by the following table prepared from the election statistics of 1900.
It is not customary to make separate returns of the women's votes and
these were obtained through the courtesy of Governor Wells, who, at
the request of the Utah Council of Women, wrote personal letters to
the county officials to secure them. Eleven of the more remote
counties did not respond but those having the largest population did
so, and, judging from previous statistics, the others would not change
the proportion of the vote.
Counties. Registered. Voted.
Men. Women. Total. Men. Women. Total.
Salt Lake 14,083 13,328 27,411 13,102 12,802 25,904
Utah 5,921 5,922 11,843 5,649 5,650 11,299
Cache 3,112 3,210 6,322 2,946 3,085 6,031
Box Elder 1,759 1,548 3,307 1,677 1,466 3,143
Davis 1,175 1,327 2,502 1,133 1,277 2,410
Carbon 986 511 1,497 937 477 1,414
Uintah 851 683 1,534 796 622 1,418
Iron 743 672 1,415 708 646 1,354
Washington 690 752 1,442 690 752 1,442
Piute 409 264 673 399 246 645
Morgan 408 387 795 398 378 775
Rich 404 289 693 398 286 684
Wayne 342 302 644 318 309 627
Grand 285 135 420 263 129 392
Kane 280 341 621 219 285 504
San Juan 123 61 184 106 56 162
31,571 29,732 61,313 29,738 28,486 58,198
Total registration of men 31,571
" vote " " 29,738
Registered but not voting 1,833
Total registration of women 29,732
" vote " " 28,486
Registered but not voting 1,246
It will be seen that in five counties the registration and vote of
women was larger than that of men, and in the State a considerably
larger proportion of women than of men who registered voted. Women
cast nearly 50 per cent. of the entire vote and yet the U. S. Census
of this year showed that males comprised over 51 per cent. of the
population.
All of the testimony which is given in the chapters on Wyoming,
Colorado and Idaho might be duplicated for Utah. From Mormon and
Gentile alike, from the press, from the highest officials, from all
who represent the best interests of the State, it is unanimously in
favor of suffrage for women. The evidence proves beyond dispute that
they use it judiciously and conscientiously, that it has tended to the
benefit of themselves and their homes, and that political conditions
have been distinctly improved.[449]
OFFICE HOLDING: Governor Heber M. Wells at once carried into effect
the spirit of the constitution, adopted in 1895, by appointing women
on all State boards of public institutions where it was wise and
possible. Two out of five places on the Board of the Deaf and Dumb
Institute were given to women, Harriet F. Emerson and Dr. Martha
Hughes Cannon.
The first Legislature, 1896, passed "An act for the establishment of
sericulture" (raising of silk worms). Women had worked energetically
to secure this measure, and it was appropriate that five of them,
three Republican and two Democratic, should be appointed as a silk
commission, Zina D. H. Young, Isabella E. Bennett, Margaret A. Caine,
Ann C. Woodbury and Mary A. Cazier. Each was required to give a
thousand-dollar bond. A later Legislature appropriated $1,000 per
annum to pay the secretary.
Two women were appointed on the Board of Regents of the State
University, Mrs. Emma J. McVicker, Republican and Gentile; Mrs.
Rebecca E. Little, Democrat and Mormon. Both are still serving. Two
were appointed Regents of the Agricultural College, Mrs. Sarah B.
Goodwin and Mrs. Emily S. Richards.
At the close of the Legislature the Republican State Central Committee
was reorganized; Mrs. Emmeline B. Wells was made vice-chairman, Miss
Julia Farnsworth, secretary. The Democratic party was quite as liberal
toward women and the feeling prevailed that at the next election women
would be placed in various State and county offices. There were many
women delegates in the county and also in the State conventions of
both parties in 1896, and a number of women were nominated.
It was a Democratic victory and the women on that ticket were
elected--Dr. Martha Hughes Cannon to the Senate, Eurithe Le Barthe and
Sarah A. Anderson to the House; Margaret A. Caine, auditor of Salt
Lake County; Ellen Jakeman, treasurer Utah County; Delilah K. Olson,
recorder Millard County; Fannie Graehl (Rep.), recorder Box Elder
County, and possibly some others.
In the Legislature of 1897, Mrs. Le Barthe introduced a bill
forbidding women to wear large hats in places of public entertainment,
which was passed. Dr. Cannon championed the measure by which a State
Board of Health was created, and was appointed by the Governor as one
of its first members. She had part in the defeat of the strong lobby
that sought to abolish the existing State Board of Public Examiners,
which prevents incompetents from practicing medicine. She introduced a
bill compelling the State to educate the deaf, mute and blind; another
requiring seats for women employes; what was known as the Medical
Bill, by which all the sanitary measures of the State are regulated
and put in operation; and another providing for the erection of a
hospital for the State School of the Deaf, Dumb and Blind, carrying
with it the necessary appropriation. All the bills introduced or
championed by Dr. Cannon became laws. She served on the Committees on
Public Health, Apportionment, Fish and Game, Banks and Banking,
Education, Labor, etc.
At the close of their second term the Senate presented her with a
handsome silver-mounted album containing the autographs of all the
Senators and employes. She had drawn what is known as the long term,
and at its close she was chosen to present a handsome gavel to the
president of the Senate in behalf of the members. Thus far she has
been the only woman Senator.
In 1899 Mrs. Alice Merrill Horne (Dem.), the third woman elected to
the House, was appointed chairman of the State University Land Site
Committee, to which was referred the bill authorizing the State to
take advantage of the congressional land grant offered for expending
$301,000 in buildings and providing for the removal of the State
University to the new site. At a jubilee in recognition of the gift,
held by the faculty and students, at which the Governor and
Legislature were guests, Mrs. Horne was the only woman to make a
speech and was introduced by President Joseph T. Kingsbury in most
flattering terms for the work she had done in behalf of education. She
championed the Free Scholarship Bill giving one hundred annual Normal
School appointments, each for a term of four years; and one creating a
State Institute of Art for the encouragement of the fine arts and for
art in public school education and in manufactures, for an annual
exhibition, a course of lectures and a State art collection, both of
which passed. She was a member of committees on Art, Education, Rules
and Insane Asylum; was the only member sent to visit the State Insane
Asylum, going by direction of the Speaker of the House, as a committee
of one, to surprise the superintendent and report actual conditions.
Mrs. Horne was presented with a photographed group of the members of
the House, herself the only woman in the picture.
The November election of 1900 was fraught with great interest to the
women, as the State officials were to be elected as well as the
Legislature, and they were anxious that there should be some women's
names on the tickets for both the House and Senate, and that a woman
should be nominated for State Superintendent of Public Instruction by
both parties. For this office the Republican and the Democratic women
presented candidates,--Mrs. Emma J. McVicker and Miss Ada Faust,--but
both conventions gave the nomination to men. Meantime Dr. John R.
Park, the superintendent, died suddenly and Gov. Wells appointed Mrs.
McVicker as his successor for the unfinished term.
Mrs. J. Ellen Foster, of Washington, D. C. was sent to Utah by the
Republican National Committee, and with Mrs. W. F. Boynton and others,
made a spirited and successful campaign.
There never has been any scramble for office on the part of women, and
here, as in the other States where they have the suffrage, there is
but little disposition on the part of men to divide with them the
"positions of emolument and trust." Only one woman was nominated for a
State office in 1900, Mrs. Elizabeth Cohen for the Legislature, and
she was defeated with the rest of the Democratic ticket. All of the
women who have served in the Legislature have been elected by the
Democrats.
Several women were elected to important city and county offices. In
many of these offices more women than men are employed as deputies and
clerks.
In 1900 Mrs. W. H. Jones was sent as delegate to the National
Republican Convention in Philadelphia, and Mrs. Elizabeth Cohen to the
Democratic in Kansas City, and both served throughout the sessions.
This is the first instance of the kind on record, although women were
sent as alternates from Wyoming to the National Republican Convention
at Minneapolis in 1888.
Women are exempted from sitting on juries, the same as editors,
lawyers and ministers, but they are not excluded if they wish to serve
or the persons on trial desire them. None has thus far been summoned.
OCCUPATIONS: No profession or occupation is legally forbidden to women
except that of working in mines.
EDUCATION: All of the higher institutions of learning are open to both
sexes. In the public schools there are 527 men and 892 women teachers.
The average monthly salary of the men is $61.42; of the women, $41.19.
* * * * *
Women in Utah always have been conspicuous in organized work. The
National Woman's Relief Society was established at Nauvoo, Ills., in
1842, and transferred to Salt Lake City in 1848. It is one of the
oldest associations of women in the United States--the oldest perhaps
of any considerable size. It has over 30,000 members and is one of the
valuable institutions of the State. The National Young Ladies' Mutual
Improvement Association has 21,700 members and in 1900 raised $3,000
partly for building purposes and partly to help the needy.[450] There
are also a State Council of Women, Daughters of the Pioneers,
Daughters of the Revolution, Council of Jewish Women, etc.
Thirty-three clubs belong to the National Federation but this by no
means includes all of them.
FOOTNOTES:
[441] The History is indebted for this chapter to Mrs. Emmeline B.
Wells of Salt Lake City, editor of the _Woman's Exponent_, and
president of the Territorial Association during the campaign when Full
Suffrage was secured. Valuable assistance has been rendered by Mrs.
Emily S. Richards of that city, vice-president during the same period.
[442] Committee: Lillie Devereux Blake of New York, Virginia L. Minor
of St. Louis, Harriet R. Shattuck of Boston, May Wright Sewall of
Indianapolis and Ellen H. Sheldon of Washington, D. C.
[443] Committee: Lillie Devereux Blake, Matilda Joslyn Gage, Caroline
Gilkey Rogers and Mary Seymour Howell, of New York; Clara B. Colby,
Nebraska; Sarah T. Miller, Maryland; Elizabeth Boynton Harbert,
Illinois; Harriet R. Shattuck, Massachusetts, and Louisa Southworth,
Ohio.
[444] The officers elected were: President, Margaret N. Caine;
vice-presidents, Lydia D. Alder, Nellie R. Webber, Priscilla J. Riter;
secretary, Cornelia N. Clayton; corresponding secretary, Charlotte I.
Kirby; treasurer, Margie Dwyer; executive committee, Maria V. Dougall,
Nettie Y. Snell, Ann E. Groesbeck, Phoebe Y. Beatie and Jennie Rowe.
[445] Vice-presidents, Mrs. Richards, Ann D. Groesbeck and Caroline E.
Dye; recording secretary, Rachel Edwards; corresponding secretary,
Julia C. Taylor; treasurer, Margie Dwyer; executive committee,
Cornelia H. Clayton, Margaret Mitchell, Nellie Little, Theresa Hills
and May Talmage.
[446] Mesdames Richards, Young, Bennett, G. S. Carlton, J. S. Gilmer,
Romania B. Pratt, Phebe Y. Beatie, Amelia F. Young, Martha H. Cannon,
C. E. Allen, Emma McVicker, Ruth M. Fox, Priscilla Jennings, Lillie
Pardee and Martha Parsons.
[447] Hon. J. F. Chidester, chairman; A. S. Anderson, Joseph E.
Robinson, Parley Christianson, Peter Lowe, James D. Murdock, Chester
Call, Andreas Engberg, A. H. Raleigh, William Howard, F. A. Hammond,
S. R. Thurman. In addition to this committee those who sustained the
women and pleaded their cause were Messrs. Richards, Whitney, Evans,
Cannon, Murdock, Rich, Hart, Ivins, Snow, Robinson, Allen, Miller,
Farr, Preston, Maeser and Wells. There were others, but these were the
foremost.
[448] Mr. Roberts was elected to Congress on the Democratic ticket in
1900, although strenuously opposed by the women of Utah, irrespective
of politics, but largely owing to the vigorous protests of the women
of the whole United States, he was not permitted to take his seat.
[Eds.
[449] See Appendix--Testimony from Woman Suffrage States.
[450] In 1889 Mrs. Susa Young Gates established the _Young Woman's
Journal_, a monthly magazine, as the organ of this association,
although it was for eight years financially a private enterprise. The
president, Mrs. Elmina S. Taylor, was her constant help and
inspiration. The first year Mrs. Lucy B. Young, mother of the editor,
then past sixty, took her buggy and traveled over Utah explaining the
venture and securing subscriptions. Two thousand numbers a year were
published. Of late years the business managers have been women. In
1897 Mrs. Gates made over the magazine to the association without any
consideration, but was retained as editor. There were at this time
practically no debts and 7,000 subscribers, which later were increased
to 10,000.
CHAPTER LXVII.
VERMONT.[451]
Much credit is due to the New England Woman Suffrage Association for
the life and efficiency of the Vermont society. In 1883 this
organization secured the services of Mrs. Hannah Tracy Cutler of
Illinois for a series of lectures. At the close of these, and pursuant
to a call signed by twenty-five citizens, a convention was held at St.
Johnsbury, November 8, 9, when, with the aid of Lucy Stone and Henry
B. Blackwell, editors of the _Woman's Journal_, Mrs. Julia Ward Howe
of Massachusetts, and Mrs. Cutler, the State W. S. A. was formed.[452]
In over seventy towns and villages local committees have been
appointed to distribute literature, circulate petitions and further
the general plans of work. For the past two years the editors have
been supplied with suffrage papers weekly or fortnightly.
Lecture trips have been arranged for the Rev. Anna Howard Shaw,
vice-president-at-large of the National Association, Mrs. Zerelda G.
Wallace of Indiana, the Rev. Ada C. Bowles, the Rev. Louis A. Banks,
Miss Alice Stone Blackwell, Miss Diana Hirschler, Miss Ida M. Buxton,
of Massachusetts, and Mrs. M. L. T. Hidden. Eighty appointments have
been filled by Miss Mary N. Chase, A. B. Thirty conventions have been
held at which valuable aid has been rendered by Mr. and Miss
Blackwell, Miss Shaw, Mrs. Howe, Mrs. Mary A. Livermore and Mrs.
Carrie Chapman Catt, chairman of the national organization
committee.[453]
LEGISLATIVE ACTION AND LAWS: Harvey Howes of West Haven was the only
man in a convention called to amend the State constitution in 1870,
who voted to grant full political rights to women; 233 voted in
opposition.
To secure to taxpaying women the right of Municipal Suffrage, has been
the special line of legislative work for the State association.
Petitions asking for this, with signatures varying in number from
1,225 to 3,616, and bills to grant it, have been presented in both
Houses of the Legislature at nine biennial sessions, beginning with
1884. In every instance save one these have been referred to the
Judiciary Committees.
In 1884 a Municipal Suffrage Bill was introduced into the House by O.
E. Butterfield and supported by himself and Messrs. Adams, Henry,
Stickney and others, but was lost by 69 yeas, 113 nays.
In 1886 a bill to permit all women to vote who paid taxes was
introduced and strongly advocated in the House by Luke P. Poland. It
was amended without his consent to require that they should pay taxes
on $200 worth of property, and passed by 139 yeas, 89 nays. In the
Senate it was championed by Messrs. Bates, Blake, Bunker, Clark,
Cushing, Foster, Pierce, Smith, Stanley and Swain, but was lost by 10
yeas, 18 nays.
In 1888 a Municipal Suffrage Bill was introduced into the House by C.
P. Marsh, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, that gave a hearing at
which the State W. S. A. was represented. Later, at a public hearing
in Representatives' Hall, Henry B. Blackwell, Prof. W. H. Carruth of
Kansas, Col. Albert Clarke, Mrs. Mary W. Foster and Miss Laura Moore
urged the passage of this bill. It was reported to the House "without
expression of opinion." The friendly members on the committee were
Messrs. Marsh, Ballard and Mann. In the debate which followed, these
three, with Messrs. Southworth and Dole, supported the bill; and a
letter was read from Amasa Scott, presenting arguments in its favor.
It was lost by 38 yeas, 192 nays.
Still later in this session a petition signed by the officers of the
State association asking that "property owned by women be exempt from
taxation," was presented in the House; as was also a bill by Hosea
Mann providing that, "The property, both real and personal, owned by
women shall be exempt from taxation, except for school purposes." This
was defeated without debate.
In 1890 a Municipal Suffrage Bill was introduced into the House by Mr.
Mann and favorably reported by the Judiciary Committee, with reasons
given "why the bill ought to pass," signed by Messrs. Thompson,
Darling, Enright, Mann, Robinson and Smith of St. Albans. It was
advocated by them, Smith of Royalton and others, but was lost by 99
yeas, 113 nays.
During this session a bill to incorporate the Vermont W. S. A., was
introduced into the Senate by S. E. Grout. It was favorably reported
from the General Committee, but was refused passage without debate by
8 yeas, 10 nays.
In 1892 Wendell Phillips Stafford introduced the Municipal Suffrage
Bill into the House; it was made a special order and was championed by
Messrs. Stafford, Booth, Darling, Enright, Martin, Taylor, Weston and
others, and was passed by 149 yeas, 83 nays. When it reached the
Senate it was reported from the Judiciary Committee with a weighty
amendment, and a third reading was refused by 18 yeas, 10 nays.
At this session Gov. Levi K. Fuller in his address, under the heading
of Municipal Suffrage, called attention to this question and advised
"giving the matter such consideration as in your judgment it may
warrant."
In 1894 the bill was introduced again into the House by Hosea Mann,
who advocated and voted for this measure in four sessions of the
Legislature. Four members of the Judiciary Committee were
favorable--Messrs. Ladd, Lord, Lawrence and Stone. Its champions were
Messrs. Mann, Burbank, Bridgeman, Butterfield, Fuller, Peck, Paddock,
Smith of Morristown, Vance and others. It was defeated by 106 yeas,
108 nays.
In 1896, for the first time, a Municipal Suffrage Bill was introduced
into the Senate, by Joseph B. Holton. It was reported favorably by the
committee; ordered to a third reading with only one opposing voice;
advocated by Messrs. Holton, Hulburd, Merrifield and Weeks, and passed
without a negative vote. When the bill reached the House it was
reported from the Judiciary Committee "without recommendation." It was
supported by Speaker Lord, Messrs. Bates, Bunker, Childs, Clark,
Haskins, McClary and others, but a third reading was refused by 89
yeas, 135 nays.
In 1898 petitions for Municipal Suffrage signed by 2,506 citizens were
presented to the Legislature and a bill was introduced into the House
by E. A. Smith. This was reported by an unfriendly chairman of the
Judiciary Committee at a time when its author was not present, and was
lost without the courtesy of a discussion.
In 1900, petitions for Municipal Suffrage for Women Taxpayers were
presented to the Senate; a bill was introduced by H. C. Royce, and at
a hearing granted by the Judiciary Committee Henry B. Blackwell, L. F.
Wilbur, the Hon. W. A. Lord and Mrs. E. M. Denny gave arguments for
it. Adverse majority and favorable minority reports were presented by
the committee. By request of Messrs. Royce and Brown, the bill was
made a special order, when it was advocated by Messrs. Royce and
Leland; but a third reading was refused by 13 yeas, 15 nays. Later in
this session, a petition signed by the officers of the State W. S. A.,
asking that "women, who are taxpayers, be exempt from taxation, save
for school purposes," was presented to the Senate. This was, by the
presiding officer, referred to the Committee on the Insane.
The names of all members voting for suffrage bills have been preserved
by the State association. The names of the opponents pass into
oblivion with no regrets.
In 1900 a bill was presented, for the second time, by the Federation
of Clubs, providing for women on the boards of State institutions
where women or children are confined, but it was killed in committee.
In 1884 the law granting to married women the right to own and control
their separate property and the power to make contracts, was secured
through the efforts of the Hon. Henry C. Ide, now United States
Commissioner in the Philippines. Since 1888 their wages have belonged
to them.
Dower and curtesy were abolished by the Legislature of 1896. Where
there are no children the widow or the widower takes in the estate of
the deceased $2,000 and one-half of the remainder, the other half
going to the relatives of the deceased. If there are children, the
widow takes absolutely one-third of the husband's real estate
(homestead of the value of $500 included) and one-third of his
personal property after payment of debts; the widower takes one-third
of the wife's real estate absolutely, but does not share in her
personal property.
The Court of Chancery may authorize a wife to convey her separate
property without the signature of her husband. The husband can
mortgage or convey all his separate property without the wife's
signature, except her homestead right of $500.
The law equalizing the division of property to the fathers and mothers
of children dying without wills, was secured by Representative T. A.
Chase in 1894.
Senator O. M. Barber, now State auditor, was the author, in the same
year, of the law allowing a married woman to be appointed executor,
guardian, administrator or trustee.
The father is the legal guardian and has custody of the persons and
education of minor children. He may appoint by will a guardian even
for one unborn. (Code, 1894.)
If the husband fail to support his wife the court may make such
decision as it thinks called for, and the town may recover from a
husband who deserted his wife and children, leaving them a charge upon
it for one year previous to the time of action.
A married woman deserted or neglected by her husband "may make
contracts for the labor of her minor children, shall be entitled to
their wages, and may in her own name sue for and recover them."
In 1886 the "age of protection" for girls was raised from 10 to 14
years. In 1898 it was raised to 16 years. The penalty is imprisonment
in the penitentiary not more than twenty years or a fine not exceeding
$2,000, or both, at the discretion of the court. No minimum penalty is
named.
SUFFRAGE: Women have the same right as men to vote on all questions
pertaining to schools and school officers in cities, towns and graded
school districts; and the same right to hold offices relating to
school affairs. This law, which had been enacted in 1880 and applied
to "school meetings," was re-enacted when the "town system" was
established in 1892, and gave women the right to vote on school
matters in the town meetings.
OFFICE HOLDING: Since 1880 "women 21 years of age" may be elected to
the office of town clerk, and to all school offices.
In 1900 thirteen women were elected town clerks; six were serving as
school directors, eighty-four as county superintendents and
seventy-five as postmasters, according to the Vermont _Register_,
which is not always complete.
Women sit on the State Board of Library Commissioners. In 1900 they
were made eligible to serve as trustees of town libraries.
This year also a law making women eligible to the office of notary
public was secured by Representative J. E. Buxton.
OCCUPATIONS: No profession or occupation is legally forbidden to
women.
EDUCATION: Equal advantages are accorded to both sexes in all the
colleges, except that the State University, at Burlington, does not
admit women to its Medical Department.
In 1888, Dr. E. R. Campbell, president of the society, reported as
follows: "The Vermont Medical Society opens wide its doors to admit
women, and bids them welcome to all its privileges and honors, on an
equal basis with their brother physicians."
In the public schools there are 509 men and 3,289 women teachers. The
average monthly salary of the men is $41.23; of the women, $25.04.
* * * * *
Progressive steps have been taken in the churches of most
denominations. In 1892, for the first time, women were elected as
delegates to the annual State Convention of the Congregational
Churches. In 1900 there were fifteen accredited women delegates in the
convention. The Domestic Missionary Society, an ally of this church,
has employed sixteen women during the past year as "missionaries," to
engage in evangelistic work in the State.
The Vermont Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, although it
does not admit women to its membership, has passed resolutions five
times in the last ten years, indorsing equal rights, and has
petitioned the Legislature to grant them Municipal Suffrage. For this
credit is due to the Rev. George L. Story and the Rev. L. L. Beeman.
The Free Baptist Church passed a resolution declaring unequivocally
for the Christian principle of political equality for women at its
Yearly Meeting in 1889. That year, for the first time in its history,
it sent a woman delegate to the General Conference.
A similar resolution was passed at a meeting of the Northern
Association of Universalists, later in the same year. This church
admits women to equal privileges in its conventions and its pulpits.
This is also true of the Unitarian Church.
The annual meeting of the State Grange in 1891 adopted this
resolution: "We sympathize with and will aid any efforts for equal
suffrage regardless of sex."
All the political parties have been urged to indorse woman suffrage.
The Prohibitionists did so in their annual convention of 1888. At the
Republican State Convention that year the Committee on Resolutions,
through its chairman, Col. Albert Clarke, presented the following,
which was adopted: "True to its impulses, history and traditions of
liberty, equality and progress, the Republican party in Vermont will
welcome women to an equal participation in government, whenever they
give earnest of desire in sufficient numbers to indicate its
success."
FOOTNOTES:
[451] The History is indebted for this chapter to Miss Laura Moore of
Barnet, who has been secretary of the State Woman Suffrage Association
for seventeen years.
[452] The following have been presidents: Mrs. M. L. T. Hidden, C. W.
Wyman, Mrs. M. E. Tucker, the Hon. Hosea Mann, Willard Chase, Mrs. A.
D. Chandler, L. F. Wilbur, Mrs. P. S. Beeman, the Rev. George L.
Story, Miss Elizabeth Colley, A. M.
Among those who have served on the executive board are Mesdames L. E.
Alfred, A. F. Baldwin, F. W. Brown, A. M. W. Chase, E. L. Corwin, C.
J. Clark, L. D. Dyer, P. R. Edes, M. W. Foster, C. D. Gallup, S. F.
Leonard, Emma J. Nelson and Julia A. Pierce; Misses Clara Eastman, O.
M. Lawrence, Laura Moore, Julia E. Smith and Mary E. Spencer; the Hon.
Chester Pierce, Col. Albert Clarke, Dudley P. Hall and G. W. Seaver.
[453] Some of those who have rendered excellent service to the cause
are Mesdames Clara Bailey, Lucia G. Brown, M. A. Brewster, Inez E.
Campbell, H. G. Minot, G. E. Moody, Harriet S. Moore, Emily E. Reed,
Clinton Smith, Mary H. Semple, Anna E. Spencer, L. B. Wilson and Jane
Marlette Taft; Misses Caroline Scott, Eliza S. Eaton and I. E. Moody;
the Rev. Mark Atwood, L. N. Chandler, Editor Arthur F. Stone and
ex-Gov. Carroll S. Page.
CHAPTER LXVIII.
VIRGINIA.
As early as 1870 and 1871 Miss Susan B. Anthony, Mrs. Matilda Joslyn
Gage of New York and Mrs. Paulina Wright Davis of Rhode Island
lectured on woman suffrage in Richmond. There has been, however, very
little organized effort in its behalf, although the movement has many
individual advocates. Since 1880 the State has been represented at the
national conventions by Mrs. Orra Langhorne, who has been its most
active worker for twenty years. Other names which appear at intervals
are Miss Etta Grimes Farrar, Miss Brill and Miss Henderson
Dangerfield. A few local societies have been formed, and in 1893 a
State Association was organized, with Mrs. Langhorne as president and
Mrs. Elizabeth B. Dodge as secretary and treasurer. Its efforts have
been confined chiefly to discovering the friends of the movement,
distributing literature and securing favorable matter in the
newspapers. The Richmond _Star_ is especially mentioned as a champion
of the enfranchisement of women. In 1895 Miss Anthony, president of
the National Association, on her way home from its convention in
Atlanta, addressed a large audience at the opera house in Culpeper.
Later this year Miss Elizabeth Upham Yates of Maine spoke in the same
place. Mrs. Ruth D. Havens of Washington, D. C., lectured on The Girls
of the Future before the State Teachers' Normal Institute.
LEGISLATIVE ACTION AND LAWS: Petitions have been sent to the
Legislature from time to time, by the State association and by
individuals for woman suffrage with educational qualifications, the
opening of State colleges to women, the appointment of women
physicians in the prisons and insane asylums, women on school boards,
proper accommodations in jails for women prisoners and the separation
of juvenile offenders from the old and hardened. None of these ever
has been acted upon.
In 1898 a bill to permit women to serve as notaries public was vetoed
by the Governor as unconstitutional.
Dower and curtesy both obtain. The wife inherits a life interest in
one-third of the real estate. If there are children she has one-third
of the personal property absolutely; if none, one-half. The husband
inherits all of the wife's personal property whether there are
children or not, and the entire real estate for life if there has been
issue born alive. If this has not been the case he has no interest in
the wife's separate real estate. The homestead, to the value of
$2,000, is exempted for the wife.
By Act of 1900, a married woman may dispose as though unmarried of all
property heretofore or hereafter acquired. She can sell her personal
property without her husband's uniting. He has the same right. She can
sell her land without his uniting, but unless he does so, if curtesy
exist, he will be entitled to a life estate. Unless the wife unites
with the husband in the sale of his real estate, she will be entitled
to dower.
By the above Act a married woman may contract and be contracted with,
sue and be sued, in the same manner and with the same consequences as
if she were unmarried, whether the right or liability asserted by or
against her accrued before or after the passage of the act. The
husband is not responsible for any contract, liability or tort of the
wife, whether the liability was incurred or the tort was committed
before or after marriage.
There has been no decision as to the wages of a married woman since
the above Act; but it is believed they would be held to belong to her
absolutely, even if not engaged in business as a sole trader.
The father is the legal guardian of the minor children, and may
appoint a guardian for such time as he pleases.
The husband is liable for necessaries for the support of the family,
and can be sued therefor by any one who supplies them.
The "age of protection" for girls was raised from 12 to 14 years in
1896. The penalty is death or imprisonment in the penitentiary not
less than five nor more than twenty years.
SUFFRAGE: Women possess no form of suffrage.
OFFICE HOLDING: No offices are filled by women except that there is
one physician at the Western Insane Asylum and, through the efforts
of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, a matron in the woman's
ward of the State prison.
Women are employed as clerks in various county offices. They can not
serve as notaries public.
OCCUPATIONS: Under the ruling of the courts, a woman can not practice
law. No other profession or occupation is legally forbidden to women.
EDUCATION: For the higher education the women of Virginia must go
outside of their State.[454] The State Superintendent of Free Schools
and the Secretary of the State Board of Education both express great
regret at this fact, and the hope that all institutions of learning
will soon be opened to them. Secretary Frank P. Brent says:
We have as yet no women acting as school superintendents or
members of school boards, but I feel sure the Constitutional
Convention will make women eligible to one or both of these
positions.
Last year I had the honor to decide that in matters pertaining to
the educational affairs of this State, the wife may be regarded
as the head of the family, although the husband is living; and
this decision has just been reaffirmed by the United States Court
of Appeals.[455]
Women are admitted to several of the smaller colleges. The
Randolph-Macon College in Ashland, and the Woman's College at
Lynchburgh, both under the same presidency, rank well among
institutions for women only. Miss Celestia C. Parrish is
vice-president. Hampton Institute, for negroes and Indians, is
co-educational.
The public schools make no distinction of sex. There are 2,909 men and
5,927 women teachers. The average monthly salary of the men is $32.09;
of the women, $26.39.
FOOTNOTES:
[454] The State Universities are closed to women only in Virginia,
Georgia and Louisiana, and the undergraduate departments in North
Carolina.
[455] The decision of the court was "When an intelligent, active,
industrious, frugal woman finds she has married a man who, instead of
coming up to the standard of a husband, is a mere dependent ... and
leaves to her the support of the family, it would be contradictory of
fact and an absurd construction of the law to say that he, and not
she, is the head of the family."
This is believed to be the first legal decision of the kind and has
created wide discussion.
CHAPTER LXIX.
WASHINGTON.[456]
The history of woman suffrage in Washington begins with the passage of
a bill by the Legislature, giving women the full rights of the ballot
on the same terms as men, which was approved Nov. 23, 1883, by the
Territorial Governor, William A. Newell. This was due principally to
the efforts of a few individuals, both men and women, as there was no
organization.[457]
The municipal elections of the following spring brought the first
opportunity to exercise the newly-acquired right. The women evinced
their appreciation of it by casting 8,368 ballots out of the whole
number of 34,000, and the leading papers testified to the widespread
acknowledgment of the strength and moral uplift of their vote.
The general election of November, 1884, naturally showed a larger vote
by both men and women, the latter casting 12,000 out of the 48,000
ballots. It was estimated at this time that there were less than
one-third as many women as men in the Territory. When the scattered
population, the long distances and the difficulties of travel are
taken into consideration it must be admitted that women took the
largest possible advantage of the recently granted privileges.
For the next two years they continued to use the franchise with
unabated zeal, and newspapers and public speakers were unanimous in
their approval. In a number of instances the official returns, during
the three-and-a-half years they possessed the suffrage, exhibited _a
larger percentage of women voting than of men_. Chief Justice Roger S.
Greene of the Supreme Court estimated that at the last election before
they were disfranchised four-fifths of all the women in the Territory
went to the polls.
Many women have remarked upon the increased respect and courtesy of
the men during this period. Mrs. Elizabeth Matthews, who removed from
New Orleans to Port Townsend in 1885, states that, although accustomed
from babyhood to the deferential gallantry of the men of the South,
she never had dreamed that any women in the world were receiving such
respectful consideration as she found in Washington Territory at that
time. The political parties realized the necessity of putting their
best men to the front, and it was fully conceded that ethics had
become a factor in politics.
Prior to the Legislature of 1886 some discussion arose as to the
constitutionality of the Equal Suffrage Law, and, in order to remove
all doubt, a strengthening Act was passed, which was approved by Gov.
Watson C. Squire, November 29.
On Feb. 3, 1887, the case of _Harlan vs. Washington_ came before the
Territorial Supreme Court. Harlan had been convicted of carrying on a
swindling game by a jury composed of both men and women, and he
contested the verdict on the ground that women were not legal voters.
The Supreme Court, whose _personnel_ had been entirely changed through
a new Presidential administration, decided that the law conferring the
elective franchise upon them was void because it had not been fully
described in its title. This decision also rendered void nineteen
other laws which had been enacted under the same conditions.
The members of the next Legislature had been elected so long before
the rendering of this decision that their seats could not be
contested; and as their election had been by both men and women they
were determined to re-establish the law which the Supreme Court had
ruthlessly overthrown. Therefore the Equal Suffrage Law was
re-enacted, perfectly titled and worded, and was approved by Gov.
Eugene Semple, Jan. 18, 1888.
The members of a convention to prepare a State constitution were soon
to be chosen, and the opponents of woman suffrage were most anxious to
have the question considered by the Supreme Court before the election
of the delegates. They arranged that the judges of the spring
municipal election in a certain precinct should refuse to accept the
vote of a Mrs. Nevada Bloomer, the wife of a saloon-keeper and herself
an avowed opponent of woman suffrage. This was done on April 3, and
she brought suit against them. The case was rushed through, and on
August 14 the Supreme Court decided that the Act of January 18 was
invalid, as a Territorial Legislature had no right to enfranchise
women, and that in consequence the Equal Suffrage Law was void. The
Judges responsible for this decision were Associate Justices George
Turner and William G. Langford.
The very Act of Congress which organized the Territory of Washington
stated explicitly that, at elections subsequent to the first, _all
persons should be allowed to vote upon whom the Territorial
Legislature might confer the elective franchise_.
By the organic act under which all the Territories were formed women
had been voting in Wyoming since 1869 and in Utah since 1870. The
arbitrary disfranchisement of the women of the latter by Congress in
1887 demonstrated that this body did have supreme control over
suffrage in the Territories, and therefore unimpeachable power to
authorize their Legislatures to confer it on women, as had been done
by that of Washington. There never was a more unconstitutional
decision than that of this Territorial Supreme Court. Congress should
have refused to admit the Territory until women had voted for
delegates to the constitutional convention and on the constitution
itself.[458]
Without doubt the Supreme Court of the United States would have
reversed the decision of the Territorial Court, but Mrs. Bloomer
refused to allow the case to be appealed, and no one else had
authority to do so.
As the women were thus illegally restrained from voting for delegates,
the opponents of their enfranchisement were enabled to elect a
convention with a majority sufficient to prevent a woman suffrage
clause in the constitution for Statehood.
Henry B. Blackwell, corresponding secretary of the American W. S. A.,
came from Massachusetts to assist in securing such a clause. After a
long discussion as to whether he should be permitted to address the
convention, both sides agreed that the delegates should be invited to
hear him in Tacoma Hall. His address was highly praised even by
newspapers and persons opposed to equal suffrage. Four days later,
with Judge Orange J. Jacobs and Mrs. Elizabeth Lyle Saxon, he was
granted a hearing before the Suffrage Committee of the convention.
The question of incorporating woman suffrage in the new State
constitution was debated at intervals from Aug. 9 to 15, 1889. The
fight for the measure was led by Edward Eldridge and W. S. Bush. In a
long and able argument Mr. Eldridge reviewed the recent decision of
the Supreme Court and made an eloquent plea for justice to women.
Substitutes granting to women Municipal Suffrage, School Suffrage, the
right to hold office, the privilege of voting on the constitution, all
were defeated. Finally a compromise was forced by which it was agreed
to submit a separate amendment giving them Full Suffrage, to be voted
on at the same time as the rest of the constitution, women themselves
not being allowed to vote upon it.[459]
Only two-and-a-half months remained before election, the women were
practically unorganized, there were few speakers, no money, and the
towns were widely scattered. Miss Matilda Hindman of Pennsylvania and
Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby of Washington, D. C., editor of the _Woman's
Tribune_, came on and canvassed the State. Both were effective
speakers and they received as much local assistance as possible, but
all the money and influence which could be commanded by the
disreputable element that had suffered from the woman's vote were
brought to bear against the amendment, and its defeat was inevitable.
The constitution was adopted Nov. 5, 1889, the woman suffrage
amendment receiving 16,521 ayes, 35,913 noes; an adverse majority of
19,392.
In 1890 the first State Legislature conferred School Suffrage on women
to the extent of voting for trustees and directors.
The political campaign of 1896 was one in which reform of all kinds
was unusually in evidence. Three women sat as delegates in the State
Fusion Convention at Ellensburg. Mrs. Laura E. Peters, president of
the suffrage club at Port Angeles, was a Populist delegate and was
chosen a member of the Platform Committee. Through her efforts a
suffrage plank was inserted in the platform of that branch of the
convention.
The president of the State Suffrage Association, Mrs. Homer M. Hill,
said in her official report: "The People's Party was composed of
Silver Republicans, Populists and Democrats. At the State convention
these met in separate sessions. The Democrats voted down a resolution
demanding that the Committee on Platform bring in a report favoring
the amendment. The Silver Republicans passed one 'commending the
action of the Free Silver party in presenting to the people the
proposed amendment to the constitution.' The Populists inserted in
their platform a plank declaring that 'direct legislation without
equal suffrage would be government by but one-half of the people,' and
unequivocally favored the amendment.
"Although each of these three parties had its own platform, the
combination formed the People's Party and made its fight upon one
composed of eleven planks, or articles of faith, to which all three
agreed, _but equal suffrage was not one of them_. Therefore the
so-called union platform, minus suffrage, was the one generally
published and used as the basis of the campaign speeches. Because of
this no speaker of the People's Party was obliged to mention the
amendment, and it was avoided as an issue in the campaign; the State
Central Committee permitted each speaker to say what he pleased
personally, but he was not allowed to commit the party or to urge men
to vote for it. Nearly every one, however, advocated equal suffrage.
"The Republicans, in convention at Tacoma, adopted the following:
'Firmly believing in the principle of equal rights to all and special
privileges to none, we recommend to the voters of the State a careful
consideration of the proposed constitutional amendment granting equal
suffrage;' and this always was published as part of the platform. A
few of the leading Republican orators advocated the amendment and none
spoke against it. Its defeat is commonly attributed to the fact that
20,000 of the People's party did not vote upon it, and that _the
Republicans passed the word a short time before election to vote
against it_.
"Mrs. W. Winslow Crannell, who was sent out by the Albany (N. Y.)
Anti-Suffrage Association, did not hold a meeting of women or a public
meeting in the State. She conferred with men whom the anti-suffrage
representative, Alfred Downing of Seattle, already knew, and her
coming tended to arouse the loyal support of the suffragists.
"The Prohibition party gave official indorsement. The Social
Democratic party and the Socialist Labor party both inserted suffrage
planks in their platforms. The latter claims 9,000 votes in the
State."
The Fusion party was everywhere successful and the Legislature of 1897
was composed of reform elements. Mrs. Peters had charge of the Equal
Suffrage Bill, which was introduced on the first day of the session by
the Hon. J. P. de Mattos, and proposed to amend the constitution by
striking out the word "male" from the suffrage clause. This passed the
House on February 4 by 54 ayes, 15 noes. The bill was amended in the
Senate and was strongly supported by Joseph Hill and W. V. Rinehart.
The amended bill passed the Senate on February 25 by 23 ayes, 11 noes,
and was returned to the House.
Here it reached a vote March 11, the last day before the close of the
session, only through Mrs. Peters' slipping up to Speaker Charles E.
Cline's desk and whispering to him to recognize L. E. Rader, who
wished to present it. As the Speaker was a staunch suffragist he did
so. The bill passed by 54 ayes, 15 noes, and was sent back for the
signature of the President of the Senate and then returned to the
House for the Speaker to sign. Mrs. Peters thus relates what happened
after he had done so:
By the merest accident, Senator Thomas Miller, a friend, obeyed
an impression to examine the bill to see if it were all right,
when lo and behold! he discovered that the true bill had been
stolen during the short recess and an absolutely worthless bill
engrossed and signed. Senator Miller at once made the fraud
public and Speaker Cline tore his signature from the bill. On
Thursday morning, the last day, a certified copy of the true bill
was sent to the House, where it was ratified and returned to the
Senate. I then requested the President of the Senate to make me a
special messenger to take the bill to the Governor for his
signature. As I happened to hold the peculiar position of having
voted (at the State convention) for both those gentlemen, and as
I had taken pains to remind them of that fact, and as both the
Governor and Lieutenant-Governor were suffragists, I found no
difficulty in having my request granted. I said that the bill had
been delayed, deformed, pigeon-holed and stolen, and I would not
feel safe until it was made law by the Governor's signature.
I was duly sworn in as special messenger, and very proudly
carried the bill to the office, where Gov. John R. Rogers
affixed his signature to it and declared it law.
The history of the campaign which followed, as condensed by the
president, Mrs. Hill, shows that active work did not begin until the
convention held at Seattle in January, 1898. The executive committee
was called together after its adjournment and the situation thoroughly
canvassed. A resolution which welcomed work for the amendment by other
societies under their own auspices was unanimously passed, as it was
realized that there was not time in which to bring all suffragists
into line under one management. Money was scarce and hard to obtain,
and public attention was divided between the Spanish-American War and
the gold excitement in Alaska. The association at once turned its
attention to the obtaining of funds, the securing of the favorable
attitude of the press and the formal indorsement of the amendment by
other organizations.
Clubs were formed in wards and precincts to hold meetings, assist the
State association financially, distribute literature and circulate a
petition for signatures of women only, asking that the voters cast
their ballots for the proposed amendment. It was impossible to
prosecute the petition work thoroughly throughout the State, but the
largest cities--Seattle, Tacoma, Spokane and Olympia--with many
country precincts, both east and west of the mountains, were very
satisfactorily canvassed. It was found that over 88 per cent. of all
the women asked to sign the petition did so. The rest were divided
between the indifferent and those positively opposed. No one received
a salary for services. Less than $500 was collected, and $5.47
remained in the treasury, after every bill was paid, the day before
election.
The State association issued 5,000 pieces of literature of its own, a
booklet of thirty pages containing testimonials from leading citizens
of the four Free States--Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and Idaho. Early in
the campaign Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, chairman of the national
organization committee, sent 62,200 pieces. Henry B. Blackwell, editor
of the _Woman's Journal_, shortly before the election forwarded from
Boston 500 pieces to each of the thirty-four counties in Washington.
This literature no doubt helped to swell the vote for the amendment.
Forty country newspapers were regularly sent free to State
headquarters; the city papers at half-rates. The press was courteous
in every instance, and either advocated equal suffrage, kept silence
or opened its columns to both sides. The Seattle _Daily Times_
strongly favored it.
The Christian Church Convention, which met in Tacoma early in the
campaign, gave hearty indorsement to the amendment. The M. E. Church
Conference followed at the same place with a vote of 27 ayes, 26 noes;
the Congregational Convention at Snohomish with one dissenting vote.
Presbyterian and other ministers throughout the State quietly gave
their support. The ministerial associations of Seattle each received a
committee from the E. S. A. One of the members of the Ministers'
Association of Spokane read a paper on Equal Suffrage, which was
interestingly discussed, showing eight in favor, three opposed and one
doubtful. The Christian Endeavorers at their convention in Walla Walla
passed a resolution calling attention to the approaching election, and
asking for the intelligent consideration of the amendment; eight of
the trustees were in favor of recommending active work in local
societies, but because the sentiment was not more nearly unanimous no
action was taken. The Independent Order of Good Templars and the
Prohibition party indorsed the amendment. The Woman's Christian
Temperance Union lent a helping hand judiciously. All demands and
arguments were non-sectarian and non-political, being based upon the
claims of justice as the only tenable ground on which to stand.
Many of the most self-sacrificing workers came from the liberal and
free-thought societies, which are generally favorable to equal rights.
The Western Central Labor Union of Seattle extended courtesies to the
E. S. A. and kept suffrage literature in its reading-room. The
_Freemen's Labor Journal_ of Spokane, State organ of the trades
unions, supported the amendment. Single Taxers, as a rule, voted for
it. The State Grange in convention formally indorsed it and promised
support.[460]
On Nov. 5, 1898, the amendment was voted upon, receiving 20,658 yeas,
30,540 nays; majority opposed, 9,882. As in 1889, the adverse
majority was 19,392, a clear gain was shown of 9,510 in nine years.
In 1899 a bill was prepared for the State association by Judge J. W.
Langley, amending the constitution so that whenever an amendment
giving the right of suffrage to women should be submitted to the
people, the women themselves should be permitted to vote upon it. John
W. Pratt introduced the bill in the House, but it was referred to the
Committee on Constitutional Revision and not reported. Near the close
of the session Mr. Pratt brought it up on the floor of the House. A
motion to postpone it indefinitely was immediately made and,
practically without discussion, was carried by almost a unanimous
vote.
ORGANIZATION: For twelve years before the women of Washington were
enfranchised, Mrs. Abigail Scott Duniway of Oregon was in the habit of
canvassing the Territory in behalf of woman suffrage, traveling by
rail, stage, steamer and on foot, and where she found halls and
churches closed against her, speaking in hotel offices and even
bar-rooms, and always circulating her paper the _New Northwest_. The
Legislature recognized her services by a resolution in 1886, when
accepting her picture, The Coronation of Womanhood. There was not
during all this time any regularly organized suffrage association.
When in the summer of 1888 the women of the Territory saw the
franchise taken away from them by decision of the Supreme Court, a
number of local societies were formed and soon banded themselves into
an association of which the Hon. Edward Eldridge was president until
his death in 1892. Afterward A. H. Stewart was made president, Mrs.
Laura E. Peters, vice-president, and Mrs. Bessie Isaacs Savage,
secretary. Mrs. Zerelda N. McCoy was president of the Olympia Club,
and Mrs. P. C. Hale, treasurer.
On Jan. 21, 22, 1895, the first delegate convention was held in
Olympia, and a State Equal Suffrage Association formally organized.
Mrs. Savage was elected president; Mrs. Clara E. Sylvester,
vice-president; Mrs. Lou Jackson Longmire, secretary; Mrs. Ella Stork,
treasurer. In April a special meeting was held in Seattle and the
State was divided into six districts for organization and other work,
as it was evident there would soon be another amendment campaign.
The second convention was held in Seattle, Jan. 29, 30, 1896, with the
Hon. Orange J. Jacobs as the principal speaker.
Throughout 1897 the efforts of the suffragists were directed toward
securing a resolution from the Legislature for the submission of an
amendment, and no convention was held.
In January, 1898, the State association again met in Seattle. Mrs.
Homer M. Hill was elected president; Mrs. Peters, vice-president; Miss
Martha E. Pike, secretary; Mrs. Savage, treasurer.
The management of the exposition held in Seattle for three weeks in
October, kindly accorded space to the Red Cross, Equal Suffrage
Association, W. C. T. U., Kindergarten and City Federation of Women's
Clubs. Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, with Miss Mary G. Hay, paid
Washington a visit during this month. She spoke in the first M. E.
Church at Seattle to a large audience, and the Woman's Century Club
tendered her a reception. At Tacoma the Woman's Study Club arranged a
lecture for her in the Tacoma Hotel parlors, which was well attended
by representative people. Mrs. Emma C. McCully made the preparations
for her at Ellensburg, and Mrs. Lida M. Ashenfelter bore the expense
of the meeting at Spokane.
In December, 1899, the State Teachers' Association passed a resolution
strongly indorsing equal suffrage. The Mental Science Convention took
similar action.
Since the defeat of the amendment in 1898 no State conventions have
been held. During 1900 the corresponding secretary, Miss Pike, visited
many towns and conferred with representative women in reference to
again taking up the work; while the president, Mrs. Hill, endeavored
to secure the interest and indorsement of the various political
parties.
LEGISLATIVE ACTION AND LAWS: In 1886 the Legislature amended the
Homestead Law and gave to widows possession of the homestead, wearing
apparel and household furniture of their deceased husbands, and the
right to comply with the legal provisions for securing homesteads in
case the husbands had not done so; it further declared that the
homestead should be inviolate from executions for the payment of
debts, either individual or community; it amended the community
property law, giving husband and wife equal rights in the
testamentary disposition of it. It also enabled married women to act
as administrators.
In 1890 the Legislature conferred School Suffrage upon women. The act
was approved by Gov. E. P. Terry on March 27. The same Legislature
passed a bill requiring employers to provide seats for their female
employes, and enacted that all avenues of employment should be open to
women. It amended the community property law so that husband or wife
could prevent the sale of his or her interest.
In 1891 a bill was passed which made a woman punishable for the crime
of arson, even though the property set fire to might belong to her
husband.
The Legislature of 1893 appropriated $5,000 for the Woman's Department
of the State at the World's Fair in Chicago. A bill passed this year
provided matrons for jails in cities of 10,000 or more inhabitants.
The "age of protection" for girls was raised from 12 to 16 years.
Unfortunately the title of this bill was omitted and in compiling the
code it was excluded, but the Supreme Court afterward legalized the
action of the Legislature.
In 1899 the age was raised to 18 years. This was accomplished through
the efforts of the W. C. T. U., under the management of Misses Mary L.
and Emma E. Page. The penalty is imprisonment in the penitentiary for
life or "for any term of years." No minimum penalty is given. Deceit
or fraud may be considered force.
Married women were granted the right to act as executors of wills in
1899.
Dower and curtesy are abolished. The testamentary rights of husband
and wife are the same in regard to their separate property. If either
die without a will, leaving only one child, or the lawful issue of
one, the widow or widower takes half the real estate. If there is more
than one child living, or one child and lawful issue of one or more
children deceased, the widow or widower takes one-third of the real
estate. If there is no descendant living the survivor receives
one-half the real estate, unless there is neither father, mother,
brother nor sister of the decedent living, when he or she takes all of
it. The surviving husband or wife has one-half the personal property
if there is issue living, otherwise all of it, after the debts are
paid.
The old Spanish law in regard to community property obtains. While
each retains control of his or her separate estate, the control of the
community property is vested absolutely in the husband. This includes
all acquired after marriage by the joint or separate efforts of
either; lands acquired under the homestead laws; lands purchased with
money derived from profits or loans of the wife's separate estate;
lands purchased by her with money saved from household expenses; and
the court has held that even her earnings outside the home are
community property unless she is living apart from her husband. The
husband can not convey this without the wife's signature, and he can
not dispose of more than one-half of it by will. Upon the death of
either husband or wife one-half of the community property descends to
the survivor, and the other half is subject to testamentary
disposition. If there is no will the survivor takes half and the heirs
of the deceased half; if there are none he or she takes the whole. The
survivor has the preference in the right of administration.
A married woman may make contracts and sue and be sued in her own
name. Husband and wife can not enter into business partnerships with
each other.
By an act of 1879 father and mother were given equal guardianship of
the children, and in case of the death of either the guardianship
passed to the survivor. But in 1896 the Legislature enacted that the
father might appoint by will a guardian of both persons and estates of
minor children to the exclusion of the mother.
The same Legislature passed a law making the expenses of the family
and education of the children chargeable upon the property of both
husband and wife, or either of them, and provided that in relation
thereto they might be sued jointly or separately.
SUFFRAGE: Since 1890 women may vote for school trustees, bonds and
appropriations on the same terms as men, but can not vote for State or
county superintendents.
OFFICE HOLDING: In the fall of 1894 Miss Ella Guptil was elected
superintendent of schools for Clallam County. Her right to hold the
office was contested by her opponent, C. E. Russell. Miss Guptil asked
the following Legislature to make her position definite, and in
February, 1895, a bill was passed and approved by Gov. John H. McGraw
which removed all doubt, and she assumed the office.
At the present time (1900) there are seven women county
superintendents. Women may sit on the school boards of all cities and
towns. They are not eligible to any other elective office.
In 1897-98 Mrs. Carrie Shaw Rice served as a member of the State Board
of Education. Women do not sit on other boards.
The law requires women matrons in the jails of all cities of 10,000
inhabitants and upwards, but not at police stations.
Women are employed in subordinate capacities in various State and
municipal offices. They are also librarians in many places.
They can not serve as notaries public.
OCCUPATIONS: It was enacted by the Legislature of 1890 that:
"Hereafter in this State every avenue of employment shall be open to
women; and any business, vocation, profession and calling followed and
pursued by men may be followed and pursued by women, and no person
shall be disqualified from engaging in or pursuing any business,
vocation, profession, calling or employment on account of sex:
Provided, That this section shall not be so construed as to permit
women to hold public office."
EDUCATION: All of the educational institutions are open to both sexes
alike.
In the public schools there are 1,033 men and 2,288 women teachers.
The average monthly salary of the men is $42.13; of the women,
$34.53.
FOOTNOTES:
[456] The History is indebted for the material for this chapter to
Miss Martha E. Pike of Seattle, corresponding secretary of the State
Equal Suffrage Association.
[457] See History of Woman Suffrage, Vol. III, p. 776.
[458] For further information see Appendix for Washington.
[459] For addresses and other proceedings see the _Woman's Tribune_,
Oct. 5, 1889, and the following numbers.
[460] That practically all of the best elements in the State favored
this amendment, and yet it was defeated, shows how thoroughly the
disreputable classes controlled politics.
CHAPTER LXX.
WEST VIRGINIA.[461]
In 1867 Samuel Young introduced into the Senate of West Virginia a
bill to confer the suffrage on educated, taxpaying women, but it found
no advocates except himself. In 1869 he presented a resolution asking
Congress for a Sixteenth Amendment to enfranchise women, which
received the votes of eight of the twenty-two senators.
No further step ever was taken in this direction until the spring of
1895, when Mrs. Annie L. Diggs of Kansas was sent into the State by
the National Woman Suffrage Association but reported that the question
was too new to make any organization possible. In the fall Miss Mary
G. Hay, national organizer, arranged a two weeks' series of meetings
with the Rev. Henrietta G. Moore of Ohio as speaker, and several clubs
were formed in the northern part of the State. A convention was called
to meet in Grafton, November 25, 26, when an association was formed
and the following board of officers was elected: President, Mrs.
Jessie C. Manley; vice-president, Harvey W. Harmer; corresponding
secretary, Mrs. Annie Caldwell Boyd; recording secretary, Mrs. L. M.
Fay; treasurer, Mrs. K. H. De Woody; auditors, Mrs. M. Caswell and
Mrs. Louise Harden.
The second convention was held at Fairmont in January, 1897, Mrs.
Carrie Chapman Catt, chairman of the national organization committee,
assisting. Everything was so new that her presence and instruction
were an inspiration and a help, without which it is doubtful whether
the work would have continued. Officers were elected as follows:
President. Mrs. Fannie J. Wheat; vice-president, Mrs. Mackie M.
Holbert; recording secretary, Mrs. Beulah Boyd Ritchie; auditors, Mrs.
Mary Long Parson and Mrs. Mary Butcher; member national executive
committee, Mrs. Mary H. Grove. The corresponding secretary and the
treasurer were re-elected.
In April, 1898, the annual meeting was held at Wheeling, in the
Carroll Club Auditorium. Mrs. Chapman Catt and the Rev. Anna Howard
Shaw, vice-president-at-large of the National Association, made
addresses each afternoon and evening, and both filled the pulpit of
the large Methodist Church on Sunday. All the officers were re-elected
except the treasurer, who was succeeded by Miss J. B. Wilson.
The next convention took place at Fairmont in the fall of 1899, Mrs.
Chapman Catt again assisting to make it a success. The officers
elected were: President, Mrs. Ritchie; vice-president, Mr. Harmer;
corresponding secretary, Mrs. Boyd; recording secretary, Miss Clara
Reinheimer; treasurer, Mrs. Holbert; auditors, Mrs. Georgia G. Clayton
and Mrs. Belle McKinney; member national executive committee, Mrs.
Wheat; press superintendent, Mrs. Manley.
Prior to 1895, the subject of the enfranchisement of women was
practically unknown in West Virginia, but now there is no part of the
State in which the injustice and ignominy of their disfranchisement
has not been brought to the mind and conscience of the voters.
LEGISLATIVE ACTION AND LAWS: In 1897 the Legislature appointed a
committee to draw up a new State constitution, and the suffragists
presented to it a petition, signed by about 600 leading men and women,
asking that the word "male" be omitted from the suffrage clause.
Individual appeals were made and literature sent to each member of the
committee. Many signatures for the petition were obtained at the State
Fair, held in Wheeling, where room for a suffrage booth in the
Manufacturer's Building was given by the president of the board, Anton
Reymann, while every other foot of space was rented out at a large
price. The booth was decorated with portraits of the leaders, Susan B.
Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and made as attractive as
possible.
In 1899 the Rev. Anna Howard Shaw addressed a joint session of both
Houses of the Legislature in behalf of the enfranchisement of women.
Her expenses were paid by the Fairmont suffrage club.[462] The lecture
was a decided success, many members of the Legislature expressing
themselves as favorable to the cause she advocated. The clause
striking out the word "male" was not, however, reported from the
committee, and the whole matter of a new constitution eventually was
dropped.[463]
By an Act of 1891, no child under 12 years of age, of either sex, can
be employed in any mine, factory or workshop.
By an Act of 1893 a married woman may carry on business in her own
name, and her earnings and all property, real and personal, purchased
by her with the proceeds of such earnings, is in all cases her sole
and separate property and not subject to the control or disposal of
her husband or liable for his debts. By another act of this year a
married woman may sue and be sued in any court in her own name.
By an Act of 1895, a married woman may appoint an attorney in fact to
execute any deed or other writing.
By an Act of 1899 employers are required to provide seats for female
employes.
Dower and curtesy both obtain. The widower has a life interest in all
his wife's real estate, whether they have had children or not. The
widow has a life interest in one-third of her husband's real estate,
if there are children living. If there are neither descendants nor
kindred, the entire real estate of a husband or wife dying without a
will goes to the survivor. If there are children living, the widow or
widower has one-third of the personal property, and all of it if there
are none. A homestead to the value of $1,000 is exempted for either.
If a child die possessed of property and without descendants or a will
the father is heir to all of it; if he is dead, the mother inherits
only an equal share with each of the remaining children. If both
parents and all brothers and sisters are dead, the grandfather is the
sole heir; he failing the grandmother shares equally with her
surviving children.
The husband can convey his separate property without his wife's
signature. The wife can not sell or encumber her separate property
without her husband's consent.
The father is the legal guardian of the minor children. If a widow
remarry the guardianship of the children of the first husband passes
to the second, and she can not even appoint a guardian at her death.
No married woman can be a guardian.
The husband is required to furnish support adequate to his property
and position in life.
In 1897 the legal age of marriage for girls was raised from twelve to
sixteen years.
The "age of protection" remains at 12 years. Formerly the penalty was
death or, in the discretion of the jury, imprisonment for not less
than seven nor more than twenty years. In 1891 it was enacted that it
might be regarded as a felony and punished by imprisonment in the
penitentiary not less than two nor more than ten years. Through the
efforts of women bills to raise the age have been repeatedly
introduced but always have been defeated.
SUFFRAGE: Women possess no form of suffrage.
OFFICE HOLDING: In 1887 Dr. Harriet B. Jones was appointed assistant
hospital physician in the State insane asylum, with the same salary
paid the men physicians. She was the first woman ever appointed to
such a position in a State institution in West Virginia. On her
resignation she was succeeded by Dr. Luella F. Bullard, who still
holds the office.
To the untiring energy of Dr. Jones is due the State Industrial Home
for Girls. During two sessions of the Legislature she remained at the
capital, entirely at her own expense and leaving a lucrative practice,
to urge the need of this institution. At length $10,000 were
appropriated for this purpose in 1897 and $20,000 more in 1899. Now a
girl committing a minor offense is no longer placed in jail or in the
penitentiary while her brother for the same misdeed is sent to the
Reform School. Dr. Jones was elected president and all the officers
are women.
The State Home for Incurables also represents the work and ability of
a woman, Mrs. Joseph Ruffner. Before the same Legislatures as Dr.
Jones, she appeared with a bill asking an appropriation, and by
persistence secured one of $66,000. The home is now in successful
operation with Mrs. Ruffner as president. The Governor is required to
appoint boards composed equally of men and women for these two
institutions.
Women sit also on the boards of orphan asylums, day nurseries and
homes for the friendless.
The Humane Society of Wheeling was organized in 1896 with Mrs. Harriet
G. List as president. In 1899 she secured an appropriation of $3,000
from the Legislature to aid in its work.
A woman is librarian on the staff of the Agricultural Experiment
Station. The board of education of Wheeling appoints the three
librarians in the public library, which is supported from the school
fund, and for several years all of these have been women.
In some parts of the State women are appointed examiners to decide on
the fitness of applicants to teach in the public schools, but they can
not sit on school boards.
Women can not serve as notaries public.
OCCUPATIONS: No profession or occupation is legally forbidden to women
except that of mining.
EDUCATION: All institutions of learning are open to both sexes alike.
Bethany College has admitted women for more than ten years, and four
are on the faculty. In 1897 the State University was made
co-educational, after much opposition. It has eight women on its
faculty, and two of the three members of its library staff are women.
In the public schools there are 4,096 men and 2,712 women teachers. It
is impossible to obtain the average salaries.
FOOTNOTES:
[461] The History is indebted for this chapter to Mrs. Annie Caldwell
Boyd of Wheeling, who has been an officer continuously in the State
Woman Suffrage Association since it was organized.
[462] This club raised money by suppers, festivals and a Woman's
Exchange for use in the work. It subscribed for twenty-five copies of
the _Woman's Journal_ to be sent to the State University, to the six
Normal Schools and to various individuals. It also offered $35 in
prizes for the best orations on The Enfranchisement of Women, to be
competed for by the students of the above schools.
[463] In the Legislature of 1901 a bill was introduced conferring on
women the right to vote for Presidential electors, as this can be done
by the legislators without a reference to the voters. The bill was
drawn up by George E. Boyd, Sr. It was reported by the House Judiciary
Committee, February 21, with the recommendation "that it do not pass."
Henry C. Hervey spoke strongly in its favor and was ably seconded by
S. G. Smith, who closed by demanding the ayes and noes on the
Speaker's question, "Shall the bill be rejected?" The ayes were 31,
noes 25, the bill being defeated by six votes. Speaker William G.
Wilson voted against it.
The bill was presented in the Senate by Nelson Whittaker, but U. S.
Senator Stephen B. Elkins came on from Washington and commanded that
it be tabled, which was done.
CHAPTER LXXI.
WISCONSIN.[464]
As a Territory Wisconsin interested herself in equal rights. In the
first Constitutional Convention universal suffrage regardless of sex
or color had a considerable vote. In the second woman suffrage
received a certain amount of favorable consideration. Early in the
history of the State widows were made heirs of all the property in
case of the death of the husband without children, and laws were
passed by which a life interest in the homestead was secured to the
wife. In 1851 the regents of the State University declared that their
plan "contemplated the admission of women," and in 1869 women were
made eligible to all school offices.
The first Woman Suffrage Association was organized in 1869 as a result
of a large convention in Milwaukee, arranged by Dr. Laura Ross and
Miss Lily Peckham, a bright young lawyer, and addressed by Mrs.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Mrs. Mary A. Livermore, Miss Susan B. Anthony
and others. Soon after this several local societies were organized.
Its annual meetings since 1883 have been held as follows: 1884,
Richland Center; 1885, Whitewater; 1886, Racine; 1887, Madison; 1888,
Stevens' Point; 1889, Milwaukee; 1890, Berlin; 1891, Menominee; 1892,
Richland Center; 1893, Mukwonago; 1894, Racine; 1895, Evansville;
1896, Waukesha; 1897, Monroe; 1898, Spring Green; 1899, Platteville;
1900, Brodhead.
The president during 1884 was Mrs. Emma C. Bascom, wife of the
president of the State University. On leaving for the East she was
succeeded by the Rev. Olympia Brown, who has been re-elected every
year since.[465] Mrs. Brown was called to the pastorate of the
Universalist Church of Racine in 1878, and during her nine years of
service there held occasional meetings in behalf of woman suffrage in
various parts of the State.
In addition to annual conventions numerous conferences have been held,
too many and too similar in character to make a detailed history of
them essential. In the winter of 1884 a course of lectures was given
in Racine on subjects relating to women by Mrs. Mary A. Livermore,
Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, Mrs. Mary E. Haggart, Mrs. May Wright Sewall and
Mrs. J. G. McMurphy.
In November, 1886, Mrs. Brown held a series of nine district
conventions in company with Miss Anthony and Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby.
On November 1 she received a telegram from Miss Anthony, then in
Kansas, saying that they would join in holding conventions in all the
congressional districts beginning on the 8th. This seemed a very short
time in which to prepare for such a campaign, but by the president's
deciding on places and dates without consultation, sending posters to
the different towns selected and announcements to all the papers of
the State, and then going in person to secure halls and make local
arrangements, the date named found a tolerable degree of preparation.
The canvass opened with a large reception at the home of Mrs. M. B.
Erskine in Racine, which was followed by conventions at Waukesha,
Ripon, Oshkosh, Green Bay, Grand Rapids, Eau Claire, La Crosse,
Evansville and Madison. At the last place the ladies spoke in the
Senate Chamber to a distinguished audience. The effect of these
meetings was marked. Many members were added to the State association,
branches were organized and an impetus given to the work such as never
was known before and has not been repeated. Since then many
conventions have been held by the president of the association, its
several lecturers and outside speakers.
In 1896 the suffrage association kept open house for ten days at the
Manona Lake Assembly; during this time the Rev. Anna Howard Shaw,
national vice-president-at-large, gave one of the Chautauqua lectures
to an audience of 4,000 people.
In 1898 a conference was held in Madison by the officers of the
National Association, attended by the State Executive Board and
representatives of various societies.
The Rev. Ella Bartlett, the Rev. Nellie Mann Opdale and the Rev. Alice
Ball Loomis have each served as State lecturer for two or more years
and proved most efficient. Mrs. Emma Smith DeVoe has also lectured in
the State during several different seasons with excellent effect.
Among those who have aided in the work in an early day may be
mentioned Madame Mathilde F. Anneke, Dr. Laura Ross Wolcott, Mrs. Ella
Partridge, Mrs. Emeline Wolcott; and later Mrs. Lephia O. Brown, the
mother, and J. H. Willis, the husband, of the Rev. Olympia Brown.[466]
Prof. Henry Doty Maxon stands pre-eminent among the men who have
assisted the cause. He was pastor of the Unitarian Church at Menominee
and vice-president of the State Suffrage Association for a number of
years, attended the annual meetings regularly and himself arranged one
of the most successful, which was held in his church, known as the
Mabel Taintor Memorial Hall. Col. J. G. McMynn exerted an influence in
favor of woman's advancement, at an early day. Many men have aided by
giving money and influence, among them State Senator Norman James,
David B. James, Capt. Andrew Taintor, the Hon. T. B. Wilson, Burr
Sprague, M. B. Erskine, the Hon. W. T. Lewis, Steven Bull, the Hon.
Isaac Stevenson, U. S. Senator Philetus Sawyer and Judge Hamilton of
Neenah. The clergy generally have assisted by giving their churches
for meetings. The Richland Center Club and the Greene County Equal
Rights Association deserve special mention for their faithfulness and
generosity. The Suffrage Club of Platteville is also very active.
One of the most important features of the work has been the
publication of the _Wisconsin Citizen_, a monthly paper devoted to
the interests of women. It was started in 1887 to educate the people
on the suffrage bill of 1885 and has continued ever since, no other
one influence having been so helpful to the cause. The association
owes this paper to Mrs. Martha Parker Dingee, a niece of Theodore
Parker, who edited it for seven years, reading all the proofs, without
help and without remuneration; and to Mrs. Helen H. Charlton who has
edited and published the paper from 1894 to the present time.
Miss Sarah H. Richards compiled and published an interesting history
and directory of the Wisconsin Woman Suffrage Association to which the
present sketch is much indebted.
LEGISLATIVE ACTION: Only one measure looking to the extension of
suffrage to women ever has been passed by the Legislature. This was
done in 1885 as the result of the efforts of Alura Collins Hollister,
who was appointed to represent the association in legislative work at
Madison. The following was submitted to the voters: "Every woman who
is a citizen of this State of the age of twenty-one years and upward,
except paupers, etc., who has resided within the State one year and in
the election district where she offers to vote ten days next preceding
any election pertaining to school matters, shall have the right to
vote at such election." This was discussed at length in both branches
of the Legislature and passed on March 13 by a large majority.
It was voted upon at the fall election in 1886 receiving a majority of
4,583, and thus became a law.[467]
It will be noted that this law specifies what women are to vote, viz.:
actual citizens who are not paupers; where women are to vote, viz.: in
the election districts where they reside; when women are to vote,
viz.: when there is an election pertaining to school matters. It does
not specify what women are to vote upon or for whom--they are full
voters without limitation at all elections pertaining to school
matters. What elections pertain to school matters? First, the general
election held once in two years, at which the State Superintendent of
Public Instruction and officers controlling the State University and
other State institutions are chosen. Second, the municipal election
which in most cities pertains to school matters, as a school board or
superintendent is chosen then. Third, other elections in country
villages where one or more school officers are chosen. Fourth, special
elections where subjects relating to schools are voted upon. Of
several suffrage bills reported at this session this one, called the
Ginty Bill, was the only one which provided for a submission of the
question to the voters, which shows the purpose of the framers to have
been to grant State or national suffrage. The broad scope of this law
practically giving women a vote on the election of all national, State
and municipal officers, was pointed out to the leaders of the suffrage
association by some of the men instrumental in its passage, notably
Senator Norman James, chairman of the Joint Special Committee that
reported the bill. It is claimed that the Legislature did not intend
to pass a law so far reaching, but the circumstances of its passage,
political conditions at the time, as well as the statements of its
members and of the committee, show that they did intend to pass this
broad, far-reaching law, giving suffrage to women.
To awaken women to the necessity of voting at the first
opportunity--the municipal election in 1887--the suffrage association
undertook an active canvass of the State which lasted without
interruption until the autumn of 1888, a period of over two years. The
Rev. Olympia Brown gave up her church in Racine and devoted herself
exclusively to the work. The association was assisted by Miss Anthony,
Mrs. Livermore, Mrs. Elizabeth Lyle Saxon, Mrs. Elizabeth Boynton
Harbert and Mrs. Catharine Waugh McCulloch. Some of these speakers
remained a month, others a week and some only for two or three
lectures. The State president attended every meeting.
On the morning of the election in April, 1887, Attorney-General
Charles B. Estabrook sent out telegrams to those places where he
supposed women would be likely to vote, ordering the inspectors to
reject their ballots, which was done; but where they were not advised
by him the ballots of women were accepted.
The next effort of the suffrage leaders was to instruct the people in
the law and the circumstances of its passage, and thus to inspire
confidence in spite of the refusal of the ballots. It was suggested
that as the Presidential election was near at hand, politicians would
not leave it uncertain as to whether or not women were entitled to
vote, but would secure an interpretation of the law from the Supreme
Court without proper argument and presentation of the facts, hence the
State W. S. A. decided to test the matter itself. The case was brought
by Mrs. Brown against the election inspectors in Racine for refusing
to accept her vote, and was ably argued before Judge John B. Winslow
of the Circuit Court, now a member of the Supreme Court of Wisconsin.
He overruled the demurrer of the inspectors, stating that women were
entitled to vote at that election and for all candidates, thus
confirming the law.
An appeal was immediately taken by the inspectors to the Supreme
Court, and in order to keep the subject before the people and to
create a favorable public sentiment the association continued its
canvass by distributing literature and giving lectures. The decision
rendered Jan. 31, 1888, was written by Justice John B. Cassody and was
so vague and loosely worded that lawyers were not agreed as to its
meaning. He reversed the finding of the lower court, however,
declaring the intent of the law to be to confer School Suffrage
only.[468]
The association now found itself confronted by a large debt, the whole
suit having cost about $1,500, but by active work the autumn of 1888
found everything paid. In all this Mrs. Almeda B. Gray, one of the
officers of the association, was a leading spirit, contributing
largely in time and money; Mrs. M. A. Fowler worked night and day,
making routes for speakers and planning the campaign, other women
assisted according to their ability and the club at Richland Center
did excellent service. The decision still left room for litigation,
the claim being made that the ruling of the Supreme Court plainly
recognized the right of women to vote provided their ballots were put
in a separate box.
In the following November Wm. A. McKinley was elected Superintendent
of Schools for Oconto County by the votes of women placed in a
separate box. His election was contested and the case was argued
before Judge Samuel B. Hastings of Green Bay, who, quoting from the
decision of Judge Cassody, decided that women had a right to vote
provided their ballots were put into a separate box. This case also
was appealed to the Supreme Court, where the decision, rendered by
Judge William P. Lyon, Jan. 26, 1890, was that the votes of the women
in Oconto County were illegally counted. The ground for this finding
was that further legislative action was necessary before separate
ballot-boxes could be legally provided. Judge Cassody dissented from
this opinion.
The law then became practically a dead letter, except in a few
instances, until 1901, when an Act of the Legislature provided for
separate ballot boxes for women, and in the spring of 1902 they voted
on school questions.
In 1895 the legislative committee, consisting of Mrs. Jennie
Lamberson, Mrs. Jessie Luther and Mrs. Alice Kollock, assisted by Mrs.
Charlton, secured the introduction of two bills--one to strike the
word "male" from the State constitution, the other for a suffrage
amendment by statute law. A hearing was granted before the joint
committee of both Houses in the Senate Chamber, which was crowded.
Mesdames Elizabeth Boynton Harbert (Ills.), Helen H. Charlton, Nellie
Mann Opdale, Ellen A. Rose and Dr. Annette J. Shaw were the
speakers.[469] The bills were reported favorably but were lost after
discussion.
LAWS: Dower and curtesy obtain. A widow is entitled to a life interest
in one-third of the real estate and, if the husband die without a
will, to the share of a child in the personal estate. If there is no
lawful issue she has the entire estate, both real and personal. The
widower has a life interest in all the real estate of his wife not
disposed of by will, or in all of it if the wife died intestate,
unless she left issue by a former husband, in which case such issue
takes it, free from the right of the surviving husband to hold the
same by curtesy. If the wife die without a will and leave no issue,
the widower is entitled to the entire estate, both real and personal.
There may also be reserved for the widow a homestead of not more than
forty acres of farm land, or one-quarter of an acre in a town, which
at her subsequent marriage or death passes to the heirs of the former
husband. If none exist she does not lose her homestead rights by
marrying again.
The wife may dispose of all her real estate by conveyance during her
lifetime or by will, without the husband's consent. He can not destroy
her dower rights.
A married woman may sue and be sued, make contracts and carry on
business in her own name.
The father, if living, and in case of his death the mother, while she
remains unmarried, shall be entitled to the custody of the persons and
education of the minor children. The father may by will appoint a
guardian for a child, whether born or unborn, to continue during its
minority or for a less time.
Neglect to provide for a wife and minor children is a misdemeanor,
punished by imprisonment in the county jail not less than fifteen
days, during ten days of which food may be bread and water only; or by
imprisonment in the penitentiary not exceeding one year, or in the
county workhouse, at the discretion of the court.
In 1887 a law was passed raising the "age of protection" for girls
from 10 to 14 years. In 1889 this was amended by lowering the age to
12 and reducing the punishment from imprisonment for life to not more
than thirty-five nor less than five years. The clause also was added:
"Provided that if the child shall be a common prostitute, the man
shall be imprisoned in the penitentiary not less than one year nor
more than seven."[470] In 1895 the age was raised again to 14 years
with the same penalty.
SUFFRAGE: By the law of 1885 every woman who is a citizen of this
State of the age of twenty-one years and upwards, except paupers,
etc., who has resided in the State for one year and in the election
district where she offers to vote ten days next preceding any election
pertaining to school matters, shall have a right to vote at such
election. By the present interpretation of this law the suffrage of
women is limited to school officers and questions. Suffrage may be
extended by statute but such law must be ratified by a majority of the
voters at a general election.
OFFICE HOLDING: There is no law authorizing women to hold any elective
office except such as pertains to schools, but they have been eligible
to these since 1869. Eighteen women have served as county
superintendents at the same time; nine are acting at present. They sit
on school boards in a number of cities.
In the Legislature women act as enrolling and engrossing clerks, and
as clerks and stenographers to committees. They are also found as
clerks, copyists and stenographers in the various elective and
appointive State, city and county offices.
In the State institutions they are employed as teachers, matrons,
bookkeepers, supervisors, State agents for placing dependent children,
etc. The Milwaukee Industrial School for Girls, supported partly by
public and partly by private funds, is the only institution managed
entirely by women.
There are no women physicians at any of the State institutions. One
woman was appointed county physician in Waukesha, and one or two have
been made city physicians.
The office of police matron was established by city ordinance in
Milwaukee in 1884. There is none in any other city.
Women act as notaries public and court commissioners.
Women could not sit on any State Boards until the Legislature of 1901
authorized the appointment of one woman on the Board of Regents for
the State University, and one on that of the State Normal School. It
also authorized the appointment of a woman State Factory Inspector.
OCCUPATIONS: No profession or occupation is legally forbidden to
women.
EDUCATION: In 1851 the regents of the State University took a stand in
favor of co-education. In 1866 an Act reorganizing the university
declared that in all its departments it should be opened to male and
female students; but owing to prejudices it was not until 1873 that
complete co-education was established, although women were graduated
in 1869. All institutions of learning are open alike to both sexes.
In the public schools there are 2,654 men and 9,811 women teachers.
The average monthly salary of the men is $41; of the women, $29.50.
FOOTNOTES:
[464] The History is indebted for most of the material in this chapter
to the Rev. Olympia Brown of Racine, president of the State Woman
Suffrage Association since 1884.
[465] The other officers at present are: Vice-presidents, Mrs. Ellen
A. Rose and Mrs. Madge Waters; chairman executive committee, Mrs. Etta
Gardner; corresponding secretary, Mrs. M. Geddes; recording secretary,
Miss Emma Graham; treasurer, Mrs. Lydia Woodward; State organizer, the
Rev. Alice Ball Loomis; district presidents, Dr. Abby M. Adams,
Mesdames Kate Taylor, M. A. Fowler, L. A. Rhodes, Augusta Morris,
Alura Collins Hollister, L. M. Eastman, Mary Upham, Emma Shores and
Sylvia Rogers; press committee, Mesdames Sarah Buck, Clara F.
Eastland, Jennie Beck and Dora Putnam; finance committee, Mesdames
Anna Gile, Donald Jones and J. B. Hamilton.
[466] Besides those mentioned above, Mesdames Nancy Comstock,
Josephine DeGroat, M. A. Derrick, M. A. Fowler, M. M. Frazier, Laura
James, Dr. Sarah Monroe, E. A. Rose, S. A. Rhodes, Burr Sprague and
Lydia Woodward all have been most valuable helpers. Among generous
contributors have been W. H. Crosby, Charles Erskine; Mesdames L. J.
Barlow, Laura C. Demmon, Almeda B. Gray, Mary E. Hulett, Emma V.
Laughton, Mary Merrill, Margaret Messenger, Hannah Patchen, Dr. Laura
Ross Wolcott, Emeline Wolcott and Park Wooster; those who have aided
by the pen are Mesdames Marian V. Dudley, Clara Eastland, Hattie Tyng
Gardner, Etta Gardner, C. V. Leighton and Minnie Stebbins Savage.
[467] The State constitution provides that the suffrage may be
extended by a law submitted to the electors at any general election.
If it receives a majority vote it is held to have the force of a
constitutional amendment.
[468] The open letter addressed to Judge Cassody, March 28, 1888, by
Mrs. Brown, in regard to this decision, was pronounced by the best
lawyers as unsurpassed in logic, legal acumen, keen sarcasm and
righteous indignation. [Eds.
[469] E. P. Wilder, associate editor of the Madison _State Journal_,
chief official organ of the Republican party, made an excellent
address at this time in favor of woman suffrage, which was afterwards
printed as a leaflet.
[470] This is believed to be the only case on record where the age of
protection has been lowered. The amendment was urged by Senator P. J.
Clawson of Monroe, Green County At its next meeting the county
suffrage society passed the strongest possible denunciatory
resolutions, and thereafter its members worked diligently to defeat
Mr. Clawson for the nomination to Congress, which they succeeded in
doing.
CHAPTER LXXII.
WYOMING.[471]
It is said that a contented people or a happy life is one without a
history. The cause of woman suffrage in Wyoming has not been marked by
agitation or strife, and for that reason there is no struggle to
record, as is the case in all other States. In its story Mrs. Esther
Morris must ever be considered the heroine. A native of New York, she
joined her husband and three sons in 1869 at South Pass, then the
chief town of Wyoming. She was a strong advocate of the
enfranchisement of women and succeeded in enlisting the co-operation
of Col. William H. Bright, president of the first Legislative Council
of the Territory, which that very year passed a bill conferring on
women the full elective franchise and the right to hold all offices.
Gov. John A. Campbell was in some doubt as to signing it, but a body
of women in Cheyenne, headed by Mrs. Amalia Post (wife of Morton E.
Post, delegate to Congress), went to his residence and announced their
intention of staying until he did so. A vacancy occurring soon
afterward in the office of Justice of the Peace at South Pass, the
Governor appointed Mrs. Morris on petition of the county attorney and
commissioners. She tried between thirty and forty cases and none was
appealed to a higher court.[472]
In 1871 a bill to repeal this woman suffrage law was passed by the
Legislature and vetoed by Governor Campbell. An attempt to pass it
over his veto failed. No proposition to abolish it ever was made in
the Legislature thereafter.
In 1884, fifteen years after women had first voted in Wyoming, U. S.
District Attorney Melville C. Brown, at the request of Miss Susan B.
Anthony, sent to the National Association an extended resume of the
status of women suffrage in the Territory, to which he himself had
been opposed in 1869. It expressed throughout the most emphatic
approval without any qualifications. Some of the statements were as
follows:
Women have exercised their elective franchise, at first not very
generally but of late with universality, and with such good
judgment and modesty as to commend it to the men of all parties
who hold the good of the Territory in high esteem.... It has been
stated that the best women do not avail themselves of the
privilege. This is maliciously false.... The foolish claim has
also been made that the influence of the ballot upon women is
bad. This is not true. It is impossible that a woman's character
can be contaminated in associating with men for a few minutes in
going to the polls any more than it would be in going to church
or to places of amusement. On the other hand women are benefited
and improved by the ballot.... The fact is, Wyoming has the
noblest and best women in the world because they have more
privileges and know better how to use them.
To conclude I will say: Woman suffrage is a settled fact here,
and will endure as long as the Territory. It has accomplished
much good; it has harmed no one; therefore we are all in favor,
and none can be found to raise a voice against it.
In the convention called the first Monday of September, 1889, to
prepare a constitution for admission as a State, this was the first
clause presented for consideration:
The right of citizens of the State of Wyoming to vote and hold
office shall not be denied or abridged on account of sex. Both
male and female citizens of this State shall enjoy all civil,
political and religious rights and privileges.
After just twenty years' experience of woman suffrage no man in this
convention was found in opposition to it, but to the surprise of the
members, one delegate, A. C. Campbell of Laramie, proposed to amend
this section by making it a separate article to be voted upon apart
from the rest of the constitution. He supported his amendment by a
long speech in which he said that he himself should vote in favor of
the article and, from his observations throughout the Territory, he
believed two-thirds or more of the people would do the same, but he
thought they ought to have a chance to express themselves; that "they
were going to have a pretty tough time anyhow getting into the Union,
and if they put in a proposition of this kind without giving those
persons who were opposed to woman suffrage a chance to express
themselves, they would vote against the whole constitution."
The other members of the convention looked upon this as a scheme of
the opponents, and Mr. Campbell had no support to his proposition. On
the contrary, the most eloquent addresses were made by George W.
Baxter, Henry A. Coffeen, C. W. Holden, Asbury B. Conaway, Melville C.
Brown, Charles H. Burritt and John W. Hoyt demanding that the suffrage
clause should stand in the constitution regardless of consequences.
Space will permit only the keynote of these courageous speeches.[473]
MR. BAXTER: ... I defend this because it is right, because it is
fair, because it is just.... I shall ever regard as a
distinguished honor my membership in this convention, which, for
the first time in the history of all this broad land, rising
above the prejudice and injustice of the past, will incorporate
into the fundamental law of the State a provision that shall
secure to every citizen within her borders not only the
protection of the courts, but the absolute and equal enjoyment of
every right and privilege guaranteed under the law to any other
citizen.
MR. COFFEEN: ... The question, as I take it, is already settled
in the hearts and minds and judgments of the people of our
glorious State proposed-to-be, and shall we stand here to-day and
debate over it when every element of justice and right and
equality is in its favor; when not one iota of weight of argument
has been brought against it; when every word that can be said is
in favor of continuing the good results of woman suffrage, which
we have experienced for twenty years?... I shall not go into the
policy or propriety of submitting such a proposition as this now
before us to the people of this Territory....
MR. HOLDEN: I do not desire at this time to offer any reason why
the right to vote should be granted to women; that is not the
question before us. The question is, shall we secure that right
by fundamental law? The proposition now under consideration is,
shall we leave it to the people of Wyoming to say whether or not
the privilege of voting shall be secured to women? Now, Mr.
Chairman, I believe that I voice the wishes of my constituency
when I say that rather than surrender the right which the women
of this Territory have so long enjoyed--and which they have used
not only with credit to themselves but with profit to the country
in which they live--I say that rather than surrender that right
we will remain in a Territorial condition throughout the endless
cycles of time.
MR. CONAWAY: ... The sentiment of this convention, and I believe
of the people whom we represent, is so nearly unanimous that
extended discussion, it seems to me, would be a waste of
time.... If it were proposed to submit to a vote of the people
whether the property of the gentleman from Laramie should be
taken from him, or my property should be taken from me and given
to somebody else, there would be no difference of opinion upon
it. In Wyoming this right of our women has been recognized, has
been enjoyed; there are such things in law as vested rights, and
the decisions of our courts are unanimous that it is not within
the power of the Legislature ever to take away from any person
his rights or his property and to confer them upon another, and
that is what this clause proposes to do, to submit to a vote
whether we shall take away from one-half of our citizens--and, as
my friend has well stated, the better half--a certain right, and
increase the rights of the other half by so doing....
MR. BROWN: I was a member of that second Legislature which tried
to disfranchise women.... From that day to the present no man in
the Legislature of Wyoming has been heard to lift his voice
against woman suffrage. It has become one of the fundamental laws
of the land, and to raise any question about it at this time is
as improper, in my judgment, as to raise a question as to any
other fundamental right guaranteed to any citizen in this
Territory. I would sooner think, Mr. Chairman, of submitting to
the people of Wyoming a separate and distinct proposition as to
whether a male citizen of the Territory shall be entitled to
vote....
MR. HOYT: ... For twenty years the women of this Territory have
taken part with the men in its government, and have exercised
this right of suffrage equally with them, and we are all proud of
the results. No man in Wyoming ever has dared to say that woman
suffrage is a failure. There has been no disturbance of the
domestic relations, there has been no diminution of the social
order, there has been no lessening of the dignity which
characterizes the exercise of the elective franchise; there have
been, on the contrary, an improvement of the social order, better
laws, better officials, a higher civilization. Why, then, this
extraordinary proposition that, after so many years, having
exercised with us the right of suffrage since the foundation of
this Territorial government, women are now to be singled out, to
be set aside, and the question submitted to a vote as to whether
they shall have a continuance of the rights which have been given
to them by unanimous consent, and which they have exercised
wisely and properly and, as my friend says, with profit to the
whole Territory? This is indeed an extraordinary proposition, to
submit to a vote the continuance of a vested right. I will not
impugn the motives of the gentleman who makes it, but I demand as
a matter of justice that it shall be voted down by an
overwhelming majority, and I would that he had never presented
it.... We are told that if we put this clause into our
constitution as a fundamental law, we shall fail to secure its
approval by the people of Wyoming and its acceptance by the
Congress of the United States; but if it should so prove that the
adoption of this provision to protect the rights of the women
should work against our admission, then I agree with my friend,
Mr. Holden, that we will remain out of the Union until a
sentiment of justice shall prevail....
MR. BURRITT: ... Mr. Campbell destroyed any argument that he made
in favor of this amendment by saying, first, that woman suffrage
as a principle is right; second, that he would vote for it if
presented to the people. And he further said that he was not
afraid, in defending the right of petition, to come before this
convention and indorse this proposition to be separately voted
upon, even if it cost him the ladies' vote or the votes of any
other class. That certainly is very courageous on the part of the
gentleman from Laramie.... But I will say this much in addition,
which he did not say, that, as a member of this convention and
believing the right of suffrage to be a vested right, of which it
would be wrong and wicked for us to attempt to deprive women, I
have also the courage to rise above the single constituent that I
have in Johnson County who is opposed to woman suffrage (and I
know but one) and to rise above the majority even of its citizens
if I knew they were opposed, and I am sure that this convention
and this State have as much courage as I have. Believing that
woman suffrage is right, I am sure that this convention has the
courage to go before Congress and say that if they will not let
us in with this plank in our State constitution we will stay out
forever.... I stand upon the platform of justice, and I advocate
the continuance of the right of women to vote and hold office and
enjoy equally with men all civil, religious and political
privileges, and that this right be incorporated as a part of the
fundamental law of the State....
The woman suffrage clause was retained as a part of the constitution,
which was adopted by more than a three-fourths majority of the popular
vote.
A bill to provide for the admission of Wyoming as a State was
introduced into the House of Representatives on Dec. 18, 1889, and
later was favorably reported from the Committee on Territories by
Charles S. Baker of New York. A minority report was presented by
William M. Springer of Illinois, consisting of twenty-three pages, two
devoted to various other reasons for non-admission and twenty-one to
objections because of the woman suffrage article.
As it was supposed that the new State would be Republican, a bitter
fight was waged by the Democrats, using the provision for woman
suffrage as a club. The bill was grandly championed by Joseph M.
Carey, delegate from the Territory (afterward United States senator)
who defended the suffrage clause with the same courage and ability as
all the others in the constitution.[474]
The principal speech in opposition was by Joseph E. Washington of
Tennessee, who said in part:
My chief objection to the admission of Wyoming is the suffrage
article in the constitution. I am unalterably opposed to female
suffrage in any form. It can only result in the end in unsexing
and degrading the womanhood of America. It is emphatically a
reform against nature.... I have no doubt that in Wyoming to-day
women vote in as many [different] precincts as they can reach on
horseback or on foot after changing their frocks and bustles....
Tennessee has not yet adopted any of these new-fangled ideas, not
that we are lacking in respect for true and exalted
womanhood.[475]
William C. Oates of Alabama also delivered a long speech in
opposition, of which the following is a specimen paragraph:
I like a woman who is a woman and appreciates the sphere to which
God and the Bible have assigned her. I do not like a man-woman.
She may be intelligent and full of learning, but when she assumes
the performance of the duties and functions assigned by nature to
man, she becomes rough and tough and can no longer be the object
of affection.
He concluded his argument by saying that if ever universal suffrage
should prevail the Government would break to pieces of its own weight.
The enfranchisement of women was also vehemently attacked by Alexander
M. Dockery of Missouri, George T. Barnes of Georgia, William M.
Springer of Illinois, and William McAdoo of New Jersey. It was
strongly defended by Henry L. Morey of Ohio, Charles S. Baker of New
York, Daniel Kerr and I. S. Struble, both of Iowa, and Harrison B.
Kelley of Kansas.
Every possible effort was made to compel the adoption of an amendment
limiting the suffrage to male citizens, and it was defeated by only
six votes. The bill of admission was passed March 28, 1890, after
three days' discussion, by 139 ayes to 127 noes. During the progress
of this debate Delegate Carey telegraphed to the Wyoming Legislature,
then in session, that it looked as if the suffrage clause would have
to be abandoned if Statehood were to be obtained, and the answer came
back: "We will remain out of the Union a hundred years rather than
come in without woman suffrage."[476]
In the Senate the fight against the suffrage article was renewed with
added intensity. The bill for the admission of Wyoming was reported
favorably through the chairman of the Committee on Territories,
Orville H. Platt of Connecticut, in January, 1890, but was not reached
on the calendar until February 17. On objection from Francis M.
Cockrell of Missouri, that there was not time then for its
consideration, it was postponed, but without losing its place on the
calendar. Not until May 2, however, did it come up again as unfinished
business, and only to be again postponed. On May 8 the bill was set
down for the following Monday, but it was June 25 before it finally
received extended consideration. The debate continued for three days
and the clause conferring suffrage on women took a prominent place.
George G. Vest of Missouri led the opposition and said in the course
of his lengthy oration:
I shall never vote to admit into the Union any State that adopts
woman suffrage. I do not propose to discuss the sentimental side
of the question.... In my judgment woman suffrage is antagonistic
to the spirit, to the institutions, of the people of the United
States. It is utterly antagonistic to my ideas of the Government
as the fathers made it and left it to us. If there were no other
reason I would never give the right of suffrage to women because
the danger to the institutions of the United States to-day is in
hurried, spasmodic, sentimental suffrage.... I believe that with
universal suffrage in this country, the injecting into our
suffrage of all the women of the United States would be the
greatest calamity that could possibly happen to our institutions
and people.... If there were no other reason with me, I would
vote against the admission of Wyoming because it has that feature
in its constitution. I will not take the responsibility as a
senator of indorsing in any way, directly or indirectly, woman
suffrage. I repeat that in my judgment it would be not only a
calamity but an absolute crime against the institutions of the
people of the United States....
In an extended speech John H. Reagan of Texas said:
But what are we going to do, what are the people of this
Territory going to do, by the adoption of this constitution? They
are going to make men of women, and when they do that the
correlative must take place that men must become women. So I
suppose we are to have women for public officers, women to do
military duty, women to work the roads, women to fight the
battles of the country, and men to wash the dishes, men to nurse
the children, men to stay at home while the ladies go out and
make stump speeches in canvasses.... Mr. President, when the
Almighty created men and women He made them for different
purposes, and six thousand years of experience have recognized
the wisdom and justice of the Almighty in this arrangement. It is
only latterly that people have got wiser than their Creator and
wiser than all the generations which have preceded them.... The
constitution of society, the necessity for the existence of
society, the necessity of home government, which is the most
important of all the parts of government, can only be preserved
and perpetuated by keeping men in their sphere and women in their
sphere....
It is a wholesome thing to reflect that after a hard day's
struggle and of rough contacts which men must have with each
other, they can go to a home presided over by one there who
soothes the passions of the day by the sweetness of her temper,
the gentleness of her disposition and the happiness which she
brings around the family circle. But if the wife and the husband
are both out in the bitter contests of the day, making speeches,
electioneering with voters, pushing their way to the polls, they
will both be apt to go home in a bad humor, and there will not be
much happiness in a family during the remainder of the day which
follows such a scene. And while they are both out what will
become of the children? Are they to take care of themselves?
What rights can women expect to have that they do not have now?
They are clothed with the protection of law.[477] In my judgment,
Mr. President, the day that the floodgate of female suffrage is
opened upon this country, the social organism will have reached
the point at which decay and ruin begin.... Why, sir, what is the
advantage? If the head of the family votes he is apt to reflect
the views of the family. It is more convenient than to have all
the family going out to vote.
Wilbur F. Sanders of Montana interrupted Senator Reagan to ask if the
law should not be an expression of the intellectual and moral sense of
all the people, and whether governments did not derive their just
powers from the consent of the governed.
John T. Morgan of Alabama entered into a long and sarcastic argument
to prove that if a woman could vote in Wyoming she might be sent to
Congress and then she could not be admitted because the law says a
senator or representative "must be an inhabitant of the State in which
_he_ is chosen." He ignored the fact that all legal papers are made
out with this pronoun, which presents no difficulty in their
application to women.
Henry B. Payne of Ohio said that he was not in favor of woman
suffrage, and that no woman in England ever had been permitted to
exercise the elective franchise. (Women then had been voting in
England for twenty-one years, the same length of time as in Wyoming.)
He asked, however, if these little technical objections would not be
more than overcome by the moral influence that a woman Representative
might exert in the committee rooms and on the floor of the House.
Mr. Morgan at once launched forth into a panegyric on the moral
influence of woman which certainly demonstrated that if sentimentalism
were a bar to voting, as Senators Vest and Reagan had insisted it
should be, the senator from Alabama would have to be disfranchised.
Part of it ran as follows:
It is not the moral influence of woman upon the ballot that I am
objecting to, and it is not to get rid of that or to silence or
destroy such influence that I oppose it, but it is the immoral
influence of the ballot upon woman that I deprecate and would
avoid. I do not want to see her drawn into contact with the rude
things of this world, where the delicacy of her senses and
sensibilities would be constantly wounded by the attrition with
bad and desperate and foul politicians and men. Such is not her
function and is not her office; and if we degrade her from the
high station that God has placed her in to put her at the
ballot-box, at political or other elections, we unman ourselves
and refuse to do the duties that God has assigned to us.
I can say for myself and for those who are dearest to me of all
the objects in this life, that I would leave a country where it
was necessary that my wife and daughters should go to the polls
to protect my liberties. I would just as soon see them shoulder
their guns and go like Amazons into the field and fight beneath
the flag for my liberties, as to see them muster on election day
for any such purpose.[478]
James K. Jones of Arkansas based his argument on the estimate of an
equal number of men and women in Wyoming, and assumed that all the
women had voted in favor of the suffrage clause and that therefore it
did not represent the wishes of men, thus denying wholly the right of
women to a voice in a matter which so vitally concerned themselves. In
reality women formed considerably less than one-third of the adult
population, while the constitution was adopted by more than a
three-fourths vote.
William M. Stewart of Nevada and Algernon S. Paddock of Nebraska
defended the right of the Territory to decide this question for
itself.
George Gray of Delaware declared his belief that "woman suffrage is
inimical to the best interests of society." John C. Spooner of
Wisconsin disapproved the enfranchisement of women, but believed
Wyoming had a right to place it in its constitution.
Orville H. Platt of Connecticut in urging the acceptance of the report
said:
I never have been an advocate of woman suffrage. I never
believed, as some senators do, that it was wise. But with all
that, I would not keep a Territory out of the Union as a State
because its constitution did allow women to vote, nor would I
force upon a Territory any restriction or qualification as to
what its vote should be in that respect. When Washington
Territory came here and asked for admission and the bill was
passed, it had had woman suffrage, and I was appealed to by a
great many citizens all over the United States to keep it out of
the Union, so far as my action could do so, until it restored the
right of women to vote which had been taken away under a decision
of its own courts--taken away, as I thought, unjustly; for I did
not consider that decision good law. The senator from
Massachusetts, Mr. Hoar, interrogated me when I was advocating
the admission of Washington as to why we did not incorporate into
that enabling act some language that should undo the wrong which
had been done by the Supreme Court of the Territory and restore
to women the right of voting. I said then, as I say now, that I
think this is a matter which belongs to the Territory; and I am
surprised that gentlemen who are so devoted to home rule as a
sacred right which should never be interfered with in this
republic, should not be willing to allow to a Territory, when it
asks for admission, the right to determine whether women should
or should not be permitted to vote by the constitution of the
proposed State.... Why should we, the Congress of the United
States, stand here and say to that Territory, where women have
enjoyed the right of voting for twenty years, and nobody arises
to gainsay it or to intimate that they have not exercised the
right wisely, why should we stand here and say: "Keep out of the
Union; we will let no community, no Territory, in here which does
not deprive its women of the right they have enjoyed while in a
Territorial condition"?
After every possible device to strike out the obnoxious clause had
been exhausted, the bill to admit Wyoming as a State was passed on
June 27, 1890, by 29 ayes, 18 noes, 37 absent.[479] Although Henry W.
Blair of New Hampshire and Henry M. Teller of Colorado interposed
remarks showing a thorough belief in the enfranchisement of women,
there was no formal argument in its behalf, it being generally
understood that all Republicans would vote for the bill in order to
admit a Republican State, and a number did so who were not in favor of
woman suffrage.
When the people of Wyoming met at Cheyenne, July 23, to celebrate
their Statehood, by Gov. Francis E. Warren sat Mrs. Amalia Post,
president of the Woman Suffrage Association. The first and principal
oration of the day was made by Mrs. Theresa A. Jenkins, of which the
History of Wyoming says:
Proceeding to the front of the platform, Mrs. Jenkins, in clear,
forceful tones which penetrated to the very outskirts of the
crowd, delivered without manuscript or notes an address which in
logic and eloquence has rarely if ever been equaled by any woman
in the land.... At its conclusion she received an ovation and was
presented with a magnificent basket of flowers.