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Reginald J. Richardson & The Chartists
1836 – 1846
The history of woman suffrage in the nineteenth century cannot be isolated from the quest for suffrage for most men. As our time period opened, few, if any, people could vote and there were stiff property qualifications. The consensus was that it was not people who were represented in a Parliament, but property that was represented in Parliament – no representation without taxation. As the century progressed, property qualifications and other qualifications, such as religion and race, which restricted the pool of potential voters decreased.
When our time period opens, vague glimmerings of the future Industrial Revolution can be viewed. Most people of the time, however, lived as their parents and grandparents had lived and expected their children to live much as they lived. For women, the one task that probably required more of a woman's time than any other was the production of cloth. Growing the cotton or flax or tending the sheep to produce the raw materials from which thread was made was just the beginning of the process. The raw material had to be prepared: carded or seeded, combed, cleaned, spun into miles and miles of thread, woven into cloth, dyed, fulled, then finally the cloth was ready to be made into a table linen, a new dress, or a pair of pants. Little wonder that the Industrial Revolution began by moving the production of cloth out of the home and into the factory where (water) powered machines spun and wove the tons of cotton, flax, and wool.
Moving industrial production of cloth, and later other goods, out of the home and into a factory had a profound effect on the lives and livelihoods of millions. As more and more production moved from the home to the factory, more and more workers came into competition with machinery – and lost. In 1815, the estimated wages of a handloom weaver was 16/- per week; in 1825, 9/- per week; and in 1830, 6/- per week . As men's wages fell, women entered the workplace to "supplement" their husband's income. And the poor got poorer and the rich got richer. Periodically during the first quarter of the nineteenth century, workers expressed their frustration and out-rage, usually by peaceful protests.
By the early 1830's British politicians came to understand that frustration was building among the working- and nascent middle- classes. In an attempt at reform, the "great" Reform Act of 1832 was passed, an act which pleased almost no one. At nearly the same time (1834), the poor laws were amended, further alienating the working-class who viewed the changes in the poor laws as detrimental to themselves. In the middle of the decade, various protest groups emerged: anti-Corn law campaigners, advocates of a ten hour working day, and nascent trade unionists. By 1838, the groups had begun to merge . A new charter, a People's Charter (from which the movement drew its name, Chartists), was proposed which demanded six legal changes:
Although Chartists did not succeed in getting their proposed laws enacted and the movement disintegrated after a few years, eventually five of the six agenda items would be adopted as law.
As with other reform groups, women were active in the Chartist movement. At the beginning of the movement, Chartist leaders supported woman suffrage and asked for universal suffrage. As with other classes of men, many working class men were not ready to give woman suffrage – they were willing to "level down" to themselves and no farther. Still other men thought the movement would look foolish if they advocated woman suffrage – better to let that go until another time. After all, their agenda was already radical enough. Fearing what little support the working-class had among the rich and powerful, Chartists scaled-back their demands by replacing a true universal suffrage with universal male suffrage, deleting their demand for woman suffrage.
At the same time, many working-class women viewed their problems in terms of class differences, not gender differences, and supported their husband's efforts to achieve the "family vote" and a "family wage." Unlike women in the classes above them, these women wanted to be freed from paid labor – they wanted to be able to stay home to care for their children, husbands, and home. Unlike better off women, when working-class women worked, there was often no one to take care of their children, and even children as young as 5 or 6 were left alone during the day while mother and father both toiled in a factory. When these women came home from work, there were no servants there who had cooked dinner, cleaned the house, shopped for groceries, tended the babies, or did the washing and ironing. As we would say now-a-days, these women worked the double-shift. So many women were not willing to fight for either suffrage or employment opportunities for themselves.
Consequently, near the beginning of the movement, men and women were more willing to advocate woman suffrage. Some leaders, like Reginald John Richardson (1808-1861, carpenter/newsagent/pamphleteer, born in Manchester) and Ernest Jones, continued to defend women's suffrage throughout the 1840s and 1850s . Woman suffrage would be debated and discussed throughout the life of the movement and a small fringe group would always support woman suffrage.
Today's excerpt is very long, but R. J. Richardson is quite knowledgeable about the employment situation for both men and women during his own time. His description of the life of working-class women opens a window to understanding why some working-class women, even today, are anti-feminist. A staunch woman suffragist, Richardson attempts to arouse women from their lethargy to fight on their own behalf. As noted in the excerpt, The Rights of Woman was written while Richardson was in prison on charges related to his social activism.
Since the excerpt is so long, I am placing the references before the excerpt.
References:
John Richardson Richardson, excerpt of The Rights of Woman in Dorothy Thompson (ed.), The Early Chartists [Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press, 1971] pp. 115 – 127. First published in 1840, Richardson's The Rights of Woman was reprinted New York: Garland, New York, 1987.
Electronic References:
'Reginald John Richardson (1808-61)', Biographies of Chartist Leaders, © -John Breuilly, University of Birmingham, accessed June 21, 2002
'Chartism,' Encarta 2002
'Manchester Chartism', The Peel Web, accessed June 21, 2002 (It appears that this link is now dead.)
Jan Rendall, ''63. Gender tensions in the Chartist movement', Women's Politics in Britain 1780-1870: Claiming Citizenship, Jan Rendall, University of York, accessed June 21, 2002
Dorothy Thompson, 'Women Chartists', Encyclopedia of 1848 Revolutions, © 1999 James Chastain
Extract from The Rights of Woman
by R. J. Richardson
Pamphlet written in prison, 1840
While Europe's eye is fix'd on mighty things,
The fate of empires and the fall of kings;
While quacks of state must each produce his plan,
And even children lisp the Rights of Man;
Amid the mighty fuss, just let me mention,
The Rights of Woman merit some attention.
BURNS
Edinburgh: printed by John Elder, High Street;
Published by John Duncan, 114 High Street.
London: John Cleave, Shoe Lane, Fleet Street.
Manchester: A. Heywood, Oldham Street.
MDCCCXL
. . . Having occupied some time in shewing you the natural degree of woman, also her scriptural qualifications and her physical inequality, I shall now proceed to the main feature of the question, or rather to the question itself — 'Ought Women to interfere in the political affairs of the country?' As I have before prepared you, by an abstract dissertation upon the natural rights of woman, I do most distinctly and unequivocally say — YES! And for the following reasons:
The first reason I hope I have sufficiently argued before and established its truth.
The second is, in a certain degree, answered by the establishment of the first reason; but in addition I may say, that it is nowhere written in the body of the civil law, that woman, by reason of her sex, is disqualified from the exercise of political rights except by her own voluntary act. Grotius, Puffendorf, Montesquieu. Vattel, and other famous civilians, have nowhere consented to such an unjust exclusion; the only instance on record where we find this right disputed, is in the famous controversy between Philip of Valois, and Edward III, concerning the Salic Law, by which females and their descendants are excluded from the monarchy of France, and from the inheritance of the allodial lands of the nobility, the latter part of the law has long become obsolete, and the former is nowhere acted upon except in France, proving that the doctrine of the exclusion of females from political power is not consonant with the law of nature and nations.
Again, civilians teach us the doctrine of community of persons and community of rights, as the best mode of establishing a pure commonwealth, in strict accordance with the genuine principles of liberty. Surely then it cannot be argued, that any inequality should prevail, or that any distinction should exist in a community, where all things are held in common, or in trust for the good of the commonwealth; nor will it be said that the members of such communities, male and female have not each an equal voice in the making of the laws necessary for the political government of that community. Of legitimate argument in favour of my position: for as all political law is based upon the civil law, so are those political institutions best that proximate nearest to the original standard of civil liberty.
Civilians tell us also, that for all the uses of society woman stands upon an equal footing with man; for all the purposes of civil government, woman is equally admissable to office; for the due promotion of the welfare of the state, woman is essentially necessary in conjunction with man. These three positions I shall mention when I advance my arguments in favour of Reason Third.
I ask, upon what ground can this civil right be abridged, diverted, or abrogated? I ask those who tyrannically withhold from woman her political rights, on what assumption do they do so? I challenge them to sustain their opinions. I invite them to discussion, and will appear to maintain my proud position as the vindicator of the rights of woman against any one who may be so lost to a sense of shame as to oppose helpless woman in pursuit of her just rights.
The third reason I advance in justification of my emphatic approval of the question at issue is, because I conceive Woman has a political right to interfere in all matters concerning the state of which she is a member, more especially as applied to Great Britain, for the following reasons:
1st - Because, by the ancient laws of the English constitution, she is admissible to every executive office in the kingdom, from the monarch upon the throne to the parish overseer, the village sexton, or the responsible office of post mistress, which is still common in small towns.
2nd – Because, by the present law of tenures, of powers, of contracts, of bargains and sale, of inheritance, of wills, and every other matter or thing touching the rights of property and transfer, woman (except in femme covert,) is qualified to be, and therefore, is admissible, as a contracting party, save during her minority or a ward in chancery, then her affairs are managed by trust,
3rd – Because, woman is responsible in her own person for any breach of contract, for any offence against the peace and laws of the land. In the church, by the penalties of imprisonment, excommunication, and premunire; in the state, by fine, imprisonment, banishment, and death.
4th – Because she is taxed in the same degree with other for the maintainance of the state and its appendages under all circumstances.
5th - and lastly, because, she contributes directly and indirectly to the wealth and resources of the nation by her labour and skill.
On these five reasons I found my opinion upon the great question, 'Ought woman to interfere in the affairs of the state?' and to that question I again answer Yes! emphatically YES!
To the first of these reasons I will add, if a woman is qualified to be a queen over a great nation, armed with power of nullifying the powers of Parliament or the deliberate resolutions of the two estates of the realm, by parity of reason, a woman in a minor degree ought to have a voice in the election of the legislative authorities. If it be admissable that the queen, a woman, by the constitution of the country can command, can rule over a nation, (and I admit the justice of it,) then I say woman in every instance ought not to he excluded from her share in the Executive and legislative power of the country.
To the second reason I will add further, if a woman can exercise the powers of a contractor, or vendor, or become heiress, testatrix, executrix or administratix, and act in such important capacities over matters and things daily arising out of transactions with real and personal property, I say that it perfectly justifies my opinion that woman is not only qualified, but ought by virtue of such qualification, to have a voice in the making those laws under which the above transactions take place.
The third reason I will illustrate by saying, that, if woman be subject to pains and penalties, on account of the infringement of any law or laws, - even unto death, — in the name of common justice, she ought to have a voice in making the laws she is bound to obey.
The fourth reason is next in importance to the last, so long as the legislature claim and levy a portion of the worldly income of a woman for the support of the state, surely it is not presumption in woman to claim the right of electing that legislature who assume the right to tax her, and on refusal, punish her with pains and penalties; it is unjust to withhold from her her fair share of the elective power of the state, it is tyranny in the extreme, and ought to be properly resisted.
The fifth Reason is equal in importance to the last, and in incontrovertible fact, that women contribute to the wealth and resources of the kingdom. The population in Great Britain in 1831, consisted of 16,255,605, which may be classified under three sources the wealth of the country is raised. Now let us begin with agriculture, and see what share the women take of the labour necessary to produce the food of the people, the rent of the landlord, and the taxes of the state. In the first place, the dairy is managed almost exclusively by women and girls; the small live stock, such as poultry, &-c.. wholly so. Look to the cheese counties of Glocester and Chester, where the female population is almost wholly employed in the dairy. Look to the milk and butter counties around the large towns, and see the number of females who are employed in milking and making butter, and bringing them to market. In a farmyard the smallest child performs some labour or other, feeding poultry, driving cows, &c. In the fields, again, we find women performing every kind of labour except draining, hedging, ditching, fencing. ploughing, and mowing. We find them driving, sowing, selling, harrowing, drilling, manuring, weeding, hoeing, picking stones, gathering potatoes, turnips, pulling carrots, mangel wurrzel, shearing, binding, gathering, hay-making, &:c. &:c. The boys and girls too, are employed in picking stones, driving, scare-crowing, tending sheep, gathering roots, &:c. in the barn. With the exception of thrashing and handicraft work, women perform every other occupation. There is no country in Europe where the women are such slaves upon the soil as they are in Scotland. I have many times counted twenty or thirty women in one field to about four or five men and boys. It is quite common to see women in the same unequal proportion to men labouring in the fields at every kind of predial labour; and many times I have been tempted to exclaim. Surely the curse of God is not upon the woman instead of the man! for in the language of holy writ, he declared to Adam, "in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread." And many times I have in my heart blamed men for allowing their women to be such slaves, to perform such labour that nature never intended them to do, nor befitted them for the task. Inured to such toils and hardships, she becomes masculine; and the force of all those tender passions implanted by God in the breast of woman to temper the ruggedness of proper usefulness destroyed. To the men of Scotland I say, Shame! To the women I say, endeavour to throw off the degradation of predial slavery, return to your domestic circles and cultivate your finer feelings for the benefit of your off-spring. How can you expect to be free, when you are willing slaves, and nourish in your lap a new race of hereditary bondsmen? How can you expect men, who seek only 'to command and overbear' others, to look to other than their own selfish interests? Rouse you, and let future historians record your zeal in the cause of human redemption, and you will confer a perpetual obligation on posterity. Debased is the man who would say women have no right to interfere in politics, when it is evident, that they have as much right as 'sordid man." None but a tyrant, or some cringing, crawling, hireling scribe, succumbing to the footstool of power, would dare to say so.
Let us examine the mining population, (i.e.) those who produce, by their labour out of the bowels of the earth, all the iron, lead, copper, tin, and other metals, besides coal, salt, slate, stone, &c. There are fewer females employed in this department than in either of the others, because of the greater strength of body and mind required to undergo the fatigue and danger of mining; but I may fairly say, that one third of those employed in mines are women, more especially in the coal mines, which are the most numerous of any other. In the coal mines of Staffordshire, Lancashire, Durham, and Northumberland, women are constantly employed the same as the men, earning from four to twelve shillings per week. It is no uncommon thing to see them suspended by a rope in the act of being lowered several hundred feet below the face of the earth into the mine, where they draw wagons laden with coal to the bottom of the shaft ready to be raised up, and also where they squat down on their knees, and sometimes in a half reclining position, for the purpose of hewing with a small pick, 6 or 8 lb weight, the coal from the seam. In many instances the seam or stratum of coal, being only 14, 16, 18, 20, or 24 inches thick, and in this narrow space, women, the fairest and tenderest of God's creatures, are found with a solitary candle, or Davy-lamp, stretched at full length, hewing out the coal, and this too for little wages; as they are paid for by weight, of course, where it is so difficult to get, less will be got. To see them at meal times rising from the mouth of the shaft, more 'like demons from the lower deeps,' than those angelic creatures, our poets call women, is a sight that would 'harrow up the souls of men,' if they possessed the feelings of humanity, and create a feeling of disgust for the institutions that can allow 'woman, lovely woman.' to be forced by poverty and distress from her domestic duties down these hell holes of coal mines. And yet, such is the apathy, such the cold, selfish indifference of the women of these islands, that they will sit by their hearths, enjoy the comfort of that fire made from coals dug out of the bowels of the earth by their poor countrywomen, and yet breathe no sigh of pity, speak no word of sorrow, nor ask of their husbands and fathers why are these poor collier women thus abused, degraded, and enslaved by their country's laws?
Who will say the poor women who at the hazard of their lives contribute to our comfort when the icy bonds of winter, and the cold biting blast of December compels us to seek refuge from cold in the artificial heat arising from coal got by her hands, have no right to a vote in the legislative powers of the country? None! not even the savage; but, should one be found that will dare to deny or withhold that right, he is less than man, he is a ------ nothing.
We next come to the manufacturing population. Here will I fearlessly assert that one half of the population employed in the manufactory of cotton, silk, and wool are women and girls. In cotton, which by the last census in 1831, 1,337,127 persons, male and female, were employed, I believe one half of them are women. In the blowing department, few or perhaps no women are employed; but in carding, drawing, and roving, I should say a majority of those employed are women. In the throstle spinning, nearly all women; in mule spinning, partially so; in weaving by power, principally women; in winding and reeling, wholly so. In hand-loom weaving one half are women, either as winders or weavers. In those hideous dens called 'Factories,' tyranny is triumphant, and slavery wretched. The numerous acts of parliament passed to regulate the Factory system, are proofs of their being in want of legislative protection; and well they may be in want, while those who stand in need of protection are excluded from all share in the legislative power of the country.
Here, then, is a population principally employed in manufacturing cotton to the extent of £.200,000.000 annually, and principally females too. Now, what is the actual condition of this degraded class of our countrywomen? At an early age, even before their tender frames receive the nourishment and secretions necessary to befit them for the duties nature ordained they should perform in after life, many years before the age of puberty, are they taken to these hell-holes to earn their little pittance, in order to enable the parents to purchase the miserable sustenance which the rapacity of the capitalist deigns to allow them to support the cravings of Nature. Many have been sent in the factories at six, seven, eight, and nine years of age. Yes, from their sleep are they now taken, and carried sleeping upon the backs of their fathers, mothers, or brothers, and, for twelve hours a-day, compelled to toil and endure the heated atmosphere of these manufacturing hells; and many times, before the abolition of night-work, did these little girls and their brothers toil the long and dreary night, whilst those for whom they toiled were sleeping on their beds of down, regardless of these outrages upon humanity. Immured in these dens, oppressed by fatigue, fed with insufficient diet, their little minds abused, their bodies scourged, their frames wasted, the pith of womanhood dried up and withered, they grow up in years, in many instances deformed in body, or die prematurely with the first attack of disease; some are women and mothers years before their natural period; but are they taken from these accursed mills by their husbands? – No! once a Factory slave, seldom do they leave it but with death; fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, all are condemned to this horrible system of slavery. The wife will rise from her marriage-bed at five o'clock in the morning, and with her husband proceed to her daily occupation in the mill, the wife in one department, and the husband in another — there is no honeymoon for them. Should she be 'as ladies wish to be who love their lords,' there is no ease, no time for nourishment and rest for her: - work, work, work, early and late, until the latest moment of her travail; there must be no time lost - no steam wasted, toil she must, until nature, bursting through the tyrant's laws, forces her to relinquish for two or three days her life of slavery to give birth to her burden, which, alas! is doomed to the same slavish life, or a lingering sickness and premature death. There is no month of ease and relaxation for her; in a few days she is hurried, regardless of her health and strength, leaving her innocent babe to the care of a nurse, who, with bottle-teat and Godfrey's cordial, keeps the little victim quiet until the mother returns from the mill to her meals. In this manner does she continue at her life of slavery for a paltry sum of 8s. to 12s. per week. It is the same in the power-loom-weaving department, but with this difference, that many are paid by the piece. In the silk department the business is cleaner and more healthy; the atmosphere purer and cooler; the labour less toilsome, and often paid by piece: the silk winding is wholly performed by women, and to a very great extent are they employed in other departments of this branch of manufacture.
I must not forget to notice the calico-printing department — I have seen much of it in England - where it is performed principally by men, and in a few instances, as mere assistants, by women. But what was my surprise when I visited the print-fields of Leven in Dumbartonshire, where I saw – O shame upon the men of Leven! — their wives and sweethearts performing the work of horses, carrying heavy burdens of wet calicoes after washing them in the cold and rapid streams, working at the tables, grasping in their delicate fingers the clumsy printing block and the heavy hammer, and printing the most difficult patterns of long cloths and shawls. -This is the work of men,' said I to the lasses, 'and you ought not to perform it: your places are in your homes: your labours are your domestic duties: your interests in the welfare of your families, and not in slaving thus for the accumulation of the wealth of others, whose slaves you seem willing to be; for shame of you! go seek husbands those of you who have them not, and make them toil for you; and those of you who have husbands and families, go home and minister to their domestic comforts.' Such were my opinions, and such are my opinions. The only palliative in their favour was, that they were conscious that they were not in their proper places; but that, as they had no voice in making the laws, they could not help their degraded position, but they would strive to obtain that power to the best of their abilities – I believe the lasses of Leven are truly patriotic, and worthy of good laws, happy homes, cheerful hearths, loving husbands, and prattling children.
In Woollen Manufacture, women are very extensively employed in about a ratio of two-fifths to men: the labour is heavy too, but not so oppressive as in the Cotton department.
In the finishing processes of cotton, women are very extensively employed. In hand-loom-weaving, it is no uncommon thing to see in a weaver's cottage under the window on the ground floor, a loom, at which the weaver's wife is employed at the same time she is surveying her domestic affairs; for instance, she will leave her loom, peel potatoes for dinner, put them upon the fire, then return to her loom: should her child cry in its cradle, she will stop, leave her loom, give it the breast, or a plaything, or get it to sleep, and return to her loom again, and so on alternately the day through; perhaps in another corner of the house a daughter will be employed upon another loom, and another daughter winding — by this kind of domestic labour she will earn 3s, 4s, or 5s. per week. A stout active young lass for weaving twenty-eight yards of calico will earn 6d., and if constant through a long day will earn 10d., which will be 5s. per week; but from this must be deducted lost time in going for warps, and taking home the cuts or pieces, besides the usual deductions, abatements. &-c. This class of workers suffer much from abatements, more especially if they be workers in silk, where the worker is frequently obliged to put up with abatements of one-half their earnings, or be driven to an arbitration, with almost the certainty of losing employment. In the Lace business, two-thirds of those employed are women and girls, and for a miserable pittance. In the hosiery business of Leicestershire and Nottinghamshire, women are very extensively employed, and most grievously oppressed. In Loughborough, Sheepshead, and the surrounding villages, tradespeople are in an awful state of wretchedness - ill fed, ill clothed, ill housed, miserably paid, and infamously abated. In the manufacture of Gloves, women are almost exclusively employed, and very ill paid. In the Pottery district, vast numbers of women and girls are employed in the printing, painting, and other departments, the labour, apparently pleasing, is nevertheless irksome and unhealthy, in consequence of the heated atmosphere of their painting rooms, and the great quantities of turpentine used by them, which evaporating, fills the heated atmosphere, and being inhaled by them, produces very unpleasant effects.
In the "Hardware districts of Birmingham and Sheffield, I am almost inclined to think there are as many women employed as men. I visited many establishments, and I invariably found great numbers of women employed in stamping, filing, polishing, sorting, painting, japanning, pin and needle making, steel pen- making, toy-making, and many other branches of hardware manufacture. Many times have I seen handsome young girls up to the elbows in nasty oil, and their faces besmeared with the same unctuous matter; surely, thought I, this is not the legitimate labour of 'those tender creatures we call ours.' No; I have concluded it is the labour of man, which tyrants have imposed upon women in order to increase their profits; for in few instances have women been called from their domestic duties to the manufactories, except for the purpose of reducing the wages of the man. Women have lent themselves to these avaricious money-grubbers, and poverty has driven them to the deed, which is the only reproach I can cast upon them; but it has many palliatives, and one, the greatest of all, they have not the protection of the law, nor the benefits of society.
I have now shown you that woman bears her share in the burdens of the state, and contributes more than her fair proportion to the wealth of the country. I ask you, is there a man, knowing these things, who can lay his hand upon his heart, and say, Women ought not to interfere in political affairs? No: I hope there is none for the honour of my sex – I do sincerely hope there is none.
I must now draw to a conclusion, by alluding to the fourth principal reason; viz; "That it is a duty imperative on woman to interfere in political affairs.' I think, nay 1 believe, that God ordained woman 'to temper man.' I believe, from this reason, that she ought to partake of his councils, public and private, that she ought to share in the making of laws for the government of the commonwealth, in the same manner as she would join with her husband in the councils of his household. It is a duty she owes to herself, to her husband, to her children, to posterity, and to her common country. When we consider that our earliest thoughts and the bias of our minds - that we are indebted to her for all that makes life a blessing — would it not be unwise, ungrateful, and inhuman in man to deny them every advantage they can possess in society; and would it not be wrong and criminal, in the highest degree, in woman herself to neglect the most important part of her duty, namely, the making of good laws for the guidance of those whom she is instrumental in bringing into the world, and for the good government of the society of which she is an ornament and a member? Every bad law injures society in some way or other: an accumulation of bad laws weakens the bond of peace; and the continuance of bad laws destroys the freedom and happiness of mankind. If woman be silent in the passing of bad laws, she neglects her duty; if she is unconcerned about the accumulation of bad laws, she is criminally apathetic; and if she remains unmoved at the continuance of bad laws, she connives at her ruin; is a party to her own disgrace; links the fetters to her own limbs; rivets the yoke of slavery to her children's necks, and deserves to be ruled over with a rod of iron. My last principal reason, viz. That is it derogatory to the Divine will to neglect so important a duty. I hope I have given sufficient proof in the foregoing pages of the rights and duties of women. I consider that she who neglects her country's good neglects her God. The Creator gave man the earth for his heritage, and bade him go forth, multiply, and replenish, and subdue it – not literally man, but mankind. How, then, can the earth be subdued but by government? and who are the governors and the governed? — Mankind; they are endowed with reason for that purpose, and by the force of such endowment, laws are made congenial with man's nature, for man's government, which constitutes society. There is no distinction made betwixt man and woman, therefore it is a duty imperative upon her to deliberate with man in all affairs of government, for with man she has a concurrent jurisdiction over the things of the earth. If she neglects her duty in the affairs of government, she does that which is derogatory to the Divine will; and. according to the true doctrine of rewards and punishments, brings the penalty of such derogation upon herself. If she fails to exercise a concurrent jurisdiction over the things of the earth, then does she again bring pains and penalties upon her own head, and her punishment is manifested in the passive obedience and slavish subjugation of which we have so many harrowing proofs.
My dear Miss, I must conclude with an earnest appeal to you in defence of our countrywomen. I know you have a brave and noble spirit worthy of your sex: therefore to you do I appeal in their behalf. Go on fearlessly advocating the right of woman to interfere in the affairs of state. I will be with you in your labours, and encourage you in your zeal, to promote the welfare of your country. Tell your countrywomen that it is a duty they owe to God, their country, themselves, and their posterity, to reform all the laws and institutions of the country which do not tend to promote the happiness of the people: to remove, by their combined efforts, the barriers that stand between them and their God, between His laws and the happiness of His people; to throw down the bulwarks of curruption that hem society within the pale of despotism, and shield them from the light of truth; to strike off the fetters that manacle the limbs of the British slaves, that they may march onwards to the goal of freedom, and establish society upon the basis of liberty; that henceforward, now, and evermore, they may adore that God who gave to man the earth for his heritage, and implanted in his breast the glowing principles of liberty, seasoned with the bounteous gift of reason. Tell them, too, they live in a land rich in its natural resources, as the allegorical land of milk and honey, but that bad laws and wicked legislators withhold from them those luxuriant resources which God gave to all men in common; tell them that but for these bad laws and wicked legislators the people would have plenty to eat, plenty to drink, plenty to wear, with good store of all that would render mankind happy and comfortable; tell them that these bad laws will never cease to be, nor wicked legislators cease to rule, until every man of twenty-one years of age, and every woman of twenty,* obtain, by their strenuous exertions, a voice in the election of those whom reason and honesty quality for law-makers and administrators. Tell them this will never come to pass until the women of Scotland, England, Wales, and unfortunate Ireland, stand by and encourage their husbands, fathers, brothers, and sons, forward in the cause of freedom; and that they band themselves together to oppose the progress of despotism, wherever, and whenever, it shall appear - combat it inch by inch, foot to foot meet it — and by their united voices scare it from their threshold, and defeat its purpose.
Trusting to your noble spirit for the dissemination of these my humble opinions, and to your untiring energy for the constant and unremitting exertions in the cause of liberty. I take my leave for the present; but fear not I shall be ever ready to vindicate the Rights of Woman against the oppressor's calumny, and the despot's scourge.
R. RICHARDSON
State Prison, Lancaster Castle
* Spinsters and widows
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Sunshine for Women encourages you to support our feminist sisters by purchasing their books, reading them, disseminating the ideas they contain, but most especially, by making their book available to our sisters, our daughters, and the community at large by requesting your school library, your public library, and area bookstores to carry their books. Remember it is not enough to write literature, history, and theology, we must pass these works on to future generations. Help us to preserve these works for a new generation by putting them on library bookshelves.
Copyrighted, created and maintained by Sunshine, 2003. You have Sunshine's permission to copy and disseminate this document as long as it is attributed to Sunshine and Sunshine's URL appears on the document.
last updated February 2003