Look at this prosecution as you will, it presents a fine dilemma to
solve; it presents to the country, as never before, the most important
and vital question of United States rights; it presents the most
important and vital question of unconstitutional power which has grown
to such dimensions in the hands of United States officials; and it must
bring to people's cognizance the very slight thread by which hangs the
security of any citizen's right to the ballot.
Governments try themselves. No government has been stable in the past;
all have fallen because all have been one-sided; all have permitted the
degradation of woman. Babylon fell; her religion defiled woman; the
hand-writing appeared upon the wall, and in a single night she was
overthrown. Neither was Rome immortal; her laws were class laws; the
rights of humanity were not respected; she underwent many changes, and
that vast empire which once ruled the world lives now only in name.
Egypt held the wisdom of the world, and as to a certain extent she
recognized the equality of woman, her empire endured for ages; at last,
she too fell, for her civilization was still an unequal one.
Special laws, or laws specially defined for one particular body of
people, on account of race, color, sex, or occupation, is class
legislation, and bears the seeds of death within itself.
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