If this lady have, as she unquestionably has, the strength of intellect conceded to her by the Senator from Massachusetts and evidenced by her own production, her judgment of woman is worth that of a continent of men.  The best judge of any woman is a woman.  The poorest judge of any woman is a man.  Let any woman with defect or flaw go amongst a community of men and she will be a successful impostor.  Let her go amongst a community of women and in one instant the instinct, the atmosphere circumambient, will tell her story.

Mrs. Leonard gives us the result of her opinion and of her experience as to whether this right of suffrage should be conferred upon her own sex.  The Senator from Massachusetts speaks of her evidence in a political campaign in Massachusetts and that her unaided and single evidence crushed down the governor of that great State.  I thank the Senator for that statement.  If Mrs. Leonard had been an office-holder and a voter not a single township would have believed the truth of what she uttered.

Mr. Hoar.  She was an office-holder, and the governor tried to put her out.

Mr. Vest. Ah! but what sort of an office-holder?  She held the office delegated to her by God himself, a ministering angel to the sick, the afflicted, and the insane.  What man in his senses would take from woman this sphere?  What man would close to her the charitable institutions and eleemosynary establishments of the country?  That is part of her kingdom; that is part of her undisputed sway and realm.  Is that the office to which woman suffragists of this country ask us now to admit them?  Is it to be the director of a hospital?  Is it to the presidency of a board of visitors of an eleemosynary institution?  Oh, no; they want to be Presidents, to be Senators, and Members of the House of Representatives, and, God save the mark, ministerial and executive officers, sheriffs, constables, and marshals.

Of course, this lady is found in this board of directors.  Where else should a true woman be found?  Where else has she always been found but by the fevered brow, the palsied hand, the erring intellect, ay, God bless them, from the cradle to the grave the guide and support of the faltering steps of childhood and the weakening steps of old age!

Oh, no, Mr. President; this will not do.  If we are to tear down all the blessed traditions, if we are to desolate our homes and firesides, if we are to unsex our mothers and wives and sisters and turn our blessed temples of domestic peace into ward political-assembly rooms, pass this joint resolution.  But for one I thank God that I am so old-fashioned that I would not give one memory of my grandmother or my mother for all the arguments that could be piled, Pelion upon Ossa, in favor of this political monstrosity.