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Gentlemen, I have had to make shipwreck of all the most sacred, dearest rights of womanhood. A right to my husband -- a right to my children -- a right to my person -- a right to my furniture -- a right to my money -- a right to my wardrobe -- a right to my home -- a right to my liberty. And, as an equivalent for all this mighty sacrifice, I retain only the legal right of being imprisoned for life, as a State pauper in a State Lunatic Asylum!

Yes, 'tis true, this is the only right my legally appointed guardian allows me. And no man, woman, or child, has any right to say it shall not be so. I am legally helpless in the absolute power of this one man tyrant.

My God-like brothers, can you deliver me? Can you befriend me?

If so, you can deliver, you can befriend all the dear sisterhood whom I represent.

Brothers, I need your protection! I need emancipation!

All my life-earnings, yea! myself, is in the absolute power of this unjust and cruel man. I have naught that I once possessed, save my stainless character, my education, and my health. On this capital alone have I staked my liberty, my emancipation. With this battery I am battling for my freedom, for justice, for right.

And, Oh, my God! sustain Thou me in this terrible conflict.

And, if it is possible, spare, Oh! spare! my earthly father, till the victory is achieved! for he is the only protector of whom my persecutor stands in any fear.

Oh, my Connecticut brothers, let him fear your laws -- let him fear your legislation -- and then your sisters will be delivered from liabilities like my own.

And will you not do it?

Can you consent to pass off the stage of action, and leave your darling daughter, your beloved sister, yea, even your better-half, legally exposed and liable to suffer all I have suffered, from this abuse of marital power? Will you not, for their sakes, cast your vote into the scales of woman's emancipation, and thus enter your God-like protest against married servitude?

Gentlemen, my case, although an extreme one, may not be so rare an exception as you may strive to fondly imagine it to be.

No, God only knows how many a sainted wife and mother has been ground down and trampled into the very dust, crushed by the arbitrary power of perverted manhood.

My brothers, 'tis true, many a nobly endowed woman has been crushed, subjected to a tyrant's control, and has been led to desire death, rather than such a life of cruel bondage.

Yea, God only knows how long is that train of living martyrs who have gone up to God's throne and God's tribunal to get their wrongs avenged on earth, because they had no protection, no claims for justice at their country's tribunal. Have they appealed to this higher court in vain?

No. The Judge of all the earth will do right. And will not the claims of this host of martyred married slaves be exacted from that government which would not protect their identity from the usurpation of perverted manhood?

Yes, 'tis true, this Government has a long account to settle for protecting, by its laws, that most guilty of all oppressors, an oppressive husband.

Gentlemen of the Judiciary Committee, on you now rests the responsibility of continuing to shelter these oppressors, under such laws, as obliterate the personal identity of the largest and best part of our American citizens.

Henceforth, may we not fondly hope that married woman's inalienable rights will be protected by the laws of Connecticut, so that on this great American continent there may be found one State where the married slave can find as safe a refuge from her oppressor as the negro slave once found in Canada?

Let the brave sons of Connecticut send forth their proclamation of freedom to woman! Then shall Connecticut's envied territory henceforth be the home of the free, as well as the brave.

Again, I am still in danger of another kidnapping, and thereby our noble cause is jeopardized.

Yes, the same wicked spirit which has been, and still is, my persecutor, is now following this dear cause of woman's emancipation, and is seeking its overthrow.

Gentlemen, have you not seen what a mighty avalanche of scandalous insinuations, and bare-faced lies, has just now been palmed off upon this credulous public, for the sole purpose of undermining my character as a sane person, knowing that just as soon as this public confidence in my sanity is destroyed, I shall be altogether helpless again, in the absolute power of my persecutor; and then he can kidnap me again and hide me for life in some lunatic asylum. And since no laws defend me, this may yet be done.

Should public sentiment -- the only law of self-defense I have -- endorse the statements of this terrible conspiracy, against the personal liberty and stainless character of an innocent woman, I may be yet again entombed to die a martyr for the Christian principle of the identity of a married woman.

Three long years of false imprisonment does not satisfy this lust for power to oppress the helpless!