Woman's Profession as Mother and Educator, with Views in Opposition to Woman Suffrage

by Catharine Esther Beecher

That there is an emergency which demands changes in our customs and laws, all well informed and benevolent persons will concede. But the main question is, what should be the nature of these changes and how shall they be secured?

There are certain customs of society which are based on the assumption that all women are to marry and be supported by husbands, and that all men are to provide for the support of a family. It is on this assumption that, in cases where men and women do the same work and do it equally well, men receive much larger wages than women.

But as emigration, war, and the vices of unrestrained civilization have interfered with this normal condition of society, the laws and customs should be modified to meet the emergency. For there are many wrongs, both to married and unmarried women, consequent on the present false and unchristian state of things.

As one example of injustice, it is granted by all who superintend public schools, that women are as good and often better teachers than men, and yet they are unjustly denied equal compensation. In

many other directions the same unjust custom prevails. Still more unjust is the custom which gives superior advantages to men for the scientific and practical training for a profession by which an honorable independence may be secured and almost none at all are provided for women. So also in the distribution of public offices of trust and emolument which secure an income from the civil state, there are several in which woman can perform the duties as well or better then men, especially in the care of schools, hospitals, jails, and all public institutions of benevolence.

Almost all persons of intelligence will concede that justice and mercy call for changes and improvement in these particulars. The main question is, what is the best method for securing such improvement?

The party of men and women who are demanding woman suffrage claim that this is the only sure and effective remedy for these and all other wrongs that oppress women both in the family and in the civil state. The party is organized and led by intelligent, energetic, and benevolent women; they have

well-conducted periodicals to urge their views and to excite sympathy by details of the various ways in which women suffer from unjust customs and laws; and they are sustained by the approval and co-operation of many gentlemen of talents and benevolence.

But the great majority of intelligent and benevolent men and women are opposed to this measure, first, on account of the probable evils involved and next because the good aimed at may be secured by a safer, more speedy, and more appropriate method.

In enumerating the evils that would result from introducing woman to the responsibilities and excitements of political life, the most prominent is her increased withdrawal from the more humble, but more important offices of the family state. At the present time, the services of the seamstress and the mantua-maker are imperfectly supplied, and when obtained it is often from those who are poorly trained. An economical, trustworthy, and competent cook, is a treasure growing more and more rare, which often the highest wages cannot procure. A kind, intelligent, and affectionate woman, to aid a mother in the cares of the nursery, is still more rare.