THE SOUTH DAKOTA CAMPAIGN.
1890.
Miss Anthony left Washington to attend the wedding of her nephew,
Wendell Phillips Mosher, and Carolyn Louise Mixer, at Cleveland, O.,
April 17; stopped in Chicago for a day, and reached Huron, S. Dak.,
April 23, 1890.[59] During the early winter she had had the most urgent
letters from this State, begging her to hasten her coming, that all
depended upon her. "If you will come we will throw off our coats and go
to work," wrote the men. "Woe to the man or woman who is not loyal to
you! If ever you were needed anywhere, you are needed here now," wrote
the women. When she had been in South Dakota the previous autumn, all
had united in urging her to take charge of the campaign, and for months
she had been receiving appeals for help. "We have not enough money to
organize one county," came from a member of the executive committee. In
January, from Alonzo Wardall, vice-president of the State Association,
"We are very grateful for your earnest efforts in our behalf and trust
you will be able to spend the coming summer with us." His wife, the
superintendent of press, wrote in February: "We shall give you the
credit, dear Miss Anthony, if we succeed next November."
On March 5, the president of the association, S. A. Ramsey, said in the
course of a long letter: "I had begun to feel misgivings relative to our
success, because we were so poorly prepared for the great conflict
which is pending; but the appointment by the national convention of a
special committee to aid us in our work has inspired me with great hope,
especially as you were placed at the head of that committee." Mrs. H. M.
Barker, State organizer, wrote March 10: "Organizing must have stopped
in the third district, had it not been for the money you sent. It is
utterly impossible for us to pay even $10 a week to organizers. I have
been disappointed in my home workers, so many incapacitated for various
reasons. We shall make suffrage a specialty in all our W. C. T. U.
county and district conventions." And April 11, the State secretary,
Rev. M. Barker, supplemented this with: "It is absolutely impossible to
raise money in the State to pay speakers and furnish literature. This
you understand. The election must go by default if it is expected."
At the Washington convention it had been ordered that all contributions
should be forwarded to the national treasurer and disbursed by order of
the committee. Notwithstanding this, a large proportion was sent
directly to Miss Anthony with the express stipulation that it should be
expended under her personal supervision. There never was a woman
connected with the suffrage movement who could collect as much money as
she; people would give to her who refused all others, with the
injunction that she should use according to her own judgment. That which
was sent her for Dakota she turned over at once to the treasurer, Mrs.
Spofford, and paid all the campaign bills by checks.
The Dakota people had made the mistake of electing a suffrage board
entirely of men, except the treasurer and State organizer, and, although
they had not a dollar in their treasury and no prospects, they agreed to
pay the secretary $100 a month for his services! When money from all
parts of the country had been sent to the national treasurer, until the
Dakota fund reached $5,500, the executive committee of that State
suddenly discovered that they could manage their own campaign, and made
a demand upon the national committee to turn the funds over to them.
Miss Anthony, as chairman, already had sent them $300 for preliminary
work; had written and telegraphed that the services of Miss Shaw could
be had for only one month, at that time, and asked if they would arrange
her routes; and had twice written them to send her their "plan of
campaign," but had received no answer to any of these communications. At
the last moment she was obliged herself to make out Miss Shaw's route
and send her into the field with practically no advertisement. On March
29 she wrote to the State president:
Immediately on the receipt of your answer to my first letter to
your executive committee, instead of sending you a personal reply I
wrote again to the entire committee, answering the various points
presented by you, Mr. and Mrs. Barker and others. This I did to
save writing the same thing to half a dozen different people, as
well as to make sure that I should get your official action upon
what seemed to me most important matters; but to this date I have
received not only no official answer, but no information which
shows my letter to have been acted upon. Nor have I heard from any
member of the committee that you have mapped out any plan of
campaign, or have accepted and proposed to work on the one which I
outlined last November at the Aberdeen meeting, and twice over have
stated in my letters.
You, personally, say to me that you must have the national funds
put into your treasury before you can plan work. Now, my dear sir,
as a business man you never would give your money to any person or
committee until they had presented to you a plan for using it which
met your approval. Then I have had no indication of any intention
on the part of your executive committee or State organizer to hold
any series of suffrage meetings or conventions. The only ones
written of are W. C. T. U. county and district conventions.
California's suffrage lecturer, I am informed, is to be introduced
to the State at the First District W. C. T. U. Convention.
Now, I want to say to you individually, and to the executive
committee generally, that the National-American South Dakota
committee will pay the money entrusted to them only to _suffrage_
lecturers and _suffrage_ conventions. We shall not pay it to any
individual or association for any other purpose, or in any other
name, than suffrage for women, pure and simple. We talked this over
fully in your executive committee meeting at Aberdeen last fall,
and all agreed that, while the temperance societies worked for
suffrage in their way, the suffrage campaign should be carried
forward on the basis of the one principle. Our national money will
not go to aid Prohibition leagues, Grand Army encampments, Woman's
Relief Corps, W. C. T. U. societies or any others, though all, we
hope, will declare and work for the suffrage amendment. We can not
ally ourselves with the Prohibition or Anti-Prohibition party--the
Democrats or the Republicans. Each may do splendid work for
suffrage within its own organization, and we shall rejoice in all
that do so; but the South Dakota and the National-American
Associations must stand on their own ground.
Co-operation is what our committee desire, and we stand ready to
aid in holding three series of county conventions with three sets
of speakers, at least one of each set a national speaker, beginning
on May 1 and continuing until the school election, June 24. I am
feeling sadly disappointed that every voting precinct of every
county has not been visited, and will not have been by the 1st of
May, as was agreed upon at Aberdeen. Still, I want to begin now and
henceforth push the work; but the entire fund would not pay every
single man and woman in the State who helps, hence every one who
can must work without cost either to the State or national
committee.
On the 7th of April Miss Anthony wrote to the State secretary:
Yours mailed April 3 is received. The National-American committee
have only about $1,300 yet in hand, and we have arranged a trip
through your State for Rev. Anna Shaw. When your committee did not
answer my telegram, I could not wait longer for fear of losing Miss
Shaw's good work before the students of your various educational
institutions, and having had urgent importunities from Mrs. D. W.
Mayer to send some of our very best speakers to Vermillion so that
the 600 students there might be roused to thought before separating
for the summer, I felt the cause could not afford to lose Miss
Shaw's effective services and so mapped out her route, and
telegraphed and wrote asking that she be advertised.
Now, my dear friends, once for all, I want to say on behalf of our
South Dakota committee, the National-American Association, and the
friends who have placed money in our hands--that we shall no more
turn it over to you to appropriate as your executive committee
please, without our voice or vote, than you would turn over the
money entrusted to your care to our committee to spend as we
choose, without your voice or vote. But while we shall retain our
right to expend the national fund in accordance with our best
judgment, we shall in future, as I have several times written your
committee, hold ourselves ready to help defray the cost of whatever
work you present to us. I have once verbally, and twice or oftener
by letter, presented a plan of campaign asking your adoption of it,
or of one which suited you better, telling you that we would
co-operate with you in executing the plan and paying therefor; and
to all of my propositions to help, the one reply has been: "The
wheels are blocked until you turn the money over to us. You in
Washington can not run the South Dakota campaign." Now nearly five
months have elapsed, and, so far as reported, the resident
committee have adopted no plan and had no organizers at work in the
different counties.
Rev. Anna Shaw made her lecture tour throughout the State, and wrote
Miss Anthony that the people everywhere were most anxious for her to
come and there was not the slightest disaffection except on the part of
two or three persons who wished to handle the funds. To these Miss Shaw
said:
What our committee object to, and what they have no right to do by
the vote of our convention, is to put a dollar of our money into
your treasury to be spent without our consent or for any purpose of
which we do not approve. For example, not one of us, myself least
of all, will consent to take out of the contributions from friends
of suffrage one dollar to pay towards a salary of $100 a month to
any man as secretary. We do not pay our national secretary a cent,
and we have no doubt there are plenty of women in the State of
Dakota who would be glad to do the secretary's work for love of the
cause. I understand it has been planned, and the statement has gone
out, that your committee propose to cut loose from Miss Anthony.
Now if you do, you cut loose from the goose that lays the golden
egg for the South Dakota work; you cut loose from all the national
speakers and workers and all the money given.
Miss Anthony wrote Alice Stone Blackwell:
I fully agree with you and dear Mrs. Wallace about not antagonizing
the prohibition and W. C. T. U. people who made the 6,000 majority
last fall in South Dakota; but I also feel that we must not
antagonize the license people, for they are one-half of the voters,
lacking only 6,000, and fully 6,000 of the Prohibition men are
anti-suffragists and can not be converted. Hence it is also vastly
important that the license men shall not have just cause to feel
that our national suffrage lecturers are W. C. T. U. agents. That
is my one point--that we shall not at the outset repel every man
who is not a Prohibitionist.
But we shall see. I surely am as earnest a prohibitionist and total
abstainer as any woman or man in South Dakota or anywhere else. But
they have prohibition, and now are after suffrage; therefore it
should not be the old prohibition and W. C. T. U. yardstick in this
campaign, but instead it must be the woman suffrage yardstick alone
by which every man and every woman shall be measured. Best assured
I shall try not to offend a single voter, of whatever persuasion,
for it is votes we are after now. I hope to make such a good
showing of work done in this spring campaign, that our friends will
feel like giving another and larger contribution to help on the
fall canvass.
The editors of the two suffrage papers, the officers of the
National-American Association, the largest contributors to the fund and
the other members of the committee, all sustained Miss Anthony in her
position. Zerelda G. Wallace published the following notice: "Having
pledged to the committee on work in South Dakota one month's services in
the projected suffrage campaign in that State, I wish to announce
publicly that all I do there will be done under the direction of the
South Dakota committee of which Susan B. Anthony is chairman."
Finally, on April 15, the executive committee of South Dakota forwarded
their plan, which included a provision that "every dollar expended
should pass through the State treasury, and that the State executive
committee should have control of all plans of work and decide what
lecturers should be engaged;" but by the time it reached Washington Miss
Anthony was well on her way to South Dakota. When she arrived she found
that it was just as she had been informed, the disaffection was confined
to a few persons, but the body of workers made her welcome and she was
cordially received throughout the State. Mrs. Emma Smith DeVoe, State
lecturer and one of the ablest women, at once placed her services at
Miss Anthony's disposal, and in a short time nearly all were working in
harmony with the national plan.
The autumn previous, when Miss Anthony was attending a convention in
Minneapolis, H. L. Loucks and Alonzo Wardall, president and secretary of
the South Dakota Farmers' Alliance, had made a journey expressly to ask
her to come into the State to conduct this canvass. She had replied that
she never again would go into an amendment campaign unless it was
endorsed and advocated by at least one of the two great political
parties. They assured her that the Farmers' Alliance dominated politics
in South Dakota, that it held the balance of power, and the year
previous had compelled the Republicans to put a prohibition plank in
their platform and, through the influence of the Alliance, that
amendment had been carried by 6,000 majority. They were ready now to do
the same for woman suffrage. It was wholly because of the assurance of
this support that Miss Anthony took the responsibility of raising the
funds and conducting the campaign in South Dakota.
When she arrived in the State, April 23, none of the political
conventions had been held. In co-operation with the State executive
board, she at once planned the suffrage mass meetings, arranged work for
the corps of speakers, pushed the district organization and made
speeches herself almost every night. The National-American Association
sent into the State and paid the expenses of Rev. Anna Shaw, Rev.
Olympia Brown, Laura M. Johns, Mary Seymour Howell, Carrie Chapman
Catt, Julia B. Nelson and Clara B. Colby.[60] It also contributed over
$1,000 to the office expenses of the State committee, paid $400 to the
Woman's Journal and Woman's Tribune for thousands of copies to be sent
to residents of South Dakota during the campaign, and flooded the State
with suffrage literature. The speakers collected altogether $1,400 in
South Dakota, which went toward their expenses. California, as her
contribution to the national fund, raised $1,000 through a committee
consisting of Hon. George C. Perkins, Mrs. Ellen Clark Sargent, Mrs.
Knox Goodrich, Hon. W. H. Mills, Miss Sarah C. Severance and Dr. Alida
C. Avery. This was used to pay the expenses of Matilda Hindman for eight
months, as one of the campaign organizers and speakers.
As Miss Anthony was on her way to a meeting June 3, she received a
telegram which sent her at once to Huron, where the annual convention of
the Farmers' Alliance was in session. Upon arriving she found her
information had been correct, that the Alliance and the Knights of Labor
had combined forces and were about to form an independent party. She was
permitted to address the convention and in the most impassioned language
she begged them not to take this step, as it would be death to the woman
suffrage amendment. She appealed to them in the name of their wives and
daughters at home, doing double duty in order that the men might attend
this convention; she reminded them of their pledges to herself and the
other women to stand by the amendment, and showed them that, of
themselves, they would not be strong enough to carry it, and that the
Republican party, unless sustained by the Alliance, would not and could
not support it. Her appeals fell upon deaf ears, and the old story was
repeated--the women sacrificed to party expediency.
The Alliance of 478 delegates, at its State convention the previous
year, November, 1889, after Miss Anthony's speech and after she had met
with its business committee, had passed this resolution:
_Resolved_, That we will do all in our power to aid in woman's
enfranchisement in South Dakota at the next general election, by
bringing it before the local Alliances for agitation and
discussion, thereby educating the masses upon the subject.
The Knights of Labor, at their annual convention in Aberdeen, January,
1890, had adopted the following:
_Resolved_, That the Knights of Labor, in assembly convened, do
hereby declare that we will support with all our strength the
amendment to the State Constitution of South Dakota, to be voted on
at the next general election, giving to our wives, mothers and
sisters the ballot.... We believe that giving to the women of our
country the ballot is the first step towards securing those reforms
for which all true Knights of Labor are striving.
This action was taken by both conventions after the amendment had been
submitted, and it was intended as a pledge of support. And yet the
following June these two bodies formed a new political party and refused
to put a woman suffrage plank in their platform! H. L. Loucks was
himself a candidate for governor on this Independent ticket, and in his
annual address at this time never mentioned woman suffrage. Before
adjourning, the convention passed a long resolution making seven or
eight declarations, among them one that "no citizen should be
disfranchised on account of sex," but, during the entire campaign, as
far as their party advocacy was concerned, this question was a dead
issue.[61]
The State Democratic Convention met at Aberdeen the following week, and
a committee of representative Dakota women was sent to present the
claims of the amendment. They were invited to seats on the platform and
there listened to an address by Hon. E. W. Miller, of Parker county,
land receiver of the Huron district, in which, according to the press
reports, "he declared that no decent, respectable woman asked for the
ballot; that the women who did so were a disgrace to their homes; that
when women voted men would have to suckle the babies," and used other
expressions of an indecent nature, "which were received with prolonged
and vigorous cheers." (Argus-Leader, June 16, 1890.)[62] Judge Bangs, of
Rapid City, who had brought in a minority report in favor of a suffrage
plank, supported it in an able and dignified speech, but it was
overwhelmingly voted down amidst great disorder. A large delegation of
Russians came to this convention wearing great yellow badges (the
brewers' color in South Dakota) lettered "Against woman suffrage and
Susan B. Anthony."
The Republican State Convention met in Mitchell, August 27. A suffrage
mass meeting was held the two days preceding, and every possible effort
made to secure a plank in the platform. Most of the national speakers
and a large body of earnest and influential South Dakota men and women
were present. Rev. Anna Shaw graphically relates an incident which
deserves a place in history:
When the Republicans had their State convention some of the leading
men promised that we should have a plank in the platform, so we
went down to see it through. We requested seats in the body of the
house for our delegation, which was composed of most of the
national speakers and the brainiest women in South Dakota, but we
were informed there was absolutely no room for us. Finally a friend
secured admission for ten on the very back of the platform, where
we could neither see nor hear unless we stood on our chairs. We
begged a good seat for Miss Anthony but no place could be made for
her. Soon after the convention opened, an announcement was made
that a delegation was waiting outside and that back of this
delegation would probably be 5,000 votes. It was at once moved and
seconded that they be invited in, and a committee was sent to
escort them to seats on the floor of the house. In a moment it
returned, followed by three big, dirty Indians in blankets and
moccasins. Plenty of room for Indian men, but not a seat for
American women!
We asked for a chance to address the delegates, but the chairman
adjourned the convention, and then announced that we might speak
during the recess. That night we went back again to the hall, and
the resolution committee not being ready to report, the audience
called for leading speakers, but none of them dared say a word
because they did not yet know what would be in the platform.
Finally when no man would respond they called for me, and I went
forward and said: "Gentlemen, I am not afraid to speak, for I know
what is in _our_ platform and I know also what I want you to
introduce into yours."
She then made her plea. It was cordially received, but the platform
entirely ignored the question of woman suffrage. This was true also of
the press and party speakers during the campaign, with one exception.
Hon. J. A. Pickler was renominated for Congress, and in his speech of
acceptance declared his belief in woman suffrage and his regret that the
Republicans did not adopt it in their platform. He was warned by the
party leaders, but replied that he would advocate it even if he
imperilled his chances for election. He spoke in favor of the amendment
throughout his campaign and was elected without difficulty. His wife,
Alice M. Pickler, was one of the most effective speakers and workers
among the Dakota women and, although Mr. Pickler was a candidate, she
did not once speak upon Republican issues but confined herself wholly to
the question of woman suffrage. She was as true and courageous as her
husband. Although fair reports of the suffrage meetings were published,
scarcely a newspaper in the State gave editorial endorsement to the
amendment.
The adverse action of the party conventions virtually destroyed all
chance for success, but the suffrage speakers usually found enthusiastic
audiences, and the friends still hoped against hope that they might
secure a popular vote. Miss Anthony never lost courage, and her letters
were full of good cheer. "Tell everybody," she wrote, "that I am
perfectly well in body and mind, never better, and never doing more
work.... Anna Shaw and I are on our way to the Black Hills, and shall
rush into Sioux City for a pay lecture and turn the proceeds over to the
Dakota fund.... O, the lack of the modern comforts and conveniences! But
I can put up with it better than any of the young folks.... All of us
must strain every nerve to move the hearts of men as they never before
were moved. I shall push ahead and do my level best to carry this State,
come weal or woe to me personally.... I never felt so buoyed up with the
love and sympathy and confidence of the good people everywhere....
The friends here are very sanguine and if I had not had my hopes dashed
to the earth in seven State campaigns before this, I, too, would dare
believe. But I shall not be cast down, even if voted down."
[Illustration: Anna Howard Shaw (Signed: "With affectionate severence
for women's truest friend, Anna Howard Shaw.")]
The eastern friends sent appreciative letters. "The thought of you and
your fellow-workers in South Dakota in this hot weather and with
insufficient funds, has lain like lead upon my heart," wrote John
Hooker. "How I wish I could accept your invitation to come to you and
talk to the old soldiers," said Clara Barton; "but alas, I have not the
strength. My heart, my hopes, are with you and if there is a spoke I can
get hold of, I will help turn that wheel before the campaign is over. My
love is always with you and your glorious cause, my dear, dear Susan
Anthony."
[Illustration: Autograph: "Hoping once more to see you I am my dear
friend, Yours faithfully, Clara Barton"]
Anna Shaw wrote from Ohio in August: "I am trying to follow your
magnificent example, in quietly passing over every personal matter for
the sake of the greatest good for the work. Whenever I find myself
giving way, I think of you and all you have borne and get fresh courage
to try once more. Dear Aunt Susan, my heart is reaching out with such a
great longing for my mother, now eighty years old, that I must go to her
for a few days before I enter upon that long canvass, but I will come to
you soon."
It was a hard campaign, the summer the hottest ever known, the distances
long, the entertainment the best which could be offered, good in the
towns but in the rural districts sometimes very poor, and the speakers
slept more than once in sod houses where the only fuel for preparing the
meals consisted of "buffalo chips." The people were in severe financial
straits. A two years' drouth had destroyed the crops, and prairie fires
had swept away the little which was left. "Starvation stares them in the
face," Miss Anthony wrote. "Why could not Congress have appropriated the
money for artesian wells and helped these earnest, honest people,
instead of voting $40,000 for a commission to come out here and
investigate?"
Frequently the speakers had to drive twenty miles between the afternoon
and evening meetings, in the heat of summer and the chill of late
autumn; at one time forty miles on a wagon seat without a back. On the
Fourth of July, a roasting day, Miss Anthony spoke in the morning, drove
fifteen miles to speak again in the afternoon, and then left at night in
a pouring rain for a long ride in a freight-car. At one town the school
house was the only place for speaking purposes, but the Russian trustees
announced that "they did not want to hear any women preach," so after
the long trip, the meeting had to be given up. Several times in the
midst of their speeches, the audience was stampeded by cyclones, not a
soul left in the house.[63] The people came twenty and thirty miles to
these meetings, bringing their dinners. Miss Anthony speaks always in
the highest terms of the fine character of the Dakota men and women, and
of their large families of bright, healthy children.
The speakers never tire of telling their experiences during that
campaign. Mary Seymour Howell relates in her own interesting way that
once she and Miss Anthony had been riding for hours in a stage which
creaked and groaned at every turn of the wheels, the poor, dilapidated
horses not able to travel out of a walk, the driver a prematurely-old
little boy whose feet did not touch the floor, and a cold Dakota wind
blowing straight into their faces. After an unbroken, homesick silence
of an hour, Miss Anthony said in a subdued and solemn voice, "Mrs.
Howell, humanity is at a very low ebb!" The tone, the look, the words,
so in harmony with the surroundings, produced a reaction which sent her
off into a fit of laughter, in which Miss Anthony soon joined.
They had been warned to keep away from a certain hotel, at one place, as
it was the very worst in the whole State. At the close of the afternoon
meeting there, a man came up and said he would be pleased to entertain
the speakers and could make them very comfortable. This seemed to be a
sure escape, so they thankfully accepted his invitation, but when they
reached his home, they discovered that he was the landlord of the poor
hotel! Miss Anthony charged Mrs. Howell to make the best of it without a
word of complaint. They went to supper, amidst heat and flies, and found
sour bread, muddy coffee and stewed green grapes. Miss Anthony ate and
drank and talked and smiled, and every little while touched Mrs.
Howell's foot with her own in a reassuring manner. After supper Mrs.
Howell went to her little, bare room, which she soon learned by the
clatter of the dishes was next to the kitchen, and through the thin
partition she heard the landlady say: "Well, I never supposed I could
entertain big-bugs, and I thought I couldn't live through having Susan
B. Anthony here, but I'm getting along all right. You ought to hear her
laugh; why, she laughs just like other people!" Mrs. Howell gives this
graphic description of the meetings at Madison, July 10:
In the afternoon we drove some distance to a beautiful lake where
Miss Anthony spoke to 1,000 men, a Farmers' Alliance picnic. When
she asked how many would vote for the suffrage amendment, all was
one mighty "aye," like the deep voice of the sea. That evening we
spoke in the opera house in the city. While Miss Anthony was
speaking a telegram for her was handed to me, and as I arose to
make the closing address I gave it to her. I had just begun when
she came quickly forward, put her hand on my arm and said, "Stop a
moment, I want to read this telegram." It was from Washington,
saying that President Harrison had signed the bill admitting
Wyoming into the Union with woman suffrage in its constitution.
Before she could finish reading the great audience was on its feet,
cheering and waving handkerchiefs and fans. After the enthusiasm
had subsided Miss Anthony made a short but wonderful speech. The
very tones of her voice changed; there were ringing notes of
gladness and tender ones of thankfulness. It was the first great
victory of her forty years of work. She spoke as one inspired,
while the audience listened for every word, some cheering, others
weeping.
When Miss Anthony was starting for South Dakota she was urged not
to go, through fear of the effect of such a campaign on her health.
Her reply was, "Better lose me than lose a State." A grand answer
from a grander woman. And this night in South Dakota we had won a
State and still had Miss Anthony with us, the central figure of the
suffrage movement as she was the central figure in that
never-to-be-forgotten night of great rejoicing.
[Illustration: Autograph: "Ever affectionately and faithfully yours,
Mary Seymour Howell."]
As very few women were able to hire help, many were obliged to bring
their babies to the meetings and, before the speaking was over, the heat
and confusion generally set them all to crying. Miss Anthony was very
patient and always expressed much sympathy for the overworked and tired
mothers. One occasion, however, was too much for her, and Anna Shaw thus
describes it:
One intensely hot Sunday afternoon, a meeting was held by the side
of a sod church, which had been extended by canvas coverings from
the wagons. The audience crowded up as close as they could be
packed to where Miss Anthony stood on a barn door laid across some
boxes. A woman with a baby sat very near the edge of this
improvised platform. The child grew tired and uneasy and finally
began to pinch Miss Anthony's ankles. She stepped back and he
immediately commenced to scream, so she stepped forward again and
he resumed his pinching. She endured it as long as she could, but
at last stooped down and whispered to the mother, "I think your
baby is too warm in here; take him out and give him a drink and he
will feel better." The woman jerked it up and started out,
exclaiming, "Well, this is the first time I have ever been insulted
on account of my motherhood!" A number of men gathered around her,
saying, "That is just what to expect from these old maid
suffragists." Some one told Miss Anthony she had lost twenty votes
by this. "Well," she replied, "if they could see the welts on my
ankles where they were pinched to keep that child still, they would
bring their twenty votes back."
She said to me the next day: "Now, Anna, no matter how many babies
cry you must not say one word or it will be taken as an insult to
motherhood." That afternoon I gave a little talk. The church was
crowded and there were so many children it seemed as if every
family had twins. There were at least six of them crying at the top
of their lungs. The louder they cried, the louder I yelled; and the
louder I yelled, the louder they cried, for they were scared.
Finally a gentleman asked, "Don't you want those children taken
out?" "O, no," said I, "there is nothing that inspires me so much
as the music of children's voices," and although a number of men
protested, I would not allow one of them taken from the room. I was
bound I wouldn't lose any votes.
Among the racy anecdotes which Miss Shaw relates of that memorable
campaign, is one which shows Miss Anthony's ready retort:
Many of the halls were merely rough boards and most of them had no
seats. I never saw so many intemperate men as at ----, in front of
the stores, on the street corners, and in the saloons, and yet they
had a prohibition law! We could not get any hall to speak in--they
were all in use for variety shows--and there was no church
finished, but the Presbyterian was the furthest along and they let
us have that, putting boards across nail kegs for seats. It was
filled to overflowing and people crowded up close to the platform.
One man came in so drunk he could not stand, so he sat down on the
edge and leaned against the table. Miss Anthony gave her argument
to prove what the ballot had done for laboring men in England and
was working up to show what it would do for women in the United
States, when suddenly the man roused and said: "Now look 'ere, old
gal, we've heard 'nuf about Victoria; can't you tell's somethin'
'bout George Washington?" The people tried to hush him, but soon he
broke out again with, "We've had 'nuf of England; can't you tell's
somethin' 'bout our grand republic?" The men cried, "Put him out,
put him out!" but Miss Anthony said: "No, gentlemen, he is a
product of man's government, and I want you to see what sort you
make."
In September Carrie Chapman Catt, one of the coolest, most logical and
level-headed women who ever went into a campaign, at the request of the
State executive committee gave her opinion of the situation as follows:
We have not a ghost of a show for success. Our cause can be
compared with the work of prohibition, always remembering ours is
the more unpopular. Last year the Methodist church led off in State
conference and declared for prohibition. It was followed by every
other church, except the German Lutheran and Catholic, even the
Scandinavian Lutherans voting largely for it. Next the Republican,
the strongest party, stood for it, because if they did not it meant
a party break. The Farmers' Alliance were solid for it. The
leaders were put to work, a large amount of money was collected and
representative men went out in local campaigns. It was debated on
the street, and men of influence converted those of weaker minds.
Now what have we? 1st.--The Lutherans, both German and
Scandinavian, and the Catholics are bitterly opposed. The
Methodists, our strongest friends everywhere else, are not so here.
2d.--We have one party openly and two others secretly against us.
3d.--While this county, for instance, gave $700 to prohibition, it
gives $2.50 to suffrage and claims that for hall rent, the amount
then not being sufficient. 4th.--When I suggested to the committee
to start a vigorous county campaign and get men of influence to go
out and speak, they did not know of one man willing to face the
political animosities it would engender.
With the exception of the work of a few women, nothing is being
done. We have opposed to us the most powerful elements in the
politics of the State. Continuing as we are, we can't poll 20,000
votes. We are converting women to "want to vote" by the hundreds,
but we are not having any appreciable effect upon the men. This is
because men have been accustomed to take new ideas only when
accompanied by party leadership with brass bands and huzzahs. We
have a total lack of all. Ours is a cold, lonesome little movement,
which will make our hearts ache about November 5. We must get
Dakota _men_ in the work. They are not talking woman suffrage on
the street. There is an absolute indifference concerning it. We
need some kind of a political mustard plaster to make things
lively. We are appealing to justice for success, when it is
selfishness that governs mankind....
The campaign was continued, however, with all the zeal and ability which
both State and national workers could command. There were between
fifteen and twenty thousand Scandinavians in the State and a woman was
sent to address them in their own language--one woman! A German woman
was sent among the men of that nationality. The last night before
election, mass meetings were held in all the large towns, Miss Anthony
and Miss Shaw being at Deadwood. In her excellent summing-up of the
campaign, Elizabeth M. Wardall, State superintendent of press, gives:
"Number of addresses by the national speakers, 789; by the State
speakers, 707; under the auspices of the W. C. T. U., 104; total, 1,600;
local and county clubs of women organized, 400. Literature sent to every
voter in the State."
What was the result of all this expenditure of time, labor and money?
There were 68,604 ballots cast; 22,972 for woman suffrage; 45,632
opposed; majority against, 22,660. Eight months of hard work by a large
corps of the ablest women in the United States, 1,600 speeches, $8,000
in money, for less than 23,000 votes! There were 30,000 foreigners in
South Dakota, Russians, Scandinavians, Poles and other nationalities. It
is claimed they voted almost solidly against woman suffrage, but even if
this were true they must have had the assistance of 15,000 American men.
If only those men who believed in prohibition had voted for woman
suffrage it would have carried, as had that measure, by 6,000 majority.
The opponents of prohibition, of course, massed themselves against
putting the ballot in the hands of women.
The main interest of this election was centered in the fight between
Huron and Pierre for the location of the capital. There never in any
State was a more shameless and corrupt buying and selling of votes, and
the woman suffrage amendment was one of the chief articles of barter.
The bribers, the liquor dealers and gamblers, were reinforced here, as
had been the case in other State campaigns, by their faithful allies,
"the Remonstrants of Boston," who circulated their anonymous sheet
through every nook and corner of the State.
All of the speakers who took any prominent part in the campaign were
paid except Miss Anthony.[64] She contributed her services for over six
months and refused during that time an offer of $500 from the State of
Washington for ten lectures and a contract from one of the largest
lecture bureaus in the country at $60 per night.[65] At the close of the
canvass she gave from the national fund $100 each to Mrs. Wardall and
Philena E. Johnson, who had worked so faithfully without pay. Then,
lacking $300 of enough to settle all the bills, she drew that amount
from her own small bank account and put it in as a contribution to the
campaign.
At the annual meeting of the State W. C. T. U., September 26, a strong
resolution was adopted endorsing Miss Anthony's work in South Dakota
and she was made an honorary member. After the election the State
suffrage committee unanimously passed the following resolution: "The
earnest and heartfelt gratitude of all the suffragists of South Dakota
is hereby extended to Susan B. Anthony, who has devoted her entire time,
energy and experience for six months to the cause of liberty and
justice."
Anna Shaw said that in all her years of preaching and lecturing she had
never been so exhausted as at the close of that canvass. Mrs. Catt was
prostrated with typhoid fever immediately upon reaching home, and
hovered between life and death for many months, in her delirium
constantly making speeches and talking of the campaign. Mary Anthony
said, "When my sister returned from South Dakota I realized for the
first time that she was indeed threescore and ten."
FOOTNOTES:
[59] "I am homesick already," she wrote Mrs. Spofford, "and have been
every minute since I left Washington. My choice would be to live there
most of the year, but no! Duty first, ease and comfort afterwards, even
if they never come."
[60] Mrs. Wallace was kept at home by serious illness in her family. In
a letter to Miss Anthony, August 18, expressing her deep regret, she
said: "Money would be no object with me if I could overcome the other
difficulties in the way, but as I can not, I fear I shall have to let
you think I am unreliable. I regret this, as there is no woman (except
Miss Willard) whose good opinion I value so highly as yours."
[61] In order to keep her next engagement, Miss Anthony was obliged to
leave Huron at 7:30 A. M., drive sixteen miles in the face of a heavy
northwest wind and rain, travel all day and speak that evening. "I did
the best I could," she wrote in her journal.
[62] Then E. W. Miller took the floor, and in a disgusting manner and
vile language berated the women present and all woman suffragists....
Miller disgraced the name of Democracy, disgraced his constituents,
disgraced South Dakota, disgraced the name of man by his brutal and low
remarks in the presence of ladies and gentlemen.--Aberdeen Pioneer.
[63] At one place where this happened, the Russian sheriff had locked
the court house doors, but the women compelled him to open them. He was
entirely converted by the addresses of the afternoon, and in the evening
when the storm was approaching, he rushed to Miss Anthony and exclaimed,
"Come, quick, and let me take you to the cellar, where you will be
perfectly safe." "O, no, thank you," she replied, "a little thing like a
cyclone does not frighten me."
[64] Henry B. Blackwell made a speaking tour of six weeks through the
State at his own expense.
[65] A letter from Mrs. Catt said: "I think you are the most unselfish
woman in all the world. You are determined to see that all the rest of
us are paid and comfortable, but think it entirely proper to work
yourself for nothing. If some of your self-sacrificing spirit could be
injected into the great body of suffragists, we would win a hundred
years sooner."