Are Women People? a Book of Rhymes for Suffrage Times

Alice Duer Miller asks a simple question, and the answer to "Are Women People?" turns out to be explosively funny. Written in 1915, at the height of the American suffrage battle, this collection of satirical verses takes the arguments against women's right to vote and lets them hang themselves. Miller inhabits the voices of anti-suffragists - the worried husbands, the concerned physicians, the patriots who fear the republic will collapse if women enter the voting booth - and with perfect rhyming couplets, she dismantles each position with devastating wit. The humor isn't decoration; it's surgical. By letting the absurdity speak for itself, Miller exposes the contradictions and fear-mongering that underpinned opposition to women's suffrage. These are poems that score points while making you laugh, that argue through mockery rather than manifesto. A century later, the title still lands like a punch.