to regulate it in any way that it may deem best for the common
good. If men are born with the right to life, liberty and
happiness, they are also born with the right to give expression
as to how these are to be maintained; and in this nation, which
professes to rest upon the consent of the governed, this
expression is given through the ballot. Consequently the
expression of a freeman's will is as God-given as his right to be
free. Since the year of Magna Charta we have repudiated the idea
of representation by proxy.

We all know that there are thousands of women in this nation who
are owners of property, mothers of children, devoted to their
homes and families and to all the duties and responsibilities
which grow out of social life, and hence are most deeply
interested in the public welfare. They have just as much at
stake in this Government, which affords them no opportunity of
giving or withholding their consent, as men who are consulted.
John Quincy Adams said in that grand speech in defense of the
petitions of the women of Plymouth: "The women are not only
justified, but exhibit the most exalted virtue, when they do
depart from the domestic sphere and enter upon the concerns of
their country, of humanity and of God."

Miss Phoebe W. Couzins (Mo.) in closing her address said: "At the
gateway of this nation, the harbor of New York, there soon shall stand
a statue of the Goddess of Liberty, presented by the republic of
France--a magnificent figure of a woman, typifying all that is grand
and glorious and free in self-government. She will hold aloft an
electric torch of great power which is to beam an effulgent light far
out to sea, that ships sailing towards this goodly land may ride
safely into harbor. So should you thus uplift the women of this
nation, and teach these men, at the very threshold, when first their
feet shall touch the shore of this republic, that here woman is
exalted, ennobled and honored; that here she bears aloft the torch of
intelligence and purity which guides our Ship of State into the safe
harbor of wise laws, pure morals and secure institutions."

It had been the custom of these committees, when they reported at all,
to delay doing so until the following year. In 1884, however, those of
both Senate and House submitted reports soon after the hearings. The
favorable recommendation was presente