public, and no profession or occupation is legally forbidden to them. All the large non-sectarian institutions of learning are open alike to both sexes.
If either the husband or wife die intestate and there are no descendants living, all of the real and personal property goes to the survivor. If there are children living, the widow receives one-half of the husband's real estate and one-half of his personal property; but the widower takes a life interest in all of the wife's real estate, whether there are children or not, and all of the personal property absolutely, if there are no living descendants—half if there be any.
All laws have been repealed which recognize civil disabilities against the wife which are not recognized against the husband except the fundamental right of voting and helping to make the laws which she is taxed to maintain, and to which, equally with man, she is held amenable.
Of the growth of public sentiment regarding the ultimate extension of this right to women, it is significant to note that when a constitutional amendment to enfranchise woman was taken in 1884, the vote was, ayes, 11,223; noes, 28,176. And, although the population was more than doubled when the amendment was resubmitted in 1900, the vote throughout the state stood, ayes, 26,265; noes, 28,402. It will thus be seen that although the "no" vote was only augmented in 16 years by 226, the affirmative vote was increased by 15,042. One county gave a majority for the amendment in 1884. The vote in 1900 gave us two-thirds of the counties of the state. One county was lost by a tie, one by a majority of one, and one by a majority of thirty-one.
As the right of suffrage—the foundation of all enduring rights—is the only right that can be withheld from women by the votes of all classes and conditions of men, it is the only right ever demanded by women which must come through a change in constitutional law. "Therefore," as Miss Anthony well says in her able and comprehensive summary of the state and national situation, "this most valuable of all rights—the one that if possessed by women at the beginning would have brought all the others without a struggle—is placed absolutely in the hands of men, to be granted or withheld at will from women." (See History of Woman Suffrage, Vol. IV.)
And yet, with all these odds against women, four of our Western States have already granted equal political rights to the wives and mothers of men. Wyoming came first, in 1869. Colorado followed by popular vote in 1893; and, in 1896, Utah and Idaho wheeled into line. The writer hereof has in hand enough of unimpeachable testimonials indorsing this movement from the best, ablest and most prominent men and women of each of these states to fill a volume.
The women of Oregon are hopefully awaiting a third effort to secure their own full and complete enfranchisement, for which their friends, the best and foremost men of the state, are preparing to submit a vote at the June election of 1906.
