usually made is not that the Jeffersonian maxim excludes women, but that
"the consent of the governed" is substantially given by the general consent
of women. That this argument has a certain plausibility may be conceded;
but it is equally clear that the minority of women, those who do wish to
vote, includes on the whole the natural leaders,--those who are foremost in
activity of mind, in literature, in art, in good works of charity. It is,
therefore, pretty sure that they only predict the opinions of the rest, who
will follow them in time. And even while waiting it is a fair question
whether the "governed" have not the right to give their votes when they
wish, even if the majority of them prefer to stay away from the polls. We
do not repeal our naturalization laws, although only the minority of our
foreign-born inhabitants as yet take the pains to become naturalized.




THE GOOD OF THE GOVERNED


In Paris, some years ago, I was for a time a resident in a cultivated
French family, where the father was non-committal in politics, the mother
and son were republicans, and the daughter was a Bonapartist. Asking the
mother why the young lady thus held to a different creed from the rest, I
was told that she had made up her mind that the streets of Paris were kept
cleaner under the empire than since its disappearance: hence her
imperialism.

I have heard American men advocate the French empire at home and abroad,
without offering reasons so good as those of the lively French maiden. But
I always think of her remark when the question is seriously asked, as Mr.