after. As for our
representing men at the fireside, I think it a great deal
pleasanter that they be there in person. Nothing is more blessed
than the home circle, and here I think if husbands were not so
often represented by their wives, while they are absent evening
after evening on "important business," the condition of things
would be improved. If the ladies aforesaid cannot vote without
the highest interests of their families being sacrificed, they
ought to be allowed to remain in peace. I am glad they made this
protest, not only because this is a country where honest views
ought to be expressed, but because agitation pushes forward
reform. I am glad that nearly half of our representatives were in
favor of submitting this question to the women of the State, and
that our interests were so ably defended by a talented
representative from our own district. I do not think, however, by
submitting it to the women, they would get a correct expression
upon the subject. A good many would vote for suffrage, a few
against it, and thousands would be afraid to vote. If it is
granted, I do not suppose all women will vote immediately. Many
prejudices will first have to give way. If women vote what they
wish to vote, and there is no disorderly conduct at the polls in
consequence, and no general disorder in the body politic, I do
not see any objection to the voting being continued from year to
year.

When women like Miss Jones of our city, now in California, take a
few more professorships in a university over half-a-hundred
competitors, write a few more libraries, show themselves capable
of solving great questions, become ornaments to their
professions, it will seem more absurd for them not to be
enfranchised than it does now for them to be so.

Hon. J. M. Ashley, of Toledo, in a speech on the floor of congress,
June 1, 1868, said:

I want citizenship and suffrage to be synonymous. To put the
question beyond the power of States to withhold it, I propose the
amendment to article fourteen, now submitted. A large number of
Republicans who concede that the qualifications of an elector
ought to be the same in every State, and that it is more properly
a national than a State question, do not believe congress has the
power under our present constitution to en