Questions below refer to this passage.   As the social and religious objections appeared against the demand for women’s political rights, the discussion became many-sided, contradictory, and as varied as the idiosyncrasies of individual character. Some said, “Man is woman’s natural protector, and she can safely trust him to make laws for her.” She might with fairness reply, as he uniformly robbed her of all property rights to 1848, he cannot safely be trusted with her personal rights in 1880, though the fact that he did make some restitution at last, might modify her distrust in the future.... Show more

Questions below refer to this passage.

 

As the social and religious objections appeared against the demand for women’s political rights, the discussion became many-sided, contradictory, and as varied as the idiosyncrasies of individual character. Some said, “Man is woman’s natural protector, and she can safely trust him to make laws for her.” She might with fairness reply, as he uniformly robbed her of all property rights to 1848, he cannot safely be trusted with her personal rights in 1880, though the fact that he did make some restitution at last, might modify her distrust in the future. However, the calendars of our courts still show that fathers deal unjustly with daughters, husbands with wives, brothers with sisters, and sons with their own mothers. Though woman needs the protection of one man against his whole sex, in pioneer life, in threading her way through a lonely forest, on the highway, or in the streets of the metropolis on a dark night, she sometimes needs, too, the protection of all men against this one. But even if she could be sure, as she is not, of the ever-present, all-protecting power of one strong arm, that would be weak indeed compared with the subtle, all-pervading influence of just and equal laws for all women. Hence woman’s need of the ballot, that she may hold in her own right hand the weapon of self-protection and self-defense.

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