"Why the Home Makers Do Not Want to Vote" - c.1909 Anti-Women's Suffrage Pamphlet

[Chicago, Illinois]: Illinois Association Opposed to the Extension of Suffrage to Women, 1909. Good. Toning, dust soiling, short tears.. A fascinating look into the anti-women's suffrage movement in America, via a brief pamphlet issued c.1909 by the Illinois Association Opposed to the Extension of Suffrage to Women. The pamphlet emphasizes the importance of gender roles, with women best serving society in the domestic sphere; suffrage, it argues, would merely stretch women thin and blur the line between male and female responsibilities too much. It concludes, "the great body of American women do not wish to vote. They love their own sphere in life, they feel their own adaptation to it, and fifty years of relentless agitation has not convinced them that participation in the duties which belong to men, would make them more honored, more useful, or happier" (p. [4]). It is interesting to approach the pamphlet from a modern lens, and to see some of the verbiage as easily useable in certain political circles today (e.g. phrasing such as "the decay of family life"). Printed bifolium (9" by 6").