Editing Emily Bissell (section)

==Anti-suffragism==
Bissell was closely identified with the [[Anti-suffragism|anti-suffragist]] movement.<ref>{{cite web
 |url=http://www.hsd.org/Women_AntiSuffragist_Bissell.htm
 |title=Emily P. Bissell, 1861–1948
 |publisher=Historical Society of Delaware
 |access-date=2010-10-03
 |url-status=dead
 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100813202611/http://www.hsd.org/Women_AntiSuffragist_Bissell.htm
 |archive-date=2010-08-13
}}</ref>
She wrote "The vote is part of man's work. Ballot-box, cartridge box, jury box, sentry box all go together in his part of life. Women cannot step in and take the responsibilities and duties of voting with assuming his place very largely".<ref>{{cite book
 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4sqiGdY0zDkC&pg=PA106
 |page=106
 |title=Votes for Women!: The Woman Suffrage Movement in Tennessee, the South, and the Nation
 |author=Marjorie Spruill Wheeler
 |publisher=Univ. of Tennessee Press
 |year=1995
 |isbn=0-87049-837-1}}</ref>

In 1896 Bissell published an essay called "The Mistaken Vocation of Shakespeare's Heroines", taking the form of a report of a lecture to suffragettes. The purported speaker launches an attack on the [[Elizabethan]] playwright [[Shakespeare]] for placing his female characters in unsuitable situations, where they are not allowed to demonstrate their true abilities. For example, instead of having [[Ophelia]] as his wife, [[Hamlet]] would have been much better served by the more forceful [[Lady Macbeth]], while Macbeth himself would have been better served by [[Portia (The Merchant of Venice)|Portia]].<ref>{{cite book
 |page=233
 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oRkNAQAAIAAJ&dq=The+Mistaken+Vocation+of+Shakespeare%27s+Heroines&pg=PA233
 |title=Women Reading Shakespeare, 1660–1900: An Anthology of Criticism
 |author1=Ann Thompson |author2=Sasha Roberts |publisher=Manchester University Press ND
 |year=1997
 |isbn=0-7190-4704-8}}</ref>
The audience greets her attack on Shakespeare with delight, ending up shouting "Down with Shakespeare!"<ref>{{cite book
 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=983sMnQCnC0C&dq=The+Mistaken+Vocation+of+Shakespeare%27s+Heroines&pg=PA63
 |page=63
 |title=Shakespeare's Comedies of Love: Essays in Honour of Alexander Leggatt
 |author1=Richard Paul Knowles |author2=Karen Bamford |author3=Alexander Leggatt |publisher=University of Toronto Press
 |year=2008
 |isbn=978-0-8020-3953-8}}</ref>
The spoof was supposed to show that it was absurd for women to seek careers.<ref>{{cite book
 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=knYtCu3aSRoC&dq=%22The+Mistaken+Vocation+of+Shakespeare%27s+Heroines%22&pg=PA24
 |page=24
 |title=Giants of the Past: Popular Fictions and the Idea of Evolution
 |author=Lisa Hopkins
 |publisher=Bucknell University Press
 |year=2004
 |isbn=0-8387-5576-3}}</ref>

In 1900, she testified before the United States Senate Committee on Woman's Suffrage, arguing that women had no place in politics.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web|last=Boylan|first=Anne M.|date=Summer 2019|title=Delaware Women's Suffrage Timeline|url=https://my.lwv.org/sites/default/files/leagues/wysiwyg/%5Bcurrent-user%3Aog-user-node%3A1%3Atitle%5D/suffrage_timeline_delaware.pdf|access-date=18 November 2020|website=Delaware Historical Society|publisher=League of Women Voters}}</ref> In March 1903 she addressed a packed meeting in [[Concord, New Hampshire]] speaking against a proposed amendment to the state constitution that would strike out the word "male" from the suffrage clause. The amendment failed to pass.<ref>{{cite book
 |url=http://www.gutenberg.org/files/30051/30051-h/30051-h.htm
 |title=The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI
 |editor=Ida Husted Harper
 |date=September 21, 2009
 |access-date=2010-10-05}}</ref>