Popular misgovernment in the United States

by Alfred Byron Cruikshank

Consider the unescapable facts, and note the silliness and fraud of the pretence that the women in politics will be no more than gentle advisers to the men in certain matters. In the woman suffrage states women vote with the men, and at the same elections, for president and vice-president of the United States; members of Congress, senators and representatives; governors and other state officers; members of state legislatures; mayors of cities; city and county officers, etc. etc. In every election contest there are usually two principal candidates for each of the above offices; say a better fitted or superior candidate A and an inferior candidate B, the interest of the public being to select A. Now if the majority of each sex favors A he is elected, but to no more purpose than he would have been without the woman vote. How then in that first case, have the women aided or counselled the men? But if as will certainly happen in most elections one of the candidates A or B is defeated by the woman vote, what difference is there between the effect of each woman’s vote and that of each man’s? Can anyone say that the women merely counselled with the men, that they did not overrule them? If a candidate is defeated by aid of the female vote who would not otherwise have been defeated, are not the men overruled? The question is absurd; as well say that the men merely advise the women, as that the women merely advise the men. The same reasoning applies to votes on legislative proposals; the woman’s vote will in every case either overrule the majority male vote, or it will be totally ineffective. There is absolutely no escape from the logic of the case.

The pretence that certain women have some secret and mysterious knowledge to impart to lawmakers and law administrators is preposterous. It is the offspring of the conceited minds of some well-to-do idle female faddists, who want to get into public notice. Some of them pretend that this private knowledge concerns factory girls, whose cause they pretend to espouse, but who in fact hate and despise them and their officious meddling. When working women have anything to say to public officials, they can say so directly or hire a lawyer to do it for them, as the men do. Some of those busy bodies pretend that they have the secret of the proper treatment of fallen women; but legislation will never help these people; it has not needed the vote to enable most women to be cruel to them in the past, nor is the franchise needed to-day to qualify good women to be charitable to them or to any other human beings in the future. Truth is, that in the entire domain of sociology the female suffragists have nothing whatever to propose except what they have borrowed from the socialists; and that we had already, and knew to be worse than worthless. Their talk about superior ability to care for the children is more prattle; one of the best feminist writers, Mrs. Gilman, has called attention in strong and plain language to the record of notorious incapacity on the part of women in the care of children (Women and Economics). The best that a woman can do for her child when ill is to take advice from the best available male physician. The administration of foundling asylums, children’s hospitals and homes is safer in the hands of men than in those of women. Most real reforms and improvements in medicine, surgery, ventilation, diet, architecture, drainage, plumbing, and other branches of hygiene and sanitation have come and will come from the male intellect and will be and are best enforced by masculine administration.

Under the régime of universal suffrage it is safe to predict that the “Naggers” will have little influence in government. They will interest themselves as the “Watch Dogs” do, and sometimes they will collide with the “Watch Dogs,” whose ideal is to save public money, while that of the “Naggers” will be to spend it. Their sympathies will probably tend towards the cranks, or “Yellow Dogs” of politics. They will very much enjoy meddling in all sorts of things of which they know nothing; and now and then they will get something through, over which they will crow and chuckle. But the female masses will make but little response to independent appeals of “Naggers,” “Watch Dogs” or other similar bands of insurgents. They will be quite under the control of the machines of the respective parties; their votes will be cast for the machine candidates; and so political ignorance and corruption doubly supported will flourish more and more.

To conclude with the “henpeck” project; this notion of sending the weak and incompetent to hinder or modify the counsels of the strong and capable on pretence of giving them advice, is one of the most foolish of many foolish products of the untrained intellect. It is a childish subterfuge of those who are ashamed to say outright that their fathers, husbands and brothers are inferior in political capacity to their mothers and sisters. But that assertion is just what is implied in female suffrage, which by reducing by one half the value and force of the ballot of each male voter, will have the actual effect of a moiety disfranchisement of the men of the country.

B. Man-made law. One of the silliest claims of the female suffrage agitators, is that they want political power, in order to repeal what they flippantly call “man-made law.” As well sneer at man-made geology, man-made mathematics or man-made astronomy; man-made they are indeed, and so are all the arts and sciences, industries and philosophies. Of the fact that law is a great science with its roots deep in the history of the past ages; of the immensity of the great body of the law, with its scores of divisions and branches, and hundreds of subdivisions, these chatterers seem to have no suspicion. When they undertake to specify the defects in the great juristic achievements of our law givers past and present, they point with scorn to two or three instances of ancient British legislation affecting the family relation, which like all really useful and practical law represented the customs and ideals of the time. Those ideals have since been modified, and the law has been changed accordingly; in one case for instance by a statute passed about 1850 by which married women are permitted freely to dispose of their separate property. But this measure, of which the suffragists always speak as if they had put it through, was adopted upon the suggestion of men long before women had any political power, and entirely without their aid. The results of that act have not been altogether happy; it is nothing to boast of specially; it was not a tribute to higher ideals, but a concession to human weakness, and has enabled many a rascal to cheat his creditors by putting his property in his wife’s name. The old common law ideal was much the higher one; it conceived of the family as a unit; and placed all its property in one common fund in the name of and under the guardianship of the husband, as the head and representative of the house. Its motto was like that of the Three Musketeers, “One for all and all for one,” which is a much more noble and lofty conception, and much more likely to promote family happiness and family success, than any represented by the Woman’s Separate Property Act, or by all that has been so far offered to the world by all the women suffrage associations put together. Under the old common law, a knave could not, as now, shelter himself from his creditors behind his wife’s skirts, and keep her and his family in base luxury while his trusting creditors suffered.

C. The legend “No taxation without representation” is one of the suffragist catchwords. Just what is meant by this nobody knows; but if it be offered as a political maxim derived from our ancestors, the answer is that they never understood or interpreted this saying as justifying woman suffrage, or any other right to vote than that of the propertied classes. By taxation, they meant direct taxation on tangible property; and as to representation, they considered that the women and children as a class were politically represented by their men. If, however, by this saying, “No taxation without representation,” the suffragists mean that every taxpayer has a right to vote, that proposition has already been answered herein by the true doctrine that suffrage is not a right at all, but a function of government, to be performed by those classes whom the state may select as duly qualified. Nor does taxation ever confer a right to vote; taxation is justified not by the franchise, but by the protection given by government to the taxed property; property owners pay the tax as a return for that protection; and therefore not only women but non-residents, resident aliens, and children owning property in the community are justly taxed, though not allowed to vote.

D. The maternity claim. Some emotional women have actually made claim to the franchise based upon the merits and dangers of maternity. This is mere nonsense. If women are not competent to vote on public affairs, their votes will be injurious to the republic; and they cannot be permitted to do themselves and others an injury merely because they have borne children. It is not enough to mean well; the female turkey means well by her chickens but she will often clumsily trample them to death if not prevented. To bear children is natural to women and is its own great reward; it is dangerous, but no more so than going to sea, and it is not proposed to give the vote to sailors to recompense them for their risk. The suffrage is not a reward; it is a function and a trust.

E. That women have interests separate from that of men. This is an absurd proposition. The social and family ties and obligations of the sexes and their interests in public matters are identical. The very existence of a woman implies the care and devotion of a father, and also the ties of family interest, family life and family love, all of which are male as well as female. The sex difference is not as other differences are, a separating influence; it is a unifying impulse; it not only unites but fuses the subjects of its action. In almost all instances the prizes achieved by the individual man, riches, ambitions, and all the rest are shared to the utmost with his women. On the other hand women never think of sharing their lives or their incomes with strangers of their sex, but always with those of their own family and blood, males as well as females, the preference if any being to the males. But though under the present system the interests of men and women are made as far as possible identical, the tendency of feminism is to separate them, with a prospect of very ill results for women.

F. Man’s alleged unfairness to women. To those who have not suffered the annoyance of having to read suffragist literature, it will seem almost incredible that even the most unscrupulous of its purveyors would accuse men of general unfairness to women. Nevertheless, they have done so repeatedly and the charge must therefore be noticed. Indeed it is well that it should be given prominence, so that people may realize the offensive character of some of the incidents of the suffrage movement. Women should always realize that they owe all they are and have to the generosity, love, foresight and ability of men. Most of the harridans and termagants, who in the suffrage agitation have displayed themselves as slanderers and insulters of men, were born and raised in houses built by men, fed and clad with material furnished by men, educated by books written by men, attended schools and colleges founded and maintained by men, or with money earned by men, are cared for by male physicians, and are now either living on the income of money amassed by men, or are employed by men, from whom they receive the salaries and instructions necessary to enable them to earn a living.

G. That women’s wages in factories and stores are too low and should be higher. No voting or legislation can permanently augment the income or comforts of any class of people, or increase women’s wages with any good effect. All wages seem low to the recipient and high to the employer. Increased wages usually produce higher rent and higher cost of living; the increased cost of living makes marriage and home life more difficult, and from this women as well as men ultimately suffer. If women generally really believe that their incomes can be increased by voting and legislation, that of itself proves their total unfitness to meddle in government. But suppose that it were possible by legislation to materially increase the wages of factory women and store girls, what would be the ultimate result to the community? A large increase in the number of women taken out of households and put into stores and factory life. No intelligent person believes that this change would really be to the advantage of women as a class, nor doubts that it would be the result of artificially advancing wages of such women above their natural level.