allot-box_ to deposit her
suffrage, still the intelligent, cultivated, noble woman is a
power behind the throne. All her influence is in favor of
morality, justice and fair dealing, all her efforts and her
counsel are in favor of good government, wise and wholesome
regulations and a faithful administration of the laws.[44] ...

It would be a gratification, and we are always glad to see the
ladies gratified, to many who have espoused the cause of woman
suffrage if they could take active part in political affairs and
go to the polls and cast their votes alongside the male sex; but
while this would be a gratification to a large number of very
worthy and excellent ladies who take a different view of the
question from that which we entertain, we feel that it would be a
great cruelty to a much larger number of the cultivated, refined,
delicate and lovely women of this country who seek no such
distinction, who would enjoy no such privilege, who would with
womanlike delicacy shrink from the discharge of any such
obligation, and who would sincerely regret that what they
consider the folly of the State had imposed upon them any such
unpleasant duties. But should female suffrage be once established
it would become an imperative necessity that the very large
class, indeed much the largest class, of the women of this
country of the character last described should yield, contrary to
their inclinations and wishes, to the necessity which would
compel them to engage in political strife.

We apprehend no one who has properly considered this question
will doubt, if female suffrage should be established, that the
more ignorant and less refined portions of the female population,
to say nothing of the baser class of females, laying aside
feminine delicacy and disregarding the sacred duties devolving
upon them, to which we have already referred, would rush to the
polls and take pleasure in the crowded association which the
situation would compel, of the two sexes in political meetings
and at the ballot-box....

It is now a problem which perplexes the brain of the ablest
statesmen to determine how we will best preserve our republican
system as against the demoralizing influence of the large class
of our present citizens and voters who by reason of their