institutions for their morality. But the State stands in no political relation to the family any more than to the school and the church. What is meant by the proposition as generally used is, that the State is politically an aggregate of families and not of individuals. This is entirely untrue, and if true the fact would be calamitous. Civil government is supposed to have had its origin in family government, the patriarch becoming chief of a tribe which was substantially the outgrowth and expansion of a single family; but if a nation was to be formed of such tribes it would be essential to its peace and prosperity that they should as soon as possible mingle into one homogeneous mass, and that no citizen should consider himself of one tribe rather than another, It is the family idea in a government like ours that makes the feuds which are handed down from generation to generation in some parts of the country. It made the frequent bloody contests of the clans in Scotland, and the dissensions of the Hebrew tribes. In a republic nothing can be more disastrous than that great political leaders should have large family followings. The first duty of the citizen is to forget that he belongs to any family in particular. He is an individual citizen of the State, and when he becomes a magistrate he must practically ignore the fact that he has family relatives who feel entitled to his special favor. He must, like justice, be blind to every fact except that the applicant for office or for justice is an individual citizen and must stand wholly on his personal merits or the justice of his cause.
The proposition that the family is the basis of the State thus taken by itself is entirely false; but even if true, the use made of it as an argument against giving suffrage to women is equally fallacious. This can be shown by a single illustration, We will suppose there are two families, in both of which the father dies, leaving in one case a widow and one son, and in the other a widow and six daughters. Where is now the family representation? The son whom we will suppose to be of age, goes to the polls and we will suppose sufficiently represents the family to which he belongs; but where is the family representation for the other widow and her six daughters? She may be the largest tax-payer in the State, and yet she can have no voice in determining what taxes shall be laid, nor to what purposes the money shall be appropriated.
The question whether the family is the basis of the State cannot be made an abstract question of political philosophy. Indeed the question is unmeaning when put as an abstract one. We might just as well ask, "Is the climate cold in a State?" or, "Is the English language spoken in a State?" It is only as we ask these questions about a particular State that they have any meaning. "Is it cold in Russia?" "Is English spoken in Connecticut?"
Take the case of a State ruled by a despot. Here the people are not the political basis of the State, either as families or as individuals. They have no political power whatever. The political basis of the State is the will of the despot. He is himself and alone the State politically. He makes the laws himself, and shoots and hangs those who disobey them. The people are indispensable to the State, and so in one sense its basis, just as the square miles that compose its territory are its physical basis, but the people stand in no political relation whatever to the State, any more than the rocks and gravel of its territory. It is only where the people of the State have the whole or a part of its political power, that the question can possibly arise as to whether individuals or families are its political basis. And when it thus arises, it comes up wholly with reference to a particular State, and not as an abstract question. And then it is wholly a question of fact, not one of political philosophy; a matter for simple ascertainment, not for speculation and reasoning. Thus, suppose the question to be, "Is the family or the individual the political basis of the State of Connecticut?" We are to answer the question solely by looking at the constitution and laws of the State. We look there and find that it is as clear as language can make it that the political basis of the State is the individual and not the family. The individual is made the voter—not the family—and that is the whole question. It was perfectly easy for the people, if they had so desired, when they were adopting a constitution, to make families and not individuals the depositaries of political power, but they chose to give the