Amongst other discriminatory issues, until 1891, the age of consent was ten years old. In one of the many letters written to a Minneapolis editor, Ripley noted that the property of young girls was better protected by the state than their persons. Upon the adopting a law during the 26th Legislature of Minnesota in 1889 empowering fathers to deny rights to their unborn children, Ripley replied the bill to be "worthy of the Dark Ages". In the campaign of raising the age of consent for girls from 10 years old to 18 years old, Ripley partially succeeded when in 1891 the state legislature raised the age of consent to 14.
