Woman: Man's Equal

by Thomas Webster

Christianity and its attendant civilization have done much for the amelioration of the condition of woman. Except in Turkey and in Utah, the idea that a man is to have more than one wife at the same time is not tolerated. In referring to the continents of Europe and America, it will be understood that Turkey in the one, Utah in the other, are always excepted. In neither Europe nor America are women subject to the surveillance of the East; they are not bought and sold in the markets. They are, if they do not marry before coming of age, mistresses of their own personal actions. The halls of science, literature, and the arts, have been partially opened to them. The doors have been set ajar, and they allowed to peep in. They may now attend the house of God without being railed in behind a lattice; and they may, without censure, move about the streets without veils, if it is not the fashion, or it does not please them to wear them. They are accorded a measure of liberty in forming their own religious opinions; that is, the law does not prevent them from doing so. They may, if they can, acquire property in their own names, or they may inherit it. In such cases they, perhaps, if unmarried, may be allowed to manage such property. Once married, it is managed, or mismanaged, as the case may be, by the husband, except in very special cases. They are not compelled by law to marry unless they choose, and are supposed to have a choice with regard to those they do marry, though outside pressure is very frequently brought to bear with regard to both. And, finally, they are allowed a share of authority in the joint government of their respective families. This is about the sum total of the privileges accorded to them.

In the population of both continents, men and women are about equally divided. It is not estimated that there are any more idiots or imbeciles among women than there are among men. Here, then, one-half of this mighty population are prohibited by law from having any voice in the making of the laws by which they are governed, or the carrying of them out after they are made. Where is justice in this case? One slight exception may be made here: in some of the Western States women are allowed to vote and to hold some few positions of profit and trust in the State. It is only a trifling advantage, but still it is an advantage, and is one step gained in the right direction.

The law allows the mother's holiest feelings to be outraged with impunity. It does not recognize her right to the custody of her own children, except at the husband's pleasure. She may be intelligent and educated, virtuous and pious. Yet, if he so wills, he may remove her children from her care, deprive her of their society, and even of the comfort of occasionally seeing them; and he may place them under the tutelage of the ignorant and vicious; while the deeply wronged mother is powerless, according to law, to help either herself or her children.

It is counted among one of woman's privileges that she may hold property in her own right. Upon what tenure is she allowed to hold it? If the property be acquired or inherited, without entail of any sort; if it be real estate, it is hers in fee-simple till she marries. After that event—unless she has guarded her rights by a legal pre-nuptial contract, properly signed and attested to by him who is to be her husband—she may not dispose of any part of it without his express sanction. He may not legally sell it away from her, it is true; but by law he is her master, and may manage it according to his supreme pleasure while he lives. Even a will made by her does not take effect, except her husband pleases, till his death. If the property be in ready money or in funds—except it be guarded in the contract—the husband becomes possessed of it at once, and may appropriate and apply it to any purpose he pleases, without consulting the wishes of his wife. She has no redress. He may, despite her remonstrances, take this her substance and her money, and spend it in foolish speculation; or, worse still, in gambling, drunkenness, and debauchery. He may maltreat her and insult her by the presence in her own house of his mistress. If, no longer able to endure his brutality, she is obliged to leave him, he may, unless the law grant a divorce and alimony, keep possession of her houses and lands, while she must leave home and children behind, and go out upon the world penniless. She can not force him to return one dollar of the wealth that was her own; and after the separation, unless legal papers warranting it have been executed, he can follow her and collect her scanty earnings. Thousands upon the back of thousands of times has all this occurred. Does not civilized law give a woman a lien upon her husband's property? and does not this counterbalance his lien upon hers? About as equally as are all other privileges balanced between the sexes; no more.

She has no legal voice whatever in the management of her husband's estate. His real estate is the only thing upon which she has any claim, and this is only a life interest—after his death—of the one-third of the estate; and of this she may only draw the interest upon the valuation. She may refuse to bar her dower[^[K]] in a sale of land, but if the bargain goes on, her refusal does not invalidate the title; all she can do is, in the event of her husband's death, to claim her interest on her "thirds." This is all she can claim. The furniture of her home, the very beds which she may have brought to the house, are included in the inventory of her husband's effects; and, unless she agrees to accept them as part of her thirds, she may be left without, one on which to rest her weary limbs; and that, too, though the property may have been purchased with money brought by her into the matrimonial firm; or though she may have been the working-bee who in reality acquired it. This is not an overdrawn picture. It is the law in civilized countries; and men are found every day who avail themselves of its conditions. That all men are not mean enough to take advantage of such laws, is no excuse for their existence. It is barbarous that, by laws in the enacting of which women have had no voice, they are left to the mercy of unscrupulous men, without the possibility of better men coming to their help, except by repealing the iniquitous statutes.

It is quite true that all women are not made to feel the full force of this bitter oppression, because of the kindness of their husbands, or the prudent forethought of their fathers in providing for unlooked-for emergencies which might occasion poverty or distress; but the laws, and the makers of them, deserve little credit for any comfort or degree of independence enjoyed by women. More sorrowful than it is, infinitely more sorrowful, would woman's condition be, if true Christianity had not made many men more just than the laws require them to be. Many of the slaves had kind masters; but was slavery any the less an iniquitous outrage upon humanity, a curse upon the land, a blot that could only be wiped away by a bloody war? The present social condition of women is merely one system of domestic slavery, which is hourly calling out to God for redress; and, though he tarry long, yet his afflicted children's cry is never lifted up in vain.

Society is even yet so constituted, and the minds of those who are administrators of the law so blinded, by the prejudices which long usage has established, that even the very few laws which are on record for her so-called protection, are rendered of little avail.

The sufferings of women and children from the effects of the liquor-traffic, is perfectly frightful; and what help is there for it? Lately, in Canada, the wife may, after she is reduced to poverty, forbid the dram-seller to sell her husband any more liquor. If he pays attention to the prohibition, well and good; if not, when in a drunken fit the husband has well-nigh killed her, she may have him bound over to keep the peace—if she can find a magistrate who will do it—and she may complain of the man who sold him the liquor. Perhaps he will be fined a dollar, perhaps not. More likely the latter, with a not very gentle hint that she has stepped out of her sphere by presuming to meddle in such matters.

If women had a voice in the making of the laws, how long would the dram-shop and low groggery send out their liquid poison to pollute civilized lands? But all women are not on the side of right. Neither are the very large majority of men. Many women are drunkards themselves, and worse. True, alas! too true. Sin has corrupted human nature, and men and women have sunk to fearful depths of degradation. Statistics go to show, however, that fallen women happily bear only a very small proportion to those upon whose moral character there is no stain. The virtuous and good are in the large majority.

Men are not allowed by law to murder their wives. Indeed, the law forbids them to beat them; but for this trifle, husbands frequently escape with an "admonition." Yet, though the letter of the law is explicit, they must stop short of killing their victims. There is a case on record, within a few years back and in a British province, where a man beat his wife to death. He was found guilty of the crime. The jury—composed of men, of course—brought in a verdict of manslaughter, and he was sentenced to three months in the common jail. The plea in his behalf was that she was a drunkard. The poor fellow had only gone a little too far; the court must be merciful. At this same assize, there was a man indicted for theft. He had made good his entrance into a jeweler's shop, and stolen therefrom a watch. The theft was proved, and the culprit sent to the penitentiary for three years. Query: Which was the greater crime, killing a woman or stealing a watch?