rs. But however that may be, no greater absurdity, to use no
harsher term, could be presented, than that of rewarding men and
punishing women for the same act, _without giving to women any
voice in the question which should he rewarded and which punished_.

I am aware, however, that we are here to be governed by the
Constitution and laws as they are, and that if the defendant has
been guilty of violating the law, she must submit to the penalty,
however unjust or absurd the law may be. But courts are not
required to so interpret laws or constitutions as to produce either
absurdity or injustice, so long as they are open to a more
reasonable interpretation. This must be my excuse for what I design
to say in regard to the propriety of female suffrage, because with
that propriety established there is very little difficulty in
finding sufficient warrant in the Constitution for its exercise.
This case, in its legal aspects, presents three questions which I
propose to discuss.

1. Was the defendant legally entitled to vote at the election in
question?

2. If she was not entitled to vote but believed that she was, and
voted in good faith in that belief, did such voting constitute a
crime under the statute before referred to?

3. Did the defendant vote in good faith in that belief?

He argued the case from a legal, constitutional and moral standpoint
and concluded:

One other matter will close what I have to say. Miss Anthony
believed, and was advised, that she had a right to vote. She may
also have been advised, as was clearly the fact, that the question
as to her right could not be brought before the courts for trial
without her voting or offering to vote, and if either was criminal,
the one was as much so as the other. Therefore she stands now
arraigned as a criminal, for taking the only step by which it was
possible to bring the great constitutional question as to her right
before the tribunals of the country for adjudication. If for thus
acting, in the most perfect good faith, with motives as pure and
impulses as noble as any which can find place in your honor's
breast in the administration of justice, she is by the laws of her
country to be condemned as a criminal, she must abide the
consequences. Her condemnation, however, under such circumstances,
would only add another most we