Associate Justice Miller reversed the decisions of
all the lower tribunals, and ordered the land back to the heirs of Mrs.
Cruthers. The Court said:

"In construing a benevolent statute of the government, made for the
benefit of its own citizens, inviting and encouraging the