A statute so full of burnin’ injustice, and shame, and disgrace that it wuz a wonder to me, and had been for some time, that the very stuns along the banks of the Delaware didn’t cry out to its Senators as they passed along to and from their law-makin’ expeditions.
And when he wuz a goin’ on the very worst about Raymond’s doin’ such a dretful thing, and what a irreparable loss it wuz, I spoke up, and sez I, “Why, Raymond had a right to it, didn’t he?”
“A right?” he thundered out in his agitation, “a right to throw away this priceless jewel? What do you mean, madam?”
“Why,” sez I calmly (for I wuz a workin’ for Duty and Right; and they always brace me up and keep me calm), “Raymond has passed the age of consent, hasn’t he?” He wuz a few days over seven years old.
“What!!!” cries the Senator, “what do you mean?”
“Why, children in your State can consent to their own ruin if they are over seven.”
“It is girls that can do this,” hollered the Senator from Delaware, “it hain’t boys.”
But I went on calm as I could:
“What are a few diamonds, that can be bought and sold, to be compared to the downfall of all hope and happiness, the contempt and derision of the world, the ruin of a life, and the loss of a immortal soul? And your laws grant this privilege to children if they are a day or two over seven.”
“That law was made for girls,” cried the Senator agin in stentorian axents.