XIV. AMENDMENT. All persons born or naturalized in the

United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are

citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they

reside.

No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge

the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United

States.

At this same convention Mrs. Virginia L. Minor, President of the

Missouri State Association, in her opening address said:

I believe that the Constitution of the United States gives me

every right and privilege to which every other citizen is

entitled; for while the Constitution gives the States the right

to regulate suffrage, it nowhere gives them power to prevent it.

The power to regulate is one thing, the power to prevent is an

entirely different thing. Thus the State can say where, when, and

what citizens may exercise the right of suffrage. If she can say

that a woman, who is a citizen of the United States, shall not

vote, then she can equally say that a Chinaman, who is not a

citizen, shall vote and represent her in Congress. The foreign

naturalized citizen claims his right to vote from and under the

paramount authority of the Federal Government, and the State has

no right to prevent him from voting, and thus place him in a

lower degree or grade of citizenship than that of free citizens.

This being the case, is it presumable that a foreign citizen is

intended to be placed higher than one born on our soil? Under our

Constitution and laws, woman is a naturalized citizen with her

husband. There are men in this town to-day, to my certain

knowledge, who have had this boon of citizenship thrust upon

them, who scorned the name, and who freely claimed allegiance to

a foreign power. Our Government has existed for eighty years, yet

this question of citizenship has never been settled. In 1856 the

question came before the then Attorney-General, Mr. Cushing, as

to whether Indians were citizens of the United States, and as

such, were entitled to the privilege of preempting our public

lands. He gave it as his opinion that they were not citizens, but

domestic subjects, and therefore not entitled to the benefits of

the act.

In 1821 the question came before Attorney-General William Wirt,

as to whether free persons of color in the State of Virginia were

citizens of the United States, and as such, entitled to command

vessels engaged in foreign trade. He gave it as his opinion that

they were not, that the Constitution by the term citizen, and by

its description of citizen, meant only those who were entitled to

all the privileges of free white persons, and negroes were not

citizens. In 1843 the question came before Attorney-General

Legree, of South Carolina, as to whether free negroes of that

State were citizens, and he gave it as his opinion that as the

law of Congress intended only to exclude aliens, therefore that

they as denizens could take advantage of the act. Mr. Marcy, in

1856, decided that negroes were not citizens, but entitled to the

protection of the Government.

In justice to our sex, I must ask you to bear in mind the fact

that all these wise Secretaries of State and Attorney-Generals,

were men that made these singular decisions, not illogical,

unreasoning women, totally incapable of understanding politics.

And lastly, in 1862, our late honored and lamented

fellow-citizen, Attorney-General Bates, decided that free negroes

were citizens. Thus, you see, it took forty-one years to make

this simple discovery. I have cited all these examples to show

you that all rights and privileges depend merely on the

acknowledgment of our right as citizens, and wherever this

question has arisen the Government has universally conceded that

we are citizens; and as such, I claim that if we are entitled to

two or three privileges, we are entitled to all. This question of

woman's right to the ballot has never yet been raised in any

quarter. It has yet to be tested whether a free, moral,

intelligent woman, highly cultivated, every dollar of whose

income and property are taxed equally with that of all men, shall

be placed by our laws on a level with the savage. I am often

jeeringly asked, "If the Constitution gives you this right, why

don't you take it?" My reply is both a statement and a question.

The State of Massachusetts allows negroes to vote. The

Constitution of the United States says the citizens of each State

shall be allowed all the privileges of the citizens in the

several States. Now, I ask you, can a woman or negro vote in

Missouri? You have placed us on the same level. Yet, by such

question you hold us responsible for the unstatesmanlike piece of

patchwork which you call the Constitution of Missouri! Women of

the State, let us no longer submit to occupy so degraded a

position! Disguise it as you may, the disfranchised class is ever

a degraded class. Let us lend all our energies to have the stigma

removed from us. Failing before the Legislatures, we must then

turn to the Supreme Court of our land and ask it to decide what

are our rights as citizens, or, at least, not doing that, give us

the privilege of the Indian, and exempt us from the burden of

taxation to support so unjust a Government. [Applause].

Ten thousand extra copies of _The Revolution_ containing these

resolutions and this speech were published and sent to friends

throughout the country, laid on every member's desk in Congress, and

circulated at the Washington Convention of 1870. From this hour up to

the time of the Supreme Court decision in the case of Virginia L.

Minor in 1875, the National Woman Suffrage Association took this view

in regard to the XIV. Amendment. Mrs. Stanton, fully accepting the new

position, made her speech on that basis before the Congressional

Committee[127] on the District of Columbia. In calling this Committee

to order Senator Hamlin said:

We have met this morning for the purpose of considering two

petitions which have been presented, I believe, only to the

Senate Committee of the District of Columbia. The first one is a

petition, very numerously signed, I think, by both ladies and

gentlemen of this city, and in a few brief words it says that:

"The undersigned, residents of the District of Columbia,

earnestly but respectfully request that you extend the right of

suffrage to the women of the District." The other memorial, very

nearly as brief, is in these words: "The undersigned citizens of

the United States pray your honorable body that in the proposed

amendments to the Constitution which may come before you in

regard to suffrage, and in any law affecting suffrage, in the

District of Columbia or in any Territory, the right of voting may

be given to the women on the same terms as to the men." Upon this

subject we have some lady friends who desire to address us, and I

have the pleasure of introducing to you Mrs. Stanton.

Mrs. STANTON said: Accustomed to appeal to the sentiments and

combat the prejudices of popular assemblies, it is a

comparatively easy task to plead the cause of woman before clear,

logical, dispassionate minds--committees of statesmen--trained to

view all subjects in the light of pure reason; for unprejudiced

minds admit to-day that if the democratic theory of government is

true, the argument lies wholly on our side of this question. As

history shows that each step in civilization has been a steady

approximation to our democratic theory, securing larger liberties

to the people, it is fair to infer that its full realization--the

equal rights of all--will be the best possible government.

Whatever is true in theory is safe in practice, and those holding

the destinies of nations in their hands should legislate with a

sublime faith in eternal principles. As bills are soon to be

introduced in both the Senate and the House, asking further

special legislation, we appear before you at this time to urge

that the women of the District shall share equally in all the

rights, privileges, and immunities you propose to confer on male

citizens.

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 secure political equality to all citizens.

While the Constitution of the United States leaves the

qualifications of electors to the several States, it nowhere

gives them the right to deprive any citizen of the elective

franchise; they may regulate, but not prohibit the franchise. The

Constitution of the United States expressly declares that no

State shall make or enforce any law that shall abridge the

privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; hence

those provisions of the several State constitutions that exclude

women from the franchise are in direct violation of the Federal

Constitution. Even the preamble recognizes, in the phrase "We,

the people," the true origin of all just government.

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.

Are not women people?

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. The 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 State to the contrary notwithstanding.

The Constitution tells us, too, who are citizens. The XIV.

Amendment says:

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and

subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the

United States and of the State wherein they reside.

No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge

the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United

States.

It has just been decided by the Supreme Court that a foreign born

woman is naturalized by marriage to a native. Therefore, as birth

and marriage secure the right of citizenship to large numbers,

the remaining classes of foreign unmarried women should secure

naturalization papers, that we may all test our right to vote in

the courts. As the subject of naturalization is expressly

withheld from the States, and as the States would clearly 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.

The States have the right to regulate but not to prohibit the

elective franchise to citizens of the United States. Thus the

States may determine the qualifications of electors. They may

require the elector to be of a certain age, to have had a fixed

residence, to be of a sane mind, and unconvicted of crime, etc.;

but to go beyond this, and say to one-half the citizens of the

State, notwithstanding you possess all these qualifications, you

shall never vote, is of the very essence of despotism. It is a

bill of attainder of the most odious character.

On this point the Constitution says:

ART. I., 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, impairing the obligations of contracts, or grant any

title of nobility. (See Cummings vs. the State of Mo., 4th

Wallace Rep 278, and Exparte Garland, same volume.)

Opposed to this provision of the Constitution, by the XV.

Amendment you have established an aristocracy of sex, sanctioning

the unjust legislation of the several States, which make all men

nobles, all women serfs. Justice and equity can only be attained

by having the same laws for men and women in the District as well

as the State.

A further investigation of the subject will show that the

language of the constitutions of all the States, with the

exception of those of Massachusetts and Virginia, on the subject

of suffrage is peculiar. They almost all read substantially

alike. "White male citizens, etc., shall be entitled to vote,"

and this is supposed to exclude all other citizens. There is no

direct exclusion, except in the two States above named. Now the

error lies in supposing that an enabling clause is necessary at

all. The right of the people of a State to participate in a

government of their own creation requires no enabling clause;

neither can it be taken from them by implication. To hold

otherwise, would be to interpolate in the constitution a

prohibition that does not exist. In framing a constitution the

people are assembled in their sovereign capacity; and being

possessed of all rights and all powers, what is not surrendered

is retained. Nothing short of a direct prohibition can work a

deprivation of rights that are fundamental.

In the language of John Jay to the people of New York, urging the

adoption of the Constitution of the United States, "silence and

blank paper neither give nor take away anything," and Alexander

Hamilton says (_Federalist_, No. 83), "Every man of discernment

must at once perceive the wide difference between silence and

abolition." The mode and manner in which the people shall take

part in the government of their creation may be prescribed by the

constitution, but the right itself is antecedent to all

constitutions. It is inalienable, and can neither be bought, nor

sold, nor given away. But even if it should be held that this

view is untenable, and that women are disfranchised by the

several State Constitutions directly, or by implication, then I

say that such prohibitions are clearly in conflict with the

Constitution of the United States and yield thereto.

The proposition is now before the people of the District to

abolish the municipal government and reduce this to a mere

territory, which is clearly retrogressive legislation; as in the

former, the chief magistrate is elected by the people and in the

latter appointed by the President. In your civil rights bill,

compelling black and white to vote together, to go to school

together, to ride in the cars together, you have taken a grand

step in progress. If in the proposed bills soon to come before

you for the establishment of a medical college in the District,

and an improved school system, you shall as carefully guard the

rights of women to equal place and salary, you will take another

onward step. In making the changes you propose, it is evident you

are doing to-day an elementary work in which all the people

should have a voice; hence, your primal duty is to extend to the

women of the District the right of suffrage, that they may vote

on the schools, colleges, hospitals, prisons, and whether their

government shall be republican with a Representative in Congress,

municipal officers, or territorial with a Governor appointed by

the President. In doing such fundamental work, many

distinguished publicists have expressed the opinion that all the

people should have a voice. In the debates in the Illinois

Convention, now in session, members refused to swear to support

the State Constitution, because, said they, "it is absurd to

swear to support what we are now tearing to pieces. We are doing

an elementary work, and are amenable to the Federal Constitution

alone."

Ever since the abolition of slavery, the District has been

resolved into its original elements. In fact by the war, and the

revision of the Federal Constitution, the nation, too, has been

resolved into its original elements, and the women have to-day,

the right to say on what basis the District, their several

States, and the nation shall be reconstructed. We think,

honorable gentlemen, you must all see the broad application of

this principle. And if all the people should have a voice in the

revision of a State or national constitution, women must be

included. The Constitution confers, by express grant upon

Congress, "exclusive jurisdiction in all cases whatsoever," for

the purposes of government. Under this grant Congress, by the

first section of the act of January 8, 1867, enacted that each

and every male person of the age of twenty-one years, who shall

have been born or naturalized in the United States, who shall

have resided in the said District for the period of one year, and

three months in the ward or election precinct in which he shall

offer to vote, shall be entitled to the elective franchise, and

shall be deemed an elector, and entitled to vote. This act, you

perceive, recognizes the pre-existing right of all persons, and

excludes women only by the use of the word male, unless, as

Hamilton says, "silence on that point is not abolition."

It is fitting that here, under the shadow of the national

capitol, under the control of the Federal Government, where the

black man was first emancipated and enfranchised, that the

experiment of a true republicanism should be tried, by securing

to woman, too, the rights of an American citizen.

SUSAN B. ANTHONY addressed the Committee as follows: We are here

for the express purpose of urging you to present in your

respective bodies, a bill to strike the word "male" from the

District of Columbia Suffrage Act, and thereby enfranchise the

women of the District. We ask that the experiment of woman

suffrage shall be tried here, under the eye of Congress, as was

that of negro suffrage. Indeed, the District has ever been made

the experimental ground of each step toward freedom. The

auction-block was here first banished, slavery was here first

abolished, the newly-made freemen were here first enfranchised;

and we now ask that the women shall here be first admitted to the

ballot. There was great fear and trepidation all over the country

as to the results of negro suffrage, and you deemed it right and

safe to inaugurate the experiment here; and you all remember that

three days discussion in 1866 on Senator Cowan's proposition to

amend the Senate bill by striking out the word "male;" the able

speeches of Cowan, Anthony, Gratz Brown, Wade, and the Senate's

nine votes for the amendment. Well do I remember with what

anxious hope we watched the daily reports of that debate, and how

we prayed that Congress might then declare for the establishment

in this District of a real, practical republic. But conscience,

or courage, or something was wanting, and women were bidden still

to wait.

When, on that March day of 1867, the negroes of the District

first voted, with what anxiety did the people wait, and with what

joy did they read the glad tidings, flashed over the wires the

following morning! And the success of that first election in

this District, inspired Congress with confidence to pass the

proposition for the XV. Amendment, and the different States to

ratify it until it has become a fixed fact that black men all

over the nation may not only vote, but sit in legislative

assemblies and constitutional conventions. We now ask Congress to

do the same for women. We ask you to enfranchise the women of the

District this very winter, so that next March they may go to the

ballot-box, and all the people of this nation may see that it is

possible for women to vote and the republic to stand. There is no

reason, no argument, nothing but prejudice, against our demand;

and there is no way to break down this prejudice but to try the

experiment. Therefore we most earnestly urge it, in full faith

that so soon as Congress and the people shall have witnessed its

beneficial results, they will go forward with a XVI. Amendment

that shall prohibit any State to disfranchise any of its citizens

on account of sex.

Mrs. HOOKER said: The fifth commandment, "Honor thy father and

thy mother," can not be obeyed while boys are taught by our laws

and constitutions to hold all women in contempt. I feel it is not

only woman's right, but duty to assume responsibility in the

government. I think the importance of the subject demands its

hearing.

Madam ANNEKE: You have lifted up the slave on this continent;

listen now to woman's cry for freedom.

Mrs. MATILDA JOSLYN GAGE: Liberty is an instinct of the human

heart, and men desirous of creating change in governments or

religion have led other men by promising them greater liberty and

better laws. Nothing is too good, too great, too sacred for

humanity--and, as part of humanity, woman as well as man demands

the best that governments have to offer. Honorable gentlemen have

spoken of petitions. For twenty years we have petitioned, and I

now hold in my hand over three thousand names of citizens from

but a small portion of the State of New York, asking that justice

shall be done women by granting them suffrage. But people have

become tired of begging for rights, and many persons favoring

this cause will not again petition. We but ask justice, and we

say to you that the stability of any government depends upon its

doing justice to the most humble individual under it.

Mrs. PAULINA WRIGHT DAVIS: We are tired of petitioning. It is

time our legislators knew what was right and gave us justice.

Mrs. WILBOUR remarked that a lady of the district near her said

she had obtained 1,500 signatures in one ward of the city to a

petition.

Senator PATTERSON inquired what the effect would be in case women

were allowed to vote, if there were a difference of opinion

between the husband and wife on some political question--where

the authority of the family would rest?

Mrs. STANTON replied that there was always a superior will and

brain in every family. If it was the man, he would rule; if it

was the woman, she would rule. Individuality would be preserved

in the family as well as in society.

Hon. Mr. WELKER wanted to know if the women in the District had

shown any interest in the movement yet.

Mrs. STANTON replied that they had; they had attended the

sessions of the Convention held here, and all she had spoken to

were in favor of it.

Mrs. WILBOUR said the petition of 1,500 women of the District

asking for suffrage had been presented to Congress this very

winter.

Hon. Mr. COOKE said that the Committee on the District of

Columbia could not get enough time allowed them by the House to

transact the necessary business of the District during the short

morning hour to which they were limited by the rules, and he

feared they would be unable to get the action of the House on the

subject.

Miss ANTHONY said that they must make time enough to present the

bill at least; and asked if women had the right to vote, and make

and unmake members, if they could not then find time to plead

woman's cause?

The honorable member was obliged to answer this pertinent

question in the affirmative.

Senator HAMLIN said the Committee would take the matter into

consideration and discuss it; that in Scripture language he could

say he "was almost, if not quite, persuaded."

Altogether the hearing was serious and impressive, and it was evident

that the honorable gentlemen had already given the subject a

thoughtful consideration. As each member of the Congressional

Committee was presented by Senator Hamlin, the ladies had abundant

opportunity for learning their individual opinions. Senator Sumner

never appeared more genial, and said though he had been in Congress

for twenty years, and through the exciting scenes of the Nebraska Act,

Emancipation, District of Columbia Suffrage Act, and Reconstruction,

he had never seen a committee in which were present so many Senators

and Representatives, so many spectators, and so much interest

manifested in the subject under discussion.

The following description (in the _Hartford Courant_) is from the pen

of Mrs. Fannie Howland.

WASHINGTON, Jan. 22, 1870.

The close of the Woman's Suffrage Convention in this city was

marked by an event which, no matter how slowly its logical

sequence is developed, must be regarded as initiative.

A committee of ladies appointed by the convention and composed in

great part of those well known as leaders in the movement, was

received at the Capitol by the committee of the Senate and House

(on the District of Columbia) for a formal hearing. The object of

that hearing was to request the honorable gentlemen to present a

bill to Congress for enfranchising the women of the District, as

an experiment preparatory to ultimate acknowledgment of equal

rights for all the women of the United States. The ladies were

received in one of the larger committee rooms, in order to

accommodate a number who wished to be present at this novel

interview. After taking their seats, the Hon. Hannibal Hamlin,

chairman, presented to them successively the gentlemen of the

committee, who certainly greeted their fair appellants with the

deferential courtesy due to fellow-sovereigns, albeit

unacknowledged and disguised, for the present, under the odium of

disfranchisement.

The gentlemen took their seats around a long table in the middle

of the room. Mrs. Stanton stood at one end, serene and

dignified. Behind her sat a large semi-circle of ladies, and

close about her a group of her companions, who would have been

remarkable anywhere for the intellectual refinement and elevated

expression of their earnest faces. Opposite, at the other end of

the table, sat Charles Sumner, looking fatigued and worn, but

listening with alert attention. So these two veterans in the

cause of freedom were fitly and suggestively brought face to

face.

The scene was impressive. It was simple, grand, historic. Women

have often appeared in history--noble, brilliant, heroic women;

but _woman_ collectively, impersonally, never until now. To-day,

for the first time, she asks recognition in the commonwealth--not

in virtue of hereditary noblesse--not for any excellence or

achievement of individuals, but on the simple ground of her

presence in the race, with the same rights, interests,

responsibilities as man. There was nothing in this gathering at

the Capitol to touch the imagination with illusion, no ball-room

splendor of light and fragrance and jewels, none of those

graceful enchantments by which women have been content to reign

through brief dynasties of beauty over briefer fealties of

homage. The cool light of a winter morning, the bare walls of a

committee room, the plain costumes of every day use, held the

mind strictly to the simple facts which gave that group of

representative men and women its moral significance, its severe

but picturesque unity. Some future artist, looking back for a

memorable illustration of this period, will put this new

"Declaration of Independence" upon canvas, and will ransack the

land for portraits of those ladies who first spoke for their

countrywomen at the Capitol, and of those Senators and

Representatives who first gave them audience.

Mrs. Stanton's speech was brief and able, eloquent from the

simplicity and earnestness of her heart, logical from the well

disciplined vigor of her mind. She was followed by Miss Anthony,

morally as inevitable and impersonal as a Greek chorus, but

physically and intellectually individual, intense, original, full

of humor and good nature--anything but the roaring lioness of

newspaper reports some years ago. Mrs. Davis, of Rhode Island,

spoke briefly in support of the demand for franchise. Mrs. I. B.

Hooker presented the Scriptural argument for the equality of

woman in all moral responsibility and duty under the divine law.

She spoke very feelingly, and was heard with marked attention. A

German lady from Wisconsin who, weighed in any balance, would not

be found wanting, struggled to express, in broken English, the

ideas for which she came forward as representing many of her

countrywomen in the West. Madam Anneke fought by her husband's

side in the revolution of 1848; but such an example adds no force

to the argument for woman's suffrage, the plea being made, not

for distinguished exceptional women, but for the average women of

the community.

When the ladies had finished their remarks, the gentlemen were

invited to ask any questions which were suggested by the subject

discussed. Either from indifference or chivalrous sentiment, no

very grave questions were proposed, nothing which required effort

or argument to answer. Probably when the matter comes, as sooner

or later it must come, before Congress, we shall hear some

well-considered defense of the Salic law, which in this

democratic republic, excludes all women from the citizen's

prerogative. One of the honorable gentlemen asked how they could

be certain that any number of women in the United States desired

the ballot. Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony recounted their

experience at conventions, the numerous signatures to petitions,

the many demonstrations here and in England in favor of woman

suffrage, but reminded the gentleman that no such separate

expression is required from the unwashed, unkempt immigrants upon

whom the government makes haste to confer unqualified suffrage,

nor from the southern negroes, who are provided for by the XV.

Amendment.

The hearing ended about noon, followed by very cordial shaking

hands and pleasant chat. I do not know if the ladies were invited

to "call again," but am quite sure that Miss Anthony's parting

salutation was an "au revoir." There was some quiet by-play as

the audience dispersed, a little interchange of knowing nods and

condescending smiles, as if to say, "we can keep these absurd

pretensions at bay while _we_ live, and after us the deluge." I

have no doubt that to some persons it appears an extravagant joke

for women to aspire to political equality with the negro. King

George thought it a very good joke when his upstart colonists

steeped their tea in the salt water of Boston harbor, but the

laugh was on their side in the long run. History has no

precedents for the elevation of woman to a civic status, but we

are making precedents every day in our conduct of popular

government. In Athens--where woman was both worshiped and

degraded--the protectress of the city was a feminine ideal whose

glorious image crowned the Parthenon with consummate beauty. In

America, where woman is beloved and respected as nowhere else in

the world--if she is only true to the ideals of private and

public virtue--if she seeks power only as a means for the highest

good of the race, the old fable of the Pellas Athenæ may become

real, and the nation acknowledge with grateful joy, that the

fathers "builded better than they knew," when they placed the

figure of a woman on the dome of their Capitol at Washington.

The second Washington Convention assembled at 10 o'clock, January

19th, 1870, in Lincoln Hall. Mrs. Stanton called the assemblage to

order and invited the Rev. Samuel J. May to open the convention with

prayer. Letters were read from John Stuart Mill, Robert Purvis, Clara

Barton, and others. Miss Barton appealed to her soldier friends in

behalf of woman's right of suffrage thus:

Brothers, when you were weak, and I was strong, I toiled for you.

Now you are strong, and I am weak because of my work for you, I

ask your aid. I ask the ballot for myself and my sex, and as I

stood by you, I pray you stand by me and mine.

Mr. Purvis closed his eloquent letter with these sentiments:

Censured as I may be for apparent inconsistency, as a member and

an officer of the American Anti-Slavery Society, in approving a

movement whose leaders are opposed to the passage of the XV.

Amendment, I must be true to my own soul, to my sense of the

absolute demands of justice, and hence, I say that, much as I

desire (and Heaven knows how deeply through life I have

antagonized therefor) the possession of all my rights as an

American citizen, were I a woman, black or white, I would resist,

by every feeling of self-respect and personal dignity, any and

every encroachment of power, every act of tyranny (for such they

will be), based upon the impious, false, and infamous assumption

of superiority of sex.

Mr. Sinclair Toucey, of New York, wrote a letter in which he said:

The argument of to-day against the legal and political equality

of the sexes carries one back to the days of pro-slavery

ascendency, and brings vividly to mind the old wail of the

non-humanity of the negro, and his lack of capacity for

civilizing improvements: and though the opponents of equal rights

for both sexes do not go quite so far as to deny the humanity of

women, yet one might believe they would, did not such a denial

involve their own status.... In a feeble manner I fought the old

pro-slavery dogma, and in a feeble manner I am trying to fight

its twin--the non-equality of the sexes.... I believe in the

brotherhood of man, regardless of sex, color, or birth-place, and

that every member of the great family is entitled to equal rights

in life's ceaseless struggles.

Mr. Mill's letter was as follows:

AVIGNON, France, Dec. 11, 1869.

DEAR MADAM: I should have reason to be ashamed of myself if your

name were unknown to me. I am not likely to forget one who stood

in the front rank of the woman's rights movement in its small

beginnings, and helped it forward so vigorously in its early and

most difficult stages. You and Mrs. Mott have well deserved to

live to see the cause in its present prosperity, and may now

fairly hope to see a commencement of victory in some of the

States at least. I have received many kind and cordial

invitations to visit the United States, and were I able, the

great convention to which you invite me would certainly be a

strong inducement to do so. My dislike to a sea voyage would not

of itself prevent me, if there were not a greater obstacle--want

of time. I have many things to do yet, before I die, and some

months (it is not worth while going to America for less) is a

great deal to give at my time of life, especially as it would

not, like ordinary traveling, be a time of mental rest, but

something very different. I regret my inability the less, as the

friends of the cause in America are quite able to dispense with

direct personal co-operation from England. The really important

co-operation is the encouragement we give one another by the

success of each in our own country. For Great Britain this

success is much greater than appears on the surface, for our

people, as you know, shrink much more timidly than Americans from

attracting public notice to themselves; and the era of great

public meetings on this subject has not arrived in our country,

though it may be near at hand. I need hardly say how much I am

gratified at the mode in which my name was mentioned in the

National Convention at Newport, and still more at the tribute to

the memory of my dear wife, who from early youth was devoted to

this cause, and had done invaluable service to it as the inspirer

and instructor of others, even before writing the essay so

deservedly eulogized in your resolutions. To her I owe the far

greater part of whatever I have myself been able to do for the

cause, for though from my boyhood I was a convinced adherent of

it, on the ground of justice, it was she who taught me to

understand the less obvious bearings of the subject, and its

close connection with all the great moral and social interests of

the cause. I am, dear madam, very sincerely yours,

J. S. MILL.

To Mrs. Paulina W. Davis.

Senator Pomeroy, of Kansas, was introduced and made some very

appropriate remarks:

He said he was no new convert to this idea of woman's right to

suffrage. Woman claims the right to vote, not because she is a

woman, and stronger or weaker than man, but because she is a

citizen, amenable to the laws and under the control of the

government. He did not propose to vote to simply give woman the

franchise, but to remove the obstacles that now forbid the

exercise of that right. He welcomed to this organization every

earnest worker, and he was glad to hear that they were stirring

up the elements. He had been waiting for the last two months for

petitions, but he thought the franchise would never be secured to

any class until it was imbedded in the constitution, and put

beyond the freaks of politicians and majorities in State

Legislatures. He was in favor of carrying the movement into the

fundamental law of the land. The negro's hour is passed, and it

is woman's hour now. The negro has had his day, his cause has

triumphed, and as woman is a citizen, and we need her ballot in

the government, I hope that this movement may have a triumphant

success.

Committees[128] were appointed. Mrs. Wright of Auburn, N. Y., stated

that her sister, Lucretia Mott, had charged her with a message to the

Convention, she sent her "God speed" to the movement, and regretted

that she could not be present.

Paulina W. Davis read an interesting history of the woman's rights

movement, giving a brief sketch of its leaders. Miss Anthony

introduced a series of resolutions,[129] which were laid on the table

for debate.

Mrs. M. GAGE, Secretary of the Suffrage Association of New York,

addressed the Convention. She thought the world had never yet

seen what woman could do, because she had never been given the

opportunity. The ballot is the symbol of a higher power than a

king's crown; it is the promise of justice to him who holds it.

John Bright said no oppression, however hoary headed, could stand

the voice of the people.

Mrs. SUSAN EDSON, of Washington, desired to have the Committee on

Resolutions urge upon Congress the passage of the bill now before

it, providing for the reorganization of the Treasury Department,

but opposing that section of the bill which fixes the salary of

the female employees lower than that of the men. She thought this

was a proper subject for the convention to discuss.

At the evening session Mrs. Josephine S. Griffing occupied the chair.

Hon. JAMES M. SCOVILL, of New Jersey, said:--I believe in

heroism. Grant won with the sword at Appomattox what Charles

Sumner contended for half a century--an idea. That idea is the

liberty of all, limited by the like liberty of each. To-night we

are here to bow to conscience, not to caste. Susan B. Anthony,

the heroine of the hour, sustained by such brave souls as crowd

this platform, who for the last twenty years have worked without

fear and without reproach, deserves the thanks of millions yet

to be, for she is the hero, the champion of the same idea for

which Abraham Lincoln and half a million soldiers died. The

emancipation of man was the proposition. The enfranchisement of

woman was not the corollary to that proposition, but the major

premise.

John Stuart Mill, in his great book, "The Subjection of Women,"

denies the superior mental capacity of man when compared with

woman. The nineteenth century don't yield a blind assent to such

bosh as Tennyson's, "Woman is the lesser man." It would not do

for Madame de Stael to assert (for alas! it was too true

then--for the first Napoleon never read Rochefort's

"Marseillaise") that man could conquer, but woman must submit to

public opinion. To-day Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Anna E.

Dickinson take public opinion by storm, because they use the

everlasting logic of human rights. Woman has power enough

whenever fidelity, or truth, or genius are worshiped. She wants

authority. The will of the nation says, "She shall have it and

that speedily." We want and demand that Congress shall make a

loud "amen" to this clearly expressed will of the nation. The

civil rights bill did little good until you armed the African

with the ballot. Then the old master touched his hat to the new

citizen--his old slave. And why? Because he was a power in the

land. It is only Godlike to use power for humanity; and that is

the way we propose to use it. Congress must hear us--shall hear

us--because we speak in the voice of the people. And I speak to

you as a man, yes, and as a lawyer, when I tell you your boasted

amendments are the small dust of the balance till the XVI. is

written. Then we will have a country, never again clasping the

Bible with the handcuffs of slavery, but a land where we, men and

women alike, can worship a common God, before whom there is

neither Jew nor Greek, "white male" nor female, barbarian,

Scythian, bond nor free.

Mrs. WILBOUR remarked that she was fully aware of the truth that

humanity was a unit. She knew the day was coming when a woman

would be considered the equal of man. No disabilities to vote or

hold office should exist in a free country on account of sex or

color. She was anxious to know by what authority the word "male"

had been placed in the constitution, which governed woman as well

as man. Woman's rights were natural rights--nothing more or less.

She claimed the right of self-rule or self-government as a

natural right. Men were united in saying, "We have the right to

vote." She was not present to be an advocate of woman's rights,

whatever they may be, but of human rights. The largest giant had

no more rights than Tom Thumb. It was brain, not force, that

governed the world. A small hand was able to discharge a musket,

guide an engine, or edit a paper as well as a large one. The

womanly in nature should be expressed by woman, the manly by man;

the two were distinct, and could not be blended together without

spoiling the harmony of the whole. Society had to be governed by

the sacred right of self-government. How could a woman be

responsible for her deeds to God if somebody had control over her

conscience?

Mr. ALBERT G. RIDDLE believed that the question of universal

franchise would be tried before the grand tribunal of the world,

and, if not victorious, it would appeal and appeal again. The

question ought to be met squarely by the "masculines" as well as

by the women. He was an earnest advocate of woman's rights,

because he claimed the same rights for his daughters as for his

sons; he wanted for them the same atmosphere, the same public

opinion, the same prestige. Women were often heard to exclaim, "I

wish I were a man." This elucidates how keenly they feel their

position. Mr. Riddle spoke at length in favor of universal

rights, and his logical arguments attracted the admiration of all

who heard him.

Mrs. JOSEPHINE S. GRIFFING stated that the city clergy had

evinced a disinclination to attend the convention, as they could

not see any justification for the same in Divine revelation. She

read a letter from Bishop Simpson, in which he wished the

convention God-speed.

Senator POMEROY said he was in favor of the XVI. Amendment, and

he thought the best place in the world to try the experiment was

in the District of Columbia. They had tried negro suffrage in the

District, and it had proved a success and a benefit. There were

plenty of offices in the city that could be filled by capable and

now idle young ladies, which were at present filled by men

weighing two hundred pounds, who were able to do a day's work but

now received large salaries for little labor.

Rev. SAMUEL J. MAY proposed to test the ladies present as to

their ideas of suffrage. He asked that every lady in the house

who desired the ballot should hold up her hand. A few ladies

responded.

Mrs. STANTON stated that Mr. May had adopted a very bad manner of

submitting the question. She would, therefore, reconsider the

vote, and ask all ladies who opposed the XVI. Amendment to rise

from their seats, and those in favor to retain them. About

sixteen ladies arose, amidst great mirth and laughter.

THE CHAIR then announced that the meeting had expressed itself

largely in favor of female suffrage.

Madam ANNEKE, a German lady, of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, stated

that, being a foreigner, allowance should be made for her

defective pronunciation. If she could not speak the English

language, she could speak the language of the heart. She came

from the West, burdened heavily with petitions, signed by one

thousand residents of the State of Wisconsin. She would appeal to

her countrymen, Carl Schurz and Finkelnburg, to assist in this

last struggle for universal liberty.

The Rev. OLYMPIA BROWN addressed herself particularly to that

small minority of ladies who had expressed themselves opposed to

the XVI. Amendment. She admired their independence of character,

for it showed they were the kind of women that the friends of

woman suffrage wished to win over to their cause. She thought

them honest in their opinions, but prejudiced. It required strong

minds to combat against the common enemy--prejudice. They may

think they do not require this right, as they might be blessed

with comfortable homes, and be satisfied with the condition they

were in. A change might come--even to them, but if it did not,

ought they not to pity other women whose situation was less

comfortable than their own? She alluded to the idle lives of

young women, to which they were condemned by the customs of

society, and said Christianity demanded a useful life from every

woman as well as every man. This cause is the cause of the

civilized world, and will go on till the ballot is in the hands

of every American woman.

Mr. STILLMAN, of R. I., had no doubt that the result of this

agitation would be to secure the universal franchise of all

women. Women would be admitted to all colleges of the land, and

to the study of the arts and sciences.

Miss ANTHONY said that Senator Pomeroy's being here to advocate

woman suffrage, might be attributed to the fact that he had a

constituency to sustain him. Let the people of other States make

as strong an expression as Kansas, and their representatives

would quickly find their places here too. She wanted women to

emigrate to Wyoming and make a model State of it by sending a

woman Senator to the National capitol. She would go there, if she

had time, but her mission was in the States until this great

reform was accomplished. She desired women to become members of

the National organization, and to pay their dollar, or

twenty-five, or twenty-five hundred dollars. She requested the

Finance Committee to take their pencils and paper, and canvass

the hall for membership and money, commencing at the door, so as

to catch every fugitive. She invited all ladies who visit New

York to call at the Woman's Bureau, and her own sanctum, the

editorial rooms of _The Revolution_.

At the second evening session, letters[130] were read from Senators

Ross, of Kansas, and Carpenter, of Wisconsin.

Miss JENNIE COLLINS, of Lowell, Mass., addressed the meeting in a

speech of some length, which was broken by frequent applause. She

came to plead the cause of the working women, her associates. She

knew the dignity of the kitchen, many of whose occupants were the

daughters of refined and wealthy parents. If these girls could

tell their story to the ladies of Washington, they would not rest

till Congress had conceded to them their rights. The sufferings

of the factory girls could hardly be described; poor wages for

hard labor, in dirty rooms, shut out from bright sunshine, with

dreary homes, were but part of their misery. With a love of the

ennobling and beautiful, a natural taste for reading and study,

many of them were led astray from the path of virtue by the

artifices of men, often the sons of their own employers, and

nothing was done to prevent their fall.

The President announced that so great was the interest evinced, that a

third day's session had been arranged.

THIRD DAY--MORNING.--Among the large and fashionable audience present

were the Governor of Wyoming Territory, many Senators and Members of

Congress, as well as other distinguished persons. Mrs. GRIFFING read

an interesting letter from Mrs. Frances D. Gage:

More than one-half of the "people," are to-day without the

right of franchise, and can exert no power in the

government, and have no voice in electing its

representatives. They have no voice in making the laws under

which they live. If they commit offenses they are punished

the same as voters. If they have property it is taxed

precisely the same and for the same purposes as is the

property of the voter. Government money and lands and

revenues are appropriated for schools, colleges, and

institutions of learning by the voters for their own use,

while the non-voters are debarred all rights and privileges

in the same. And it may be said that the disfranchised "have

no rights that the enfranchised are bound to respect." ... A

government that fails to execute its own laws and mocks at

its own enactments, can not be respected by its people. We

therefore demand that our representatives "shall guarantee

to every State in this Union a republican form of

government;" that the right of suffrage be guaranteed to all

persons of sound mind and adult years, without regard to

race, color, or sex.

Respectfully, FRANCES D. GAGE.

Rev. SAMUEL J. MAY said this movement was the most radical one

ever proposed to the civilized world. America had suffered

severely because it had violated the rights of 4,000,000 people.

If the rights of 15,000,000 were much longer violated, severer

suffering still would be induced.

CHARLOTTE B. WILBOUR said: In demanding suffrage for women we are

not making any innovation on political principles, but only

attempting to restore the broken connection between practice and

profession. A steady, constant, palpable ignoring of the

application of great truths, like the claim of woman's rights,

and the equality of all before the law, begets a reckless manner

of assertion, an illogical application of premises, and thence a

sort of organic dishonesty of mind which is carried into practice

almost unconsciously. Every subject of a government who has not a

voice in its conduct is openly degraded, and must be something

more or less than human not to show it in the conduct of his

life. We demand the ballot for women in the name of that very

domesticity which is urged against it, of that home whose peace

has always been more marred by passive servility and masculine

authority than by any over-assertion of individuality, on the

part of the so-called partner.

Speeches were also made by Mr. Hinton of Washington, and Miss

Phoebe Couzins.

Miss ANTHONY called upon Senator Sherman, of Ohio, to address the

meeting, who expressed himself highly pleased with the convention

to which he only came as a listener. The following letters were

then read:

SYRACUSE, January 18, 1870.

Mrs. M. J. GAGE--_Dear Friend_: I doubt not this meeting

will urge emphatically upon Congress the duty of striking

the word "male" from the suffrage bill for the District of

Columbia. It is a gross injustice, a _shame_ that such a

term should be in any legal paper defining citizenship in

any civilized State, especially a shame that it should stand

in a bill touching suffrage, in what ought to be the model

District, the choice sample ground of wise and just

government for the _model republic_. Let an indignant

protest and admonition go up in regard to this matter from

your convention, that Congress shall not dare to disregard.

I trust also that the convention will urge upon Congress the

eminent fitness and duty of passing without delay the XVI.

Amendment, and submitting the same to the Legislatures of

the several States for ratification.

The world is moving to-day in the direction of the abolition

of all monopolies of privilege and that of equal and exact

justice and fair play to all classes. Woman now has the

floor; the hour has struck for her. Wyoming and Colorado are

already setting example for the older communities. Let the

preaching of this faith in effective ways, its benign and

thorough working, begin at Jerusalem, at the Capitol of the

nation, and may your convention urge the work to immediate

undertaking, aye, and completion then, at home.

Yours truly, CHAS. D. B. MILLS.

CORNELL UNIVERSITY, ITHACA, N. Y., Jan. 17, 1870.

Mrs. M. JOSLYN GAGE--_Dear Madam_: I beg you to be assured

that I heartily sympathize with all well directed efforts to

secure to woman equality before the law. Whatever can be

done to give her a fair and equal chance with man, is due to

her, and no effort of mine shall be wanting to secure so

desirable a consummation.

Very respectfully yours, HOMER B. SPRAGUE.

Mrs. Helen Taylor, of London, after expressing the wish that she

might be with us, says:

It is a great delight to hear of the numerous societies, in

various countries, working well and vigorously for that

justice which for so long has been denied to women. The time

can not be far distant now, when we shall attain the right

of expressing our opinion by giving a vote.

Letters joining in the demand for a XVI. Amendment were received

from E. H. G. Clarke, of Troy, N. Y.; S. D. Dillaye, of Syracuse;

Martha B. Dickinson, Sarah Pugh, Mrs. E. K. Pugh, Abby Kimber, of

Philadelphia; Mrs. Mary J. O'Donovan-Rossa, and Hon. Jacob H.

Ela. The following extracts from private letters of Mrs. Hooker

show somewhat the spirit of the occasion.

WASHINGTON, January 19, 1870.

I have just come from a good meeting; just such a house as

we had at Hartford the mornings of our Convention. Senator

Pomeroy spoke admirably, and carried every one with him.

Then came Olympia Brown, and nothing could have been better

than her speech and the effect of it on the audience, which,

by the way, was earnest and intelligent. But Madam Anneke,

the German patriot who fought with her husband and slept

beside her horse in the field, carried the day over everyone

else. It was fairly overwhelming to hear her English, so

surcharged with feeling, yet so exact in the choice of

words, and the burden of it all was that the trials of the

battle-field were as naught compared to this inward struggle

of her soul toward liberty for woman. Her presence,

gestures, oratory, were simply magnificent.

Mrs. F., of Cincinnati, who lives here now, came to me this

morning with great warmth, saying she had brought two

Senators' wives who were opposed, and they said a few more

such women as Olympia Brown would convert them. She has

promised to bring them to our reception at the Arlington

this evening.

_Jan. 20._--We have had to hold a three days' meeting,

interest grew so fast. Yesterday morning Lincoln Hall

jammed, even aisles full. I never heard better speaking in

my life, not a disturbance in the audience, not a jar on the

platform, all loving, tender, earnest. Olympia Brown is

wonderful; she talked Christ and His Gospel just I should

have done with her voice and practice; can't enlarge, but

she surely is a remarkable woman. We are to have a hearing

by a committee from both Houses on Saturday, and Senator

Pomeroy will present a bill for suffrage in the District of

Columbia next week, and would not be much surprised if it

were carried at once--does not really expect that--but

Senator Trumbull, Chairman of Judiciary, says he shall vote

for it, and so do many others in both Houses. Mrs. Pomeroy

received yesterday afternoon, and to my surprise, nearly all

her callers had been at the Convention--at least three

hundred young ladies were in the hall, they said, and all

spoke with perfect respect of the movement--many seemed in

sympathy with it.

_Jan. 21, two o'clock._--Just from the Committee Room, and

too full to write. Mrs. Stanton standing at the head of the

long table (Committee all round the table, Sumner so

attentive as to fix my eyes upon him with intense interest,

watching changes of expression) read a magnificent argument.

Mrs. Davis and Miss Anthony followed, and then sitting in my

chair, I made a five minutes' talk on my favorite

point--personal responsibility God's only method in human

affairs. Then questions from various gentlemen and

conversation all round the room for two hours. The large

room was full of gentlemen and ladies, and there were

congratulations without stint, but Sumner, grandest of all,

approaching Mrs. Stanton and myself, said in a deep voice,

really full of emotion, "I have been in this place, ladies,

for twenty years; I have followed or led in every movement

toward liberty and enfranchisement; but I have it to say to

you now, that I never attended such a committee meeting as

this in my life, it exceeds all that I have ever witnessed."

Mrs. Howland was there, and excited to her highest eloquence

in speech; with flushed cheeks she said to me, "If only that

scene could have been photographed--it was the grandest one

of history--the first time that _woman_ has ever appeared in

halls of legislation--women often, but woman never before."

I have sent her home to write a letter for the _Courant_,

and I hope she will make it out; she has promised to try.

Senator Pomeroy counts thirteen Senators ready to vote for

us now, but I can not attempt to do justice to the

situation.

_The Revolution_ of March 24, 1870, gives the following call for the

May Anniversary of the National Woman's Suffrage Association, which

held its regular annual meeting in Irving Hall, New York, May 10th and

11th:

The various woman suffrage associations throughout this country

and the Old World are invited to send delegates to the

Convention, prepared to report the progress of our movement in

their respective localities. And, in order that this annual

meeting may be the expression of the whole people, we ask all

friends of woman suffrage to consider themselves personally

invited to attend and take part in its discussions. With the

political rights of woman secured in the Territories of Utah and

Wyoming--with the agitation of the question in the various State

Legislatures, with the proposition to strike the word "male" from

the State Constitution of Vermont--with New York, New England,

and the great West well organized, we are confident that our

leading political parties will soon see that their own interest

and the highest interests of the country require them to

recognize our claim.

The Executive Committee recommend the friends of woman suffrage,

everywhere, to concentrate their efforts upon the work of

securing a XVI. Amendment to the Federal Constitution that shall

prohibit the States from disfranchising any of their citizens on

account of sex.

Many of the ablest advocates[131] of the cause--both men and

women--will address the meetings. Communications and

contributions should be addressed to the Corresponding Secretary.

ELIZABETH CADY STANTON, _President_.

ERNESTINE L. ROSE, _Chairman Executive Committee_.

CHARLOTTE B. WILBOUR, _Corresponding Secretary_,

151 East 51st Street, New York.

The Convention was eventually held in Apollo Hall, the owners of

Irving Hall annulling their contract when they learned that colored

people were not only to be admitted to the audience, but welcomed to

the platform as speakers. The Rev. Phebe Hanaford opened the meeting

with prayer, Mrs. Charlotte Wilbour read the call, and announced the

various committees, Miss Anthony reported the work done during the

past year; excellent addresses were made by the many able speakers

present, and strong resolutions were discussed and adopted.

It was during this convention that a proposition was made, that as the

American Association had chosen Henry Ward Beecher for President, Mrs.

Stanton and Miss Anthony should resign their offices for a season, and

place some popular man at the head of the National Society. They

readily assented, hoping thereby to heal the division so distracting

to friends in every State, and unite all the forces in a grand Union

Association. Theodore Tilton, editor of the _Independent_, was chosen

for the position. He and Mr. Beecher exchanged amicable letters, and a

meeting of pacification[132] was held at the Fifth Avenue hotel where

both sides were fairly represented. Complimentary greetings were

exchanged, but nothing was gained.

The one wise step in this episode was the meeting of the National

Woman Suffrage Association: in Washington, January, 1871, as usual

under its long-tried leaders, as if no mistaken policy had been

suggested or considered. Emerson says the power of the human mind is

shown in its ability to recover after a blunder. The Association

showed its real strength in taking up again and carrying forward its

grand National work.

THE SECOND DECADE CELEBRATION.

At half past ten o'clock Friday morning October 19, 1870, the

twentieth anniversary convention assembled in Apollo Hall, New York.

A large number of the life-long friends were on the platform and a

fine audience in attendance. Mrs. Stanton called the meeting to order

and read the call.[133] She said, after due consultation the committee

had decided that as Mrs. Davis had called the first National

Convention twenty years ago, and presided over its deliberations, it

was peculiarly fitting that she should preside over this also. A

motion was made and seconded to that effect, and unanimously adopted.

On taking the chair Mrs. Davis gave the following resumé of the

Woman's Rights movement:

In assembling to review the past twenty years, it is a fitting

question to ask if there has been progress; or has this universal

radical reform, which was then declared, been like reformations

in religion, but a substitution of a new error for an old one;

or, like physical revolutions, but a rebellion? Has this work,

intended from its inception to change the structure of the

central organization of society, failed and become a monument of

buried hopes? Have we come together after twenty years, bowed

with a profound grief over the wreck and debris of the battle

unwon, or to rejoice over what has been attained, and mark out

work for the next decade?

We answer, in many things we have failed, for we believed and

hoped beyond the possible; but reviewing the past we have only

cause for rejoicing--for thanksgiving to God--and for courage in

the future. We affirmed a principle, an adjustment of measures to

the exigencies of the times, a profound expediency true to the

highest principles of rights, and to-day we reiterate the axiom

with which we started, that "They who would be free, themselves

must strike the blow," believing it as imperative as when the

first woman took it up, and applied it to her needs; and it must

be kept as steadily before the eye, for not yet can we rest on

our privileges gained.

Women are still frivolous; the slaves of prejudice, passion,

folly, fashion, and petty ambitions, and so they will remain till

the shackles, both social and political, are broken, and they are

held responsible beings--accountable to God alone. Not till then

can it be known what untold wealth lies buried in womanhood--"how

many mute, inglorious Miltons." Men are still conceited,

arrogant, and usurping, dwarfing their own manhood by a false

position toward one half the human race.

In commencing this work we knew that we were attacking the

strongholds of prejudice, but truth could no longer be

suppressed, nor principles hidden. It must be ours to strike the

bottom line. We believed it would take a generation to clear away

the rubbish, to uproot the theories of ages, to overthrow

customs, which at some period of the world's history had their

significance.

We proclaimed that our work was to reform, reconstruct, and

harmonize society; not to lay waste her homes and her

sanctuaries. A few only have been found brave enough to do more

than touch the fringe work that circles round the vortex which is

heaving and surging with social pollutions, which might well make

angels stand appalled; but should the occasion come in this

country, the pure women of our nation will rise, as the women of

England are now doing, resisting a legislation which degrades

womanhood to the lowest depths. We proclaimed a peaceful

revolution; for we abhorred then as now the atrocities of war,

hence our demand for a participation in government, that we might

bring a new element into it to restrain and purify it. Says a

French lady in a private letter received a few days since, "Oh,

is it not time that women come? Is it not because we have no

voice in public affairs that Europe is on fire now? Men are true

brutes. Pride, injustice, and cruelty are their most remarkable

qualities. What can free us from their laws so unjust?" This is

the sad, passionate utterance of a French woman now in the hour

of her country's peril. What better proof that women love peace

more than glory, than in the Empress Eugenie's course,--She would

have no force used to uphold her power. "She would rather be

pitied than hated."

Frances Wright, a noble Scotchwoman, early sought to make herself

thoroughly acquainted with the nature of our institutions, and

the genius of our government. She determined to try the

experiment of organized labor with negroes. Purchasing two

thousand acres of land on the Bluffs, now known as Memphis,

Tenn., she took a number of families, with fifteen able-bodied

men, and, giving them their freedom, organized her work.

Prostrated by illness, she was compelled to yield her personal

supervision, and thus her attempt to civilize those people

failed, and they were finally sent to Hayti.

She then commenced lecturing on the nature and object of the

"American Political Institutions." She gave also a course of

Historical and Political Lectures; and another course on the

Nature of Knowledge, Free Inquiry, Divisions of Knowledge,

Religion, Morals, Opinions, Existing Evils and a Reply to the

Traducers of the French Reformers. No other person was at that

time prepared so well to defend them as she was, from her having

been in part educated in General Lafayette's family. In all

those lectures she showed the low estimate of woman, and her

inferior education.

To this heroic woman, who left ease, elegance, a high social

circle of rich culture, and with true self-abnegation gave her

life, in the country of her adoption, to the teaching of her

highest idea of truth, it is fitting that we pay a tribute of

just, though late, respect. Her writings are of the purest and

noblest character, and whatever there is of error in them is

easily thrown aside. The spider sucks poison from the same flower

from which the bee gathers honey; let us therefore ask if the

evil be not in ourselves before we condemn others. Pharisaism,

then as now, was ready to stone the prophet of freedom. She bore

the calumny, reproach and persecution to which she was subjected

for the truth, as calmly as Socrates. Looking down from the

serene heights of her philosophy she pitied and endured the

scoffs and jeers of the multitude, and fearlessly continued to

utter her rebukes against oppression, ignorance and bigotry.

Women joined in the hue and cry against her, little thinking that

men were building the gallows and making them the executioners.

Women have crucified in all ages the redeemers of their own sex,

and men mock them with the fact. It is time now that we trample

beneath our feet this ignoble public sentiment which men have

made for us; and if others are to be crucified before we can be

redeemed, let men do the cruel, cowardly work; but let us learn

to hedge womanhood round with generous, protecting love and care.

Then men will learn, as they should, that this system of

traducing women is no longer to be used as a means for their

subjugation. Let us learn to demand that all men who come into

our presence be as pure as they claim that woman should be. Let

the test be applied which Christ gave, that if any is without sin

in word, or deed, or thought, he shall "cast the first stone."...

When the war ended and National reconstruction commenced, women,

feeling an equal interest in having the work rightly done,

presented their petitions for the right of suffrage, but were

coolly told by those who were most eager to enfranchise the

negro, "stand aside and wait, it is the black man's hour." The

sacrifice of their sons on the altar of freedom was not counted

to them as anything. Their years of toil and weary watching in

camp and hospital were not to be put in the scale with the black

man's, who fought for his own freedom. Such wrong and injustice

is bearing its fruits, in the confusion of the councils of the

Republican party. Like the French of 1848, they refused to deal

justly with the mothers of the nation, and are now reaping a

bitter reward. They dared to suppress the petitions of thousands

of women, and now disintegration has begun; the handwriting is

seen on the wall. Thus injustice has done its work, and thousands

of women have been roused by it to protest who had never before

given any thought to public affairs.

The National Convention, held in the Church of the Puritans,

after the war, was one of intense interest, and marked an era in

this movement. The demand for suffrage became paramount--the only

one with many. Mrs. Stanton, in 1867, went before the Judiciary

Committee of the New York Legislature, asking universal suffrage

to be recognized by the Constitutional Convention which was to be

held. About this time a bill was before a Committee of the

Legislature, the purport of which was to legalize prostitution

Reading this bill in the presence of the Committee, her quick

mind comprehended all its horrors at a glance, and she tried the

test of asking each man if he would be willing that that law

should be applied to his daughter, his sister, or any one dear to

him. Self-ism answered "No." "Then, gentlemen," said she,

"legislate for the poorer daughters of the State as you would for

your own." All that winter she battled against that hideous

system, which would legalize the foulest of sins, and to her

efforts, mainly, the delay of passing that law is due. She made a

clear exposition of that cruel, corrupt, one-sided legislation,

which subjects woman to the grossest indignities, while men are

benefited and allowed safe and unlimited license. To her

lectures, also, is due a healthier tone of public sentiment on

the marriage question. It is slowly beginning to be felt that in

that relation there is a vast amount of legalized prostitution.

In 1867 an extensive lecturing tour through Kansas was made by

Mrs. Stanton, Miss Anthony, Rev. Olympia Brown, Henry Blackwell,

and Lucy Stone. The proposition of striking the words "white

male" from the Constitution had been submitted to the people, and

the result of the campaign was one third the vote of the State in

favor of both propositions. Of Miss Brown, now preaching in New

England, we can not forbear saying we have few in our ranks more

earnest, honest, or devoted. A clear, incisive intellect, a true

heart and firm purpose mark her every day life. She is

unobtrusive and gentle, but always ready at the call of duty. On

this campaign they were joined by a new worker, George Francis

Train, whether for good or ill it will be for history to decide.

Certain it is, that a new impulse was given to the cause, and

_The Revolution_ established, with Susan B. Anthony as

proprietor, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Parker Pillsbury as

editors, has done a great work. It has been hated, abused,

slandered, misquoted, and garbled; nevertheless, it has been a

terror to evil doers, and a help to those who would do well.

Others, thinking to do better, have started monthly and weekly

papers....

In May, 1869, at the annual meeting of the Equal Rights Society,

which had been three years in existence, a change of name was

proposed. Notice was given to that effect, and at a large

meeting, in which nineteen States were represented, the National

Woman Suffrage Society was formed, which has done most efficient

service, holding conventions in many of our large cities, and

awakening thought and action. In Saratoga and Newport a new class

was reached. Wearied with the monotony of fashionable dissipation

and the driveling idiocy of flirtations, women were glad to hear

a few sensible, wholesome truths.

In December, 1869, an able report was received from Mrs. Kate N.

Doggett, one of the six delegates to the Labor Convention, in

Berlin. In the spring of 1869 a fresh impulse was given to the

work in the establishment of the Woman's Bureau, by Mrs.

Elizabeth B. Phelps. Its discontinuance was due to the same cause

which has thwarted so many plans of women. There were not a

sufficient number possessed of wealth who had the will to render

this a permanent institution. Mrs. Phelps possesses in an eminent

degree all the requisites for such a post--a queenly hospitality,

elegant manners, fine conversational ability, with a generous

catholic spirit. Delicacy forbids saying all that the heart

prompts of friends.... In November, 1869, a delegate convention

was held in Cleveland, Ohio, and a society organized, called the

American Woman's Suffrage Society. Its work is yet to be done.

The crowning act of 1869, and the one which gave an omen for the

year that was approaching, was the enfranchising of the women of

Wyoming and Utah. For these acts of justice we are most grateful.

A correspondent says:

The cause of woman in Wyoming goes bravely on. At the last

sitting of the District Court in Albany County, both the

Grand and Petit Juries were equally composed of either sex;

and Chief-Justice Howe, presiding, took advantage of this

occasion to compliment, in the highest terms, the

intelligence, discrimination, honesty, and propriety of the

conduct with which the women acquitted themselves last

session, saying they had gone far to vindicate the policy,

justify the experiment, and realize the expectations of

those who had clothed themselves with the right. The bar,

the bench, and the intelligent men of the country had long

felt that something was needed to improve and justify our

jury system; something to lift it above prejudice and

passion, and imbue it with a higher regard for law, justice,

oath, and conscience. His Honor then expressed the opinion

that the introduction of the new element furnished good

reason to expect that to women we should ultimately be

indebted for those reforms which the unaided exertions of

men had been incompetent to effect.

This is certainly a most flattering presentment of the results of

enfranchising the sex in Wyoming, and what is better, it seems

substantially a just one. The question will therefore naturally

suggest itself, if women, in their new political capacity, are

thus able to "tone" the rude elements of Western civilization,

what inconsistency is there in granting them like privileges in

communities whose superior refinement is so much less likely to

expose them to insult or mortification? In Utah it is of less

account, because the women there are under a hierarchy, and as

yet vote only as directed.

In January, 1870, a convention was called in Washington by the

officers of the National Society. This meeting, large in

attendance and deeply earnest, marked an historical era, the

influence of which can not be estimated. A hearing before the

joint committee of the House and Senate of the District was

asked, in order to present the question of woman suffrage, and

granted. Elizabeth Cady Stanton made the argument in favor of

enfranchising women of the District of Columbia. It was clear,

incisive, and cogent; divested of all sentiment, and condensed

into a twenty-minutes' speech. It was very impressive. Susan B.

Anthony, Madam Anneke, and others made a few pertinent remarks.

At the close of the hearing, Hon. Charles Sumner said: "In my

twenty years' experience in the Senate of the United States, I

have never witnessed so fine a hearing as this one, so large an

attendance, and such respectful attention." Thus begins the

national history of this great reform--a fitting opening for

1870.

The work, not only in this country, but in Europe, was greatly

accelerated by the publication of John Stuart Mill's inestimable

book, "The Subjection of Woman," which has been extensively

circulated in a cheap form in this country, and has been

translated and reprinted in France, Prussia, and Russia. The

first National Woman Suffrage Convention was held in London,

July, 1869, at which Members of Parliament, professors of

science--noble men and noble women, still more ennobled by this

great work--took active part, and now women have the right of

suffrage there in the municipal elections. The bill was

introduced by Mr. Jacob Bright, and, says Prof. Fawcett: "In one

night it passed beyond ridicule, so ably and calmly was it

presented, and in less than one year it is a fixed fact." How

stands the comparison, Aristocratic England and Democratic

America? The Crown Princesses of Prussia and Italy are strong

advocates of this movement, while women, who pay taxes in Austria

and Russia, vote and have a voice in making laws. Will America

hold on to her barbarism in this, as she did to chattel slavery,

till all the nations of the earth cry out against her wrong to

womanhood?...

A few of the earlier women who came to this work should be named

here. Martha C. Wright, sister of Lucretia Mott, of Auburn, has

presided in most of the New York State Conventions, and in some

of the National, and her pen has always been sharpened in ready

defense of the cause and its leaders. A woman of rare good sense

and large sympathies, she is always to be trusted in emergencies.

Sarah Helen Whitman was the first literary woman of reputation

who gave her name to the cause, and her interest has never

lessened, though ill health has prevented any work. Alice Cary

for years gave her heartiest sympathy to the movement, and

socially she and her sister Phoebe have awakened an interest in a

large circle not easily penetrated by outside influences. Her

story, never completed, the "Born Thrall," published in _The

Revolution_, gave evidence of thought, experience, and deep

feeling. The songs of the sisters have a new sweet sadness, now

that Alice is singing hers on the other side of the river of

life. Grace Greenwood has done good service with her fluent pen

and voice through the press and on the platform. Mary L. Booth,

with her rich culture and her unsurpassed practical ability, her

skill as a translator of Martin's great History of France, and

numberless other works, has given aid to the cause with her pen,

one of the best in the country. As an editor she has done great

service by showing that a woman can work as earnestly and

persistently at a closely confining business as a man, and can

hold for years a place at the head of a profession so difficult

and so arduous.

As physicians, many women have won not only fame, but wealth. The

names are too many for our limits. A few only who have taken an

active interest in the principles which we have been urging can

be given. Dr. Mercy B. Jackson, Dr. Ann Preston, and Dr. Clemence

Lozier are some of the names which stand out conspicuously.

The government appointments within the last two years have been a

matter of great rejoicing. Many responsible offices are held by

women in different localities. There are 1,400 postmistresses,

some of them of first-class offices. The one in Richmond, Va., is

considered a model office, held by Miss Rachel Van Lew.

Ten years ago a young girl sprang, like Minerva from the head of

Jupiter, fully armed, into the moral and political arena, and has

stirred the heart of the Nation as no other speaker ever did.

Anna E. Dickinson has never feared to utter the boldest truths,

has never shrunk from, or withheld the most scathing rebukes of

sin in high places, has never faltered or failed in principle,

and yet is to-day a far more popular lecturer than those who have

pandered to a corrupt, vitiated public taste. Does this not prove

that the deep heart of the people is better than it has the

credit of being.

About the same time Theodore Tilton threw into the scale his

brilliant and varied talents, and the _Independent_, of which he

was editor, was found on the side of freedom for all. Judge

Samuel E. Sewall, always on the right side in every good work,

published, in 1868, a digest of the laws of Massachusetts in

relation to woman's disabilities, which has done good work.

Later, Prof. Hickox prepared one of like character for

Connecticut, which is enough to rouse the women of that State to

white heat.

Within the last two years of the second decade many new speakers

have appeared on our platform. Standing first is Mrs. Mary A.

Livermore, a woman of rare powers of oratory. Possessing a

magnetism which grasps and holds her audience whether they will

or no, she is a special pleader, and if her logic is not always

perfect it is most effective, for she has the power of unlocking

the hearts of her hearers. She has made within the last two years

extensive lecturing tours in the North and West, and verging

toward the South. Mrs. Julia Ward Howe came in November, 1868,

and laid her rich gifts on the altar of freedom, and has often

been heard in conventions, and twice or thrice before the

Legislature of Massachusetts. Mrs. Isabella Beecher Hooker, from

the family of ministers, also came about this time with her ready

available talents. Phoebe Couzins and Lilie Peckham, alike

generous, enthusiastic, cultured, and above all of high-toned

principles, lead a strong band of young workers. Charlotte B.

Wilbour, gifted in a high degree, calm in judgment and steady in

purpose, is always a tower of strength. Celia Burleigh, graceful,

poetic and earnest, is equally at home on the platform or in the

drawing-room, and Lillie Devereux Blake is always ready with pen

or voice. Myra Bradwell, with her legal knowledge, is another to

be grateful for; and with pride the names of Elizabeth O.

Willard, Catherine B. Waite, and Elizabeth Boynton are recorded

as having given their rare gifts to this work. We gladly pay

tribute to James W. Stillman, of Rhode Island, who has given most

generously of time, money, and, above all, talents, to this

cause, and that, at a time when ridicule and even the sacrifice

of position followed. His logical argument on the inherent right

of self-government has done great service.

Looking back over the names of our co-workers, those of Hannah

Tracy Cutler, and Frances D. Gage, and Jane Elizabeth M. Jones

are widely honored. Another of this class is Josephine S.

Griffing, a woman of rare endowments intellectually, with a heart

as true and gentle as God ever gave to woman. Modest, almost to a

fault, she is the unseen power that moves the machinery in the

very heart of the nation; asking no recognition, no applause, she

works on with a steady, systematic, careful earnestness which

commands the respect of the best and wisest.

Early among women journalists Mrs. Jane G. Swisshelm stands out

conspicuously. The Pittsburg _Saturday Visitor_, which she edited

for several years with marked ability, was the paper most often

quoted, and made war upon by all opposers of progress. Mrs. C. I.

H. Nichols also edited the Windham Co. _Democrat_, in

Brattleboro, Vt., with much ability, and though less radical and

aggressive than Mrs. Swisshelm's paper, it is to the seed sown by

her head and hands that all the spirit of progress there is in

that county is due.

There is yet one other name that well deserves not one page but

many, for his good deeds and unselfish work. A man with a strong,

vigorous mind, a quick conception of principles and perfectly

fearless in his advocacy of them, holding always his personality

so in reserve as sometimes to be overlooked among the many more

assuming. Parker Pillsbury was for some time editor of the

_National Anti-Slavery Standard_, and co-editor of the

_Revolution_. His editorials have been marked by an almost

prophetic spirit; and the profoundness of their thought will be

more justly appreciated as there is a larger development and a

higher demand for unqualified justice. The Hutchinson family were

among our earliest workers, giving of time and money liberally

without regard to party or sectionalism. Mr. John Hutchinson and

family went through Kansas with the lecturing tourists, in 1867,

and with their inspiring songs for freedom did much toward

increasing the vote for woman suffrage. They still continue their

work, penetrating into the most benighted regions, for freedom,

temperance, peace, and the reign of righteousness; they are doing

their quota in the world's great work.

Mrs. Mary F. Davis has been from the first a most able and

efficient advocate; her winning, gentle manners, her courtesy and

respect for the rights of others have been unvarying. If not

herself aggressive, she has never faltered in her adherence to

the fullest truth; in this she is always sustained by her

husband, Andrew Jackson Davis, who has never hesitated or

temporized on any great question. Among business women who have

gone steadily on in the path of duty, the name of Charlotte

Fowler Wells stands out conspicuously. For over thirty years she

has been an equal in all business relations with her husband,

conducting the extensive correspondence of the house, as well as

being head book-keeper. Her serene face gives evidence of a life

of quiet, self-respecting independence.

Mrs. Frances V. Hallock and sister, Mrs. Robert Dale Owen, hold a

place worthy of honorable mention for their good works and steady

adherence to truth, and their clear, quick comprehension of its

far-reaching power. Rev. Phebe Hanaford, pastor of a church in

New Haven, Conn., has done a great work for woman. She is the

mother of a family, and finds time not only to conduct their

education, but to preach regularly every Sabbath, to write books

of merit, and to superintend her domestic affairs, which are

managed with skill, economy and good taste. Always cheerful and

kindly, she wins many friends, not only to herself but for the

cause. There is another movement that began in this decade now

closed upon us, which properly belongs to its history, viz: that

of the Working Women. It has been represented from Boston by Miss

Jennie Collins, a slight woman, all brain and soul. She tells her

stories with such a tender, natural pathos that few eyes are dry

during her speeches. She makes no pretense, but gives most

unmistakable evidence of a rich nature that has been repressed

and tortured. She is the type of a large class that will develop

into beautiful, symmetrical characters when the shackles are

broken and women are free.

Conventions and organizations have so multiplied that it would

require a volume to give their history. The chief of these are

the great Northwestern and Pacific Slope Associations. Added to

these are the State Societies in nearly all the Northern and

Middle States. A State Society was organized in Richmond,

Virginia, in April, 1870, by Matilda Joslyn Gage, a woman of wide

historical information. Lectures have been given in several of

the Southern States by individuals.

If the notices of women are by far more numerous than those of

men,[134] it is not from forgetfulness of their services, for I

credit them with all sincerity of motive, and nobleness in the

wish for our enfranchisement. I have given, as briefly as

possible, the two decades from 1850 to 1870. I have set down

nothing in malice, and what is omitted must be charged to want of

space and time. When the full history of this work is written,

differences which have retarded its progress, and the wide range

of action and reaction can be gone into if the historian so

wills. I have endeavored to keep this report free from

sectionalism and faction, believing that the _finale_ would bring

together all parties in one glad day of rejoicing. That there

will be political parties in the future, with women, as with men,

there can be no question; but that the sexes will have a

purifying influence, each upon the other, is already conceded

even by the opposers.

In closing this _resume_ permit me to say that this meager

outline, condensed from notes made from year to year, in no way

satisfies the writer, but has been given by the earnest

solicitations of friends, who wished that the steady progress of

the cause might be marked in this retrospective hour. There is

much that should have been embodied in this sketch of the past,

especially the resolutions which have marked varying phases of

the work, and which seemed like a divine inspiration in their

comprehensive grasp and far-reaching thought, on this the last

great question of reform.

Mrs. Mott rose at the conclusion of Mrs. Davis' history of the

work for the past twenty years, and expressed herself as greatly

pleased with its succinct and careful preparation. She felt that

it was of great importance to the future work that this history

be preserved, and hoped it would be published as part of the

proceedings of this meeting. She felt that we had lost in not

having kept more careful record of the progress of the work. She

was sorry Mrs. Davis had not said more of herself, as she had

done much toward opening the medical profession to women, and

also in making lecturing a lucrative and respectable profession

for them. She was, I believe, the first woman to claim the right

to equal pay with men for her lectures. Mrs. Stanton expressed

the same pleasure in listening to the report, and satisfaction in

its historical accuracy. Resolutions[135] which had been

prepared by the Committee, were offered for discussion. Mrs.

Gage spoke of the advance in the cause of education for women,

and reviewed the progress in each particular branch of science.

Letters from various parts of the world were read by Mrs.

Griffing and Mrs. Lillie Devereux Blake, the latter of whom

demonstrated in an amusing and forcible manner that the women of

our country did not form a part of the "people," according to the

various banners and posters displayed about the streets in

reference to the coming election. Woman did want to vote; she did

love her country; but because she was not one of the "people,"

that privilege was denied her. Miss Anthony made several

characteristic, short speeches at intervals, in a style which is

peculiarly her own. Her force and humor were fully appreciated by

the audience, who applauded her repeatedly. Her appeals for money

met with great favor. The Rev. Olympia Brown made a stirring

speech in reference to woman's work in the cause of the "social

evil," speaking at some length upon the action of the women of

England on the subject. Mr. Crozier, of Brooklyn, was the only

gentleman who spoke, and he acquitted himself very creditably in

his confession upon joining the cause of woman's rights.

Several resolutions were offered in reference to the European

war, and much sympathy was expressed with the present suffering

originated by it. The improved condition of Italy was also

referred to. The Convention was a highly interesting one in many

particulars, and the pioneers of the cause who engaged in active

service twenty years ago proved themselves as ardent as in the

early days.

The following letters were read:

26 HEREFORD SQUARE, LONDON.

DEAR MADAM:--I received your kind letter some weeks ago, and

beg to apologize for the delay of this reply. Pray accept my

thanks for your kind expressions regarding my small efforts

to keep alive the great cause we have all so near at heart.

I regret to hear that one who, like yourself, has been a

pioneer on the way when the path was the ruggedest, should

for many years have been incapacitated from aiding its

progress. May you now be restored fully to activity. We

certainly want all true workers, albeit the progress of the

cause surpasses our most sanguine expectations, on that as

well as on this side of the Atlantic.

Pray accept my thanks for your kind invitation to your

Convention. It will not, I think, ever be likely that I

shall visit America, but I shall always read with deep

interest of all that goes forward there. Accept, dear madam,

my thanks for your kindness and sincere regard.

Mrs. P. W. DAVIS. FRANCES POWER COBBE.

MORNINGSIDE, EDINBURGH, Sept. 24, 1870.

MADAM:--I regret that I am unable to accept the invitation

with which you have honored me, for I have been an invalid

for some months, and am not sufficiently well to undertake

any journey. I can assure you that the cause of woman is

gradually but firmly gaining ground in Scotland, and that

each month we are gaining in the right direction. At present

there are six female medical students studying in our

university. The College of Surgeons has thrown its doors

open, without any restriction, to the female student.

The Merchants' Maiden Company has, within the last few

months, opened large schools in connection with its

hospitals, offering as its prizes Bursaries in the

university to girls as well as boys, which I think is one of

the strongest moves which as yet has been made in behalf of

women. The petition in favor of the medical education of

women was largely signed in Scotland. The Society for the

higher education of Women is progressing well and the

professors spoke highly of the efficiency of their working

pupils. In the university classes of botany and natural

history all the female students were in the honor list, and

Miss Edith Pechey was the first chemistry student for the

year.

With best wishes and thanks to you and your committee for

your kind invitation, I am truly yours,

S. K. KINGSLEY, for HENRY KINGSLEY.

ALDERLEY EDGE, near MANCHESTER, Sept. 26, 1870.

MADAM:--I beg to thank you for the circular and your

accompanying note, both inviting me to attend the Twentieth

Anniversary of the inauguration of the Woman Suffrage

Movement in the United States, to be held in New York on the

20th and 21st of October. I have once traveled through your

country with very much pleasure, and, I hope, with some

profit, and I have a strong desire to come again; but as it

is impossible for me to do so now, I can not attend your

meeting. I need not say that I sympathize with your object.

It seems to me to be inconsistent with the principles of

your Government, and of ours, to deny to women the power to

control those who legislate for them. Until they obtain this

control through the suffrage, they will suffer many

disadvantages and be the victims of unequal laws. How soon

they will obtain it must depend mainly upon their own

efforts. In the meantime the present agitation will give

them an interest in many public questions, will in itself be

an education in preparation for political power, and will

exercise an influence in favor of more equal legislation

between men and women.

Very truly yours,

Mrs. P. W. DAVIS. JACOB BRIGHT.

FROM MRS. DR. TAYLOR.

NOTTING HILL, August 10, 1870.

DEAR MADAM:--I cordially thank you for your kind request

that I should attend your Convention in October. It is quite

impossible for me to leave England now, but I am deputed by

our London Committee for Woman's Suffrage to express their

sympathy with your movement, and the hope that the efforts

you are making will be crowned with success, and that Mrs.

Lucretia Mott will live to see the fruit of some of her good

and noble work.

Believe me yours truly, M. TAYLOR.

FROM LADY AMBERLY.

RODBOROUGH MANOR, STROUD, July 14, 1870.

DEAR MADAM:--I thank you much for your invitation to attend

your second decade meeting of the Woman's Suffrage

Association. I regret that it will not be in my power to

accept it. Much as I enjoyed my visit to America, it is

rather too far to undertake a second journey there. You

must, indeed be glad, after twenty years of work, to see the

great advance in public opinion on this question. It seems

now to be progressing very fast. I have just aided in

establishing a committee at Stroud, and we hope soon to have

one in every borough in England for female suffrage.

Yours truly,

Mrs. P. W. DAVIS. KATE AMBERLY.

280 PARK ROAD, SOUTH HILL, LIVERPOOL.

DEAR MADAM:--Mrs. Butler regrets very much not to have been

able to write to you before, and begs you will kindly accept

her apologies as well as her thanks for your invitation to

your Decade Meeting. I have the honor and privilege to be at

present Mrs. Butler's Secretary. She is overwhelmed with

work, and would be thankful for your sympathy in it. I wish

I could give you a clear idea of the battle she has to

fight, but it is very difficult for me, as a German, to put

it in adequate words.

Mrs. Butler's introductory essay to "Woman's Work and

Woman's Culture" only gives a faint idea of her character

and strivings, compared to the grand reality of her life.

She has devoted more than fifteen years to the rescue of

"fallen women"--a work that requires more active charity and

self-denial than any other. The English Parliament passed,

some time ago, certain acts called the Contagious Disease

Acts, as a sanitary measure, on the model of Continental

legislation. To earnest, religious minds, like Mrs.

Butler's, the acts appear immoral in principle, as declaring

vice a necessity; unjust, as inflicting penalties on women

and letting men go free; and cruel in their application,

enrolling women in a degraded class, making their return to

virtue almost impossible. I think if I tell you that by

these acts a woman can be arrested by a policeman on

suspicion of being a prostitute, and subjected to an

examination which amounts to a surgical operation, always

disgraceful, sometimes injurious, even dangerous, I have

made quite clear to an American lady that such a state of

things can not be endured.

The best English women, with Mrs. Butler and Miss

Nightingale as leaders, stand up nobly for the poor,

degraded women whom, with their true Christian hearts, they

still recognize as sisters. Mrs. Butler, who is rather

delicate, devotes all her strength to this cause at present.

She travels much, has been in the garrison towns, where, for

the benefit of the soldiers, these atrocious acts are in

force, and in large meetings denounces the cruelties to

women. By her efforts more than sixty thousand signatures

have been obtained for the repeal of the acts. Many good

men, I am thankful to say, are on our side, and it is a

matter of congratulation that in this point many people join

who widely differ in other respects. I firmly believe that

this question, which can no longer be avoided, will produce

a great social reform. Women who timidly keep aloof from all

political movements, after this experience of male

legislation, eagerly demand the suffrage.

I am sure you will forgive Mrs. Butler for not writing

herself. As soon as she has a little more breathing time she

is sure to write, but she fears she will never be able to

cross the Atlantic.

Yours sincerely, ROSA BRUHN.

Mrs. P. W. DAVIS.

PARIS, RUE NOLLET 92, 7th September.

DEAR MADAME:--I burned the answer I had written to you under

the shameful government now fallen, and whose crimes and

treasons extorted from me cries of despair for the ruin they

have brought on our country.

I thank you for the generous sympathy you express toward us

in our great woe. Your honored names have been blessed for

this by our French hearts. We are now relieved, and though

our actual peril is none the less, we are in possession of

our own force. We are rid of the despicable robbers of our

honor, our fortune and our lives; and in the most terrible

energy, is a consolation and support. Better is it to die

with honor than live dishonored. How happy you are to be

born on a soil not infested by monarchical roots. They are

like dog-grass, which springs up again and again, nurtured

by the ignorance of our rural population. When the Prussians

shall have been driven away, we may have civil struggles to

fear from the emissaries of this detested monarchy. What

avails experience to the blind.

I forwarded immediately your letter to George Sand. Accept

my heartfelt thanks for your fraternal invitation to me.

Yes, you say right, our hearts are wholly absorbed, and no

place is ours but Paris in this hour of supreme struggle and

sacrifice. We shall be with you in thought only, dear

sisters--you, the pioneers in woman's emancipation--your

names are enshrined in our hearts; but this crisis here will

not be useless for the cause. The women of Paris are noble

and courageous; one may hear them in every group encouraging

the men to desperate resistance. Everywhere they form

societies for the relief of the distressed and the wounded.

Many have petitioned for this revolution, and have

instigated men to the accomplishment of it. Many will take

arms in defense and fight; yea, fight with all the strength

which desperation lends, should the struggle reach our

streets.... They have already proved this sort of courage.

Men feel now how very necessary their co-operation is, and

after the crisis I hope they will not forget it. But it is

better that woman herself should learn to have a will, an

active opinion in public affairs, and this disposition will,

doubtless, continue to increase, as it has done for the last

two years.

Hail, dear and valiant sisters; blessed be your work in

which my heart, and many of those around me unite.

ANDRE LEO.

Mesdames PAULINA W. DAVIS, LUCRETIA MOTT, MARTHA WRIGHT,

ELIZABETH C. STANTON, ISABELLA B. HOOKER.

NAPLES, October 10, 1870.

DEAR MRS. DAVIS:--I have only now received your letter, or I

should sooner have expressed how highly I am gratified by

the honor you do me in asking my opinions with regard to

woman suffrage. I can not more strongly show my sympathy

with my accomplished sisters in the United States, than by

saying that I signed a petition to the British Parliament,

requesting permission for women to vote at the elections. It

was rejected, for the opposition and prejudices in the men

of Great Britain are still very strong against any change in

our condition. We have, however, gained a most important

privilege lately, chiefly through the liberality of the

University of Cambridge, in having the opportunity of

acquiring every branch of knowledge, literary and

scientific.

We owe much to the society of which you are the secretary,

for persevering in our behalf for twenty years under strong

opposition. The progress of civilization will ultimately

emancipate half the human race from the low position in

which we have hitherto been kept. Accept, dear Mrs. Davis,

my thanks for your letter, and believe me,

Very sincerely yours, MARY SOMERVILLE.

VICTORIA PRESS, LONDON, Oct. 3, 1870.

MY DEAR MRS. DAVIS AND MRS. STANTON:--Will you kindly let me

answer both your notes together, and assure you how much I

value the feeling which prompted you to write them. I shall

not easily part with either of those letters, although

pressure of work drives me to answer them in one, and say

that I am utterly unable to respond to your wish that I

should attend your Decade Meeting. Few things would give me

such satisfaction as to find myself in America, especially

after your noble invitations and promises of a cordial

reception everywhere. But--and how many buts there are in

life--I dare not leave my work at present in England. There

are several very important movements just now resting almost

entirely upon me, and having put my hand to the plow, I dare

not look back. I am at present the only regular lecturer

here on this subject, and I am full of engagements up to

April next--north, south, east, and west--and the discussion

society I have started in London is still too young to run

alone, and yet promises such good things for the future,

that I feel it ought to be carefully tended.

I can only add that I shall watch with great interest for

the accounts of your meeting on the 19th. I long for the day

when I can see you in the flesh--those with whose spirits I

now ever hold communion. Excuse haste. I have just returned

from the North, and find my table overwhelmed with

invitations to lecture and appeals for help. The learned

meetings and social discussions of the British Associations

at Liverpool, and the Social Science Congress at Newcastle,

have all been crowded into the last fortnight. Wishing you

and your noble workers God-speed, believe me,

Yours, most truly, EMILY FAITHFUL.

DEAR LADIES:--It would give me great pleasure to accept your

kind invitation to be present at your meeting to-day, if it

were possible, but it is not.

Go on with your great work; it is arduous, but it is

sublime! You are doing good that you know not of in old

Europe. You have taken the initiative, and she is following

hard after. I wish to recommend to you the appeal of Mme.

Gasparin to the American women to join in her heart-cry for

peace. Coming so recently as I have, from the seat of

war--from Paris and from Rome--I can testify to the earnest,

the beseeching appeal of European women to their sisters in

America to give them help in this their hour of calamity and

need--the help of sympathy, the succor of love!

The day before I left France, one of the noblest of French

women, Mademoiselle Daubie (the distinguished author of that

remarkable work, "The Poor Women of the Nineteenth Century,"

which every woman and legislator ought to read,) said to me:

"We are looking wistfully every whither for some hand

stretched out through the darkness, but, alas! there is

none. But you are going to America. Oh! tell the women there

to help us in this struggle with ignorance, corruption, and

war." Let us heed this cry.

France lies prostrate in the dust! But Rome is free! So in

all human sorrow there is some hope. Let us, then, lift up

the one by all possible help, remembering her greatness, and

pity her misfortunes; having faith in her capabilities, and

praying for her liberty--for that liberty that can only be

practicable when built upon intelligence and virtue, and

only real when woman is not the slave, but the helpmate of

man; and let us rejoice with that other sister--Italia--who

is now lifting up her face toward heaven, and after these

long years of anguish and waiting the mother is restored to

her children!

The rule of the Cæsars is gone, and the reign of absolutism

is passing away! And while the science of men goes flashing

round the earth--over sea and land--uniting the nations in

treaties of commerce and compacts of liberty, the warm,

generous heart of woman shall keep pace, uniting humanity in

sympathy and love.

I am, dear ladies, yours most respectfully,

EMELIA J. MERIMAN.[136]

The speakers during the day gave many delightful reminiscences of the

noble men and women who had given their earnest efforts to promote

this great reform, and dwelt with hope on the many encouraging steps

of progress that had marked the years since the initiative steps were

taken. The day before the Convention an elegant reception was held at

the St. James Hotel. Nearly two hundred persons called during the

afternoon, and about forty sat down to a sumptuous dinner.[137]

The Washington Convention of 1871[138] was thus described by _The

Republican_ of that city:

The third Annual National Woman's Suffrage Convention, held at

Lincoln Hall, was an unprecedented success. Its leading spirit

was Mrs. Isabella Beecher Hooker, who, together with Josephine S.

Griffing, Paulina Wright Davis, and Susan B. Anthony, made all

the preliminary arrangements, and managed the meeting. Mrs.

Hooker's zeal, activity, and amiability gave her the power to

make an easy conquest wherever she carries the banner of the good

cause. Her generalship in Washington marshalled hosts of new and

ardent friends into the movement. Five sessions were held, during

each of which the Convention was presided over by some member of

the Senate or House of Representatives; and it was a novel

feature to see such men as Senators Nye, Warren, and Wilson

sitting successively in the president's chair, apparently half

unconscious that it was one of greater honor than their familiar

seats in the Senate. Speeches were made by Adelle Hazlett,

Olympia Brown, Lilie Peckham, Isabella B. Hooker, Lillie Devereux

Blake, Cora Hatch Tappan, Susan B. Anthony, Kate Stanton,

Victoria C. Woodhull, Hon. A. G. Riddle (of the Washington bar),

Frederick Douglass, Senators Nye and Wilson, and Mara E. Post,

who made a journey all the way from Wyoming to attend the

Convention. A good deal was said by the speakers concerning the

proposed interpretation of the existing constitutional

amendments. It was thus a convention with a new idea. The

reporters could not say that only the old, stock arguments were

used. There was an air of novelty about the proceedings,

indicating healthy life in the movement. The consequence was that

the cause of woman's enfranchisement made a new, sudden, and

profound impression at Washington.

This Convention was remarkable for the absence of the usual long

series of resolutions covering every point of our demands.

Another peculiarity was the unusual amount of money that flowed into

the treasury, as the following letter, among many others of the same

character, shows:

MISS ANTHONY--I have this morning deposited $500 for the use

of the N. W. S. A., and I will give a check for the amount

as you desire it.

Washington, D. C. Mrs. M. M. CARTTER.

Letters were read from Mrs. Esther Morris,[139] Justice of the Peace

in Wyoming Territory, and from Mrs. Jane Graham Jones, of Chicago.

Senator Nye, who presided at the evening session, said, "He had not

given much thought to the question of Woman Suffrage, but it was his

opinion that in proportion as we elevated the mothers of voters, so

were the voters themselves elevated." The audiences during this

convention were large, and the press not only respectful but highly

complimentary.

It was just before this enthusiastic convention that Victoria Woodhull

presented her memorial to Congress and secured a hearing[140] before

the Judiciary Committee of the House, which called out the able

Minority Report, by William Loughridge, of Iowa, and Benjamin F.

Butler, of Massachusetts. The following is from the Congressional

_Globe_ of Dec. 21, 1870.

In the Senate: Mr. HARRIS presented the memorial of Victoria C.

Woodhull, praying for the passage of such laws as may be

necessary and proper for carrying into execution the right vested

by the Constitution in the citizens of the United States to vote

without regard to sex; which was referred to the Committee on the

Judiciary, and ordered to be printed.

In the House: Mr. JULIAN--I ask unanimous consent to present at

this time and have printed in the _Globe_ the memorial of

Victoria C. Woodhull, claiming the right of suffrage under the

XIV. and XV. Articles of Amendments to the Constitution of the

United States, and asking for the enactment of the necessary and

appropriate legislation to guarantee the exercise of that right

to the women of the United States. I also ask that the petition

be referred to the Committee on the Judiciary.

No objection was made, and it was ordered accordingly.

THE MEMORIAL OF VICTORIA C. WOODHULL.

_To the Honorable the Senate and House of Representatives of the

United States in Congress assembled, respectfully showeth:_

That she was born in the State of Ohio, and is above the age of

twenty-one years; that she has resided in the State of New York

during the past three years; that she is still a resident

thereof, and that she is a citizen of the United States, as

declared by the XIV. Article of the Amendments to the

Constitution of the United States.

That since the adoption of the XV. Article of the Amendments to

the Constitution, neither the State of New York nor any other

State, nor any Territory, has passed any law to abridge the right

of any citizen of the United States to vote, as established by

said article, neither on account of sex or otherwise. That,

nevertheless, the right to vote is denied to women citizens of

the United States by the operation of Election Laws in the

several States and Territories, which laws were enacted prior to

the adoption of the said XV. Article, and which are inconsistent

with the Constitution as amended, and, therefore, are void and of

no effect; but which, being still enforced by the said States and

Territories, render the Constitution inoperative as regards the

right of women citizens to vote:

And whereas, Article VI., Section 2, declares "That this

Constitution and the laws of the United States which shall be

made in pursuance thereof, and all treaties made, or which shall

be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the

supreme law of the land; and all judges in every State shall be

bound thereby, anything in the Constitution and laws of any State

to the contrary, notwithstanding."

And whereas, no distinction between citizens is made in the

Constitution of the United States on account of sex; but the XV.

Article of Amendments to it provides that "No State shall make or

enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges and immunities

of citizens of the United States, nor deny to any person within

its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

And whereas, Congress has power to make laws which shall be

necessary and proper for carrying into execution all powers

vested by the Constitution in the Government of the United

States; and to make or alter all regulations in relation to

holding elections for senators or representatives, and especially

to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of the

said XIV. Article:

And whereas, the continuance of the enforcement of said local

election laws, denying and abridging the right of citizens to

vote on account of sex, is a grievance to your memorialist and to

various other persons, citizens of the United States,

Therefore, your memorialist would most respectfully petition your

honorable bodies to make such laws as in the wisdom of Congress

shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the

right vested by the Constitution in the citizens of the United

States to vote, without regard to sex.

And your memorialist will ever pray. VICTORIA C. WOODHULL.

New York City, Dec. 19, 1870.

ADDRESS OF VICTORIA C. WOODHULL JANUARY 11, 1871.

_To the Honorable the Judiciary Committee of the House of

Representatives of the Congress of the United States:_

Having most respectfully memorialized Congress for the passage of

such laws as in its wisdom shall seem necessary and proper to

carry into effect the rights vested by the Constitution of the

United States in the citizens to vote, without regard to sex, I

beg leave to submit to your honorable body the following in favor

of my prayer in said memorial which has been referred to your

Committee.