第27章 CHAPTER 3(2)

It will perhaps be sufficient if I confine myself, in the details of myargument, to functions of a public nature: since, if I am successful as tothose, it probably will be readily granted that women should be admissibleto all other occupations to which it is at all material whether they areadmitted or not. And here let me begin by marking out one function, broadlydistinguished from all others, their right to which is entirely independentof any question which can be raised concerning their faculties. I mean thesuffrage, both parliamentary and municipal. The right to share in the choiceof those who are to exercise a public trust, is altogether a distinct thingfrom that of competing for the trust itself. If no one could vote for a Memberof Parliament who was not fit to be a candidate, the government would bea narrow oligarchy indeed. To have a voice in choosing those by whom oneis to be governed, is a means of self-protection due to everyone, thoughhe were to remain for ever excluded from the function of governing: and thatwomen are considered fit to have such a choice, may be presumed from thefact, that the law already gives it to women in the most important of allcases to themselves: for the choice of the man who is to govern a woman tothe end of life, is always supposed to be voluntarily made by herself. Inthe case of election to public trusts, it is the business of constitutionallaw to surround the right of suffrage with all needful securities and limitations;but whatever securities are sufficient in the case of the male sex, no othersneed be required in the case of women. Under whatever conditions, and withinwhatever limits, men are admitted to the suffrage, there is not a shadowof justification for not admitting women under the same. The majority ofthe women of any class are not likely to differ in political opinion fromthe majority of the men of the same class, unless the question be one inwhich the interests of women, as such, are in some way involved; and if theyare so, women require the suffrage, as their guarantee of just and equalconsideration. This ought to be obvious even to those who coincide in noother of the doctrines for which I contend. Even if every woman were a wife,and if every wife ought to be a slave, all the more would these slaves standin need of legal protection: and we know what legal protection the slaveshave, where the laws are made by their masters.

With regard to the fitness of women, not only to participate in elections,but themselves to hold offices or practise professions involving importantpublic responsibilities; I have already observed that this considerationis not essential to the practical question in dispute: since any woman, whosucceeds in an open profession, proves by that very fact that she is qualifiedfor it. And in the case of public offices, if the political system of thecountry is such as to exclude unfit men, it will equally exclude unfit women: while if it is not, there is no additional evil in the fact that the unfitpersons whom it admits may be either women or men. As long therefore as itis acknowledged that even a few women may be fit for these duties, the lawswhich shut the door on those exceptions cannot be justified by any opinionwhich can be held respecting the capacities of women in general. But, thoughthis last consideration is not essential, it is far from being irrelevant.

An unprejudiced view of it gives additional strength to the arguments againstthe disabilities of women, and reinforces them by high considerations ofpractical utility.

Let us first make entire abstraction of all psychological considerationstending to show, that any of the mental differences supposed to exist betweenwomen and men are but the natural effect of the differences in their educationand circumstances, and indicate no radical difference, far less radical inferiority,of nature. Let us consider women only as they already are, or as they areknown to have been; and the capacities which they have already practicallyshown. What they have done, that at least, if nothing else, it is provedthat they can do. When we consider how sedulously they are all trained awayfrom, instead of being trained towards, any of the occupations or objectsreserved for men, it is evident that I am taking a very humble ground forthem, when I rest their case on what they have actually achieved. For, inthis case, negative evidence is worth little, -- while any positive evidenceis conclusive. It cannot be inferred to be impossible that a woman shouldbe a Homer, or an Aristotle, or a Michael Angelo, or a Beethoven, becauseno woman has yet actually produced works comparable to theirs in any of thoselines of excellence. This negative fact at most leaves the question uncertain,and open to psychological discussion. But it is quite certain that a womancan be a Queen Elizabeth, or a Deborah, or a Joan of Arc, since this is notinference, but fact. Now it is a curious consideration, that the only thingswhich the existing law excludes women from doing, are the things which theyhave proved that they are able to do. There is no law to prevent a womanfrom having written all the plays of Shakespeare, or composed all the operasof Mozart. But Queen Elizabeth or Queen Victoria, had they not inheritedthe throne, could not have been entrusted with the smallest of the politicalduties, of which the former showed herself equal to the greatest.