The statement is further made by Suffragists that "though woman needs protection of one man against his whole sex, in pioneer life, in threading her way through a lonely forest, on the highway, or in the streets of a metropolis on a dark night, she sometimes needs, too, the protection of all men against this one. But even if she could be sure, as she is not, of the ever-present, all-protecting power of one strong arm, that would be weak indeed compared with the subtle, all-pervading influence of just and equal laws for all women. Hence woman's need of the ballot, that she may hold in her own right hand the weapon of self-protection and defence." The possession of the ballot has not been able to secure for men "the subtle and all-pervading influence of just and equal laws," and despite his holding the ballot in his own hand, man has had to hold also a more apparent weapon if he visit a striker's camp or meddle with an anarchist riot. Something more tangible than protective influence is needed to make the public streets of this city safe for women in broad daylight. Again, they say that "Wisdom would suggest division of labor in peace as well as in war." Wisdom would have no chance to make such a suggestion, if women attempted to do the same work as do men, in the same way. There is true division of labor now, in peace as well as in war.
Suffragists mention as a final indignity the extension of the suffrage to the negro. Their protest only serves to suggest another forcible illustration of the fact that law and the enforcement of law may be different things. The suffrage is not extended to the negro. The Congress of the United States voted that it should be so extended; and while the Government stood behind his vote with its military power, the negro voted. But no one pretends that he has done so, to any practical extent, since that time. Unarmed, the negro finds that he cannot enforce his own vote against the will of white men armed to the teeth. The "all-pervading influence of just and equal laws" cannot enforce it for him. Would the women be any better off, if the men chose that they should not exercise the vote? Who would enforce it?
This fact and argument show how little arbitration has to do with the practical decision concerning suffrage. Suffrage writers and speakers harp upon the thought that arbitration will take the place of force. That method of settling disputes cannot come too quickly, but it has not come yet. It has no real bearing on the organization of the state as resting upon the civil and military service of its citizens. England consented to arbitrate with the powerful United States, but refused to arbitrate with defenceless Nicaragua in a far less important matter. Congress has seriously considered exterminating the remnant of the beautiful herd of seals that once played in our Northern Pacific waters, because British subjects have continued, in violation of the Arbitration treaty, to kill the animals with cruelty. Behind arbitration, as behind all law and order, military power must always stand and must sometimes be used. One more proof that the vote is not the real power, but only its insignia, lies in the fact that legislation has not been able to put an end to strikes and riots. Laws that forbid them are passed with all due form; but when they come, as come they do, the reading of the riot act is suspended and the regiments are ordered to Chicago, or Buffalo, or Brooklyn, or Homestead, or Cripple Creek, or Cleveland, or the Indian country. The force of those bodies was not "brutal," it was physical power obeying mental; and unless mental power can command physical, there is no way in which mental power can enforce its decrees in government. There are now facing us tremendous moral issues, which presage tremendous struggles; and a very notable example of the dangers that would attend woman suffrage is suggested by them. If women had the power to create a numerical majority when there was a majority of the law's natural and only defenders against them, they might soon precipitate a crisis that would lead to bloodshed, which they would be powerless either to prevent or to allay. Would the majority of men submit to the minority of men associated with non-combatants? American history furnishes no reason for supposing that they would. The Dorr War in Rhode Island is a case in point, in local matters. I am neither an alarmist nor a believer in war as a panacea; but if we discuss this subject at all, we must discuss it with facts and not fancies in our minds.