Where constitutions can be revised by the convention method as well as by amendment there is some hope; if amendment fails revision holds out a chance.  But twelve states[A] hold no constitutional conventions; in Maryland conventions are twenty years apart and in many other states it is as difficult to call a constitutional convention as to revise the Constitution by amendment.

[Footnote A:  Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi, North Dakota, Arkansas, Connecticut, Indiana, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Virginia.]

New Hampshire amends by constitutional convention alone and these conventions are held infrequently.

Only in Delaware is the Constitution amended to-day by act of the Legislature without the people’s vote and without any technical requirements except a large Legislative majority.

Yet in twenty-four states[A] before the Civil War the foundations of male suffrage were laid by legislature or constitutional convention alone, and in many cases, furthermore, the conditions of suffrage were dictated by the Federal Government.  Even as late as the ’90’s five State Constitutions were adopted, suffrage clause and all, by State Legislatures or constitutional conventions without the referendum.[B]

[Footnote A:  New Hampshire, South Carolina, Virginia, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia, New York, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Vermont, Kentucky, Florida, Tennessee, Ohio, Louisiana, Indiana, Mississippi, Illinois, Alabama, Missouri and Arkansas.]

[Footnote B:  Many reconstruction constitutions also but these were not permanent.  The five constitutions in the 90’s were Mississippi, South Carolina, Delaware, Louisiana and Virginia, and Kentucky made changes after the constitution had been submitted.]

In the other states universal male suffrage came easily at a time when thinly populated states wanted to hold out inducements to male immigrant labor.  To-day any male once naturalized, and in some states before he is naturalized, becomes automatically a voting citizen of any state in the Union after he has fulfilled the state residence requirements and, in some states, an educational requirement.

The one word “male” shut women out in the old days from these easy avenues to citizenship and to-day her path by the state by state method is beset by almost insuperable difficulties.

CHAPTER III.

ELECTION LAWS AND REFERENDA

To establish a “government of the people” is to follow an ideal set by the growth of democratic principles, but, after such government has been established by a constitution, it remains to be determined how the will of the people is to be recorded and each state accordingly has enacted an election law to provide for registration and for taking the vote.  These laws are so defective as to give unquestioned advantage