Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 4.djvu/1082

 Resolved, By the House of Representatives, the Senate concurring, That, in view of these results, the enfranchisement of women in every State and Territory of the American Union is hereby recommended as a measure tending to the advancement of a higher and better social order;

Resolved, That an authenticated copy of these resolutions be forwarded by the Governor of the State to the Legislature of every State and Territory, and that the press be requested to call public attention to these resolutions.

"President of the Senate." "Speaker of the House."

Approved Feb. 13, 1901.

,"Governor."

For a number of years women served on grand and petit juries. In compiling the first volume of the Laws of Wyoming, Secretary and Acting Governor Edward M. Lee said:

In the provisions of the woman suffrage clause, enacted in 1869, we placed this youngest Territory on earth in the van of civilization and progress. That this statement has been verified by practical experience the testimony is unanimous, continuous and conclusive. Not a link is wanting in the chain of evidence and, as a Governor of the Territory once said: "The only dissenting voices against woman suffrage have been those of convicts who have been tried and found guilty by women jurors." Women exercised the right of jurors and contributed to the speedy release of the Territory from the régime of the pistol and bowie-knife. They not only performed their new duties without losing any of the womanly virtues, and with dignity and decorum, but good results were immediately seen. Chief Justice J. H. Howe, of the Supreme Court, under whose direction women were first drawn on juries, wrote in 1872: "After the grand jury had been in session two days the dance-house keepers, gamblers and demi-monde fled out of the State in dismay to escape the indictment of women jurors. In short, I have never, in twenty-five years' experience in the courts of the country, seen a more faithful and resolutely honest grand and petit jury than these."

The best women in the Territory served as jurors, and they were treated with the most profound, respect and highly complimented for their efficiency. The successor of Chief Justice Howe was opposed to their serving and none were summoned by him. Jury duty is not acceptable to men, as a rule, and the women themselves were not anxious for it, so the custom gradually fell into disuse. The juries are made up from the tax lists, which contain only a small proportion of women. There are no court