, you are today
receiving more praise from the best men of the party than for any
and all of your utterances inside the line of the platform. I know,
if you had in your letter of acceptance, or in your New York
speech, declared yourself in favor of "perfect equality of rights
for women, civil and political," you would have touched an electric
spark which would have fired the hearts of the women of the entire
nation, and made the triumph of the Republican party more grand and
glorious than any it ever has seen.

Third.--As to picking fruit before it is ripe! Allow me to remind
you that very much fruit is never picked; some is nipped in the
bud; some is worm-eaten and falls to the ground; some rots on the
trees before it ripens; some, too slow in ripening, is bitten by
the early frosts of autumn; while some rare, ripe apples hang until
frozen and worthless on the leafless boughs! Really, Mr. Garfield,
if after passing through the war of the rebellion and sixteen years
in Congress; if after seeing and hearing and repeating that _no
class_ ever got justice and equality of chances from any government
except it had the power--the ballot--to clutch them for itself; if
after all your opportunities for growth and development, you can
not yet see the truth of the great principle of individual
self-government; if you have reached only the idea of
class-government, and that, too, of the most hateful and cruel
form--bounded by sex--there must be some radical defect in the
ethics of the party of which you are the chosen leader.

No matter which party administers the government, women will
continue to get only subordinate positions and half pay, not
because of the party's or the President's lack of chivalric regard,
but because, in the nature of things, it is impossible for any
government to protect a disfranchised class in equality of chances.
Women, to get justice, must have political freedom. But pardon this
long trespass upon your time and patience, and please bear in mind
that it is not for the many good things the Republican party and
its nominee have done in extending the area of liberty that I
criticise them, but because they have failed to place the women of
the nation on the plane of political equality with men. I do not
ask you to go beyond your