And
they have had children because they could not help it, transmitting to
their daughters their own lack of maternal instinct. Under the new
regime a large proportion of such women do not marry, and accordingly
have few if any children to inherit their defects. Hence the average
level of maternal instinct of the women of America is likely steadily to
rise.
We conclude that any claim of biological equality of the two sexes must
use the word in a figurative sense, not ignoring the differentiation of
the two sexes, as extreme feminists are inclined to do. To this
differentiation we shall return later.
2. Political equality includes the demand for the vote and for the
removal of various legal restrictions, such as have sometimes prevented
a wife from disposing of her own property without the consent of her
husband or such as have made her citizenship follow that of her husband.
In the United States, these legal restrictions are rapidly being
removed, at such a rate that in some states it is now the husband who
has a right to complain of certain legal discriminations.
Equal suffrage is also gaining steadily, but its eugenic aspect is not
wholly clear. Theoretically much is to be said for it, as making use of
woman's large social sympathies and responsibilities and interest in the
family; but in the states where it has been tried, its effects have not
been all that was hoped.
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