After considerable uproar these were referred to a select committee on

which were placed two ladies, Mary L. Booth and Julia A. Wilbur, both

strong supporters of Miss Anthony. The committee brought in a majority

report in favor of the resolutions but this make-shift minority report

was adopted: "In our opinion the colored children of the State should

enjoy equal advantages of education with the white." Miss Anthony then

proceeded to throw another bomb by presenting this resolution:

Since the true and harmonious development of the race demands that

the sexes be associated together in every department of life;

therefore

_Resolved_, That it is the duty of all our schools, colleges and

universities to open their doors to woman and to give her equal and

identical educational advantages side by side with her brother man.

This opened the flood gates. Motions to lay on the table, to refer to a

committee, etc., were voted down. A few strong speeches were made in

favor, but most of them were in opposition and very bitter, insisting

that "it was sought to uproot the theory and practice of the whole

world." The antique Professor Davies was in his element. He declared:

"Here is an attempt to introduce a vast social evil. I have been trying

for four years,[_i.e._ ever since Miss Anthony's first appearance at a

teachers' convention] to escape this question, but if it has to come,

let it be boldly met and disposed of. I am opposed to anything that has

a tendency to impair the sensitive delicacy and purity of the female

character or to remove the restraints of life. These resolutions are

the first step in the school which seeks to abolish marriage, and

behind this picture I see a monster of social deformity."

Another speaker, whose name is lost in oblivion, said in tones which

would melt a heart of stone: "Shall an oak and a rose tree receive the

same culture? Better to us is the clear, steady, softened, silvery

moonlight of woman's quiet, unobtrusive influence, than the flashes of

electricity showing that the true balance of nature is destroyed. Aye,

better a thousand times is it than the glimmering ignus fatuus rising

from decayed hopes and leading the deluded follower to those horrible

quagmires of social existence--amalgamation and Mormonism."

Prof. John W. Buckley, of Brooklyn, opposed the resolution in coarse

and abusive language. State Superintendent of Public Instruction Henry

H. Van Dyck demolished its last hope when he demanded with outstretched

arm and pointed finger: "Do you mean to say you want the boys and girls

to room side by side in dormitories? To educate them together can have

but one result!"

The Binghamton Daily Republican said: "Miss Anthony vindicated her

resolutions with eloquence, force, spirit and dignity, and showed

herself a match, at least, in debate for any member of the convention.

She was equal if not identical. Whatever may be thought of her notions

or sense of propriety in her bold and conspicuous position, personally,

intellectually and socially speaking, there can be but one opinion as

to her superior energy, ability and moral courage; and she may well be

regarded as an evangel and heroine by her own sex."

The woman who advocated co-education in those days was indeed in a

"bold and conspicuous position." The resolutions were lost by a large

majority. Even if every man present had voted against them, there were

enough women to have carried them had they voted in the affirmative.

The Republican said: "If the lady members had voted so as to be heard

we know not what would have been the result; but their voices, to say

the least, have not been ordained by the Creator to be equal or

identical with man's, and are drowned by his louder sounds." Mrs.

Stanton's opinion can best be learned by an extract from a letter:

I see by the papers that you have once more stirred that pool of

intellectual stagnation, the educational convention. What an

infernal set of fools those schoolmarms must be! Well, if in order

to please men they wish to live on air, let them. The sooner the

present generation of women dies out, the better. We have idiots

enough in the world now without such women propagating any more....

The New York Times was really quite complimentary. Mr. Stanton

brought every item he could find about you. "Well, my dear," he

would say, "another notice of Susan. You stir up Susan, and she

stirs the world." I was glad you went to torment those devils. I

guess they will begin to think their time has come. I glory in your

perseverance. O, Susan, I will do anything to help you on. You and

I have a prospect of a good long life. We shall not be in our prime

before fifty, and after that we shall be good for twenty years at

least. If we do not make old Davies shake in his boots or turn in

his grave, I am mistaken.

The proceedings of the convention were published in full in the New

York Tribune, and Miss Anthony received letters of commendation from

Judge William Hay, Charles L. Reason, superintendent of the New York

city colored schools, and many others. William Marvin, of Binghamton,

wrote: "The sympathy of the people here, during the teachers'

association, was decidedly with you. A vote from the audience would

have carried any one of your resolutions."

In the autumn the anti-slavery meetings were resumed, and Miss Anthony

was unsparing of herself and everybody else. Parker Pillsbury

complained: "What a task-mistress our general agent is proving herself.

I expect as soon as women get command, an end will have come to all our

peace. We shall yet have societies for the protection of men's rights,

in the cause of which many of us will have to be martyrs." Her brother,

Daniel R., was sending frequent letters from Kansas containing graphic

descriptions of the terrible condition of affairs in that unhappy

territory, and scathing denunciations of the treachery of northern

"dough faces," thus fanning the fires of patriotism that glowed in her

breast and filling her with renewed zeal for the cause to which she was

giving her time and strength. During these days she wrote a cherished

sister:

Though words of love are seldom written or spoken by one of us to

the other, there must ever remain the abiding faith that the heart

still beats true and fond. Our family is now so widely separated

that our enjoyment must consist in soul communing. Indeed, I almost

believe in the power of affection to draw unto itself the yearning

heart of the absent one. What the modern Spiritualist tells of

feeling the presence of departed friends and enjoying their loving

ministrations, I sometimes imagine to be true, not of the spirits

of those gone hence, but of those still in the body who are

separated from us. I often pass blessed moments in these sweet,

silent communings.... Every day brings to me new conceptions of

life and its duties, and it is my constant desire that I may be

strong and fearless, baring my arm to the encounter and pressing

cheerfully forward, though the way is rough and thorny.

I have just returned from the hardest three weeks' tour of

anti-slavery meetings I have had yet, so cold and disheartening.

The masses seem devoid of conscience and looking only for some new

expedient to accomplish the desired good; but in every town there

are some true spirits who walk in God's sunlight and do what is

right, trusting results to the great Immutable Law.... I wish all

the dear ones would write me more often. Though I am sure of their

affection, yet when the soul is burdened and one is surrounded by

strangers, a letter from a loved one brings healing to the spirit,

and I need it more than I can tell.

There is scarcely a letter to her own family, in the large number

preserved, which does not express a longing for love and sympathy, a

craving that no public career, no devotion to any cause, however

absorbing, ever eradicates from the human soul.

Although so fully occupied, Miss Anthony did not neglect the beloved

cause of woman. This year, however, when she attempted to arrange for

the annual convention, she found to her dismay that every one of the

speakers whom she always depended upon was unable to be present because

of maternal duties. Some were anticipating an event, others had very

young infants, and the older women were kept at home by expected or

recently arrived grandchildren. She was used to overcoming obstacles,

but the conditions on this occasion were too much for her and, with

feelings which can not well be put into language, she was obliged to

give up the national convention, the only one omitted from 1850 to

1861.

Amidst the hard work and many disappointments of the year, there is one

gleam of humor in what was known to the family as "Susan's raspberry

experiment." During her wanderings she visited her friend Sarah Hallock

who had made a great success of raspberry culture, selling 40,000

baskets during the season, and she did not see why she could not do

quite as well. She unfolded her plan to her father, who supported her

in that as in everything and gave her as much ground as she desired.

While at home for a short time she had this underdrained and prepared,

$100 worth of raspberry plants set out and staked; then went away and

left the family to look after them. The father was in the city all day

attending to business, the sister Mary teaching school, the mother was

not well and there was no one else but the hired man, who knew nothing

about the culture of raspberries and was otherwise occupied; so the

bushes took their chances.

The fame of the experiment, however, spread far and wide, the

newspapers announced that Miss Anthony had bought a large farm and

stocked it with raspberries; that she had abandoned the platform and

taken up fruit culture. She received scores of letters asking

information as to the best plants and most successful methods, others

begging her not to give up public work, and many from friends who had

no end of fun at her expense. The bushes grew and bore fruit enough to

give the family a number of delicious meals. Then a very cold winter

followed and there was no one to care for the tender plants. In

December came a letter from the irrepressible brother-in-law, Aaron

McLean: "As to your raspberry 'spec,' I regret to tell you it has 'gone

up.' The poor, little, helpless things expired of a bad cold about two

weeks since. Do you remember that text of Scripture, which says, 'She

who by the plow would thrive, herself must either hold or drive'? It

has cost you $200 to learn the truth of it." Her sister Mary wrote: "I

hope, Susan, when you get a husband and children, you will treat them

better than you did your raspberry plants, and not leave them to their

fate at the beginning of winter."

It was a deep regret to Miss Anthony that she could not give the

necessary time and care to make this experiment a success, as she was

anxious to encourage women to go into the pursuit of agriculture,

horticulture, floriculture, anything which would take them out of

doors. In a letter to Mr. Higginson she says: "The salvation of the

race depends, in a great measure, upon rescuing women from their

hothouse existence. Whether in kitchen, nursery or parlor, all alike

are shut away from God's sunshine. Why did not your Caroline Plummer,

of Salem, why do not all of our wealthy women leave money for

industrial and agricultural schools for girls, instead of ever and

always providing for boys alone?" This is one of the many instances

where Miss Anthony foreshadowed reforms and improvements which have

been fulfilled in the present generation.

In 1858 is presented same routine of unremitting work which

characterized so many previous years. The winter was given up to

anti-slavery meetings with their attendant hardships. Miss Anthony has

great scorn for those who talk regretfully of the "good old days." She

thinks one lecture season under the conditions which then existed would

be an effectual cure to any longing for them one might have. The

conveniences of modern life, bathrooms with plenty of hot water,

toiletrooms, steam-heated houses, gas and hundreds of comforts so

common at the present time that one scarcely can realize they have not

always existed, were comparatively unknown. One of the greatest trials

these travellers had to endure was the wretched cooking which was the

rule and not exception among our much-praised foremothers. In one of

the old diaries is this single ejaculation, "O, the crimes that are

committed in the kitchens of this land!" In those days the housewife

could not step around the corner and buy for two cents a cake of yeast

which insured good bread, but the process of yeast-making was long and

difficult and not well understood by the average housekeeper, so a

substitute was found in "salt risings," and a heavy indigestible mass

generally resulted. White flour was little used and was of a poor

quality. Baking powder was unknown and all forms of cakes and warm

bread were made with sour milk and soda, easily ruined by too much or

too little of the latter. In no particular did the table compare

favorably with that of modern families.

[Illustration: THE FARM-HOME NEAR ROCHESTER, N.Y., 1845-65.]

The anti-slavery and woman's rights lecturers always accepted private

hospitality when offered, for reasons of economy and, as many of the

people who favored these reforms were seeking light in other directions

also, they were very apt to find themselves the guests of "cranks" upon

the food question and were thus made the subject of most of the

experiments in vogue at that period. On one occasion Miss Anthony,

Aaron Powell and Oliver Johnson were entertained by prominent and

well-to-do people in a town near New York, who had not a mouthful for

any of the three meals except nuts, apples and coarse bran stirred in

water and baked. At the end of one day the men ignominiously fled and

left her to stay over Sunday and hold the Monday meeting. She lived

through it but on Tuesday started for New York and never stopped till

she reached Delmonico's, where she revelled in a porterhouse steak and

a pot of coffee.

During these winter meetings all of the men broke down physically and

their letters were filled with complaints of their heads, their backs,

their lungs, their throats and their eyes. Garrison wrote at one time:

"I hope to be present at the meeting but I can not foresee what will be

my spinal condition at that time, and I could not think of appearing as

a 'Garrisonian Abolitionist' without a backbone." Miss Anthony never

lost a day or missed an engagement, although it may be imagined that

she had many hours of weariness when she would have been glad to drop

the burden for a while. On March 17 she writes: "How happy I am to lay

my head on my own home pillow once more after a long four months,

scarcely stopping a second night under one roof." Mr. May wrote in

behalf of the committee: "We rejoice with you in the success of your

meetings and in all your hopes for the upspringing of the good seed

sown by the faithful joint labors of you and your gallant little band.

We have made the following a committee of arrangements for the annual

meeting: Garrison, Phillips, Quincy, Johnson and Susan B. Anthony."

So she at once girded on her armor and began to prepare for the May

anniversary and, being determined the National Woman's Rights

Convention should not be omitted this year, she conducted also an

extensive correspondence in regard to that. Referring to all this

drudgery Lucy Stone urged: "Don't do it; quit common work such as a

common worker could do; and don't mourn over us and our babies. We are

growing workers. I know you are tired with your four months' work, but

it is not half so hard as taking care of a child night and day. I shall

not assume any responsibility for another convention till I have had my

ten daughters." But Miss Anthony knew that this "common work," this

hiring halls, raising money and advertising meetings was just what

nobody else could or would do. She understood also that while the other

women were at home "growing workers," somebody must be in the field

looking after the harvest.

Abby Hutchinson, the only sister in the famous family of singers, wrote

from their Jersey home, Dawnwood: "I want so much to help you; I have

longed to do some good with my voice but public life wears me out very

fast." Nevertheless she came and sang for them. Mrs. Stanton and Mrs.

Brown Blackwell brought new babies into the world a few weeks before

the convention, to Miss Anthony's usual discomfiture. She wrote to the

latter: "Mrs. Stanton sends her love to you and says if you are going

to have a large family, go right on and finish up as she has done. She

has only devoted eighteen years out of the very heart of her existence

to this great work. But I say, stop now."

The convention in Mozart Hall followed close upon the Anti-Slavery

Anniversary, Miss Anthony presided and there were the usual

distinguished speakers, Phillips, Pillsbury, Garrison, Douglass,

Higginson, Lucretia Mott, Mrs. Gage, Mrs. Rose, and, for the first

time, George William Curtis spoke on the woman's rights platform.

Notwithstanding this array of talent, the convention through all its

six sessions was threatened with a mob, encouraged by the Herald and

other New York papers. The disturbance at times was so great the

speakers could not be heard, even Curtis was greeted with hisses and

groans, but Miss Anthony stood at the helm unterrified through all and

did not leave her post until the last feature of the program was

completed and the convention adjourned. She was growing accustomed to

mobs.

In August, 1858, she attended the teachers' convention at Lockport. The

sensational feature of this meeting was the reading by Professor Davies

of the first cablegram from England, a message from the Queen to the

President. The press reports show that she took a prominent part in the

proceedings and possibly merited the name which some one gave her of

"the thorn in the side of the convention." These annual gatherings were

very largely in the nature of mutual admiration societies among the

men, who consumed much of the time in complimenting each other and the

rest of it in long-winded orations. During this one Miss Anthony arose

and said that, as all members had the same right to speak, she would

suggest that speeches should be limited so as to give each a chance.

She made some of the men furious by stating that they spoke so low they

could not be heard.

At another time she suggested that, as there were only a few hours left

for the business of the convention, they should not be frittered away

in trifling discussions, saying, "if she were a man she would be

ashamed to consume the time in telling how much she loved women and in

fulsome flattery of other men." She moved also that they set aside the

proposed discussion on "The Effects of High Intellectual Culture on the

Efficiency and Respectability of Manual Labor," and take up pressing

questions. When one man was indulging in a lot of the senseless twaddle

about his wife which many of them are fond of introducing in their

speeches, she called him to order saying that the kind of a wife he

had, had nothing to do with the subject. She introduced again the

resolution demanding equal pay for equal work without regard to sex. A

friend wrote of this occasion: "She arraigned those assembled teachers

for their misdemeanors as she would a class of schoolboys, in perfect

unconsciousness that she was doing anything unusual. We women never can

be sufficiently thankful to her for taking the hard blows and still

harder criticisms, while we reaped the benefits."

The press reports said: "Miss Anthony has gained in the estimation of

the teachers' convention, and is now listened to with great attention."

She gave her lecture on "Co-Education" to a crowded house of Lockport's

prominent citizens, introduced by President George L. Farnham, of

Syracuse, always her friend in those troublous days. By this time more

than a score of the eminent educators of the day had become her

steadfast friends, and they welcomed her to these conventions, aiding

her efforts in every possible manner. Rev. Samuel J. May, who had

delivered an address, upon his return home wrote: "You are a great

girl, and I wish there were thousands more in the world like you. Some

foolish old conventionalisms would be utterly routed, and the legal and

social disabilities of women would not long be what they are." Miss

Anthony herself, writing to Antoinette Blackwell, said: "I wish I had

time to tell you of my Lockport experience; it was rich. I never felt

so cool and self-possessed among the plannings and plottings of the few

old fogies, and they never appeared so frantic with rage. They

evidently felt that their reign of terror is about ended."

October, 1858, brought another crucial occasion. In Rochester, a young

man, Ira Stout, had been condemned to be hung for murder. A number of

persons strongly opposed to capital punishment believed this a suitable

time to make a demonstration. It was not that they doubted the guilt of

Stout, but they were opposed to the principle of what they termed

judicial murder. As the Anthonys and many of the leading Quaker

families, Frederick Douglass and a number of Abolitionists shared in

this opinion, it was not surprising that Miss Anthony undertook to get

up the meeting. In a cold rain she made the round of the orthodox

ministers but none would sign the call. The Universalist minister, Rev.

J.H. Tuttle, agreed to be present and speak. She secured thirty or

forty signatures, engaged the city hall and advertised extensively. The

feeling against Stout was very strong and there was a determination

among certain members of the community that this meeting should not be

held. Huge placards were posted throughout the city, urging all opposed

to the sentiments of the call to be out in force, a virtual invitation

to the mob.

When the evening arrived, October 7, the hall was filled with a crowd

of nearly 2,000, a large portion of whom only needed the word to break

into a riot. Miss Anthony called the assemblage to order and Frederick

Douglass was made chairman, but when he attempted to speak, his voice

was drowned with groans and yells. Aaron M. Powell, William C. Bloss

and others tried to make themselves heard but the mob had full sway.

Miss Anthony was greeted with a perfect storm of hisses. Finally the

demonstrations became so threatening that she and the other speakers

were hurried out of the hall by a rear door, the meeting was broken up

and the janitor turned out the lights. No attempt was made by the mayor

or police to quell the disturbance and mob law reigned supreme.

The brightest ray of sunshine in the closing days of 1858 was the

following letter from Mr. Phillips: "I have had given me $5,000 for the

woman's rights cause; to procure tracts on that subject, publish and

circulate them, pay for lectures and secure such other agitation of the

question as we deem fit and best to obtain equal civil and political

position for women. The name of the giver of this generous fund I am

not allowed to tell you. The only condition of the gift is that it is

to remain in my keeping. You, Lucy Stone and myself are a committee of

trustees to spend it wisely and efficiently." The donor proved to be

Francis Jackson, the staunch friend of the emancipation of woman as

well as the negro.

[Autograph:

With much respect and esteem,

Francis Jackson"]

[Footnote 24: Now Elizabeth Powell Bond, dean of Swarthmore College for

many years.]

[Footnote 25: The Bangor Jeffersonian said: "Miss Anthony is far from

being an impracticable enthusiast. Dignity, conscientiousness and

regard for the highest welfare of her sex, are the impressions which

one receives of her. Doubtless all (if any there were) who went to

scoff, remained to pray for the success of the doctrine she advocated.

Personally she is good-looking, of symmetrical figure and modest and

ladylike demeanor."

The Bangor Whig was equally favorable. The Ellsworth American said:

"Her enunciation is very clear and remarkably distinct, yet there is

nothing in it of the unfeminine character and tone which people had

been led to expect from the usual criticisms of the press. The lecture

itself, as an intellectual effort, was satisfactory as well to those

who dissented as to those who sympathized with its positions and

arguments. It was fruitful in ideas and suggestions and we doubt not

many a woman, and man too, went home that night, with the germ of more

active ideas in their heads than had gathered there for a twelvemonth

before."]

CHAPTER XI.

CONDITIONS PRIOR TO THE WAR.

1859.

Among Miss Anthony's many schemes for regenerating the world was one to

have a Free church in Rochester, after the manner of Theodore Parker's

in Boston, similar to an ethical society, where no doctrines should be

preached and all should be welcome, contributing what they chose. This

was in her mind for years, and at the beginning of 1859 she engaged

Corinthian Hall for Sunday evenings, her good friend, William A.

Reynolds, as usual making her a reduced rate; and here Antoinette Brown

Blackwell and Parker Pillsbury each preached for a month. She tried to

engage Mrs. Stanton for a year and also Aaron M. Powell, but the

financial support was too uncertain and the project had to be

abandoned. All her life, however, Miss Anthony cherished the hope of

seeing this Free church established and sustained. She arranged a

series of lectures for this winter. George William Curtis accepted her

invitation in this characteristic letter:

I think of no title for your course, but why have any? Why not say

simply, "A Course of Independent Lectures?" To call them woman's

rights would damn them in advance, so strong is prejudice. The only

one I have at all suited to your purpose is "Fair Play for

Women."[26] I hate the words "woman's rights," nor do they properly

describe my treatment of the question which, in my mind, is not one

of sex but of humanity. My lecture is a plea for the recognition of

the equal humanity of women and an assertion that they have rights

not as women but as human beings. In respect to terms, I leave it

with you. I usually receive $50, but you will understand that I

should prefer to pay the expenses myself rather than that you or

any one interested should expend a penny; so if you can not justly

give me anything, I shall be content.

[Autograph:

Yours very faithfully

George William Curtis]

Miss Anthony always came out of these lecture courses in debt, but she

would call upon her friends or borrow from sister or father enough to

make up the deficit, and replace the loan out of her scanty earnings.

She persisted in having them to educate the public on the progressive

questions of the day. At this time the long, severe mental and physical

strain of years began to be felt in her one weak spot, and the old

trouble with her back asserted itself. From every quarter came urgent

appeals for her assistance. At first she answered: "If New York calls a

constitutional convention for next spring, this will be a capital

winter to strike heavy blows for freedom and equality such as we shall

not have for a long time to come. I am ready just as soon as the armies

can be marshaled and equipped." But later she wrote:

It is being forced upon me that nature orders me to stay quietly at

home this winter and it may be that it is to enable me to get a

greater literary culture than I possibly could, amidst the hurry

and bustle of continual meetings. Somehow I can not philosophize

away a shrinking from going into active work. I can not get up a

particle of enthusiasm or faith in the success, either financial or

spiritual, of another series of conventions. For the past five

years I have gone through this routine and something within me

keeps praying to be spared from more of it. There has been such a

surfeit of lecturing, the people are tired of it. Then I never was

so poor in purse and I fear to end another campaign with a heavy

debt to still further encroach upon my small savings. I can not

bear to make myself dependent upon relatives for the food I eat and

the clothes I wear; I never have done it and hope I may never have

to. Perhaps I may feel a renewed faith in myself and my work but

the past years have brought me so much isolation and spiritual

loneliness, although in the midst of crowds, that I confess to a

longing to stay for awhile among my own people.

The commands of the physician were imperative that she should avoid all

fatigue and nervous excitement, but her pen was not idle, and the time

which she hoped to devote to the reading of many books was occupied in

sending out letters, petitions, appeals and the various documents

necessary to keep the work going. In answer to an invitation from the

Friends of Human Progress she wrote:

To be esteemed worthy to speak for woman, for the slave, for

humanity, is ever grateful to me, and I regret that I can not be

with you at your annual gathering to get for myself a fresh

baptism, a new and deeper faith. I would exhort all women to be

discontented with their present condition and to assert their

individuality of thought, word and action by the energetic doing of

noble deeds. Idle wishes, vain repinings, loud-sounding

declamations never can bring freedom to any human soul. What woman

most needs is a true appreciation of her womanhood, a self-respect

which shall scorn to eat the bread of dependence. Whoever consents

to live by "the sweat of the brow" of another human being

inevitably humiliates and degrades herself.... No genuine equality,

no real freedom, no true manhood or womanhood can exist on any

foundation save that of pecuniary independence. As a right over a

man's subsistence is a power over his moral being, so a right over

a woman's subsistence enslaves her will, degrades her pride and

vitiates her whole moral nature.

To her brother Daniel R., in Kansas, who was somewhat skeptical on the

woman question, she sent this strong letter:

Even the smallest human right denied, is large. The fact that the

ruling class withhold this right is prima facie evidence that they

deem it of importance for good or for evil. In either case,

therefore, the human being is outraged. It, perchance, may matter

but little whether Kansas be governed by a constitution made by her

bona fide settlers or by people of another State or by Congress;

but for Kansas to be denied the right to make her own constitution

and laws is an outrage not to be tolerated. So the constitution and

laws of a State and nation may be just as considerate of woman's

needs and wants as if framed by herself, yet for man to deny her

the right to a voice in making and administering them, is

paralleled only by the Lecompton usurpation. For any human being or

class of human beings, whether black, white, male or female, tamely

to submit to the denial of their right to self-government shows

that the instinct of liberty has been blotted out.

You blunder on this question of woman's rights just where thousands

of others do. You believe woman unlike man in her nature; that

conditions of life which any man of spirit would sooner die than

accept are not only endurable to woman but are needful to her

fullest enjoyment. Make her position in church, State, marriage,

your own; everywhere your equality ignored, everywhere made to feel

another empowered by law and time-honored custom to prescribe the

privileges to be enjoyed and the duties to be discharged by you;

and then if you can imagine yourself to be content and happy, judge

your mother and sisters and all women to be.

It was not because the three-penny tax on tea was so exorbitant

that our Revolutionary fathers fought and died, but to establish

the principle that such taxation was unjust. It is the same with

this woman's revolution; though every law were as just to woman as

to man, the principle that one class may usurp the power to

legislate for another is unjust, and all who are now in the

struggle from love of principle would still work on until the

establishment of the grand and immutable truth, "All governments

derive their just powers from the consent of the governed."

She wrote Lydia Mott: "The new encyclopedia is just out and I notice in

regard to Antoinette Brown Blackwell that it gives a full description

of her work up to the time of her marriage, then says: 'She married

Samuel Blackwell and lives near New York.' Not a word of the splendid

work she has done on the platform and in the pulpit since. Thus does

every married woman sink her individuality." This brought from Lydia a

spirited answer:

For my part, when you speak of the individuality of one who is

truly married being inevitably lost, I think you mistake. If there

ever was any individuality it will remain. I don't believe it is

necessary for development that the individual must always force

itself upon us. We naturally fall into the habits and frequently

the train of thought of those we love and I like the expression

"we" rather than "I." I never feel that my interests and actions

can be independent of the dear ones with whom I am surrounded. Even

the one who seems to be most absorbed may, in reality, possess the

strongest soul. This standing alone is not natural and therefore

can not be right. I am sure one of these days you will view this

matter from a different standpoint.

Miss Anthony so far yielded as to reply: "Institutions, among them

marriage, are justly chargeable with many social and individual ills

but, after all, the whole man or woman will rise above them. I am sure

my 'true woman' never will be crushed or dwarfed by them. Woman must

take to her soul a purpose and then make circumstances conform to this

purpose, instead of forever singing the refrain, 'if and if and if!'"

But later when one woman failed to keep a lecture engagement because

her husband wanted her to go somewhere with him, and another because

her husband was not willing she should leave home, she again poured out

her sorrows to her friend:

There is not one woman left who may be relied on, all have "first

to please their husband," after which there is but little time or

energy left to spend in any other direction. I am not complaining

or despairing, but facts are stern realities. The twain become one

flesh, the woman, "we"; henceforth she has no separate work, and

how soon the last standing monuments (yourself and myself, Lydia),

will lay down the individual "shovel and de hoe" and with proper

zeal and spirit grasp those of some masculine hand, the mercies and

the spirits only know. I declare to you that I distrust the power

of any woman, even of myself, to withstand the mighty matrimonial

maelstrom!

But how did I get into this dissertation? If to you it seems

morbid, pardon the pen-wandering. In the depths of my soul there is

a continual denial of the self-annihilating spiritual or legal

union of two human beings. Such union, in the very nature of

things, must bring an end to the free action of one or the other,

and it matters not to the individual whose freedom has thus

departed whether it be the gentle rule of love or the iron hand of

law which blotted out from the immortal being the individual

soul-stamp of the Good Father. How I do wish those who know

something of the real social needs of our age would rescue this

greatest, deepest, highest question from the present

unphilosophical, unspiritual discussers.

As might be expected, the legacy of $5,000 brought not only a flood of

requests from all parts of the country, but some division of opinion

among those who had it in control. Miss Anthony would use all of it in

the work of propaganda, lectures, conventions, tracts and newspaper

articles. Lucy Stone wished to use part in suits to prove the

unconstitutionality of the law which taxes women and refuses them

representation. Antoinette Blackwell wanted a portion to establish a

church where she could spread the doctrine of woman's rights along with

the gospel. Most of the women lecturers and some of the men wished to

be engaged immediately at a fixed salary. Miss Anthony writes for

advice to Phillips, who replies: "Go ahead with your New York plan as

sketched to me. I am willing to risk spending $1,000 on it. Never

apologize as if you troubled me; it is my business as much as yours,

and I am only sorry to be of so little help." Brief records in the

little diary say:

Sister Mary and I passed New Year's Day, 1859, most quietly and

happily in the dear farm-home. Mother is in the East with sister

Hannah, and father dined in the city with sister Guelma, who sent

us a plate of her excellent turkey.... In the afternoon Mary and I

drove to Frederick Douglass' and had a nice visit; stayed to tea

and listened to a part of his new lecture on "Self-Made Men."...

Father and Mary gone to their work in the city, and I am writing on

my lecture "The True Woman." Ground out four commercial-note pages

in five mortal hours, but they are strong.... Ten degrees below

zero. Mother home; no writing today; all talk about the eastern

folks.... Antoinette Blackwell preached here yesterday, and we have

had a good visit together today. Just helped two fugitive slaves,

perhaps genuine and perhaps not.... Went to the city to hear A.A.

Willit's lecture on "A Plea for Home." Gives woman a place only in

domestic life--sad failure.... Twenty letters written and mailed

today. Took tea with the Hallowells. Am glad to learn that the

money forwarded to the Anti-Slavery Bazar and lost was sent by a

man instead of a woman.... Heard Bayard Taylor on "Life in

Lapland." Hundreds could not gain admittance. Curtis lectured on

"Fair Play for Women"; great success, but I feel that he has not

yet been tried by fire. Afterwards visited with Curtis and Taylor,

and Mr. Curtis said: "Rather than have a radical thinker like Mrs.

Rose at your suffrage conventions, you would better give them up.

With such speakers as Beecher, Phillips, Theodore Parker, Chapin,

Tilton and myself advocating woman's cause, it can not fail."

[Autograph:

Respectfully yours,

E.H. Chapin"]

Miss Anthony did not hesitate to criticise even Mr. Curtis, writing him

in reference to his great lecture, "Democracy and Education": "When all

the different classes of industrial claimants for a voice in the

government were enumerated, there was not one which could be

interpreted to represent womanhood. Hence only the few who know that

with George William Curtis, the words 'man,' 'people,' 'citizens,' are

not, as with the vast majority of lecturers, mere glittering

generalities, can understand that his grand principles of democracy are

intended to be applied to woman equally with man. I listen for the

unthinking masses and pray that every earnest, manly spirit shall help

make women free." In reply Mr. Curtis closed a long and cordial letter

by saying: "Believe me that I have thought of the point you make but

the greater statement must inevitably include the less." She scribbled

a comment on the back of this for her own satisfaction: "Men still the

greater, women the less."

The last of January Miss Anthony went to Albany to attend the

anti-slavery convention and remained six weeks during the legislative

session to work in the interest of the women's petitions and the

Personal Liberty Bill. This was a season of great enjoyment for her,

notwithstanding much tramping about in the rain and snow and many

discouraging experiences with the Legislature. She writes a friend:

"Well, I am a member of the lobby but lacking the two most essential

requisites, for I neither accept money nor have I any to pay out. Dr.

Cheever speaks tonight in the Assembly chamber on 'The Guilt of the

Slave Traffic and of the Legislation by which it is Supported.' I have

been going about all day to collect enough to defray his expenses."

Phillips, Garrison, Pillsbury and all the host were at the convention.

They dined in Lydia Mott's simple little home and had a merry time.

Between the meetings the party visited the Legislature, Geological

Hall, Palmer's studio and other places of interest and managed to get a

bit of holiday recreation. Miss Anthony stayed with her friend Miss

Mott, visited Rev. Mayo, called often on Thurlow Weed, went to Troy to

hear Beecher lecture on "The Burdens of Society," to Hudson to hear

Phillips on "Toussaint L'Ouverture" and, whenever she could spare a day

from her work with the Legislature, held woman's rights meetings in

neighboring towns; thus every hour was filled to overflowing.

In March she finished her lecture, "The True Woman," and plunged into

the preparations for the approaching woman's rights convention. She

also indulged the love for gardening which her busy life so seldom

permitted and, judging from her diary, must have given the hired men

more attention than they ever received before or afterwards:

Uncovered the strawberry and raspberry beds.... Worked with Simon

building frames for the grape vines in the peach orchards.... Set

out eighteen English black currants, twenty-two English

gooseberries and Muscadine grape vines, also Lawton

blackberries.... Worked in the garden all day, then went to the

city to hear Dr. Cheever; few there, but grand lecture. How he

unmasked the church hypocrites!... Wrote reports of the lecture

for Standard and Liberator, and helped father plan the new

kitchen.... Finished setting out the apple trees and the 600

blackberry bushes, then took the 6 o'clock train for Seneca Falls.

Hot and dusty, and I am very, very tired.

[Autograph: Wendell Phillips]

She spoke in various towns all the way to New York where she arrived in

time to attend the Anti-Slavery Anniversary and make final arrangements

for the convention in Mozart Hall, May 12. She had written asking

Lucretia Mott to preside, who answered, "I am sure there needs not a

better presiding officer than thyself," but agreed to come. When the

hour arrived the hall was so packed that it was impossible for Mrs.

Mott to reach the platform and Miss Anthony was obliged to open the

meeting. This convention, like several which preceded it, was greatly

disturbed by noise and interruptions from the audience, until finally

it was turned over to Wendell Phillips who "knew better than any one

else how to play with and lash a mob and thrust what he wished to say

into their long ears." At the end of his speech Miss Anthony

immediately adjourned the convention, to prevent violent

demonstrations. The Tribune said:

The woman's rights meeting last night was well calculated to

advance the cause that the reformers met to plead. The speakers

were comparatively so temperate, while sundry voters were so

intemperate in demonstrating their folly, rudeness, ignorance and

indecency, that almost any cause which the one pleaded and the

other objected to would be likely to find favor with order-loving

people. The presence of a single policeman might have preserved

perfect order, saved the reputation of our city before crowds of

strangers and given hundreds an opportunity to hear. Of course it

being a meeting that women were to address, as "women have no

rights in public which men are bound to maintain," there was no

policeman present.

The disturbances at these conventions were not so much because the mob

objected to the doctrine of woman's rights as that they were addressed

by the leading anti-slavery speakers and therefore had to bear the

odium attached to that hated cause.

A strong memorial, asking for equal social, civil and political rights

for women and based on the guarantees of the Declaration of

Independence, was prepared by a committee consisting of Miss Anthony,

Mr. Phillips and seven others, to be presented to every legislature in

the Union. By the time the legislatures met in 1860, political affairs

had reached a crisis and the country was in a state of unrest and

excitement which made it impossible to secure consideration for this or

any other question outside the vital issues that were pressing,

although it was presented in several States.

Miss Anthony and Mrs. Stanton wrote an eloquent appeal to be circulated

with the petitions to rouse public sentiment. Armed with this the

former began correspondence with speakers in reference to a summer and

fall campaign of the state. The diary shows that she actually found

time to attend a picnic, but as she was called upon for a speech while

there the day was not wholly wasted. There are also references to

"moonlight rides," and one entry records: "Mr. ---- walked home with

me; marvelously attentive. What a pity such powers of intellect should

lack the moral spine!"

Out of the Francis Jackson fund Mr. Phillips sent Miss Anthony $1,500

for her extensive campaign. She engaged speakers to come into New York

in different months, and July 13 opened the series with Antoinette

Blackwell at Niagara Falls. From here they made the round of the

watering places, Avon, Clifton, Trenton Falls, Sharon, Saratoga,

Ballston Spa and Lake George, where persons of wealth and prominence

were gathered from all parts of the Union. In some places they spoke in

a grove to thousands of people; at others in hotel parlors, and

everywhere met a friendly spirit and respectful treatment.

Miss Anthony did not forget to go to Poughkeepsie this summer, and stir

up the teachers at their annual meeting. Antoinette Blackwell says of

this trip: "I shall always recollect our journey on the boat with two

or three dozen teachers, and your walking the deck with one and

another, talking about women and their rights, in school and out of

school, in the most matter-of-fact way, although it was plainly evident

that most of them would sooner have listened to a discussion on the

rights of the Hottentots." The teacher who was her chief support at

these conventions was Helen Philleo.[27] There were very few of them in

those days who had the courage to help fight this battle for their own

interests. At the last session she announced a woman's rights meeting

and many remained to attend it.

After the summer resorts were closed the meetings were continued in the

principal towns. Mrs. Blackwell thus describes an incident in the Fort

William Henry hotel: "I remember a rich scene at the breakfast table.

Aaron Powell was with us and the colored waiter pointedly offered him

the bill of fare. Miss Anthony glanced at it and began to give her

order, not to Powell in ladylike modesty, but promptly and

energetically to the waiter. He turned a grandiloquent, deaf ear;

Powell fidgeted and studied his newspaper; she persisted, determined

that no man should come between her and her own order for coffee,

cornbread and beefsteak. 'What do I understand is the full order, sir,

for your party?' demanded the waiter, doggedly and suggestively. Powell

tried to repeat her wishes, but stumbled and stammered and grew red in

the face. I put in a working oar to cover the undercurrent of laughter,

while she, coolly unconscious of everything except that there was no

occasion for a 'middleman,' since she was entirely competent to look

after her own breakfast, repeated her order, and the waiter, looking

intensely disgusted, concluded to bring something, right or wrong."

While at Easton among her old friends Miss Anthony attended Quaker

meeting and the spirit moved her to speak very forcibly, as she relates

in a letter: "A young Quaker preacher from Virginia, who happened to be

there, said: 'Christ was no agitator, but a peacemaker; George Fox was

no agitator; the Friends at the South follow these examples and are

never disturbed by fanaticism.' This was more than I could bear; I

sprung to my feet and quoted: 'I came into the world not to bring peace

but a sword.... Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites that

devour widow's houses!' Read the New Testament, and say if Christ was

not an agitator. Who is this among us crying 'peace, peace, when there

is no peace?'--and sat down." It is a matter of regret that she did not

tell what became of the gentleman from Virginia.

Miss Anthony writes to Mary Hallowell, during these days: "I am more

tired than ever before and know that I am draining the millpond too low

each day to be filled quite up during the night, but I am having fine

audiences of thinking men and women. Oh, if we could but make our

meetings ring like those of the anti-slavery people, wouldn't the world

hear us? But to do that we must have souls baptized into the work and

consecrated to it."

Mrs. Blackwell's domestic affairs will not permit any further lecturing

and Miss Anthony says in a letter to her: "O, dear, dear, how I do wish

you could have kept on with me. I can't tell you how utterly awful is

the suspense these other women keep me in: first, they can't, then they

can, then they won't unless things are so and so; and when I think

everything is settled, it all has to be gone over again. The fact is I

am not fit to deal with anybody who is not terribly in earnest." To

this she replies: "Dear child, I'm sorry I can not help you, but pity a

poor married woman and forgive. The ordeal that I have been going

through, four sewingwomen each giving about two days, no end of little

garments to alter and to make, with a husband whose clothes as well as

himself have been neglected for three months, the garden to be covered

up from the frost, shrubs to transplant, winter provisions to lay in

and only one good-natured, stupid servant to help with all. This,

Susan, is 'woman's sphere.'"

As Miss Anthony never approved of a woman's neglecting her household

for any purpose, she urged no more but sought elsewhere for assistance.

There was not one unmarried woman except herself in all the corps of

available speakers and, while some of them could make a trip of a few

weeks, not one could be depended on for steady work. In October she

secured Mrs. Tracy Cutler for awhile, and later Frances D. Gage, J.

Elizabeth Jones and Lucy N. Coleman, but was obliged to hold many

meetings alone. These were continued at intervals through the fall of

1859 and the winter and spring of 1860, and numerous pages of foolscap

are still in existence containing a carefully kept account of the

expenses. Each meeting was made partly to pay for itself, the lecturers

received $12 a week, Miss Anthony herself taking only this sum, and it

may be believed that no more extended and effective propaganda work

ever was accomplished with the same amount of money. While this was

being done, she also assisted Clarina Howard Nichols and Susan E.

Wattles to plan an important campaign in Kansas with money furnished

from the Jackson fund.

She received the following characteristic letter from Rev. Thomas K.

Beecher when she asked for the use of his church in Elmira: "I will

answer for myself and afterwards append the decision of the trustees.

Anybody with good moral character and clean feet is welcome to use our

meeting house, if they like, but were I you I should prefer Holden's

Hall. But, lastly, I should shrink from holding such a meeting. I fear

that you will come to pain of disappointment when your enthusiasm is

chilled and bruised against the stone walls of Elmira apathy. More

people will attend at Holden's Hall than at church. So speaks in brief,

yours with hearty respect."

Mrs. Blackwell writes her teasingly about what she calls her

obtuseness, going straight ahead with her work, never knowing when she

was snubbed or defeated, giving the undiluted doctrine to people

without ever perceiving their frantic efforts to escape, and ignoring

all the humorous features of the campaigns. Miss Anthony retorts: "You

might give some of the funny things at your own expense, but tell just

as many as you please at mine. You see I have always gone with such a

blind rush that I never had time to see the ridiculous, and blessed for

me and my work and my happiness that I did not." Another invariable

habit was never to notice complaints written to her. She always

answered the business points but entirely ignored complainings, charges

against other people and all extraneous matters.

She relates a significant incident which occurred during this summer

campaign when she and Antoinette Blackwell spent a Sunday at Gerrit

Smith's. He had established at Peterboro and was maintaining at his own

expense a Free church. Mrs. Blackwell, under the influence of Theodore

Parker, Chapin and other liberal thinkers, had become very broad in her

doctrines, and was greatly pleased at an opportunity to preach for Mr.

Smith, thinking to find perfect appreciation and sympathy. After church

Miss Anthony went to her room and found her weeping bitterly, but she

begged to be left to herself. When more composed she sent for her and

told how in the midst of her sermon, when she felt herself surpassing

anything she ever had done, she heard a gentle snore, and looking down

beheld Mr. Smith sound asleep! She was terribly disappointed and now

had made up her mind there was but one thing for the human soul, and

that was to live absolutely within itself. There is no friend, no

relative, who can enter into the depths of another individuality. A

husband and wife may be very happy together; in all the little

occurrences which really make up the sum of everyday life, they may be

perfectly congenial; but there will be times when each will feel the

other separated by an immeasurable distance. Henceforth she would enjoy

what solace there was in her religious faith for herself but would

expect no other soul to share it with her. "This was to me a wonderful

revelation," said Miss Anthony, "and I realized, as never before, that

in our most sacred hours we dwell indeed in a world of solitude."

[Autograph: Antoinette Brown Blackwell]

On December 2, 1859, occurred that terrible tragedy in the country's

history, the execution of John Brown for the raid on the United States

arsenal at Harper's Ferry. The nation was shaken as by a great

earthquake. Its dreadful import was realized perhaps by none so

strikingly as by that little band of Abolitionists who never had

wavered in their belief that slavery must ultimately disrupt the Union.

When the country was paralyzed with horror and uncertainty, they alone

dared call public meetings of mourning and indignation. It was natural

that in Rochester they should turn to Susan B. Anthony for leadership.

Without a moment's hesitation for fear of consequences she engaged

Corinthian Hall and set about arranging a meeting for the evening of

that day. Parker Pillsbury wrote:

Can you not make this gathering one of a popular character? What I

mean is will not some sturdy Republican or Gerrit Smith man

preside, another act as secretary and several make addresses? Only

we must not lose the control. I do not believe that any observance

of the day will be instituted outside our ranks. I am without

tidings from the "seat of war" since Tuesday evening; and do not

know what we shall hear next. My voice is against any attempt at

rescue. It would inevitably, I fear, lead to bloodshed which could

not compensate nor be compensated. If the people dare murder their

victim, as they are determined to do, and in the name of law, he

dares and is prepared to die and the moral effect of the execution

will be without a parallel since the scenes on Calvary eighteen

hundred years ago, and the halter that day sanctified shall be the

cord to draw millions to salvation.

[Autograph: Parker Pillsbury]

Miss Anthony found that beyond the little band of Abolitionists not a

person dared give her any assistance. Her diary says: "Not one man of

prominence in religion or politics will publicly identify himself with

the John Brown meeting." She went from door to door selling tickets and

collecting money. Samuel D. Porter, a prominent member of the Liberty

party, assisted her, as did that circle of staunch Quaker friends who

never failed her in any undertaking; Frederick Douglass had been

obliged to flee to England. An admission fee of fifty cents kept out

the rabble, and not more than 300 were present. The masses of the

people, even those in full sympathy, were afraid to attend. Rev. Abram

Pryn, a Free church minister, made a fine address, and Parker Pillsbury

spoke as never before. Mr. Porter said: "This was the only occasion

that ever matched Pillsbury's adjectives." Miss Anthony presided and

there was no disturbance. The surplus receipts were sent to John

Brown's family.

Mrs. Stanton wrote shortly afterwards, urging her to come to Seneca

Falls: "Indeed it would do me great good to see some reformers just

now. The death of my father, the worse than death of my dear cousin

Gerrit,[28] the martyrdom of that great and glorious John Brown, all

conspire to make me regret more than ever my dwarfed and perverted

womanhood. In times like these every soul should do the work of a

fullgrown man. When I pass the gate of the celestials and good Peter

asks me where I wish to sit, I will say: 'Anywhere so that I am neither

a negro nor a woman. Confer on me, great angel, the glory of white

manhood, so that henceforth I may feel unlimited freedom.'"

In this year of 1859, Charles F. Hovey, a wealthy merchant of Boston, a

radical in religion and a noted reformer and philanthropist, left

$50,000 to be expended in securing equal rights for women, the

abolition of slavery, and other reforms, at the discretion of Wendell

Phillips, Wm. Lloyd Garrison and the other executors. As slavery was

abolished four years later, a considerable portion of this was used for

the cause of woman.

Early in December the anti-slavery committee insisted that Miss Anthony

should resume the management of their conventions, as they wished to

hold a series throughout the large cities of the State and had been

unable to find any one who could so successfully conduct them. Abby

Kelly Foster, though often critical and censorious, wrote her regarding

one of her speeches: "It is a timely, noble, clear-sighted and fearless

vindication of our platform. I want to say how delighted both Stephen

and myself are to see that you, though much younger than some others in

the anti-slavery school, have been able to appreciate so entirely the

genius of our enterprise." The distinguished George B. Cheever, of the

Church of the Puritans in New York, one of the few orthodox clergymen

who stood with the Abolitionists in those early days, wrote Miss

Anthony: "May God be with you and guide and bless you in your efforts.

That is the strength we all need and must have if we accomplish

anything good and permanent in this terrible conflict."

[Autograph: George B. Cheever]

A single instance will show how closely the question of woman's rights

was connected with that of anti-slavery in the popular mind. When Miss

Anthony and Mrs. Blackwell were at Fort William Henry, at the head of

Lake George, they spoke one evening in the hotel parlors. There were a

number of southerners present and many of them were delighted with the

meeting, whose doctrines were entirely new to them, and made liberal

contributions. The next day the speakers left in the stage with one of

these, Judge John J. Ormond and his two daughters, of Tuscaloosa, Ala.

He told Miss Anthony he had been instrumental in securing many laws

favorable to women in that state and it would be a pleasure to him to

see that their memorial was presented to the Alabama Legislature. When

she reached home she sent it to him with the following letter:

Enclosed is a copy of our woman's rights memorial. Will you give me

a full report of the action taken upon it?... I hope you and your

daughters arrived home safe. Say to the elder I shall be most happy

to hear from her when she shall have fairly inaugurated some noble

life work. I trust each will take to her soul a strong purpose and

that on her tombstone shall be engraved her own name and her own

noble deeds instead of merely the daughter of Judge Ormond, or the

relict of some Honorable or D. D. When true womanhood shall be

attained it will be spoken of and remembered for itself alone. My

kindest regards to them, accompanied with the most earnest desire

that they shall make truth and freedom the polar star of their

lives.

To this Judge Ormond made cordial reply, October 17, 1859:

DEAR MADAM: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your

letter of the 2d inst., with the papers enclosed. The petition to

the Legislature will be presented by the senator from this county

and I will apprise you of the action had upon it. My daughters are

obliged to you for the interest you take in them. To a certain

extent I agree with you as to the duties of woman. I am greatly in

favor of her elevation to her proper sphere as the equal of man as

to her civil rights, the security of her person, the right to her

property and, where there is a separation after marriage, her equal

right with the father to the custody and education of the children.

All this as a legislator I have endeavored to accomplish, making

large innovations upon the ancient common law. If I differ from you

as to her political rights, it is because I think that, from

political as well as moral considerations, she is unfit for, indeed

incapacitated from, the performance of most of the duties which are

now performed by men as members of the body politic; but there are

many avocations and professions now exclusively occupied by men

which women are as well, perhaps better fitted to fill. I hope

these will soon be thrown open to an active competition of both

sexes.

Then came the raid on Harper's Ferry and all its terrible consequences,

and in December Judge Ormond wrote again:

MADAM: In redemption of my promise to tell you the fate of the

woman's rights petition to our Legislature, I have the honor to

inform you that it was virtually rejected, being laid on the table.

I interested a distinguished member of our Senate in its

presentation and, in addition, wrote a letter which under ordinary

circumstances would have insured its respectful consideration. But

after your petition was forwarded came the treasonable and

murderous invasion of John Brown. The atrocity of this act,

countenanced as it manifestly was by a great party at the North,

has extinguished our last spark of fraternal feeling. Whilst we are

all living under a Constitution which secures to us our right to

our slaves, the results of which are in truth more beneficial to

the whole North, and especially to the New England States, than to

us, you are secretly plotting murderous inroads into our peaceful

country and endeavoring to incite our slaves to cut the throats of

our wives and children. Can you believe that this state of things

can last? We now look upon you as our worst enemies and are ready

to separate from you. Measures are in progress as far as

practicable to establish non-intercourse with you and to proscribe

all articles of northern manufacture or origin, including New

England teachers. We can live without you; it remains to be seen

how you will get along without us. You will probably find that

fanaticism is not an element of national wealth or conducive to the

happiness or comfort of the people.

In conclusion, let me assure you this is written more in sorrow

than in anger. I am not a politician and have always been a

strenuous friend of the Union. I am now in favor of a separation,

unless you immediately retrace your steps and give the necessary

guarantees by the passage of appropriate laws that you will

faithfully abide by the compromises of the Constitution, by which

alone the slaveholding States can with honor or safety remain in

the Union. But that this will be done, I have very little hope, as

"madness seems to rule the hour;" and as you have thus constituted

yourselves our enemies, you must not be surprised at finding that

we are yours.

[Footnote 26: A critic said of this: "It is the most faultless

presentation of the question to which I have listened. Mr. Curtis takes

the broadest view of the subject, his logic in its sweep is convincing

as demonstration itself. His satire is cutting, but not bitter; his wit

keen as a Damascus blade. He came out bravely for the suffrage." For

forty years the advocates of equal rights have been using this lecture

as one of their strongest documents.]

[Footnote 27: By an odd coincidence, while this chapter was being

written a letter came to Miss Anthony from Dean M. Jenkins, of Detroit,

which said: "Enclosed please find my check to help on the good work to

which you have devoted your life. You see I have almost pardoned you

for saying, 'I have never quite forgiven you for marrying Helen Philleo

and taking her away from the suffrage work.' In place of one worker you

now have four. Mrs. Jenkins made a convert of me. Our daughter, Mrs.

Spalding, is as earnest a worker for the suffrage cause as her mother,

and our son is a defender of his mother's principles...."]

[Footnote 28: He had become temporarily insane on account of the

persecution he suffered in connection with the John Brown raid.]

CHAPTER XII.

RIFT IN COMMON LAW--DIVORCE QUESTION.

1860.

During the first decade of its history the movement toward securing a

larger liberty for women was known by the comprehensive term "woman's

rights." At its inception, under the English common law which

everywhere prevailed, woman was legally a part of man's belongings, one

of his chattels. Restrained by custom from speaking in public or

expressing herself through the newspapers, she had been silent under

the oppression of ages. When at length she found her voice there were

so many wrongs to be righted that she scarcely knew which first should

receive attention. Those early meetings could not be called woman

suffrage conventions, for many who advocated all the other reforms

which they considered either disbelieved in or were indifferent to the

franchise. It was only the Anthonys, Stantons, Stones, Roses,

Garrisons, Phillips of this great movement for woman's liberty who were

philosophical enough to see that the right of suffrage was the

underlying principle of the whole question; so it was not for many

years, not until practically all other demands had been granted, that

they were finally resolved into a suffrage organization, pure and

simple. At the beginning of 1860 the laws relating to women, as briefly

stated by the great jurist, David Dudley Field, were as follows:

The elective franchise is confined entirely to men. A married woman

can not sue for her services, as all she earns legally belongs to

the husband, whereas his earnings belong to himself, and the wife

legally has no interest in them. Where children have property and

both parents are living, the father is the guardian. In case of the

wife's death without a will, the husband is entitled to all her

personal property and to a life interest in the whole of her real

estate to the entire exclusion of the children, even though this

property may have come to her through a former husband and the

children of that marriage still be living. If the husband die

without a will, the widow is entitled to one-third of the personal

property and to a life interest in one-third only of the real

estate. In case a wife be personally injured, either in reputation

by slander, or in body by accident, compensation must be recovered

in the joint name of herself and her husband, and when recovered it

belongs to him. On the other hand, the wife has no legal claim in a

similar case in regard to the husband. The father may by deed or

will appoint a guardian for the minor children, who may thus be

taken entirely away from the jurisdiction of the mother at his

death. Where both parents are dead, the children shall be given to

the nearest of kin and, as between relatives of the same degree of

consanguinity, males shall be preferred. No married woman can act

as administrator in any case.

One can not but ask why, under such laws, women ever would marry, but

in those days virtually all occupations were closed to them and the

vast majority were compelled to marry for support. In the few cases

where women had their own means, they married because of the public

sentiment which considered it a serious reproach to remain a spinster

and rigorously forbade to her all the pleasures and independence that

are freely accorded to the unmarried woman of today. And they married

because it is natural for women to marry, and all laws and all customs,

all restrictions and all freedom, never will circumvent nature.

On February 3 and 4, 1860, the State Woman's Rights Convention was held

at Albany in Association Hall, an interesting and successful meeting.

At its close, in a letter to Mrs. Wright, Miss Anthony said: "Mr. Anson

Bingham, chairman of the judiciary committee, will bring in a radical

report in favor of all our claims, but previous to doing so he wishes

our strongest arguments made before the committee and says Mrs. Stanton

must come. I wish you would slip over there and make her feel that the

salvation of the Empire State, at least of the women in it, depends

upon her bending all her powers to move the hearts of our law-givers at

this time. I should go there myself this very night but I must watch

and encourage friends here." Mrs. Stanton replied to her urgent appeal:

"I am willing to do the appointed work at Albany. If Napoleon says

cross the Alps, they are crossed. You must come here and start me on

the right train of thought, as your practical knowledge of just what is

wanted is everything in getting up the right document."

The readers of history never will be able to separate Miss Anthony's

addresses from Mrs. Stanton's; they themselves scarcely could do it.

Some of the strongest ever written by either were prepared without the

assistance of the other, but most of their resolutions, memorials and

speeches were the joint work of both. Miss Anthony always said, "Mrs.

Stanton is my sentence maker, my pen artist." No one can excel Miss

Anthony in logic of thought or vigor of expression; no one is so

thoroughly supplied with facts, statistics and arguments, but she finds

it difficult and distasteful to put them into written form. When,

however, some one else has taken her wonderful stock of material and

reduced it to shape, she is a perfect critic. Her ear is as carefully

attuned to the correct balance of words as that of a skilled musician

to harmony in music. She will detect instantly a weak spot in a

sentence or a paragraph and never fail to suggest the exact word or

phrase needed to give it poise and strength.

Mrs. Stanton had a large house and a constantly increasing family,

making it exceedingly difficult to find time for literary work; so when

a state paper was to be written, Miss Anthony would go to Seneca Falls.

After the children were in bed, the two women would sit up far into the

night arranging material and planning their work. The next day Mrs.

Stanton would seek the quietest spot in the house and begin writing,

while Miss Anthony would give the children their breakfast, start the

older ones to school, make the dessert for dinner and trundle the

babies up and down the walk, rushing in occasionally to help the writer

out of a vortex. Many an article which will be read with delight by

future generations was thus prepared. Mrs. Stanton describes these

occasions in her charming Reminiscences:

It was mid such exhilarating scenes that Miss Anthony and I wrote

addresses for temperance, anti-slavery, educational and woman's

rights conventions. Here we forged resolutions, protests, appeals,

petitions, agricultural reports and constitutional arguments, for

we made it a matter of conscience to accept every invitation to

speak on every question, in order to maintain woman's right to do

so. It is often said by those who know Miss Anthony best, that she

has been my good angel, always pushing and guiding me to work. With

the cares of a large family, perhaps I might in time, like too many

women, have become wholly absorbed in a narrow selfishness, had not

my friend been continually exploring new fields for missionary

labors. Her description of a body of men on any platform,

complacently deciding questions in which women had an equal

interest without an equal voice, readily roused me to a

determination to throw a fire-brand in the midst of their assembly.

Thus, whenever I saw that stately Quaker girl coming across my lawn

I knew that some happy convocation of the sons of Adam were to be

set by the ears with our appeals or resolutions. The little

portmanteau stuffed with facts was opened and there we had what

Rev. John Smith and Hon. Richard Roe had said, false interpretation

of Bible texts, statistics of women robbed of their property, shut

out of some college, half-paid for their work, reports of some

disgraceful trial--injustice enough to turn any woman's thoughts

from stockings and puddings. Then we would get out our pens and

write articles for papers, a petition to the Legislature, letters

to the faithful here and there, stir up the women in Ohio,

Pennsylvania or Massachusetts, call on the Lily, the Una, the

Liberator, the Standard, to remember our wrongs. We never met

without issuing a pronunciamento on some question.

In thought and sympathy we were one, and in the division of labor

we exactly complemented each other. In writing we did better work

together than either could do alone. While she is slow and

analytical in composition, I am rapid and synthetic. I am the

better writer, she the better critic. She supplied the facts and

statistics, I the philosophy and rhetoric, and together we made

arguments which have stood unshaken by the storms of nearly fifty

long years.[29]

In 1878 Theodore Tilton gave this graphic description: "These two

women, sitting together in their parlors, have for the last thirty

years been diligent forgers of all manner of projectiles, from

fireworks to thunderbolts, and have hurled them with unexpected

explosion into the midst of all manner of educational, reformatory,

religious and political assemblies, sometimes to the pleasant surprise

and half welcome of the members; more often to the bewilderment and

prostration of numerous victims; and in a few signal instances, to the

gnashing of angry men's teeth. I know of no two more pertinacious

incendiaries in the whole country; nor will they themselves deny the

charge. In fact, this noise-making twain are the two sticks of a drum

for keeping up what Daniel Webster called 'the rub-a-dub of

agitation.'"

On March 19, 1860, Mrs. Stanton presented her address to a joint

session of the Legislature at Albany, occupying the speaker's desk and

facing as magnificent an audience as ever assembled in the old Capitol.

It was a grand plea for a repeal of the unjust and oppressive laws

relating to women, and it was universally said that its eloquence could

not have been surpassed by any man in the United States. A bill was

then in the hands of the judiciary committee, simply an amendment of

the Property Law of 1848, to which Andrew J. Colvin objected as not

liberal enough. Miss Anthony gave him a very radical bill just

introduced into the Massachusetts Legislature, which he examined

carefully, adding several clauses to make it still broader. It was

accepted by the committee, composed of Messrs. Hammond, Ramsey and

Colvin, reported to the Senate and passed by that body in February. It

was concurred in by the Assembly the day following Mrs. Stanton's

speech, and signed by Governor Edwin D. Morgan.[30] This new law

declared in brief:

Any property, real and personal, which any married woman now owns,

or which may come to her by descent, etc., shall be her sole and

separate property, not subject to control or interference by her

husband.

Any married woman may bargain, sell, etc., carry on any trade or

perform any services on her own account, and her earnings shall be

her sole and separate property and may be used or invested by her

in her own name.

A married woman may buy, sell, make contracts, etc., and if the

husband has willfully abandoned her, or is an habitual drunkard, or

insane, or a convict, his consent shall not be necessary.

A married woman may sue and be sued, bringing action in her own

name for damages and the money recovered shall be her sole

property.

Every married woman shall be joint guardian of her children with

her husband, with equal powers, etc., regarding them.

At the decease of the husband the wife shall have the same property

rights as the husband would have at her death.

This remarkable action, which might be termed almost a legal

revolution, was the result of nearly ten years of laborious and

persistent effort on the part of a little handful of women who, by

constant agitation through conventions, meetings and petitions, had

created a public sentiment which stood back of the Legislature and gave

it sanction to do this act of justice. While all these women worked

earnestly and conscientiously to bring about this great reform, there

was but one, during the entire period, who gave practically every month

of every year to this purpose, and that one was Susan B. Anthony. In

storm and sunshine, in heat and cold, in seasons of encouragement and

in times of doubt, criticism and contumely, she never faltered, never

stopped. Going with her petition from door to door, only to have them

shut in her face by the women she was trying to help; subjecting

herself to the jeers and insults of men whom she need never have met

except for this mission; held up by the press to the censure and

ridicule of thousands who never had seen or heard her; misrepresented

and abused above all other women because she stood in the front of the

battle and offered herself a vicarious sacrifice--can the women of New

York, can the women of the nation, ever be sufficiently grateful to

this one who, willingly and unflinchingly, did the hardest pioneer work

ever performed by mortal?

Miss Anthony divided the winter of 1860 between the anti-slavery and

the woman's cause. As she had very little on hand (!) she arranged

another course of lectures for Rochester, inviting A.D. Mayo, Ralph

Waldo Emerson, Thomas Starr King and others. These speakers were in the

employ of the lyceum bureau, but were so restricted by it that they

could give their great _reform_, lectures only under private

management. At the close of Emerson's he said to Miss Anthony that he

had been instrumental in establishing the lyceum for the purpose of

securing a freedom of speech not permitted in the churches, but he

believed that now he would have to do as much to break it up, because

of its conservatism, and organize some new scheme which would permit

men and women to utter their highest thought. She was in the habit of

arranging many of her woman's rights meetings in different towns when

Phillips or others were to be there for a lyceum lecture, thus securing

them for a speech the following afternoon.

[Autograph: Cordially yours, T.S. King]

A letter received this winter from her sister Mary is interesting as

showing that the belief in equal rights for women was quite as strong

in other members of the family. She had been requested by the board of

education to fill the place of one of the principals who was ill, and

gives the following account:

I was willing to do the best I could to help out, so the next

morning, with fear and trembling, I faced the 150 young men and

women, many of whom, like their fathers and mothers before them,

felt that no woman had the ability to occupy such a place. All went

well until it was noised about that I should expect as much salary

as had been paid the principal. To establish such a precedent would

never do, so a man from a neighboring town was sent for post-haste,

but the moment he began his administration the boys rebelled. After

slates and books had been thrown from the window and I had been

obliged to guard him from their snowballs on his way home, he

decided teaching, in that place at least, was not his "sphere" and

refused to return.

Next morning the committee asked me to resume the management. I

answered: "No person can fill the place of a long-tried teacher,

but I in a measure succeeded--yet not one of you would entertain

the idea of paying me as much as the principal. You sent to another

town for a man, who has made an absolute failure, and yet you do

not hesitate to pay him the full salary for the time he was here.

If you will be as just to me, I will resume the work and do my

best--on any other conditions I must decline." They agreed to the

proposition, I finished the term and for the first time on record a

woman received a principal's salary!

A little later Miss Mary continues the story:

You know the principal of Number Ten has been ill nearly two

months. I asked him if Miss Hayden, who took his place, was to

receive his salary. He replied: "Do you think after the money has

been audited to me, I ought to turn around and give it all to her?"

Said I: "If the board are willing to pay you $72 a month while you

are sick and pay her the same, all right; but if only one is to

receive that salary, I say, and most emphatically, she is the one."

He wanted to know if I was not aware that mine was the only case

where such a thing had been done in Rochester. I told him I was

heartily glad I had been the means of having justice done for once,

and was really in hopes other women teachers would follow my

example and suffer themselves no longer to be duped.

Miss Hayden however was obliged to accept $25 a month for doing exactly

the work for which the man received $72 during all his illness. To keep

her from making trouble, the board gave her a small present with the

understanding that it was not to be considered as salary. A short time

afterwards Miss Mary wrote again: "A woman teacher on a salary of $20 a

month has just been ill for a week and another was employed to take her

place; when she recovered, she was obliged to have the supply teacher's

salary deducted from her own. So I posted down to the superintendent's

office and had another decidedly plain talk. He owned that it was

unjust but said there was no help for it."

In the winter of 1860, Henry Ward Beecher delivered his great woman's

rights speech at Cooper Institute, New York. At that time his name was

a power in the whole world and his masterly exposition of the rights of

women is still used as one of the best suffrage leaflets. Miss Anthony

tells in her diary of meeting Tilton and of his amusing account of the

struggle they had to get this speech published in the Independent. Her

little visits to New York and Boston always inspired her with fresh

courage, for here she would meet Theodore Parker, Frothingham, Cheever,

Chapin, Beecher, Greeley, Phillips, Garrison, the great spirits of that

age, and all in perfect sympathy with what she represented.

The Tenth National Woman's Rights Convention assembled in Cooper

Institute, May 10, 1860. Miss Anthony called it to order and read a

full and interesting report of the work and progress of the past year.

The usual eloquent speeches were made by Phillips, Mrs. Rose, Rev.

Beriah Green, Mary Grew, Rev. Samuel Longfellow, brother of the poet,

and others. The warmest gratitude was expressed "toward Susan B.

Anthony, through whose untiring exertions and executive ability the

recent laws for women were secured." A hearty laugh was enjoyed at the

expense of the man who shouted from the audience, "She'd a great deal

better have been at home taking care of her husband and children." The

proceedings were pleasant and harmonious, but next morning the whole

atmosphere was changed and Elizabeth Cady Stanton did it with a little

set of resolutions declaring that, under certain conditions, divorce

was justifiable. She supported them by an address which for logic of

argument, force of expression and beauty of diction never has been,

never can be surpassed. No such thoughts ever before had been put into

words. She spoke on that day for all the women of the world, for the

wives of the present and future generations. The audience sat

breathless and, at the close of the following peroration, burst into

long-continued applause:

We can not take our gauge of womanhood from the past but from the

solemn convictions of our own souls, in the higher development of

the race. No parchments, however venerable with the mold of ages,

no human institutions, can bound the immortal wants of the royal

sons and daughters of the great I Am--rightful heirs of the joys of

time and joint heirs of the glories of eternity. If in marriage

either party claim the right to stand supreme, to woman, the mother

of the race, belongs the scepter and the crown. Her life is one

long sacrifice for man. You tell us that among all womankind there

is no Moses, Christ or Paul--no Michael Angelo, Beethoven or

Shakespeare--no Columbus or Galileo--no Locke or Bacon. Behold

those mighty minds so grand, so comprehensive--they themselves are

_our_ great works! Into you, O sons of earth, goes all of us that

is immortal. In you center our very life, our hopes, our intensest

love. For you we gladly pour out our heart's blood and die, knowing

that from our suffering comes forth a new and more glorious

resurrection of thought and life.

This speech set the convention on fire. Antoinette Blackwell spoke

strongly in opposition, Mrs. Rose eloquently in favor. Mr. Phillips was

not satisfied even with the motion to lay the resolutions on the table

but moved to expunge them from the journal of the convention, which, he

said, had nothing to do with laws except those that rested unequally

upon women and the laws of divorce did not. It seems incredible that

Mr. Phillips could have taken this position, when by the law the wife

had no legal claim upon either property or children in case of divorce,

and, even though the innocent party, must go forth into the world

homeless and childless; in the majority of States she could not sue for

divorce in her own name nor could she claim enough of the community

property to pay the costs of the suit. Miss Anthony said:

I hope Mr. Phillips will withdraw his motion. It would be contrary

to all parliamentary usage that when the speeches which advocated

them are published in the proceedings, the resolutions should not

be. I wholly dissent from the point that this question does not

belong on our platform. Marriage has ever been a one-sided

contract, resting most unequally upon the sexes. Woman never has

been consulted; her wish never has been taken into consideration as

regards the terms of the marriage compact. By law, public sentiment

and religion, woman never has been thought of other than as a piece

of property to be disposed of at the will and pleasure of man. This

very hour, by our statute books, by our so-called enlightened

Christian civilization, she has no voice whatever in saying what

shall be the basis of this relation. She must accept marriage as

man proffers it, or not at all.

And then again, on Mr. Phillips' own ground, the discussion is

perfectly in order, since nearly all the wrongs of which we

complain grow out of the inequality, the injustice of the marriage

laws, that rob the wife of the right to herself and her children

and make her the slave of the man she marries. I hope, therefore,

the resolutions will be allowed to go out to the public, that there

may be a fair report of the ideas which actually have been

presented here and that they may not be left to the mercy of the

press.

Abby Hopper Gibbons supported Mr. Phillips, but Mr. Garrison favored

the publication of the resolutions. The motion to expunge them from the

minutes was lost.

[Autograph:

Yours affectionately

Ernestine L. Rose]

This discussion stirred the country from center to circumference, and

all the prominent newspapers had editorials favoring one side or the

other. It produced the first unpleasantness in the ranks of those who

had stood together for the past decade. Greeley launched thunderbolts

against the right of divorce under any circumstances, and Mrs. Stanton

replied to him in his own paper. Lucy Stone, who just before the

convention had written to Mrs. Stanton, "That is a great, grand

question, may God touch your lips," now took sides with Phillips. To

Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony came letters from far and wide, both

approving and condemning. Mrs. William H. Seward and her sister, Mrs.

Worden, wrote that it not only was a germane question to be discussed

at the convention but that there could be no such thing as equal rights

with the existing conditions of marriage and divorce. From Lucretia

Mott came the encouraging words: "I was rejoiced to have such a defense

of the resolutions as yours. I have the fullest confidence in the

united judgment of Elizabeth Stanton and Susan Anthony and I am glad

they are so vigorous in the work." Parker Pillsbury sent a breezy note:

"What a pretty kettle of hot water you tumbled into at New York! Your

marriage and divorce speeches and resolutions you must have learned in

the school of a Wollstonecraft or a Sophie Arnaut. You broke the very

heart of the portly Evening Post and nearly drove the Tribune to the

grave."

For the censure of the world at large they did not care, but Phillips'

defection almost broke their hearts. He was their ideal of the brave

and the true and always before they had had his approval and assistance

in every undertaking. Miss Anthony wrote Mrs. Stanton: "It is not for

you or for me, any more than for Mr. Phillips, to dictate our platform;

that must be fixed by the majority. He is evidently greatly distressed.

I find my only comfort in that glorious thought of Theodore Parker:

'All this is but the noise and dust of the wagon bringing the harvest

home.' These things must be, and happy are they who see clearly to the

end." And to her friend Amy Post: "It is wonderful what letters of

approval we are receiving, some of them from the noblest women of the

State, not connected in any way with our great movement but

sympathizing fully with our position on the question of divorce. I only

regret that history may not see Wendell Phillips first and grandest in

the recognition of this great truth; but he is a man and can not put

himself in the position of a wife, can not feel what she does under the

present marriage code. And yet in his relations to his own wife he is

the embodiment of chivalry, tenderness and love."

In a letter to Miss Anthony, Mrs. Stanton said: "We are right. My

reason, my experience, my soul proclaim it. Our religion, laws,

customs, all are founded on the idea that woman was made for man. I am

a woman, and I can feel in every nerve where my deepest wrongs are

hidden. The men know we have struck a blow at their greatest

stronghold. Come what will, my whole soul rejoices in the truth I have

uttered. One word of thanks from a suffering woman outweighs with me

the howls of Christendom."

Notwithstanding all that had passed, Miss Anthony wrote Mr. Phillips

for money from the Hovey fund to publish the report of the convention

containing these very resolutions, and he sent it accompanied with a

cordial letter. With his generous disposition he soon recognized the

fact that it was eminently proper to agitate this question of divorce,

in order to make it possible for a woman to secure release from a

habitual drunkard, or a husband who treated her with personal violence

or willfully abandoned her, and to have some claim on their property

and a right to their children, if she were the innocent party. Before

three months he wrote Miss Anthony, "Go ahead, you are doing grandly,"

and he spoke many times afterwards on their platform. During the height

of this discussion Miss Anthony was in Albany and Rev. Mayo, thinking

to annihilate her, said: "You are not married, you have no business to

be discussing marriage." "Well, Mr. Mayo," she replied, "you are not a

slave, suppose you quit lecturing on slavery."

As a result of this agitation a little clique of women in Boston, led

by Caroline H. Dall, announced that they would hold a convention which

should not be open to free discussion but should be "limited to the

subjects of Education, Vocation and Civil Position." They drew to

themselves a small body of conservatives and it was thought might start

a new movement, but the meeting had no permanent results. Parker

Pillsbury said of it: "With the exception of Phillips, no soul kindled

with volcanic fire was permitted a solitary spark. O, such a meeting!

Beautiful as parlor theatricals, but as a bold shriek for freedom or a

protest against tyrant laws, not a sparrow on the housetop could have

been more harmless." Miss Anthony wrote at this time: "Cautious,

careful people, always casting about to preserve their reputation and

social standing, never can bring about a reform. Those who are really

in earnest must be willing to be anything or nothing in the world's

estimation, and publicly and privately, in season and out, avow their

sympathy with despised and persecuted ideas and their advocates, and

bear the consequences."

In June she and Mrs. Stanton went to a large meeting of Progressive

Friends at Waterloo, where the latter read this same speech on divorce

and then, to quote Miss Anthony's own words, "As usual when she had

fired her gun she went home and left me to finish the battle." In this

case it lasted several days, but Mrs. Stanton knew she could count upon

her friend to defend her to the last ditch. Miss Anthony was always on

the skirmish line. She would interview the married women who could not

leave home and children, get their approval of her plans and then go to

the front. Once or twice a year she would gather her hosts for a big

battle, but the rest of the time she did picket duty, acted as scout

and penetrated alone the enemy's country. Between meetings she would

find her way home, make over her old dresses and on rare occasions get

a new one. This she called "looking after the externals." Then, as her

mother was an invalid, she would clean the house from top to bottom and

do a vast amount of necessary work.

In her diary are many such entries as these: "Washed all the shutters.

Took up the carpet this morning.... Whitewashed the kitchen today....

Helped the girl wash this morning; in the afternoon ironed six shirts,

and started for New York at 4 o'clock. Was a little bit tired." At one

time, with the help of a seamstress, she made fourteen shirts,

stitching by hand all the collars, bosoms and wristbands, and, as this

woman had worked in the Troy laundry, she taught Miss Anthony to

clear-starch and iron them. Each summer she managed to be home long

enough to assist with the canning, pickling and preserving. The little

journal gives the best glimpses of her daily life, usually only a hasty

scrawl of a few lines but containing many flashes of humor and wisdom.

Thus the records run:

Crowded house at Port Byron. I tried to say a few words at opening,

but soon curled up like a sensitive plant. It is a terrible

martyrdom for me to speak.... Very many Abolitionists have yet to

learn the A B C of woman's rights.... The Boston Congregationalist

has a scurrilous article. Shall write the editor.... It is

discouraging that no man does right for right's sake, but

everything to serve party.... I find such comfort in Aurora Leigh

when I am sorely pressed.... Heard Stephen A. Douglas today; a low

spectacle for both eye and ear.... Gave my lecture on "The True

Woman" at Penn Yan teachers' institute. Some strange gentleman

present supported my plea for physical culture for girls.... Had a

talk with Frederick Douglass. He seems to have no faith in simple

and abstract right.... Lost patience this morning over a lamp and

suffered vastly therefor. Why can I not learn self-control?...

Company came and found me out in the garden picking peas and

blackberries--and hoopless.... A fine-looking young colored man on

train presented me with a bouquet. Can't tell whether he knew me or

only felt my sympathy.... Am reading Buckle's History of

Civilization and Darwin's Descent of Man. Have finished his Origin

of Species. Pillsbury has just given me Emerson's poems....

Miss Anthony did not fail to put aside everything long enough to attend

the State Teachers' Convention at Syracuse. The right of women to take

part had now become so well established that it needed no further

defense, but she still fought for equal pay for equal services, and

equal advantages of education for colored children, and each year found

her views gaining a stronger support from both men and women. After

this convention she continued her meetings, anti-slavery and woman's

rights, and during the summer visited again her birthplace at Adams,

Mass., writing home:

Found grandfather working in the oat field, just think of it,

ninety-and-a-half years old! But in honor of my arrival he remained

home and visited all the afternoon. How hard the women here work,

and how destitute they are of all the conveniences. It is perfectly

barbarous when they have plenty of money. I borrowed a calico dress

and sunbonnet and with the cousins climbed to the very top of Old

Greylock. Later I visited the "Daniel House," as grandfather calls

our old home. I rambled through the orchard, but the spice-apple

tree is dead and the little tree in the corner that we children

loved so well. I visited the old spring up in the pasture, and

thought how many times the tired feet of mother and grandmother had

trod those paths--and the little brook runs over the stones as

merry and beautiful as ever.

From here she went to Boston to attend a meeting of the Hovey fund

committee and urged them to establish a "depository" at Albany with

Lydia Mott in charge, which was done. This depot of supplies of

literature, etc., for the anti-slavery cause, and central meeting place

for its friends, was continued throughout the war. The Mott sisters,

cousins of James, lovely and cultured Quaker women, had a little home

in Maiden Lane and kept a gentlemen's furnishing store, making by hand

the ruffled shirtbosoms and other fine linen. As their home had been so

long the center for the reformers of the day, the committee were glad

to put Lydia in charge of this depository, at a small salary, and she

conducted an extensive correspondence for them during several years.

Miss Anthony stayed with her till everything was arranged and in good

running order. In July she had received the following invitation:

By a unanimous vote of the Union Agricultural Society of Dundee a

resolution was passed to tender you an invitation to deliver the

annual address at our next fair. We know it is a departure from

established usage, but your experience as one of a brave band of

radical reformers will have taught you that only by gradual steps

and continued efforts can the prejudices of custom be overcome and

the rights of humanity maintained. Woman's rights are coming to be

respected more and more every year, and we hope you will aid us in

demonstrating that a woman can deliver as profitable an address at

an agricultural fair as can a lord of creation....

Yours respectfully, WILLIAM HOUSE, _Secretary, per_ D. S. BRUNER.

To refuse such an opportunity was not to be thought of, so she

accepted, and then wrote Mrs. Stanton, who answered: "Come on and we

will grind out the speech. I shall expect to get the inspiration,

thoughts and facts from you, and will agree to dress all the children

you bring."

She found a cordial welcome when she reached Dundee, October 17. It

rained so hard her address was deferred till the next day, as it had to

be delivered out of doors, so she visited the "art" and "culinary"

departments of the fair, and records in her diary: "I have just put an

extra paragraph in my speech on bedquilts and bad cooking." Her stage

was a big lumber wagon, and her desk the melodeon of James G. Clark,

the noted singer and Abolitionist, who held an umbrella over her head

to keep off the rain. The diary says: "More than 2,000 feet were

planted in the mud, but I had a grand listening to the very end." The

speech was a great success and was published in full in the Dundee

Record, occupying the entire front page. It was a fine exposition of

modern methods of farming and a strong plea for beautifying the home,

giving the children books and music and making life so pleasant they

would not want to leave the country for the city. These ideas at that

time were new and attracted much attention and favorable comment. This

was the first instance of a woman's making an address on such an

occasion.

At the close of 1860 an incident occurred which attracted wide

attention and strikingly illustrated Miss Anthony's unflinching courage

and firm persistence when she felt she was right. One evening in

December she was in Albany at the depository with Lydia Mott when a

lady, heavily veiled, entered and in a long, confidential talk told her

story, which in brief was as follows: She was the sister of a United

States senator and of a prominent lawyer, and in her younger days was

principal of the academy and had written several books. She married a

distinguished member of the Massachusetts Senate and they had three

children. Having discovered that her husband was unfaithful to her and

confronted him with the proofs, he was furious and threw her down

stairs, and thereafter was very abusive. When she threatened to expose

him, he had her shut up in an insane asylum, a very easy thing for

husbands to do in those days. She was there a year and a half, but at

length, through a writ of habeas corpus, was released and taken to the

home of her brother. Naturally she longed to see her children and the

husband permitted the son to visit her a few weeks. When she had to

give him up she begged for the thirteen-year-old daughter, who was

allowed to remain for two weeks, and then the father demanded her

return. The mother pleaded for longer time but was refused. She prayed

her brother to interfere but he answered: "It is of no use for you to

say another word. The child belongs by law to the father and it is your

place to submit. If you make any more trouble about it we'll send you

back to the asylum."

Then in her desperation she took the child and fled from the house,

finding refuge with a Quaker family, where she stayed until she learned

that her hiding-place was discovered, and now as a last resort she came

to these women. They assured the unhappy mother that they would help

her and, upon making careful inquiry among her friends, found that,

while all believed her sane, no one was willing to take her part

because of the prominence of her brothers and husband. Finally it was

decided that Miss Anthony should go with the mother and child to New

York and put them in a safe place, so they were directed to disguise

themselves and be at the train on Christmas afternoon. Miss Anthony

went on board and soon saw a woman in an old shawl, dilapidated bonnet

and green goggles, accompanied by a poorly dressed child, and she knew

that so far all was well, but she found the woman in a terrible state

of nervousness. She had met her brother coming out of another car where

he had just placed his young son to return to boarding-school, after a

happy vacation at home, while his sister with her child was fleeing

like a criminal; but fortunately he had not recognized her.

Miss Anthony and her charges reached New York at 10 o'clock at night

and went through snow and slush to a hotel but were refused admittance

because it did not take women "unaccompanied by a gentleman." They made

their weary way to another, only to be met with a similar refusal.

Finally she thought of an acquaintance who had had a wretched

experience with a bad husband and was now divorced, and she felt that

sympathy would certainly impel this woman to give them shelter. When

they reached the house they found her keeping boarders and she said all

would leave if they learned she was "harboring a runaway wife." It was

then midnight. They went in the cold arid darkness to a hotel on

Broadway, but here the excuse was made that the house was full. Miss

Anthony's patience had reached its limit and she declared: "I know that

is not so. You can give us a place to sleep or we will sit in this

office all night." The clerk threatened to call the police. "Very

well," was the reply, "we will sit here till they come and take us to

the station." At last he gave them a room without a fire, and there,

cold, wet and exhausted, they remained till morning. Then they started

out again on foot, as they had not enough money left to hire a

carriage.

They went to Mrs. Rose but she could not accommodate them; then to Abby

Hopper Gibbons, who sent them to Elizabeth F. Ellet, saying if they

could not find quarters to come back and she would care for them. Mrs.

Ellet was not at home. All day they went from place to place but no one

was willing to accept the responsibility of sheltering them, and at

night, utterly worn out, they returned to Mrs. Gibbons. She promised to

keep the mother and child until other arrangements could be effected,

and Miss Anthony left them there and took the 10 o'clock train back to

Albany. She arrived toward morning, tired out in mind and body, but

soon was made comfortable by the ministrations of her faithful friend

Lydia.

[Autograph: Abby Hopper Gibbons]

It was not long before the family became convinced that Miss Anthony

knew the whereabouts of mother and child and then began a siege of

persecution. She had at this time commenced that never-to-be-forgotten

series of anti-slavery conventions which were mobbed in every town from

Buffalo to Albany. In the midst of all this excitement and danger, she

was constantly receiving threats from the brothers that they would have

her arrested on the platform. They said she had broken the laws and

they would make her pay the penalty; that their sister was an "ugly"

woman and nobody could live with her. To this she replied: "I have

heard there was Indian blood in your family; perhaps your sister has

got a little of it as well as yourselves. I think you would not allow

your children to be taken away from you, law or no law. There is no

reason or justice in a woman's submitting to such outrages, and I

propose to defy the law and you also."

If she had been harassed only by these men, it would have caused her no

especial worry, but letters and telegrams from friends poured in urging

her to reveal the hiding-place and, most surprising of all, both

Garrison and Phillips wrote that she had abducted a man's child and

must surrender it! Mr. Phillips remonstrated: "Let us urge you,

therefore, at once to advise and insist upon this woman's returning to

her relatives. Garrison concurs with me fully and earnestly in this

opinion, thinking that our movement's repute for good sense should not

be compromised by any such mistake." In a letter from Mr. Garrison

covering six pages of foolscap, he argued: "Our identification with the

woman's rights movement and the anti-slavery cause is such that we

ought not unnecessarily involve them in any hasty and ill-judged, no

matter how well-meant, efforts of our own. We, at least, owe to them

this--that if for any act of ours we are dragged before courts we ought

to be able to show that we acted discreetly as well as with good

intentions." Both men spoke kindly and affectionately but they were

unable to view the question from a mother's or even from a woman's

standpoint. Miss Anthony replied to them:

I can not give you a satisfactory statement on paper, but I feel

the strongest assurance that all I have done is wholly right. Had I

turned my back upon her I should have scorned myself. In all those

hours of aid and sympathy for that outraged woman I remembered only

that I was a human being. That I should stop to ask if my act would

injure the reputation of any movement never crossed my mind, nor

will I now allow such a fear to stifle my sympathies or tempt me to

expose her to the cruel, inhuman treatment of her own household.

Trust me that as I ignore all law to help the slave, so will I

ignore it all to protect an enslaved woman.

At the anti-slavery convention in Albany Mr. Garrison pleaded with her

to give up the child and insisted that she was entirely in the wrong.

He said: "Don't you know the law of Massachusetts gives the father the

entire guardianship and control of the children?" "Yes, I know it," she

replied, "and does not the law of the United States give the

slaveholder the ownership of the slave? And don't you break it every

time you help a slave to Canada?" "Yes, I do." "Well, the law which

gives the father the sole ownership of the children is just as wicked

and I'll break it just as quickly. You would die before you would

deliver a slave to his master, and I will die before I will give up

that child to its father." It was impossible for even such great men as

Garrison and Phillips to feel for a wronged and outraged woman as they

could for a wronged and outraged black man. Miss Anthony wrote at this

time: "Only to think that in this great trial I should be hounded by

the two men whom I adore and reverence above all others!" Through all

this ordeal her father sustained her position, saying: "My child, I

think you have done absolutely right, but don't put a word on paper or

make a statement to any one that you are not prepared to face in court.

Legally you are wrong, but morally you are right, and I will stand by

you."

Mrs. Elizabeth F. Ellet, author of Women of the Revolution and other

works, cared for and protected the unfortunates, obtained sewing for

the mother and helped her to live in peaceful seclusion for a year. She

was placed in the family of a physician who watched her closely and

testified, as did all connected with her, that she was perfectly sane.

According to her letters still in existence, the husband took

possession of her funds in bank, drew all the money due to her from her

publishers and forbade them to pay her any more from the sale of her

books, as he had a legal right to do. In this extremity one of the

brothers sent her some money through Miss Mott, who stood as firm as

Miss Anthony in the face of threat and persecution. At length, feeling

safe, the mother let the little girl go to Sunday-school alone and at

the door of the church she was suddenly snatched up, put into a close

carriage and in a few hours placed in possession of the father. The

mother and her friends made every effort to secure the child, but the

law was on the side of the father and they never succeeded.

[Footnote 29: At Miss Anthony's request only such speeches are

published in the appendix of this biography as were prepared entirely

without the co-operation of Mrs. Stanton.]

[Footnote 30: In a letter to Miss Anthony regretting that no action was

taken on the suffrage question, Mr. Colvin wrote: "The more reflection

I give, the more my mind becomes convinced that in a republican

government we have no right to deny woman the privileges she claims.

Besides, the moral element which those privileges would bring into

action would, in my judgment, have a powerful influence in perpetuating

our form of government."]

CHAPTER XIII.

MOB EXPERIENCE----CIVIL WAR.

1861--1862.

The beginning of 1861 found the country in a state approaching

demoralization. Lincoln had received a majority of the electoral vote

but far from a majority of the popular vote. The victory was so narrow

that the Republicans did not feel themselves strong enough for

aggressive action, and the party was composed of a number of diverse

elements not yet sufficiently united to agree upon a distinctive

policy. Its one cohesive force was the principle of no further

extension of slavery, but there was no thought among its leaders of any

interference with this institution in the States where it already

existed. They accepted the interpretation of the Constitution which

declared that it sanctioned and protected slavery, but were determined

that the Territories should be admitted into the Union as free States.

While many of them were in favor of emancipation, they expected that in

some way this question would be settled without recourse to extreme

measures, and they feared the effect, not only on the South but on the

North, of the forcible language and radical demands of the

Abolitionists.

The latter were roused to desperation. Never for an instant did they

accept the doctrine that the North should be satisfied merely by the

prevention of any further spread of slavery; they believed the system

should be exterminated root and branch. They were angered at the

reserved and dispassionate language of Lincoln and alarmed at the

threats of the secession of the South, which must result either in

putting it forever beyond the power of the government to interfere with

slavery, or in terrorizing it into making such concessions as would

enable the slave power to intrench itself still more strongly under the

protection of the Constitution.

At this critical moment, therefore, the Abolitionists put forth every

effort to rouse public sentiment to the impending dangers. They

gathered their forces and sent them throughout New England, New York

and the Western States, bearing upon their banners the watchwords, "No

Compromise with Slaveholders. Immediate and Unconditional

Emancipation." One detachment, under the intrepid leadership of Susan

B. Anthony, arranged a series of meetings for New York in the winter of

1861. This party was composed of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Rev. Samuel J.

May, Rev. Beriah Green, Aaron M. Powell and Stephen S. Foster; but one

after another gave out and went home, while Miss Anthony still remained

at the helm. The series began at Buffalo, January 3, in St. James Hall.

The mob was ready for them and, led by ex-Justice George Hinson and

Birdseye Wilcox, hissed, hooted, yelled and stamped, making it utterly

impossible for the speakers to be heard. Prominent among the disturbers

were young Horatio Seymour and a son of ex-President Fillmore. The

police refused to obey the orders of a Republican mayor and joined in

the efforts of the mob, which held carnival two entire days, finally

crowding upon the platform and taking possession; and in the midst of

the melee the gas was turned off. Miss Anthony stood her ground,

however, until lights were brought in, and then herself declared the

meeting adjourned.

In towns where there were not enough people to create a disturbance,

the meetings passed off quietly, but they were mobbed and broken up in

every city from Buffalo to Albany. Democratic officials encouraged the

mob spirit and where Republicans might have wished to oppose it, they

were too cowardly to do so. The meetings were advertised for three days

in Rochester, beginning January 12, and, as the newspapers occupied

many columns with a discussion as to whether they would be broken up

here as elsewhere, the opposition was thoroughly aroused and the

turbulent elements had time to become fully organized. The board of

aldermen were called together to consider whether means could not be

found to prevent Mr. Reynolds allowing the use of Corinthian Hall,

which had been rented for the occasion, and whether it would not be

wise to issue an order forbidding the owner of any public building to

let it to the Abolitionists; but finally adjourned without action.

The mob, under the lead of Constable Richard L. Swift, fully answered

all expectations. As Miss Anthony stepped forward to open the meeting,

she was greeted with a broadside of hisses and ironical applause. When

Mrs. Stanton began her address her voice was drowned in jeers and

groans and, although she persevered for some time, she was unable to

complete a single sentence. Rev. May attempted to speak and was met by

yells, and stamping of feet. A Southerner in the audience rose and

said: "Well, I may as well go back to Kentucky, for this is ahead of

any demonstration against free speech I ever saw in the South;" but he

was stopped by cries of, "Put him out!" The men kept on their hats,

smoked pipes and cigars, stamped, bellowed, swore, and bedlam reigned.

The acting mayor, sheriff and chief of police were present, but not an

arrest was made. Mrs. Stanton finally left the platform, but Miss

Anthony courageously maintained her position until the chief of police

mounted the rostrum and declared the meeting adjourned. Even then the

rioters refused to go out of the hall, and the speakers were obliged to

leave under protection of the police amid the hooting and howling of

the rabble. All wanted to give up the rest of the meetings, but Miss

Anthony declared they had a right to speak and it was the business of

the authorities to protect them, and persisted in finishing the series

as advertised. On Sunday the only place where they were allowed to hold

services was in Zion's colored church. The house was filled, morning

and evening, and they were left in peace.

At Port Byron the meeting was broken up by the throwing of cayenne

pepper on the stove. When the speakers reached Utica, where Mechanics'

Hall had been engaged, they learned that the board of directors had met

and decided it should not be used, in direct violation of the contract

with Miss Anthony, who had spent $60 on the meeting. They found the

doors locked and a large crowd on the outside. The mayor was among them

and begged her not to attempt to hold a meeting. In reply she demanded

that the doors be opened. He refused but offered to escort her to a

place of safety. She answered: "I am not afraid. It is you who are the

coward. If you have the power to protect me in person, you have also

the power to protect me in the right of free speech. I scorn your

assistance." She declined his proffered arm, but he persisted in

escorting her through the mob. As no hall could be had they held their

meeting at the residence of her host, James C. DeLong, and formed an

anti-slavery organization. The instigator of the opposition in Utica

was ex-Governor Horatio Seymour. Of the meeting at Rome, Miss Anthony

wrote:

Last evening there was a furious organized mob. I stood at the foot

of the stairs to take the admission fee. Some thirty or forty had

properly paid and passed up when a great uproar in the street told

of times coming. It proved to be a closely packed gang of forty or

fifty rowdies, who stamped and yelled and never halted for me. I

said, "Ten cents, sir," to the leader, but he brushed me aside, big

cloak, furs and all, as if I had been a mosquito, and cried, "Come

on, boys!" They rushed to the platform, where were Foster and

Powell who had not yet commenced speaking, seated themselves at the

table, drew out packs of cards, sang the Star-Spangled Banner and

hurrahed and hooted. After some thirty or forty minutes, Mr. Foster

and Aaron came down and I accompanied them back to Stanwix Hotel,

where the gang made desperate efforts to get through the entrance

room in pursuit of the "damned Abolitionists." The Republican paper

called us pestiferous fanatics and infidels, and advised every

decent man to stay away. Were the Republicans true at this crisis,

we not only should be heard quietly, as in past years, but should

have far larger audiences; and yet a hundred unmolested conventions

would not have made us a tithe of the sympathizers this one

diabolical mob has done.

Mr. May was in favor of giving up the conventions and was especially

anxious that one should not be attempted in Syracuse, which city, he

said, had always maintained freedom of speech and he did not want the

record broken; but still, if they insisted upon coming he would do all

in his power to help them. Miss Anthony was firm, replying: "If

Syracuse is capable of maintaining free speech the record will not be

broken; if it is not capable, it has no right to the reputation."

Convention Hall was engaged and Mr. May and Mr. C.D.B. Mills lent every

possible assistance, but the Abolitionists encountered here the worst

opposition of all. The hall was filled with a howling, drunken,

infuriated crowd, headed by Ezra Downer, a liquor dealer, and Luke

McKenna, a pro-slavery Democrat. Even Mr. May, who was venerated by all

Syracuse, was not allowed to speak. Rotten eggs were thrown, benches

broken, and knives and pistols gleamed in every direction. The few

ladies present were hurried out of the room, and Miss Anthony faced

that raging audience, the only woman there. The Republican chief of

police refused to make any effort toward keeping order. The mob crowded

upon the platform and took possession of the meeting, and Miss Anthony

and her little band were forced out of the hall. They repaired to the

residence of Dr. R.W. and Mrs. Hannah Fuller Pease, which was crowded

with friends of the cause. That evening the rioters dragged through the

streets hideous effigies of Susan B. Anthony and Rev. S.J. May, and

burned them in the public square.