What eight million women want

d woman told a halting story of a dissipated son, a shrewish daughter-in-law, and a state of servitude on her own part,-a story pitifully sordid in its details. The farm had co

ure, barns, cattle, tools. Even the money in the bank was his. A clause in the

in the house of another woman,-her son's wife. Was it true that the law took her home away from her,-the farm th

e, for then it became by law your husband's property, precisely as if he had bought it. He had a right to leave it to whom he would

and stood by her father's chair. "Why couldn't you help her?"

rned that a married woman had no existence, in the eyes of the law, apart from her husband. She could own no property; she could neither buy nor sell; she could not receive a gift, even from her own husband. She was, i

rary of sheep-bound books, were the beginning and the end of the law, and to her mind the way to get rid of measures which took women's homes away from them

o her part toward revising many of the laws under which women, in her day, suffered, and her succ

need equalizing. In America, paradise of women, the generally accepted theory that w

e rights they want, sometimes a few that they do not need at all. Is the house yours? The furniture yours? The motor yours? The income y

, and as well protected as the women who live on your block. For a whole big arm

e, intelligent woman, tolerant of her husband's failings, ambitious for her children. She took a large house, furnished it on the installment plan, and filled it with boarders. The boarders gave the family an income larger

rs, he told his wife, had descended on him, seized his busin

furniture with the money my boarders paid me. Nobody can touch my propert

ight she took the case. "A woman's earnings are her

awyer, "and whatever you earn is yours, certainly. That i

Why sho

re liable to attachment for your husband's debts. Unless you make a specific declaration t

have to be recorded in order to keep my

ould be your husband's, not yours. If you bought a house together, the house could be seized for his debts. Everything you buy with your money is yours. Everything

dollars, and she put the money into a first payment on a pretty little cottage. During the first two or three years of the marriage the doctor's wife, from time to time, attended cases of illness, usually contributing her

e had gone his wife found that the house she lived in, and which she had helped to buy, had been sold, without her knowledge or consent. The transaction was perfectly legal. Community property, that

e property. Some time afterwards the father and son quarreled, and the father attempted to get back his property. His plea in court was that his wife's consen

aving a large slice of property given away without her knowledge, but the sam

weakly." Their wives and children work eleven hours a day (or night) and every pay day the men go to the mills and collect their wages. The money belongs to them under the law. Even if the women had the spirit to protest, the protest

Texas woman should appeal to her employer, and tell him that her husband had abandoned her, he would refuse to give the

xcept in Louisiana and Florida, is founded on English common law, and English common law was developed at a period when men were of much greater importance in the state t

t be fed, clothed, and sheltered. What more could they possibly ask? In return for permanent board and clothes, the woman was required to give her husband

rty; she could possess none. Her husband could not give her any, because there could be no contract between a married pair. A contract implies at least two people, and husband and

ten the sons were made heirs, and the wife was left to what tender mercies they owned.

ied woman belonged to her husband. If he chose to rent out her services, or if she offered to work

e for her conduct. Being propertyless, she could not be held to account for wrongs committed. If she stole, or destroyed property, or injured the person of another, if she committed

ch robbed them of every shred of independence they were always reminded that the system at the same time relieved them of every shred of respons

ry good. The law supported them by permitting "moderate correction." A married woman might be kept in wha

English common law, in its application to American women, was made in 1650, when the General Court of Massachusetts Bay Colony decreed t

ade them necessary, new laws were enacted and put into force. In all cases not specifically covered by these new laws, the old English common law was applied. It did not occur to any one that women would ever need sp

ped to raise the roof-tree, her skill and industry, to a very large extent, furnished the house. She spun and wove, cured meat, dried corn, tanned skins, made shoes, dipped candles, and was, in a word, almost the only manufacturer in the coun

why the legal position of most American women to-day

were valuable because of the need of their labor, their special activities. Also, for a very long period, women were scarce, and they were highly prized not alone for their labor, but because their

ca, violence against women was, from the first, an unbearable idea. Laws protecting maid serva

islation was made for her benefit. Her legal status, or rather her absence of legal stat

men at a disadvantage with men. Whatever laws are unfair and oppressive t

ute, a wife is so completely her husband's property that he is responsible for her behavior. If she should rob her neighbor's clothesline, or wreck a chicken yard, her unfortunate husband

. In Massachusetts, for one State, if a woman owned a saloon and sold beer on Sunday, she would be liable to arrest, and so also would her husband, provided he were in the house when the beer was sold. Both would probab

nd most American wives were kindly treated. At least public opinion demanded that they be treated with kindness. Long before any other modifi

ute books. Remember that the only right she had was the right to be supported, and if she left her husband's house she left her only means of living. She could hardly support herself, for few avenues of industry were open to women. She was literally

dsome mahogany bureau, bequeathed her by her grandfather. After a few years of marriage the husband suddenly died, leaving no will. The home and all it contained were sold at auction. The widow was permitted to buy certain objects of furniture, and among them was her cherished bureau. Where the poor

eared, offering his heart and "all his worldly goods." "No, I thank

s women, were active for years, addressing legislative committees in New York and Massachusetts, circulating petitions, writing to newspapers, agitating everywhere in favor of married women's property

ghts. It was not until 1848 that a really effective Married Women's Property Law was secured, by action of the N

women themselves was a matter for grave conjecture. It was not suggested by any of the American debaters, as it was later on the floors of the English Parliament, that women, if they controlled their own property, would undoubt

easily be gambled away, or wasted through improvidence, or diverted to the use of strangers. In other words, they knew that their property, when daughters inherited it

the agitation against women's legal disabilities. The National Woman Suffrage Association, oldest of all women's organization

cases a woman lawyer is made chairman, and the work is done under her direction. Sometimes, as in Texas, a well known and friendly man lawyer is retained for the task. Almost invariably the report of the legislative commi

do, which is literally the woman's paradise. In Colorado it would be difficult to find even the smallest inequality between men and women. They vote on equal terms, and if any woman deserves to go to the legislature

guard their interests they have a Legislative Committee of the State Feder

legislature, and every bill which directly affects women and children, before

olorado. They are permitted to hold any office. They are co-guardians of their children, and the education of children has been placed almost entirely in the hands of women. This does not mean that Colorado has we

would choose for a residence. The laws of Louisiana were based, not on the English common law

e great Napoleon, closing a conference on his famous

certain chapter of the Daughters of the Confederacy a number of very valuable relics of her husband, and of the short-lived Confederate Government. Her action was made public, and it was then revealed that two

ld not legally do so, and after you were married, if your husband wanted that pickle-fork, he could get it. Your clothing, your dowry, become community property as soon as the marriage ceremony is over, and community property in Louisiana is controlled absolut

their children. At his death she may become their guardian, but if she marries a second time-and the law permits her to remarry, provided she waits ten months-she retains h

few men are so unjust to their wives as to take advantage of unequal property rights. Laws always lag behind the sense of justice wh

des Colorado where women vote-women are in such a minority that their votes are powerless to remove all their disabilities. Very rarely have club women even so much felicity as the New York Sta

, but the proud boast that in America no woman is the slave of her husband will have to be

, Louisiana, California, Arizona, North Dakota, and Idaho. He has virtual control-that i

as traders on their own account in these States: Georgia, Mont

re permitted to work o

States a married woman may not engage in any business without permission from the courts. In Texas, Louisiana, and Georgia this is the case. In Wyoming, where women vo

red from seven of the United States. The legal profession is closed to women in

e learned professions by refusing them the advantages of

en's taxes help support the universities. These States are Georgia, Virginia, Lou

labama or Arkansas, if you are a woman. In Alabama, indeed, you may not be a minister of the gospel, a

he club women began the study of their position before the law they were amazed to find, in all but ten of the States and territories, that they had absolutely no

contribute to their support, she has joint guardianship. Under som

away, or willed away, from the mother. That this almost never happens is due largely to th

act that courts of justice are growing r

ried life, left him, taking with her their two little girls. South Carolina allows no divorce for any cause. The sanctity of the marriage tie is held so lightly in South Carolina that the law permits

the children. He could not care for the children, probably had no wish to have them near him, but he took them back to South Carolina,

lman, however, showed so little respect for the statutes that she sued her husband and his parents to recover her babies. The judge before whom the suit was brought was in a dilemma. There was

ns that selfish and lazy fathers are anxious to put their children to work, when the mothers know they are far too young. A woman in Scranton, Pennsylvania, told me, with tears filling her eyes, that he

ren. He can collect their wages, and he does. Very, very oft

unopened. It was his regular day for getting drunk and indulging in an orgy of gambling. Often more than half of the girls' wages would have vanished bef

mother that may claim the p

gent women. But their protests have been received with apathy, and, in some instances, with contempt by legislators. Only last year a determined fight was made by the

tury ago. If women had the guardianship of their children, would anything prevent them from taking the children and leaving home? What would become of the sanctity

ults. There are no laws compelling the husband to support his wife. The husband is under an assumed obligation to support his family, but there exists no means of forcing him to do his duty. Family desertion has become one of the commonest and one of the most baffling of modern social

de it a felony. Unfortunately there has been devised no machinery to enforce these laws, so they are practicall

ough he is counted a felon, needs only to cross the river to New Jersey to be reasonably safe. Imagine the State of New York spending good money to chase a man whom it does not want as

feudal conditions, and has for its very basis the assumption of the weakness, ig

n's intellectual ability to decide their own legal status, they are, taken the country over, rather better educated than men. There are more girls than boys in the high schools of the United States; more girls than boys in the higher grammar grades.

en are beginning to think of themselves as independent human beings. Their work of bearing and rear

claim in her husband's income. American women may not need such a law, but they insist that they need something to