defeat at the polls in order to remove it from politics for five years
as the same question cannot be again submitted for that length of
time.

There are state constitutions so impossible of amendment that women
of those states can only secure enfranchisement through Federal action
and fair play demands the submission of a Federal constitutional
amendment. (See Chapter II.)


4. PROTECTION FROM INADEQUATE ELECTION LAWS DEMANDS IT.

The election laws of all states make inadequate provision for
safeguarding the vote on constitutional amendments. Since election
laws do not protect suffrage referenda, suffragists justly demand the
method prescribed by our national constitution to appeal their case
from male voters at large to the higher court of Congress and the
Legislatures. (See Chapters III and IV.)


5. EQUAL STATUS OF MEN AND WOMEN VOTERS DEMANDS IT.

Until the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment the National
Constitution did not discriminate against women but in Section 2 of
that amendment provision was made whereby a penalty may be directed
against any state which denies the right to vote to its _male
inhabitants_ possessed of the necessary qualifications as prescribed
by nation and state. If the entire 48 states should severally
enfranchise women their political status would still be inferior to
that of men, since no provision for national protection in their right