Female Suffrage (R. A. Cohen and A. J. Phelps)

“Female Suffrage” Sheet Music (pdf).
“Female Suffrage” Karaoke (midi with lyrics).

Lyrics: R. A. Cohen.
Tune: A. J. Phelps.


You may wear your silks and satin, go when and where you please,
Make embroidery and tattin’, and live quite at your ease.
You may go to ball and concert in gaudy hat and coat.
In fact, my charming creatures, do everything but vote.

You may visit ball and concert in gaudy hat and coat.
In fact, my charming creatures, do everything but vote.

You may seek for health and riches and marry at your will,
But men must wear the breeches and rule the household still
For nature so designed it, and so our fathers wrote.
And clearly they defined it that man, alone, should vote.

You may visit ball and concert in gaudy hat and coat.
In fact, my charming creatures, do everything but vote.

You wish to be our equal; we prize you something more
And proudly look upon you than angels little lower.
We would not have you equal but superior to us,
A something we can idolize though fashioned out of dust.

You may visit ball and concert in gaudy hat and coat.
In fact, my charming creatures, do everything but vote.

But when from her position, a careless woman’s hurled,
She’s the loathing of our manhood, the scorn of all the world;
She loses her identity with all that’s noble, then,
And seeks the common level of the commonest of men.

You may visit ball and concert in gaudy hat and coat.
In fact, my charming creatures, do everything but vote.

I have given my opinion, and I hold that it is true.
What would strengthen politicians would tend to weaken you.
It would bring you to its level, in spite of all that’s said,
And political corruption would show its hydra-head.

You may visit ball and concert in gaudy hat and coat.
In fact, my charming creatures, do everything but vote.

Then, mothers, wives, and sisters, I beg you keep your place
And remain what nature made you: the help-meets of our race.
Let no temptation lead you, nor any wily fox,
To descend unto the level of the nation’s ballot box.

You may visit ball and concert in gaudy hat and coat.
In fact, my charming creatures, do everything but vote.


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