negatived--yeas 19, nays 125--the proposition that women should
share with men the duties and responsibilities of voters at
elections. This decision was preceded by an earnest, protracted
discussion, in which the right and expediency of extending the
elective franchise to women were most eloquently urged by George
William Curtis, and less elaborately by several others. The
judgment pronounced yesterday by the Convention must therefore be
regarded as final.
We do not, however, regard it as a verdict against a
participation in public affairs by women. On the contrary, we
hold that woman's influence not only is, but should be felt in
legislation and government, and must increase in power as the
race becomes more enlightened and humane. We only insist that she
shall speak and be heard distinctly as woman, not mingled and
confused with man. To make women voters at our elections as now
held, and eligible to office in competition with men, would be
far better calculated to corrupt woman than to reform man and
purify politics. To have women mingle freely with men in primary
meetings, caucuses, nominating conventions, investigating
committees, juries, etc., etc., is not in our judgment calculated
to elevate woman more than to reform existing abuses in
legislation and practical politics. We should greatly prefer a
system like this:
Let the women of our State, after due discussion and
consultation, hold a convention composed of delegates from the
several counties, equal in number to the members of Assembly. To
this Convention let none but women be admitted, whether as
officers or spectators. Let this convention, keeping its debates
wholly private, decide what department of legislative government
may be safely assigned and set apart to woman. We would suggest
all that relates to the family; marriage, divorce, separation
from bed and board, the control and maintenance of children,
education, the property rights of married women, inheritance,
dower, etc., etc., as subjects that could wisely and safely be
set apart to be legislated upon by woman alone. And we believe
that if she (not a few women, but the sex) shall ever suggest and
require such an apportionment of legislative powers and duties,
man will cheerfully concede it.
"But would you have woman hold elections like ours"? No! we would
not! We would have her teach us how to take the sense of the
electors far more quietly and cheaply. When a department of
legislation shall be assigned to woman, we would have her collect
through school-district, or kindred organizations, the names of
all female citizens who possess the qualifications, other than of
sex, required from male voters at our elections. These being
duly, lucidly registered, let, then, women in each Assembly
district be designated to collect the votes of its women. Let
them simply advertise the address to which votes should be sent
and appoint a week wherein to collect them. Now, let every female
citizen write her ballot and enclose it, signing her name to the
address indicated; and due time having been allowed for votes to
arrive by mail or otherwise, let the votes be duly canvassed, and
the result ascertained and declared, and certificates of election
issued accordingly.
Under this plan, the invalid, the bed-ridden, the bereaved, and
even the absent, could vote as well as others, and the cost of
holding an election throughout the State need not reach $10,000.
Such are the outlines of our views regarding woman in politics.
They are doubtless susceptible of improvement; but we think not
by effacing in politics the natural and time-honored distinctions
between women and men. A female legislature, a jury of women, we
could abide; a legislature of men and women, a jury promiscuously
drawn from the sexes we do not believe in.
The New York _Independent_ published the following criticism on Mr.
Greeley's report a few days after its publication:
CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION.
BY ELIZABETH CADY STANTON.
Your committee does not recommend an extension of the
elective franchise to woman. However defensible in theory,
we are satisfied that public sentiment does not demand, and
would not sustain, an innovation so revolutionary and
sweeping; so openly at war with a distribution of duties and
functions between the sexes as venerable as the Government
itself, and involving transformations so radical in social
and domestic life. Should we prove to be in error on this
head, the Convention may overrule us by changing a few words
in the first section of our proposed article.
In the above extract from the majority report of the Committee on
Suffrage we have substantially four reasons why the committee did
not recommend an extension of the elective franchise to women.
1st. Public sentiment does not demand it.
2d. It would be an innovation revolutionary and sweeping.
3d. It is at war with a distribution of duties and functions
between the sexes.
4th. The enfranchisement of women would disturb relations as
venerable as government itself, and radically change our domestic
life.
Shades of Jeremy Bentham and Sidney Smith forgive! After
publishing to the world that immortal oration of Noodledom, and
refuting for all time such fallacies as the above, how amazing
that Radical Republicans in the capital of the Empire State
should repeat in the ears of the nineteenth century stale
platitudes from the effete civilizations of the Old World--that
to their starving wives and mothers, knocking at the door of the
political citadel, instead of bread and the ballot, they should
give stones and twenty years more of degradation in
disfranchisement. But if it be true that public sentiment is not
prepared for this just and beneficent measure, then it is the
duty of our leaders, instead of stereotyping the ignorant
prejudices of the people into statutes and constitutions, to
educate this public sentiment, by the utterance of sound ideas,
by the example of honest action. When God gives new truths to the
few, it is that they may win the response of the many. There is
no blunder more constantly made by politicians than the
assumption that the people are never ready for an onward step.
The people were ready for emancipation so long before the
Government declared it that, when it did come, the measure called
forth but little enthusiasm. It is not so much the will of the
people that troubles the politician as the safety of the party in
power. This committee denies the ballot to woman, and gives it to
the black man, for the same reason--party success; not because
they think public sentiment is ready for either, for in their
uncertainty they dare not submit the question of the black man
separately to a vote of the people. "But the measure is so
revolutionary and sweeping." When we abjured King George, and
declared all men equal, we inaugurated a very revolutionary
measure, undermined kingdoms and empires, deranged the political,
commercial, and social interests of two continents, and upset
innumerable family relations, by crowding husbands and fathers
into untimely graves. Had the Honorable Suffrage Committee been
in Boston Harbor, they would have objected to throwing the tea
overboard as too revolutionary a measure; they would have scouted
Jefferson's radical declaration as absurd, in view of the royal
facts on every throne in Europe, and the divine command, "Honor
the king." After revolutionizing, as we have just done, the
entire system of labor at the South, the social and political
status of a race, and in pressing a measure for which public
sentiment seemed unprepared, deluging the land in blood, how
futile is such reasoning as the above in the mouths of those who
inaugurated this second revolution.
Again, "The enfranchisement of woman is at war with the
distribution of duties and functions between the sexes." The plea
of tyrants in all ages. Says the English peer, "I'll make laws
and govern; let the peasant till the earth and provide the sinews
of war." Says the proud slaveholder, "I'll read and write and
think; let the negro hoe the sugar, rice, and corn." Says the New
York Suffrage Committee, "We will do the voting; let women pay
the taxes. We will be judges, jurors, sheriffs; and give woman
the right to be hung on the gallows." Napoleon once said to
Madame de Stael, "Why will you women meddle with politics?"
"Sire," she replied, "if you will hang us, we must ask the reason
why."
The functions of the sexes! What particular function does it
require to vote? In the discussion on this point, we hear of
property, education, morality, sanity; yet "white males" vote
without these, and women possessing all are denied the right.
While different men have different duties, different functions,
different spheres, ranging from the heights of Parnassus to the
bowels of the earth, why legislate all women into a nutshell?
Because a man is a father, must he needs be nothing else? Are
lawyers, merchants, tailors, cobblers, bootblacks less skilled in
their specialties because they vote? Because some women are
mothers, shall all women concentrate every thought in that
direction? and can those who are mothers be nothing else? Have
not those who are training up sons and daughters an interest
beyond the home, in the great outer world, where they are soon to
act their part? If women should vote one day in the year, must
every duty and function of their being be subordinated to that
one act during the whole 365?
Many men, possessing the right of suffrage, never exercise it:
many more use it indifferently once a year, or sell it to the
highest bidder; and on what principle does the theory rest, that
if woman had this right, she would desert husband, child, and
home, and reserve all her love and care, her smiles and
enthusiasm, for the ballot-box? No; woman's love for man is not
based on the statutes of the State, nor the maternal instinct on
the second article of the Constitution. Whatever distribution of
duties and functions are fixed by nature we need no legislation
to enforce. So long as the fact of motherhood does not release
woman from taxation, and the necessity of earning her own bread,
it should not deprive her of that right most needed for her
protection. If the 40,000 drunkards' wives in this State have the
necessary functions to provide food, clothes, and shelter for
worthless husbands and helpless children, they have the necessary
functions to go to the polls and vote for such social and
sanitary laws as shall end the vice of intemperance.
"But," says the Committee, "this measure would disturb relations
as venerable as government itself."
So said objectors twenty years ago in this State when woman was
first secured in her rights of property. Some of our must
distinguished lawyers prophesied a social convulsion on the
adoption of that measure. But it came without earthquake or
tornado. In a single hour, by a stroke of the pen, the women of
the Empire State were crowned property-holders. But only those
who had felt the iron teeth of the law took note of the onward
legislation. It was a mighty wave on the shores of progress, that
made scarce a ripple on the surface, washing the feet of the
lonely traveler on the sand, though unheeded by the multitude on
the bosom of its waters.
The ballot in the hand of woman will bring neither the millennium
nor pandemonium the next day; but it will surely right many
wrongs. It will open to her the colleges, the professions, the
profitable and honorable walks of life, and give her better wages
for her work. In securing to woman self-respect, independence and
power, we shall purify and exalt our social relations. Helpless
and dependent, woman must ever be the victim of society. "Give a
man a right over my subsistence," says Alexander Hamilton, "and
he has a right over my whole moral being."
February 13, 1868, Mr. Graves offered a resolution: "That the article
on suffrage be recommitted to be revised, by striking out the word
'male' after the word 'every' in the first line of Section 1, Article
II."
Mr. GRAVES said: In offering this resolution I am not unmindful
of the opinion that has been expressed in this Convention on the
question. Yet, sir, I see a willingness expressed on all sides,
to extend the suffrage to the black man at the South and the
equally ignorant foreigner, alike without education, without
knowledge of our laws and Constitution, incapable of appreciating
the genius of republican institutions, and who, neither by
manner, by effort, by example, by influence, can do aught to
promote the best interests of this Government.
If this constitution as it now is shall be approved by the
people, you allow the black men of the South, fresh from the
chains of slavery, to go to the ballot-box and vote on all the
great questions involving the interests of this nation, while you
deny the same right to educated, patriotic women--our own wives
and mothers, who are educating our children, who give tone and
character to society, and who are first and foremost in all moral
movements.
You deny them the right to select officers who are to discharge
the duties of government, and, worse still, a voice in the laws
they are compelled to obey. Yes, sir, you say to the drunken
husband who spends his time in whisky saloons, who goes reeling
home at night to abuse his wife and children, that he is fit to
vote on the interests of the family and the town, while you deny
that right to the clear-headed, industrious wife, who feeds,
clothes and shelters the worthless husband and educates the
half-orphaned children.
What a travesty on common sense and justice is such legislation!
I know there are men in this Convention shaking in their boots
for fear their mothers, wives, and daughters shall have equal
power with themselves; cowardly men without gallantry, who fear
that woman's voice in legislation might end some of the pet vices
of society--might be more potent than their own.
Mr. SEAVER rose to a point of order, and asked, "Who are the men
shaking in their boots?"
Mr. GRAVES retorted, "Wounded birds will flutter."
Mr. VEDDER wanted the gentleman's words recorded.
Mr. GRAVES: I was about to say that educated women should be
permitted to go to the ballot-box, and by their votes help to
maintain our form of government. Why is it that every father in
this country is educating his daughter as well as his son in all
branches of science? Why does he expend his money in preparing
his daughter for the most responsible positions, and then deny
her the right to exercise her powers in the most intricate and
exalted of sciences--that of government? I know it is said that
the right of suffrage conferred on woman would destroy all
domestic peace; which is to say a man can not tolerate an equal
at his fireside. Does domestic peace exist in the exact ratio of
a woman's inferiority to the man she calls her husband? The
intelligent, educated wife must exert an influence for good over
the husband. The wise, far-seeing, self-disciplined mother must
exert an influence for good over her children; why, then, may not
this influence be equally potent in the State?
The resolution was lost.
The struggle in New York ended, all thoughts were turned towards
Kansas, where, as already shown, the friends of woman suffrage were
doomed to another disappointment. However, the year was one of active
effort; tracts and petitions were diligently circulated; a thorough
campaign made in Kansas; a series of meetings held in all the chief
cities from Leavenworth to New York, and a newspaper established,
demanding far more time and money than its founders anticipated. Thus
the intervening months were fully occupied until the May
Anniversaries, when all religious and reformatory associations were
accustomed to hold their annual meetings in New York city.
EQUAL RIGHTS ANNIVERSARY.
The American Equal Rights Association held its annual meeting in
Cooper Institute, New York, May 14, 1868. Its officers[106], with but
few changes, were the same as before.
The HUTCHINSON FAMILY, the branch of John, was present, and with
their sister, Abby Hutchinson Patten, opened the meeting with
their song, "We Come to Greet You." Lucy Stone read a letter from
John Stuart Mill, expressing sympathy with the movement. Letters
were also read from Rev. Robert Collyer of Chicago, Maria
Giddings, the daughter of Hon. Joshua R. Giddings, of Ohio,
Frances Dana Gage, and several others. Miss Anthony invited all
delegates of Equal Rights Societies to seats on the platform; she
also moved that Mrs. Rose, Mrs. Stanton, Mr. Burleigh and Mr.
Foster be a committee to prepare resolutions.
HENRY B. BLACKWELL reported the success of the campaign of the
women of this Society in Kansas, where Rev. Olympia Brown, Lucy
Stone, Mrs. Stanton and Susan B. Anthony had canvassed. Their
eloquence and determination gave great promise of success; but in
an inopportune moment, Horace Greeley and others saw fit in the
Constitutional Convention to report unfavorably on the
proposition to extend suffrage to the women of the Empire State,
and that influenced the sentiment of the younger Western States,
and their enterprise was crushed. Even the Republicans in Kansas,
after witnessing this example, set their faces against the
extension of suffrage to women. The negroes got but a few more
votes than did the women.
LUCY STONE gave a resume of the progress of the cause in this
country and in England. Col. Higginson and Mrs. Rose made
excellent remarks. "Keep the ball rolling" was gracefully
rendered by Mrs. Abby Hutchinson Patton, the whole audience
joining in the chorus. Mrs. Stone presented two forms of petition
to Congress; one to extend suffrage to women in the District of
Columbia and the Territories, the other for the submission of a
proposition for a 16th Amendment to prohibit the States from
disfranchising citizens on account of sex. Frederick Douglass
made an acceptable speech in favor of the petitions. The
President announced that Mrs. Patten headed the subscription list
to aid the association in its work for the coming year with $50.
Miss Anthony presented the various tracts published by the
Society, and _The Revolution_, urging the friends of the cause to
aid in the circulation of the paper, as it was the only one owned
and edited by women, wholly devoted to the cause of Equal Rights.
Rev. Dr. Blanchard, of Brooklyn, opened the evening session with
prayer; a resolution was proposed and adopted, on the death of
James Mott, husband of Lucretia Mott, President of the first
Woman's Rights Convention at Seneca Falls.
Rev. OLYMPIA BROWN: It is said that Nature is against us. In the
Massachusetts Legislature, Mr. Dana, Chairman of the Committee
before whom we had a hearing, said: "Nature is against it. It
will take the romance out of life to grant what you desire"! If
the romance of life is a falsehood and a fiction, we want to get
back to truth, nature and God. We all love liberty and desire to
possess it. No one worthy the name of man or woman is willing to
surrender liberty and become subservient to another. Woman may be
shut out of politics by law, but her influence will be felt
there. Some of our leading reformers work for other objects
first; the enfranchisement of the negro, the eight hour law, the
temperance cause; and leave the woman suffrage question in the
background; but woman will be enfranchised in spite of them. It
is no use to tell us to wait until something else is done. _Now_
is the accepted time for the enfranchisement of woman. The
abolition of slavery was thought to be premature, but that
mistake is now clearly seen. Now is the time for every
disfranchised class to make known its wants. The Republican party
is no better than the Democratic. It sacrificed principle and
nominated a man for President to _save the party_, whom they were
afraid the Democrats would nominate if they did not! The
Republican party controlled Kansas, and yet repudiated woman's
rights in the canvass of last year. We want a party (and would
like the Republican party) who will adopt a platform of Universal
Suffrage for every color and every sex. "The Republican party
must be saved," is the cry; but its great danger is in not being
true to principle. We will push on, keeping in view the rights of
our common nature until woman is the peer of man in every sphere
of life.
ELIZABETH A. KINGSLEY, of Philadelphia, CHARLES BURLEIGH, Rev.
HENRY BLANCHARD and Mrs. ROSE made brief addresses.
FREDERICK DOUGLASS deprecated the seeming assertion of Rev. O. B.
Frothingham, that one good cause was in opposition to another. I
champion the right of the negro to vote. It is with us a matter
of life and death, and therefore can not be postponed. I have
always championed woman's right to vote; but it will be seen that
the present claim for the negro is one of the most _urgent_
necessity. The assertion of the right of women to vote meets
nothing but ridicule; there is no deep seated malignity in the
hearts of the people against her; but name the right of the negro
to vote, all hell is turned loose and the Ku-klux and Regulators
hunt and slay the unoffending black man. The government of this
country loves women. They are the sisters, mothers, wives and
daughters of our rulers; but the negro is loathed. Women should
not censure Mr. Phillips, Mr. Greeley, or Mr. Tilton, all have
spoken eloquently for woman's rights. We are all talking for
woman's rights, and we should be just to all our friends and
enemies. There is a difference between the Republican and
Democratic parties.
OLYMPIA BROWN: What is it?
FREDERICK DOUGLASS: The Democratic party has, during the whole
war, been in sympathy with the rebellion, while the Republican
party has supported the Government.
OLYMPIA BROWN: How is it now?
FREDERICK DOUGLASS: The Democratic party opposes impeachment, and
desires a white man's government.
OLYMPIA BROWN: What is the difference in _principle_ between the
position of the Democratic party opposing the enfranchisement of
2,000,000 negro men, and the Republican party opposing the
emancipation of 17,000,000 white women?
FREDERICK DOUGLASS: The Democratic party opposes suffrage to
both: but the Republican party is in favor of enfranchising the
negro, and is largely in favor of enfranchising woman. Where is
the Democrat who favors woman suffrage? (A voice in the audience,
"Train!") Yes, he hates the negro, and that is what stimulates
him to substitute the cry of emancipation for women. The negro
needs suffrage to protect his life and property, and to ensure
him respect and education. He needs it for the safety of
reconstruction and the salvation of the Union; for his own
elevation from the position of a drudge to that of an influential
member of society. If you want women to forget and forsake
frivolity, and the negro to take pride in becoming a useful and
respectable member of society, give them both the ballot.
OLYMPIA BROWN: Why did Republican Kansas vote down negro
suffrage?
FREDERICK DOUGLASS: Because of your ally, George Francis Train!
OLYMPIA BROWN: How about Minnesota without Train? The Republican
party is a party and cares for nothing but party! It has
repudiated both negro suffrage and woman suffrage.
FREDERICK DOUGLASS: Minnesota lacked only 1,200 votes of carrying
negro suffrage. All the Democrats voted against it, while only a
small portion of the Republicans did so. And this was
substantially the same in Ohio and Connecticut. The Republican
party is about to bring ten States into the Union; and Thaddeus
Stevens has reported a bill to admit seven, all on the
fundamental basis of constitutions guaranteeing negro suffrage
forever.
OLYMPIA BROWN again insisted that the party was false, and that
now was the time for every true patriot to demand that no new
State should be admitted except on the basis of suffrage to women
as well as negroes.
LUCY STONE controverted Mr. Douglass' statement that women were
not persecuted for endeavoring to obtain their rights, and
depicted in glowing colors the wrongs of women and the inadequacy
of the laws to redress them. Mrs. Stone also charged the
Republican party as false to principle unless it protected women
as well as colored men in the exercise of their right to vote.
_The Tribune_ said the resolutions adopted declare that suffrage
is an inalienable right without qualification of sex or race;
that our State and National Governments are anti-Republican in
form, and anti-Democratic in fact; that the only way to decide
whether women want to vote is to give them an opportunity of
doing so; that the Republicans are bound to extend the
application of manhood suffrage to women; that Reconstruction
will fail to secure peace, unless it gives women the right to
vote; they invite the National Conventions of both parties to put
a woman suffrage plank in their platforms; petition[107] Congress
to extend suffrage to the women of the District of Columbia, and
to propose a Constitutional Amendment prohibiting political
distinctions on account of sex; assert that the laws depriving
married women of the equal custody of their children and of the
control of their property, are a disgrace to civilization; and
thank the men of Kansas who voted for Woman Suffrage.
FOOTNOTES:
[92] Following this hearing, Mr. Folger presented a resolution in the
Senate for the women of the State to vote for delegates to the
Constitutional Convention, and nine members voted in its favor.
[93] The _Albany Evening Journal_ of January 24th, says: "Mrs. Stanton
had a large audience to hear her argument in favor of so amending the
Constitution as to permit women and colored men to vote and hold
office. She said all that could be said and said it well in support of
her position, but it is still a problem whether the Judiciary
Committee were convinced. Like most men of old-fashioned notions, they
are slow to believe that women would be elevated, either in
usefulness, or dignity, by being transferred from the drawing room and
the nursery to the ballot-box and the forum!!
[94] Horace Greeley, Westchester Co., Leslie W. Russel, Lawrence Co.,
William Cassidy, Albany Co., William H. Merrill, Wyoming Co., George
Williams, Oneida Co., John G. Schumaker, Kings Co., Isaac L. Eudress,
Livingston Co.
[95] _June 20, 1867._--Mr. CORBETT presented a memorial from citizens
of Syracuse for securing the right of suffrage for women on equal
terms with men.
Mr. GRAVES--Petition of Mrs. F. D. Fish and 180 other citizens--worthy
and intelligent men and women--of the city of Utica, asking equal
suffrage for men and women.
Referred to the Committee on Suffrage.
_June 26, 1867._--Mr. RATHBUN--Petition for universal suffrage for
women as well as men.
C. E. PARKER--Petition for citizens of Tioga County.
Mr. CURTIS--A petition from Mrs. Daniel Cady, of Johnstown, and 200
others, asking to have "male" stricken from the State Constitution.
E. G. LAPHAM presented a petition.
Mr. EZRA GRAVES presented thirty-seven petitions--Brooklyn, 1; Mt.
Morris, 4; Troy, 1; Lima, 1; New York City, 8; Buffalo, 3;
Skaneateles, 2; Lockport, 1; Poughkeepsie, 1; Dutchess County, 1;
Utica, 1; Fairfield, Herkimer Co., 1. In all, 2,040 persons asking for
equal suffrage.
_Friday, June 28th._--C. C. DWIGHT--Mrs. Eliza Wright Osborn and 22
others, of Auburn, asking suffrage for women. Mr. COOKE--Mrs. Lina
Vandenburg and 350 others. Mr. ARCHER--Sundry citizens. Mr. MEAD--Mrs.
E. A. Kingsbury and 20 others. Mr. SCHOONMAKER--M. I. Ingraham and
others. Mr. HOUSTON--Lucia Sutton. Mr. RATHBUN--Mrs. A. H. Sabin and
20 others. J. BROOKS--Emma Suydam and 15 others.
Mr. GRAVES--Two memorials. 1st. Schoharie County, 204 men and women
for constitutional amendment prohibiting sale of intoxicating liquors.
2d. Lucia Humphrey and 30 others for equal suffrage. All went to
Committee on Suffrage, except Mr. Graves' first, which went to
Committee on Adulterated Liquors.
[96] Mr. GREELEY, June 26th, from the Committee on Suffrage, offered a
resolution that "The use of this hall on the 27th, Thursday evening of
this week, be granted to the Standing Committee on the Right of
Suffrage, that they may accord a public hearing to the advocates of
female suffrage," which was adopted.
[97] The _Albany Evening Journal_ of June 28, 1867, says, editorially:
WOMANHOOD SUFFRAGE.--The Assembly Chamber was well filled last evening
to listen to Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony. Mrs. Stanton made a
stirring appeal, and Miss Anthony followed. In response to queries,
she said she expected that women would yet serve as jurors and be
drafted. Several hundred had fought in the late war, but when their
sex was discovered they were dismissed in disgrace; and to the shame
of the Government be it said, they were never paid for their services.
[98] Mr. Folger offered a resolution--That the use of this Chamber be
granted to the American Equal Rights Association for a meeting on the
evening of Wednesday, the 10th inst.
[99] GEO. FRANCIS TRAIN BEFORE THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION AT
ALBANY.--The Constitutional Convention at Albany has not had many
variations from its customary slate of topics, but it is a noteworthy
fact that no New York paper mentioned that Geo. Francis Train
addressed the Convention for two hours on the subject of woman voting
and the financial policy of the nation. Mr. Train having been the only
man to volunteer his services in Kansas and before the Convention, it
is worthy of note, when the argument advanced by our chivalrous press
is a sneer, a sarcasm, or an insult, that Mr. Train's defense of women
voting was received by the Convention by loud and repeated applause.
The following was the resolution, passed unanimously, offering the
hall:
STATE OF NEW YORK, IN CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION, }
ALBANY, December 4, 1867. }
On motion of Mr. Ballard:
_Resolved_, That the use of the Assembly Chamber be granted to
Geo. Francis Train, Esq., at 4 P.M. this day.
By order. LUTHER CALDWELL, _Secretary_.
[100] In 1846 the question of negro suffrage was submitted to a
popular vote, and negatived by 223,884 to 85,306; in 1850 it was again
defeated by a vote of 337,984 to 197,503; a similar submission was
provided for by a concurrent resolution of the Legislature of 1859,
which by neglect of the State officer to provide for its publication,
was defeated; but its fate may fairly be regarded as further evidence
of the indifference of the public toward a change.
[101] _July 1st._--Mr. FOWLER presented a petition from Miss Laura
Bosworth and others for woman suffrage.
_July 9th._--From Gerrit Smith and 180 others of Madison County, for
female suffrage.
Mr. ENDRESS--Emma C. Lawrence and 50 others of Westchester, for female
suffrage.
Mr. MURPHY--Thomas N. Cashow and 20 others, of Kings County, for woman
suffrage.
Mr. FULLERTON--Mary J. Quackenbosh and many others, from Newburgh.
Mr. VAN CAMPEN--Mary E. Mead and many others, of Westchester County.
Mr. BEADLE--Mrs. W. S. Shute, Mary C. Bristol, and 120 others from
Horse Heads.
Mr. HAMMOND--Mrs. J. C. Holmes and many others from Westchester
County.
_July 10th._--Mr. TUCKER--A petition from a large number of men and
women for extending the right of suffrage to woman.
Mr. GRAVES--Fifty-four ladies of New York City, asking suffrage for
women.
_July 11th._--Mr. CURTIS--From Charles J. Seymour, Mrs. Mary Newman
and 500 others from Broome County, for equal suffrage.
_July 12th._--Mr. CORBETT--Henry Ward Beecher, Edwin A. Studwell, and
many others, of Kings County, for woman suffrage.
_July 16th._--Mr. FOLGER presented a petition from Emily P. Collins,
of Rochester, and others, asking that women be granted the privilege
of voting, that in 1869 the proposition be submitted for all who can
read and write.
_July 18th._--Mr. GREELEY--From Mrs. Louisa Howland and many others,
of Mt. Vernon, Westchester County, for woman suffrage.
Mr. CURTIS--From Mrs. Eliza Benton and others of New York City, asking
for equal suffrage. Another from Caroline E. Hubbard and 20 others, of
Westchester County.
_July 31st._--Mr. POTTER--Lydia Baldwin, F. Brucklin, and others, of
Erie County, asking for the extension of the suffrage to women.
Mr. GRAVES--Jane E. Turner, Rev. C. H. Bebee, and 56 others,
Bridgewater, Oneida County. Another from Julia M. Sherwood and 22
others, Westchester County, asking for woman suffrage.
[102] The ladies suggested to Mr. Curtis to present Mrs. Greeley's
petition last, and with emphasis, that it might attract the attention
of the reporters, and thus have Mrs. Greeley's petition and Mr.
Greeley's report to antidote each other, and appear side by side in
the Metropolitan journals. After the Convention adjourned that day,
some of the ladies lingered in the vestibule to congratulate Mr.
Greeley on his conservative report; but he had disappeared through
some side door, and could not be found. A few weeks after he met Mrs.
Stanton and Miss Anthony at one of Alice Cary's Sunday evening
receptions. They noticed him slowly making his way toward them, and
prepared for the coming storm. As he approached, both arose, and with
extended hands, exclaimed most cordially, "Good evening, Mr. Greeley."
But his hands hung limp and undemonstrative by his side, as he said in
low and measured words, "You two ladies are the most maneuvering
politicians in the State of New York. You set out to annoy me in the
Constitutional Convention, and you did it effectually. I saw in the
manner my wife's petition was presented, that Mr. Curtis was acting
under instructions. I saw the reporters prick up their ears and knew
that my report and Mrs. Greeley's petition would come out together,
with large headings in the city papers, and probably be called out by
the newsboys in the street."
Turning to Mrs. Stanton, he said, "You are so tenacious about your own
name, why did you not inscribe my wife's maiden name, Mary Cheney
Greeley on her petition?" "Because," I replied, "I wanted all the
world to know that it was the wife of Horace Greeley who protested
against her husband's report." "Well," said he, "I understand the
animus of that whole proceeding, and now let me tell you what I intend
to do. I have given positive instructions that no word of praise shall
ever again be awarded you in the _Tribune_, and that if your name is
ever necessarily mentioned, it shall be as Mrs. Henry B. Stanton!" And
so it has been ever since.
From that time Mr. Greeley was seemingly hostile to the woman suffrage
movement, just as he was toward the anti-slavery cause, after the
Abolitionists in rolling up 60,000 votes for James G. Birney, defeated
Henry Clay, and gave the ascendency to the Democrats by electing Polk.
Clay being a strong Protectionist was a great favorite with Mr.
Greeley, and his defeat was a sore disappointment, and for years he
denounced Abolitionists individually and collectively in his scathing
editorials. Still in his happier moods he firmly believed in the civil
and political equality of both women and negroes.
[103] This amendment was on the following section of Mr. Greeley's
Report:
SECTION I. Every man of the age of twenty-one years who shall have
been an inhabitant of this State for one year next preceding an
election, and for the last thirty days a citizen of the United States,
and a resident of the election district where he may offer his vote,
shall be entitled to vote at such election, in said district and not
elsewhere, for all officers elected by the people.
_Provided_, That idiots, lunatics, persons under guardianship, felons,
and persons convicted of bribery, unless pardoned or otherwise
restored to civil rights, shall not be entitled to vote....
[104] The Albany _Evening Journal_ of July 25, 1867, in speaking of
the "Suffrage Discussion," said: "All men and women have the right to
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. If when deprived of the
ballot the consequence is that this inalienable right is abridged,
then society owes it to the class thus practically enslaved to bestow
suffrage upon them. At the South there is no safety for the negro from
oppressive laws but in the ballot. It is idle to argue ignorance.
Political enfranchisement is the best educator."
[105] Beals, Bell, Corning, Curtis, Duganne, Farnum, Field, Folger,
Fowler, Graves, Hadley, Hammond, Kinney, Lapham, M. H. Lawrence, Pond,
Tucker, Vedder, Wales.
[106] _President_--Lucretia Mott.
_Vice-Presidents_--Elizabeth Cady Stanton, N.Y.; Frederick Douglass,
N.Y.; Henry Ward Beecher, N.Y.; Martha C. Wright N.Y.; Elizabeth B.
Chace. R.I.; C. Prince, Ct; Frances D. Gage, N.Y.; Robert Purvis,
Penn.; Parker Pillsbury, N.H.; Antoinette Brown Blackwell, N.J.;
Josephine S. Griffing, D.C.; Thomas Garrett, Del.; Stephen H. Camp,
Ohio; Euphemia Cochrane, Mich.; Mary A. Livermore, Ill.; Mrs. Isaac H.
Sturgeon, Mo.; Amelia Bloomer, Iowa; Helen Ekin Starrett, Kansas;
Virginia Penny, Kentucky; Olympia Brown, Mass.
_Corresponding Secretary_--Mary E. Gage.
_Recording Secretaries_--Henry B. Blackwell, Hattie Purvis.
_Treasurer_--John J. Merritt.
_Executive Committee_--Lucy Stone, Edward S. Bunker, Elizabeth R.
Tilton, Ernestine L. Rose, Robert J. Johnston, Edwin A. Studwell, Anna
Cromwell Field, Susan B. Anthony, Theodore Tilton, Margaret E.
Winchester, Abby Hutchinson Patton.
[107]
ST. LOUIS, May 4, 1868.
MRS. E. C. STANTON--_Dear Friend_: Our gentlemen friends urge us to
memorialize Congress on the question of Suffrage in the District. Well
knowing how a single petition is suffocated, would it not be well for
all the States to unite, and be presented at the same time? New York,
being the banner State, must head the move and be spokesman. Out list
of names is waiting the interminable Impeachment to be handed in (oh,
for old Ben. Wade in the White House), but it seems to me one State
should not go alone; if all the State organizations were notified to
send in their lists immediately to whoever you think will be most
likely to do justice to the cause, we could make quite a formidable
display combined.
Your sincere friend, MRS. FRANCIS MINOR,
President of the St. Louis Woman's Suffrage Association.
* * * * *
ENFRANCHISEMENT IN THE DISTRICT.--MAY 21, 1868.--_To the Friends of
Equal Rights_: The whole government of the District of Columbia is to
be revised by Congress, in consequence of the expiration of local
charters, within the next nine months. A rare opportunity is thus
afforded to bring the enfranchisement of woman to the attention of
Congress and the country. We urge you to send in petitions as fast as
possible, with as many signatures as you can obtain. They should be
sent to Mrs. Josephine S. Griffing, 213 North Capitol street,
Washington, D. C., who will acknowledge their receipt and attend to
their presentation.
FORM OF PETITION.
_To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States in
Congress Assembled_:
The undersigned ----, of the ---- of ----, in the State of ----,
respectfully petition, that in your revision of the government of the
District of Columbia, you will protect the women of the District from
being debarred the exercise of their right of suffrage.
[Illustration: Jane Graham Jones.]
CHAPTER XXI.
RECONSTRUCTION.
The Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments--Universal Suffrage and
Universal Amnesty the Key-note of Reconstruction--Gerrit Smith
and Wendell Phillips Hesitate--A Trying Period in the Woman
Suffrage Movement--Those Opposed to the word "Male" in the
Fourteenth Amendment Voted Down in Conventions--The Negro's
Hour--Virginia L. Minor on Suffrage in the District of
Columbia--Women Advised to be Silent--The Hypocrisy of the
Democrats preferable to that of the Republicans--Senator
Pomeroy's Amendment--Protests against a Man's Government--Negro
Suffrage a Political Necessity--Charles Sumner Opposed to the
Fourteenth Amendment, but Voted for it as a Party Measure--Woman
Suffrage for Utah--Discussion in the House as to who Constitute
Electors--Bills for Woman Suffrage presented by the Hon. George
W. Julian and Senators Wilson and Pomeroy--The Fifteenth
Amendment--Anna E. Dickinson's Suggestion--Opinions of Women on
the Fifteenth Amendment--The Sixteenth Amendment--Miss Anthony
chosen a Delegate to the Democratic National Convention July 4,
1868--Her Address Read by a Unanimous Vote--Horatio Seymour in
the Chair--Comments of the Press--The _Revolution_.
The war settled two questions: 1st. That we are a Nation, and not a
mere confederacy of States. 2d. That all "persons" born or naturalized
in the United States are "citizens," and stand equal before the law.
Freedom, United States citizenship, the limit of State authority, and
national protection of the fundamental rights of citizens in the
several States, are clearly set forth in the following amendments:
THIRTEENTH AMENDMENT, DECEMBER 18, 1865.
"1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a
punishment for crime, whereof the party shall have been duly
convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place
subject to their jurisdiction."
"2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by
appropriate legislation."
FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT, JULY 28, 1868.
Section 1. "All persons born or naturalized in the United States
and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the
United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State
shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges
or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any
State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without
due process of law, nor deny to any person within its
jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
Section 2. "Representatives shall be apportioned among the
several States according to their respective numbers, counting
the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not
taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice
of electors for President and Vice-President of the United
States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial
officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof,
is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being
twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in
any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion or other
crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in
the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear
to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in
such State."
Section 3. "No person shall be a Senator or Representative in
Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any
office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any
State, who, having previously taken an oath as a member of
Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member
of any State Legislature, or as an Executive or Judicial officer
of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States,
shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same,
or give aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may,
by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability."
* * * * *
Section 5. "The Congress shall have power to enforce, by
appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article."
FIFTEENTH AMENDMENT, MARCH 30, 1870.
Section 1. "The right of citizens of the United to vote shall not
be denied or abridged by the United States, or by any State, on
account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude."
Section 2. "The Congress shall have power to enforce this article
by appropriate legislation."
The women understood the principles involved in these amendments, and
accepted the logical conclusions. Under the first they applied to
Congress for protection against the tyranny of the States in depriving
them of the right of suffrage, but they were remanded to the States,
and were told that Congress had no jurisdiction in the matter. Under
the second, when women claimed the rights of citizens as tax-payers
who helped to support the Government, they were told that neither the
fathers nor their sons ever thought of women in framing their
Constitutions, and that some special legislation was needed before
their rights of citizenship could be recognized or accorded.
During the prolonged debates on these amendments, those who watched
the progress of political sentiment and understood the drift of
events, struck the key-note of reconstruction in "universal suffrage
and universal amnesty," but they were speedily silenced or condemned.
Abraham Lincoln saw that this was the true policy, and counseled it
in private. But he was influenced by those who misjudged the signs of
the times, and for the success of his party and his own re-election,
he yielded to weak counselors. Horace Greeley, with the suffering and
humiliation of the South, as well as the guilt and selfishness of the
North before him, declared "universal suffrage and universal amnesty"
to be the true basis of reconstruction, but a few cracks of the party
whip brought him into line. Henry Ward Beecher foreshadowed the same
policy in an able letter, which called down upon him the nation's
scorn and denunciation, for which he was stabbed by the friends of his
own household. He was the one leading man in the nation who, in all
his public speeches, demanded universal suffrage in the
reconstruction. And by universal suffrage Mr. Beecher meant political
equality for all, without distinction of race, color, or sex. Women
would have been dull scholars indeed had they not readily seen that
the watchword "universal suffrage" stripped of the limitations that
lay in the minds of party politicians, included women also.
Under Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment they saw that being
"persons" and born in the United States, they were "citizens," whom
the National Government was bound to protect against the tyranny of
the State.
Section 2 called their attention to another principle of justice, that
those who were counted in the basis of representation should have a
voice in the rulers whose election their numbers helped to secure. To
be sure, the word "male" thrown in seemed to nullify all applications
of the several amendments to one sex, nevertheless the women
understood the breadth of the principle, and made their demands for an
equal recognition on the ground that they too were counted in the
basis of representation.
Again, in the discussion on removing the "political disabilities" of
those who had made war on the Government, when the injustice of taxing
that large class denied the suffrage was pointed out and the exercise
of that right demanded for thousands of rebels, the women saw the
application of that principle to themselves, and echoed the old
war-cry in our first Revolution, "taxation without representation is
tyranny." In the exhaustive discussions on the emancipation and
enfranchisement of the black man and the restoration of the rebels to
political equality, the fundamental principles of republican
government were more clearly comprehended by the American people than
ever before. Hence, it was in harmony with the order of events that
educated women, appreciating the genius of our institutions, with
their interest in politics intensified by all the complications of
the war, should think and reason and express their opinions on all
these great questions of popular thought. They saw that "universal
suffrage and universal amnesty" was the broad, safe foundation for the
new republic. They saw that the enfranchisement of the women of the
South would not only double the vote, but give a new impulse to
thought and education throughout the Southern States, and mitigate the
hostility they would naturally feel in seeing their slaves suddenly
made their political superiors, their rulers, law-makers, judges, and
jurors! They saw that with the incoming tide of ignorant voters from
Southern plantations and from the nations of the Old World, that the
Government needed the intelligent votes and moral influence of woman
to outweigh the ignorance and vice fast crowding round our polling
booths.
Seeing all this, they pressed with earnestness the well-considered
demand for woman's enfranchisement, not from any selfish or personal
considerations, but for the elevation of all womankind, and to
vindicate the principles that underlie republican government. They who
have the responsibility of action are usually more timid in counsel
than those who can exert only an indirect influence. Hence the
statesmen of that period did not dare to trust their own principles to
their logical results, and instead of the broad demand of equal rights
for all, they proposed reconstruction on the basis of "manhood
suffrage"; a half-way measure that satisfied nobody, glossed over by
the party in power as "universal suffrage," "equal suffrage,"
"impartial suffrage," until compelled to call the proposition by its
true name, "manhood suffrage."
Having served the Government during the war in such varied capacities,
and taken an active part in the discussion of its vital principles on
so many reform platforms, women naturally felt that in reconstruction
their rights as citizens should be protected and secured. They who had
so diligently rolled up petitions for the emancipation and
enfranchisement of the slaves now demanded the same liberties, not
only for the white women of the nation, but for the newly made
freed-women from Southern plantations, who had borne more grievous
burdens and endured keener sufferings in the flesh and far more
aggravating humiliations in spirit, than the man slave could ever
know. And yet Abolitionists who had drawn their most eloquent appeals
for emancipation from the hopeless degradation of woman in slavery,
ignored alike the African and the Saxon in reconstruction, and refused
to sign the petition for "woman suffrage." Even such just and liberal
men as Gerrit Smith and Wendell Phillips, in their haste to see the
consummation of the black man's freedom, to which they had devoted
their life-long efforts, lost sight of the ever-binding principles of
justice, and accepted an amendment to the National Constitution that
made all men rulers, all women subjects. Gerrit Smith, who had often
said, "It is always safe to do right"; "now is the time for action,
you can not be sure of to-morrow"; "speak the truth though the heavens
fall," acted from policy rather than principle in refusing to sign the
following petition:
_To the Senate and House of Representatives in Congress
assembled_:
The undersigned, citizens of the State of New York, earnestly but
respectfully request, that in any change or amendment of the
Constitution you may propose to extend or regulate suffrage,
there shall be no distinctions made between men and women.
PETERBORO, Dec. 30, 1868.
MY DEAR SUSAN B. ANTHONY:--I this evening received your earnest
letter. It pains me to be obliged to disappoint you. But I can
not sign the petition you send me. Cheerfully, gladly can I sign
a petition for the enfranchisement of women. But I can not sign a
paper against the enfranchisement of the negro man, unless at the
same time woman shall be enfranchised. The removal of the
political disabilities of race is my first desire--of sex, my
second. If put on the same level and urged in the same connection
neither will be soon accomplished. The former will very soon be,
if untrammeled by the other, and its success will prepare the way
for the accomplishment of the other.
With great regard, your friend, GERRIT SMITH.
To which letter Mrs. Stanton replied in _The Revolution_ Jan. 14,
1869:
The above is the petition to which our friend Gerrit Smith, as an
abolitionist, can not conscientiously put his name, while
Republicans and Democrats are signing it all over the country. He
does not clearly read the signs of the times, or he would see
that there is to be no reconstruction of this nation, except on
the basis of universal suffrage, as the natural, inalienable
right of every citizen. The uprising of the women on both
continents, in France, England, Russia, Switzerland, and the
United States, all show that advancing civilization demands a new
element in the government of nations. As the aristocracy in this
country is the "male sex," and as Mr. Smith belongs to the
privileged order, he naturally considers it important for the
best interests of the nation, that every type and shade of
degraded, ignorant manhood should be enfranchised, before even
the higher classes of womanhood should be admitted to the polls.
This does not surprise us. Men always judge more wisely of
objective wrongs and oppressions, than of those in which they are
themselves involved. Tyranny on a Southern plantation is far more
easily seen by white men at the North than the wrongs of the
women of their own households.
Then, again, when men have devoted their lives to one reform,
there is a natural feeling of pride, as well as an earnest
principle, in seeing that one thing accomplished. Hence, in
criticising such good and noble men as Gerrit Smith and Wendell
Phillips for their apathy on woman's enfranchisement at this
hour, it is not because we think their course at all remarkable,
nor that we have the least hope of influencing them, but simply
to rouse the women of the country to the fact that they must not
look to these men as their champions at this hour. While
philosophy and science alike point to woman as the new power
destined to redeem the world, how can Mr. Smith fail to see that
it is just this we need to restore honor and virtue in the
Government? There is sex in the spiritual as well as the
physical, and what we need to-day in government, in the world of
morals and thought, is the recognition of the feminine element,
as it is this alone that can hold the masculine in check.
Again; Mr. Smith refuses to sign the petition because he thinks
to press the broader question of "universal suffrage" would
defeat the partial one of "manhood suffrage"; in other words, to
demand protection for woman against her oppressors, would
jeopardize the black man's chance of securing protection against
his oppressors. If it is a question of precedence merely, on what
principle of justice or courtesy should woman yield her right of
enfranchisement to the negro? If men can not be trusted to
legislate for their own sex, how can they legislate for the
opposite sex, of whose wants and needs they know nothing? It has
always been considered good philosophy in pressing any measure to
claim the uttermost in order to get something. Being in Ireland
at the time of the Repeal excitement, we asked Daniel O'Connell
one day if he expected to secure a repeal of the Union. "Oh, no!"
said he, "but I claim everything that I may be sure of getting
something." But their intense interest in the negro blinded our
former champions so that they forsook principle for policy, and
in giving woman the cold shoulder raised a more deadly opposition
to the negro than any we had yet encountered, creating an
antagonism between him and the very element most needed to be
propitiated in his behalf. It was this feeling that defeated
"negro suffrage" in Kansas.
But Mr. Smith abandons the principle clearly involved, and
intrenches himself on policy. He would undoubtedly plead the
necessity of the ballot for the negro at the south for his
protection, and point us to innumerable acts of cruelty he
suffers to-day. But all these things fall as heavily on the women
of the black race, yea far more so, for no man can ever know the
deep, the damning degradation to which woman is subject in her
youth, in helplessness and poverty. The enfranchisement of the
men of her race, Mr. Smith would say, is her protection. Our
Saxon men have held the ballot in this country for a century, and
what honest man can claim that it has been used for woman's
protection? Alas! we have given the very hey day of our life to
undoing the cruel and unjust laws that the men of New York had
made for their own mothers, wives, and daughters.
As to the "rights of races," on which so much stress is laid just
now, we have listened to debates in anti-slavery conventions, for
twenty years or more, and we never heard Gerrit Smith plead the
negro cause on any lower ground than his manhood; his individual,
inalienable right to freedom and equality, and thus, we conjure
every thoughtful man to plead woman's cause to-day. Politicians
will find, when they come to test this question of "negro
supremacy" in the several States, that there is a far stronger
feeling among the women of the nation than they supposed. We
doubt whether a constitutional amendment securing "manhood
suffrage" alone could be fairly passed in a single State in this
Union. Women everywhere are waking up to their own God-given
rights, to their true dignity as citizens of a republic, as
mothers of the race.
Although those who demand "woman's suffrage" on principle are
few, those who would oppose "negro suffrage" from prejudice are
many, hence the only way to secure the latter, is to end all this
talk of class legislation, bury the negro in the citizen, and
claim the suffrage for all men and women, as a natural,
inalienable right. The friends of the negro never made a greater
blunder than when, at the close of the war, they timidly refused
to lead the nation in demanding suffrage for all. If even Wendell
Phillips and Gerrit Smith, the very apostles of liberty on this
continent, failed at that point, how can we wonder at the
vacillation and confusion of politicians at this hour. We had
hoped that the elections of '67, with their overwhelming
majorities in every State against negro suffrage, would have
proved to all alike, how futile is compromise, how short-sighted
is policy. We have pressed these considerations so often on Mr.
Phillips and Mr. Smith during the last four years, that we fear
we have entirely forfeited the friendship of the one, and
diminished the confidence of the other in our good judgment; but
time, that rights all wrongs, will surely bring them back to the
standpoint of principle.
As soon as we had a mouthpiece in _The Revolution_ we found that many
noble women in every State understood the situation, and saw that
while the question of reconstruction was under debate, woman was false
to herself not to put in her claims. In face of all opposition, those
who did see the policy and justice of claiming this time as the
woman's hour also, made the most persistent, brave fight possible.
Again were appeals and petitions sent to Congress and the people, but
now for woman's enfranchisement. When the whole nation was as it were
resolved into its original elements, and the fundamental rights of
citizens the topic for discussion in the halls of legislation and at
every fireside, the time seemed so opportune for the settlement of the
broad question of representation, that the persistency and
determination of a few women to secure their rights was neither
surprising nor unreasonable.
This was one of the most trying periods in the woman suffrage
movement. Negro suffrage being a party measure, a political necessity
and the culmination of the anti-slavery conflict, Republicans and
Abolitionists could bid each other a most sincere and heartfelt
Godspeed. And with them, too, stood the majority of the woman suffrage
associations. Wives and daughters of Republicans and Abolitionists,
imbued with the ideas of politicians, "one measure at a time," "one
reform for a generation," lost sight of the true philosophy, that
justice is always in order, and the fact that "universal suffrage" was
the one reform that belonged specifically to the period of
reconstruction. But women educated to self-sacrifice and
self-abnegation readily accepted the idea that it was divine and
beautiful to hold their claims for rights and privileges in abeyance
to all orders and classes of men. They forgot that the highest
patriotism, and the best interests of man himself demanded the
enfranchisement of woman.
The few who insisted on absolute right stood firmly together under a
steady fire of ridicule and reproach even from their life-long friends
most loved and honored. They knew their position was unassailable, for
they had well learned the lesson taught in the early days of
anti-slavery and the Republican party, that all compromises with
principle are dangerous. Statesmen and reformers alike admitted that
the demands of the women were just and proper, though not opportune.
But when the whole question of suffrage was up for discussion, there
could not be a better time to get all the agitation possible in regard
to woman's claims. The subject once settled on the narrow ground of
class, it would not be renewed for a generation. Time has proved their
fears well grounded. Nearly twenty years have passed, and there has
been no such agitation and excitement as then on the question. If all
the women, to say nothing of the Republicans and Abolitionists who
claimed to believe in the truth of the idea, had stood firm, woman
would have been enfranchised with the negro. But few could withstand
the persecution, the ridicule, the pathetic appeals to keep silent,
and in a large measure when the Anti-Slavery Society disbanded the
woman suffrage movement became the toy of the Republican party, and
has been trifled with ever since, like the cat with the mouse in the
fable.
But Democrats seeing the inconsistency of Republicans, did advocate
our cause, present our petitions in Congress, and frank our documents
to all parts of the country. And because these women, denied help and
encouragement from other sources, accepted aid from the Democrats,
they were called "Copperheads";[108] disloyal to the Government.
Women who had been complimented by the Republican press as "wise,"
"prudent," "noble," while rolling up 300,000 petitions for
emancipation, were now said to be "selfish," "impracticable,"
"unreasonable," because forsooth they demanded some new liberties for
themselves. More over said the Republicans, "these Democrats are
hypocritical, they do not believe in the extension of suffrage to any
class." To this the women replied, "If the Democrats advocate a grand
measure of public policy which they do not believe, they occupy much
higher ground than Republicans who refuse to press the same measure
which they claim to believe. At all events the hypocrisy of Democrats
serves us a better purpose in the present emergency than does the
treachery of Republicans."
But with all their long-time friends against them; such as Charles
Sumner and Henry Wilson in the Senate, William Lloyd Garrison and
Gerrit Smith in reform, Horace Greeley and most of the Liberals in the
press, the position of the women seemed so untenable to the majority
that at times a sense of utter loneliness and desertion made the
bravest of them doubt the possibility of maintaining the struggle or
making themselves fairly understood. And yet, what was done was sound
in principle and wise in policy. Every argument made by Republicans
and Abolitionists for the enfranchisement of the negro was pertinent
for woman. As Mr. Sumner said to us years after he made that great
speech on "Equal rights to all," "substitute sex for color, and you
have the best speech I could make on your platform." Our cause was
wise too in policy, for never before had we such an opportunity to
compel intelligent opposition in the halls of legislation and in
conventions of the people. Black men were at the white heat of anxiety
and expectation; Abolitionists, with bated breath, watched every move
and vote in Congress; Republicans felt that on the success or defeat
of "negro suffrage" hung the life or death of their party; and all
alike feared the slightest influence that might turn the scale, and
deplored the seeming coalition of the women and the Democrats. Hence
what an hour to proclaim our principles of government upon their
broadest basis, and to keep up the discussion of woman suffrage at
every point with so formidable an opposition!
Few[109] only were equal to the emergency. Even in the Equal Rights
Conventions the slightest opposition to the XIV Amendment called out
hisses and denunciation, and all resolutions on that point were
promptly voted down. Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony were waylaid again
and again in the ante-rooms, and implored to avoid all discussions on
the pending amendments, and were persistently opposed by black men,
Abolitionists, Republicans and women who did not understand either the
principle or policy involved in the discussion. This opposition of the
few did not grow out of any hostility to "negro suffrage," for they
were all Abolitionists, and had labored untiringly for the
emancipation of the slaves; but they were opposed to the
enfranchisement of another class of ignorant men to be lifted above
their heads, to be their law-makers and Governors; to prescribe the
moral code and political status of their daughters. The hue and cry
against those who claimed that "that was the woman's hour," for
accepting the aid of Democrats in the establishment of a paper through
which they could plead their own case, were so many plausible pretexts
in the mouths of those who could not consistently attack their
principles of action. But from this opposition on all sides true woman
suffragists learned their power to stand alone, and to maintain the
right against large and honorable majorities.
Again said our professed friends we can carry "negro suffrage" now; it
is a political necessity; do not trammel us with another issue--this
done, depend upon it, men have too much chivalry to forget the
services of the loyal women all through the war, and through the long
political struggle in Congress. Women in our conventions echoed the
same assuring sentiments, and voted down resolutions of protest and
rebuke. They were deceived with the plausible promises made by
Republicans and Abolitionists--promises still unredeemed, for
Republicans have been busy ever since trying to save the life of their
party; and Abolitionists, with few exceptions, have thrown their
influence into Labor Reform, Temperance, Finance, and Literature. But
of what do you complain, asked our statesmen. Of many things, we
replied:
1st. Our National Constitution was broad and liberal in letter and
spirit, put no limits on suffrage, made no distinctions in sex, until
the Republicans, by their amendments, introduced the word "male," and
thus blocked woman's path to equality.
2d. Republicans in Congress either suppressed our petitions for
suffrage, or presented them under protest, after holding them for
weeks in their possession.
3d. By their speeches and votes in Congress, and their decisions in
the courts on questions involving our civil and political rights, they
have stultified their own grand declarations of the equal rights of
citizens in a republic.
When the XIV Amendment was first proposed, the Hon. Charles Sumner
opposed it, because, he said, there was already enough of Justice,
Liberty, and Equality in the Constitution to protect the humblest
citizen under our flag. He had always taken the ground that the
Constitution was an Anti-Slavery document, hence to vote for an
amendment was to contradict his former position. We opposed the
amendments because, in the Constitution as it was there were no
distinctions of sex recognized, while the amendments declaring
"manhood suffrage," established an aristocracy of sex. However, in due
season, Mr. Sumner withdrew his opposition; and without changing his
opinion, voted for the amendments because negro suffrage was a party
measure, and the political necessity of the hour. We, having no party,
no votes, no political right but to petition and discuss the measures
up for consideration, saw no reason for changing our opinions, hence
we used the best possible means to keep up the agitation until the
amendments were passed, and beyond reconsideration. Nevertheless, in
the midst of this general hostility, the sound policy of the agitation
carried on against the Republican party and its measures was evident
in the numerous bills some of its liberal members soon after presented
in Congress. In _The Revolution_, December 10, 1868, we find the
following:
NOW'S THE HOUR.--Not the "negro's hour" alone, but everybody's
hour. All honor to Senator Pomeroy! He has taken the first step
to redeem the Constitution from all odious distinctions on
account of race or sex. He lost no time in presenting, at the
opening of Congressional proceedings, the following as an
amendment to the Federal Constitution to regulate suffrage
throughout the country:
Article 15. The basis of suffrage in the United States shall
be that of citizenship; and all native or naturalized
citizens shall enjoy the same rights and privileges of the
elective franchise; but each State shall determine by law
the age of a citizen and the time of residence required for
the exercise of the right of suffrage which shall apply
equally to all citizens; and also shall make all laws
concerning the times, places, and manner of holding
elections.
Laid on the table and ordered to be printed.
Now let the work of petitioning and agitating for this amendment
be prosecuted with a vigor and energy unknown before. And let
Senator Pomeroy be honored with receiving and presenting to the
Senate such a deluge of names as shall convince him that his
noble step in the direction of a true democracy, is appreciated;
and such too as shall be a rebuke to all half-way measures that
would leave woman (white and colored) behind the colored male;
and moreover, that shall convince Congress and the whole
government that we can be trifled with no longer on a subject so
vital to the peace, prosperity, and perpetuity of our own people,
and the establishment of free institutions among the nations of
the earth.
CONGRESS WIDE AWAKE.--Last week we gave good account of Mr.
Julian, of Indiana, on behalf of suffrage for woman. This week we
can report similar progress in the Senate also. The following is
Senator Wilson's bill to amend an act entitled an act to regulate
the elective franchise in the District of Columbia:
Be it enacted, etc., That the word "male" in the first
section of the act entitled "An act to regulate the elective
franchise in the District of Columbia, passed on the 8th day
of January, 1867," be struck out, and that every word in
said act applicable to persons of the male sex shall apply
equally to persons of the female sex, so that hereafter
women, who are inhabitants of the said District of Columbia
and citizens of the United States, may vote at all elections
and be eligible to civil offices in said District on the
same terms and conditions in all respects as men.
Mr. Julian, in the House, on leave, introduced the following bill
further to extend the right of suffrage in the District of
Columbia:
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress Assembled, That
from and after the passage of this act the right of suffrage
in the District of Columbia shall be based upon citizenship;
and all citizens of the United States, native and
naturalized, resident in said District, who are twenty-one
years of age, of sound mind, and who have not forfeited this
right by crime, shall enjoy the same equally, irrespective
of sex.
SEC. 2, And be it further enacted, That all acts or parts of
acts inconsistent with the provisions of this act are hereby
repealed.
Mr. Julian, on leave, introduced the following bill further to
extend the right of suffrage in the Territories of the United
States:
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress Assembled, That
from and after the passage of this act the right of suffrage
in all the Territories of the United States, now or
hereafter to be organized, shall be based upon citizenship;
and all citizens of the United States, native or
naturalized, resident in said Territories, who are
twenty-one years of age, of sound mind, and who have not
forfeited their right by crime, shall enjoy the same
equally, irrespective of sex.
SEC. 2, And be it further enacted, That all acts or parts of
acts, either by Congress or the legislative assemblies of
said Territories, inconsistent with the provisions of this
act are hereby declared null and void.
WOMAN SUFFRAGE IN UTAH.--March 25, 1869.--Mr. Julian introduced
the following bill into Congress to discourage polygamy in Utah
by granting the right of suffrage to the women of that Territory:
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress Assembled, That
from and after the passage of this act the right of Suffrage
in the Territory of Utah shall belong to, and may be
exercised by, the people thereof, without any distinction or
discrimination whatever founded on sex.
The bill was read twice, referred to the Committee on
Territories, and ordered to be printed.
The New York _Herald_ is no more than an average of the voice of
the intelligent portion of the press in the following excerpts
from its columns: Senator Wilson has introduced a bill so to
amend the suffrage laws of the District of Columbia as to give to
women of all colors and races, as well as men, the right of
suffrage. As Congress has exclusive powers of legislation over
the District of Columbia in all cases whatsoever, here is a fair
chance to try the two houses upon this very interesting question.
There are a few out-spoken members of the Senate in favor of
Woman Suffrage, and first and foremost among them is "Old Ben
Wade," who goes for the whole programme of negroes' rights and
women's rights. Senator Pomeroy, of Kansas, has so far advanced
in the cause of Woman Suffrage that he has proposed to make it a
part of the supreme law of the land. But we like the idea of Mr.
Wilson of first trying the experiment in the District of
Columbia.
We remember the time when, in full view from the west front of
the Capitol, there was a regular slave pen which was also a
market where negroes were bought and sold. The abolitionists
first raised a hue and cry against that pen, and they kept it up
to 1850, when among the compromise measures of Henry Clay passed
that year was a provision abolishing the slave trade in the
District. Some twelve years later, during the rebellion, the
bolder and broader experiment was tried of abolishing slavery _in
toto_ in said District. These measures over a reserved bit of
territory over which Congress possesses absolute authority were
deemed judicious experiments and were demanded for the sake of
consistency, in view of the legislation resolved upon in Southern
reconstruction. So now, in view of a constitutional amendment
establishing not only manhood suffrage, but womanhood suffrage
throughout the United States, Mr. Wilson doubtless thinks it wise
first to try the experiment of Woman Suffrage in the aforesaid
District, to see how it will work. As the District of Columbia
has not only survived but has flourished and continues to
flourish under emancipation and negro suffrage, we can not
imagine why there should be any hesitation in trying therein the
experiment of Woman Suffrage. At all events let Senator Wilson
push forward his bill, so that the country may know, so that
General Grant may know, and so that the women may know who in the
Senate in favor of negroes' rights will dare to oppose woman's
rights.
CONGRESS.--DECEMBER 16, 1869.--In the House, some discussion
arose on a question involving the equality of woman to hold
appointments in the government. It was on a bill providing for
the taking of the census. A motion was made to amend an amendment
by changing the word elector (voter) to resident.
MR. LAWRENCE, of Ohio, said: I am opposed to the amendment of the
gentleman from New York. The effect will be to exclude every
female from any appointment, and although I suppose there will
not be many female applicants for office under this bill, I see
no reason why we should exclude them. (Laughter.) I know no
reason why a soldier's widow or any other female properly
qualified might not receive an appointment to any office the
duties of which she may be as capable of performing as those of
our own sex. If reasons exist let them be given. I will inquire
of the gallant gentleman from New York whether he wishes to
exclude this portion of his constituents and mine from the
privilege of holding office under this bill? (Renewed laughter.)
Mr. WOOD: My amendment says elector, not electress, and until the
ladies have the privilege of electors of the United States I
propose to exclude them.
Mr. LAWRENCE: I am opposed to that. Merit and capacity to serve
the people to the best advantage, after a proper consideration of
claims, should be the test for office.
Mr. GARFIELD, of Ohio: The word "elector" in the amendment of the
gentleman from New York (Mr. Wood) would exclude Alaska
altogether. There are no electors in Alaska. I would suggest that
he substitute the word "resident," which would avoid the
difficulty to which I have referred.
The question being put on Mr. Wood's amendment,
Mr. GARFIELD, of Ohio, moved to amend the proposed amendment by
inserting the word "resident" instead of "elector."
The question being put on Mr. Garfield's amendment to Mr. Wood's
amendment, it was agreed to. The question being put on Mr. Wood's
amendment, as amended, it was agreed to. So far, then, woman is
not to be proscribed.
As in the war women bravely assumed duties in many departments of
labor unknown to them before, so in the reconstruction they gave more
earnest thought to questions of public policy, and made many valuable
suggestions. A well written speech on "Reconstruction and Universal
Suffrage," was delivered by Mrs. M. C. Walling, of Texas, in the
Senate chamber of the Capitol at Washington, May 10th, 1866; The first
and last time that a woman was ever granted the privilege of speaking
there.
To Anna Dickinson belongs the honor of suggesting a XV amendment.
Although the XIV amendment to the National Constitution gave to that
document for the first time a concise definition of a "citizen," and
forbade any State to abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens
of the United States, yet this amendment was found inadequate to
protect the political rights of the colored men; and the Republican
party was anxiously casting about for a method of perfecting their
work, when the puzzle was solved by a proposition for a XV amendment,
which should prohibit disfranchisement on account of race, color, or
previous condition of servitude. The suggestion for this amendment
originated at the National Loyalists' Convention held at Philadelphia,
September, 1866, in a consultation between Anna Dickinson, Frederick
Douglass, and Theodore Tilton, and was in time accepted by the
Republican party. It was reported in Congress Feb. 26, 1869, and
received the necessary ratification March 30, 1870. Thus a woman and a
colored man were two important factors in perfecting the work of
reconstruction through a constitutional provision prohibiting
disfranchisement on account of race, color, or previous condition of
servitude.
As when the XIV amendment was pending, the efforts of women were
directed toward securing the omission of the invidious word "male," so
on the submission of the XV amendment their efforts were again
directed toward securing the enfranchisement of woman by the
introduction of the word "sex" in the last line of Section 1. But
Congress with the usual short-sightedness of injustice, refused to
secure the political freedom of one half the entire people, even
forgetting to enfranchise a portion of the colored race from their
"previous condition of servitude" because of sex.
The sound position taken by Anna Dickinson at this period is
substantiated by Frederick Douglass, not only in his "Life and Times,"
but in the following letters:
WASHINGTON, D. C., Jan. 31, 1882.
DEAR MRS. STANTON:-- ... Mrs. Gage's version of the origin of the
15th Amendment is in substance true. To dear Anna E. Dickinson
and brave Theodore Tilton belongs the credit of forcing that
amendment upon the attention of the Nation at the right moment
and in the right way to make it successful. I have given Miss
Dickinson the credit you award her in my "Life and Times," and
have made myself one of your earliest converts in the same.
Very truly yours, FRED'K. DOUGLASS.
WASHINGTON, D. C., Feb. 6, 1882.
MY DEAR MRS. STANTON:--Referring, since reading your note, to
what I have said of the National Loyalist Convention, held in
Philadelphia in 1866, I find that I have done but very scant
justice to Anna E. Dickinson and Theodore Tilton. Their courage,
skill and sagacity, were never displayed to greater advantage
than on that occasion. I have, as you will see, mentioned the
main facts, but I have given but a meagre view of the moral
conditions surrounding it. Bold and prompt action was needed, and
the man and the woman were equal to the occasion. From the first
Miss Dickinson, Mr. Tilton and myself felt that any
reconstruction at the South leaving the freedmen without the
ballot, would leave them in the absolute power of the old
master-class. Hence from the first we conferred together as to
the manner of bringing the subject to the attention of the
Convention. We looked to the Committee on Resolutions to bring up
the subject, but waited in vain. They had nothing for us but well
rounded platitudes and glittering generalities about the Union
and the relation of the States to the National Government all
well enough in ordinary times, but totally inappropriate in
respect of the real situation of the country at the moment. When
it became known that Mr. Tilton and myself meant to bring forward
the subject, we were besought not to do a thing so impolitic. We
were implored not to load the Republican party with this new
burden. We were told of the advantage it would give the
Democratic party against us; how it would intensify and
concentrate the prejudice already felt for the negro. It was
evident that negro suffrage was the one great dread of the
Convention. The proposal to discuss it was deplored as a blunder
which would cost us dearly. This apprehension was mainly confined
to the delegates from the border States, and as they had the
control of the Convention, they managed to keep out the
disturbing question of negro suffrage till the last day.
Seeing the evident purpose to this end, Mr. Tilton, after
consulting with Miss Dickinson and myself, introduced the
suffrage question. His action was received as a very large
fire-brand, and caused a storm of tumult and confusion, in the
midst of which the President, Mr. Speed, and other officers left
their places on the platform, declaring the Convention adjourned.
At this critical juncture, with the tact and skill of a veteran,
Mr. Tilton seized the helm, declared the Convention not
adjourned, and moved that Honorable John Minor Botts take the
Chair. The Border States delegates took their hats and heels out
of the Convention without standing upon the order of their going,
while the men from the Gulf States nobly stood their ground. The
Convention was still large. The going out of the Border States
unfettered the platform. Anna E. Dickinson came on the stand with
all her wonted ability, and thrilled the audience by her
eloquent plea for negro suffrage. Hers was the speech, not of a
brilliant declaimer, but the solid logic of a statesman. When she
sat down I felt that the battle was more than half won. Next
after Miss Dickinson came Theodore Tilton. It was plain from the
moment he took the stand that the situation suited him, and that
we were to hear from him that day such words of wisdom, truth and
soberness as only genius could supply. We were not disappointed.
He was the full master of the subject and the occasion, I
followed Mr. Tilton, and resolutions favoring what has since
become the 15th Amendment were passed with very little
opposition.
You will notice on page 480 of my book, that I don't forget my
walk with you from the house of Mr. Joseph Southwick, where you
quietly brought to my notice your arguments for womanhood
suffrage. That is forty years ago. You had just returned from
your European tour. From that conversation with you I have been
convinced of the wisdom of woman suffrage, and have never denied
the faith....
Very truly yours, FRED'K. DOUGLASS.
When Anna Dickinson, Frederick Douglass, and Theodore Tilton pressed
the question of negro suffrage on the Loyalists' convention, they were
met by the same arguments and appeals against it, that were urged upon
those who pressed woman suffrage when the Fourteenth Amendment was
pending. Douglass knew that any reconstruction without political
equality for the black man was a delusion; the women saw as clearly
that any reconstruction without political equality for them was a
delusion also, and their determination to have some recognition under
government sprung from the same love of freedom and self-respect that
moved Douglass when, with equal determination, he walked in the
procession, and took his seat as a delegate, as he had a right to do,
though warned that he would stir up a mob, and be a firebrand in the
convention. The description of this scene by Mr. Douglass himself is a
suggestive study for all oppressed classes:
I was residing in Rochester at the time, and was duly elected as
a delegate from that city to attend this convention. The honor
was a surprise and a gratification to me. It was unprecedented
for a city of over 60,000 white citizens, and only about 200
colored residents, to elect a colored man to represent them in a
national political convention, and the announcement of it gave a
shock to the country of no inconsiderable violence. Many
Republicans, with every feeling of respect for me personally,
were unable to see the wisdom of such a course. They dreaded the
clamor of social equality and amalgamation which would be raised
against the party, in consequence of this startling innovation.
They, dear fellows, found it much more agreeable to talk of the
principles of liberty as glittering generalities, than to reduce
those principles to practice.
When the train on which I was going to the convention reached
Harrisburgh, it met and was attached to another from the West
crowded with Western and Southern delegates on the way to the
convention, and among them were several loyal Governors, chief
among whom was the Governor of Indiana, Oliver P. Morton, a man
of Websterian mould in all that appertained to mental power. When
my presence became known to these gentlemen, a consultation was
immediately held among them, upon the question as to what was
best to do with me. It seems strange now, in view of all the
progress which has been made, that such a question could arise.
But the circumstances of the times made me the Jonah of the
Republican ship, and responsible for the contrary winds and
misbehaving weather. Before we reached Lancaster, on our eastward
bound trip, I was duly waited upon by a committee of my brother
delegates, which had been appointed by other honorable delegates,
to represent to me the undesirableness of my attendance upon the
National Loyalists' Convention. The spokesman of these
sub-delegates was a gentleman from New Orleans with a very French
name, which has now escaped me, but which I wish I could recall,
that I might credit him with a high degree of politeness and the
gift of eloquence. He began by telling me that he knew my history
and my works, and that he entertained a very high respect for me,
that both himself and the gentlemen who sent him, as well as
those who accompanied him, regarded me with admiration; that
there was not among them the remotest objection to sitting in the
convention with me, but their personal wishes in the matter they
felt should be set aside for the sake of our common cause; that
whether I should or should not go into the convention was purely
a matter of expediency; that I must know that there was a very
strong and bitter prejudice against my race in the North as well
as at the South; and that the cry of social and political
equality would not fail to be raised against the Republican party
if I should attend this loyal national convention. He insisted
that it was a time for the sacrifice of my own personal feeling,
for the good of the Republican cause; that there were several
districts in the State of Indiana so evenly balanced that a very
slight circumstance would be likely to turn the scale against us,
and defeat our Congressional candidates and thus leave Congress
without a two-thirds vote to control the headstrong and
treacherous man then in the presidential chair. It was urged that
this was a terrible responsibility for me or any other man to
take.
I listened very attentively to this address, uttering, no word
during its delivery; but when it was finished, I said to the
speaker and the committee, with all the emphasis I could throw
into my voice and manner: "Gentlemen, with all respect, you might
as well ask me to put a loaded pistol to my head and blow my
brains out, as to ask me to keep out of this convention, to which
I have been duly elected. Then, gentlemen, what would you gain by
this exclusion? Would not the charge of cowardice, certain to be
brought against you, prove more damaging than that of
amalgamation? Would you not be branded all over the land as
dastardly hypocrites, professing principles which you have no
wish or intention of carrying out? As a mere matter of policy or
expediency, you will be wise to let me in. Everybody knows that I
have been duly elected as a delegate by the city of Rochester.
The fact has been broadly announced and commented upon all over
the country. If I am not admitted, the public will ask, 'Where is
Douglass? Why is he not seen in the convention?' and you would
find that inquiry more difficult to answer than any charge
brought against you for favoring political or social equality;
but, ignoring the question of policy altogether, and looking at
it as one of right and wrong, I am bound to go into that
convention; not to do so, would contradict the principle and
practice of my life." With this answer, the committee retired
from the car in which I was seated, and did not again approach me
on the subject; but I saw plainly enough then, as well as on the
morning when the Loyalist procession was to march through the
streets of Philadelphia, that while I was not to be formally
excluded, I was to be ignored by the Convention.
I was the ugly and deformed child of the family, and to be kept
out of sight as much as possible while there was company in the
house. Especially was it the purpose to offer me no inducement to
be present in the ranks of the procession of its members and
friends, which was to start from Independence Hall on the first
morning of its meeting. In good season, however, I was present at
this grand starting point. My reception there confirmed my
impression as to the policy intended to be pursued toward me. Few
of the many I knew were prepared to give me a cordial
recognition, and among these few I may mention Gen. Benj. F.
Butler, who, whatever others may say of him, has always shown a
courage equal to his convictions. Almost everybody else whom I
met seemed to be ashamed or afraid of me. On the previous night I
had been warned that I should not be allowed to walk through the
city in the procession; fears had been expressed that my presence
in it would so shock the prejudices of the people of
Philadelphia, as to cause the procession to be mobbed.
The members of the convention were to walk two abreast, and as I
was the only colored member of the convention, the question was,
as to who of my brother members would consent to walk with me?
The answer was not long in coming. There was one man present who
was broad enough to take in the whole situation, and brave enough
to meet the duty of the hour; one who was neither afraid nor
ashamed to own me as a man and a brother; one man of the purest
Caucasian type, a poet and a scholar, brilliant as a writer,
eloquent as a speaker, and holding a high and influential
position--the editor of a weekly journal having the largest
circulation of any weekly paper in the city or State of New
York--and that man was Mr. Theodore Tilton. He came to me in my
isolation, seized me by the hand in a most brotherly way, and
proposed to walk with me in the procession. I have been in many
awkward and disagreeable positions in my life, when the presence
of a friend would have been highly valued, but I think I never
appreciated an act of courage and generous sentiment more highly
than I did that of this brave young man, when we marched through
the streets of Philadelphia on this memorable day.
Well! what came of all these dark forebodings of timid men? How
was my presence regarded by the populace? and what effect did it
produce? I will tell you. The fears of the loyal Governors who
wished me excluded to propitiate the favor of the crowd, met with
a signal reproof, their apprehensions were shown to be
groundless, and they were compelled, as many of them confessed to
me afterwards, to own themselves entirely mistaken. The people
were more enlightened and had made more progress than their
leaders had supposed. An act for which those leaders expected to
be pelted with stones, only brought to them unmeasured applause.
Along the whole line of march my presence was cheered repeatedly
and enthusiastically. I was myself utterly surprised by the
heartiness and unanimity of the popular approval. We were
marching through a city remarkable for the depth and bitterness
of its hatred of the abolition movement; a city whose populace
had mobbed anti-slavery meetings, burned temperance halls and
churches owned by colored people, and burned down Pennsylvania
Hall because it had opened its doors to people of different
colors upon terms of equality. But now the children of those who
had committed these outrages and follies, were applauding the
very principles which their fathers had condemned. After the
demonstrations of this first day, I found myself a welcome member
of the convention, and cordial greeting took the place of cold
aversion. The victory was short, signal, and complete.
This experience shows how little knowledge politicians have of what
lies in the hearts of the people; that even statesmen seldom
appreciate the many steps in progressive thought already achieved,
before there is any popular demonstration. It shows, too, the
commanding influence of personal dignity and lofty self-respect,
incapable of being either flattered or coerced to take any position
among men but one of absolute equality. And this was exactly the
position taken by those women who opposed the Fourteenth Amendment.
The Loyalists' Convention was held at a most critical period in the
Nation's life; the policy and action of all the Southern States
centered in its deliberations. Though Mr. Douglass would not hold the
rightful representation of his race in abeyance to the success of the
Convention, the pacification of the South, the policy of the border
States, nor the life of the Nation, yet he too criticised the women
who took precisely the same position in maintaining the dignity of sex
against the action of the Republican party and the whole Northern
policy of reconstruction. What to either class was the nation's life,
so long as the flag gave them no protection against the humiliating
distinctions of caste? What to them were boasted republican
institutions, so long as their rights, privileges, and immunities as
citizens were denied? White men could only be taught the lesson of a
common humanity by just such resistance as these oppressed classes
made. Protests and petitions, falling like seeds here and there on
good ground, at last moved some liberal Republicans to action, and
several bills recognizing the political existence of women were duly
presented. The best results of the war have been the struggle and
determination of black men and women for recognition in the
reconstruction, for they have compelled the nation's consideration of
the vital principles of republican government, and secured for both
classes many rights and privileges heretofore unknown.
The congressional action throughout this session proves that if all
the friends of woman suffrage had been steadfast to their principles,
and made a simultaneous effort against any further extension of
"manhood suffrage" until woman too was recognized, the measure might
have been carried; at least the agitation could have been prolonged
and intensified in the halls of legislation fourfold. But in the
general confusion as to what might or might not be sound policy, the
most liberal took each onward step with doubt and hesitation. However,
the persistent hostility to the amendments kept up the agitation in
Congress, which at last culminated in a proposition for a Sixteenth
Amendment, for which the National Woman Suffrage Association has, with
one short interval, ever since petitioned.
THE SIXTEENTH AMENDMENT.--March 15, 1869, will be held memorable
in all coming time as the day when the Hon. George W. Julian
submitted a "Joint Resolution" to Congress to enfranchise the
women of the Republic by proposing a Sixteenth Amendment to the
Federal Constitution, which reads as follows:
ART. 16. The Right of Suffrage in the United States shall be
based on citizenship, and shall be regulated by Congress;
and all citizens of the United States, whether native or
naturalized, shall enjoy this right equally without any
distinction or discrimination whatever founded on sex.
Since our famous Bill of Rights was given to the world declaring
all men equal, there has been no other proposition, in its
magnitude, beneficence, and far-reaching consequences, so
momentous as this. The specific work now before us, is to press
the importance of this Amendment on the consideration of the
people, and to urge Congress to its speedy adoption. Suffrage
associations should be formed at once and newspapers established
in every State to press Woman's Enfranchisement, and petitions
should be circulated in every school district from Maine to
California, praying the adoption of the Sixteenth Amendment, that
when the Forty-second Congress assembles it may understand the
work before it.--_The Revolution_, April 29, 1869.
Petitions for a Sixteenth Amendment were immediately printed and sent
throughout the nation, and have been steadily rolling into Congress
for the last thirteen years from all the State and National Woman
Suffrage Associations. The Fortieth Congress was the first in which an
amendment to the National Constitution in the interests of woman was
ever proposed. In a series of editorials in _The Revolution_ there was
a decided expression of hostility towards the Fifteenth Amendment
during all the time it was pending in Congress. In the issue of
October 21, 1869, Mrs. Stanton said:
All wise women should oppose the Fifteenth Amendment for two
reasons. 1st. Because it is invidious to their sex. Look at it
from what point you will, and in every aspect, it reflects the
old idea of woman's inferiority, her subject condition. And yet
the one need to secure an onward step in civilization is a new
dignity and self-respect in women themselves. No one can think
that the pending proposition of "manhood suffrage" exalts woman,
either in her own eyes or those of the man by her side, but it
does degrade her practically and theoretically, just as black men
were more degraded when all other men were enfranchised.
2d. We should oppose the measure, because men have no right to
pass it without our consent. When it is proposed to change the
constitution or fundamental law of the State or Nation, all the
people have a right to say what that change shall be.
If women understood this pending proposition in all its bearings,
theoretically and practically, there would be an overwhelming
vote against the admission of another man to the ruling power of
this nation, until they themselves were first enfranchised. There
is no true patriotism, no true nobility in tamely and silently
submitting to this insult. It is mere sycophancy to man; it is
licking the hand that forges a new chain for our degradation; it
is indorsing the old idea that woman's divinely ordained position
is at man's feet, and not on an even platform by his side.
By this edict of the liberal party, the women of this Republic
are now to touch the lowest depths of their political
degradation.
JUNE 3, 1869.
THE FIFTEENTH AMENDMENT.--It is not to be believed that the
nation which is now engaged in admitting the newly liberated
negro to the plenitude of all political franchise, will much
longer retain woman in a state of _helotage_, which is more
degrading than ever, because being no longer shared by any of the
male sex, it constitutes every woman the inferior of every
man.--JOHN STUART MILL.
It is this thought, so clearly seen and concisely stated by this
distinguished English philosopher and statesman, that I have
endeavored to press on the hearts of American reformers for the
last four years. I have seen and felt, with a vividness and
intensity that no words could express, the far-reaching
consequences of this degradation of one-half the citizens of the
republic, on the government, the Saxon race, and woman herself,
in all her political, religious, and social relations. It is
sufficiently humiliating to a proud woman to be reminded ever and
anon in the polite world that she's a political nonentity; to
have the fact gracefully mourned over, or wittily laughed at, in
classic words and cultured voice by one's superiors in knowledge,
wisdom and power; but to hear the rights of woman scorned in
foreign tongue and native gibberish by everything in manhood's
form, is enough to fire the souls of those who think and feel,
and rouse the most lethargic into action.
If, with weak and vacillating words and stammering tongue, our
bravest men to-day say freedom to woman, what can we hope when
the millions educated in despotism, ignorant of the philosophy of
true government, religion and social life, shall be our judges
and rulers? As you go down in the scale of manhood, the idea
strengthens at every step, that woman was created for no higher
purpose than to gratify the lust of man. Every daily paper
heralds some rape on flying, hunted girls; and the pitying eyes
of angels see the holocaust of womanhood no journal ever notes.
In thought I trace the slender threads that link these hideous,
overt acts to creeds and codes that make an aristocracy of sex.
When a mighty nation, with a scratch of the pen, frames the base
ideas of the lower orders into constitutions and statute laws,
and declares every serf, peasant and slave the rightful
sovereigns of all womankind, they not only degrade every woman in
her own eyes, but in that of every man on the footstool. A
cultivated lady in Baltimore writes us a description of a colored
republican reunion, held in that city a few evenings since, in
which a colored gentleman offered the following toast: "Our wives
and daughters--May the women of our race never unsex themselves
by becoming strong-minded."
E. C. S.
MARCH 11, 1869.
DRAWING THE LINES.--If the fifteenth article of Constitutional
Amendments ever gets ratified and becomes the rule of suffrage,
it will have at least one good effect. Woman will then know with
what power she has to contend. It will be male versus female, the
land over. All manhood will vote not because of intelligence,
patriotism, property, or white skin, but because it is male, not
female. All womanhood will be newly outraged and debased, not for
ignorance, disloyalty, poverty, or a black skin, but because it
is female, not male. Julia Ward Howe, of Boston, has some good
thoughts in the _Galaxy_ for March on this subject, in part as
below:
"The Irish or German savage, after three years' cleansing, is
admitted to the general enrollment of the community. The colored
man, cleaner at the start than these, the natural ally of
republican principles, trained to an understanding of freedom by
a long experience of its opposite, stands next upon the record.
Voting to him is a military necessity. It is the only weapon with
which he can meet those whom law, custom, and prejudice have
hitherto trebly armed against him. This admitted right of
elective franchise to all men, brings one scarcely anticipated
condition. It arrays now the whole male and female sexes in a new
and unforeseen condition. The right of the elective franchise is
now the recognition of the inalienable right of all men to the
proper administration of their interests, and in America this
right is founded upon the right of human intelligence to its own
exercise, the right of human labor to its own recompense. The
generous culture which allows woman in this country so large an
extension of thought, and the social necessities which place in
her hands so many of the nicer tasks hitherto kept for those of
the other sex, alike commission her to claim and make good her
right to the most simple, general and explicit method of
expressing her will in the arena where wills are counted and
respected."
END OF THE SUFFRAGE AGITATION.--"The adoption of the Fifteenth
Amendment will put an end to further agitation of the subject,
for a long time at least, and thus leave the government of the
country free to deal with its material interests, and with the
more pressing questions of public policy and administration which
will arise from time to time. We do not concur with those who
predict that the question of suffrage for women will speedily
demand public action or engross public attention, or that the
right of men to hold office without distinction of color or race,
will absorb any great degree of public time or public thought for
a long while to come. Until some decided practical advantage is
to be gained by a dominant political party, neither of these
questions will be pressed to a decision; and both of them have,
in our judgment, commanded more attention already than they will
soon command again. With the adoption of the Fifteenth Amendment,
we may fairly look upon the suffrage agitation as at an end, for
the present political generation at all events; and that
consideration, of itself, affords a very powerful argument in
favor of its adoption."
Such is the conclusion of the New York _Times_. It is, too, the
belief, hope, and intention of a large number of party leaders,
both Republican and Democrat. But such reckon without their host.
They seem to have no idea with whom they have to deal. Woman may
not achieve her rights next year; may not vote for President in
1872. But if President Grant means by "let us have peace," an end
to the struggle for Woman Suffrage, he must pray to some other
than the God of Heaven, or the politicians of his party and
country; for the latter can't stop the agitation, and the former
won't. So President Pierce actually proclaimed peace with slavery
at his inauguration; but John Brown was already whetting his
sword, and the Almighty was forging his thunderbolts for that
vessel of wrath, long fitted for destruction, and the day of
peace is not even yet.
P. P.
PROVIDENCE, June 7, 1869.
PAULINA WRIGHT DAVIS ON THE FIFTEENTH AMENDMENT.--MY DEAR MRS.
STANTON: Nothing but the great crisis pending in our movement
would have drawn me from my retirement again into public strife
and turmoil, but I feel it a duty to enter my protest with yours
against the Fifteenth Amendment. Last winter, in Boston, I could
only give my vote against it, for no Sixteenth had been proposed.
It seemed almost a childish, selfish thing to do, when all the
eloquence of a Boston platform was arrayed on the other side, and
other women rose and said they were ready to step aside and let
the colored man have his rights first. Not one said we will step
aside and let the negro woman (whom I affirm, as I ever have, is
better fitted for self-government than the negro man) have her
rights before we press our claim, I could not but think it an
easy thing for them to do, never having had the right they
demanded. But if they truly believe that it will do for humanity
what is claimed for it, I do not see why it should be called
magnanimous for a woman to say, I yield to man just what he has
always asserted as his, the right to rule. You have taken a bold
stand, and I thank God for it. Though still in the minority,
there is hope; for with a radical truth one shall chase a
thousand, and two put ten thousand to flight; and ere very long,
before another convention, I trust many more will see with us
that the Fifteenth Amendment, without the Sixteenth, is a
compromise worse by far for the nation than any other ever
passed. They could be repealed, this can not. Once settled, the
waves of corruption will swamp our little bark freighted with all
humanity, the women of all shades of color, and subject to every
variety of tyranny and oppression, from the cramped feet of the
Chinese to the cramped brains and waists of our own higher order
of civilization.
It seems specially strange to those of us who so well remember
the motto of the old Abolitionists, "Immediate and unconditional
emancipation," now to hear a half measure advocated. It was that
stern principle of justice which attracted and held me in the old
organization when those dearest to me went into the Liberty
party. I had been trained in that school which taught children
that they must do right for right's sake, without hope of reward
or fear of punishment, leaving the consequences with the All wise
Ruler of events. Among the early Abolitionists this
uncompromising spirit was manifest, and to me it was the real
gospel.
I remember well the strong opposition to some who advocated the
election of John C. Fremont, in 1856, among whom was Frederick
Douglass. He was then denounced as a compromiser asking for a
half loaf. He still asks for the half loaf; but others who stood
firmly then for the whole have now come down to his plane, and
desire above all things to finish up the anti-slavery work and
have the negro man out of the way, and so give the Sixteenth
Amendment the go-by, claiming manhood suffrage because it is the
order of nature that man, however ignorant, debased and brutal he
may be, shall always be first, because he always has been,
yielding the whole argument to physical force, leaving the negro
woman wholly out of the question, giving her over to the tyranny
of the husband, which is nearly, if not quite, equal to that of
the master. The anti-slavery platform still carefully guards
itself against the woman question, while on the Suffrage platform
the Fifteenth Amendment is considered essential. Miss Couzins was
the only one who put the two amendments fairly before the
Convention in Boston. After presenting the issues of the two
amendments she trenched lightly on another topic still more
offensive. She plead for the outcast woman in a most womanly way,
but it did not prove to be a popular theme; but I think she is
too true, pure, and noble not to do the same again and again.
Last evening Miss Peckham, Mrs. Churchill, and Miss Couzins
presented the suffrage question to a select audience in
Providence. Each in her own way and from her own stand-point
spoke well. I have not time to give you as elaborate a notice as
I should like to of each, but will do so after the convention
which the State Association propose holding next week, on Monday,
the 14th, in Westerly, R. I. If you have helps to send us we
shall welcome them cordially.
Yours ever truly,
P. W. DAVIS.
JULY 22, 1869.
FIFTEENTH AMENDMENT--ITS LUDICROUS SIDE.--Almost every question
has its ludicrous side. The champions of the Fifteenth Amendment
to the Constitution present an illustration. Conceding woman's
equal right to the ballot with man, they still resist her claims
on the ground that this is not her hour, but man's hour. "The
black man's hour." As though justice and right were determined by
clocks and almanacs. And as though some sort of terrible crisis
could not be urged always. Admitting even that in fitness for the
franchise, the white women, especially of the North, are
eminently superior to the average of Southern men, of any color,
they still demand that woman's claim be postponed to their
favorite Fifteenth Amendment, which presumes every man in the
nation of whatever color, grade, or race, the superior of woman,
however exalted by culture, by wealth, by refinement, by
patriotism, or whatever virtues, gifts, or graces. An Amendment,
it is called, while preparing the way to lift into lordship
absolute, every man, however mean and vile, over every woman,
however divine her character!
And then these "Amenders" presume to charge with "selfishness,"
"ignorance," "conservatism," and nobody knows what else, those
who are laboring night and day, in season, out of season, and at
all seasons, under a banner on which was inscribed at the
formation of their Association, "Equal Rights to all citizens;
ESPECIALLY THE RIGHT OF SUFFRAGE, IRRESPECTIVE OF RACE, COLOR OR
SEX." Without pretending that the Association, or any of its
members, has violated, in letter or in spirit, a word of this
constitutional pledge, leading Abolitionists are charging
"injustice," "insincerity," and "treachery to the cause of
liberty," on actors in the Equal Rights Association, besides
ignorance, selfishness, and conservatism, because they will not
turn aside from their holy purpose to promote a measure that
basely, grossly insults one-half, and that the best half of the
human race. Were the subject not too serious for mirth, such
accusations, coming from such a source, would be simply
ludicrous. As it is, many will laugh at such absurdity. The
Fifteenth Amendment, at best, is but a trick, a device (as was
the Fourteenth with its word _male_ three times burned into a
single period), of as corrupt and unprincipled a school of
politicians as ever disgraced the name of legislation, to save
themselves and their party in place and power. It is told us in
all seriousness, that the word _male_ is not in the Fifteenth
Amendment, as though that atoned for its infamy, and rendered it
worthy of woman's support. Why should the word _male_ be in it?
Three times solemnly muttered in the Fourteenth, it needed no
repetition in the Fifteenth.
Another ludicrous view of this subject, is the zeal with which so
many women are laboring to hoist all mandom into power over them.
Power as omnipotent as ignorance, prejudice, and love of
domination can possibly create. A little reflection, one would
think, might show and satisfy the blindest that the opposition
they encounter already is quite sufficient, without augmenting it
a thousand fold, and anchoring it fast in the constitution of the
country. True, they are assured by radical Republicans that as
soon as the negro man is secured, the colored woman and the white
woman also shall be equally distinguished. Had this age an Æsop,
he would tell again his story of the goat and the fox at the
bottom of the well. How to get out, of course, was the question.
After long and anxious thought, a happy expedient struck the fox.
"Do you, friend goat, rear yourself up against the wall, as near
the top as possible, and from the tip of your horns I can spring
out, and then it will be quite easy to pull you up by the horns
also." No quicker spoken than done. Out leaped the fox, and was
safe. Then the goat demanded his release, as promised. "You old
fool!" answered Reynard! "Had you half as much brain as beard,
you would know that I would never risk my life to save yours,"
and away he ran. The whole history of American politics is
assurance, but pre-eminently so is the history of present
parties, that a party victory would scarcely be risked to save
all womankind from consuming fire. A very few such elections as
the late one in Virginia, would subdue immensely the present
Republican ardor on the colored man's rights.
But most ludicrous of all is it to hear old anti-slavery leaders
and teachers referring to the past for defense of their present
hostility, and challenging us to re-read that history and be
ashamed of our present course. But when in the past did Wendell
Phillips ever teach that a half loaf is better than no bread, if
poisoned, or if it were snatched or stolen from a family of
starving orphans? It was not in 1839, nor '49, nor '59, that he
held or inculcated such a philosophy. The motto of the
Anti-Slavery _Standard_ was and is "Without Concealment--Without
Compromise." Now under that sublime evangel women are instructed
to bridge over the gulf to colored male enfranchisement with
their own imperiled, nay, sacrificed equal rights. Better now the
"half loaf," festering, putrid with the poison of compromise,
than no bread! Better that the black man have his half loaf,
though he steal it from his mother and sisters, more hungry,
starving, and dying, than himself!