What rights have women? ... [they are] punished for breaking laws which they have no voice in making. All avenues to enterprise and honors are closed against them. If poor, they must drudge for a mere pittance if of the wealthy classes, they must be dressed dolls of fashion parlor puppets.
Ernestine RoseBut it will be said that the husband provides for the wife, or in other words, he feeds, clothes and shelters her! I wish I had the power to make every one before me fully realize the degradation contained in that idea.
Ernestine RoseAgitate! Agitate! Ought to be the motto of every reformer. Agitation is the opposite of stagnation - the one is life, the other death.
Ernestine RoseFor here lies the corner stone of all the injustices done woman, the wrong idea from which all other wrongs proceed. She is not acknowledged as mistress of herself. For her cradle to her grave she is another's. We do indeed need and demand the other rights of which I have spoken, but let us first obtain OURSELVES.
Ernestine Rose