_First_--They are denied the right of choosing their own

rulers, but are compelled to submit to the choice of a

minority consisting of its male residents, fully one-third

of whom are of foreign birth. _Second_--They are held

amenable to laws they have had no share in making and in

which they are forbidden a voice--laws which touch all their

most vital interests of education, industry, children,

property, life and liberty. _Third_--While compelled to bear

the burdens and suffer the penalties of government, they are

debarred the honors and emoluments of civil service, and the

control of offices in the righteous discharge of whose

duties their interest is equal to that of men.

_Fourth_--They are taxed without their consent to sustain

men in office who enact laws directly opposing their

interests, and inasmuch as the State of New York pays

one-sixth the taxes of the United States, its women feel the

arm of oppression--like Briareus with his hundred

hands--touching and crushing them with its burdens.

_Fifth_--They are under the power of an autocrat whose

salary they must pay, but who, in opposition to the will of

the people--as recently shown in the passage of the School

bill by the legislature--has by his veto denied them all

official authority in the control of the public schools, and

this despite the fact of there being 3,670 more girls of

school age than boys, and 14,819 more women than men

teaching in the State. _Sixth_--Under pretence of regulating

public morals, women of the _femme de pave_ class, many of

whom have been driven to this mode of life as a livelihood,

are subjected to more oppressive laws than their partners in

vice. _Seventh_--The laws treat married women as criminals

by taking from them all legal control of their children,

while those born outside of marriage belong absolutely to

the mothers. _Eighth_--They forbid the mother's inheritance

of property from her children in case the father is living,

thus making her of no consideration in the eyes of those to

whom she has given birth. _Ninth_--They give the husband

control of the common property--allow him to spend the whole

personal estate in riotous living, or even to sell the home

over his wife's head, subject only to her third

life-interest in case she survives him. _Tenth_--They allow

the husband to imprison her at his pleasure within his own

house, the court sustaining him in this coercion until the

wife "submits herself to her husband's will."

_Eleventh_--They allow the husband while the common property

is in his possession, "without even the formality of a legal

complaint, the taking of an oath or the filing of a bond for

the good faith of his action," to advertise his wife through

the public press as a deserter and to forbid her credit.

_Twelfth_--They deny the widow the right of inheritance in

the common property that they give the widower, allow her

but forty days' residence in the family mansion before

paying rent to her husband's heirs, thus treating her as if

she were an alien to her own children--set off to her a few

paltry articles of household use, close the estate through a

process of law, and make the days of her bereavement doubly

days of sorrow.

The above laws of marriage, placing irresponsible authority in

the hands of the husband, have given him a power of moral

coercion over the wife, making her virtually his slave. Without

entering into fuller details of the injustice and oppression of

the laws upon all women, married and single, we will sum the

whole subject up in the language of the French Woman's Rights

League, which characterizes woman's position thus:

(1) Woman is held _politically_ to have no existence; (2)

_civilly_, she is a minor; (3) in marriage she is a serf;

(4) in labor she is made inferior and robbed of her

earnings; (5) in public instruction she is sacrificed to

man; (6) out of marriage, answers to the faults committed by

both; (7) as a mother is deprived of her right to her

children; (8) she is only deemed equally responsible,

intelligent and answerable in taxes and crimes.

By order of the New York State Woman Suffrage Society.

May, 1877. MATILDA JOSLYN GAGE, _Secretary_.

In the summer of 1877 another effort was made by women of wealth to

be relieved from taxation. Several memorials to that effect were

sent to the legislature, one headed by Susan A. King[230] of New

York, a self-made woman who had accumulated a large fortune and

owned much real estate. Her memorial, signed by a few others,

represented $9,000,000. The committee bearing these waited on many

members of the legislature to secure their influence when such a

bill should be presented, which was done March 11, by Col. Alfred

Wagstaff, with warm recommendations. He was followed by Senator

McCarthy of Onondaga, who also introduced a bill for an amendment

to the constitution to secure to women the right of suffrage. Both

these bills called out the determined opposition of Thomas C.

Ecclesine, senator from the eleventh district, and the ridicule of

others. The delegation of ladies, sitting there as representatives

of half the people of the State, felt insulted to have their

demands thus sneered at; it was for them a moment of bitter

humiliation. In the evening, however, their time for retaliation

came, as they had a hearing in the Senate chamber, before the

Judiciary Committee, where an immense crowd assembled at an early

hour. The chairman of the committee Hon. William H. Robertson,

presided. Each of the ladies, in the course of her speech, referred

to the insulting remarks of Mr. Hughes of Washington county. That

gentleman, being present, looked as if he regretted his unfortunate

jokes, and winced under the sarcasm of the ladies.

Soon after this, great excitement was created by the close of

Stewart's Home for Working Women. This fine building, on the corner

of Thirty-second street and Fourth avenue, had been erected by the

merchant prince for the use of working women, who could there find

a home at a moderate expense. The millionaire dead, his large

fortune passed into other hands. The building was completed and

furnished in a style of elegance far beyond what was appropriated

to that purpose. On April 2, with a great flourish, the immense

building was thrown open for public inspection. A large number of

women applied at once for admission, but encountered a set of rules

that drove most of them away. This gave Judge Hilton an excuse for

violating his obligation to carry out the plan of his dead

benefactor, and in a few weeks he closed the house to working women

and opened it as the Park Hotel, for which it was so admirably

furnished and fitted that it was the general opinion that it was

intended for this from the beginning. Great indignation was felt in

the community, the women calling a meeting to express their

disappointment and dissatisfaction. This was held in Cooper

Institute, under the auspices of the Woman Suffrage

Association.[231] Had Mr. Stewart provided a permanent home for

working women it would have been but a meager return for the

underpaid toil of the thousands who had labored for half a century

to build up his princely fortune. But even the idea of such an act

of justice died with him.

In 1879 that eminent philanthropist Dr. Hervey Backus Wilbur,

superintendent of the State Idiot Asylum at Syracuse, urged the

passage of a law requiring the employment of competent women as

physicians in the female wards of the State insane asylums.

Petitions prepared by him were circulated by the officers of the

Women's Medical College, of the New York Infirmary, by Mrs.

Josephine Shaw Lowell of the State Board of Charities, and by Drs.

Willard Parker, Mary Putnam Jacobi, and other eminent physicians of

New York. The bill prepared by Dr. Wilbur was introduced in the

Assembly by Hon. Erastus Brooks, and required the trustees of each

of the four State asylums for the insane, "to employ one or more

competent, well-educated female physicians to have the charge of

the female patients of said asylum, under the direction of the

medical superintendents of the several asylums, as in the case of

the other or male assistant physicians, and to take the place of

such male assistant physician or physicians in the wards of the

female patients." Although Dr. Wilbur stood at the head of his

profession, his authority upon everything connected with the

feeble-minded being not only recognized in this country but in

Europe also as absolute, yet this bill, which did not contemplate

placing a woman in charge of such an institution, and which was so

purely moral in its character, met with ridicule and opposition

from the press of the State, to which Dr. Wilbur made an exhaustive

reply, showing the need of women as physicians in all institutions

in which unfortunate women are incarcerated.

When the fall elections of 1879 approached, a circular letter was

sent to every candidate for office in the city, asking his views on

the question of woman suffrage, and delegations waited on the

nominees for mayor. Mr. Edward Cooper, the Republican candidate,

declared he had no sympathy with the movement, while Hon. Augustus

Schell, the Democratic candidate, received the ladies with great

courtesy, and avowed himself friendly at least to the demand for

equal wages and better opportunities for education, and in the

trades and professions. From the answers received, a list of

candidates was prepared. On the evening of October 30, a crowded

mass-meeting was held in Steinway Hall to advocate the election of

those men who were favorable to the enfranchisement of woman. Mr.

Schell was chosen Mayor. The re-nomination in 1879, of Lucius

Robinson for governor by the Democratic convention, aroused the

opposition of the women who understood the politics of the State.

He had declared that "the God of Nature did not intend women for

public life"; they resolved that the same power should retire Mr.

Robinson from public life, and held mass-meetings to that end.[232]

These meetings were all alike crowded and enthusiastic, and the

speakers[233] felt richly paid for their efforts. A thorough

canvass of the State was also made, and a protest[234] extensively

circulated, condemning the governor for his veto of the

school-bill.

Mr. F. B. Thurber, and Miss Susan A. King contributed liberally to

this campaign. Handbills containing the protest and a call for a

series of mass-meetings, were distributed by the thousands all over

the State. The last meeting was held at the seventh ward Republican

wigwam, an immense structure, in Brooklyn: its use was given by the

unanimous vote of the club.[235] At every one of these meetings

resolutions were passed condemning Mr. Robinson, and electors were

urged to cast their votes against him. No doubt the enthusiasm the

women aroused for his opponent helped in a measure to defeat him.

In the meantime, women in the eleventh senatorial district were

concentrating their efforts for the defeat of Thomas H. Eccelsine.

His Republican opponent, Hon. Chas. E. Foster, was a pronounced

advocate of woman suffrage. Miss King,[236] who resided in this

district, exerted all her influence for his election, giving time,

money and thought to the canvass. On the morning of November 5, the

day after election, the papers announced that Mr. Cornell was

chosen governor, and that Mr. Ecclesine, who two years before had

been elected by 7,000 majority, was defeated by 600, and Mr. Foster

chosen senator in his stead.

This campaign attracted much attention. The journals throughout the

country commented upon the action of the women. It was conceded

that their efforts had counted for something in influencing the

election, and from this moment the leaders of the woman suffrage

movement in New York regarded themselves as possessing some

political influence.

In January, 1880, Governor Alonzo B. Cornell, in his first message

to the legislature, among other recommendations, embodied the

following:

The policy of making women eligible as school officers has been

adopted in several States with beneficial results, and the

question is exciting much discussion in this State. Women are

equally competent with men for this duty, and it cannot be

doubted that their admission to representation would largely

increase the efficacy of our school management. The favorable

attention of the legislature is earnestly directed to this

subject.

With such words from the chief executive it was an easy matter to

find friends for a measure making women eligible as school

officers. Early in the session the following bill was introduced by

Hon. Lorraine B. Sessions of Cattaraugus:

No person shall be deemed ineligible to serve as any school

officer, or to vote at any school meeting, by reason of sex, who

has the voter's qualifications required by law.

Senator Edwin G. Halbert of Broome rendered efficient aid and the

bill passed at once in the Senate by a nearly unanimous vote. Hon.

G. W. Husted of Westchester introduced it at once in the assembly

and earnestly championed the measure. It passed by a vote of 87 to

3. The bill was laid before the governor, who promptly affixed his

signature to it, and thus, at last, secured to the women of the

Empire State the right to vote on all school matters, and to hold

any school offices to which they might be chosen. The bill was

signed on February 12, and the next day being Friday, was the last

day of registration in the city of Syracuse, the election there

taking place on the following Tuesday. The news did not reach there

until late in the day, the evening papers being the first to

contain it. But, although so little was known of the measure,

thirteen women registered their names as voters, and cast their

ballots at the election. This was the first time the women of New

York ever voted, and Tuesday, February 18, 1880, is a day to be

remembered.[237] The voting for officers, like all other-school

matters, was provided for, not under the general laws, but by the

school statutes. There are two general elections in chartered

cities and universal suffrage for school as well as all other

officers; no preparation being required of voters but registration.

In the rural districts school meetings are held for elections, and

there are, by the statutes, three classes of voters described by

law.

1. Every person (male or female) who is a resident of the

district, of the age of twenty-one years, entitled to hold lands

in this State, who either owns or hires real estate in the

district liable to taxation for school purposes.

2. Every citizen of the United States (male or female) above the

age of twenty-one years, who is a resident of the district, and

who owns any personal property assessed on the last preceding

assessment roll of the town exceeding $50 in value, exclusive of

such as is exempt from execution.

3. Every citizen of the United States (male or female) above the

age of twenty-one years, who is a resident of the district and

who has permanently residing with him, or her, a child or

children of school age, some one or more of whom shall have

attended the school of the district for a period of at least

eight weeks within the year preceding the time at which the vote

is offered.

Several of the large cities hold their elections on the first

Tuesday in March, while the majority of the rural districts hold

their school meetings on the second Tuesday in October.

Preparations were at once made to call out a large vote of women in

the cities holding spring elections, but all such efforts were

checked by official action. The mayor of Rochester wrote to the

governor, asking him if the new law applied to cities. Mr. Cornell

laid the question before Attorney-General Ward, who promptly gave

an opinion that inasmuch as the words "school meeting" were used in

the law, women could only vote where such meetings were held, but

were not entitled to vote at the elections in large cities.

Meantime the New York City Association called a meeting of

congratulation on the passage of the bill on February 25, when

Robinson Hall was crowded to overflowing with the friends of woman

suffrage, some of whom addressed the vast audience.[238]

A mass-meeting of women was held at Albany, in Geological Hall,

Mrs. Blake presiding. It was especially announced that the meeting

was only for ladies, but several men who strayed in were permitted

to remain, to take that part in the proceedings usually allowed to

women in masculine assemblies, that is, to be silent spectators.

Resolutions were passed, urging the women to vote at the coming

election, and the names of several ladies were suggested as

trustees. March 19, 1880, the Albany County Woman Suffrage

Association[239] was formed, whose first active duty was to rouse

the women to vote in the coming school election, which they did, in

spite of the attorney-general's opinion.

Mr. Edwin G. Halbert of Broome also introduced a bill in the

Senate, for a constitutional amendment, to secure to women the

right of suffrage, which was passed by that conservative body just

before its adjournment. Meantime Mr. Wilcox urged the passage of

the bill to prohibit disfranchisement, which was brought to a third

reading in the Assembly. He prepared and circulated among the

members of the legislature a brief,[240] showing their power to

extend the suffrage. The argument is unanswerable, establishing the

fact that women had voted through the early days of the Colonies,

and proving, by unanswerable authorities, their right to do so;

thus establishing the right of women to vote in 1885. Mr.

Wilcox' researches on this point will prove invaluable in the

enfranchisement of woman, as his facts are irresistible. Following

is the proposed bill:

AN ACT _to Prohibit Disfranchisement_.

Introduced in the Assembly by Hon. Alex. F. Andrews, March 31,

1880. Reported by the Judiciary Committee for consideration, May

24. Ordered to third reading, May 27. Again so reported,

unanimously, March 16, 1881. Again ordered to third reading, May

3, 1881; ayes 60, noes 40. Vote on passage, May 11, 1881; ayes

59, noes 55, majority 4. (65 necessary to pass).

_Whereas_, the common law entitles women to vote under the same

qualifications as men; and

_Whereas_, said common law has never been abrogated in this

State; and

_Whereas_, a practice nevertheless obtains of treating as

disfranchised all persons to whom suffrage is not secured by

express words of the constitution; and

_Whereas_, the constitution makes no provision for this practice,

but on the contrary declares that its own object is to secure the

blessings of freedom to the people, and provides that no member

of this State shall be disfranchised or deprived of any of the

privileges secured to any citizen unless by constitutional

provision and judicial decision thereunder; and

_Whereas_, this practice, despite the want of authority therefor,

has by continuance acquired the force of law; and

_Whereas_, many citizens object to this practice as a violation

of the spirit and purpose of the constitution, as well as against

justice and public policy; and

_Whereas_, the legislature has corrected this practice in

repeated instances, its power to do so being in such instances

fully recognized and exercised; therefore

The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and

Assembly, do enact as follows:

SECTION 1. Every woman shall be free to vote, under the

qualifications required of men, or to refrain from voting, as she

may choose; and no person shall be debarred, by reason of sex,

from voting at any election, or at any town meeting, school

meeting, or other choice of government functionaries whatsoever.

SEC. 2. All acts and parts of acts inconsistent with this act,

are hereby repealed.

SEC. 3. This act shall take effect immediately.

Various memorials were sent to the legislature in behalf of this

bill, and a hearing was granted to its advocates.[241] The

Assembly chamber in the beautiful new capitol was crowded as it

had never been before. A large proportion of the senators and

assemblymen were present, many of the judges from the various

courts, while the governor and lieutenant-governor occupied

prominent places, and large crowds of fashionable ladies and

leading gentlemen filled the seats and galleries. The chairman of

the committee, Hon. George L. Ferry, presided. The ladies were

graciously received by the governor, who, at their request, gave

them the pen with which he signed the bill providing "school

suffrage for women," and in return they presented him a handsome

gold-mounted pen, a gift from the City Society.

The first voting by women after the passage of the new law, was at

Syracuse, February 17, only five days after the bill received the

governor's signature, but the great body of women had not the

opportunity until October. At that time in Fayetteville, the home

of Matilda Joslyn Gage, women voted in large numbers; the three who

had been placed upon the ticket, trustee, clerk and librarian were

all elected. It was an hour of triumph for Mrs. Gage who was

heartily congratulated upon the result. It was remarked that so

quiet an election had seldom been known. At Middletown, Orange

county, Dr. Lydia Sayre Hasbrook urged the women to take advantage

of their new privilege, and when the day of election came, although

it was cold and stormy, over 200 voted, and elected the entire

ticket of women for trustees, Mrs. Hasbrook herself being chosen as

one.

There were many places, however, where no women voted, for the

reform had all the antagonisms and prejudices of custom to

overcome. Many obstacles were thrown in the way to prevent them

from exercising this right. The men of their families objecting,

and misconstruing the law, kept them in doubt both as to their

rights and duties. The clergy from their pulpits warned the women

of their congregations not to vote, fathers forbade their

daughters, husbands their wives. The wonder is that against such a

pressure so many women did vote after all.

October 12, 1880, the elections took place in a large proportion of

the eleven thousand school districts of the State, and the daily

journals were full of items as to the result. We copy a few of

these:

LOWVILLE, Lewis County, Oct. 16, 1880.--The business meeting was

held on the evening of the 12th, and was attended by twenty

ladies. On the following day at 1 P.M., the election was held.

The ladies had an independent ticket opposing the incumbent clerk

and trustee. Seven voted. Four were challenged. They swore their

votes in. Boys just turned twenty-one years of age voted

unchallenged. The clerk, who is a young sprig of a lawyer, made

himself conspicuous by challenging our votes. He first read the

opinion of the State superintendent of public instruction, and

said that the penalty for illegal voting was not less than six

months' imprisonment. My vote was challenged, and although my

husband is an owner of much real estate and cannot sell one foot

of it without my consent, I could not vote.

From Penn Yan a woman writes:--About seventy ladies voted here,

but none who did not either own or lease real estate. The

argument so often used against woman suffrage--viz: that the

first to avail themselves of the privilege would be those least

qualified to do so, is directly refuted, in this town at least,

since the ladies who voted are without doubt those who by natural

ability and by culture are abundantly competent to vote

intelligently as well as conscientiously.

A woman in Nunda writes:--Only six women attended the school

meeting in the first district on the 12th, but over forty went to

the polls on the 13th. Two women were on one of the tickets; the

opposition ticket was made up entirely of males. We were

supported by the best men in the village. The ticket bearing the

names of Mrs. Fidelia J. M. Whitcomb, M. D., and Mrs. S. Augusta

Herrick, was elected.

From Poland a woman writes:--Our school meeting was attended by

about thirty men and two women. The population of the village is

between three and four hundred. My neighbor and I were proud of

the privilege of casting our first vote. There was nothing of

special interest to call out voters, as our trustees are

satisfactory to all. If circumstances required, there would be

many women voters here.

David Hopkins and Gustave Dettloff were candidates for school

trustee in district No. 1 of New Lots, Long Island, at the last

election. Mr. Hopkins is a farmer and was seeking reelection. Mr.

Dettloff is connected with an insurance company in this city, and

is a well-known resident of the town. The friends of Mr. Hopkins

about an hour before the closing of the polls, perceived that

there was danger of their candidate's defeat. A consultation was

held, and it was decided to utilize the new law giving women the

privilege of voting. Accordingly, several farm wagons were

procured and sent through the district to gather in the farmers'

wives and daughters. The wagons returned to the polls with 107

women, all of whom voted for Mr. Hopkins, thus saving him from

defeat. It was too late to use a counter poison. The total number

of votes cast was 329, Mr. Hopkins receiving eighty majority.

PORT JERVIS. Oct. 13.--The annual election of school trustees

occurred to-day and was attended with unusual excitement. Eight

hundred and thirty votes were polled, 150, for the women's

ticket, the remainder being divided. Only fifty ladies voted, a

great many being kept from the polls by the crowd of loafers

standing around. The Protestant ticket, composed of three men,

was elected. The election was held in a small room, and this was

crowded with men who amused themselves by passing remarks about

the ladies until the police were called in. Every lady who

offered her vote was challenged and a great many left the polls

in disgust. In Carpenter's Point and Sparrowbush, two suburbs of

the village, the ladies voted and were not molested.

Only a few women voted on Tuesday evening at the election for

school trustees in the first district of Southfield, Staten

Island. When the poll was opened Judge John G. Vaughan, the

retiring trustee, presided. A motion was made to reelect him by

acclamation. Amid great confusion Judge Vaughan put the motion

and declared it carried. Then Officers Fitzgerald and Leary had

to take charge of the meeting to preserve order, and Judge

Vaughan's opponents withdrew, threatening proceedings to have the

election declared invalid. Abram C. Wood was elected school

trustee in the West New Brighton (S. I.) district by 69 majority,

which included the votes of eight of eleven women present. Other

women promised to vote if Mr. Wood needed their support. Mr.

Robert B. Minturn presided.

SING SING, Oct. 13.--Five women voted at the school meeting last

night.

MOUNT MORRIS, Oct. 13.--One hundred and twenty women voted at the

school election here last evening.

GLEN'S FALLS, Oct. 13.--I am informed that women did vote here

and in the neighborhood last evening.

PERRY, Oct. 13.--A large woman vote was cast here. Two women were

elected members of the school-board.

PEEKSKILL, Oct. 13.--Five women voted in one district.

SHELTER ISLAND, Oct. 13.--Women voted at our school meeting.

COFFIN SUMMIT, Oct. 15.--Six women voted at the school meeting

here. A lady was nominated for trustee and received many votes,

but was defeated.

STAMFORD, Oct. 15.--Four ladies voted at the school meeting.

PORT RICHMOND, Oct. 15.--Six ladies attended the school meeting.

The chairman, Mr. Sidney P. Ronason, made a speech, welcoming

them, stating that an unsuccessful effort had been made by

citizens to induce a leading lady to become a candidate for

trustee; also, that Lester A. Scofield, the retiring trustee,

would cheerfully give way if any competent lady would take his

place. This Mr. Scofield confirmed, but, no lady being nominated,

he was reelected without opposition.

BALDWINVILLE, Oct. 15.--Thirty-three ladies voted at the school

election.

LOCKPORT, Oct. 15.--Two Quaker ladies voted at the school meeting

of the first district of this township. One of them, Dr. Sarah

Lamb Cushing, was chosen tax-collector by 23 votes out of 26. On

the entrance of the ladies, smoking and all disorder ceased, and

the meeting was uncommonly well-conducted.

LAWTON STATION, Oct. 15.--Of the 16 votes cast at the school

meeting here, 15 were given by women. A woman received the

highest vote for school trustee, but withdrew in favor of one of

the male candidates. The proceedings were enlivened with singing

by the pupils under the direction of the teacher. Several

improvements in the building were ordered at the instance of the

ladies.

KNOWLESVILLE, Oct. 15.--Many women meant to vote at the school

meeting, but a person went from house to house and threatened

them with legal penalties if they did. Mrs. James Kernholtz was

nominated for tax-collector at the meeting, but declined, saying

the pay was too small. Miss Adelina Lockwood, being nominated for

librarian, declined, but was elected by acclamation, amid great

applause. The meeting was very large, but unusually orderly.

FLUSHING, Oct. 15.--Forty women voted at the school meeting here,

and in the adjoining district.

SYRACUSE, Oct. 14, 1881.--At the Fayetteville, Onondaga county,

school district election yesterday, a direct issue was made on

the question of woman's rights. The candidate of the women was

chosen. This is the women's second victory in that place, giving

them control of the school-board.

A correspondent describing what the voters had to encounter, said:

Is the question asked, why have not more women voted? I answer,

hundreds of women in this State were debarred by falsehood and

intimidation. No sooner had the school suffrage law passed than

the wildest statements about it were made. It was given out that

the Governor had recalled the bill from the Secretary of State

after signing it (which he could not do), and vetoed it; that the

law was unconstitutional; that it was defective and inoperative;

that it did not apply to cities and villages; that it had been

repealed; and like untruths. Pains was taken to hide its

existence by corrupt officials, who told the women that the law

did not apply to the places where they lived, or who withheld the

fact of its passage. The State was flooded just before the

elections with an incorrect statement that only the rich women

could vote; that the children's mothers could not unless they

held real estate. The story was also set afloat that the

attorney-general had indorsed this statement; which that

gentleman promptly repudiated. All this we corrected as fast and

as far as we could; but it unavoidably did much harm.

Wholesale hindrance and terrorism too, were used. A few samples

are these: In Albany, many women were threatened by their own

husbands with expulsion from house and home, imprisonment, bodily

violence or death if they dared vote; while many others were

deterred by insults and threats of social persecution. Many

persons ridiculed and abused those who sought to vote. In some

districts the inspectors refused to register qualified women,

while in others votes were refused. Statements were widely

published that the law did not apply to Albany. In Knowersville,

the village teacher went to every house, and threatened the women

with state-prison if they dared to vote. In Mount Morris, the

president of the Board of Education denounced the ladies who

induced others to vote. In Fayetteville, Saratoga and elsewhere,

the ladies' request for some share in making the tickets was

scornfully ignored. In Port Jervis, the Board of Education

declined a hall that was offered, and had the election in a low,

dirty little room. Smoke was puffed in the ladies' faces,

challenges were frequent, and all sorts of impudent questions

were asked of the voters. In Long Island City many ladies were

challenged, and stones were thrown in the street at Mrs. Emma

Gates Conkling, the lady who was most active in bringing out the

new voters. In New Brighton, the village paper threatened the

women with jail if they voted; and when a motion was made in one

district that the ladies be invited to attend, a large negative

vote was given, one man shouting, "We have enough of women at

home; we don't want'em here!" At West New Brighton it was openly

announced that the meeting should be too turbulent for ladies,

insomuch that many who intended to go staid away, and the few who

went were obliged to wait till all the men had voted. In Newham a

gang of low fellows took possession of the polling place early,

filled it with smoke of the worst tobacco, and covered the floor

with tobacco juice; and through all this the few ladies who

ventured to vote had to pass. In New York a man who claims to be

a gentleman said: "If my wife undertook to vote I would trample

her under my feet." In New Rochelle the school trustee told the

women they were not entitled to vote, and tried to prevent a

meeting being held to inform them. Clergymen from the pulpit

urged women not to vote, and a mob gathered at the polls and

blocked the way. These are but samples of the difficulties under

which the new law went into operation; and it is the truth that

there was as much bulldozing of voters in New York as ever in the

South, though sometimes by other means.

In 1880 Mrs. Blake was sent by the New York society to the

Republican and Democratic presidential conventions at Chicago and

Cincinnati, and on her return a meeting was called in Republican

Hall, July 9, to hear her report as to the comparative treatment

received by the delegates in the two conventions. Soon afterwards a

delegation of ladies[242] waited on Winfield S. Hancock, the

Democratic nominee, who received them with much courtesy, saying he

was quite willing to interpret, in its broadest sense, that clause

of his letter of acceptance wherein he said: "It is only by a full

vote and a fair count that the people can rule in fact, as required

by the theory of our government." "I am willing, ladies," said the

general, "to have you say that I believe in a free ballot for all

the people of the United States, women as well as men."

Mrs. Blake, Mrs. Slocum and Mr. Wilcox made quite an extensive

canvass through many counties of the State, to rouse the women to

use their right to vote on all school matters.

The bill to prohibit disfranchisement was again introduced in the

legislature of 1881, by Joseph M. Congdon, and ordered to a third

reading May 3, by a vote of 60 to 40, and on May 11 came up for

final action, when the ladies, by special courtesy, were admitted

to the floor of the Assembly chamber to listen to the discussion.

General Francis B. Spinola and General James W. Husted made earnest

speeches in favor of the bill, and Hon. Erastus Brooks and General

George A. Sharpe in opposition. The roll-call gave 57 ayes to 55

noes--a majority of those present, but not the majority (65) of all

the members of the Assembly, which the constitution of New York

requires for the final passage of a bill. The vote astonished the

opponents, and placed the measure among the grave questions of the

day. This substantial success inspired the friends to renewed

efforts.[243]

The necessity of properly qualified women in the police stations

again came up for consideration. The condition of unfortunate women

nightly consigned to these places had long been set forth by the

leaders of the suffrage movement. In New York there were thirty-two

station-houses in which, from night to night, from five to forty

women were lodged, some on criminal charges, some from extreme

poverty. All there, young and old, were entirely in the hands of

men, in sickness or distress. If search was to be made on charge of

theft, it was always a male official who performed the duty. If the

most delicate and refined lady were taken ill on the street, or

injured in any way, she was liable to be taken to the nearest

station, where the needful examinations to ascertain if life yet

lingered must be made by men. In view of these facts, a resolution

was again passed at the State convention, and request made to the

police commissioners, to permit a delegation of ladies to meet with

them in conference. The commissioners deigned no reply, but gave

the letter to the press, whereupon ensued a storm of comment and

ridicule.

On consultation with Mrs. Josephine Shaw Lowell, commissioner of

the State Board of Charities, a bill was drawn up and sent to

Albany, providing for the appointment of one or more police-matrons

at every station-house in cities of 50,000 inhabitants and upwards,

the salaries to be $600 each. Hon. J. C. Boyd presented the bill in

the Senate, where it passed April 18. In the Assembly its passage

was urged by Hon. Michael C. Murphy, chairman of the Committee on

Cities. Meantime Mayor Grace and Comptroller Campbell entered their

protest against the bill, declaring the measure ought to originate

in the city departments, where there was full power to appoint

police-matrons; also, that the proposed salaries would be a heavy

drain upon the city treasury. The comptroller was at once informed

of the previous application to the police commissioners, from whom

no reply had been received, which virtually compelled appeal to the

legislature. And as to salaries, it was suggested that there were

now on the pay-roll of the police of New York 2,500 men whose

salaries amounted to over $2,500,000, whereas the bill before the

legislature asked for only sixty matrons, whose salaries would

amount to but $36,000. This was certainly a most reasonable demand

for the protection of one-half the people of the city, who paid

fully half the indirect taxes as well as a fair proportion of the

direct taxes. Finally, it was proposed to the comptroller that the

bill should be withdrawn if he would recommend the appointment of

police-matrons in the city departments. This was not accepted. The

Committee on Cities gave a hearing to Mrs. Blake, and reported

unanimously in favor of the bill. Public sentiment supported the

measure, the press generally advocated it, and the Assembly passed

the bill by a vote of 96 to 7; but it failed to receive the

signature of the governor,--a most striking proof of the need of

the ballot for women; since, friendly as he was to woman's

enfranchisement, when he found the police department, with its

thousands of attaches, _all with votes_ in their hands, opposed,

Governor Cornell was found wanting in courage and conscience to

sign this bill for women who had no votes.[244] The next year

application was again made to the city authorities for the

appointment of matrons, but they refused to act. The bill was

reintroduced in the legislature, passed by a large majority in the

Assembly, but defeated in the Senate by the adverse report of the

Committee on Cities. A mass-meeting to discuss this question of

police-matrons was held in Steinway Hall, March 1, at which the

speakers[B] all urged such appointments.

During the winter of 1882 an effort was made in New York city to

secure the enforcement of the law enacted by the previous

legislature, which provided that seats should be furnished for the

"shop-girls." Mrs. Emma Gates Conkling caused the arrest of certain

prominent shop-keepers on the charge of not complying with the law,

but on coming to trial the suits were withdrawn on the promise of

the delinquents to give seats to their employes.

During the winter of 1882 agitation for the higher education of

women was renewed, and a society organized by some of the most

influential ladies in the city. They rolled up a petition of 1,200,

asking that Columbia College be opened to women. President Barnard

had recommended this in his reports for three years. The agitation

culminated in a grand meeting[245] in the new Union League Theater.

Parke Godwin of the _Evening Post_ presided. The audience was

chiefly composed of fashionable ladies, whose equipages filled

Thirty-eighth street blocks away, yet not a woman sat on the

platform; not a woman's voice was heard; even the report of the

society was read by a man, and every inspiration of the occasion

was filtered through the brain of some man. Among other things, Mr.

Godwin, son-in-law of the poet Bryant, said:

We speak of the higher education of women. Why not also of men?

Because they already have the opportunity for obtaining it. The

idea upon which our government is built is the idea of equal

rights for all; and that means equal opportunities. Every society

needs all the best intellect that it can get. We have many evil

influences acting upon our society here, and we need the

all-controlling influence of woman. We cannot fix a standard for

her. History shows what she has done, in a Vespasia, Vittoria

Colonna, De Stael, Bremer, Evans, Somerville and Maria Mitchell.

She does not go out of her sphere when she is so highly educated.

She can darn her stockings just as well if she does know the word

in half-a-dozen languages. There is no longer novelty in this

movement; it has been tried successfully here and abroad in the

universities, and always with success.

Addresses were also made by Rev. Dr. Stowe, Dr. William Draper,

Joseph Choate, and others eminent in one way or another. The

meeting closed by circulating a petition for presentation to the

trustees of Columbia College, asking that properly qualified women

be admitted to lectures and examinations.

The bill to prohibit disfranchisement on account of sex was again

introduced in the Assembly by Hon. J. Hampden Robb, and referred to

the Committee on Grievances, of which Major James Haggerty was

chairman, who gave to it his hearty approval and granted two

hearings to the officers of the State society, on behalf of the

large number of memorialists who had sent in their petitions from

all parts of the State. The women of Albany were indefatigable in

their personal appeals to the different members of the Assembly,

urging them to vote for the bill, while Major Haggerty was untiring

in his advocacy of the measure. On May 3 there was an animated

discussion:[246] the bill passed to its third reading by an

overwhelming vote, which alarmed the opponents into making a

thorough canvass, that proved to them the necessity of some

decisive action for the defeat of the bill. The Hon. Erastas Brooks

presented a resolution, calling on the attorney-general for his

opinion on the constitutionality of the proposed law, which was

passed in a moment of confusion, and when many of our friends were

absent. Following is the opinion elicited:

STATE OF NEW YORK. OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL,}

ALBANY, May 10, 1882.}

_To the Assembly:_

I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of the resolution of

the Assembly requesting the attorney-general to report his

opinion as to the constitutionality of Assembly bill No. 637,

which provides that "every woman shall be free to vote under the

qualifications required of men, or to refrain from voting, as she

may choose; and no person shall be debarred by reason of sex from

voting at any election, or at any town meeting, school meeting,

or other choice of government functionaries whatsoever," and

whether, without an amendment to the constitution, suffrage can

be granted to any class of persons not named in the constitution.

I reply:

_First_--It has been decided so often by the judicial tribunals

of the various States of the Union, and by the Supreme Court of

the United States, that suffrage is not a natural inherent right,

but one governed by the law-making power and regulated by

questions of availability and expediency, instead of absolute,

inalienable right (1, 3), that the question is no longer open for

discussion, either by the judicial forum or legislative

assemblies (_Burnham vs. Laning, 1 Legal Gazette Rep., 411,

Supreme Court Penn.; Minor vs. Happersett, 21 Wallace, 162; Day

vs. Jones, 31 California, 261; Anderson vs. Baker, 23 Maryland,

531; Abbott vs. Bayley, 6 Pickering, 92; 2 Dallas, 471-2; In re

Susan B. Anthony, 11 Blatchford, 200_). At the common law women

had no right to vote and no political status (2, 4) (_Maine's

Ancient Law, 140; Cooley's Const. Lim., 599; Blackstone's Comm.,

171_).

_Second_--Therefore the constitution of the State of New York,

providing that every male citizen of the age of 21 years who

shall have certain other qualifications, may vote, the

determination of the organic law specifying who shall have the

privilege of voting, excludes all other classes (5), such as

women, persons under 21 years of age and aliens. The argument

that, because women are not expressly prohibited, they may vote,

fails to give the slightest force to the term "male" in the

constitution; and by the same force of reasoning, the expression

of the term "citizen" and the statement of the age of 21 years

would not necessarily exclude aliens and those under 21 years of

age from voting (6). Therefore, assuming that our organic law was

properly adopted without the participation of women either in

making or adopting it (7), that organic law controls.

_Third_--It follows, therefore, as a logical consequence that the

proposed reform cannot be accomplished except by an amendment of

the constitution ratified by two successive legislatures and the

people, or by a constitutional convention, whose work shall be

sanctioned by a vote of the people.

LESLIE W. RUSSELL, _Attorney-General_.[247]

Weak as was this document, and untenable as were its assertions, it

had great weight with many of the members of the legislature coming

as the opinion did from the attorney-general of the State. The

friends of the bill resolved to call for the vote when the bill

should be reached, and on May 16, the women were present in large

numbers, listening with intense interest to the brief speeches of

the members for and against, and watching and counting the vote as

the roll-call proceeded, which resulted in 54 ayes and 59 noes,

lacking three votes of a majority of those present and only eleven

of the requisite number, sixty-five. In view of the official

opinion against its constitutionality amounting to a legal

decision, this was a most gratifying vote.[248]

The presence of Leslie W. Russell in Albany, as attorney-general,

rendered it useless to reintroduce the bill to prohibit

disfranchisement on account of sex in the legislature of 1883, but

in its stead, Dr. John G. Boyd of New York introduced a proposition

to strike "male" from the suffrage clause of the constitution,

which, however, received only fifteen votes.

To pass from the State to the Church, the winter of 1883 was

notable for the delivery of a series of Lenten lectures on woman by

the Rev. Morgan Dix, D. D., rector of Trinity Church, New York,

afterwards published in book form under the title, "The Calling of

a Christian Woman and her Training to Fulfill it." The lectures

were delivered each Friday evening during Lent, in Trinity Chapel,

and at once attracted attention from their conservative,

reaectionary, almost monastic views of woman's position and duties.

After reading a report of one of these remarkable essays in which

women were gravely told their highest happiness should be found in

singing hymns, Mrs. Blake decided to reply to them. She secured a

hall on Fourteenth street, and on successive Sunday evenings gave

addresses in reply. Both courses of lectures were well attended.

The moderate audiences of Trinity Chapel soon became a throng that

more than filled the large building, while the hall in which Mrs.

Blake spoke was packed to suffocation, hundreds going away unable

to gain admittance. The press everywhere favored the broad and

liberal views presented by Mrs. Blake, and denounced the old-time

narrow theories of Dr. Dix. Mrs. Blake's lectures were also

published in book form with the title of "Woman's Place To-day" and

had a large circulation.

The Republicans again nominating Mr. Russell for attorney-general,

an active campaign was organized against him and in favor of the

Democratic nominee, Mr. Dennis O'Brien. Protests[249] against

Russell were circulated throughout the State; Republican tickets

were printed with the name of Denis O'Brien for attorney-general,

and on election day women distributed these tickets, and made every

possible effort to ensure the defeat of Russell; and he was

defeated by 13,000 votes.

The legislature of 1884 showed a marked gain; Hon. Erastus Brooks,

General George A. Sharpe, and other prominent opponents had been

retired, and their seats filled by active friends. Our bill was

introduced by Mr. William Howland of Cayuga, and referred to the

Committee on the Judiciary. Mr. Howland also secured the passage of

a special act, granting women the right to vote at the charter

elections of Union Springs, Cayuga county. Under similar enactments

women have the right to vote for municipal officers in Dansville,

Newport and other villages and towns in the State.

On March 11, 12, the annual meeting of the State society was held

in the City Hall, Albany, with a good representation[250] from the

National Convention at Washington, added to our own State

speakers.[251] On the last evening there was an overflow meeting

held in Geological Hall, presided over by Mrs. Matilda Joslyn Gage.

Governor Cleveland accorded the delegates a most courteous

reception in his room in the capitol. A hearing was had before the

Judiciary Committee March 13. The assembly-chamber was crowded.

General Husted, chairman of the committee, presided, and Mrs.

Blake, the president of the society, introduced the speakers.[252]

A few days later the same committee gave a special hearing to Mrs.

Gougar, who made the journey from Indiana to present the case. The

committee reported adversely, but by the able tactics of General

Husted, after an animated debate the bill was placed on the

calendar by a vote of 66 to 62, and shortly after ordered to a

third reading by a vote of 74 to 39. On May 8 the bill was reached

for final action. Frederick B. Howe of New York was the principal

opponent, trying to obstruct legislation by one and another

pretext. General Husted took the floor in an able speech on the

constitutionality of the bill, and the vote stood 57 ayes to 61

noes, lacking eight votes of the requisite 65.

While the right of suffrage is still denied, gains in personal and

property rights have been granted:

In 1880, the law requiring the private acknowledgment by a

married woman of her execution of deeds, or other written

instruments, without the "fear or compulsion" of her husband, was

abolished, leaving the wife to make, take and certify in the same

manner as if she were a _feme sole_.

March 21, 1884, the penal code of the State was amended, raising

the age of consent from ten to sixteen years, and also providing

penalties[253] for inveigling or enticing any unmarried woman,

under the age of twenty-five years, into a house of ill-fame or

assignation.

Under the act of May 28, 1884, a married woman may contract to

the same extent, with like effect and in the same form as if

unmarried, and she and her separate estate shall be liable

thereon, whether such contract relates to her separate business

or estate, or otherwise, and in no case shall a charge upon her

separate estate be necessary.

It is by court decisions that we most readily learn the legal

status of married women, under the favorable legislation of the

period covered by this History. While referring the reader to

Abbott's Digest of New York Laws for full knowledge upon this

point, we give a few of the more recent decisions as illustrating

general legal opinion:

TROY, March 23, 1882.--The Court of Appeals decided that married

women are the rightful owners of articles of personal adornment

or convenience coming from husbands, and can bequeath them to

their heirs. The court held that separate and personal possession

by a wife of articles specially fitted for and adapted to her

personal use, and differing in that respect from household goods

kept for the common use of husband and wife, would draw after it

a presumption of the executed gift if the property came from the

husband, and of the wife's ownership, but for disabilities of the

marital relations. Now that these disabilities are removed the

separate existence and separate property of the wife are

recognized, and her capacity to take and hold as her own the gift

in good faith and fairly made to her by her husband established,

it seemed to the court time to clothe her right with natural and

proper attributes, and apply to the gift to her, although made by

her husband, the general rules of law unmodified and unimpaired

by the old disabilities of the marriage relations.

This decision was important as further destroying the old

common-law theory of the husband's absolute ownership of his wife's

person, property, services and earnings. The same year (1882) the

Supreme Court, at its general term, rendered a decision that a

married woman could sue her husband for damages for assault and

battery; that by the act of 1860 the legislature intended to, and

did, change the common-law rule, that a wife could not sue her

husband. Judge Brady rendered the opinion, Judge Daniels

concurring; Presiding Judge Noah Davis dissenting. Judge Brady

said:

To allow the right (to sue) in an action of this character, in

accordance with the language of the statute, would be to promote

greater harmony by enlarging the rights of married women and

increasing the obligations of husbands, by affording greater

protection to the former, and by enforcing greater restraint upon

the latter in the indulgence of their evil passions. The

declaration of such a rule is not against the policy of the law.

It is in harmony with it, and calculated to preserve peace and,

in a great measure, prevent barbarous acts, acts of cruelty,

regarded by mankind as inexcusable, contemptible, detestable. It

is neither too early nor too late to promulgate the doctrine that

if a husband commits an assault and battery upon his wife he may

be held responsible civilly and criminally for the act, which is

not only committed in violation of the laws of God and man, but

in direct antagonism to the contract of marriage, its

obligations, duties, responsibilities, and the very basis on

which it rests. The rules of the common law on this subject have

been dispelled, routed, and justly so, by the acts of 1860 and

1862. They are things of the past which have succumbed to more

liberal and just views, like many other doctrines of the common

law which could not stand the scrutiny and analysis of modern

civilization.

The utter insecurity of woman without the ballot is shown in the

reversal of this decision within a few months, by the Court of

Appeals, on the ground that it would be "contrary to the policy of

the law, and destructive to the conjugal union and tranquility

which it had always been the object of the law to guard and

protect." Could satire go farther? We record with satisfaction the

fact that Judge Danforth uttered a strong dissenting opinion.

The friends of woman suffrage in the legislature of 1884 secured

the passage of a bill empowering women to vote on all questions of

taxation submitted to a popular vote in the village of Union

Springs. Governor Cleveland was urged to veto it; but after hearing

all the objections he signed the bill and it became a law.

At Clinton, Oneida county, twenty-two women voted on June 21, 1884,

at an election on the question of establishing water-works. Eight

voted for the tax, fourteen against it. Fifteen other women

appeared at the polls, but were excluded from voting because,

though they were real-estate tax-payers, the assessor had left

their names off the tax-roll. Judge Theodore W. Dwight, president

of the Columbia Law School, pronounced women tax-payers entitled to

vote under the general water-works act, and therefore that the

election-officials violated the law in refusing to accept the votes

of the women whose names were omitted from the assessors' tax-list.

In 1879, there was a report of the committee to allow widows an

active voice in the settlement of the family estate and to have the

sole guardianship of minor children. A petition in favor of the

bill had upon it the names of such well-known men as Peter Cooper,

George William Curtis, Henry Bergh and J. W. Simonton.

September 13, 1879, Mrs. MacDonald of Boston argued her own case

before the United States Circuit Court in New York city, in a

patent suit. It was a marked event in court circles, she being the

first lady pleader that ever appeared in that court, and the second

woman who ever argued a case in this State. Anne Bradstreet was for

years a marked character in Albany courts, but her claims for

justice were regarded as an amusing lunacy.

In 1880, Governor Cornell appointed Miss Carpenter on the State

Board of Charities.

In the suit of Mr. Edward Jones to recover $860 which he alleged he

had loaned to the Rev. Anna Oliver for the Willoughby Avenue

Methodist Episcopal Church, Brooklyn, of which she was pastor, a

verdict for the defendant was rendered. Miss Oliver addressed the

following letter to the court:

_To his Honor, the Judge, the Intelligent Jury, the Lawyers and

all who are engaged in the case of Jones vs. Oliver_:

GENTLEMEN:--Thanking you for the politeness, the courtesy, the

chivalry even, that has been shown me to-day, allow me to make of

you the following request: Please sit down at your earliest

leisure, and endeavor to realize in imagination how you would

feel if you were sued by a woman, and the case was brought before

a court composed entirely of women; the judge a woman; every

member of the jury a woman; women to read the oath to you, and

hold the Bible, and every lawyer a woman. Further, your case to

be tried under laws framed entirely by women, in which neither

you nor any man had ever been allowed a voice. Somewhat as you

would feel under such circumstances, you may be assured, on

reading this, I have felt during the trial to-day. Perhaps the

women would be lenient to you (the sexes do favor each other),

but would you be satisfied? Would you feel that such an

arrangement was exactly the just and fair thing? If you would

not, I ask you on the principle of the Golden Rule, to use your

influence for the enfranchisement of women.

_New York, 1881._

Mrs. Roebling, wife of the engineer in charge of the construction

of the marvelous Brooklyn bridge, made the patterns for various

necessary shapes of iron and steel such as no mills were making,

after her husband and other engineers had for weeks puzzled their

brains over the difficulties.

When Frank Leslie died, his printing-house was involved, and Mrs.

Leslie undertook to redeem it, which she did, and in a very short

time. Speaking of it she says:

"I had the property in reach, and the assignees were ready to

turn it over to me, but to get it, it was necessary for me to

raise $50,000, I borrowed it from a woman. How happy I was when

she signed the check, and how beautiful it seemed to me to see

one woman helping another. I borrowed the money in June, and was

to make the first payment of $5,000, on the 1st of November. On

the 29th of October I paid the $50,000 with interest. From June

to the 29th of October, I made $50,000 clear. I had also to pay

$30,000 to the creditors who did not come under the contract.

While I was paying this $80,000 of my husband's debts, I spent

but $30 for myself, except for my board. I lived in a little

attic room, without a carpet, and the window was so high that I

could not get a glimpse of the sky unless I stood on a chair and

looked out. When I had paid the debts and raised a monument to my

husband, then I said to myself, 'now for a great big pair of

diamond earrings,' and away I went to Europe, and here are the

diamonds." The diamonds are perfect matches, twenty-seven carats

in weight, and are nearly as large as nickles.

In Lansingburgh the women tax-payers offered their ballots and were

repulsed, as follows:

September 2, 1885, the special election of the taxable

inhabitants of the village of Lansingburgh took place, to vote

upon a proposition to raise by tax the sum of $15,000 for

water-works purposes. The measure was voted by 102 for it to 46

against. But a small amount of interest was manifested in the

election. Several women tax-payers offered their votes, but the

inspectors would not receive them, and the matter will be

contested in the courts. The call for the election asked for an

expression from "the taxable inhabitants," and women tax-payers

in the 'burgh claim under the law their rights must be

recognized. Lansingburgh inspectors have on numerous occasions

refused to receive the ballots thus tendered, and the women have

lost patience. They are to employ the best of counsel and settle

the question at as early a day as possible. Women pay tax upon

$367,394 of the property within the village boundaries, and they

believe that they, to the number of 317 at least, are entitled to

votes on all questions involving a monetary expenditure. In

Saratoga, Clinton, and a number of other places in this State,

where elections in relation to water-works have taken place, it

has been held by legal authority that women property owners have

a right to vote, and they have voted accordingly the same as

other tax-payers.

In regard to recent efforts to secure legislation favorable to

women, Mr. Wilcox writes:

The impression that the School Act, passed in 1880, did not apply

to cities, led to the introduction by the Hon. Charles S. Baker

of Rochester, of a bill covering cities. A test vote showed the

Assembly practically unanimous for it, but it was referred to the

Judiciary Committee to examine its constitutionality. The

chairman, Hon. Geo. L. Ferry, and other members, asked me to

look up the point and inform the committee, supposing a

constitutional amendment needful. When the point was made on this

bill, I for the first time closely examined the constitution, and

finding there was nought to prevent the legislature enfranchising

anyone, promptly apprised the committee of the discovery. The

acting-chairman, Major Wm. D. Brennan, requested me to furnish

the committee a legal brief on the matter. This (Feb. 19, 1880) I

did, and arranged a public hearing before them in the

assembly-chamber, which was attended by Governor Cornell,

Lieutenant-Governor Hoskins, many senators, assemblymen, and

State officers; at which Mrs. Blake, the sainted Helen M. Slocum

and Mrs. Elizabeth L. Saxon were the speakers. From that year to

the present there has been a "Bill to Prohibit Disfranchisement"

before each legislature. In 1881, it was carried to a majority

vote in the Assembly. In 1883, two-thirds of the Assembly were

ready to pass the bill when the attorney-general declared it

unconstitutional. In 1884, Governor Cleveland had approved two

suffrage acts, and promised to sign all the friends could carry.

In 1885, growing tired of the senseless clamor of

"unconstitutionality," I resolved to show how little law the

clamorers knew. To the knowledge gained by five years'

discussion, I added that obtained by several months' research in

the State Library at Albany, that of the New York Bar

Association, those of the New York Law Institute and Columbia

College, and elsewhere. The result was the publication of "Cases

of the Legislature's Power over Suffrage," wherein it was shown,

condensed from a great number of authorities, that all classes

have received suffrage, not from the constitution but from the

legislature, and that the latter has exercised the power of

extending suffrage in hundreds of cases. This document received

high praise from General James W. Husted and Major James

Haggerty, who have manfully championed our bills in the Assembly,

General Husted reading from it in his speech and it was signally

sanctioned by the Assembly which, after being supplied with

copies, voted down by more than three to one a motion to

substitute a constitutional amendment.

But while working at this document, I was fortunate enough to

make a still greater discovery--that portions of statute law

which formerly prevented women's voting were repealed long since;

that the constitution and statutes in their present shape secure

women the legal right to vote.

February 19, 1885, a hearing was granted to Mrs. Stanton, Mrs.

Rogers and Mrs. Blake in the assembly-chamber before the Committee

on Grievances, on the "Bill to Prohibit Disfranchisement." The

splendid auditorium was crowded for two hours, and members of the

committee lingered a long time after the audience had dispersed to

discuss the whole question still further with the speakers. On the

next day Mrs. Mary Seymour Howell and Governor John W. Hoyt of

Wyoming Territory had a second hearing. The committee reported for

consideration. When the bill came up for a third reading, General

Martin L. Curtis of St. Lawrence moved that it be sent to

the Judiciary Committee with instructions to substitute a

constitutional amendment; lost, ayes 25, noes 75; carried to a

third reading by _viva voce_ vote. The vote on the final passage

was, ayes 57, noes 56; the constitutional majority in this State

being 65 of the 128 members, it was lost by eight votes. Of the 73

Republicans, 29 voted for the bill; of the 55 Democrats, 28 voted

for the bill, showing that more than half the Democratic vote was

in favor, and only two-fifths of the Republican; thus our defeat

was due to the Republican party.

Thus stands the question of woman suffrage in the Empire State

to-day, where women are in the majority.[254] After long years of

unremitting efforts who can read this chapter of woman's faith and

patience, under such oft-repeated disappointments, but with pity

for her humiliations and admiration for her courage and

persistence. For nearly half a century the petitions, the appeals,

the arguments of the women of New York have been before the

legislature for consideration, and the trivial concessions of

justice thus far wrung from our rulers bear no proportion to the

prolonged labors we have gone through to achieve them.

FOOTNOTES:

[200] It has recently been ascertained that the first woman's

rights petition sent to the New York State legislature was by Miss

Mary Ayers, in 1834, for a change in the property laws. It was ten

or fifteen feet long when unrolled, and is still buried in the

vaults of the capitol at Albany.

[201] Many years afterwards, lecturing in Texas, I met a party of

ladies from Georgia, thoroughly awake on all questions relating to

women. Finding ourselves quite in accord, I said, "how did you get

those ideas in Georgia?" "Why," said one, "some of our friends

attended a woman's convention at Saratoga, and told us what was

said there, and gave us several tracts on all phases of the

question, which were the chief topics of discussion among us long

after." Southern women have suffered so many evils growing out of

the system of slavery that they readily learn the lessons of

freedom.--[E. C. S.

[202] The following were elected officers of the association.

_President_, Martha C. Wright, Auburn. _Vice-Presidents_, Celia

Burleigh, Brooklyn; Rachel S. Martin, Albany; Lydia A. Strowbridge,

Cortland; Jennie White, Syracuse; Eliza W. Osborn, Auburn; Sarah G.

Love, Ithaca; W. S. V. Rosa, Watertown; Mary M. R. Parks, Utica;

Amy Post, Rochester; Candace S. Brockett, Brockett's Bridge; Ida

Greeley, Chappaqua; Mary Hunt, Waterloo. _Secretary_, Matilda

Joslyn Gage, Fayetteville. _Executive Committee_, Lucy A. Brand,

Emeline A. Morgan, Mrs. H. Stewart, Samuel J. May, Rhoda Price, all

of Syracuse. _Advisory Counsel_, for First Judicial District, Susan

B. Anthony, New York; Second, Sarah Schram, Newburgh; Third, Sarah

H. Hallock, Milton; Fourth, Caroline Mowry Holmes, Greenwich;

Fifth, Ann T. Randall, Oswego; Sixth, Mrs. Professor Sprague,

Ithaca, Seventh, Harriet N. Austin, Dansville; Eighth, Helen P.

Jenkins, Buffalo.

[203] The speakers were Celia Burleigh, Susan B. Anthony, Charlotte

B. Wilbour, Matilda Joslyn Gage, Mrs. Bedortha, of Saratoga, Mrs.

Strowbridge, of Cortland, Mrs. Norton, J. N. Holmes, esq., Judge

McKean, Rev. Mr. Angier, Hon. Wm. Hay. See Vol. II., page 402, for

Mrs. Burleigh's letter on this Saratoga convention.

[204] The Board of Trustees of Mt. Vernon, Westchester county,

called a meeting of taxpayers of that village on July 19, 1868, to

vote upon the question of levying a tax of $6,000 for the purpose

of making and repairing highways and sidewalks, and for sundry

other public improvements. Over sixty per cent. of the real-estate

owners being women, they resolved upon asserting their right to a

voice in the matter, and issued a call for a meeting, signed by the

following influential ladies: Mrs. M. J. Law, Mrs. H. H. Leaver,

Mrs. Olive Leaver, Mrs. J. Haggerty, Mary H. Macdonald, Mrs.

Dorothy Ferguson, Mrs. M. J. Farrand, Mrs. Jeanette Oron, Mrs.

Thirza Clark, Mrs. S. J. Clark, Mrs. Nettie Morgan, Mrs. D. Downs,

Miss L. M. Hale, Miss Susie Law, Mrs. Celia Pratt, Mrs. Sabra

Talcott, Mrs. Mary Wilkie, Mrs. Elizabeth Latham, Mrs. Mary C.

Brown, Mrs. J. M. Lockwood, Mrs. May Howe, Mrs. Adaline Baylis,

Mrs. J. Harper, Miss Elizabeth Eaton, Miss C. Frederiska Scharft,

Mrs. S. A. Hathaway, Mrs. Margaret Hick, Mrs. Rebecca Dimmic, Mrs.

Catharine Alphonse, Miss Julia Cheney, Mrs. E. Watkins, Mrs. L. M.

Pease, Mrs. Margaret Coles, Mrs. Ruth Smith, Mrs. Mary A. Douglas,

Mrs. Sarah Valentine, Mrs. H. C. Jones, Mrs. J. Tomlinson, Mrs.

Amanda Carr, Mrs. Margaret Wooley, Mrs. S. Seeber, Mrs. B. Powers,

Mrs. S. A. Waterhouse, Mrs. H. M. Smith. But notwithstanding the

numbers, wealth, and social influence of the women, their demand

was rejected, while hundreds of men, who had never paid a dollar's

tax into the village treasury, were permitted to deposit their

votes, though challenged by friends, and well known to the officers

as not possessors of a foot of real estate.

[205] The Working Women's Association was organized in New York,

September 17, 1868, with Mrs. Anna Tobitt, _President_;

Miss Augusta Lewis, Miss Susan Johns, Miss Mary Peers.

_Vice-Presidents_; Miss Elizabeth C. Browne, _Secretary_, and Miss

Julia Browne, _Treasurer_. The three vice-presidents were young

ladies of about twenty. Miss Lewis worked upon a newly invented

type-setting machine.

[206] "Sergeant Robinson, of the Twenty-sixth Precinct, made a raid

on the abandoned women patroling the park last evening. At 11 p. m.

six unfortunates were caged." Thus runs the record. Will some one

now be kind enough to tell us whether Sergeant Robinson, or any

other sergeant, made a raid upon the abandoned men who were

patrolling Broadway at the same hour? Did any one on that night,

or, indeed, upon any other night, within the memory of the oldest

Knickerbocker, make a raid upon the gamblers, thieves, drunkards

and panders that infest Houston street? By what authority do the

police call women "abandoned" and arrest them because they are

patrolling any public park or square? If these women belonged to

the class euphemistically called "unfortunate," they were doubtless

there because men were already there before them. And if it was

illegal in women and deserving of punishment, why should men

escape? _Prima facie_, if crime were committed, the latter are the

greater criminals of the two. We humbly suggest to all who are

endeavoring to reform this class of women, that they turn their

attention to reforming the opposite sex. If you can make men so

pure that they will not seek the society of prostitutes, you will

soon have no prostitutes for them to seek; in other words,

prostitution will cease when men become sufficiently pure to make

no demand for prostitutes. In any event, the police should treat

both sexes alike. Making a raid, as it is called, upon abandoned

women, and shutting them up in prison, never can procure good

results. The most repulsive and bestial features of "the social

evil" have their origin in the treatment that women receive at the

hands of the police; and society itself would be much better if the

police would keep their hands off such women.--[P. P. in _The

Revolution_.

[207] An important decision relating to the eligibility of

candidates for the Cornell free scholarship has been rendered by

Judge Martin of the Supreme Court. Mary E. Wright, who stood third

in the recent examination here for the scholarship, contested the

appointment on the ground that the candidates who were first and

second in the examination were not pupils of a school in the

county. The judge decided that candidates for the position must be

residents of the county and pupils of a school therein, to be

eligible, and he awarded the scholarship to Miss Wright. This is

the first contested scholarship since the establishment of the

University.--_Ithaca dispatch to New York Times._

[208] Dr. Lewis H. Morgan, who died in 1882, famed in both

hemispheres as an ethnologist, left a considerable estate to be

devoted at the death of his wife (which has since occurred) and of

his son without issue, to the establishment, in connection with the

University of Rochester, of a collegiate institution for women.

This makes it very probable that Rochester will ultimately offer

equal opportunities to both sexes.

[209] At one time it was said that Hobart College had more

professors than students, and one year had arrived at such a point

of exhaustion as to graduate but one young man. When the

proposition to incorporate Geneva Medical College with the Syracuse

University was made, Hon. George F. Comstock, a trustee of the

latter institution, vigorously opposed it unless equal advantages

were pledged to women.

[210] See Volume II., page 264.

[211] The twelve were:. Mrs. H. M. Field, Mrs. Anna Lynch Botta,

Miss Kate Field, Mrs. Anna B. Allen, Miss Josephine Pollard, Mrs.

Celia Burleigh, Mrs. Fanny Barrow, Mrs. C. B. Wilbour, Mrs. J. C.

Croly, Miss Ella Dietz, Alice and Phebe Cary.

[212] She now reports the cattle-market for four New York papers

including the _Tribune_ and _Times_.

[213] _President_, Charlotte B. Wilbour; _Vice-Presidents_, Dr.

Clemence S. Lozier, Mrs. Devereux Blake; _Secretary_, Frances V.

Hallock; _Treasurer_, Miss Jeannie McAdam.

[214] The petitioners were represented by Mrs. Wilbour, Mrs. Hester

M. Poole, Elizabeth B. Phelps, Elizabeth Langdon, Mrs. I. D. Hull,

Mrs. Charlotte L. Coleman, Mrs. M. E. Leclover, Matilda Joslyn

Gage.

[215] See Vol. II., page 628.

[216] Isabella Beecher Hooker, Susan B. Anthony, Rev. Olympia

Brown, Matilda Joslyn Gage, Dr. Clemence Lozier, Helen M. Slocum,

Lillie Devereux Blake.

[217] Lillie Devereux Blake was born in Raleigh, North Carolina, in

August, 1833. Her father, George Devereux, was a wealthy Southern

gentleman of Irish descent. Her mother's maiden name was Sarah

Elizabeth Johnson of Stratford, Connecticut, a descendant of

William Samuel Johnson who was one of the first two senators from

that State. Both her parents were descended from Jonathan Edwards.

Her father died in 1837, and the widow subsequently removed to New

Haven, Conn., where she was well known for her large and generous

hospitality. Her daughter, the future favorite writer and lecturer,

was a much admired belle, and in 1855 was married to Frank Umsted,

a lawyer of Philadelphia, with whom she lived two years in St.

Louis, Mo. Mr. Umsted died in 1859, and his widow, who had written

sketches for _Harper's Magazine_ and published a novel called

"Southwold," from that date contributed largely to leading

newspapers and magazines. She was Washington correspondent of the

_Evening Post_ in the winter of 1861, published "Rockford" in 1862,

and wrote many stories for _Frank Leslie's Weekly_, the

_Philadelphia Press_ and other publications. In 1866 she married

Greenfill Blake of New York. In 1872 Mrs. Blake published "Fettered

for Life," a novel designed to show the legal disadvantages of

women. Ever since she became interested in the suffrage movement

Mrs. Blake has been one of the most ardent advocates. She has taken

several lecturing tours in different States of the Union. Mrs.

Blake is an easy speaker and writer, and of late has contributed to

many of our popular magazines. Much of the recent work in the New

York legislature is due to her untiring zeal.

[218] Mrs. Jennie McAdam, Mrs. Hester Poole, Charlotte Coleman,

Mrs. Hull, Mrs. Morse and others. A month before, January 23, Miss

Anthony was invited to address the commission, giving her

constitutional argument, showing woman's right to vote under the

fourteenth amendment. Hon. Henry R. Selden was in the audience,

being in the city on Miss Anthony's case. At the close of her

argument he said: "If I had heard that speech before, I could have

made a stronger plea before Judge Hall this morning."

[219] She was escorted to the capitol by Phoebe H. Jones and the

venerable Lydia Mott, who for a quarter of a century had

entertained at their respective homes the various speakers that had

come to Albany to plead for new liberties, and had accompanied

them, one after another, to the halls of legislation.

[220] Addressed by Mrs. Wilbour, Mrs. Blake, Mrs. Lozier, Mrs.

Hallock, Hamilton Wilcox and Dr. Hallock.

[221] For Judge Hunt's decision, see Volume II., page 677.

[222] Miss Charlotte C. Jackson, the valedictorian of the Normal

College of New York; Miss Mary Hussey of Orange, New Jersey; Miss

Mosher of Ann Arbor, Michigan; Miss Emma Wendt, daughter of

Mathilde Wendt. In 1867, Mrs. Stanton had made a similar

application to Theodore D. Dwight, that the law school might be

opened to young women. In the course of their conversation

Professor Dwight said; "Do you think girls know enough to study

law?" Mrs. Stanton replied: "All the liberal laws for women that

have been passed in the last twenty years are the results of the

protests of women; surely, if they know enough to protest against

bad laws, they know enough to study our whole system of

jurisprudence."

[223] It was peculiarly fitting that this application should be

made by Mrs. Blake, as two of her ancestors had been presidents of

the college. The first it ever had, when founded as King's

College in 1700, was the Rev. Samuel Johnson, D. D., her

great-great-grandfather. His son, the Hon. Samuel William Johnson,

was the first president after the Revolution, when the name was

changed to Columbia College.

[224] Julia Ward Howe, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Antoinette Brown

Blackwell, Mary F. Eastman, Helen Potter, Sarah Andrews Spencer,

Augusta Cooper Bristol, Alice Fletcher, Maria Mitchell, professor

at Vassar College, Isabella Beecher Hooker, Frances Ellen Burr,

Abby Smith, Rossella E. Buckingham, and others.

[225] Dr. Clemence Lozier was born of a good family in New Jersey.

She was married at the early age of 16, and widowed at 27, left

with a young family without means of support. But being an

excellent teacher, she soon found employment. For eleven years she

was principal of a young ladies' seminary. By natural instinct a

physician and a healer, she determined to fit herself for that

profession. A physician of the old school assisted her in her

medical studies, and in 1853 she received a diploma from the

Eclectic College of Syracuse, and shortly after established herself

in New York, where her practice steadily increased, until her

professional income was one of the largest in the city. In 1860 she

began a course of free medical lectures to women, which continued

for three years, culminating in "The New York Medical College for

Women," which was chartered in 1863. The foundation and

establishment of this institution was the crowning work of her

life, to which she has devoted time and money. From the first she

has been dean of the faculty, and after years of struggle at last

has the satisfaction of seeing it a complete success, owning a fine

building up town, with hospital and dispensary attached.

[226] Several ladies appeared last week before the New York

Supervisors' Committee to protest against excessive taxation. The

New York _World_ informs us that Mrs. Harriet Ramsen complained

that the appraisement of lot 5 West One Hundred and Twenty-second

street, was increased from $7,000 to $9,000. Mrs. P. P. Dickinson,

house 48 West Fifty-sixth street, increased from $15,000 to

$20,000; Mrs. Cynthia Bunce, house 37 West Fifty-fourth street,

last year's valuation $10,000; this year's, $15,000. Mrs. Daly, who

owns a house in Seventy-second street, informed the committee that

the assessment on the house (a small dwelling) was put at $2,000,

an increase of $700 over last year's valuation. This house stands

in an unopened street. Supervisor McCafferty said that the

committee would do all in its power to have the assessment reduced,

and also remarked that it was a positive outrage to assess such a

small house at so high a figure. Mrs. Louisa St. John, who is

reputed to be worth $2,000,000, complained because three lots on

Fifth avenue, near Eighty-sixth street, and five lots on the

last-named street, have been assessed at much higher figures than

other lots in the neighborhood. Mrs. St. John addressed the

committee with much eloquence and force. Said she: "I do not

complain of the assessments that have been laid on my property. I

complain of the inequalities practiced by the assessors, and I

should like to see them set right." Supervisor McCafferty assured

Mrs. St. John that everything in the power of the committee would

be done to equalize assessments in future. Mrs. St. John is a heavy

speculator in real estate. She attends sales and has property

"knocked down" to her. She makes all her own searches in the

register's office, and is known, in fact, among property-owners as

a very thorough real-estate lawyer. Many years ago she was the

proprietor of the Globe Hotel, now Frankfort House, corner of

Frankfort and William streets.

[227] The Albany _Evening Journal_ of January 22 said: A hearing

was granted by the Judiciary Committee to-night, on the petition of

the Woman's Tax-payers Association of the City of Rochester, for

either representation or relief from taxation. The petitioners were

heard in the assembly chamber, and in addition to members of the

committee, a large audience of ladies and gentlemen were drawn

together, including the president of the Senate, speaker of the

House, and nearly all the leading members of both branches of the

legislature. The first speaker was Mrs. Blake, the youngest of the

trio, who occupied about twenty minutes and was well received. She

was followed by Miss Anthony, who made a telling speech, frequently

eliciting applause. She recounted her long service in the woman's

rights cause, and gave a brief history of the different enactments

and repeals on the question for the last thirty years. She related

her experience in voting, and said she was fined $100 and costs,

one cent of which she had never paid and never meant to. She

claimed Judge Waite was in favor of woman suffrage, and believed

the present speaker of the Assembly of New York was also in favor

of the movement. Calls being made for General Husted, that

gentleman replied that Miss Anthony was perfectly correct in her

statement. She summed up by asking the committee to report in favor

of legislation exempting women from taxation unless represented by

the ballot, remarking that she would not ask for the right to vote,

as that was guaranteed her by the Constitution of the United

States. Miss Anthony then introduced Mrs. Joslyn Gage, who said if

any member of the committee had objections to offer or questions to

ask she would like the privilege of answering; but as none of the

committee availed themselves, she proceeded for fifteen minutes in

about the same strain as her predecessors. Calls being made for Mr.

Spencer and eliciting no reply from that gentleman, Mrs. Blake said

they should consider him a convert.

[228] The speakers were Dr. Clemence Lozier, Helen M. Slocum,

Henrietta Westbrook, Mrs. Devereux Blake. Mrs. J. E. Frobisher

recited Paul Revere's ride, and Helen M. Cooke read the

resolutions.

[229] Helen M. Slocum, Dr. Clemence Lozier, Mrs. Devereux Blake.

[230] Miss King, the head of a New York tea-dealing firm composed

of women, who control a capital of $1,000,000, has recently gone to

China to make purchases. Her previous business experience, as

narrated by a correspondent of the Chicago _Tribune_, explains her

fitness for her mission, while it incidentally throws some light on

the secrets of the tea-company business:

"Previous to the outbreak of our civil war Miss King was

extensively engaged in utilizing the leaves of the great blackberry

and raspberry crops running to waste in the rich lowlands of

Georgia and Alabama, and kept in that fertile region a large levy

of Northern women--smart, like herself--to superintend the

gathering of the leaves and their preparation for shipment to

headquarters in New York. These leaves were prepared for the market

at their manipulating halls in one of the narrow streets on the

Hudson side of New York city. Over this stage of the tea

preparations Miss King had special supervision, and, by a generous

use of the genuine imported teas, worked up our American

productions into all the accredited varieties of the black and

green teas of commerce. Here the female supervision apparently

ended. In their extensive tea ware-rooms in Walker street the

business was conducted by the shrewdest representatives of

Gothamite trade, with all the appliances of the great Chinese

tea-importing houses. Here were huge piles of tea-chests, assorted

and unassorted, and the high-salaried tea-taster with his row of

tiny cups of hot-drawn tea, delicately sampling and classifying the

varieties and grades for market. The breaking out of the war

stopped the Southern supplies and sent Miss King's female agents to

their Northern homes. But the business was made to conform to the

new order of things. Large cargoes of imported black teas were

bought as they arrived and were skillfully manipulated into those

high-cost varieties of green teas so extensively purchased by the

government for its commissary and medical departments."

[231] Mrs. Lozier presided. Addresses were made by Matilda Fletcher

of Iowa, Mrs. Helen Slocum and Mrs. Devereux Blake.

[232] In Poughkeepsie, Yonkers, Harlem, Williamsburgh, Brighton,

and in several districts in the city of New York.

[233] Matilda Joslyn Gage, Helen M. Loder, Mrs. Clara Neyman, Mrs.

Slocum, Mrs. Miller and Mrs. Blake.

[234] _To the Women of the State of New York:_

The undersigned, citizens of the State of New York, who if free to

do so, would express themselves at the ballot box, but who by

unjust enactments are debarred the exercise of that political

freedom whereto "the God of nature" entitles them, earnestly

protest against the proposed reelection of Lucius Robinson as

governor. They say naught against his honor as a man, but they

protest because when the legislature of the Empire State had passed

a bill making women eligible to school-boards. Lucius Robinson, by

his veto, kept this bill from becoming law. They therefore call on

all men and women who respect themselves and dare maintain their

rights, to do all in their power to defeat the reelection of one

who has set himself against the advance made by Iowa, Kansas,

Oregon, Illinois, Michigan, Colorado, California, Minnesota,

Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire, in many of which

States woman's right to vote on school questions is also

recognized.

[Signed:] Matilda Joslyn Gage, _President N. Y. State Woman

Suffrage Association_. Jennie M. Lozier, M. D., _Secretary_. Lillie

Devereux Blake, _Vice-President National Association_. Clemence S.

Lozier, M. D., _President N. Y. City Association_. Susan A. King,

Cordelia S. Knapp, Helen M. Slocum, Susan B. Anthony, Amanda Deyo,

Helen M. Cooke, Elizabeth B. Phelps, Charlotte Fowler Wells, Emma

S. Allen.

[235] Chester A. Arthur, chairman of the Republican campaign

committee, presented the motion.

[236] She threw her spacious apartments open, and gave some of the

voters a free lunch, that she might have the opportunity of adding

her personal persuasions to the public protests. Miss King and Miss

Helen Potter, the distinguished reader, then residing with Miss

King, assisted in raising a banner for Cornell and Foster,

applauded by the multitude of by-standers.

[237] Mrs. Lucy A. Brand, principal of the Genesee school of this

city, a woman with abilities as good as those of any male

principal, but who, because she is a woman, receives $550 less

salary a year than a male principal, was the first woman in the

State of New York to cast a vote under the new school law. On

Saturday afternoon she was at a friend's house, when the _Journal_

was thrown in, containing the first editorial notice of the passage

of the law. Mrs. Brand saw the welcome announcement. "Let us go and

register," she at once said, her heart swelling with joy and

thankfulness that even this small quantity of justice had been done

woman. "Where is my shawl? I feel as if I should die if I don't get

there," for the hour was late, and the time for closing the

registry lists was near at hand. To have lost this opportunity

would have placed her in the position of a second Tantalus, the cup

withdrawn just as it touched her lips. But she was in time, and the

important act of registering accomplished, she had but to possess

her soul in patience until the following Tuesday. Who shall say how

long the two intervening days were to her; but Tuesday morning at

last arrived, when, for the first time, Mrs. Brand was to exercise

the freeman's right of self-government. A gentleman, the owner of

the block in which she resided, offered to accompany her to the

polls, although he was a Democrat and knew Mrs. Brand would vote

the Republican ticket. Although not hesitating to go alone, Mrs.

Brand accepted this courtesy. As she entered the polling place the

men present fell back in a semi-circle. Not a sound was heard, not

a whisper, not a breath. In silence and with a joyous solemnity

well befitting the occasion, Mrs. Brand cast her first vote, at

five minutes past eight in the morning. The post-master of the

city, Mr. Chase, offered his congratulations. A few ordinary

remarks were exchanged, and then Mrs. Brand left the place. And

that was all; neither more nor less. No opposition, no rudeness, no

jostling crowd of men, but such behavior as is seen when Christians

come together at the sacrament. I have long known Mrs. Brand as a

noble woman, but talking with her a few days since I could but

notice the added sense of self-respecting dignity that freedom

gives. "I feel a constant gratitude that even some portion of my

rights have been recognized," said she, and I left her, more than

ever impressed, if that is possible, with the beauty and sacredness

of freedom.--[M. J. G.

[238] Rev. Robert Collyer, Elizabeth L. Saxon, Clara Neyman,

Augusta Cooper Bristol, Helen M. Slocum, Hamilton Wilcox, Mrs.

Devereux Blake, and Dr. Clemence Lozier who presided.

[239] Mary Seymour Howell, _President_; Miss Kate Stoneman,

_Secretary_. Miss Stoneman cast the first vote at the school

election in Albany.

[240] See appendix.

[241] Mrs. Blake, Mrs. Slocum, Mrs. Saxon, of Louisiana.

[242] Miss Helen Potter, Miss Susan A. King, Miss Helen M. Slocum,

Miss Harriet K. Dolson and Mrs. Devereux Blake.

[243] Mrs. Rogers organized a society in Lansingburg, Mrs. Loder in

Poughkeepsie, Miss Stoneman held meetings in Chautauqua county,

Mrs. Howell in Livingston county, Mrs. Blake in ten other counties,

and held several parlor meetings in New York city. The annual

convention of the State society was held in Chickering Hall,

February 1, 2, 1882.

[244] The press generally commented unfavorably. The _Herald_ said:

"The legislature passed a bill in the interest of decency and

humanity, authorizing the appointment of matrons in the several

police stations in the city of New York to look after female

prisoners who might be placed in the station-houses. This bill was

recommended by our best charitable and religious societies, but

failed to receive the sanction of the governor, although he very

promptly signed a bill to increase the number of the detective

force."

[245] Mrs. Emma Gates Conkling, Mrs. Clara Neyman, Dr. Clemence

Lozier and Mrs. Blake.

[246] Major Haggerty, ex-Governor Thomas G. Alvord and Hon. James

D. McMellan in its favor; Hon. Erastus Brooks and General Sharpe

against.

[247] Mr. Hamilton Wilcox at once prepared an able paper, refuting

the attorney-general's assertion. It was widely circulated

throughout the State.

[248] When the vote was announced, the ladies sent the pages with

bouquets to the leading speakers in behalf of the bill, and

button-hole sprigs to the fifty-four who voted aye.

[249] _To the Women of the State of New York_:

The undersigned urge you to exert yourselves to turn every

vote possible against Leslie W. Russell's reelection as

attorney-general. His official acts prove him the unscrupulous foe

of your liberties. By informing the legislature that you have no

right to vote at common law, he has denied your sacred rights and

misrepresented the law to your hurt. By stating that you have no

natural right to vote, he has denied your title to freedom and

sought to keep your rights at the mercy of those in power. By

informing the legislature that the bill to repeal the statutes

which keep you from voting was unconstitutional he misled the

legislature and kept you disfranchised. By thus continuing your

disfranchisement, he has subjected you to many misfortunes and

wrongs which the repeal of your disfranchisement would cure, and is

personally responsible for these sufferings. He has also sought to

rob the mothers of this State of their votes at school elections,

and thus to deprive them of the power to control their children's

education.

[Signed:] Clemence S. Lozier, M. D., New York; Mary R. Pell,

Queens; Lillie Devereux Blake, New York; Caroline A. Bassett, Erie;

Susan A. King, New York; Lucy Shawler, Chenango; Mary E. Tallman,

Oneida; Hannah M. Angel, Allegany; Ida Louise Dildine, Broome;

Zerivah L. Watkeys, Onondaga; Asenath C. Coolidge, Jefferson; Sarah

H. Hallock, Ulster; N. W. Cooper, Jefferson, and others.

_To the Republican and Independent Voters of the State of New

York_:

The undersigned earnestly ask you to cast your votes against Leslie

W. Russell, the present attorney-general. When the legislature last

year was about to repeal the election laws which prevent women from

exercising the right of suffrage, Leslie W. Russell stated to that

body that women had no right at common law to vote, and that this

bill was unconstitutional. By these misstatements he misled the

legislature, defeated this most righteous bill and prolonged the

disfranchisement of women. Thus he inflicted on a majority of our

adult citizens, who had committed no offense, the penalty of

disfranchisement and the great mischiefs which flow thence, and,

like Judge Taney in the Dred-Scott decision, perverted law and

constitution to justify injustice and continue wrong. A vote for

Leslie W. Russell is a vote to keep these women disfranchised and

to prolong these mischiefs. He who thus blocks the way of freedom

should be removed from the place which enables him to do this. You

can vote at this election for fifteen or more officers. It is but a

small thing to ask, that each of you cast one-fifteenth part of his

vote to represent women's interest at the polls.

[Signed:] Clemence S. Lozier, M. D., Bronson Murray, Susan A. King,

Hamilton Wilcox, Lillie Devereux Blake, Albert O. Wilcox.

[250] Abigail Scott Duniway, editor _New Northwest_, Oregon;

Elizabeth Boynton Harbert, editor "Woman's Kingdom," Chicago

_Inter-Ocean_; Helen M. Gougar, editor _Our Herald_, Indiana.

[251] On the evening of March 8 the New York city society gave a

reception in honor of the delegates to the National Convention,

recently held at Washington, in the elegant parlors of the Hoffman

House.

[252] Mrs. Gage, Mrs. Howell, Mrs. Rogers, Mrs. Duniway and Mrs.

Gougar.

[253] Imprisonment for not more than five years, or a fine of not

more than $1,000, or both.

[254] The last census shows there are 72,224 more women than men in

New York; that there are 360,381 women and girls over ten years of

age who support themselves by work outside their own homes, not

including the house-keepers who, from the raw material brought into

the family, manufacture food and clothing three times its original

value.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

PENNSYLVANIA.

Carrie Burnham--The Canon and Civil Law the Source of Woman's

Degradation--Women Sold with Cattle in 1768--Women Arrested in

Pittsburgh--Mrs. McManus--Opposition to Women in the Colleges and

Hospitals; John W. Forney Vindicates their Rights--Ann

Preston--Women in Dentistry--James Truman's Letter--Swarthmore

College--Suffrage Association Formed in 1866, in

Philadelphia--John K. Wildman's Letter--Judge William S.

Pierce--The Citizens' Suffrage Association, 333 Walnut Street,

Edward M. Davis, President--Petitions to the

Legislature--Constitutional Convention, 1873--Bishop Simpson,

Mary Grew, Sarah C. Hallowell, Matilda Hindman, Mrs. Stanton,

Address the Convention--Messrs. Broomall and Campbell Debate With

the Opposition--Amendment Making Women Eligible to School

Offices--Two Women Elected to Philadelphia School Board,

1874--The Wages of Married Women Protected--J. Edgar Thomson's

Will--Literary Women as Editors--The Rev. Knox Little--Anne E.

McDowell--Women as Physicians in Insane Asylums--The Fourteenth

Amendment Resolution, 1881--Ex-Governor Hoyt's Lecture on

Wyoming.

In the demand for the right of suffrage, women are constantly asked

by the opposition if they cannot trust their own fathers, husbands

and brothers to legislate for them. The answer to this question may

be found in an able digest of the old common laws and the Revised

Statutes of Pennsylvania,[255] prepared by Carrie S. Burnham[256]

of Pennsylvania. A careful perusal of this paper will show the

relative position of man and woman to be that of sovereign and

subject.

To get at the real sentiments of a people in regard to the true

status of woman we must read the canon and civil laws that form the

basic principles of their religion and government. We must not

trust to the feelings and actions of the best men towards the

individual women whom they may chance to love and respect. The

chivalry and courtesy that the few command through their beauty,

wealth and position, are one thing; but justice, equality, liberty

for the multitude, are quite another. And when the few, through

misfortune, are made to feel the iron teeth of the law, they regret

that they had not used their power to secure permanent protection

under just laws, rather than to have trusted the transient favors

of individuals to shield them in life's emergencies.

The law securing to married women the right to property,[257]

inherited by will or bequest, passed the legislature of

Pennsylvania, and was approved by the governor April 11, 1848, just

five days after a similar law had been passed in New York. Judge

Bovier was the mover for the Pennsylvania Married Women's Property

Law. His feelings had been so often outraged with the misery caused

by men marrying women for their property, that he was bound the law

should be repealed. He prevailed on several young Quakers who had

rich sisters, to run for the legislature. They were elected and did

their duty. Judge Bovier was a descendent of the Waldenses, a

society of French Quakers who fled to the mountains from

persecution. Their descendants are still living in France.[258]

The disabilities and degradation that women suffer to-day grow out

of the spirit of laws that date from a time when women were viewed

in the light of beasts of burden. Scarce a century has passed since

women were sold in this country with cattle. In the _Pennsylvania

Gazette_ for January 7, 1768, is the following advertisement:

TO BE SEEN.--At the Crooked Billet, near the Court-house,

Philadelphia (Price Three Pence), A Two Year Old Hogg, 12 Hands

high, and in length 16 Feet; thought to be the largest of its

Kind ever seen in America.

In the same paper of the following week occurs this yet more

extraordinary announcement:

TO BE SOLD.--A Healthy Young Dutch Woman, fit for town or country

business; about 18 years old; can spin well; she speaks good

English, and has about five years to serve. Inquire at James Der

Kinderen's, Strawberry alley.

In one century of growth a woman's sewing machine was better

protected than the woman herself under the old common law:

AN ACT _to exempt Sewing Machines belonging to Seamstresses in

this Commonwealth from levy and sale on execution or distress for

rent_:

SECTION 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of

Representatives of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania in general

assembly met, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the

same, That hereafter all sewing machines belonging to

seamstresses in this commonwealth shall be exempt from levy and

sale on execution or distress for rent, in addition to any

article or money now exempt by law. Approved, April 17, 1869.

While the following order reflects the spirit of the seventeenth

century, the comments show the dawning of the right idea, and are

worthy the time in which the great State of Pennsylvania could

boast such women as Lucretia Mott, Anna E. Dickinson, Jane G.

Swisshelm and Sarah J. Hale:

A WOMAN ORDER IN PITTSBURGH.--The mayor of Pittsburgh has ordered

the arrest of every woman found on the streets alone after 9

o'clock in the evening; the consequence of which has been that

some respectable ladies have recently seen the inside of the

lock-up.--_Exchange, June, 1869._

Now let the mothers, wives and daughters of Pittsburgh obtain the

passage, by the city council, of an ordinance causing the arrest

of every _man_ found in the streets after 9 o'clock in the

evening, and the law will then be equal in its operation. This

legislating upon the behavior of one sex by the other

exclusively, is one-sided and despotic. Give both sexes a chance

at reforming each other.

Another step in progress was indicated by the assumption of some

women to influence civil administration, not only for their own

protection, but for that of their sires and sons:

An exchange says that women are becoming perfect nuisances, and

to substantiate the assertion adds that 1,500 women in Chester

county, Pennsylvania, have petitioned the court to grant no more

liquor licenses.

Suppose wives should come reeling home, night after night, with

curses on their lips, to destroy the food, the dishes, the

furniture for which husbands toiled; to abuse trembling children,

making the home, from year to year, a pandemonium on earth--would

the good men properly be called "nuisances," who should rise up and

say this must end; we must protect our firesides, our children,

ourselves, society at large? To have women even suggest such

beneficent laws for the men of their families is called "a

nuisance," while the whole barbarous code for women was declared by

Lord Coke to be the "perfection of reason."

The prejudice against sex has been as bitter and unreasonable as

against color, and far more reprehensible, because in too many

cases it has been a contest between the inferior, with law on his

side, and the superior, with law and custom against her, as the

following facts in the _Sunday Dispatch_, by Anne E. McDowell,

fully show:

The decision of the Court of Common Pleas in the case of Mrs.

McManus, elected principal of the Mount Vernon Boys' Grammar

School, is to the effect that, no rule being in existence

prohibiting the exercise of the duties of such office by a woman,

the resolution of the controllers against the exercise of the

duties of that office by the lady was unjustifiable and illegal.

Since the decision was pronounced the controllers have come up to

the boundary of the principle held by the court, and a rule has

been proposed that in future women shall be ineligible to be

principals of boys' grammar schools--the case of Mrs. McManus

being specially excepted. That lady, therefore, will be

undisturbed. But she may be, like the celebrated "Lady

Freemason." an exception to her sex. The controllers have not

favored the public with their reasons for opposition to the

employment of females in the higher positions of teaching. Women

are good enough for inferior service about a boys'

grammar-school, it seems, but they are not capable of

superintending it. They may be, and are, teachers in all the

classes in such schools, even to the highest; but when the

question arises whether a woman, perfectly competent, shall be

superintendent of all the classes--for a principal is little

more--the controllers say _no_. If this action is influenced by a

belief that women cannot control a school of boys, we hope that

the experience in the case of Mrs. McManus will dispel the

illusion, and the public can afford to await the result of the

trial. But if it is caused by a regard to tradition or precedent,

or because there never has yet been an instance of a woman being

a principal of a boys' grammar-school before this case of Mrs.

McManus, we hope that the controllers will soon see the error of

their course. The complaints from the sections are to the effect

that it is very difficult to get a competent male teacher to

remain principal of a boys' grammar-school for any length of

time. The salary attached to that position is inadequate,

according to the increased cost of living of the times. Gentlemen

who are competent to act as principals of the public schools find

that they can make more money by establishing private schools;

and hence they are uneasy and dissatisfied while in the public

service. A woman able to take charge of a boys' grammar-school

will be paid a more liberal salary (such is the injustice of our

social system in relation to female labor) in that position than

in any other connected with education that she can command, and

she will therefore be likely to be better satisfied with the

duties and to perform them more properly. That such advantage

ought to be held out to ladies competent to be teachers of the

highest grade, we firmly believe. The field of female avocations

should be extended in every legitimate direction; and it seems to

us, unless some reason can be given for the exception, which has

not yet been presented in the case of Mrs. McManus, that the

principalships of the boys' grammar-schools ought to be

accessible to ladies of the proper character and qualification,

without the imputation that by reason of their sex they must

necessarily be unfitted for such duties.

In preparing themselves for the medical profession, for which the

most conservative people now admit that women are peculiarly

adapted, students have encountered years of opposition, ridicule

and persecution. After a college for women was established in

Philadelphia,[259] there was another long struggle before their

right to attend the clinics in the hospitals was accorded. The

faculty and students alike protested against the admission of women

into mixed classes; but as there was no provision to give them the

clinics alone, a protest against mixed classes was a protest

against such advantages to women altogether. One would have

supposed the men might have left the delicacy of the question to

the decision of the women themselves. But in this struggle for

education men have always been more concerned about the loss of

modesty than the acquirement of knowledge and wisdom. From the

opinions usually expressed by these self-constituted guardians of

the feminine character, we might be led to infer that the virtues

of women were not a part of the essential elements of their

organization, but a sort of temporary scaffolding, erected by

society to shield a naturally weak structure that any wind could

readily demolish.

At a meeting convened November 15 at the University of

Pennsylvania, to consider the subject of clinical instruction to

mixed classes the following remonstrance was unanimously adopted:

The undersigned, professors in the University of Pennsylvania,

professors in Jefferson Medical College, members of the medical

staff of various hospitals of Philadelphia, and members of the

medical profession in Philadelphia at large, out of respect for

their profession, and for the interests of the public, do feel it

to be their duty, at the present time, to express their

convictions upon the subject of "clinical instruction to _mixed

classes_ of male and female students of medicine." They are

induced to present their views on this question, which is of so

grave importance to medical education, from the fact that it is

misunderstood by the public, and because an attempt is now being

made to force it before the community in a shape which they

conceive to be injurious to the progress of medical science, and

to the efficiency of clinical teaching. They have no hesitation

in declaring that their deliberate conviction is adverse to

conducting clinical instruction in the presence of students of

_both sexes_. The judgment that has been arrived at is based upon

the following considerations:

I. Clinical instruction in practical medicine demands an

examination of all the organs and parts of the body, as far as

practicable; hence, personal exposure becomes for this purpose

often a matter of absolute necessity. It cannot be assumed, by

any right-minded person, that male patients should be subjected

to inspection before a class of females, although this inspection

may, without impropriety, be submitted to before those of their

own sex. A thorough investigation, as well as demonstration, in

these cases--so necessary to render instruction complete and

effective--is, by a mixed audience, precluded; while the clinical

lecturer is restrained and embarrassed in his inquiries, and must

therefore fall short in the conclusions which he may draw, and in

the instruction which he communicates.

II. In many operations upon male patients exposure of the body is

inevitable, and demonstrations must be made which are unfitted

for the observation of students of the opposite sex. These

expositions, when made under the eye of such a conjoined

assemblage, are shocking to the sense of decency, and entail the

risk of unmanning the surgeon--of distracting his mind, and

endangering the life of his patient. Besides this, a large class

of surgical diseases of the male is of so delicate a nature as

altogether to forbid inspection by female students. Yet a

complete understanding of this particular class of diseases is of

preeminent importance to the community. Moreover, such affections

can be thoroughly studied only in the clinics of the large

cities, and the opportunity for studying them, so far from being

curtailed, should be extended to the utmost possible degree. To

those who are familiar with such cases as are here alluded to, it

is inconceivable that females should ever be called to their

treatment.

III. By the joint participation, on the part of male and female

students, in the instruction and in the demonstrations which

properly belong to the clinical lecture-room, the barrier of

respect is broken down, and that high estimation of womanly

qualities, which should always be sustained and cherished, and

which has its origin in domestic and social associations, is

lost, by an inevitable and positive demoralization of the

individuals concerned, thereby entailing most serious detriment

to the morals of society. In view of the above considerations,

the undersigned[260] do earnestly and solemnly protest against

the admixture of the sexes at clinical instruction in medicine

and surgery, and do respectfully lay these their views before the

board of managers of the hospitals in Philadelphia.

_November 15, 1869._

At meetings held at the University and Jefferson Medical Colleges,

by the students, on Wednesday evening, the following preambles and

resolutions were adopted:

WHEREAS, The managers of the Pennsylvania Hospital have seen fit

to admit female students to the clinics of that establishment,

thereby excluding from the lectures many cases, medical and

surgical; and

WHEREAS, We consider that in our purchase of tickets of admission

there was a tacit agreement that we should have the benefit of

all cases which the medical and surgical staff of that hospital

should deem fit for our instruction:

_Resolved_, That a respectful request be made to the managers of

the Pennsylvania Hospital that we be informed as to whether the

usual character of the clinics will be changed.

_Resolved_, That pending the action of the managers on this

question, we as a class and individually absent ourselves from

the clinical lectures. And

WHEREAS, The levity of a few thoughtless young men in the

presence of the females at the hospital has caused the journals

of this city to assume that the whole class of medical students

are utterly devoid of all the attributes of gentlemen,

_Resolved_, That while we do not by any means concede that the

published accounts of the affair are correct, we deplore the fact

that _any_ demonstration should have taken place; for although

the female students may be considered by their presence at the

hospital where male students are present, to have cast aside that

delicacy and modesty which constitutes the aegis of their sex,

they are women, and as such demand our forbearance, if not our

respect.

_Resolved_, That these preambles and resolutions be published in

some respectable journal of this city.[261]

On these remonstrances of the faculty and students, _The Press_,

John W. Forney, editor, had many able editorials condemning the

action of the medical fraternity. The leading journals throughout

the country advocated the right of the women to enjoy the

advantages of the hospital clinics. _The Press_, November 22, 1869,

said:

The proceedings of the meeting held by the faculties of our two

leading medical schools evince the disposition which lurks at the

bottom of the movement against women as physicians. The hospital

managers are to be browbeaten into the stand taken by the

students, and now sanctioned by the professors. If the women are

to be denied the privilege of clinical lectures, why do not

learned professors, or students, or both, have the manliness to

suggest and advocate some means of solving the difficulty so that

the rights of neither sex shall be impaired? Would any professor

agree to lecture to the women separately? Would any professor

favor the admission of women into the female wards of the

hospitals? Would any professor agree to propose anything, or do

anything that would weaken the firm stand taken against the

admission of women to professional privileges? If so, why not do

it at once? Nothing else will make protestations of fairness

appear at all genuine. Nothing else will remove the stigma of

attempting to drag the hospitals into a support of this crusade

against women. * * * How absurd the solemn declaration, "it

cannot be assumed by any right-minded person that male patients

should be subjected to inspection before a class of females,

although this inspection may, without impropriety, be submitted

to before those of their own sex." This cuts both ways. If it be

improper for female students to be present when patients of the

other sex are treated, is it proper for male students to witness

the treatment of female patients?

The practical good sense shown in the following report of a

committee of the Faculty of the Woman's Medical College of

Pennsylvania, makes a very favorable contrast with the unreasonable

remonstrances of the so-called superior sex:

PHILADELPHIA, NOV. 15, 1869.

As the relation of students of medicine to public clinics, and

the views entertained by those entitled to speak for their

medical education, are now extensively discussed in the public

journals, it seems necessary for us to state our position.

Considering it decided that, as practitioners of medicine, the

guardianship of life and health is to be placed in the keeping of

women, it becomes the interest of society and the duty of those

entrusted with their professional training to endeavor to provide

for them all suitable means for that practical instruction which

is gained at hospital clinics.

The taunt has heretofore been frequently thrown out that ladies

have not attended the great clinical schools of the country, nor

listened to its celebrated teachers, and that, consequently, they

cannot be as well prepared as men for medical practice. We

believe, as we have always done, that in all special diseases of

men and women, and in all operations necessarily involving

embarrassing exposure of person, it is not fitting or expedient

that students of different sexes should attend promiscuously;

that all special diseases of men should be treated by men in the

presence of men only, and those of women, where it is

practicable, by women in the presence of women only. It was this

feeling, founded on the respect due to the delicacy of women as

patients, perhaps more than any other consideration, which led to

the founding of the Women's Hospital in Philadelphia. There the

clinical demonstration of special diseases is made by and before

women alone. As we would not permit men to enter these clinics,

neither would we be willing--out of regard to the feelings of men

as patients, if for no other considerations--that our students

should attend clinics where men are specially treated, and there

has been no time in the history of our college when our students

could intentionally do so, save in direct contravention of our

known views. In nearly all the great public hospitals, however,

by far the larger proportion of cases suited for clinical

illustration--whether medical or surgical--is of those which

involve no necessary exposure, and are the results of diseases

and accidents to which man and woman are subject alike, and which

women are constantly called upon to treat. Into these clinics,

women also--often sensitive and shrinking, albeit poor--are

brought as patients to illustrate the lectures, and we maintain

that wherever it is proper to introduce women as patients, there

also is it but just and in accordance with the instincts of the

truest womanhood for women to appear as physicians and students.

We had arranged when our class was admitted to the Pennsylvania

hospital to attend on alternate clinic days only, so as to allow

ample opportunity for the unembarrassed exhibition of special

cases to the other students by themselves. We encouraged our

students to visit the hospital upon this view, sustained by our

confidence in the sound judgment and high-minded courtesy of the

medical gentlemen in charge of the wards. All the objections that

have been made to our students' admission to these clinics seem

to be based upon the mistaken assumption that they had designed

to attend them indiscriminately. As we state distinctly and

unequivocally that this was not the fact, that they had no idea

or intention of being present except on one day of the week, and

when no cases which it would not be proper to illustrate before

both classes of students would necessarily be brought in--it

seems to us that all these objections are destroyed, and we

cannot but feel that those fair-minded professional gentlemen,

who, under this false impression as to facts, have objected to

our course, will, upon a candid reconsideration, acknowledge that

our position is just and intrinsically right. The general

testimony of those who attended the Saturday clinics last winter

at the Philadelphia Hospital at Blockley, when about forty ladies

made regular visits, was that the tone and bearing of the

students were greatly improved, while the usual cases were

brought forward and the full measure of instruction given without

any violation of refined propriety.

We maintain, in common with all medical men, that science is

impersonal, and that the high aim of relief to suffering humanity

sanctifies all duties: and we repel, as derogatory to the science

of medicine, the assertion that the physician who has risen to

the level of his high calling need be embarrassed, in treating

general diseases, by the presence of earnest women. The movement

for woman's medical education has been sustained from the

beginning by the most refined, intelligent, and religious women,

and by the noblest and best men in the community. It has ever

been regarded by these as the cause of humanity, calculated in

its very nature to enlarge professional experience, bless women,

and refine society. It has in our own city caused a college and a

hospital not only to be founded, but to be sustained and endowed

by those who have known intimately the character and objects of

this work, and the aims and efforts of those connected with it.

It has this year brought to this city some fifty educated and

earnest women to study medicine, women who have come to this

labor enthusiastically but reverently, as to a great

life-interest and a holy calling. These ladies purchased tickets,

and entered the clinic of the Pennsylvania Hospital, with no

obtrusive spirit, and with no intention of interfering with the

legitimate advantages of other students. If they have been forced

into an unwelcome notoriety, it has not been of their own

seeking.

ANN PRESTON, M. D., _Dean_.

EMELINE H. CLEVELAND, M. D., _Secretary_.

We are indebted to James Truman, D. D. S., of the Pennsylvania

College of Dental Surgery, for the following account of the

admission of women into that branch of the medical profession:

The general agitation of the question: What are women best

qualified for in the struggle for existence? naturally led

liberal minds to the opening of new avenues for the employment of

their talents, shared equally with men. Her right to practice in

medicine had been conceded after a long and severe conflict. Even

the domain of the theologian had been invaded, but law and

dentistry were as yet closed, and in the case of the latter,

unthought of as an appropriate avocation for women. The subject,

however, seemed so important, presenting a field of labor

peculiarly suited to her, that one gentleman, then professor in

the Pennsylvania College of Dental Surgery, felt it his duty to

call public attention to this promising work. In a valedictory

delivered by him to the class of 1866, at Musical Fund Hall of

Philadelphia, he included in his theme the peculiar fitness of

dentistry for women. The question was briefly stated, but it

rather startled the large audience by its novelty, and the effect

was no less surprising on the faculty, board of trustees and

professional gentlemen on the platform.

In the fall of 1868 the dean of the Pennsylvania College of

Dental Surgery was waited upon by a German gentleman, who desired

to introduce a lady who had come to this country with the

expectation that all colleges were open to women. Although

informed that this was not the case, he still entertained the

hope that she might be admitted as a student of dentistry. She

gave her name as Henrietti Hirschfeld, of Berlin. The matter came

up before the faculty, and after a free discussion of the whole

subject, she was rejected by a majority vote, but two voting in

her favor.

In a subsequent interview with Professor Truman, he learned that

she had left her native land with the full assurance that she

would have no difficulty in "free America" in securing a dental

education. She had also the positive sanction of her government,

through the then minister of instruction, Dr. Falk, that on

condition of receiving an American diploma she would be permitted

to practice on her return. Her distress, therefore, at this

initial failure was, naturally, very great. The excitement that

this application made was intensified when it was rumored among

the students that a woman desired to be matriculated. The

opposition became very bitter, and manifested itself in many

petty annoyances. In the course of a day or two one gentleman of

the faculty, and he the dean, concluded to change his vote, and

as this decided the question, she was admitted. The opposition of

the professor of anatomy, who belonged to the old school of

medical teachers, was so manifest that it was deemed advisable to

have her take anatomy in the Woman's Medical College for that

winter. The first year of this was in every way satisfactory.

Although the students received her and Mrs. Truman, who

accompanied her on the first visit, with a storm of hisses, they

gradually learned not only to treat her with respect, but she

became a favorite with all, and while not convinced as to the

propriety of women in dentistry, they all agreed that Mrs.

Hirschfeld might do as an exception. The last year she was

permitted by the irate professor of anatomy, Dr. Forbes, to take

that subject under him.

She graduated with honor, and returned to Berlin to practice her

profession. This was regarded as an exceptional case, and by no

means settled the status of the college in regard to women. The

conservative element was exceedingly bitter, and it was very

evident that a long time must elapse before another woman could

be admitted. The great stir made by Mrs. Hirschfeld's graduation

brought several other applications from ladies of Germany, but

these were without hesitation denied. Failing to convince his

colleagues of the injustice of their action, Dr. Truman tried to

secure more favorable results from other colleges, and applied

personally to Dr. Gorgas of the Baltimore College of Dental

Surgery. The answer was favorable, and he accompanied the

applicant and entered her in that institution. This furnished

accommodation for the few applicants. The loss in money began to

tell on the pockets, if not the consciences, of the faculty of

the Philadelphia school. They saw the stream had flown in another

direction, swelling the coffers of another institution, when,

without an effort, they could have retained the whole. They

concluded to try the experiment again, and accepted three ladies

in 1872 and 1873--Miss Annie D. Ramborger of Philadelphia,

Fraulein Veleske Wilcke and Dr. Jacoby of Germany. Their first

year was very satisfactory, but at its close it was very evident

that there was a determination on the part of the minority of the

class to spare no effort to effect their removal from the school.

A petition was forwarded to the faculty to this effect, and

although one was presented by the majority of the students in

their favor, the faculty chose to accept the former as

representing public sentiment, and it was decided not to allow

them to take another year at this college. This outrage was not

accomplished without forcible protest from the gentleman

previously named, and he appealed from this decision to the

governing power, the board of trustees.[262] To hear this appeal

a special meeting was called for March 27, 1873, at which the

communication of Professor Truman was read and ordered filed. A

similar communication, in opposition, was received, signed by

Professors T. L. Buckingham, E. Wildman, George T. Barker, James

Tyson and J. Ewing Mears. The matter was referred to a committee

consisting of Hon. Henry C. Carey, W. S. Pierce and G. R.

Morehouse, M. D. At a special meeting convened for this purpose,

March 31, 1873, this committee made their report. They say:

Three ladies entered as students of this college at the

commencement of the session, 1872-73, paid their

matriculation fees, attended the course of lectures, and

were informed, by a resolution adopted by a majority of the

faculty at the close of the session, that they would not be

permitted to attend the second course of lectures. No other

cause was assigned for the action of the faculty than that

they deemed it against the interest of the college to permit

them to do so, on account of the dissatisfaction which it

gave to certain male students, etc. * * * The goal to which

all medical and dental students look, is graduation and the

diploma, which is to be the evidence of their qualification

to practice their art. To qualify themselves for this they

bestow their time, their money and their labor. To deprive

them of this without just cause is to disappoint their

hopes, and to receive from them money and bestowal of time

and labor without the full equivalent which they had a right

to expect.