n. There
was still much to be done in securing opportunity for women; but they
could go on establishing the type of life that free women were to live.
Their problems were, however, even more complex than those which
confronted their predecessors. What line of education should women
pursue? What lines of work could they best undertake? How could they
combine an independent professional or industrial career with the life
of a home and the responsibilities of a mother? How far must older
social restraints be modified in the interest of intellectual and
industrial freedom? It was a time for constructive statesmanship, rather
than for revolution; and each woman knew she was under criticism, and
that her success or failure was vastly more than her own personal
concern. In her all free women were being judged.

To the third generation belongs the host of women who are to-day filling
our college halls, managing the women's clubs, teaching the state
schools, and competing with men in every industrial calling. Theirs is
the task of completing woman's social and political emancipation, and of
educating them to meet their newfound liberties. It is possible that
this present generation has a keener sense of rights than of duties; and
the young women of to-day must be led to realize that the delicate
adjustments still to be worked out require devotion equal to that of
the earlier generations, if the toll of wasted life is not to be
excessive.

What now is the relation of women to the range of political activity
described in the last chapter? Have they need of the protection which
government gives? Are they able to form political judgments? Have they
knowledge of the working of political machinery; or, lacking it, are
they prepared to obtain it? Are they able to make a wise selection of
people to represent them in political action? Have they need of the
training which participation in political life gives? Have they the
preliminary preparation to take up that training to advantage, and can
they undertake these duties without serious loss of qualities desirable
in women?

Women certainly have need of protection; each has a life dear to her,
and honor which is dearer to her than life. In this respect she has a
greater need than men. Most women, also, have property of some kind, and
we are increasingly recognizing their right to control this for
themselves; hence they need property protection the same as men. We do
not need to think