"
The brutal teachings of Brigham Young and his councillors and all the
laws and institutions of Utah are intended to reduce woman to utter and
abject servitude, and to resist this power in the earlier days when they
were sensitive to the touch of the tyrant's will would have been a very
dangerous experiment; but now, with help stretching towards them, they
seem to be too throughly paralyzed by years of total submission to be
able to avail themselves of it.
The numbering of the vote is a very essential element in the ballot, as
by that means the priesthood has knowledge of the failure of any man or
woman to vote as they have been ordered. The Edmunds commission reports
as follows in regard to Woman's suffrage: "We are satisfied that owing
to the peculiar state of affairs in Utah--this law is an obstruction to
the speedy solution of the vexed question."
There are many laws on the statute books detrimental to women. No right
of dower exists in the territory, and the legislators at their last
session wholly refused to provide for it.
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