Title: The First Essay on the Political Rights of Women
Author: Condorcet, Jean-Antoine-Nicolas de Caritat, marquis de, 1743-1794
Language: English
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                            THE FIRST ESSAY
                                  ON
                    The Political Rights of Women.


         A Translation of CONDORCET’S Essay “_Sur l’admission
            des femmes au droit de Cité_” (On the Admission
                of Women to the Rights of Citizenship).
                      --_Collected Writings_, 1789.


                                  BY
                      DR. ALICE DRYSDALE VICKERY.

                      (WITH PREFACE AND REMARKS.)


                              LETCHWORTH:
                      GARDEN CITY PRESS LIMITED.

                           =Price Twopence.=



Preface.


More than one hundred years have passed away since, in 1789, the
Marquis de Condorcet wrote his “_Esquisse sur l’Admission des Femmes
au Droit de Cité_,” and yet the problem of women’s enfranchisement
still awaits an equitable solution. Those of us who are old enough to
remember the inauguration of the popular movement for the extension of
the franchise to women (which may be dated from the day in which our
late noble leader, JOHN STUART MILL, addressed the House of Commons on
this subject, in May, 1867), feel that our lives are passing away
while wearily awaiting the dilatory educational development of mankind
in this question.

The essential principles of our claim have been reiterated again and
again. We form one-half of the human race, and need recognition by the
law as much as the other half of the race. But, as long as our
law-makers are not directly responsible to us for their conduct in
Parliament, they may, and do, safely neglect our interests, and pass
laws which jeopardise our liberties and subordinate our just rights of
person, property, and offspring to the supposed interests of the men
whom they represent.

The spirit which animates Parliament pervades the whole of our social
life; and women suffer from lack of educational facilities, and from
obstacles to success in industrial and professional life, in ways
which have no parallel in the case of men. All these things have been
urged again and again until we are weary of repeating them; and we ask
ourselves, as we mentally review our position, Where shall we find
some new argument wherewith to arrest the attention, and compel the
action, of those who have the power, but seem to lack the will, to do
justice? It is curious to note that the great point on which the mass
of men seem united is their _sex_. Prejudices of race, of caste, of
colour may be overcome; but the pride of sex remains. Rights of
citizenship are accorded to the small shopkeeper, artisan, lodger,
agricultural labourer, and to the illiterate who knows no difference
between one party and the other, either as to tendencies or methods of
government. The Anglo-Saxon confers rights of citizenship upon the
foreigner, upon the negro (as in the United States), upon the Maori
(as in New Zealand)--the last of whom, sitting in the New Zealand
House of Representatives, helped to maintain this glorious prerogative
of sex by giving their casting-votes against a measure intended to
meet the claims of the Anglo-Saxon women in New Zealand.[1]

    [1] The Parliamentary Franchise was conferred on the women of
    New Zealand in 1893, the same year in which the above was
    printed. In 1907 the Hon. R. Oliver, late member of the
    Legislative Council, writes: “The interest now taken by women
    in New Zealand in the politics of the country is remarkable,
    and is regarded as a decided gain to the community.”

And all this despite the admitted fact that the social and economic
problems, which are coming more and more into the field of
parliamentary labours, are all but incapable of solution without the
help of enfranchised women.

Must women, then, following the example of men, learn to put sex in
the first place and regard all other interests as secondary? Is this
really what men wish to force women to do? One would think not. At
present women have not adopted any such principle of action. They are
divided rather than otherwise, according to the relations they occupy
with regard to men. The married woman, on the one hand, seems opposed
to the claims of the widowed and single, on the other--and _vice
versâ_; and both together combine to ostracise some of their own sex.
It seems probable, however, that we women will have to learn to drop
all such rivalries, and determine to form one vast organisation, which
shall include within its ranks all sorts and conditions of women, and
shall extend over the whole of the United Kingdom, if we would not see
this nineteenth century completed without Woman’s Emancipation
becoming an accomplished fact.

                                                (DR.) ALICE VICKERY.



On the Admission of Women to the Rights of Citizenship.

BY THE MARQUIS DE CONDORCET.


Custom may familiarise mankind with the violation of their natural
rights to such an extent, that even among those who have lost or been
deprived of these rights, no one thinks of reclaiming them, or is even
conscious that they have suffered any injustice.

Certain of these violations (of natural right) have escaped the notice
of philosophers and legislators, even while concerning themselves
zealously to establish the common rights of individuals of the human
race, and in this way to lay the foundation of political institutions.
For example, have they not all violated the principle of the equality
of rights in tranquilly depriving one-half of the human race of the
right of taking part in the formation of laws by the exclusion of
women from the rights of citizenship? Could there be a stronger proof
of the power of habit, even among enlightened men, than to hear
invoked the principle of equal rights in favour of perhaps some 300 or
400 men, who had been deprived of it by an absurd prejudice, and
forget it when it concerns some 12,000,000 women?

To show that this exclusion is not an act of tyranny, it must be
proved either that the natural rights of women are not absolutely the
same as those of men, or that women are not capable of exercising
these rights.

But the rights of men result simply from the fact that they are
rational, sentient beings, susceptible of acquiring ideas of morality,
and of reasoning concerning those ideas. Women having, then, the same
qualities, have necessarily the same rights. Either no individual of
the human species has any true rights, or all have the same; and he or
she who votes against the rights of another, whatever may be his or
her religion, colour, or sex, has by that fact abjured his own.

It would be difficult to prove that women are incapable of exercising
the rights of citizenship. Although liable to become mothers of
families, and exposed to other passing indispositions, why may they
not exercise rights of which it has never been proposed to deprive
those persons who periodically suffer from gout, bronchitis, etc.?
Admitting for the moment that there exists in men a superiority of
mind, which is not the necessary result of a difference of education
(which is by no means proved, but which should be, to permit of women
being deprived of a natural right without injustice), this inferiority
can only consist in two points. It is said that no woman has made any
important discovery in science, or has given any proofs of the
possession of genius in arts, literature, etc.; but, on the other
hand, it is not pretended that the rights of citizenship should be
accorded only to men of genius. It is added that no woman has the same
extent of knowledge, the same power of reasoning, as certain men; but
what results from that? Only this, that with the exception of a
limited number of exceptionally enlightened men, equality is absolute
between women and the remainder of the men; that this small class
apart, inferiority and superiority are equally divided between the two
sexes. But since it would be completely absurd to restrict to this
superior class the rights of citizenship and the power of being
entrusted with public functions, why should women be excluded any more
than those men who are inferior to a great number of women? Lastly,
shall it be said that there exists in the minds and hearts of women
certain qualities which ought to exclude them from the enjoyment of
their natural rights? Let us interrogate the facts. Elizabeth of
England, Maria Theresa, the two Catherines of Russia--have they not
shown that neither in courage nor in strength of mind are women
wanting?

Elizabeth possessed all the failings of women. Did these failings work
more harm during her reign than resulted from the failings of men
during the reign of her father, Henry VIII., or her successor, James
I.? Have the lovers of certain empresses exercised a more dangerous
influence than the mistresses of Louis XIV., of Louis XV., or even of
Henry IV.?

Will it be maintained that Mistress Macaulay would not have expressed
her opinions in the House of Commons better than many representatives
of the British nation? In dealing with the question of liberty of
conscience, would she not have expressed more elevated principles than
those of Pitt, as well as more powerful reasoning? Although as great
an enthusiast on behalf of liberty as Mr. Burke could be on behalf of
its opposite, would she, while defending the French Constitution, have
made use of such absurd and offensive nonsense as that which this
celebrated rhetorician made use of in attacking it? Would not the
adopted daughter of Montaigne have better defended the rights of
citizens in France, in 1614, than the Councillor Courtin, who was a
believer in magic and occult powers? Was not the Princesse des Ursins
superior to Chamillard? Could not the Marquise de Chatelet have
written equally as well as M. Rouillé? Would Mme. de Lambert have made
laws as absurd and as barbarous as those of the “garde des Sceaux,” of
Armenouville, against Protestants, invaders of domestic privacy,
robbers and negroes? In looking back over the list of those who have
governed the world, men have scarcely the right to be so very
uplifted.

Women are superior to men in the gentle and domestic virtues; they, as
well as men, know how to love liberty, although they do not
participate in all its advantages; and in republics they have been
known to sacrifice themselves for it. They have shown that they
possess the virtues of citizens whenever chance or civil disasters
have brought them upon a scene from which they have been shut out by
the pride and the tyranny of men in all nations.

It has been said that women, in spite of much ability, of much
sagacity, and of a power of reasoning carried to a degree equalling
that of subtle dialecticians, yet are never governed by what is called
“reason.”

This observation is not correct. Women are not governed, it is true,
by the reason (and experience) of men; they are governed by their own
reason (and experience).

Their interests not being the same (as those of men) by the fault of
the law, the same things not having the same importance for them as
for men, they may, without failing in rational conduct, govern
themselves by different principles, and tend towards a different
result. It is as reasonable for a woman to concern herself respecting
her personal attractions as it was for Demosthenes to cultivate his
voice and his gestures.

It is said that women, although superior in some respects to man--more
gentle, more sensitive, less subject to those vices which proceed from
egotism and hardness of heart--yet do not really possess the sentiment
of justice; that they obey rather their feelings than their
conscience. This observation is more correct, but it proves nothing;
it is not nature, it is education, it is social existence which
produces this difference.

Neither the one nor the other has habituated women to the idea of what
is just, but only to the idea of what is “honnête,” or respectable.
Excluded from public affairs, from all those things which are judged
of according to rigorous ideas of justice, or according to positive
laws, the things with which they are occupied and which are affected
by them are precisely those which are regulated by natural feelings of
honesty (or, rather, propriety) and of sentiment. It is, then, unjust
to allege as an excuse for continuing to refuse to women the enjoyment
of all their natural rights motives which have only a kind of reality
because women lack the experience which comes from the exercise of
these rights.

If reasons such as these are to be admitted against women, it will
become necessary to deprive of the rights of citizenship that portion
of the people who, devoted to constant labour, can neither acquire
knowledge nor exercise their reason; and thus, little by little, only
those persons would be permitted to be citizens who had completed a
course of legal study. If such principles are admitted, we must, as a
natural consequence, renounce the idea of a liberal constitution. The
various aristocracies have only had such principles as these for
foundation or excuse. The etymology of the word is a sufficient proof
of this.

Neither can the subjection of wives to their husbands be alleged
against their claims, since it would be possible in the same statute
to destroy this tyranny of the civil law. The existence of one
injustice can never be accepted as a reason for committing another.

There remain, then, only two objections to discuss. And, in truth,
these can only oppose motives of expediency against the admission of
women to the right of voting; which motives can never be upheld as a
bar to the exercise of true justice. The contrary maxim has only too
often served as the pretext and excuse of tyrants; it is in the name
of expediency that commerce and industry groan in chains; and that
Africa remains afflicted with slavery: it was in the name of public
expediency that the Bastille was crowded; that the censorship of the
press was instituted; that accused persons were not allowed to
communicate with their advisers; that torture was resorted to.
Nevertheless, we will discuss these objections, so as to leave nothing
without reply.

It is necessary, we are warned, to be on guard against the influence
exercised by women over men. We reply at once that this, like any
other influence, is much more to be feared when not exercised openly;
and that, whatever influence may be peculiar to women, if exercised
upon more than one individual at a time, will in so far become
proportionately lessened. That since, up to this time, women have not
been admitted in any country to absolute equality; since their empire
has none the less existed everywhere; and since the more women have
been degraded by the laws, the more dangerous has their influence
been; it does not appear that this remedy of subjection ought to
inspire us with much confidence. Is it not probable, on the contrary,
that their special empire would diminish if women had less interest in
its preservation; if it ceased to be for them their sole means of
defence, and of escape from persecution?

If politeness does not permit to men to maintain their opinions
against women in society, this politeness, it may be said, is near
akin to pride; we yield a victory of no importance; defeat does not
humiliate when it is regarded as voluntary. Is it seriously believed
that it would be the same in a public discussion on an important
topic? Does politeness forbid the bringing of an action at law against
a woman?

But, it will be said, this change will be contrary to general
expediency, because it will take women away from those duties which
nature has reserved for them. This objection scarcely appears to me
well founded. Whatever form of constitution may be established, it is
certain that in the present state of civilisation among European
nations there will never be more than a limited number of citizens
required to occupy themselves with public affairs. Women will no more
be torn from their homes than agricultural labourers from their
ploughs, or artisans from their workshops. And, among the richer
classes, we nowhere see women giving themselves up so persistently to
domestic affairs that we should fear to distract their attention; and
a really serious occupation or interest would take them less away than
the frivolous pleasures to which idleness, a want of object in life,
and an inferior education have condemned them.

The principal source of this fear is the idea that every person
admitted to exercise the rights of citizenship immediately aspires to
govern others. This may be true to a certain extent, at a time when
the constitution is being established, but the feeling can scarcely
prove durable. And so it is scarcely necessary to believe that because
women may become members of national assemblies, they would
immediately abandon their children, their homes, and their needles.
They would only be the better fitted to educate their children and to
rear men. It is natural that a woman should suckle her infant; that
she should watch over its early childhood. Detained in her home by
these cares, and less muscular than the man, it is also natural that
she should lead a more retired, a more domestic life. The woman,
therefore, as well as the man in a corresponding class of life, would
be under the necessity of performing certain duties at certain times
according to circumstances. This may be a motive for not giving her
the preference in an election, but it cannot be a reason for legal
exclusion. Gallantry would doubtless lose by the change, but domestic
customs would be improved by equality in this as in other things.

Up to this time the manners of all nations have been more or less
brutal and corrupt. I only know of one exception, and that is in
favour of the Americans of the United States, who are spread, few in
number, over a wide territory. Up to this time, among all nations,
legal inequality has existed between men and women; and it would not
be difficult to show that, in these two phenomena, the second is one
of the causes of the first, because inequality necessarily introduces
corruption, and is the most common cause of it, if even it be not the
sole cause.

I now demand that opponents should condescend to refute these
propositions by other methods than by pleasantries and declamations;
above all, that they should show me any natural difference between men
and women which may legitimately serve as foundation for the
deprivation of a right.

The equality of rights established between men by our new constitution
has brought down upon us eloquent declamations and never-ending
pleasantries; but up till now no one has been able to oppose to it one
single reason, and this is certainly neither from lack of talent nor
lack of zeal. I venture to believe that it will be the same with
regard to equality of rights between the two sexes. It is sufficiently
curious that, in a great number of countries, women have been judged
incapable of all public functions yet worthy of royalty; that in
France a woman has been able to be regent, and yet that up to 1776 she
could not be a milliner or dressmaker (“marchande des modes”) in
Paris, except under cover of her husband’s name;[2] and that, lastly,
in our elective assemblies they have accorded to rights of property
what they have refused to natural right. Many of our noble deputies
owe to ladies the honour of sitting among the representatives of the
nation. Why, instead of depriving of this right women who were owners
of landed estates, was it not extended to all those who possessed
property or were heads of households? Why, if it be found absurd to
exercise the right of citizenship by proxy, deprive women of this
right, rather than leave them the liberty of exercising it in person?

    [2] Before the suppression of “jurandes,” in 1776, women
    could neither carry on a business of a “marchande des modes”
    (milliner and dressmaker) nor of any other profession
    exercised by them, unless they were married, or unless some
    man lent or sold them his name for that purpose.--_See_
    preamble of the Edict of 1776.



REMARKS.


Although I am not aware of any previous translation of the foregoing
essay, and do not remember to have seen anywhere any allusion to this
first publication on the subject of woman’s emancipation, yet I have
been struck by the close similarity of the arguments used by J. S.
Mill and by those who have succeeded him in the advocacy of women’s
electoral freedom to those used by the Marquis de Condorcet in this
essay. It could not, indeed, well be otherwise, since the fundamental
principle of equal rights, and equal claim to protection in the
exercise of these rights, must present itself in the same forcible
light to any really intelligent person who is truly anxious to lay
down just and fair principles of government. That it should be within
the reach of every individual of the human race to attain to the power
of influencing the Government under which he or she lives, follows
inevitably to logical minds, and the only exceptions which can fairly
be made are those of the immature and the failures.

The immature, indeed, can scarcely be called exceptions, since
maturity succeeds immaturity--the child becomes the adult; and as
physical, moral, and intellectual powers are acquired, civil rights
must be accorded.

The failures, then, include all those who can with due regard to just
principles be entirely excluded; and these are the idiot, who never
reaches maturity; the lunatic, who, becoming diseased, loses the
mental and moral characteristics of maturity; and the criminal, who is
coming more and more to be looked upon as partaking of the character
of the idiot and the lunatic. I venture to think, then, that the real
issue is narrowing itself down to this: that the opponents of women’s
emancipation really regard all women either as perpetually immature
(to whom they will accord more or less protection, privilege, or even
adoration, just as they admire the innocence of childhood), or as the
perpetual failures of the race.

If women continue to be excluded from electoral functions, it will be
because a majority of men in their secret hearts relegate them to one
or other of these classes. But there are, happily, increasing numbers
of men who are perfectly aware of, and sympathise with the indignation
of women at the affront thus put upon them. These men cannot but feel
that the insult thus publicly affixed to all women affects them also.
They say: “We are the sons of women, and may in our turn also become
fathers of women. Are we, then, sons of slaves, and shall we in turn
create slaves to hinder the development and lower the morality of our
sons? No! we believe that women ought to be free and equal before the
law, so that they may become mothers of free and equal sons and
daughters, helping in each other’s development, ennobling and no
longer enslaving each other.”

If the issue narrows down, looked at from first principles, it
broadens out indefinitely as the details of its applications and
effects come before us. These are wide and far-reaching, and space
fails for entering upon them here. But in the struggles of the
labouring classes, in the societies for reform of evils, for the
spread of improvements, in the work of the County Council, etc., we
find that women’s help is needed, and that it either cannot be given
at all, or is miserably curtailed in its power for good and useful
work, because it is not accompanied by the electoral powers which back
up men’s endeavours. So it must remain till the power of the vote is
granted, and so does the Nemesis of injustice and inequality before
the law daily work out its revenge.



TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:

Original spelling and punctuation have been preserved. Two printer's
errors have been fixed: on page 3, the year 1879 has been changed to
1789. On page 5, the second and third lines were reversed. The proper
word order has been restored.





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