The Women of the Town.
Some could live and some just died, and most of them none could know,
And it’s “What if the fallen women vote?” from the men who keep them so.
Allegory on Wimmin’s Rights
By Josiah Allen’s Wife (Marietta Holly)
(American contemporary. A philosopher who uses the humorous story to carry her message to the reading public.)
“Wimmin haint no business with the laws of the country,” said Josiah.
“If they haint no business with the law, the law haint no business with them,” said I warmly. “Of the three classes that haint no business with the law—lunatics, idiots and wimmin—the lunatics and idiots have the best time of it,” says I with a great rush of ideas into my brain that almost lifted up the border of my head-dress. “Let a idiot kill a man; ‘What of it?’ says the law. Let a luny steal a sheep; again the law murmurs in a calm and gentle tone, ‘What of it? They haint no business with the law, and the law haint no business with them!’
“But let one of a third class, let a woman steal a sheep, does the law soothe her in those comfortin’ tones? No; it thunders to her in awful accents: ‘You haint no business with the law, but the law has a good deal of business with you, vile female; start for state’s prison! You haint nothin’ at all to do with the law, only to pay all the taxes it tells you to, embrace a license bill that is ruinin’ to your husband, give up your innocent little children to a wicked father if it tells you to, and a few other little things, such as bein’ dragged off to prison by it, chained up for life, and hung, and et cetery.”
“‘Methought I once heard the words,’ sithes the female, ‘True government consists in the consent of the governed. Did I dream them, or did the voice of a luny pour them into my ear?’