DEAR REVOLUTION:--As you look at the date, your patriotic heart

will palpitate to think that the women of _The Revolution_ have

taken possession of the home of the President, and propose to

hold a Woman Suffrage Convention right under the very shadow of

his flagstaff, peering up beside one chimney of a large square

brick house with a flat roof. Said house is situated on a high

hill with pleasant grounds about. At the present writing we are

on the opposite hill under the hospitable roof of "Sarah Coates,"

whose name appears in the reports of all the early Ohio

conventions. She is now Mrs. Harris. We arrived here this morning

at six o'clock, and found good Mr. Harris waiting for us at the

depot. He is one of the oldest and wealthiest inhabitants in the

county. They have a beautiful home, surrounded with every comfort

and luxury. Mrs. Harris is a noble woman, tall, fine-looking, and

moves about among her household gods like a queen. Although she

has a large family of black-eyed, rosy-cheeked children,

pictures, statuary, a cabinet of rare minerals, a conservatory of

beautiful plants, and a husband who thinks her but little lower

than the angels, she still demands the right to vote, and

occasionally indulges in the luxury of public speaking. She is

the moving spirit in every step of progress in Galena, and was

the President of the convention. We have had a most enthusiastic

meeting, three sessions, and house crowded throughout on an

admission fee of twenty-five cents. The women all over the West

are wide-awake. Theodore Tilton had just preceded us, and some

ladies laughingly told us that Theodore said they would

_certainly_ vote in _twenty years_!!

Let our cold-blooded Eastern reformers understand that ideas,

like grains, grow fast in the West, and that women here intend to

vote now, "right along," as the Hutchinsons sing. The editor of

the _Independent_ may talk of twenty years down on the Hudson

among the Rip Van Winkles in Spookey Hollow, to H. G. in New

York, or W. P. at the "Hub," but never to Western audiences, or

to the women of _The Revolution_. Why, Mr. Tilton, when you go to

the Senate some wise woman will sit on your right, and some black

man on your left. You are to pay the penalty of your theorizing

and be sandwiched between a woman and a black man in all the laws

and constitutions before five years pass over your curly head.

Twenty years! Why, Theodore, we expect to be walking the golden

streets of the New Jerusalem by that time, talking with Noah,

Moses, and Aaron, about the flood, the Pharaohs, the journey

through the Red Sea and the wilderness. We shall be holding

conventions by that time on the banks of the Jordan with Eve,

Sarah, Rebecca, Huldah, Deborah, Miriam, Ruth, Naomi, Sheba,

Esther, Vashti, Mary, Elizabeth, Priscilla and Phebe, Tryphena

and Tryphosa, and all the strong-minded women honorably mentioned

in sacred history. Do you not know, Theodore, that we have vowed

never to go disfranchised into the Kingdom of Heaven? In the

meantime, we propose to discuss sanitary and sumptuary laws,

finance, and free trade, religion and railroads, education and

elections with such worthies as yourself in the councils of the

American republic. Twenty years! Why, every white male in the

nation will be tied to an apron-string by that time, while all

the poets and philosophers will be writing essays on "The Sphere

of Man"!

We found the good men and women of Galena filled with faith in

the new President. They say he is a sober, honest, true man; that

he will entirely revolutionize affairs at Washington, send the

old political hacks to their homes, drive bribery and corruption

from high places, and draw a new order of statesmen about him.

May the good angels guide and strengthen him, for unless

something is soon done to rouse the slumbering virtue of the

American people, our sun will set in darkness to rise no more.

Feeling the deepest interest in the past, the present, and the

future of Ulysses, we asked a thousand questions concerning him.

Among other things, we proposed to go to the tannery where he

used to work, but found that was a myth. We peeped into some of

the stores where, in his leisure hours, he used to smoke the pipe

of peace, and fancied that in walking up and down the streets our

feet might be treading in his footsteps. What a fascination there

is in the material surroundings of great souls, and in contact

with the people who have seen and loved them! But, alas, how

little of the inner life, that is most interesting to hear about,

mortals ever reveal to one another.

On the way from Galena to Toledo we met Frederick Douglass,

dressed in a cap and a great circular cape of wolf-skins. He

really presented a most formidable and ferocious aspect. I

thought perhaps he intended to illustrate "William the Silent" in

his northern dress, as well as to depict his character in his

Lyceum lecture. As I had been talking against the pending

amendment of "manhood suffrage," I trembled in my shoes and was

almost as paralyzed as Red Riding Hood in a similar encounter.

But unlike the little maiden, I had a friend at hand, and, as

usual in the hour of danger, I fell back in the shadow of Miss

Anthony, who stepped forward bravely and took the wolf by the

hand. His hearty words of welcome and gracious smile reassured

me, so that when my time came I was able to meet him with the

usual _suaviter in modo_. Our joy in shaking hands here and there

with Douglass, Tilton, and Anna Dickinson, through the West, was

like meeting ships at sea; as pleasant and as fleeting.

Douglass's hair is fast becoming as white as snow, which adds

greatly to the dignity of his countenance. We hear his lecture on

"William the Silent" much praised. Mr. Tilton's lecture too, on

"Statesmanship," is said to be the best he has ever delivered. We

had an earnest debate with Douglass as far as we journeyed

together, and were glad to find that he was gradually working up

to our ideas on the question of suffrage. He is at present

hanging by the eyelids half-way between the lofty position of

Robert Purvis, and the narrow one of George W. Downing. As he

will attend the woman suffrage anniversary in New York in May, we

shall have an opportunity for a full and free discussion of the

whole question.

TOLEDO, Ohio.

At two o'clock in the morning we reached Toledo, drove to the

Oliver House, registered our names, left some notes for friends,

who would be looking for us next day, and then retired, giving

orders not to be called till noon, even for the King of France.

At the appointed hour our friend, Mr. Israel Hall, formerly of

Syracuse, was announced. He invited us to his hospitable home,

where we stayed during the convention, which was held in Hunker's

Hall and pronounced a complete success. At the close of the

meetings, a rising vote was called of all those in favor of

woman's suffrage. The entire audience, men and women, rose as if

one body. Two dissenting "white males" (small, men of course)

came to the surface in opposition, to the great amusement of

everybody. The platform throughout the meetings was occupied by

some of the leading men and women of the city. Judge Jones called

the convention to order and presided over its deliberations.

There was no lack of questions in Toledo, but they were all

cunningly propounded in writing. This was a new feature in our

meetings and we were much struck with its wisdom. The questioner

in an audience, no matter how bland and benevolent, is always

viewed with aversion, and, however well armed at all points, is

sure to be unhorsed by a brilliant sally of wit and ridicule. But

when a poser is put in black and white, nothing will do but

downright logic and argument. To that _unwomanly_ work we

addressed ourselves in the Toledo convention, and all admitted

that we gave most satisfactory answers. Mrs. Israel Hall is the

one who heads the woman's rebellion here. To her let all those

write and go who wish to work in that part of the Lord's

vineyard. We are glad to see by the papers that while we have

been so enthusiastically received in the West, Lucy Stone is

drawing crowded houses in all the chief cities of New England.

E. C. S.

THE MAY ANNIVERSARIES IN NEW YORK AND BROOKLYN.

The Executive Committee of the Equal Rights Association issued a

call[116] for the anniversary in New York, early in the spring of

1869. Never for any Convention were so many letters[117] written to

distinguished legislators and editors, nor so many promptly and fairly

answered.

The anniversary commenced on Wednesday morning at Steinway Hall, New

York. The opening session was very largely attended, the spacious hall

being nearly full, showing that the era of anniversaries of important

and useful societies, had by no means passed away.[118] In the absence

of the president, Mrs. Lucretia Mott, the chair was taken by Mrs.

Elizabeth Cady Stanton, First Vice-President. Rev. Mrs. Hanaford, of

Massachusetts, opened the meeting with prayer.

LUCY STONE presented verbally the report of the Executive

Committee for the past year, running over the petitions in favor

of woman suffrage presented during the year to Congress and State

Legislatures and the various conventions held in different parts

of the country, and remarked upon the greater respect now shown

to the petitions. Formerly, she said, they were laughed at, and

frequently not at all considered. This last year they were

referred to committees, and often debated at great length in the

legislatures, and in some cases motions to submit to the people

of the State an amendment to the State Constitution doing away

with the distinction of sex in the matter of suffrage was

rejected by very small majorities. In one State, that of Nevada,

such a motion was carried; and the question will shortly be

submitted to the people of the State. A number of important and

very successful conventions have been held in the Western States,

and have made a decided impression. But what is most significant

is, that newspapers of all shades of opinion are giving a great

deal of space to this subject. It is recognized as among the

great questions of the age, which can not be put down until it is

settled upon the basis of immutable justice and right. The report

was unanimously accepted and adopted.

Rev. O. B. FROTHINGHAM.--I am not here this morning thinking that

I can add any thing to the strength of the cause, but thinking

that perhaps I may gain something from the generous, sweet

atmosphere that I am sure will prevail. This is a meeting, if I

understand it, of the former Woman's Rights Association, and the

subjects which come before us properly are the subjects which

concern woman in all her social, civil, and domestic life. But

the one question which is of vital moment and of sole prominence,

is that of suffrage. All other questions have been virtually

decided in favor of woman. She has the _entrée_ to all the fields

of labor. She is now the teacher, preacher, artist, she has a

place in the scientific world--in the literary world. She is a

journalist, a maker of books, a public reader; in fact, there is

no position which woman, as woman, is not entitled to hold. But

there is one position that woman, as woman, does not occupy, and

that is the position of a voter. One field alone she does not

possess, and that is the political field; one work she is not

permitted, and that is the work of making laws. This question

goes down to the bottom--it touches the vital matter of woman's

relation to the State.... Is there anything in the constitution

of the female mind, to disqualify her for the exercise of the

franchise. As long as there are fifty, thirty, ten, or even one

woman who is capable of exercising this trust or holding this

responsibility it demonstrates that sex, as a sex, does not

disfranchise, and the whole question is granted. (Applause.) Here

our laws are made by irresponsible people--people who demoralize

and debauch society; people who make their living in a large

measure by upholding the institutions that are inherently,

forever, and always corrupt. (Applause.) Laws that are made by

the people who own dramshops, who keep gambling-saloons, who

minister to the depraved passions and vices of either sex, laws

made by the idler, the dissipated, by the demoralized--are they

laws? It is true that this government is founded upon caste.

Slavery is abolished, but the aristocracy of sex is not. One

reason that the suffrage is not conceded to woman is that those

who refuse to do so, do not appreciate it themselves. (Applause.)

As long as the power of suffrage means the power to steal, to

tread down the weak, and get the rich offices into their own

hands, those who have the key of the coffers will wish to keep it

in their own pockets. (Applause.)

The Committee on Organization reported the officers of the

society for the ensuing year.[119]

STEPHEN FOSTER laid down the principle that when any persons on

account of strong objections against them in the minds of some,

prevented harmony in a society and efficiency in its operations,

those persons should retire from prominent positions in that

society. He said he had taken that course when, as agent of the

Anti-Slavery Society, he became obnoxious on account of his

position on some questions. He objected, to certain nominations

made by the committee for various reasons. The first was that the

persons nominated had publicly repudiated the principles of the

society. One of these was the presiding officer.

Mrs. STANTON:--I would like you to say in what respect.

Mr. FOSTER:--I will with pleasure; for, ladies and gentlemen, I

admire our talented President with all my heart, and love the

woman. (Great laughter.) But I believe she has publicly

repudiated the principles of the society.

Mrs. STANTON:--I would like Mr. Foster to state in what way.

Mr. FOSTER:--What are these principles? The equality of

men--universal suffrage. These ladies stand at the head of a

paper which has adopted as its motto Educated Suffrage. I put

myself on this platform as an enemy of educated suffrage, as an

enemy of white suffrage, as an enemy of man suffrage, as an enemy

of every kind of suffrage except universal suffrage. _The

Revolution_ lately had an article headed "That Infamous Fifteenth

Amendment." It is true it was not written by our President, yet

it comes from a person whom she has over and over again publicly

indorsed. I am not willing to take George Francis Train on this

platform with his ridicule of the negro and opposition to his

enfranchisement.

Mrs. MARY A. LIVERMORE:--Is it quite generous to bring George

Francis Train on this platform when he has retired from _The

Revolution_ entirely?

Mr. FOSTER:--If _The Revolution_, which has so often indorsed

George Francis Train, will repudiate him because of his course in

respect to the negro's rights, I have nothing further to say. But

it does not repudiate him. He goes out; it does not cast him

out.

Miss ANTHONY:--Of course it does not.

Mr. FOSTER:--My friend says yes to what I have said. I thought it

was so. I only wanted to tell you why the Massachusetts society

can not coalesce with the party here, and why we want these women

to retire and leave us to nominate officers who can receive the

respect of both parties. The Massachusetts Abolitionists can not

co-operate with this society as it is now organized. If you

choose to put officers here that ridicule the negro, and

pronounce the Amendment infamous, why I must retire; I can not

work with you. You can not have my support, and you must not use

my name. I can not shoulder the responsibility of electing

officers who publicly repudiate the principles of the society.

HENRY B. BLACKWELL said: In regard to the criticisms on our

officers, I will agree that many unwise things have been written

in _The Revolution_ by a gentleman who furnished part of the

means by which that paper has been carried on. But that gentleman

has withdrawn, and you, who know the real opinions of Miss

Anthony and Mrs. Stanton on the question of negro suffrage, do

not believe that they mean to create antagonism between the negro

and the woman question. If they did disbelieve in negro suffrage,

it would be no reason for excluding them. We should no more

exclude a person from our platform for disbelieving negro

suffrage than a person should be excluded from the anti-slavery

platform for disbelieving woman suffrage. But I know that Miss

Anthony and Mrs. Stanton believe in the right of the negro to

vote. We are united on that point. There is no question of

principle between us.

The vote on the report of the Committee on Organization was now

taken, and adopted by a large majority.

Mr. DOUGLASS:--I came here more as a listener than to speak, and

I have listened with a great deal of pleasure to the eloquent

address of the Rev. Mr. Frothingham and the splendid address of

the President. There is no name greater than that of Elizabeth

Cady Stanton in the matter of woman's rights and equal rights,

but my sentiments are tinged a little against _The Revolution_.

There was in the address to which I allude the employment of

certain names, such as "Sambo," and the gardener, and the

bootblack, and the daughters of Jefferson and Washington, and all

the rest that I can not coincide with. I have asked what

difference there is between the daughters of Jefferson and

Washington and other daughters. (Laughter.) I must say that I do

not see how any one can pretend that there is the same urgency in

giving the ballot to woman as to the negro. With us, the matter

is a question of life and death, at least, in fifteen States of

the Union. When women, because they are women, are hunted down

through the cities of New York and New Orleans; when they are

dragged from their houses and hung upon lamp-posts; when their

children are torn from their arms, and their brains dashed out

upon the pavement; when they are objects of insult and outrage at

every turn; when they are in danger of having their homes burnt

down over their heads; when their children are not allowed to

enter schools; then they will have an urgency to obtain the

ballot equal to our own. (Great applause.)

A VOICE:--Is that not all true about black women?

Mr. DOUGLASS:--Yes, yes, yes; it is true of the black woman, but

not because she is a woman, but because she is black. (Applause.)

Julia Ward Howe at the conclusion of her great speech delivered

at the convention in Boston last year, said: "I am willing that

the negro shall get the ballot before me." (Applause.) Woman!

why, she has 10,000 modes of grappling with her difficulties. I

believe that all the virtue of the world can take care of all the

evil. I believe that all the intelligence can take care of all

the ignorance. (Applause.) I am in favor of woman's suffrage in

order that we shall have all the virtue and vice confronted. Let

me tell you that when there were few houses in which the black

man could have put his head, this woolly head of mine found a

refuge in the house of Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and if I had

been blacker than sixteen midnights, without a single star, it

would have been the same. (Applause.)

Miss ANTHONY:--The old anti-slavery school say women must stand

back and wait until the negroes shall be recognized. But we say,

if you will not give the whole loaf of suffrage to the entire

people, give it to the most intelligent first. (Applause.) If

intelligence, justice, and morality are to have precedence in the

Government, let the question of woman be brought up first and

that of the negro last. (Applause.) While I was canvassing the

State with petitions and had them filled with names for our cause

to the Legislature, a man dared to say to me that the freedom of

women was all a theory and not a practical thing. (Applause.)

When Mr. Douglass mentioned the black man first and the woman

last, if he had noticed he would have seen that it was the men

that clapped and not the women. There is not the woman born who

desires to eat the bread of dependence, no matter whether it be

from the hand of father, husband, or brother; for any one who

does so eat her bread places herself in the power of the person

from whom she takes it. (Applause.) Mr. Douglass talks about the

wrongs of the negro; but with all the outrages that he to-day

suffers, he would not exchange his sex and take the place of

Elizabeth Cady Stanton. (Laughter and applause.)

Mr. DOUGLASS:--I want to know if granting you the right of

suffrage will change the nature of our sexes? (Great laughter.)

Miss ANTHONY:--It will change the pecuniary position of woman; it

will place her where she can earn her own bread. (Loud applause.)

She will not then be driven to such employments only as man

chooses for her.

Mrs. NORTON said that Mr. Douglass's remarks left her to defend

the Government from the inferred inability to grapple with the

two questions at once. It legislates upon many questions at one

and the same time, and it has the power to decide the woman

question and the negro question at one and the same time.

(Applause.)

Mrs. LUCY STONE:--Mrs. Stanton will, of course, advocate the

precedence for her sex, and Mr. Douglass will strive for the

first position for his, and both are perhaps right. If it be true

that the government derives its authority from the consent of the

governed, we, are safe in trusting that principle to the

uttermost. If one has a right to say that you can not read and

therefore can not vote, then it may be said that you are a woman

and therefore can not vote. We are lost if we turn away from the

middle principle and argue for one class. I was once a teacher

among fugitive slaves. There was one old man, and every tooth was

gone, his hair was white, and his face was full of wrinkles, yet,

day after day and hour after hour, he came up to the school-house

and tried with patience to learn to read, and by-and-by, when he

had spelled out the first few verses of the first chapter of the

Gospel of St. John, he said to me, "Now, I want to learn to

write." I tried to make him satisfied with what he had acquired,

but the old man said, "Mrs. Stone, somewhere in the wide world I

have a son; I have not heard from him in twenty years; if I

should hear from him, I want to write to him, so take hold of my

hand and teach me." I did, but before he had proceeded in many

lessons, the angels came and gathered him up and bore him to his

Father. Let no man speak of an educated suffrage. The gentleman

who addressed you claimed that the negroes had the first right to

the suffrage, and drew a picture which only his great word-power

can do. He again in Massachusetts, when it had cast a majority in

favor of Grant and negro suffrage, stood upon the platform and

said that woman had better wait for the negro; that is, that both

could not be carried, and that the negro had better be the one.

But I freely forgave him because he felt as he spoke. But woman

suffrage is more imperative than his own; and I want to remind

the audience that when he says what the Ku-Kluxes did all over

the South, the Ku-Kluxes here in the North in the shape of men,

take away the children from the mother, and separate them as

completely as if done on the block of the auctioneer. Over in New

Jersey they have a law which says that _any_ father--he might be

the most brutal man that ever existed--_any_ father, it says,

whether he be under age or not, may by his last will and

testament dispose of the custody of his child, born or to be

born, and that such disposition shall be good against all

persons, and that the mother may not recover her child; and that

law modified in form exists over every State in the Union except

in Kansas. Woman has an ocean of wrongs too deep for any plummet,

and the negro, too, has an ocean of wrongs that can not be

fathomed. There are two great oceans; in the one is the black

man, and in the other is the woman. But I thank God for that XV.

Amendment, and hope that it will be adopted in every State. I

will be thankful in my soul if _any_ body can get out of the

terrible pit. But I believe that the safety of the government

would be more promoted by the admission of woman as an element of

restoration and harmony than the negro. I believe that the

influence of woman will save the country before every other

power. (Applause.) I see the signs of the times pointing to this

consummation, and I believe that in some parts of the country

women will vote for the President of these United States in 1872.

(Applause.)

At the opening of the evening session Henry B. Blackwell

presented a series of resolutions.[120] Antoinette Brown

Blackwell spoke, and was followed by Olive Logan.

Miss LOGAN said:--I stand here to-night full of faith, inborn

faith, in the rights of woman to advance boldly in all ennobling

paths.... In my former sphere of life, the equality of woman was

fully recognized so far as the kind of labor and the amount of

reward for her labor are concerned. As an actress, there was no

position in which I was not fully welcomed if I possessed the

ability and industry to reach it. If I could become a Ristori, my

earnings would be as great as hers, and if I was a man and could

become a Kean, a Macready, or a Booth, the same reward would be

obtained. If I reach no higher rank than what is called a

"walking lady," I am sure of the same pay as a man who occupies

the position of a "walking gentleman." In that sphere of life, be

it remembered, I was reared from childhood; to that place I was

so accustomed that I had no idea it was a privilege denied my sex

to enter into almost every other field of endeavor.

In literature also I found myself on an equality with man. If I

wrote a good article, I got as good pay; and heaven knows the pay

to man or woman was small enough. (Applause). In that field, for

a long time, I did not feel an interest in the subject of women's

rights, and stood afar off, looking at the work of those

revolutionary creatures, Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony. The idea

of identifying myself with them was as far removed from my

thoughts as becoming a female gymnast and whirling upon a

trapeze. But once I wrote a lecture, and one night I delivered

it. Adhering to my practice of speaking about that which was most

familiar, my lecture was about the stage. I lectured, simply

because I thought the pay would be better in that department; the

idea that I was running counter to anybody's prejudice, never

entered my head. And I was so far removed that I never read a

page of _The Revolution_ in my life, and, what is more, I did not

want to; and when Miss Anthony passed down Broadway and saw the

bills announcing my lecture she knew nothing about me, and what

is more, she did not want to. (Laughter). She made a confession

to me afterwards. She said to herself, "Here is a lady going to

lecture about the stage," looking through her blessed

spectacles, as I can see her (laughter)--and I can hear her

muttering "a woman's rights woman." (Laughter). That is not so

very long ago, a little over a year. Since this great question of

woman's rights was thrust upon me, I am asked to define my

position; wherever I have traveled in the fifteen months I have

had to do so. A lady of society asked me, "Are you in favor of

woman's rights?" I had either to answer yes or no, and "Yes," I

said. (Applause)....

I met, in my travels, in a New England town, an educated woman,

who found herself obliged to earn her livelihood, after living a

life of luxury and ease. Her husband, who had provided her with

every material comfort, had gone to the grave. All his property

was taken to pay his debts, and she found herself penniless. What

was that woman to do? She looks abroad among the usual

employments of women, and her only resource seems to be that

little bit of steel around which cluster so many

associations--the needle--and by the needle, with the best work

and the best wages, the most she can get is two dollars a day.

With this, poor as it is, she will be content; but she finds an

army of other women looking for the same, and most of them

looking in vain. These things have opened my eyes to a vista such

as I never saw before. They have touched my heart as it never

before was touched. They have aroused my conscience to the fact

that this woman question is the question of the hour, and that I

must take part in it. I take my stand boldly, proudly, with such

earnest, thoughtful women as Susan B. Anthony, Mrs. Stanton, and

Anna Dickinson, to work together with them for the

enfranchisement of woman, for her elevation personally and

socially, and above all for her right and opportunity to work at

such employments as she can follow, with the right to such pay as

men get. (Applause). There are thousands of women who have no

vital interest in this question. They are happy wives and

daughters, and may they ever be so; but they can not tell how

soon their husbands and brothers may be lost to them, and they

will find themselves destitute and penniless with no resources in

themselves against misfortune. Then it will be for such that we

labor. Our purpose is to help those who need help, widows and

orphan girls. There is no need to do battle in this matter. In

all kindness and gentleness we urge our claims. There is no need

to declare war upon man, for the best of men in this country are

with us heart and soul. These are with us in greater numbers even

than our own sex. (A Voice--"That is true." Great applause). Do

not say that we seek to break up family peace and fireside joy;

far from it. (Applause). We interfere not with the wife or

daughter who is happy in the strong protection thrown around her

by a father or husband, but it is cowardice for such to throw

obstacles in the way of those who need help. More than this, for

the sake of the helpless woman, to whose unhappiness in the loss

of beloved ones is added the agony of hard and griping want. For

the sake of the poor girl who has no power to cope with the hard

actualities of a desolate life, while her trembling feet tread

the crumbling edge of the dark abyss of infamy. For the sake of

this we are pleading and entertaining this great question,

withhold your answer till at least you have learned to say, "God

speed."

The next speaker was Miss Phoebe Couzins, a young law student from St.

Louis, who spoke in a most agreeable and forcible manner.

Miss COUZINS said:--MRS. PRESIDENT AND LADIES: I deem it the duty

of every earnest woman to express herself in regard to the XVth

Amendment to our Federal Constitution. I feel deeply the

humiliation and insult that is offered to the women of the United

States in this Amendment, and have always publicly protested

against its passage. During a recent tour through the Eastern

States I became still more (if that were possible) firmly fixed

in my convictions. Its advocates are unwilling to have it

publicly discussed, showing that they know there is an element of

weakness in it which will not bear a thorough investigation.

While feeling entirely willing that the black man shall have all

the rights to which he is justly entitled, I consider the claims

of the black woman of paramount importance. I have had

opportunities of seeing and knowing the condition of both sexes,

and will bear my testimony, that the black women are, and always

have been, in a far worse condition than the men. As a class,

they are better, and more intelligent than the men, yet they have

been subjected to greater brutalities, while compelled to perform

exactly the same labor as men toiling by their side in the

fields, just as hard burdens imposed upon them, just as severe

punishments decreed to them, with the added cares of maternity

and household work, with their children taken from them and sold

into bondage; suffering a thousandfold more than any man could

suffer. Then, too, the laws for women in the Southern States,

both married and single, degrade them still further. The black

men, as a class, are very tyrannical in their families; they have

learned the lesson of brute force but too well, and as the

marriage law allows the husband entire control over his wife's

earnings and her children, she is in worse bondage than before;

because in many cases the task of providing for helpless children

and an idle, lazy, husband, is imposed on the patient wife and

mother; and, with this sudden elevation to citizenship, which the

mass of stupid, ignorant negroes look upon as entitling them to

great honor, I regard the future state of the negro woman,

without the ballot in her hand, as deplorable. And what is said

of the ignorant black man can as truthfully be said of the

ignorant white man; they all regard woman as an inferior being.

She is their helpless, household slave. He is her ruler, her

law-giver, her conscience, her judge and jury, and the prisoner

at the bar has no appeal. This XVth Amendment thrusts all women

still further down in the scale of degradation, and I consider it

neither praiseworthy nor magnanimous for women to assert that

they are willing to hold their claims in abeyance, until all

shades and types of men have the franchise. It is admitting a

false principle, which all women, who are loyal to truth and

justice, should immediately reject. For over twenty-five years,

the advocates of woman suffrage have been trying to bring this

vital question before the country. They have accomplished

herculean tasks and still it is up-hill work. Shall they, after

battling so long with ignorance, prejudice and unreasoning

customs, stand quietly back and obsequiously say they are willing

that the floodgates shall be opened and a still greater mass of

ignorance, vice and degradation let in to overpower their little

army, and set this question back for a century? Their solemn duty

to future generations forbids such a compromise.

The advocates of the XVth Amendment tell us we ought to accept

the half loaf when we can not get the whole. I do not see that

woman gets any part of the loaf, not even a crumb that falls

from the rich man's table. It may appear very magnanimous for

men, who have never known the degradation of being thrust down in

the scale of humanity by reason of their sex, to urge these

yielding measures upon women, they can not and do not know our

feelings on the subject, and I regard it as neither just nor

generous to eternally compel women to yield on all questions (no

matter how humiliating), simply because they are women.

The Anti-Slavery party declares that with the adoption of the

XVth Amendment their work is done. Have they, then, been battling

for over thirty years for a fraction of a principle? If so, then

the XVth Amendment is a fitting capstone to their labors. Were

the earnest women who fought and endured so heroically with them,

but tools in the hands of the leaders, to place "manhood

suffrage" on the highest pinnacle of the temple dedicated to

Truth and Justice? And are they now to bow down, and worship in

abject submission this fractional part of a principle, that has

hitherto proclaimed itself, as knowing neither bond nor free,

male nor female, but one perfect humanity?

The XV. Amendment virtually says that every intelligent, virtuous

woman is the inferior of every ignorant man, no matter how low he

may be sunk in the scale of morality, and every instinct of my

being rises to refute such doctrine, and God speaking within me

says, No! eternally No!

Rev. GILBERT HAVEN, editor of _Zion's Herald_, was introduced,

and said--Ladies and Gentlemen: As I believe that is the way to

address you, or shall I merge you into one and call you fellow

citizens--

Miss ANTHONY--Let me tell you how to say it. It is perfectly

right for a gentleman to say "ladies and gentlemen," but a lady

should say, "gentlemen and ladies." (Great applause.) You mention

your friend's name before you do your own. (Applause.) I always

feel like rebuking any woman who says, "ladies and gentlemen." It

is a lack of good manners. (Laughter and great applause.)

Mr. HAVEN--I thank the lady for the rule she has laid down. Now,

Mr. Beecher has said that a minister is composed of the worst

part of man and woman, and there are wealthy men who say that the

pulpit should be closed against the introduction of politics, but

I am glad this sentiment is not a rule; I rejoice that the

country has emancipated the ministry so that a minister can speak

on politics. I go further than saying that it is the mere right

of the women to achieve suffrage. I say that it is an obligation

imposed upon the American people to grant the demands of this

large and influential class of the commonwealth. The legislation

of the country concerns the woman as much as the man. Is not the

wife as much interested in the preservation of property as her

husband? Another reason is, that the purity of politics depends

upon the admission of woman to the franchise, for without her

influence morality in politics can not be secured. (Applause.)

HENRY B. BLACKWELL presented the following resolution:

_Resolved_, That in seeking to remove the legal disabilities

which now oppress woman as wife and mother, the friends of

woman suffrage are not seeking to undermine or destroy the

sanctity of the marriage relation, but to ennoble marriage,

making the obligations and responsibilities of the contract

mutual and equal for husband and wife.

MARY A. LIVERMORE said that that was introduced by her

permission, but the original resolution was stronger, and she

having slept over it, thought that it should be introduced

instead of that one, and offered the following:

_Resolved_, That while we recognize the disabilities which

the legal marriage imposes upon woman as wife and mother,

and while we pledge ourselves to seek their removal by

putting her on equal terms with man, we abhorrently

repudiate Free Loveism as horrible and mischievous to

society, and disown any sympathy with it.

Mrs. LIVERMORE said that the West wanted some such resolution as

that in consequence of the innuendoes that had come to their ears

with regard to their striving after the ballot.

Mrs. HANAFORD spoke against such inferences not only for the

ministers of her own denomination, but the Christian men and

women of New England everywhere. She had heard people say that

when women indorsed woman suffrage they indorsed Free Loveism,

and God knows they despise it. Let me carry back to my New

England home the word that you as well as your honored President,

whom we love, whose labor we appreciate, and whose name has also

been dragged into this inference, scout all such suggestions as

contrary to the law of God and humanity.

LUCY STONE: I feel it is a mortal shame to give any foundation

for the implication that we favor Free Loveism. I am ashamed that

the question should be asked here. There should be nothing said

about it at all. Do not let us, for the sake of our own

self-respect, allow it to be hinted that we helped forge a shadow

of a chain which comes in the name of Free Love. I am unwilling

that it should be suggested that this great, sacred cause of ours

means anything but what we have said it does. If any one says to

me, "Oh, I know what you mean, you mean Free Love by this

agitation," let the lie stick in his throat. You may talk about

Free Love, if you please, but we are to have the right to vote.

To-day we are fined, imprisoned, and hanged, without a jury trial

by our peers. You shall not cheat us by getting us off to talk

about something else. When we get the suffrage, then you may

taunt us with anything you please, and we will then talk about it

as long as you please.

ERNESTINE L. ROSE: We are informed by the people from the West

that they are wiser than we are, and that those in the East are

also wiser than we are. If they are wiser than we, I think it

strange that this question of Free Love should have been brought

upon this platform at all. I object to Mrs. Livermore's

resolution, not on account of its principles, but on account of

its pleading guilty. When a man comes to me and tries to convince

me that he is not a thief, then I take care of my coppers. If we

pass this resolution that we are not Free Lovers, people will say

it is true that you are, for you try to hide it. Lucretia Mott's

name has been mentioned as a friend of Free Love, but I hurl back

the lie into the faces of all the ministers in the East and into

the faces of the newspapers of the West, and defy them to point

to one shadow of a reason why they should connect her name with

that vice. We have been thirty years in this city before the

public, and it is an insult to all the women who have labored in

this cause; it is an insult to the thousands and tens of

thousands of men and women that have listened to us in our

Conventions, to say at this late hour that we are not Free

Lovers.

SUSAN B. ANTHONY repudiated the resolution on the same ground as

Mrs. Rose, and said this howl came from those men who knew that

when women got their rights they would be able to live honestly:

no longer be compelled to sell themselves for bread, either in or

out of marriage.

Mrs. Dr. L. S. BATCHELDER, a delegate appointed by the Boston

Working Women's Association, said that she represented ten

thousand working women of New England, and they had instructed

her as their representative to introduce a resolution looking to

the amelioration of the condition of the working women.

Senator WILSON spoke as follows: This is a rather new place for

me to stand, and yet I am very glad to say that I have no new

views in regard to this question. I learned fifteen or twenty

years ago something about this reform in its earliest days, when

the excellent people, who have labored so long with so much

earnestness and fidelity, first launched it before the country. I

never knew the time in the last fifteen or twenty years that I

was not ready to give my wife the right to vote if she wanted it.

I believe in the Declaration of Independence in its full scope

and meaning; believing it was born of Christianity; that it came

from the teachings of the New Testament; and I am willing to

trust the New Testament and the Declaration of Independence

anywhere on God's earth, and to adopt their doctrine in the

fullest and broadest manner. I do not know that all the good in

the world will be accomplished when the women of the United

States have the right to vote. But it is sure to come. Truth is

truth, and will stand.

Mrs. ERNESTINE L. ROSE referred to the assertion of the Rev. Mr.

Haven, that the seeds of the Woman's Rights reform were sown in

Massachusetts, and proceeded to disprove it. Thirty-two years ago

she went round in New York city with petitions to the Legislature

to obtain for married women the right to hold property in their

own names. She only got five names the first year, but she and

others persevered for eleven years, and finally succeeded. Who,

asked Mrs. Rose, was the first to call a National Convention of

women--New York or Massachusetts? [Applause.] I like to have

justice done and honor given where it is due.

Mrs. SARAH F. NORTON, of the New York Working Woman's

Association, referring to the former attempt to exclude the

discussion of the relations of capital and labor, argued that the

question was an appropriate one in any Woman's Rights Convention,

and proposed that some member of the New York Working Women's

Association be heard on that point.

Mrs. ELEANOR KIRK accordingly described the beginning, progress,

and operations of the Association. She also replied to the recent

criticism of the _World_ upon the semi-literary, semi-Woman's

Rights nature of the meetings of their associations, and

contended that they had a perfect right to debate and read

essays, and do anything else that other women might do.

Mrs. MARY F. DAVIS spoke in behalf of the rights of her own sex,

but expressed her willingness to see the negro guaranteed in his

rights, and would wait if only one question could be disposed of.

But she thought they would not have to wait long, for the Hon.

Mr. Wilson had assured them that their side is to be strongly and

successfully advocated. Every step in the great cause of human

rights helps the next one forward. In 1848 Mrs. Stanton called

the first Convention at Seneca Falls.

Miss ANTHONY: And Lucretia Mott.

Mrs. DAVIS: Yes, and Lucretia Mott; and I love to speak of them

in association. Mrs. Rose has alluded to the primary steps she

took, and there were Susan B. Anthony, Lucy Stone, Antoinette

Brown Blackwell, and Paulina Wright Davis, and a great galaxy who

paved the way; and we stand here to proclaim the immortal

principle of woman's freedom. [Great applause.] The lady then

referred to the great work that lay before them in lifting out of

misery and wretchedness the numbers of women in this city and

elsewhere, who were experiencing all the fullness of human

degradation. Even when they had finished their present work, a

large field was still before them in the elevation of their sex.

[Applause.]

Mrs. PAULINA W. DAVIS said she would not be altogether satisfied

to have the XVth Amendment passed without the XVIth, for woman

would have a race of tyrants raised above her in the South, and

the black women of that country would also receive worse

treatment than if the Amendment was not passed. Take any class

that have been slaves, and you will find that they are the worst

when free, and become the hardest masters. The colored women of

the South say they do not want to get married to the negro, as

their husbands can take their children away from them, and also

appropriate their earnings. The black women are more intelligent

than the men, because they have learned something from their

mistresses. She then related incidents showing how black men whip

and abuse their wives in the South. One of her sister's servants

whipped his wife every Sunday regularly. [Laughter.] She thought

that sort of men should not have the making of the laws for the

government of the women throughout the land. [Applause.]

Mr. DOUGLASS said that all disinterested spectators would concede

that this Equal Rights meeting had been pre-eminently a Woman's

Rights meeting. [Applause.] They had just heard an argument with

which he could not agree--that the suffrage to the black men

should be postponed to that of the women. I do not believe the

story that the slaves who are enfranchised become the worst of

tyrants. [A voice, "Neither do I." Applause.] I know how this

theory came about. When a slave was made a driver, he made

himself more officious than the white driver, so that his master

might not suspect that he was favoring those under him. But we do

not intend to have any master over us. [Applause.]

THE PRESIDENT, Mrs. Stanton, argued that not another man should

be enfranchised until enough women are admitted to the polls to

outweigh those already there. [Applause.] She did not believe in

allowing ignorant negroes and foreigners to make laws for her to

obey. [Applause.]

Mrs. HARPER (colored) asked Mr. Blackwell to read the fifth

resolution of the series he submitted, and contended that that

covered the whole ground of the resolutions of Mr. Douglass. When

it was a question of race, she let the lesser question of sex go.

But the white women all go for sex, letting race occupy a minor

position. She liked the idea of working women, but she would

like to know if it was broad enough to take colored women?

Miss ANTHONY and several others: Yes, yes.

Mrs. HARPER said that when she was at Boston there were sixty

women who left work because one colored woman went to gain a

livelihood in their midst. [Applause] If the nation could only

handle one question, she would not have the black women put a

single straw in the way, if only the men of the race could obtain

what they wanted. [Great applause.]

Mr. C. C. BURLEIGH attempted to speak, but was received with some

disapprobation by the audience, and confusion ensued.

Miss ANTHONY protested against the XVth Amendment because it

wasn't Equal Rights. It put two million more men in position of

tyrants over two million women who had until now been the equals

of the men at their side.

Mr. BURLEIGH again essayed to speak. The confusion was so great

that he could not be heard.

Mrs. STONE appealed for order, and her first appearance caused

the most respectful silence, as did the words of every one of the

ladies who addressed the audience. Mr. Burleigh again ventured,

but with no better result, and Miss Anthony made another appeal

to the audience to hear him. He tried again to get a word in, but

was once more unsuccessful.

Mrs. LIVERMORE, after protesting against the disorderly behavior

of the audience, said a few words in advocacy of the resolutions

of Mr. Douglass, when a motion was made to lay them upon the

table, and Mr. Blackwell moved the "previous question."

Miss ANTHONY hoped that this, the first attempt at gagging

discussion, would not be countenanced. (Applause.) She made a

strong protest against this treatment of Mr. Burleigh. Sufficient

silence was obtained for that gentleman to say that he had

finished; but he was determined that they should hear the last

word. (Hisses and laughter.) He now took his seat. The motion to

lay the resolutions upon the table for discussion in the evening

was then carried, and the Association adjourned till the evening,

to meet in the large hall of the Cooper Institute. A letter from

Jules Favre, the celebrated French advocate and _litterateur_,

was read, after which addresses were delivered by Madam Anneke,

of Milwaukee (in German), and by Madame de Hericourt, of Chicago

(in French). Both of these ladies are of revolutionary

tendencies, and left their native countries because they had

rendered themselves obnoxious by a too free expression of their

political opinions.

Madam ANNEKE said--_Mrs. President_: Nearly two decades have

passed since, in answer to a call from our co-workers, I stood

before a large assembly, over which Mrs. Mott presided, to utter,

in the name of suffering and struggling womanhood, the cry of my

old Fatherland for freedom and justice. At that time my voice was

overwhelmed by the sound of sneers, scoffs, and hisses--the

eloquence of tyranny, by which every outcry of the human heart is

stifled. Then, through the support of our friends Mrs. Rose and

Wendell Phillips, who are ever ready in the cause of human

rights, I was allowed, in my native tongue, to echo faintly the

cry for justice and freedom. What a change has been wrought since

then! To-day they greet us with deferential respect. Such giant

steps are made by public opinion! What they then derided, and

sought, through physical power and rough ignorance, to render

wholly impossible, to day they greet with the voice of welcome

and jubilee. Such an expression of sentiment is to us the most

certain and joyful token of a gigantic revolution in public

opinion--still more gratifying is it, that the history of the

last few years proves that under the force of an universal

necessity, reason and freedom are being consistently developed.

Such is the iron step of time, that it brings forward every event

to meet its rare fulfillment. Under your protection I am once

more permitted, in this dawning of a new epoch which is visible

to all eyes that will see, and audible to all ears that will

hear, to express my hopes, my longing, my striving, and my

confidence. And now, permit me to do so in the language of my

childhood's play, as well as that of the earnest and free

philosophy of German thinkers and workers. Not that I believe it

is left to me to interest the children of my old Fatherland, here

present, in the new era of truth and freedom, as if these

glorious principles were not of yore implanted in their

hearts--as if they could not take them up in a strange idiom--but

because I am urged from my deepest soul to speak out loud and

free, as I have ever felt myself constrained to do, and as I can

not do in the language of my beloved adopted land. The

consciousness and the holy conviction of our inalienable human

rights, which I have won in the struggle of my own strangely

varied life, and in the wrestling for independence which has

carried me through the terrors of bloody revolution, and brought

me to this effulgent shore where _Sanita Libertas_ is free to all

who seek it--this sacred strand, of which our German poet says:

_Dich halte ich!_ (I have gained thee and will not leave thee.)

So I turn to you, my dear compatriots, in the language of our

Fatherland--to you who are accustomed to German ways of

thinking--to you who have grown up in the light which flows from

thinking brains--to you whose hearts warmly cherish human rights

and human worth--who are not afraid of truth when it speaks of

such deep, clear, and universally important subjects as human

rights and human duties. He who fears truth will find hiding

places, but he who combats for it is worthy of it. The method of

its adversaries is to address themselves to thoughtless passion,

and thus arouse mockery and abuse against those who search for

scientific knowledge to appeal to easily moved feelings and

kindle sentiments of hatred and contempt. They can do this only

while truth is in the minority--only until right shall become

might.

You will learn to judge of woman's strength when you see that she

persists strenuously in this purpose, and secures, by her energy,

the rights which shall invest her with power. That which you can

no longer suppress in woman--that which is free above all

things--that which is pre-eminently important to mankind, and

must have free play in every mind, is the natural thirst for

scientific knowledge--that fountain of all peacefully progressing

amelioration in human history. This longing, this effort of

reason seeking knowledge of itself, of ideas, conclusions, and

all higher things, has, as far as historical remembrance goes

back, never been so violently suppressed in any human being as

in woman. But, so far from its having been extinguished in her,

it has, under the influence of this enlightened century, become a

gigantic flame which shines most brightly under the protection of

the star-spangled banner. There does not exist a man-made

doctrine, fabricated expressly for us, and which we must learn by

heart, that shall henceforth be our law. Nor shall the authority

of old traditions be a standard for us--be this authority called

Veda, Talmud, Koran, or Bible. No. Reason, which we recognize as

our highest and only law-giver, commands us to be free. We have

recognized our duty--we have heard the rustling of the golden

wings of our guardian angel--we are inspired for the work!

We are no longer in the beginning of history--that age which was

a constant struggle with nature, misery, ignorance, helplessness,

and every kind of bondage. The moral idea of the State struggles

for that fulfillment in which all individuals shall be brought

into a union which shall augment a million-fold both its

individual and collective force. Therefore, don't exclude

us--don't exclude woman--don't exclude the whole half of the

human family. Receive us--begin the work in which a new era shall

dawn. In all great events we find that woman has a guiding

hand--let us stay near you now, when humanity is concerned. Man

has the spirit of truth, but woman alone has passion for it. All

creations need love--let us, therefore, celebrate a union from

which shall spring the morning of freedom for humanity. Give us

our rights in the State. Honor us as your equals, and allow us to

use the rights which belong to us, and which reason commands us

to use. Whether it be prudent to enfranchise woman, is not the

question--only whether it be right. What is positively right,

must be prudent, must be wise, and must, finally, be useful. Give

the lie to the monarchically disposed statesman, who says the

republic of the United States is only an experiment, which

earlier or later will prove a failure. Give the lie to such

hopes, I say, by carrying out the whole elevated idea of the

republic--by calling the entire, excluded half of mankind and

every being endowed with reason, to the ballot-box, which is the

people's holy palladium.

MADAME DE HERICOURT said: I wish to ask if rights have their

source in ability, in functions, in qualities? No, certainly; for

we see that all men, however they may differ in endowments, have

equal rights. What, then, is the basis of rights? Humanity.

Consequently, even if it be true that woman is inferior to man in

intelligence and social ability, it is not desirable that she

shut herself within what is called woman's sphere. In a

philosophical light, the objections brought against her have no

bearing on this question. Woman must have equal rights with man,

because she is, like him, a human being; and only in

establishing, through anatomical or biological proof, that she

does not belong to the human race, can her rights be withheld.

When such demonstration is made, my claims shall cease. In the

meantime, let me say that woman--whether useful or

useless--belonging to humanity, must have the rights of humanity.

But is it true that the equality of man and woman would not be

useful to society? We might answer this question in the

affirmative were the sexes alike, but for the very reason that

they differ in many respects, is the presence of woman by the

side of man, if we desire order and justice, everywhere

necessary. Is it graceful, I ask, to walk on one leg? Men, since

the beginning of history, have had the bad taste to prefer a lame

society to one that is healthy and beautiful. We women have

really too much taste to yield longer to such deformity. In law,

in institutions, in every social and political matter, there are

two sides. Up to the present day, man has usurped what belongs to

woman. That is the reason why we have injustice, corruption,

international hatred, cruelty, war, shameful laws--man assuming,

in regard to woman, the sinful relation of slaveholder. Such

relation must and will change, because we women have decided that

it shall not exist. With you, gentlemen, we will vote, legislate,

govern--not only because it is our right, but because it is time

to substitute order, peace, equity, and virtue, for the disorder,

war, cruelty, injustice, and corruption which you, acting alone,

have established. You doubt our fitness to take part in

government because we are fickle, extravagant, etc., etc., as you

say. I answer, there is an inconsiderable minority which deserve

such epithets; but even if all women deserved them, who is in

fault? You not only prefer the weak-minded, extravagant women to

the strong-minded and reasonable ones, but as soon as a woman

attempts to leave her sphere, you, coward-like, throw yourselves

before her, and secure to your own profit all remunerative

occupations. I could, perhaps, forgive your selfishness and

injustice, but I can not forgive your want of logic nor your

hypocrisy. You condemn woman to starvation, to ignorance, to

extravagance, in order to please yourselves, and then reproach

her for this ignorance and extravagance, while you heap blame and

ridicule on those who are educated, wise, and frugal. You are,

indeed, very absurd or very silly. Your judgment is so weak that

you reproach woman with the faults of a slave, when it is you who

have made and who keep her a slave, and who know, moreover, that

no true and virtuous soul can accept slavery. You reproach woman

with being an active agent in corruption and ruin, without

perceiving that it is you who have condemned her to this awful

work, in which only your bad passions sustain her. Whatever you

may do, you can not escape her influence. If she is free,

virtuous, and worthy, she will give you free, virtuous, and

worthy sons, and maintain in you republican virtues. If she

remain a slave, she will debase you and your sons; and your

country will come under the rule of tyranny. Insane men can not

understand that where there is one slave there are always two--he

who wears the chain and he who rivets it. Unreasonable,

short-sighted men can not understand that to enfranchise woman is

to elevate man; to give him a companion who shall encourage his

good and noble aspirations, instead of one who would debase and

draw him down into an abyss of selfishness and dishonesty.

Gentlemen, will you be just, will you preserve the republic, will

you stop the moral ruin of your country; will you be worthy,

virtuous, and courageous for the welfare of your nation, and, in

spite of all obstacles, enfranchise your mothers, wives,

daughters, and sisters? Take care that you be not too late! Such

injustice and folly would be at the cost of your liberty, in

which event you could claim no mercy, for tyrants deserve to be

the victims of tyrants.

After her brief address, Madame de Hericourt submitted to the

Convention a series of resolutions for the organization of

Women's Leagues.[121]

ERNESTINE L. ROSE said--_Mrs. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen_:

What we need is to arouse both men and women to the great

necessity of justice and of right. The world moves. We need not

seek further than this Convention assembled here to-night to show

that it moves. We have assembled here delegates from the East and

the West, from the North and the South, from all over the United

States, from England, from France, and from Germany--all have

come to give us greeting and well-wishes, both in writing and in

speech. I only wish that this whole audience might have been able

to understand and appreciate the eloquent speeches which have

been delivered here to-night. They have been uttered in support

of the claim--the just demand--of woman for the right to vote.

Why is it, my friends, that Congress has enacted laws to give the

negro of the South the right to vote? Why do they not at the same

time protect the negro woman? If Congress really means to protect

the negro race, they should have acknowledged woman just as much

as man; not only in the South, but here in the North, the only

way to protect her is by the ballot. We have often heard from

this platform, and I myself have often said, that with individual

man we do not find fault. We do not war with man; we war with bad

principles. And let me ask whether we have not the right to war

with these principles which stamp the degradation of inferiority

upon women.

This Society calls itself the Equal Rights Association. That I

understand to be an association which has no distinction of sex,

class, or color. Congress does not seem to understand the meaning

of the term universal. I understand the word universal to include

ALL. Congress understood that Universal Suffrage meant the white

man only. Since the war we have changed the name for Impartial

Suffrage. When some of our editors, such as Mr. Greeley and

others, were asked what they meant by impartial suffrage, they

said, "Why, man, of course; the man and the brother." Congress

has enacted resolutions for the suffrage of men and brothers.

They don't speak of the women and sisters. [Applause.] They have

begun to change their tactics, and call it manhood suffrage. I

propose to call it Woman Suffrage; then we shall know what we

mean. We might commence by calling the Chinaman a man and a

brother, or the Hottentot, or the Calmuck, or the Indian, the

idiot or the criminal, but where shall we stop? They will bring

all these in before us, and then they will bring in the

babies--the _male_ babies. [Laughter.] I am a foreigner. I had

great difficulty in acquiring the English language, and I never

shall acquire it. But I am afraid that in the meaning of language

Congress is a great deal worse off than I have ever been. I go

for the change of name; I will not be construed into a man and a

brother. I ask the same rights for women that are extended to

men--the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness;

and every pursuit in life must be as free and open to me as any

man in the land. [Applause.] But they will never be thrown open

to me or to any of you, until we have the power of the ballot in

our own hands. That little paper is a great talisman. We have

often been told that the golden key can unlock all the doors.

That little piece of paper can unlock doors where golden keys

fail. Wherever men are--whether in the workshop, in the store, in

the laboratory, or in the legislative halls--I want to see women.

Wherever man is, there she is needed; wherever man has work to

do--work for the benefit of humanity--there should men and women

unite and co-operate together. It is not well for man to be alone

or work alone; and he can not work for woman as well as woman can

work for herself. I suggest that the name of this society be

changed from Equal Rights Association to Woman's Suffrage

Association.

LUCY STONE said she must oppose this till the colored man gained

the right to vote. If they changed the name of the association

for such a reason as it was evident it was proposed, they would

lose the confidence of the public. I hope you will not do it.

A GENTLEMAN: Mrs. President, I hope you will do it. I move that

the name of the association be changed to the "Universal

Franchise Association."

Mrs. STANTON: The question is already settled by our

constitution, which requires a month's notice previous to the

annual meeting before any change of name can be made. We will now

have a song. [Laughter.]

Mr. BLACKWELL said that he had just returned from the South, and

that he had learned to think that the test oath required of white

men who had been rebels must be abolished before the vote be

given to the negro. He was willing that the negro should have the

suffrage, but not under such conditions that he should rule the

South. [At the allusion of Mr. Blackwell to abolishing the test

oath, the audience hissed loudly.]

Mrs. STANTON said--Gentlemen and Ladies: I take this as quite an

insult to me. It is as if you were invited to dine with me and

you turned up your nose at everything that was set on the table.

Mrs. LIVERMORE said: It certainly requires a great amount of

nerve to talk before you, for you have such a frankness in

expressing yourselves that I am afraid of you. [Laughter and

applause.] If you do not like the dish, you turn up your nose at

it and say, "Take it away, take it away." [Laughter.] I was

brought up in the West, and it is a good place to get rid of any

superfluous modesty, but I am afraid of you. [Applause.] It seems

that you are more willing to be pleased than to hear what we have

to say. [Applause.] Throughout the day the men who have attended

our Convention have been turbulent. [Applause.] I say it frankly,

that the behavior of the majority of men has not been respectful.

[Applause.] She then gave a pathetic narration of the sorrow she

had seen among the depraved and destitute of our great cities,

and said the work of the coming year would be to get up a monster

petition of a million of names asking the Legislature for

suffrage. [Applause.]

After a song from the Hutchinson Family, who had come from

Chicago to entertain the audiences of the Association, the

meeting adjourned.

The friends of woman's suffrage, including most of the delegates to

the Equal Rights Convention in New York, met in mass meeting in the

Academy of Music, Brooklyn, Friday morning, May 14th, at 10 o'clock.

Mr. Edwin A. Studwell called the meeting to order and nominated Mrs.

Anna C. Field for President. This lady was unanimously elected, and

took the chair. Mrs. Celia Burleigh was elected Secretary. On motion

of Mr. Studwell, a committee[122] was appointed to draft resolutions.

Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton was then introduced, and made the opening

speech.

Mrs. LUCY STONE congratulated the ladies upon the large number of

men who had become converted to their cause.

Mr. LANGDON, of Vermont, followed with a brief speech.

Mrs. BURLEIGH read a letter from the Hon. Geo. Wm. Curtis,

indorsing very decidedly the doctrine of woman suffrage.

Rev. PHEBE HANAFORD then delivered a most eloquent and touching

address on the moral influence that the participation of women in

government would have upon the world. Every true mother was with

this movement. The golden rule given by Jesus, if carried out,

would give equal rights to all, and there would be no distinction

between color, race, or sex.

The Rev. GILBERT HAVEN, of Massachusetts, said there were three

reforms needed--one was the abolition of social distinctions,

another was the abolition of the rum-shop, and the third was

giving the ballot to women. Of the three, which should take the

precedence? It was hard to say that woman did not lead them all.

He had claimed yesterday that the Woman's Rights movement

originated in Massachusetts. He was mistaken. The great idea of

woman's equality was taught by Christ; and still further back,

when man and woman were created and placed in Paradise, they were

placed there on an equality. God gave man no supremacy over woman

there. Not until sin had entered the world, not until after the

fall was it said, "He shall rule over her." If we were to be

controlled by this curse of sin, we should still adhere to the

old law giving the supremacy to the first-born son, for that was

declared at the same time between Cain and Abel. Sin degraded,

but grace emancipated. On the day of Pentecost, the Spirit fell

upon the man and woman alike. St. Paul declared this great

doctrine of Woman's Rights when he said, "There is neither Greek

nor Jew, neither bond nor free, neither male nor female, but all

are one in Christ. If a woman prophesy, let her prophesy with the

head covered," but he did not say women shall not prophesy. The

doctrine of Woman's Rights originated with God Himself. There

were many reasons why we should give the ballot to women. It

would elevate woman herself, as well as confer incalculable

benefits on man.

At the afternoon session addresses were made by Mrs. Livermore, Lucy

Stone, Lilie Peckham, Rev. J. W. Chadwick, and Lucretia Mott. In the

evening the building was crowded throughout, including stage and both

galleries, with the very best of people. The Committee on organization

reported for President, Mrs. Celia Burleigh, and for Vice-Presidents

about twenty names. Mrs. Norton read an extract from a letter of Wm.

Lloyd Garrison. Miss Olive Logan spoke in her own dramatic style. She

dealt numerous severe blows at the other sex. Her many sarcastic and

humorous hits elicited great applause. A resolution declaring woman

entitled to vote and hold office under all conditions which it is

proper to impose on man, was read and adopted, after which Lucretia

Mott addressed the convention in her usual happy manner.

Mrs. HARPER spoke on matters concerning her own race.

The Rev. HENRY WARD BEECHER said: In relation to this Woman's

Rights movement, I am opposed to coercion. If a woman says, "I

have all the rights I want," I say, very well. We do not preach

the doctrine of coercive rights. You shall have perfect liberty

to stay at home. All we ask is, that women shall follow their

natures. Of all heresies it seems to me there never was one so

absurd as that which supposes that woman is not fit for the

peculiar duties of government. She was fit to whip you and me; to

teach us the best things we know; fit to take care of home; and

let me tell you that the woman who is fit to take care of home is

fit to stand in the gateway of heaven itself. Nothing is more

sacred between this and the heavenly rest than the Christian

household. It is said that woman is not fit to hold office. Take

the Presidents of the United States, as they run for the last

eight or ten years, and I would rather take my chances among the

average of women. A President of these United States requires

merely common sense and honesty. Men are not more honest than

women, not more sincere nor more capable.

Miss PHOEBE COUZINS and Mr. DOUGLASS made brief addresses. The

HUTCHINSONS sang one of their soul-stirring songs. LUCY STONE closed

the exercises with a most effective appeal.

Out of these broad differences of opinion on the amendments, as shown

in the debates, divisions grew up between Republicans and

Abolitionists on the one side, and the leaders of the Woman Suffrage

movement on the other. The constant conflict on the Equal Rights

platform proved the futility of any attempt to discuss the wrongs of

different classes in one association. A general dissatisfaction had

been expressed by the delegates from the West at the latitude of

debate involved in an Equal Rights Association. Hence, a change of

name and more restricted discussions were strenuously urged by them.

Accordingly, at the close of Anniversary week, a meeting was called at

the Woman's Bureau,[123] which resulted in reorganization under the

name of "The National Woman Suffrage Association."[124]

There had been so much trouble with men in the Equal Rights Society,

that it was thought best to keep the absolute control henceforth in

the hands of women. Sad experience had taught them that in trying

emergencies they would be left to fight their own battles, and

therefore it was best to fit themselves for their responsibilities by

filling the positions of trust exclusively with women. This was not

accomplished without a pretty sharp struggle. As it was, they had to

concede the right of membership to men, in order to carry the main

point, as several ladies would not join unless men also could be

admitted. All preliminaries discussed and amicably adjusted, a list of

officers was chosen and an organization completed, making a XVIth

Amendment the special object of its work and consideration. The

regular weekly meetings of this Association were reported by the

metropolitan press with many spicy and critical comments, which did a

great educational work and roused much thought on the whole question.

Conventions were held during the summer at Saratoga and Newport. The

following letter from Celia Burleigh gives a bird's-eye view of that

at Saratoga:

SARATOGA, July 16th, 1869.

The advocates of Woman Suffrage have fairly earned the title of

Revolutionists by their recent bold move on the enemy's

stronghold. The great foe to progress is want of thought, and the

devotees of fashion are about the last to come into line and work

for any great reform. Not a little surprise, and some

indignation, were expressed by the representatives of upper

tendom sojourning here, that strong-minded women were not only

coming to Saratoga, but actually intending to hold a convention.

What next? What place would henceforth be safe from the assaults

of these irrepressible amazons of reform? Saratoga has survived

the shock, however; Flora McFlimsey has looked in the face of

Miss Anthony, and has not been turned to stone. More than that,

finding the convention pouring into the parlors of Congress Hall,

and escape actually cut off, Flora, after deliberating whether to

faint and be carried out, or gratify her curiosity by looking on,

finally submitted gracefully to the inevitable and did the

latter. From her crimson cushioned arm chair by the window, she

saw the meeting called to order, saw one after another of "those

horrid women, whose names are in the newspapers," quietly taking

their places, doing the thing proper to be done, and carrying

forward the business of the meeting. Really, they were not so

dreadful after all. They neither wore beards nor pantaloons.

There was not even a woman with short hair among them. On the

contrary, they seemed to be decidedly appreciative of "good

clothes" and if less familiar with the goddess of fashion than

Miss Flora they did not walk arm in arm with her, they at least

followed at no great distance and were, to a woman, finished off

with the regulation back-bow of loops and ends. Spite of herself,

Miss McFlimsey became interested, and when Miss Anthony mentioned

the fact that the majority of men felt it necessary to talk down

to women, instead of sharing with them their best thoughts and

most vital interests, Flora looked reflective, as if in that

direction might lie the clew to the insufferable stupidity which

she often found in the young gentlemen of her acquaintance.

That a Woman Suffrage Convention should have been allowed to

organize in the parlors of Congress Hall, that those parlors

should have been filled to their utmost capacity by the habitual

guests of the place, that such men as Millard Fillmore, Thurlow

Weed, George Opdyke, and any number of clergymen from different

parts of the country, should have been interested lookers-on, are

significant facts that may well carry dismay to the enemies of

the cause. That the whole business of the Convention was

transacted by women in a dignified, orderly, and business-like

manner, is a strong intimation that in spite of all that has been

said to the contrary, women are capable of learning how to

conduct meetings and manage affairs. Even the least friendly

spectator was compelled to admit it, that the delegates to the

Convention were as free from eccentricity in dress and manner as

the most fastidious taste could demand; that they were remarkable

only for the comprehensive range of thought, indicated in their

utterances, and the earnestness with which they advocate

principles which they evidently believe to be right. Another fact

worth noticing is the character of the reports of the Convention

furnished to the daily papers. They were, for the most part,

full, impartial, and respectful in tone; especially was this the

case with the local papers. Altogether, the Woman Suffrage

Conventions in the State of New York must be regarded as a

decided success. The interest manifested shows that thought on

the subject is no longer confined to the few, but that it is

gradually permeating the whole public mind.

In its present condition, Saratoga realizes one's ideal of a

summer resort, and yet in the good time coming, we can imagine an

improvement--that even Congress Hall, with its gentlemanly and

courteous proprietor, its sumptuous appointments and army of

waiters, may yet have an added excellence; when, by the

possession of the ballot, woman becomes a possible proprietor and

actual worker; when to earn money is as honorable for a woman as

it now is for a man, we may hope to find in every hotel not only

a host, but a hostess; and whatever may be said of the excellence

of men as housekeepers, I confidently predict that even Congress

Hall will be vastly improved by the addition.

The chief speakers at this Convention were Charlotte Wilbour,

Celia Burleigh, Matilda Joslyn Gage, Rev. Mr. Angier, J. N.

Holmes, Esq., Judge McKean, and Mrs. Dr. Strowbridge.

C. B.

THE NEWPORT CONVENTION.--_Dear Revolution_: Susan B. Anthony

having decided that neither age, color, sex, or previous

condition could shield any one from this agitation--that neither

the frosts of winter nor the heats of summer could afford its

champions any excuse for halting on the way, our forces were

commanded to be in marching order on the 25th of August, to

besiege the "butterflies of fashion" in Newport.[125] Having

gleefully chased butterflies in our young days on our way to

school, we thought it might be as well to chase them in our old

age on the way to heaven. So, obeying orders, we sailed across

the Sound one bright moonlight night with a gay party of the

"disfranchised," and found ourselves quartered on the enemy the

next morning as the sun rose in all its resplendent glory.

Although trunk after trunk--not of gossamers, laces, and

flowers, but of Suffrage ammunition, speeches, resolutions,

petitions, tracts, John Stuart Mill's last work, and folios of

_The Revolution_ had been slowly carried up the winding stairs of

the Atlantic--the brave men and fair women, who had tripped the

light fantastic toe until the midnight hours, slept heedlessly

on, wholly unaware that twelve apartments were already filled

with invaders of the strong-minded editors, reporters, and the

Hutchinson family to the third and fourth generation.

Suffice it to say the Convention continued through two days with

the usual amount of good and bad speaking and debating, strong

and feeble resolutions, fair and unfair reporting--but, with all

its faults, an improvement on the general run of conventions

called by the stronger sex. We say this not in a spirit of

boasting, but with a heart overflowing with pity for the "men of

the period." The chief speakers were Paulina Wright Davis,

Isabella Beecher Hooker, Theodore Tilton, Francis D. Moulton,

Rev. Phebe Hanaford, Lillie Devereux Blake, Elizabeth R.

Churchill, the Hon. Mr. Stillman, of Rhode Island; and the editor

and proprietor of _The Revolution_. The occasion was enlivened

with the stirring songs of the Hutchinsons, and a reading by Mrs.

Sarah Fisher Ames, the distinguished artist who moulded the bust

of Abraham Lincoln which now adorns the rooms of the Union

League.

The audience throughout the sittings of the Convention was large,

fashionable, and as enthusiastic as the state of the weather

would permit. From the numbers of _The Revolution_ and John

Stuart Mill's new work sold at the door, it is evident that much

interest was roused on the question. We can say truly that we

never received a more quiet and respectful hearing; and, from

many private conversations with ladies and gentlemen of

influence, we feel assured that we have done much by our

gatherings in Saratoga and Newport to awaken thought among a new

class of people. The _ennui_ and utter vacuity of a life of mere

pleasure is fast urging fashionable women to something better,

and, when they do awake to the magnitude and far-reaching

consequences of woman's enfranchisement, they will be the most

enthusiastic workers for its accomplishment.

E. C. S.

The Fourth of July this year was celebrated for the first time by

members of the Woman Suffrage Association, in a beautiful grove in

Westchester County. Edwin A. Studwell of Brooklyn made all the

necessary arrangements. Speeches were made by Judge E. D. Culver, Mrs.

Stanton, and Miss Anthony. The Woman Suffrage meetings at the Bureau

were crowded every week. October 7th there was an unusually large

attendance, to discuss the coming Industrial Congress at Berlin. The

following letter to the Berlin Congress was read and adopted:

NATIONAL WOMAN SUFFRAGE ASSOCIATION, }

NEW YORK, September 28, 1869. }

_To the Woman's Industrial Congress at Berlin_:

At a meeting of our Executive Committee the call for your

Convention was duly considered, and a committee appointed to

address you a letter. In behalf of the progressive women of this

country we would express to you the deep interest we feel in the

present movement among the women of Europe, everywhere throwing

off the lethargy of ages and asserting their individual dignity

and power, showing that the emancipation of woman is one of those

great ideas that mark the centuries. While in your circular you

specify various subjects for consideration, you make no mention

of the right of suffrage.

As yours is an Industrial Congress in which women occupied in

every branch of labor are to be represented, you may think this

question could not legitimately come before you. And even if it

could, you may not think best to startle the timid or provoke the

powerful by the assertion that a fair day's wages for a fair

day's work and the dignity of labor, alike depend on the

political status of the laborer. Perhaps in your country, where

the right of representation is so limited even among men, women

do not feel the degradation of disfranchisement as we do under

this Government, where it is now proposed to make sex the only

disqualification for citizenship.

The ultimate object of all these labor movements on both

continents, is the emancipation of the masses from the slavery of

poverty and ignorance, and the shorter way to this end is to give

all the people a voice in the laws that govern them, for the

ballot is bread, land, education, dignity, and power. The

extending of new privileges and abating of old grievances may

afford some temporary relief; but the kernel of the whole

question of the people's wrongs can never be touched until the

essential equality of all citizens under the government is fully

recognized. In America we have the true theory of government, and

step by step we are coming to its practical realization.

Seeing that no class ever did or ever can legislate wisely for

another, the women, even in this country, have done complaining

of specific wrongs, and are demanding the right to legislate for

themselves. We are now holding conventions in the chief cities of

the several States, and petitioning Congress for a sixteenth

amendment to the Federal Constitution that shall forbid the

disfranchisement of any citizen on account of sex. In January,

soon after the convening of Congress, we shall hold a National

Convention in Washington to press our arguments on the

representatives of the people. Sooner or later you will be driven

to make the same demand; for, from whatever point you start in

tracing the wrongs of citizens, you will be logically brought

step by step to see that the real difficulty in all cases is the

need of representation in the government. However various our

plans and objects, we are all working to a common centre. And in

this general awakening among women we are taking the grandest

step in civilization that the world has yet seen. When men and

women are reunited as equals in the great work of life, then, and

not till then, will harmony and happiness reign supreme on earth.

Tendering you our best wishes for the success of your convention

and the triumph of our cause in Europe, we are yours, with much

esteem,

ELIZABETH CADY STANTON, ELIZABETH B. PHELPS,

CHARLOTTE B. WILBOUR, SUSAN B. ANTHONY.

PAULINA WRIGHT DAVIS.

The following ladies were appointed delegates to the Woman's

Industrial Congress called to meet at Berlin: Ernestine L. Rose, Laura

C. Bullard, New York; Kate N. Doggett, Mary J. Safford, Illinois; Mary

Peckenpaugh, Missouri. A letter from Mrs. Bullard[126] was listened to

with interest.

During the Autumn of this year there was a secession from our ranks,

and the preliminary steps were taken for another organization. Aside

from the divisions growing out of a difference of opinion on the

amendments, there were some personal hostilities among the leaders of

the movement that culminated in two Societies, which were generally

spoken of as the New York and Boston wings of the Woman Suffrage

reform. The former, as already stated, called the "National Woman

Suffrage Association," with Elizabeth Cady Stanton for President,

organized in May; the latter called "The American Woman Suffrage

Association," with Henry Ward Beecher for President, organized the

following November. Most of those who inaugurated the reform remained

in the National Association--Lucretia Mott, Martha C. Wright,

Ernestine Rose, Clarina Howard Nichols, Paulina Wright Davis, Sarah

Pugh, Amy Post, Mary H. Hallowell, Lydia Mott, Catharine A. F.

Stebbins, Adeline Thomson, Josephine S. Griffing, Clemence S. Lozier,

Rev. Olympia Brown, Matilda Joslyn Gage, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan

B. Anthony--and continued to work harmoniously together.

FOOTNOTES:

[111] A NATIONAL WOMAN'S SUFFRAGE CONVENTION will be held in Carroll

Hall, Washington, D. C., on the 19th and 20th of January, 1869. All

associations friendly to Woman's Rights are invited to send delegates

from every State. Friends of the cause are invited to attend and take

part in the discussions.

_Committee of Arrangements._--Josephine S. Griffing, William

Hutchinson, Lydia S. Hall, John H. Crane, Mary T. Corner, George F.

Needham, James K. Wilcox.

[112] Speeches were made by Mrs. Griffing and Miss Clara Barton of

Washington, Mrs. Wright and Susan B. Anthony of New York, Mr. Edward

M. Davis and Mr. Robert Purvis of Pennsylvania, Dr. Charles Purvis,

Mr. and Mrs. Stebbins, Mr. Wilcox, Mrs. Julia Archibald, Col. Hinton

and Mr. George T. Downing of Washington, Mrs. Starrett, Dr. Root and

Mrs. Archibald of Kansas, Mr. Wolff of Colorado, Mrs. Kingsbury of

Vineland, New Jersey, Mrs. Dr. Hathaway of Massachusetts, Mrs. Minor

of Missouri, and others.

[113] The amendment as proposed by the Hon. Thaddeus Stevens, of

Pennsylvania, extended the right of suffrage to "all citizens," which

included both white and black women. At the bare thought of such an

impending calamity, the more timid Republicans were filled with alarm,

and the word "male" promptly inserted.

[114] A circumstance at the Woman's National Convention served to

impress me profoundly with the monstrousness of slavery, and of the

prejudice it created and has left behind it, which I have been waiting

a convenient opportunity to tell you about. Far into the first evening

of the Convention, when the debate had waxed warm between Mrs.

Stanton--who opposed the admission of any more men (referring to the

negroes) to the political franchise, until the present arbiters of the

question were disposed to admit women also--and Mr. Downing and Dr.

Purvis, of Washington, an elegant looking gentleman arose upon impulse

and began to talk in his seat, but, after a little hesitancy, accepted

the invitation of Mrs. Mott and Miss Anthony to take the platform. As

he stood up before the audience, he appeared a tall, slender, elderly

gentleman, with the white hair and other marks of years, at least not

less than sixty, graced with a handsome face of the highest type,

strikingly fine in character. I have seen many nations and conditions

of people, and I do not fear to say with some regard for my reputation

as an observer--that I believe it one of the most benevolent and

exalted faces--one of the most elevated and least mixed with the

animal and earthly alloys of our humanity, that adorn the whole globe.

He spoke but a few words. They were all of the character of the

generous impulse upon which he rose. In his gratitude for what those

noble women had done for the colored race, _with which he was

identified_, he was willing to wait for the ballot for himself, his

sons, and his race, until women were permitted to enjoy it. The

speaker was Robert Purvis, of Philadelphia, Dr. Purvis's father. By

the gas light of the hall, he not only appeared to be a white man, but

a light complexioned white man. It may be that he has one

thirty-second--possibly one-sixteenth--negro blood in his veins. There

is so little in effect, that the whole make-up of the man is after the

highest pattern of white men. Besides--to descend a little--Mr. Purvis

is a gentleman of wealth and culture, and surrounds his family with

all the gratifications of the intellectual, esthetic and moral

desires, and carefully developed his children at home and at the best

schools into which they could gain admission.--_Correspondence of the

Denver News._

[115] _Resolved_, That governments among men have hitherto signally

failed, their history being but a series of revolutions, bloodshed,

and desolation.

_Resolved_, That a democracy based on a republicanism which proscribes

and disfranchises one part of the citizens for their sex, and another

for their color, is a contradiction in terms more offensive and harder

to be borne than despotism itself, under its true name, and vastly

more dangerous by its seductive influence to human well-being.

_Resolved_, That we demand, as the only assurance of national

perpetuity and peace, as well as a measure of Justice and right, that

in the reconstruction of the Government suffrage shall be based on

loyalty and intelligence, and nowhere be limited by odious

distinctions on account of color, or sex.

_Resolved_, That we earnestly recommend to the friends of equal

suffrage in all the States to call a convention at their respective

capitals during the sessions of their Legislatures, and that

committees be appointed to memorialize those bodies on the subject of

suffrage alike impartial for men and women, and that as far as

possible able and earnest women obtain a hearing before them, to urge

the necessity and justice of their claim.

_Resolved_, That we denounce the proposition now pending in Congress

to abolish the elective franchise in the District of Columbia, as it

tends to make the disfranchisement of the 25,000 women of the

District, and the lately enfranchised colored men perpetual.

_Resolved_, That in demanding the ballot for the disfranchised

classes, we do not overlook the logical fact of the right to be voted

for; and we know no reason why a colored man should be excluded from a

seat in Congress, or any woman either, who possesses the suitable

capabilities, and has been duly elected.

_Resolved_, That we demand of the Government, and of the public also,

that women and colored people shall choose their own occupations, and

be paid always equally with men for equal work.

_Resolved_, That a _man's_ government is worse than a _white_ man's

government, because, in proportion as you increase the tyrants, you

make the condition of the disfranchised class more hopeless and

degraded.

_Resolved_, That as the partisan cry of a white man's government

created the antagonism between the Irishman and the negro, culminating

in those fearful riots in 1863, so the Republican cry of manhood

suffrage creates the same antagonism between the negro and the woman,

and must result, especially in the Southern States, in greater

injustice toward woman.

[116] ANNIVERSARY OF THE AMERICAN EQUAL RIGHTS ASSOCIATION.

The American Equal Rights Association will hold its Anniversary in New

York, at Steinway Hall, Wednesday and Thursday, May 12th and 13th, and

in Brooklyn, Academy of Music, on Friday, the 14th.

After a century of discussion on the rights of citizens in a republic,

and the gradual extension of suffrage, without property or educational

qualifications, to all white men, the thought of the nation has turned

for the last thirty years to negroes and women.

And in the enfranchisement of black men by the Fourteenth and

Fifteenth Amendments to the Federal Constitution, the Congress of the

United States has now virtually established on this continent an

aristocracy of sex; an aristocracy hitherto unknown in the history of

nations.

With every type and shade of manhood thus exalted above their heads,

there never was a time when all women, rich and poor, white and black,

native and foreign, should be so wide awake to the degradation of

their position, and so persistent in their demands to be recognized in

the government.

Woman's enfranchisement is now a practical question in England and the

United States. With bills before Parliament, Congress, and all our

State Legislatures--with such able champions as John Stuart Mill and

George William Curtis, woman need but speak the word to secure her

political freedom to-day.

We sincerely hope that in the coming National Anniversary every State

and Territory, East and West, North and South, will be represented. We

invite delegates, too, from all those countries in the Old World where

women are demanding their political rights.

Let there be a grand gathering in the metropolis of the nation, that

Republicans and Democrats may alike understand, that with the women of

this country lies a political power in the future, that both parties

would do well to respect.

The following speakers from the several States are pledged: Anna E.

Dickinson, Frederick Douglass, Mary A. Livermore, Madam Anneke, Lillie

Peckham, Phoebe Couzins, M. H. Brinkerhoff, Mrs. Frances McKinley,

Amelia Bloomer, Olive Logan, Mrs. E. Oakes Smith, Elizabeth Cady

Stanton, Henry Ward Beecher, Olympia Brown, Robert Purvis, Josephine

S. Griffing, Lucy Stone, Ernestine L. Rose, Susan B. Anthony, Theodore

Tilton, Rev. O. B. Frothingham.

LUCRETIA MOTT, _President_.

_Vice-Presidents_, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Frederick Douglass, Henry

Ward Beecher, Martha C. Wright, Frances D. Gage, New York; Olympia

Brown, Massachusetts; Elizabeth B. Chase, Rhode Island; Charles

Prince, Connecticut; Robert Purvis, Pennsylvania; Antoinette B.

Blackwell, New Jersey; Josephine S. Griffing, Washington, D. C.;

Thomas Garrett, Delaware; Stephen H. Camp, Ohio; Euphemia Cochrane,

Michigan; Mary A. Livermore, Illinois; Mrs. I. H. Sturgeon, Missouri;

Amelia Bloomer, Iowa; Mary A. Starrett, Kansas; Virginia Penny,

Kentucky.

_Corresponding Secretary_, Mary E. Gage.

_Recording Secretaries_, Henry B. Blackwell, Harriet 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, Oliver Johnson, Mrs. Horace

Greeley, Abby Hopper Gibbons, Elizabeth Smith Miller.

[117] See Appendix.

[118] On the platform were seated Ernestine L. Rose, of New York; Mary

A. Livermore, of Chicago; Phoebe Couzins, of St. Louis; Lillie

Peckham, of Milwaukee; Madam Anneke, of Milwaukee; Madam de Hericourt,

of Chicago; Mrs. M. Joslyn Gage, of Syracuse; Frederick Douglass; Lucy

Stone, of New Jersey; Olive Logan, of New York; Josephine Griffing, of

Washington; Mrs. Paulina W. Davis; Mrs. Abby H. Patton; Mrs. Kate N.

Doggett; Eleanor Kirk; Mrs. Bachelder, of Boston; Mrs. Mary Macdonald,

of Mount Vernon; Rev. Mrs. Hanaford; Rev. Antoinette L. Brown

Blackwell, of New Jersey; Mrs. Jennette Brown Heath, of Kansas; Mrs.

Mary Newman, of Binghamton, N.Y.; Mrs. Mathilde Wendt, of New York;

Andrew Jackson Davis; Mary F. Davis; Mrs. Caroline Morey Holmes, of

Union Village, New York; Mrs. Phelps, of the Woman's Bureau, New York;

Senator Pomeroy; Mrs. Longley, of Cincinnati; Mrs. Amelia Bloomer, of

Council Bluffs, Iowa; Lizzie Boynton, of Ohio; Mary A. Gage, of

Brooklyn; Mrs. Sarah Norton, of the New York Working-Women's

Association, and others.

The following committees, on motion of Miss Susan B. Anthony, were

appointed by the Chair: Committee on Nominations--Edwin S. Bunker,

Lydia Mott, Edwin A. Studwell, Abby H. Gibbons, Lucy Stone, Charles C.

Burleigh, and Lillie Peckham. Committee on Resolutions--Ernestine L.

Rose, Henry B. Blackwell, Anna C. Field, Mary A. Livermore, S. S.

Foster, Josephine S. Griffing, Madam Anneke, Madam Hericourt, and

Phebe A. Hanaford. Committee on Finance--Susan B. Anthony, Anna C.

Field, Mary A. Gage, and R. J. Johnston.

[119] _President_:--Lucretia Mott.

_Vice-Presidents at Large_:--Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Ernestine

L. Rose.

_Vice-Presidents for the States_:--John Neal, Maine; Armenia S. White,

New Hampshire; James Hutchinson, Jr., Vermont; William Lloyd Garrison,

Julia Ward Howe, Massachusetts; Elizabeth B. Chase, Rhode Island;

Isabella B. Hooker, Connecticut; Henry Ward Beecher, Frederick

Douglass, Martha C. Wright, New York; Portia Gage, New Jersey; Robert

Purvis, Pennsylvania; Mary A. Livermore, Illinois; George W. Julian,

Indiana; Benjamin F. Wade, Ohio; Gilbert Haven, Michigan; Rev. A. L.

Lindsley, Oregon; Joseph H. Moore, California; Hon. J. Nye, Nevada;

Hon. A. P. K. Safford, Arizona; Hon. James H. Ashley, Montana;

Josephine S. Griffing, District of Columbia; Thomas Garrett, Delaware;

Ellen M. Harris, Maryland; John C. Underwood, Virginia; Mrs. J. K.

Miller, North Carolina; Mrs. Pillsbury, South Carolina; Elizabeth

Wright, Texas; Mrs. Dr. Hawkes, Florida; Hon. Guy Wines, Tennessee;

Mrs. Francis Minor, Missouri; Hon. Charles Robinson, Kansas; Governor

Fairchild and Madam Anneke, Wisconsin; Mrs. Harriet Bishop, Minnesota;

Hon. Mr. Loughridge, Iowa.

_Executive Committee_:---Elizabeth R. Tilton, Lucy Stone, Edwin

Studwell, Susan B. Anthony, Antoinette Brown Blackwell, Thomas W.

Higginson, Anna C. Field, Edward S. Bunker, Abby Hutchinson Patton,

Oliver Johnson, Elizabeth Smith Miller, Margaret E. Winchester, Edward

Cromwell, Robert J. Johnston, Mary A. Davis.

_Corresponding Secretaries_:--Mary A. Gage, Harriet Purvis, Henry B.

Blackwell.

_Treasurer_:--John J. Merritt.

[120] _Resolved_, That the extension of suffrage to woman is essential

to the public safety and to the establishment and permanence of free

institutions; that the admission of woman to political recognition in

our national reconstruction is as imperative as the admission of any

particular class of men.

_Resolved_, That as woman, in private life, in the partnership of

marriage, is now the conservator of private morals, so woman in public

life, in the partnership of a republican State, based upon Universal

suffrage, will become the conservator of public morals.

_Resolved_, That the petitions of more than 200,000 women to Congress

and to their State Legislature during the past winter, are expressions

of popular sympathy and approval, everywhere throughout the land, and

ought to silence the cavil of our opponents that "women do not want to

vote."

_Resolved_, That while we heartily approve of the Fifteenth Amendment,

extending suffrage to men, without distinction of race, we

nevertheless feel profound regret that Congress has not submitted a

parallel amendment for the enfranchisement of women.

_Resolved_, That any party professing to be democratic in spirit or

republican in principle, which opposes or ignores the political rights

of woman, is false to its professions, short-sighted in its policy,

and unworthy of the confidence of the friends of impartial liberty.

_Resolved_, That we hail the report of the Joint Special Committee,

just rendered to the Massachusetts Legislature, in favor of woman

suffrage, as a fresh evidence of the growth of public sentiment and we

earnestly hope that Massachusetts, by promptly submitting the question

to a vote of her people, will maintain her historic pre-eminence in

the cause of human liberty.

_Resolved_, That the thanks of the Convention are due to the Hon.

George W. Julian in the House of Representatives, and to the Hon.

Henry Wilson and the Hon. S. C. Pomeroy In the Senate of the United

States, for their recent active efforts to secure suffrage for woman.

_Resolved_, That we recommend the men and women of every Ward, Town,

County, and State, to form local Associations for creating and

organizing public sentiment in favor of Suffrage for Woman, and to

take every possible practical means to effect her enfranchisement.

[121] 1st. That we form a League of all women claiming their rights,

both in America and Europe.

2d. The aim of this League, which shall be called the "Universal

League for Woman's Rights and Universal Peace," is to extinguish

prejudice between nations, to create a common interest through the

influence of woman, in order to substitute the reign of humanity for

the divisions and hatred and causes of war, and to give aid to the

women of all nations in securing their rights.

3d. That in every country Emancipation Societies shall be organized,

that a National Union may be formed which shall be in constant

communication with other countries by means of journals, pamphlets,

and books.

4th. That every year a General Assembly of delegates from every

country shall meet in one of the capitals by turn. These capitals

might for the present be Washington, Paris, London, Florence, and one

of the central cities of Germany.

5th. That at the stated meetings of the League there shall be an

exhibition of works of art by women.

6th. That, in traveling, women should everywhere find friendship and

aid in pursuing the end which they propose. Women, being sisters and

daughters in the ranks of humanity, must feel themselves at home with

their sisters of all nations. Among us there can be no foreigners,

since we are not citizens.

[122] E. S. Bunker, Mrs. E. R. Tilton, Mrs. A. Field, Rev. J. W.

Chadwick, J. J. Merritt and Mrs. E. A. Studwell.

[123] The Woman's Bureau was located at No. 49 East Twenty-third

Street, owned by Mrs. Elizabeth B. Phelps. Handsomely furnished

apartments were rented to the proprietor of _The Revolution_, where

much of the editorial work of that paper was done. Meetings were held

in the spacious parlors every week, where Mrs. Phelps also gave many

pleasant receptions, breakfasts, luncheons, and dinners. It was a kind

of ladies' exchange, where reformers were sure to meet each other.

These pleasant rooms in a fashionable part of the city gave a fresh

impetus to our cause, and the regular meetings, seemingly so novel and

_recherché_, called out several new speakers. This was the school

where Lilie Devereux Blake, Dr. Clemence Lozier, Isabella Beecher

Hooker, and others made their first attempts at oratory.

[124] In _The Revolution_ of May 20th we find the following:

NATIONAL WOMAN'S SUFFRAGE ASSOCIATION.--This organization was formed

at the reunion held at the Woman's Bureau at the close of the

Convention in New York. Delegates from nineteen States, including

California and Washington Territory, were present on the occasion, and

all felt the importance of an organization distinctively for Woman's

Suffrage, in view of the fact that a Sixteenth Amendment to the

Federal Constitution to secure this is now before the people. The

Association has held several meetings to plan the work for the coming

year. Committees are in correspondence with friends in the several

States to complete the list of officers.

_President._--Elizabeth Cady Stanton. _Vice-Presidents._--Elizabeth B.

Phelps, New York; Anna E. Dickinson, Pennsylvania; Mrs. Kate N.

Doggett, Illinois; Madam Anneke, Wisconsin; Mrs. Lucy Elmes,

Connecticut; Mrs. Senator Henderson, Missouri; Mattie Griffith Brown,

Massachusetts; Mrs. Nicholas Smith, Kansas; Lucy A. Snow, Maine;

Elizabeth B. Schenck, California; Josephine S. Griffing, D.C.; Paulina

W. Davis, Rhode Island; Miss Phoebe W. Couzins, Missouri.

_Corresponding Secretaries._--Mrs. Laura Curtis Bullard, Ida Greeley,

Adelaide Hallock. _Recording Secretaries._--Abby Burton Crosby, Sarah

E. Fuller. _Treasurer._--Elizabeth Smith Miller. _Executive

Committee._--Ernestine L. Rose, Charlotte B. Wilbour, Mathilde F.

Wendt, Mary F. Gilbert, Susan B. Anthony. _Advisory Counsel._--Matilda

Joslyn Gage, New York; Mrs. Francis Minor, Missouri; Adeline Thompson,

Pennsylvania; Mrs. M. B. Longley, Ohio; Mrs. Dr. J. P. Root, Kansas;

Lilie Peckham, Wisconsin.

_Constitution_--Article 1. This organization shall be called the

National Woman Suffrage Association.

Article 2. Its object shall be to secure the Ballot to the women of

the nation on equal terms with men.

Article 3. Any citizen of the United States favoring this object,

shall, by the payment of the sum of one dollar annually into the

treasury, be considered a member of the Association, and no other

shall be entitled to vote in its deliberations.

Article 4. The officers of the Association shall be a President, a

Vice-President from each of the States and Territories, Corresponding

and Recording Secretaries, Treasurer, an Executive Committee of not

less than five nor more than nine members, located in New York City,

and an Advisory Counsel of one person from each State and Territory,

who shall be members of the National Executive Committee. The officers

shall be chosen at each annual meeting of the Association.

Article 5. Any Woman's Suffrage Association may become auxiliary to

the National Association by its officers becoming members of the

Parent Association and sending an annual contribution of not less than

twenty-five dollars.

PETITION FOR WOMEN SUFFRAGE.--The following Petition was adopted by

the National Woman Suffrage Association at their meeting held at the

Woman's Bureau, June 1, 1869:

_To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States_:

The undersigned men and women of the United States ask for the prompt

passage by your Honorable Bodies of a Sixteenth Amendment to the

Constitution, to be submitted to the Legislatures of the several

States for ratification, which shall secure to all citizens the right

of suffrage without distinction of sex.

_The Revolution_ of May 27, 1869, said: "NATIONAL WOMAN SUFFRAGE

ASSOCIATION.--It is with great pleasure that we announce that Anna E.

Dickinson will deliver the inaugural address of the new National Woman

Suffrage movement at the Cooper Institute to-morrow (Friday) evening

at eight o'clock, also that Miss Dickinson consents to represent

Pennsylvania in that Association as its Vice-President. The title of

Anna Dickinson's lecture is "Nothing Unreasonable."

CHICAGO, Illinois.

_Dear Miss Anthony_: As to the new Society, God bless and speed it.

Write me down for anything in which I can serve it. I feel like "a new

hand," but I am not so dull but I can learn. Please put my name on

your list of members, and also on your list of subscribers.

With entire sympathy, KATE N. DOGGETT.

MANHATTAN, Kansas, _June 3, 1869_.

I shall be indeed proud to represent Kansas in the new National Woman

Suffrage Association, whose formation meets my hearty approval.

Definiteness of purpose is always conducive to success, and I think it

would be well now to concentrate all our efforts upon the one idea of

"Suffrage for Women." You may rely upon me to do whatever lies within

my power and ability to further the cause.

Yours truly, MARY A. HUMPHREY.

[125] NATIONAL WOMAN SUFFRAGE CONVENTION AT NEWPORT, R.I.--A Woman

Suffrage Convention will be held in the Academy of Music at Newport,

R.I., on Wednesday and Thursday the 25th and 26th days of August next.

The success attending the recent gathering at Saratoga warrants the

most sanguine hopes and expectations from this also. The intense

interest now everywhere felt on the great question renders all appeal

for a full attendance unnecessary. Among the speakers will be

Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Mrs. Paulina Wright Davis, Mrs. Celia

Burleigh, Rev. Phebe A. Hanaford, Mrs. Wilbour, and Miss Susan B.

Anthony. The Misses Alice and Phoebe Cary, Mrs. Isabella Beecher

Hooker, Mrs. E. H. Bullard, and many other of the most eminent women

of the country will be in attendance. Names of other speakers will be

announced hereafter.

In behalf of the National Woman Suffrage Association.

ELIZABETH CADY STANTON, President.

A. L. NORTON, PAULINA W. DAVIS,

Advisory Counsel for the State of Rhode Island.

[126]

LONDON, July 18, 1869.

_Mrs. President and Members of the Woman's National Suffrage

Association_:

I send an account of the first woman suffrage meeting ever held in

London. But if we may judge anything of the prospects of the movement

from the list of men and women who have interested themselves in the

cause, it will not be the last. When such men as John Stuart Mill,

Charles Kingsley, Prof. Newman, and their peers, put the shoulder to

the wheel, a cause is bound to move on and crush all obstacles in the

way of its progress. No old stumbling blocks of prejudice, or deep

ruts of conventionality can impede the onward movement. As in America,

I find that intellect, genius, wealth, and fashion even, are beginning

in England to fall into the ranks and push on the woman suffrage

question. Miss Frances Power Cobbe writes me: "The uprising of a sex

throughout the civilized world, is certainly an unique fact in

history, and can hardly fail of some important results."

With the confident expectation that her prophecy will find a speedy

and perhaps grander fulfillment than she or any of us dream of now, I

remain yours, respectfully,

LAURA C. BULLARD, _Cor. Sec'y N. W. S. Association_.

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE NEW DEPARTURE.

UNDER THE FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT.

Francis Minor's Resolutions--Hearing before Congressional

Committee--Descriptions by Mrs. Fannie Howland and Grace

Greenwood--Washington Convention, 1870--Rev. Samuel J.

May--Senator Carpenter--Professor Sprague, of Cornell

University--Notes of Mrs. Hooker--May Anniversary in New

York--The Fifth Avenue Conference--Second Decade

Celebration--Washington, 1871--Victoria Woodhull's

Memorial--Judiciary Committee--Majority and Minority

Reports--George W. Julian and A. A. Sargent in the House--May

Anniversary, 1871--Washington in 1872--Senate Judiciary

Committee--Benjamin F. Butler--The Sherman-Dahlgren

Protest--Women in Grant and Wilson Campaign.

Although with Charles Sumner many believed that under the original

Constitution women were citizens and therefore voters in our Republic,

much more bold and invincible were their claims when the XIV.

Amendment added new barriers to the already strong bulwarks of the

Supreme Law of the land.

The significance of these amendments in reference to women was first

seen by Francis Minor, of Missouri, a member of the legal profession

in St. Louis. He called attention to the view of the question,

afterward adopted by many leading lawyers of the American bar, that

women were enfranchised by the letter and spirit of the XIV.

Amendment. On this interpretation the officers of the National

Association began soon after to base their speeches, resolutions, and

hearings before Congress, and to make divers attempts to vote in

different parts of the country.

At a woman suffrage convention in St. Louis, October, 1869, the

following suggestive resolutions were presented by Francis Minor,

Esq., enclosed in the accompanying letter to _The Revolution_:

ST. LOUIS, Oct. 14, 1869.

DEAR REVOLUTION:--I wish to say a few words about the action of

the Woman's Suffrage Convention just held here. It is everywhere

spoken of as a complete success, both in point of numbers and the

orderly decorum with which its proceedings were conducted. But I

desire to call special attention to the resolutions adopted. When

I framed them, I looked beyond the action of this Convention.

These resolutions place the cause of equal rights far in advance

of any position heretofore taken. Now, for the first time, the

views and purposes of our organization assume a fixed purpose and

definite end. We no longer beat the air--no longer assume merely

the attitude of petitioners. We claim a right, based upon

citizenship. These resolutions will stand the test of legal

criticism--and I write now to ask, if a case can not be made at

your coming election. If this were done, in no other way could

our cause be more widely, and at the same time definitely brought

before the public. Every newspaper in the land would tell the

story, every fireside would hear the news. The question would be

thoroughly discussed by thousands, who now give it no

thought--and by the time it reached the court of final resort,

the popular verdict would be in accord with the judgment that is

sure to be rendered. If these resolutions are right, let the

question be settled by individual determination. A case could not

be made here for a year to come, but you could make one in New

York at the coming election.

Respectfully, FRANCIS MINOR.

THE ST. LOUIS RESOLUTIONS.

WHEREAS, In the adjustment of the question of suffrage now

before the people of this country for settlement, it is of

the highest importance that the organic law of the land

should be so framed and construed as to work injustice to

none, but secure as far as possible perfect political

equality among all classes of citizens; and,

WHEREAS, 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; be it

_Resolved_, 1. That the immunities and privileges of

American citizenship, however defined, are National in

character and paramount to all State authority.

2. That while the Constitution of the United States leaves

the qualification of electors to the several States, it

nowhere gives them the right to deprive any citizen of the

elective franchise which is possessed by any other

citizen--to regulate, not including the right to prohibit

the franchise.

3. That, as the Constitution of the United States expressly

declares that no State shall make or enforce any laws that

shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of

the United States, those provisions of the several State

Constitutions that exclude women from the franchise on

account of sex, are violative alike of the spirit and letter

of the Federal Constitution.

4. That, as the subject of naturalization is expressly

withheld from the States, and as the States clearly would

have no right to deprive of the franchise naturalized

citizens, among whom women are expressly included, still

more clearly have they no right to deprive native-born women

citizens of this right.

5. That justice and equity can only be attained by having

the same laws for men and women alike.

6. That having full faith and confidence in the truth and

justice of these principles, we will never cease to urge the

claims of women to a participation in the affairs of

government equal with men.

Extracts from the Constitution of the United States, upon which

the resolutions are based:

PREAMBLE, We, the people of the United States, in order to

form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure

domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense,

promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of

liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and

establish this Constitution for the United States of

America.

ARTICLE I. Sec. 2. The House of Representatives shall be

composed of members chosen every second year by the people

of the several States, and the electors in each State shall

have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most

numerous branch of the State Legislature.

[Illustration: Virginia L. Minor.]

SEC. 4. The times, places, and manner of holding elections

for Senators and Representatives shall be prescribed in each

State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may, at

any time, by law, alter such regulations, except as to the

places of choosing Senators.--[See Elliot's Debates, vol. 3,

p. 366--remarks of Mr. Madison--Story's Commentaries, Secs.

623, 626, 578].

SEC. 8. The Congress shall have power to establish a uniform

mode of naturalization--to make all laws which shall be

necessary and proper for carrying into execution the

foregoing powers vested by this Constitution in the

Government of the United States, or in any department or

officer thereof.

SEC. 9. No bill of attainder, or _ex post facto_ law shall

be passed.

No title of nobility shall be granted by the United States.

No State shall pass any bill of attainder, _ex post facto_

law--or law impairing the obligations of contracts, or grant

any title of nobility.--(See Cummings _vs._ the State of

Missouri. Wallace Rep. 278, and Exparte Garland, same

volume).

ARTICLE IV. Sec. 2. The citizens of each State shall be

entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the

several States. (The elective franchise is one of the

privileges secured by this section--See Corfield _vs._

Coryell, 4 Washington Circuit Court Reps. 380--cited and

approved in Dunham _vs._ Lamphere, 3 Gray--Mass. Rep.

276--and Bennett _vs._ Boggs, Baldwin Rep., p. 72, Circuit

Court U. S.)

SEC. 4. The United States shall guarantee to every State in

this Union a republican form of government. (How can that

form of government be republican, when one-half the people

are forever deprived of all participation in its affairs).

ARTICLE VI. This Constitution, and the laws of the United

States which shall be made in pursuance thereof, shall be

the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every State

shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws

of any States to the contrary notwithstanding.