n would be incomplete or
society would commit an injustice towards her, giving her the means
to educate herself and then depriving her of the necessary power to
use that education for the benefit of society and collective progress.

I can not resist this conclusion. If woman is given equal opportunities
with man for educating herself; if she is encouraged to learn and
study the knowledge of the world and of life, it is but just that the
doors of public life should be thrown open to her in order to allow
her to play in it the part to which she is entitled.

In backward societies, woman is taught only such knowledge as she
requires for the home; that is, she is unconsciously prepared for that
gentle, that charming slavery so pleasing to the masculine sex. The
question now before us is what system we shall adopt for our women:
whether slavery and ignorance, or liberty and education.

Female suffrage is the consequence of the education of woman; it is
also the consequence of her liberty of conscience. The vote is the
expression of political faith, just as worship is the expression of
religious faith. There is no more reason for keeping woman from the
ballot box than there is for preventing her from going to church.

There is no reason why suffrage should be a privilege of sex,
considering that the duties of citizenship rest as heavily upon woman
as upon man. Is woman under less obligation to strive for the welfare
and future of her country because she is a woman? To attempt to curtail
the activity of woman in public life is tantamount to declaring that a
woman must not love her country and must not dedicate any of her time
to her duties of citizenship; that she must not feel the affection
and devotion which the idea of native land and community awaken in
every well-born creature.

Physical barrenness is combated and looked upon as a misfortune in
woman; but we condemn her to a perpetual political barrenness, to
patriotic barrenness, if we keep her away from exercising the right of
suffrage which affords the citizen the most effective means to make
his influence felt in social questions and in the improvement of the
public affairs. How are we to inculcate in our children, that sacred
pledge of the future of the nation, the cult and worship of native land
and liberty if we do not give their mothers that practical education
involved in the exercise of the right of suffrage; if they are taught
that government and politics