woman the protection that she needs and should have,
as to-day she has absolutely no chance beside her brother.
Although she gives the same quality and the same amount of work
yet she can not command the same wage, and why? Simply because
she is not a recognized citizen by virtue of the ballot. If you
would go into the factories, the mills, the mercantile
establishments and meet these women and learn from them the
indignities to which they ofttimes are subjected in order that
they may retain their places you would not wait for any one to
come here and argue the question with you. You would see for
yourselves that the only remedy is to grant to them that same
protection that you give to every man over 21 years of age. The
girl so employed submits in a way to these things because she is
thinking of the time when her factory days will be over, when she
will make a home for husband and children, and God forbid that
the time shall ever come that our girls will lose sight of this,
their greatest vocation! But before they are competent to take
charge of the home in every sense of the word, before they can
give to their children all that these should have, they must
themselves be placed upon a basis of equality with their
husbands....

Why should I, a tax-paying woman, be denied the right by casting
my ballot to say how these taxes that I am paying shall be
expended? In the light of progress and of American civilization,
we know this cannot continue. We have great things at stake in
our children. We are trying to take away that shadow which rests
upon these United States, the shadow of child labor. It will not
be done until the mothers have the right to speak for their
children through the ballot. We are looking for the day when we
shall be able to stand shoulder to shoulder with our men and
share with them the burdens and responsibilities of this greatest
nation and be able to hold up our heads and say: "We are on an
equal footing because we have men in the United States who
recognize equality of rights."

Mrs. Raymond Robins, thoroughly qualified to speak on this question,
said in part: "I have the great honor and privilege of representing,
as president of the National Women's Trade Union League, something
like 75,000 organized working women, and I believe all