Why Women Shouldn't Be Allowed to Vote

At the height of the movement to gain the vote for women in the United States, Alice Duer Miller (1874-1942), an author and a feminist, compiled a list of all the reasons that were being given in newspaper editorials, by politicians, and in public debate, against allowing women to vote.

Noting that the arguments were directly contradictory, she wrote the following set of paired statements to show how the contending arguments canceled each other out.

Our Own Twelve Anti-Suffragist Reasons

1. Because no woman will leave her domestic duties to vote.

2. Because no woman who may vote will attend to her domestic duties.

3. Because it will make dissension between husband and wife.

4. Because every women will vote as her husband tells her to.

5. Because bad women will corrupt politics.

6. Because bad politics will corrupt women. 7. Because women have no power of organization.

8. Because women will form a solid party and out-vote men.

9. Because men and women are so different that they must stick to different duties.

10. Because men and women are so much like that men, with one vote each, can represent their own views and ours too.

11. Because women cannot use force.

12. Because the militants did use force.