every office
holder who has to do with the executing of the law, and take the
power from the hands of the women of the nation, the mothers, you
put the long arm of the lever, as we call it in mechanics, in
the hands of the whisky power and make it utterly impossible for
regulation of sobriety to be maintained in our community? The
first step towards social regulation and good society in towns,
cities, and villages is the ballot in the hands of the mothers of
those places. I appeal to you especially in this matter, I do not
know what you think about the proper sphere of women.

It matters little what any of us think about it. We shall each and
every individual find our own proper sphere if we are left to
act in freedom; but my opinion is that when the whole arena of
politics and government is thrown open to women they will endeavor
to do very much as they do in their homes; that the men will look
after the greenback theory or the hard-money theory, that you will
look after free-trade or tariff, and the women will do the home
housekeeping of the government, which is to take care of the moral
government and the social regulation of our home department.

It seems to me that we have the power of government outside to
shape and control circumstances, but that the inside power, the
government housekeeping, is powerless, and is compelled to accept
whatever conditions or circumstances shall be granted.

Therefore I do not ask for liquor suffrage alone, nor for school
suffrage alone, because that would amount to nothing. We must be
able to have a voice in the election not only of every law-maker,
but of every one who has to do either with the making or the
executing of the laws.

Then you ask why we do not get suffrage by the popular-vote
method, State by State? I answer, because there is no reason why
I, for instance, should desire the women of one State of this
nation to vote any more than the women of another State. I have
no more interest as regards the women of New York than I
as regards the women of Indiana, Iowa, or any of the States
represented by the women who have come up here. The reason why I
do not wish to get this right by what you call the popular-vote
method, the State vote, is because I believe there is a United
States citizenship. I believe that this is a nation,