"Woman has always had the right to property and wages, the right to make contracts and do business in her own name. And even married women, by recent legislation, have been secured in these civil rights. Woman now holds a vast amount of the property in the country, and pays her full proportion of taxes. On what principle, then, do you deny her representation?"

"We propose no new theories. We simply ask that you secure to ALL the practical application of the immutable principles of our government, without distinction of race, color or sex. And we urge our demand now, because you have the opportunity and the power to take this onward step in legislation. The nations of the earth stand watching and waiting to see if our Revolutionary idea, 'all men are created equal,' can be realized in government. Crush not, we pray you, the million hopes that hang on our success. Men and parties must pass away, but justice is eternal."

"The only tenable ground of representation is UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE, as it is only through Universal Suffrage that the principle of 'Equal Rights to All' can be realized. All prohibitions based on race, color, sex, property, or education, are violations of the republican idea. You assume to be the representatives of 15,000,000 women — American citizens — who already possess every attainable qualification for the ballot. Women read and write, hold many offices under government, pay taxes, and the penalties of crime, and yet are allowed to exercise but the one right of petition."

"With man, woman shared the dangers of the Mayflower on a stormy sea, the dreary landing on Plymouth Rock, the rigors of a New England winter, and the privations of a seven years' war. With him she bravely threw off the British yoke, felt every pulsation of his heart for freedom, and inspired the glowing eloquence that maintained it through the century. With you, we have just passed through the agony and death, the resurrection and triumph, of another revolution, doing all in our power to mitigate its horrors and gild its glories. And now, think you we have no souls to fire, no brains to weigh your arguments; that, after education such as this, we can stand silent witnesses while you sell our birthright of liberty, to save from a timely death an effete political organization? No, as we respect womanhood, we must protest against this desecration of the Magna Carta of American liberties; and with an importunity not to be repelled, our demand must ever be: 'No compromise of human rights' — 'No admission in the Constitution of inequality of rights, or disfranchisement on account of color or sex.'"

In American history class last week, I found it upsetting to be reminded of the centuries of unequal treatment women have received in the United States. It amazed me how differently people have interpreted the Constitution over the course of our history. The Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution is a great example. Doesn't the 14th Amendment promise that "no state shall . . . deny to any person the equal protection of the laws"?

As much as this clause proclaims the United States' commitment to the proposition that "all men are created equal," it was unfortunately interpreted quite literally over the years. The 14th Amendment, which was ratified in 1868, applied only to men. It wasn't until 1971 that the Equal Protection Clause was actually extended to women!

Not once in those 103 years was the clause ever used by the Supreme Court to throw out a law that clearly favored men. For instance, in 1873 the Court upheld an Illinois law prohibiting women from practicing law! Clearly, the Court was relegating all women to a second-class status. The Court even confirmed its prejudicial position in 1875 when it upheld state laws that extended the right to vote only to men. This decision remained the law until ratification of the 19th Amendment, giving us women the right to vote, 45 years later. However, even with the vote, the Court still continued to rule against women. As recently as 1961, it ruled that women should be automatically excused from jury duty because women were the only ones who could attend to home and family life!

We future doctors, scientists, and business owners, who also just happen to be female, must make sure that equality is the guiding force in the United States for all time. Don't miss an opportunity to remind anyone who will listen of this: "It was we, the people; not we, the white male citizens; nor yet we, the male citizens; but we, the whole people, who formed the Union (Susan B. Anthony)."