Anti-Suffragists
Document A: Molly Elliot Seawell (Modifed)
It has often been pointed out that women should not pass laws on
matters of war and peace, since no woman can do military duty. But
this point applies to other issues, too. No woman can have any
practical knowledge of shipping and navigation, of the work of train-
men on railways, of mining, or of many other subjects of the highest
importance. Their legislation, therefore, would not be intelligent, and
the laws they devised to help sailors, trainmen, miners, etc., might be
highly offensive to the very people they tried to help. If sailors and
miners refused to obey the laws, who would have to enforce them?
The men!
The entire execution of the law would be in the hands of men, backed
up by irresponsible voters (women) who could not lift a finger to catch
or punish a criminal. And if all the dangers and difficulties of
executing the law lay upon men, what right have women to make the
law?
Also, there seems to be a close relationship between suffrage and
divorce. Political differences in families, between brothers, for
example, who vote on differing sides, do not promote harmony. How
much more inharmonious must be political differences between a
husband and wife, each of whom has a vote which may be used as a
weapon against the other? What is likely to be the state of that family,
when the husband votes one ticket, and the wife votes another?
Vocabulary
Devised: designed
Executing: carrying out
Inharmonious: unpleasant
Source: Excerpt from Molly Elliot Seawell, an anti-suffragist from
Virginia who published the anti-suffrage book, The Ladies’ Battle, in
1911.