Let this course be pursued a few years, and the enormous proportion of lawyer-legislators would be diminished by one-half.
Victoria C. Woodhull
The Public Record
Victoria Claflin Woodhull, later Victoria Woodhull Martin, was an American leader of the women's suffrage movement who ran for president of the United States in the 1872 election. While many historians and authors agree that Woodhull was the first woman to run for the presidency, some disagree with classifying it as a true candidacy because according to the Constitution she would have been too young to be president if elected.
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Those who declaim so loudly and profusely about the wrongs labor suffers at the instance of capital, should be strictly guarded against, lest they, unwittingly, become your leaders and advisers.
Finally, when the regular party ticket is presented, the least objectionable one receives the support; and thus it comes that the real interests and wishes of the people are seldom represented, and as seldom is the elected candidate the…
The difficulty has been—and we fear will be—that while the laborer has been busy at his regular task, others have managed the incipient stages that produce the candidates, in such a manner that the interests of the majority have been…
Being so vastly in the majority, every office should be filled by them.
It is the most complete evidence of supineness on the part of the laboring classes that they are not now represented as they should be.
It cannot be too strongly insisted upon, nor too often repeated, that it is the first duty of the labor interest to look to it that our halls of legislation are filled by those who understand the true and the harmonious relations of labor…
None are fit to hold position who will sacrifice one iota of their conviction in order to retain it.
Most persons who occupy position now, feel compelled to yield principle to the demands of policy, in order to retain it.
Nominate and elect your own men; if your first choice fails you, try again, and continue trying, until the right man for the position is found; and when found, while holding him strictly accountable, give him your cordial support while he…
You are in the majority, and the fault is your own if you do not make use of the power you possess.
In these you will find your best advocates, but see to it that your suffrages are never, once again, worse than withheld.