Chapter XXVI · (continued 3)

Mr. Blackwell addressed the Convention as follows:

He enumerated the different methods which have been proposed in order to secure the suffrage for women, as follows: By a XVI. Amendment to the Constitution, as suggested by the Hon. George W. Julian; by an Act of Congress enfranchising women in the District of Columbia, as advised by Hon. Henry Wilson; by Amendments to the various State Constitutions, and by litigation for a broader construction of the XIV. and XV. Amendments to the Constitution. Mr. Blackwell said that all these methods are worth trying, but thought there was a swifter and easier method, viz: to induce the State Legislatures to direct that the votes of all adult native and naturalized citizens shall be received and counted in the Presidential election of 1872. This can be done, in Mr. Blackwell's opinion, under the first section of the second article of the Constitution, which says:

Each State shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress.

The great underlying mass of ignorance is always conservative. Hence the difficulty of making constitutional amendments, and the importance of employing an easier method. Let every man or woman who believes in woman suffrage organize within their respective States and endeavor to obtain such an act from their respective Legislatures next winter, and let it be understood that the votes of the woman suffrage party, both men and women, will be cast as a unit within each State for the party which does this great act of political justice.

Giles B. Stebbins said: It has been stated that women don't want the ballot. Well, suppose they don't. That is the very strongest argument why they should be taught that they do. Fred. Douglass said, "Show me a contented slave, and I will show you a depraved man." We want duties and responsibilities shared equally by all, that man may be more manly and woman more womanly.

Mrs. Elizabeth K. Churchill, of Providence, said: Can there be an aristocracy meaner and more tyrannical than that of sex, by which a wise, cultured, intelligent woman is made the inferior (for that is what the denial of the ballot implies), the inferior of a base, brutal, degraded man? The divine right of kings is an exploded notion; it is time for the divine right of sex to follow it. The chief value of the ballot is the educational power. He who feels an interest in men and measures will soon feel a responsibility. Everybody knows that women are no better than men. They are no angels floating in an ethereal atmosphere. It is the fashion sometimes to call them "angels," but I observe they are no longer angels when they get aged. I don't know a more unpleasant rôle to play than that of an aged angel. If it is said that woman can't know enough to vote, I can only reply that God made them to match men. But no standard of education was ever fixed for the ballot; and if there had been one, it never could exclude woman, any more than it could negroes.

Mrs. Livermore left the chair for a short time to read a note from a lady inquiring whether, if she thought the woman suffrage movement was condemned in the New Testament, she would abandon the movement. I think she said, that it is not the proper way to put the question. If the question were put to me, If I thought the woman's reform contrary to Christianity, would I throw it overboard? I should answer, Yes, unhesitatingly; I should desire, for one, to stop it; I should renounce it forever. What is it that the woman's reform asks for woman? We ask for the ballot, and we ask it simply because it is the symbol of equality. There is no other recognized symbol of equality in this country. We ask for the ballot that we may be equal to men before the law. The very moment we obtain it the work of this association is done, and it must get out of the way. Then new associations must be formed to take the new work that will come before us, for when the ballot is given to woman then the great work will begin. Then comes the tug of war. For the obtaining of the ballot by woman is but stepping up the first round of the ladder, whose topmost round takes hold of perfection.

Oliver Johnson moved that the resolutions reported in the morning be voted on. The motion was carried, and the resolutions having been separately read, passed unanimously with little discussion till the last two were reached.

Mr. Kilgore, of Philadelphia, objected to the seventh resolution, and said, if you don't want to cover this purpose with doubt and uncertainty, which is always an evidence of weakness, claim your right to vote under the XIV. and XV. Amendments to the Constitution.

Mrs. Lucy Stone replied that we all believed we had a right to vote under the original Constitution, as well as under these amendments, but since there was great doubt whether woman suffrage should be reached through these, she thought it best to seek also for a XVI. Amendment.

Oliver Johnson said he didn't want to be included in Mrs. Blackwell's remark that the Constitution gives women the ballot. He thought it not wise to agitate this question. The right to vote under the Constitution can be reached only under a decision of the courts, and while waiting for that you are diverting the public mind from the true point at issue. Slavery had been put down in such a way that it can never be reconstructed; but if it had been put aside by a decision of the Supreme Court, a triumph of the Democratic party might change the character of the Supreme Court and reinstate it. He thought it wise to have the resolutions as they were, so that persons of all shades of opinions may vote for them.

Dr. Mary Walker said that the fact of women attempting to vote in Washington had done more for woman suffrage than all the Conventions ever held. We want a declaratory law, she said, passed by the Congress of the United States, giving women the right to vote. This was the only way to save an immense amount of labor in the different States.

David Plumb, of New York, advocated the seventh resolution. We need a XVI. Amendment to settle woman suffrage on a firm basis. After considerable debate the resolution was unanimously adopted.

The eighth resolution was then discussed, to which Mr. Kilgore also objected, offering a motion that all the resolution coming after the words "special social theories," be stricken out. He was opposed, especially, to the introduction of the words "free love." What was meant by them?

Mr. Blackwell said the Convention meant by the use of that phrase exactly what the New York Tribune of that morning meant, in its statement that the woman suffrage movement was one for free love.

The President said this great movement was not responsible for the freaks and follies of individuals. The resolutions simply denied that this association indorsed free love, which certain papers charged them with. After considerable discussion, the resolution was adopted by the strong, decided and united voices of nearly a thousand people, voting in the affirmative. At the evening session of the Convention the great hall was filled completely, not a seat on the lower floor being unoccupied, and all the desirable seats in the gallery being taken.

Moses Coit Tyler, Professor in the Michigan State University at Ann Arbor, was the first speaker: The seaboard is the natural seat of liberty. Coming to you from the inland, where the salt breath of the Atlantic is exchanged for the sweet vapors of the lakes, I say to you, look well to your laurels! What are you seaboard people doing to vindicate your honor? We, in the interior, have at least one National university which opens its gates to the sex which has the misfortune to be that of Mrs. Livermore, Mrs. Howe, and others. One of the keenest and brightest minds of the law in the West animates the head of a woman. In my own State of Michigan, at least two women have succeeded in getting their votes into the ballot-box. These are strifes in which good people may engage, and of the trophies won in such a contest every modest man may boast. This deep, national, resolute demand for a great right withheld, means that woman is really a person, and not merely a lovely shadow. If you can convince the majority of American men, and what is more, the majority of American women, that woman is a person, you will have the ballot to-morrow. We call woman an angel, and it is very easy to do that, because the Constitution of the United States don't take any account of angels. If all citizens who are masculine have the right to vote, it is not because they are males, but because they are persons who are members of the Nation. Therefore women should likewise be given this right because they are also members of the nation, and it is the right of every member to vote. But, after all, we men are rather bashful, you know, and the business is new to us. We have a sort of "Barkis is willin'" feeling, and don't want to be the first to speak. We are like the rustic young man who escorted a young lady home for the first time. Says she, as they reached the garden-gate: "Now, Jake, don't tell any one you beau'd me home." "No," he replied, "I am as much ashamed of it as you be!" [Laughter.] Now, it would have been much better if the young lady had said something more exhilarating, more encouraging. So we are new to the business of escorting women to the ballot, and they must come forward, and, overcoming their natural timidity, meet us half way and speak for themselves.

Mary Grew, of Philadelphia, was the next speaker: When I am asked to give arguments for the cause of woman suffrage, it seems like the old times when we were asked to give arguments for the freedom of the slave. It is enough for me to know that the charter of our Nation states that "taxation without representation is tyranny," and that "all just government is founded on the consent of the governed." No woman wrote those words. They were written by men. I stood recently at a woman suffrage meeting in Boston, and I heard a gentleman say, "I am willing, on certain conditions, that women shall vote. When women shall suppress intemperance, I am willing they shall have the ballot." I don't know how he was going to ascertain whether they would suppress it or not. I know that men who have held the ballot all their lives have not suppressed it; and I don't think there is any one here who would say that women would suppress it. What is woman going to do with the ballot? I don't know; I don't care; and it is of no consequence. Their right to the ballot does not rest on the way in which they vote. This, however, must be admitted, and that is, that there are women in this country who will vote much more wisely than some men in New York and Philadelphia. You, my brothers, claim the right to vote because you are taxed, because you are one of the governed; and you know if an attempt was made to touch your right to vote, you would sacrifice everything to defend it. What would money be worth to you without it? You call it the symbol of your citizenship; and without it you would be slaves—not free. Listen, then, when a woman tells you that her freedom is but nominal without it. And when you ask what women are going to do with it, ask yourselves what you want it for and what you are going to do with it. There never was a class of people able to take care of the rights of another class....

Mrs. Lucy Stone next addressed the meeting briefly: If you have a man, said she, who is a fool or a felon, you put him over the line alongside of your mother. Every man of you before he sleeps should go on his knees to his mother, and beg her pardon, and you should tell her you are ashamed of yourselves.

The Rev. Washington Gladden, one of the editors of the Independent, rose to answer Mrs. Grew's question—why the Tribune does not inquire about these ignorant men who are abusing the franchise? He could inform her. It is because they can not afford to. They are all politicians there. They want votes. They can not afford to tell the truth about these ignorant and vicious voters. He proceeded to give a sad picture of the political world at present and to show how little conscience, culture, or common honesty finds its way to the ballot-box. He didn't think the ballot had done anything for the education of the ignorant foreigner who had come to this country; he doubted whether it would do anything for the education of woman. He didn't wish to be classed with the opposers to woman suffrage, and yet he didn't see his way clear to espouse it as others on the platform did. He believed in impartial suffrage—impartial for men and women, but not universal. He would have men and women fitted for the suffrage before they exercised it.

Grace Greenwood gave a sketch of society in Washington.

Mrs. Livermore, referring to Mr. Gladden's remarks, said there was nothing so painful to her as the lack of faith in republicanism among cultivated American gentlemen. Political atheism seemed to be rife among them. What wonder that political corruption exists to such an extent, when the clergymen, the doctors, professors of colleges, members of churches, the educated and cultivated, refuse to exercise the rights of citizenship by going to the polls to vote—when intelligence and morality are to so great a degree eliminated from public affairs? At a late Presidential election in Massachusetts it was ascertained that but 54 per cent. of the legal voters actually went to the polls. Among the 46 per cent. who staid away were the clergymen, the physicians, and the professional men. There was a fearful political apathy among the educated classes in reference to the discharge of their political duties. If educated and good men, as a body, would interest themselves in the primary meetings and the caucuses, politics would be improved, even before women got the suffrage.

It was proposed that the Convention should adjourn by singing the doxology, "Praise God from whom all blessings flow." The great audience rose and joined as with one voice in singing the grand centuries-old doxology, and then adjourned, many urging that the Convention should hold over another day.

In the autumn of 1871 the American Woman Suffrage Association held conventions at Philadelphia, Washington, Baltimore, and Pittsburgh. The annual meeting in Philadelphia was held in National Hall, and presided over by Mrs. Tracy Cutler, who made the opening address. The number of the delegates to this Convention was sixty-two, representing fourteen States.

Mrs. Lucy Stone, Chairman of the Executive Committee, read her report, in which, among other things, she said—Petitions from each of our auxiliary State societies, asking for the ballot, were sent to their respective State Legislatures, and a hearing granted whenever it was asked. This is a great gain upon some previous years, when, as once in Rhode Island, our petitions were referred to "a committee on burial grounds."

The following letter was read from William Lloyd Garrison:

Boston, November 18, 1871.

Dear Mr. Blackwell—Lest some persons might be disappointed at my non-attendance, I regretted to see myself positively announced among the speakers at the annual meeting of the American Woman Suffrage Association, to be held at Philadelphia next week. I certainly desired and hoped to be present, even to the last moment; but circumstances oblige me to remain at home, and I can do no more (and assuredly no less) than to send a word of cheer by letter. Though I was careful not to commit myself as to my personal presence at the meeting, I am willing to be everywhere known as committed to the cause of Woman Suffrage, with all my understanding, heart, and soul. I regard its claims to be as reasonable, just, and valid as any ever presented in behalf of any portion of the human race, suffering from the exercise of usurped powers. Until it can be shown that women have not, by nature and destiny, the same common rights and interests as men—have not as much at stake in all matters pertaining to an impartial administration of government as men—are not held to the same allegiance as men—and are not made amenable to the same penal laws, even to the extent of being hanged, as men—their right to the ballot, and to an equal participation in all municipal, judicial, and legislative proceedings can not be sensibly denied. The mere statement of the case is its strongest argument, furnishing as it does a self-evident proposition. It is a disgrace to our democratic professions that there is yet a portion—ay, one half of our population, legally discrowned and outraged on account of a natural and necessary distinction of sex, which alters nothing in regard to moral obligations and duties, or to political rights and privileges, in the courts of justice and common sense.

It is amazing to see what insulting flings are made, what ridiculous things are uttered, in derogation of the claim of women to an equal voice in making and administering the laws of the land, in quarters where we had a right to look for perfect courtesy, fair treatment, and an intelligent understanding; to say nothing of the nonsense and ribaldry proceeding from haunts of vice and "lewd fellows of the baser sort." But what great reformatory movement was ever treated any better at the outset? Still, it requires a large stock of patience to be calm under such trying provocations; and the consideration that, after all, they are indispensable to the success of the righteous object sought, can alone impart serenity.

What is the question? Not whether many or few women are demanding political enfranchisement; not whether the marriage institution, as now regulated, is right or wrong; not whether this woman, or that, advocates "free love," so called, or anything else; not whether a wife will continue to be true to her marriage vows, or a mother faithful to her maternal instincts; not whether the cradle will be rocked, the pot boiled, and household affairs dutifully looked after; not whether women are better or worse than men; not whether they will vote wisely or foolishly, if allowed the ballot. These and a thousand similarly absurd issues are but mockeries. The one question to be settled is, shall the principles and doctrines of the Declaration of Independence be reduced to practice, so that taxation and representation shall go hand in hand, and the grand truth be made practically, as well as theoretically valid, that all are equally endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, and that all governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed?

Wm. Lloyd Garrison.

Yours for equal rights,

Letters were also read from George W. Julian, Frances D. Gage, and Oliver Johnson. The Committee on Business then reported the resolutions,[191] which were unanimously adopted, after a short speech by Col. T. W. Higginson.

Mrs. Julia Ward Howe referred to the organization of the association and the necessity for it. We had felt that existing associations had failed to represent the methods and convictions which belonged to our way of thinking. No right of a free society is more valuable than the right of free association, in virtue of which those who are able and willing to work can choose their own fellow-workers and adopt the center of activity which best corresponds with their feeling and with their homes. The experience of two years has confirmed our opinion of the propriety of the measures then adopted. We made no attempt to cajole or allure those who did not belong to us.

I am sure that as our work in common has gone on we have grown in good-will. We are fighting our battle still, but do not see our victory yet. We are not opposing men and women, but the enemies of men and women—ignorance, prejudice, and injustice. Many people bring into a new movement the whole intensity and unreason of their personal desires and discontents, and the train of progress must carry all this luggage along with it. Woman suffrage means equality in and out of marriage.

Mrs. Howe referred to the fact that women had been educated not to depend upon themselves, and drew a graphic picture of their condition should the tide of prosperity ebb from under them. Remember, too, I pray you, that power to do ill can not be denied without including the power to do good. The question as to whether men, in case that women should vote, would be less polite to women, was touched upon. The speaker said, "that if ladies wish to retain this deference, they certainly pay a dear price for it." The speaker was opposed to arguing that the right of woman suffrage was guaranteed in the XIV. and XV. Amendments. I go further back and find the spirit of all liberality in every liberal clause, and the spirit of all freedom.

Robert Dale Owen followed, and said woman suffrage was the only means of rectifying the injustice of the laws. His attention was first called to the value of suffrage when he endeavored to get a modification of the property laws for married women in 1836. As a member of the Indiana Legislature, he tried three successive years in vain to obtain for wives a right to their own earnings. He was fifteen years in effecting it. When the law was passed securing married women in their earnings, one of his fellow-members solemnly warned him that homes would be broken up and family happiness ruined, and that for all this unmeasured misery he would hereafter be held responsible. But the law still stood upon the statute book of Indiana, and homes were not destroyed.

The Rev. Mrs. Celia Burleigh was the next speaker. She pictured, in a witty, epigrammatic manner, the progress of freedom in womankind. The picture drawn was of an Asiatic seraglio, where the spirit of revolution crept in, and the ladies commenced their incendiarism by walking abroad, and then followed up the direful unsexing of themselves by gradually removing the inviolable veil first from one eye and then the other—and last and most horrible of all—from the nose. But it made her none the less lovely.

Mr. Edward M. Davis then spoke briefly, and was followed by Mrs. Lucretia Mott, who gave some interesting reminiscences of the contempt for women manifested by the World's Convention in 1840, from which women delegates were excluded, and of which William Lloyd Garrison, in consequence, refused to become a member.

The President, Mrs. Cutler, said: It seems clear to me that the XIV. and XV. Amendments recognize our rights. The XIV. Amendment was passed in the interest of a special class, but we must not forget that the passage of a general law for a particular class also guarantees whatever rights can be found to come under that same general idea. [Applause.] First, we have the definition of citizenship, which applies to us fairly and squarely under the phrase all "persons." Then comes the right to vote. Some say it is not a right but a privilege. I maintain the contrary. I say it is an inalienable right. You can not maintain a republican form of government and deny to half the population its right to vote. This may not be settled to-day or to-morrow, but the truth, like a mighty rock, stands there impregnable against all assault. We do not need to be in too much haste. Let the matter be sifted thoroughly. I do not object, therefore, to the phraseology of the resolution.

Mr. Charles Burleigh said: I have never yet been able to see that the right of voting is secured legally to women under any instrument which is recognized as having the force of law. A republican form of government does not mean universal suffrage. We know that the framers of the Constitution never dreamed that the idea of a republic would include even all the males of the country. If this is not a correct idea I answer that when you make an affirmation you must accept that affirmation as the makers of it understood it. I hold we have no right to go to any use of legal quibbling in the matter. If we stand on simple right, let us stand there; if on constitutional authority, we have no right to warp that authority. So with the question of citizenship. It does not imply a voice in the government, by any means, to be a citizen.

Mr. Blackwell, on behalf of the Business Committee, offered some resolutions.[192]

Dr. H. T. Child spoke upon the second resolution. As a peace man and as a temperance man he was in favor of the resolution.

Colonel Higginson said: If the resolution that has just been read commits this body to the peace, temperance, or any other movement, I would oppose it. Every great moral movement must stand by itself. Napoleon said that the next worse thing to a bad general was two good generals. I do not oppose it as an intemperate man, nor as a war man, for I served too long in the army not to wish for peace. I simply want my wife to vote, and how she votes can be dictated by her conscience. I don't believe in hitching the woman question to anything. Emerson said if you want to succeed you must hitch your wagon to a star, but two stars will only cause confusion.

Mr. Edward M. Davis opposed the temperance, etc., resolutions. We had better not, he said, pass anything but suffrage on this platform.

Mrs. Gough said the resolution did not indorse the peace and temperance movements. It simply opens up a channel of education. Woman needs the growth and development coming from the exercise of higher powers than she now possesses. The resolutions were then unanimously adopted.

At the afternoon session the officers for the next year were elected. The presidency was accorded to Mrs. Lucy Stone. The speakers at this meeting were Dr. Stone, of Michigan; Mrs. Lillie Devereux Blake, of New York; John Cameron, of Delaware; John Ritchie, of Kansas; Mrs. Margaret V. Longley, Mrs. M. W. Coggins, Miss Matilda Hindman, Mrs. Cutler, Miss Mary Grew, Mrs. Lucas, sister of John Bright, and others.

Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, at the evening session offered resolutions of thanks for the hospitality extended to the members of the Association by the citizens of Philadelphia, and also for the able and impartial manner in which the proceedings of the Association had been reported by the press of the city. In a brief address, Mrs. Howe then summed up the proceedings of the Association, saying that she had never attended a convention where such entire harmony had prevailed, and where such an amount of good work had been accomplished. Every one, she was sure, would go away happy and contented.

The President, Mrs. Cutler, then made the valedictory address, complimenting the audience for the attention they had shown and the interest they had manifested in the proceedings. She alluded to the fight for freedom in the days gone by—a fight in which nearly all present had taken a part, and prophesied that as they had won that fight they would win the fight in which they were now engaged. In conclusion she said that in the name of justice, in the name of humanity, in the name of love, she demanded that the rights which woman desired should be accorded to her. The Convention then adjourned.

The following extract is from an editorial in the Woman's Journal:

The Convention of the American Woman Suffrage Association in Washington [1871] was in every sense a success.

It made a calm, deliberate statement of the reasons that make the exercise of suffrage woman's right and duty. It made a strong and earnest appeal to the intellect and conscience of the country in behalf of equal rights for all. The speakers were selected beforehand, and came prepared to do justice to their subject. Accordingly the proceedings were orderly, harmonious, and effective, and the influence exerted was serious and impressive. The resolution adopted at the annual meeting in Philadelphia, a fortnight before, affirming that woman suffrage, which means equality in the home, means also greater purity, constancy, and permanence in marriage, was reaffirmed.

Hon. Geo. F. Hoar made an admirable argument in behalf of suffrage at the closing session. A large number of Senators and Representatives attended the meetings. Many of these, among others Senators Morton and Wilson, assured us of their hearty sympathy with our movement. The most kindly and genial hospitality was extended to the speakers by the citizens of Washington, and nothing occurred to mar the pleasure or diminish the influence of the meetings, which were very largely attended, the audiences averaging one thousand.

We have just reason to complain of the spirit of the Washington press, as manifested in their reports of the Convention. The sole exception was the Daily Chronicle, which was fair and friendly. The other reports amounted to little more than a burlesque, and the editorial comments consisted chiefly of denunciation and ridicule. The N.Y. Tribune, finding nothing to ridicule in our proceedings, suppressed all mention of the Convention, not publishing even the brief notices of the Associated Press. Having charged woman suffrage with hostility to marriage, the Tribune has carefully refrained from informing its readers that the American Woman Suffrage Association, representing thirteen organized State societies, has held for the first time a Convention in Washington, solely to urge the claim of woman to legal and political equality. We wait to see whether the Tribune will be equally reticent, hereafter. But neither the silence nor the misrepresentations of our opponents will check the steady growth and progress of the woman suffrage movement.

H. B. B.

The following is a short extract from the able address of Hon. G. F. Hoar, Representative from Massachusetts, who said:

He would prefer the subject left to the leaders on the platform and only be a follower in the ranks, but on command of those having the matter in hand he had come to show his colors. As he understood the subject, it was to assure the American people that it was right to admit women to participate in the affairs of government. They were using the best minds and brains to draw out the arguments on this subject, and some of our wisest fellow-citizens have been unable to see any favorable argument for granting this privilege. He then proceeded to give the ideas entertained by citizens of the different foreign countries as to what was the object of the republic, and said that this country was made up of the aggregate personal worth of the people. There could not be in a State a man having the right to compel another to be subject to him without being unjust. Therefore it is said that all men are created equal. Is it right and safe that the women of this country should have a voice in its administration? The only way to find out would be by having the understanding of those persons who are to accomplish it and carry it into effect. If there was anything in which woman excelled man it was her penetration and correct judgment of persons at first sight. It by no means follows that because woman has the right to vote, that entitles her to hold office. That right is vested in the judgment of our fellow-citizens, who, if they regard us as worthy and capable, will elect us to the offices.

Upon the Convention held in Baltimore, the following editorial appeared in the Woman's Journal:

In no one State of the Union has there been a more rapid advance in public sentiment, during the last ten years, upon all public questions, than in the State of Maryland. In 1861 a woman suffrage meeting in Baltimore would have been a failure. In 1871 the Convention of the American Woman Suffrage Association has proved the very reverse. Two evening sessions and two intermediate day sessions were well attended. The speakers were Lucy Stone, Margaret W. Campbell, Elizabeth K. Churchill, and Henry B. Blackwell.

Notwithstanding the disappointment felt by the audience at the unexpected absence of Mrs. Julia Ward Howe and Rev. James Freeman Clarke, great interest was manifested, and the newspapers of the city gave the meetings candid and respectful notices. We were more than gratified by the unusual fairness and courtesy displayed by the press of Baltimore. Indeed, to this and especially to the generous aid of that admirable paper, the Baltimore American, are largely due the success of our meetings. We feel all the more bound to notice this frank and generous treatment of a new and unpopular movement by the press of Maryland because we have felt it our duty to condemn the striking contrast exhibited in other quarters. In Baltimore competent reporters made a conscientious abstract of the speeches they professed to report. When this is done in New York and Washington, the woman suffrage cause will have less difficulty in enlisting public attention.

We were also exceedingly gratified to find that the laws of Maryland for wives, mothers, and widows, though still far from equitable, are greatly in advance of those of Massachusetts and of most Northern States. We are promised by one of the most eminent lawyers of Baltimore a full statement of the legal status of married women in Maryland. We shall publish it in the Woman's Journal, as an evidence that equity and liberality are not bounded by "Mason and Dixon" or any other geographical line.

H. B. B.

A mass convention of the American Woman Suffrage Association at Apollo Hall, New York, on the 9th of May, 1872, was an interesting and successful meeting. Mrs. Lucy Stone presided, and made the opening address. Rev. James Freeman Clarke, Charlotte B. Wilbour, Mary F. Eastman, Rev. Edward Eggleston, Helen M. Jenkins, Henry B. Blackwell, Amanda Deyo, and others addressed the Convention.

Some disappointment was felt at the unavoidable absence of Mr. Garrison, Mrs. Bowles, and Mrs. Livermore, the two former being detained by severe indisposition. In consequence of an error of dates on the part of the proprietors of Steinway Hall, the meeting was held at an unusual place; nevertheless, the number of persons in attendance at the three sessions averaged seven hundred, and was composed, for the most part, of substantial, reliable friends of the movement. The notices of the Press were brief, but respectful. The Convention declined to take any separate political action, arraigned the so-called "Liberal Republicans" for their illiberal exclusion of women, and appealed to the approaching National Conventions at Philadelphia and Baltimore for a recognition of the rightful claims of woman to legal and political equality.

The American Woman Suffrage Association held in 1872 its fourth annual meeting, and celebrated its third anniversary at St. Louis.

Dr. Stone, of Michigan, said: Friends of the cause of universal suffrage—We live in an era of common sense. Sir William Hamilton, who was a great philosopher, and who investigated all the systems of philosophy from Aristotle down to Descartes and Kant, who went to the lowest depths of philosophy, dived deep for pearls, sometimes bringing up also mud and clams, declared after all his survey of the various schools of philosophy, that the great regulating power of the human mind was common sense; that of all the faculties, that which controlled all others was common sense. That was the basis of his system of philosophy. Now it is just as appropriate as friends of social and political reform, that we should rely upon common sense, as it was for this great philosopher, and it is this on which we purpose to rely. Wherever there is a battle to be fought, they who make the best use and most continued exercise of common sense are sure to win. This is not only true in moral contests, in the strife of mind with mind, but it is true in those material contests such as we have recently had. It was true in the great contest between Germany and France. It was this the crusaders lacked, and the reason why they spent so many ages in doing nothing was that they did not exercise their common sense. When the Jews, by their follies, by their obduracy, had destroyed themselves, and the Almighty wished to bring them to their senses, he said, "Come, let us reason together." For he knew if they would exercise their common sense they would no longer be rebellious as they had been. And it is true at the present time. I think if we can succeed in inducing those who differ from us to reason—I mean to exercise that regulating power which the common mind as well as the philosophic mind possesses, if they would exercise their common sense, the battle would be fought and the victory would be won. Sometimes circumstances unexpectedly bring men to their senses in these matters. We know there has been a great deal of discussion on the subject of slavery, and we needed a Dred Scott decision to bring men to their senses. When they contemplated that in all its bearings and ultimate results, common sense said: It can never be endured; we have had enough of this going on. Let us come directly to the point. Is a negro a man? Is he a rational, accountable man or not? If a beast has rights we are bound to respect, and if a man for abusing it may be thrown into the penitentiary, is it possible that he who is made in the image of God is without rights? Does not common sense teach that we have some rights, and if our laws contradict such a decision as this it is time we have better laws, and such as common sense will approve. We want some one to rise in the cause of suffrage to cut the Gordian knot that binds the community, that binds churches, that binds good men everywhere, as well as those who are willing to be mistaken. A single word from Gen. Butler, who, whatever may have been charged against him, is not lacking in common sense, the single word "contraband," wrought a revolution in the midst of our rebellion, and to that we owe to a great extent our success in the war. We want such a gleam of light to burst upon the minds of the community, upon the great American people who are interested in the subject. The field is ours for the next four years, and we will strive to impress the doctrines of common sense upon all men and all women everywhere, until the atmosphere shall be full of it and all shall take it in by absorption.

Mrs. Longley, of Cincinnati, said—Ladies and Gentlemen: In a country where "No taxation without representation" is a watchword, and where it is held that "all just governments derive their powers from the consent of the governed," it should be unnecessary to plead for the recognition of the right of half its people to participate in making the laws by which they are taxed and governed. The justice of woman's claim to the ballot is so self-evident, and so entirely in accord with the spirit of our institutions and the fundamental principles upon which they are based, that I often feel as though it were offering an insult to American men to undertake to argue the question. But, every election day reminds us that these fundamental principles which our forefathers fought to establish are outraged. "We, the people," they said, yet nearly a century finds half the people ignored, half the people taxed without being represented, and governed without their consent. I know it is held that the expression "the people" in the Constitution does not include women, and should not be interpreted literally; but it appears to me that if we engage in this method of interpretation of constitutions and laws we shall soon get things mixed. If the expression does not include women in the sense of voters it does not include them in the sense of tax-payers, nor in the sense of criminals, nor does it even include them as being entitled to the enjoyment of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness"—as the Declaration of Independence declares "a people" to be entitled to these.

Surely it will not be said that the rights of half the people of the United States were ignored by the men who framed the Constitution of the United States. It was evidently the object of the Constitution to secure equal rights to all. The Constitution of the United States recognizes the great principle of human equality, and the rights of women can not be delegated to or represented by their husbands. Women who believe that they are responsible to God only, are not willing to be circumscribed by men.

Mrs. Hannah M. Tracy Cutler said that this was a progressive, a growing, and a glorious country. All people came here and found protection under its generous shelter, more or less. We had been digging away at this suffrage question until, in her opinion, we are getting pretty near the foundation of government. We are pulling up the old ideas and throwing them out of the way and making room for the grand tree of liberty to grow. That tree has already grown to considerable size, and flourished more or less under the generous protection of our institutions—less a good deal, the negro said a few years ago, though now he begins to realize that it is more.

We women are quite well protected. Sometimes we are protected a great deal more than we want to be. [Several ladies in the audience, "That's so!" and laughter.] The American men are the best men under the sun. Each one of them is a prince of the blood royal. That's a reasonably good compliment. Now, gentlemen, turn round and say to the women of America, "You are each and every one of you a princess by divine right, and we will give you even the half of our kingdom." That is all we ask. But they say, "Show us the precedent. The thing never has been done before. The women have been ignored in government from the earliest days until now," etc. Why, gentlemen, away back in the remote ages of history—so far that the memory of man runneth not distinctly thereto—we find that women not only lived and gave men to the world, but that they lived and gave laws to the world.

Mrs. Stone, the President, said she would like to speak to the delegates and friends, because she knew those who were here had been working in this cause for years. They are short of time, but all give it that deep, earnest baptism of work for the principles that underlie republican institutions. They would work until that end is achieved, or until death relieved them from their labor. She felt cheered on seeing the progress they had made. It was about twenty years since the speaker came to this city to deliver a course of lectures for woman's rights. They called it woman's rights in those days. They did not use the word suffrage at all; and, as she stood there now, her mind ran back over a score of years. When she counted the gains they had made, it seemed as if she had been in some fairy palace, and by charms the old wrongs had dropped away and new good had sprung up. They had fought for woman's rights, and had taken hold of the hands of little girls growing out of girlhood into womanhood—girls who must stand on their own feet and earn a living for themselves. When there was no father's hand or brother's arm to help, what could woman do? She looked out into the great thoroughfares of industry open to all men, and almost all were shut against her. Woman was a teacher at a dollar a day, and had to board round. She was a seamstress with still smaller pay, or she was a housekeeper at her own house or somebody's else, where, so far as material gains were concerned, the results were small. Other industries were shut to her. The world is as full of women as men. They have to eat, drink, and be clothed, and, until other opportunities are obtained, their supplies are infinitely smaller than those offered to men. Why should women, whose supple fingers can set type—why should not they be type-setters? The printers joined together in bands and swore by all the gods they knew that women should not be printers. They joined together in a body and printed in a book that they would not work for any man who employed women as printers. They thought it would degrade the labor of man. The reformers asked for what was honest, good, and true, and found a response in the business interest of men, and the way was opened for women printers. Instead of brothers talking of supporting their sisters and making themselves poor they now worked side by side. A paper which they would have here for subscription—the Woman's Journal—came from an office where all the printers, with two exceptions, were girls; and the man who managed the office said it was an advantage, because the girls are always sober and never go on a spree. He could always be sure of having the paper out at the right time. The steady, honest, little women printers are always there. They asked why the women could not go into the stores and sell shoes, cloth, and dry goods, and why should not men build cities and sail ships and do what larger muscles fit them for? and they quoted the words of King Solomon, who spoke of a good wife sending out ships and dealing in merchandise. Women entered stores and became not only clerks but merchants, and some of the best stores she knew to-day were owned by women, who do not look to the time when they are to go to the workhouse or some worse place even, but were laying by some means to give them comfortable maintenance in their old age. Fathers who had daughters looked forward with more courage, because there were more avenues for woman's industry and better pay to reward it.

When Chicago was burned, the telegraphic dispatches most promptly forwarded and accurately worded were sent by women, and a generous public appreciated the fact. In medical matters they said, "Here is a department—here is a field for which women are peculiarly adapted, and to which they would be welcomed in the hour of peril." They were laughed at and called "she doctors" by those who thought women would be scared by their vulgarity; and some young doctors threw stones and mud, literally, and tried to prevent women being physicians. But gentlemen who had wives and daughters looked in the faces of those half-bearded boys mocking at women wishing to study medicine, and asked, "Are these the fellows who wish to come to our homes and practice?" And when those boys knew they would not be welcome to those houses, they smoothed down their anger, went back to their studies, and have behaved better ever since. The speaker mentioned the case of a sister of the Fowlers who kept a horse and carriage, and a man to drive. She has a large practice, with $15,000 a year. They next asked that there should be women lawyers. She believed the day was not far off when women would as worthily fill that as any other profession. What they asked was, that woman should have a wider sphere of activity.

The speaker next alluded to the fact that the captain of a ship going to California had fallen sick and died. The captain's wife, who had been on many voyages, asked the sailors over the dead body of her husband to be as loyal to her as they had been to him, and every man swore fealty to the woman, whom they knew to be worthy of command. When she brought the ship safe to port, the grateful underwriters made up a purse for the woman who had saved the ship.

After relating a similar anecdote in relation to a ship that sailed from China, the speaker narrated the progress made by women in being admitted to the Christian ministry. When they had so many rights, they were sure they could earn their own bread; and they must have the right to vote in this Government, where they were taxed, and where their sons could be sent to fight in war. In a republican government they were entitled to vote; and now the Republican party—the great Republican party that had swept the country by such a magnificent vote—had made the cause its own and could carry them on to triumph; giving them the suffrage as it had given it to the negroes. The Convention at Philadelphia listened respectfully to their claim, and the Republican party of the State of Massachusetts had put it in their platform. In the last campaign the suffragists won five hundred thousand votes of men who were bound to vote for them by and by, and they were sure to win. She believed the final hour of victory could not be far away.

Mrs. Howe, chairman of the Executive Committee, gave a long and deeply interesting report. Mr. Blackwell read the following letters:

Mrs. Lucy Stone:—Dear Madam—I should be glad to meet with you at St. Louis and to add my testimony to that of the noble band, who, after so long a conflict for another step in the advance of humanity, seem on the eve of seeing their wishes fulfilled. I have never been sanguine as to the near and rapid accomplishment of the admission of women to the right and duty of suffrage, but I have never doubted of its ultimate accomplishment, because I believe that every movement, founded in justice and wisdom, will at length prevail. The cause of woman suffrage never seemed to me more worthy of the consideration of thoughtful men than now. What it has suffered, all causes that strike at deep principles must expect to suffer in their early history. And it has been relieved of its hindrances sooner than might have been expected. The action of political conventions, State and National, has been significant. If the articles on suffrage are vague as to principle, they are striking as the record of the conclusions of observant politicians in respect to the currents and tendencies of the public mind. They felt the need of saying something, and if they did it reluctantly, it is all the more significant. While then I can not be with you personally, I am with you in sympathy, and in the firm faith of the justice of your cause and of its final victory.

Henry Ward Beecher.

Very truly yours,

Brooklyn, November 9, 1872.

My Dear Mrs. Howe and Lucy Stone:—I am sorry that I must decline your kind invitation to attend the annual meeting of the American Woman Suffrage Association at St. Louis. I am too old (approaching seventy-six) and infirm to make long journeys. Let woman be of good cheer. She will not have to wait for the ballot much longer. The arguments are unanswerable and will soon be crowned with success. Allow me to send you the enclosed twenty-five dollars toward defraying the expenses of the meeting. With great regard,

Gerrit Smith.

Your friend,

Peterboro, N. Y., November 15, 1872.

Dear Lucy:—I am glad to hear that the American Woman Suffrage Association is to meet at St. Louis this month. The more women are brought to think on this subject, the more they will be convinced that their spiritual growth has been stinted by customs and opinions which have no real foundation in nature and truth; and the frank, free West is more courageous than the East in carrying its convictions promptly into practice. I rejoiced in the recent political action of women in Massachusetts and elsewhere—first, because it was salutary for women themselves as all things are which promote the activity of their minds on important subjects; and, secondly, because the promptness and earnestness with which they almost universally took the right side has greatly helped to convince those who needed convincing that women are competent to examine into affairs of National interest and to form rational conclusions therefrom.

Although I feel grateful to the Republican party for treating our claims with more respectful consideration than any other party has done, yet my principal reason for earnestly desiring its continuance in power is, that it is essentially the party of progress. It owes its existence to progress, and its vitality has been preserved by its practical support of progressive ideas. It embodies a very large portion of the culture, the conscientiousness, and the enlightened good sense of the nation, and its elements are so harmonized as to produce a safe medium between old fogyism and radical rashness. It is natural for such a party to respect our claims, because they have become accustomed to respect what is founded on principles of justice. It was the learning of that lesson which originally made them a powerful party, and they can not be false to ideas of true progress without committing suicide. Of course, with changing events, party names will change; but I hope women will carefully notice what principles underlie these changes, and will conscientiously give their influence to whatever party proves itself most friendly to the largest freedom regulated by wise and equal laws.

With a cordial greeting to our sisters of the West and to our brothers also, I wish you God-speed on your mission of enfranchisement to half the human race.

L. Maria Child.

Wayland,November 12, 1872.

The Business Committee reported resolutions,[193] which after much discussion were adopted. Officers[194] for the ensuing year were then proposed and elected.

Miss Eastman was announced. As she stepped to the front she was received with applause. She gave an able address, answering the questions, "What is to be gained and what is to be lost, by giving women the ballot?" She confined her attention to the latter question principally, by reviewing the condition of women in the past, and their condition in foreign countries. She answered the charge that women are unfit to use the ballot. There was quite an array of facts in her discourse, and extreme beauty in her language, though the latter covered at times exquisite sarcasm that was relished by all. She made a decided impression upon the audience, and concluded amid demonstrations of applause.

Lucy Stone made the closing speech, and said that after the golden words to which we had been listening, silence was most fitting; what she had to say, therefore, would be brief and without preliminary. The distinctions which are made on account of sex are so utterly without reason, that a mere statement of them ought to be sufficient to secure their immediate correction.

For example, here are twins, a baby boy and girl; they rock in the same cradle; the same breast blesses their baby lips; the same hand guides their first tottering steps. A little later they play the same plays, recite the same lessons and hold the same rank as scholars. They ask admission to Harvard college. The boy is received, and the girl refused. Can any one tell me a good reason why? At twenty-one their father gives them each a house. They both pay taxes on this real estate, but the young man has a voice, both in the amount of tax and its use, all of which is denied to the young woman. Can any one tell a good reason why?

They assume the marriage relation. The young husband can sell his house, give a good title, convey his stocks, will his property according to his pleasure, have the guardianship and control of his children. The young wife can not sell her house, or give a valid title; can not convey her stocks, or make a will of her property with the same freedom that the husband can, has no equal right to the control and guardianship of her children. Can any one tell a good reason why?

The man becomes a widower, but the house, the land, the furniture, and the children are all undisturbed. The woman becomes a widow. The property is divided in fractions, the contents of the cupboards and closets counted, valued, divided, and the widow's thirds (commonly known as the widow's incumbrance), are left to this woman. Can any one give a good reason why there should be such a difference between the rights of the widow and the widower? or why woman as a student, a wife, a mother, a widow, and a citizen, should be held at such a disadvantage?

The mere statement of the case shows the injustice, and the wrong which needs to be righted. There is only one way to remove this, and that is for woman to use her right to the ballot, and through it, protect herself. Oh, men of St. Louis! will you not use the power you hold, and the opportunity to make the application of our theory of government sure as far as in you lies, to each man's mother, sister, and daughter?

On motion of Mr. Blackwell, it was

Resolved, That the thanks of this Convention are extended to the citizens of St. Louis for the kind hospitality they have extended to the delegates of this Convention. Also to the representatives of the press for the candid and respectful reports which have appeared in the daily papers of the city.

The American Woman Suffrage Association held an introductory anniversary meeting Monday, October 13, 1873, in the large hall of the Cooper Institute. A fine audience attended, the hall being nearly filled. Fully two-thirds of this audience were men. Colonel T. W. Higginson, the President of the Association, said:

This is my last service as President of this association. Unlike other bodies, it only has a man for that office every other year, and this is the end of the other year. We meet here as a family, men and women, each ready to do his or her share of the talk. We stand here to speak neither for one nor the other, but for that great movement which is to sweep through the land and arouse one sex to its rights and the other to its duties. Not to arouse man against woman, but in favor of the civilization which is to come. It is more than twenty years since the Woman Suffrage Association came up in an organized form. We entered into this movement with no ideas of immediate success. We had behind us only a few years of agitation after long centuries of prejudice and distrust. Look through the long record of the great reforms of the world, and what a series of delays and discouragements you find! It is a history of defeats before victories. Men sometimes come to us with sympathy because we have been defeated in this Legislature or that convention. Sympathy! We thank heaven that it had got there to be defeated; that we are strong enough to be in a minority! Defeat is victory afterward. We have been defeated again and again, and again, and each time we find ourselves growing stronger.

Miss Mary F. Eastman, in an able address, stated the progress of the movement in different States, and insisted on the right of women to the exercise of the franchise, as a consequence of the Declaration of Independence. The elective franchise was the greatest blessing enjoyed by a free people, and the inability of any class to exercise it indicated a description of servitude. She said that the person was trying to erase God's finger mark upon the human soul who would prevent anybody, man or woman, from following natural bent and ability in any avocation. In the founding of Harvard and other early colleges, some provision was made for the education of Indians, but none for women. Already at Yale and West Point colored men have a fair chance, not yet the women. Miss Eastman thought that suffrage was the highway to all other reforms.

Mrs. Lucy Stone said: Mr. President, Fellow-workers, Ladies, and Gentlemen:—Our cause is half won when we find that people are willing to hear it, as you seem to be willing to hear it now. One of the best things we can have in meetings like this is to create a discontent that women are not permitted to enjoy all their rights. To-night while we are here, there are gathered in Plymouth Church, women who are laying plans to take part in the celebration of the Centennial, in 1876. At this point in the speaker's remarks, some confusion arose from the entry into the hall of about 200 young women.

Mr. Dennis Griffin rose and said these women were not the Cooper Institute class; they were parasol-makers who had been forced out of employment by their employers, and they had come, not as women suffragists but as women suffering, to ask of the audience their sympathetic support, and if when the lady had finished her speech the audience would permit the President of this Association of working women to speak from the platform, she would explain their grievances.

Mrs. Stone then proceeded, saying that if one thing was surer than another, it was that woman suffrage would help every suffering sewing woman. It had been said that the ballot was worth fifty cents a day to a man; and, if so, it was worth just as much to a woman. All over the Union, as this night in Plymouth Church, women were preparing to take part in the coming Centennial to celebrate the Fourth of July, 1876. When she heard this she asked herself what part women had in such a celebration? Just as men were oppressed previous to 1776, so were women oppressed to-day. I say that women should resolve to take no part in it. Let them shut their doors and darken their windows on that day, and let a few of the most matronly women dress themselves in black and stand at the corners of the streets where the largest procession is to pass, bearing banners inscribed, "We are governed without our consent; we are taxed without representation." The Declaration of Independence belonged to men. Let them have their masculine celebration and masculine glory all to themselves, and let the women, wherever they can get a church, go there and hold solemn service and toll the bell. "It will give us a chance for moral protest," she continued, "such as we shall never have again, for before another hundred years it must surely be that the growth of public sentiment will sweep away all distinctions based solely on sex."

At the close of Mrs. Stone's remarks, the Chairman invited the representative of the parasol-makers to state her case, introducing her as Miss Leonard, of New York, President of the parasol-makers.

Miss Leonard advanced to the front of the platform, and appeared to be much embarrassed at fronting so large an audience. The hearty applause with which she was greeted assuring her of a kindly reception, she became a little more at ease, and in a low tone of voice spoke as follows:

My Worthy Friends, Ladies and Gentlemen: I was not prepared to meet an audience like this. In consequence of being oppressed by our employers we were obliged to leave their employ, because we can not earn our bread. Consequently we held a meeting up stairs to-night, and knowing that you were here we thought we would let you know that there are hundreds of women suffering, not for the ballot but for bread. I have never wanted the ballot. I believe it belongs to the men who have it; but I come to ask you in the name of humanity if there can be any society organized that will repress the unscrupulous employers and let the public know they are oppressing the poor girls. Men are strong; they can get together and ask what they want; they can organize in large bodies, but the working women are the most oppressed race in the United States. I am thankful to you, gentlemen and ladies (I should have put the ladies first), for giving me your attention. I don't intend to detain you long, because your meeting is here for a different purpose, but I hope you will give me your sympathies. I can not make you an eloquent speech, for I, as a working woman, have had to labor eighteen hours a day for my bread, and therefore have had no time to educate myself as an orator.

Henry B. Blackwell said: This audience is composed mostly of men. I have a word to say to men especially. Why is it that labor is oppressed and that working women and working men are in some respects worse off than ever before? I answer; because our Government is Republican only in name. It is not even representative of men. The primary meetings which nominate the candidates and control the policy of parties are neglected by the voters. Not one man in fifty attends them. They are controlled in every locality by rings of trading politicians.

Now there is only one remedy for this. You must somehow contrive to interest the mass of the people in public business. You must reform the primary meetings by securing an attendance of the intelligent classes of the community. There is only one way to do this. The same way you have already adopted in the churches, in charitable associations, in society, everywhere except in politics, you must enlist the sympathy and co-operation of women. Then the men who now stay away will go with their wives and sisters. The reason the better class of men neglect to attend the primaries is this—civilized and refined men spend their evenings in the society of women; they go with them to church meetings, to concerts, to lectures. They do not break off these engagements to go down to some liquor saloon, or other unattractive locality, there, amid the fumes of tobacco and whisky, to find everything already cut and dried beforehand. They try it once or twice and then retire for life disgusted. We ask suffrage for women because they are different from men. Not better nor wiser on the whole, but better and wiser in certain respects. They are more temperate, more chaste, more economical. Their presence will appeal to the self-respect of men. Thus both will be improved, and politics will be redeemed and purified.

The second session of this Convention was held in Brooklyn, in Plymouth Church. At this meeting the Chairman of the Executive Committee, Mrs. Lucy Stone read her annual report, and then the delegates from the different States gave accounts of the cause in all parts of the Union, as carried on by means of the State societies. At the opening of the afternoon session Col. Higginson read the following letters:

Andover, Mass., Sept. 29, 1873.

My Dear Mrs. Stone:—My regret at not being able to attend the meetings of the American Suffrage Association this year, is not consoled by the pleasure of expressing, by letter, my warmest sympathy with their objects; but, if we can not do the thing we would, we must do the next best thing to it.

To say that I believe in womanhood suffrage with my whole head and heart, is very imperfectly to express the eagerness with which I hope for it, and the confidence with which I expect it. It will come, as other right things come, because it is right. But those forces which "make for righteousness" make haste slowly. Do we not often trip up ourselves in our pilgrimage toward truth, by attributing our own sense of hunger and hurry and heat to the fullness and leisure and calm in which the object of our passionate search moves forward to meet us? There is something very significant to the student of progress, in the history of the forerunners of revolutions. Their eager confidence in their own immediate success, their pathetic bewilderment at the mystery of their apparent failures, are rich with suggestion to any one who means work for an unpopular cause. No reform marches evenly to its consummation. If it does not meet apparent overthrow, it must step at times with the uneasiness of what George Eliot would call its "growing pains." But growing pains are not death-throes. In the name of growth and decay let us be exact in our diagnosis!

I have fallen into this train of thought, because there seems to have been a concerted and deliberate attempt, this past year, on the part of certain of those opposed to the thorough elevation of women, to assert that our influence is distinctly losing ground. Irresponsible assertion is the last refuge of the force whose arguments have fallen off in the fray, and "unconscious annihilation" is as yet a very agreeable condition. It might be replied, in the language of the hymn-book:

Perhaps to the onlookers this has not been one of our fast years. No one actually engaged in the struggle to improve the condition of women can for an instant doubt that it has been a strong one. A silent, sure awakening of women to their own needs is taking place on every hand; and it is becoming evident that until the masses of women are thus awakened, the movement to enfranchise them must not anticipate any very vivid successes. Let us be content if our strength runs for a time to the making of muscle, not to the trial of speed.

Elizabeth Stuart Phelps.

I am, Madam, very sincerely,

Concord, Oct. 1, 1873.

Dear Mrs. Stone:—I am so busy just now proving "woman's right to labor," that I have no time to help prove "woman's right to vote."

When I read your note aloud to the family, asking "What shall I say to Mrs. Stone?" a voice from the transcendental mist which usually surrounds my honored father instantly replied, "Tell her you are ready to follow her as leader, sure that you could not have a better one." My brave old mother, with the ardor of many unquenchable Mays shining in her face, cried out, "Tell her I am seventy three, but I mean to go to the polls before I die, even if my three daughters have to carry me." And two little men, already mustered in, added the cheering words, "Go ahead, Aunt Weedy, we will let you vote as much as ever you like."

Such being the temper of the small Convention of which I am now president, I can not hesitate to say that though I may not be with you in body, I shall be in spirit, and am as ever, hopefully and heartily yours,

Louisa May Alcott.

Letters from William Lloyd Garrison and Lydia Maria Child were also read, expressing deep sympathy and hope for the cause.

Mr. Blackwell, as Chairman of the Business Committee, reported the resolutions, of which the last was:

6. Resolved, That the woman suffrage movement, like every other reform of the age, laments the loss and honors the memory of its most powerful advocate, John Stuart Mill.

Matilda J. Hindman, of Pittsburgh, made an address explaining the origin of the movement for woman suffrage, asserting its verity and necessity. She gave many reasons for woman's needing the ballot.

Mrs. Lucy Stone gave instances of oppressive laws with reference to statutes relative to widows which are in force in some New England States, and which bear very hard upon women because they can not vote.

Mrs. Abba G. Woolson, of Massachusetts, author of "Woman in American Society," gave an exceedingly interesting description of her tour through Wyoming, her hour and a half conversation in the cars with Gov. Campbell, whose testimony was positive in favor of all the new privileges given to women, by which Wyoming has distinguished herself. Mrs. Woolson came home happy to have for the first time set her foot on Republican soil; "for," said she, "no State in the Union is a republic, but it is to me an absolute monarchy."

Rev. Celia Burleigh, demonstrated that this Government is not a republic, but an aristocracy so long as the suffrage is denied to woman.

Mrs. Mary A. Livermore found much encouragement for the cause in various signs of the times. She would have women act as if they already bore the responsibilities of voters; would have them put off frivolity and every other cause of offense to opponents, and put on a soberness of spirit and a gracious gravity of mien as behooved those in whose hearts a great work lay. She exhorted them to remember that they were not arrayed against men as foes, but that they were working with fathers, brothers, husbands and sons for the best interests of the whole race.

An audience of at least 1,200 persons was present at the closing session.

The following letter from Miriam M. Cole was read:

Otterbein University, Westerville, O., Oct. 4, 1873.

Dear Mr. Blackwell—Much as I wish to be with you the 13th and 14th, I can not. My work in the University can not be given to another, and I have no right to leave it undone. I hope your meeting will be profitable and successful. It is said, "Interest in woman suffrage is dying out." This is not true, so far as I know. There is more sober, candid talk on the subject in private circles, here in Ohio, than ever before. Our students in the University are asking questions, with a desire for intelligent answers, and at home, in Sydney, before I left, many experienced politicians confessed it to be the one thing needful. I am sure it is gaining ground among our quiet, sensible people. The stir may not be so demonstrative in cities as formerly, but through the country there is a general awakening. If we can only have patience to wait, we shall not be disappointed. Right, sooner or later, will come into its kingdom. Women are no longer children to be frightened by imaginary bears, neither will they be satisfied with playthings, who ask for better. The distance between men and women is lessening every year. Colleges are bringing them on to the same plane, and the agitation of this question of woman's right to a voice in the government, has given and is giving men new ideas respecting the strength of woman's intellect and her determination to be more than a doll in this busy world.

Whether we are made voting citizens or not, let no man beguile himself with the thought that the old order of things will be restored. They who step into light and freedom will not retrace their steps. This end is equality, civil, religious and political—there is no stopping-place this side of that. My best wishes are with you and yours.

Miriam M. Cole.

Miss Huldah B. Loud, of East Abington, Mass., was the first speaker: Scorned by the Democrats and fawned upon by the Republicans, who profess but to betray, under these circumstances we come again to the fight. We believe in liberty in the highest degree, such liberty as our fathers fought for, and this struggle will go on until that liberty is gained; liberty is the pursuit of life, health, and happiness. We look in vain for honesty in political life. We turn in disgust from the meaningless platitudes of the Republican Convention at Worcester, from the incidental admission of a plank in the platform which means nothing.

If we would be recognized as a power by political parties, every suffragist should withhold his ballot, and thus politicians would be brought to their senses. If we labor for anything, if we mean anything, we mean woman suffrage, and let us not give a moral or material support, politically, to the man who is not in harmony with the principle of free suffrage in its broadest significance.

We are called unwomanly for our advocacy of this priceless boon to women. We are willing that our womanly character should stand by the side of those who oppose this movement. Do you call Lucy Stone, the woman reformer of the world, with her eloquence, her soft voice, her matchless, unwearied work for all that is good, with her motherly appearance, do you call such a woman unwomanly? Or Margaret Fuller, or Julia Ward Howe, do you call these women unwomanly? Then let us take our place by them, cast in our lot with them and be called unwomanly. It is said, and it is sadly true, that many women do not want the ballot; and it is no less sadly true that many of our most bitter opponents are our sister women. But if they do not want the ballot, if you deprive me of the right you do me a grievous wrong. It is said that if we were given the privilege of the ballot, we would not use it. Is it any reason if I do not choose to avail myself of my rights that I should be deprived of them? Why do you consult women if this right shall be given them? You did not consult the slave in regard to his freedom, but you said he was wanted for the salvation of the country, and you took him and forced freedom upon him.

Mrs. Julia Ward Howe and Mrs. Mary A. Livermore spoke alike with great force and earnestness upon the moral and religious phases of the movement.

Mrs. Frances Watkins Harper, of Philadelphia, made the closing speech. She showed that much as white women need the ballot, colored women need it more. Although the women of her race are no longer sold on the auction block, they are subjected to the legal authority of ignorant and often degraded men. She rejoiced in the progress already made, but pleaded for equal rights and equal education for the colored women of the land.

The President said—Ladies and gentlemen, the letters have been read, the reports accepted, the resolutions adopted, the officers[195] for the ensuing year chosen, and there being no further business before the Convention, it is moved and seconded that we adjourn sine die.

The Sixth Annual Meeting of the American Woman Suffrage Association assembled at the Opera House in Detroit, Tuesday morning, Oct. 13, 1874.

Col. W. M. Ferry, of Grand Haven, Chairman of the State Executive Committee of the Michigan Suffrage Association, called the meeting to order, and made a brief address of welcome. He spoke of the pleasure the Convention afforded many of the advocates of woman suffrage in this city who have the cause deeply at heart. He then alluded to the authoress of the well-known hymn, "The Battle Hymn of the Republic," Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, and introduced her as the President of the American Woman Suffrage Association.

The Rev. Mrs. Gillette, of Rochester, Mich., opened the meeting with prayer.

The President, Mrs. Howe, then delivered the Annual Address:

Ladies and Gentlemen of the American Woman Suffrage Convention:

It is my office on the present occasion to welcome you to this scene of our happy and harmonious meeting. In this great country many families do not gather their members together oftener than once in a year. When they accomplish this they ordain a festival, and call it Thanksgiving Day. This Association is in some sense a family, whose members are widely scattered. East, West, North and South claim and contain us. But when the sacred call for our Annual Meeting is issued, distances are forgotten, business and pleasures are interrupted. Like the wave of a magician's wand, the touch of a common sympathy summons us and keeps us in sight. Our first feeling, I suppose, is one of great pleasure at looking each other in the face again. This is our Suffrage Thanksgiving, and we hope to keep it right cordially. Welcome, dear friends, faithful sisters and brothers. Welcome, one and all. In this world of death we still live. In this world of doubt we still believe in even-handed justice, and in pure law. So, with one breath, we give God thanks for our continued life and faith, and wish each other and our great cause Godspeed.

But we are met for something more than a mere expression of feeling, however cordial and timely that might be. We meet here to take counsel for the spiritual welfare to which each one of us stands pledged. How goes the good fight? Let each department of our little army tell. What victories have been achieved, what defeats suffered with patience? How shall we improve the one? What shall we learn from the other? Oh! let us feel that these rare moments of our meeting are precious. Here we must compare notes and learn what has been done. Here, too, we must briefly survey what is yet to do and how it is to be done. May no moment in this too brief season be wasted! May we all speak and act in view of great necessities and of high hopes. We may take for our text the words: "Now is our salvation nearer than when we believed." But we must also acknowledge that the end is not yet.

Every year that sees us banded together in pursuit of our present object sees a wonderful growth in its prominence and recognized importance. Opposition has grown with our efforts. People at first said, "Nobody will resist you." This was when people thought we were in fun. But when it appeared that we were in sad and bitter earnest, opposition was not wanting. Wherever we came to plead the cause of human freedom, the enemies of human freedom met and withstood us. All the professions have befriended—all, too, have opposed us. We have stood before powers and dignitaries to maintain what we believe; and while we have asked that the right of suffrage be recognized in the persons of women, women learned and unlearned have stood up to ask that our petition should not be granted. We need not say that for one woman who has done this, hundreds and thousands have risen up to bless the woman suffrage cause and its champions. And for every doctor, lawyer and priest who has shrieked forth or set forth our presumptive disabilities, a tenfold number of men in all of these callings have arisen to do battle for the right, and to tell us on the authority of their special knowledge and experience, that the reform we ask for is congenial to nature and founded on right. Goldwin Smith, a man knowing naught of woman, airs his irrational views in the English Fortnightly, and Frances Power Cobbe and Prof. Cairnes, and a host of others, unravel the net of his flimsy statements. Drs. Clarke and Maudsley dogmatize from their male view of the female constitution; and from men and women throughout the country an indignant protest rises up. Men and women say alike: "It is not education that demoralizes and diseases our women. It is want of education, want of object, want of right knowledge of ends and methods." And how shall we acquire this unless we are taught? And how shall we be taught unless provision is made for us? And how shall provision be made for us unless we make it ourselves by voting for it?

Some mention is due to the place in which we meet. We are in the State of Michigan, a State in which the question of impartial suffrage has been carefully canvassed and presented during the past year. Within a short distance from us is the University of Michigan, liberal to men and to women, whose scholarly claims and merits its Professors and its President openly and earnestly attest. We claim that institution as our potent ally. It furnishes the remedy to all that we complain of. Equal education for the sexes is the true preparation for equality in civil and social ordinances. Even at this distance we breathe something of that pure air in which the woman grows to her full intellectual stature, untrammeled by artificial limitation of object and of method. We boast our own Boston, its culture and its conscience, but while Harvard persistently closes its doors to women, we blush too for New England, and sorrowfully wish it better enlightenment and better behavior.

Having spoken of the East and the West, let me say how welcome to us of the East are occasions which make us better acquainted with our fellow-workers and believers of the West. The late Mr. Seward once said that slavery was sectional and freedom National. This was true in a larger sense than that in which he said it. All that is slavish tends to keep up sectional prejudice and isolation. All that is liberal tends to sympathy and union. East and West are the two hands of this mighty country—let the harmony of the present occasion show that they have but one heart between them. Are not all our chief possessions held in common? We gave you Sumner and you gave us Lincoln. We fought together the war of our late enfranchisement, and when God shall give us impartial suffrage as an established fact, it will be hard to discriminate between our work and yours. But the two hands will then be clasped, and the one heart uplifted with a throb of thankfulness that shall make our whole Nation one, and that forever. For the present moment, while we workers for woman suffrage can make no boast as to the final adoption of our method, we can yet rejoice in the results which already crown our work. Christ, in the very infancy of his mission, looked abroad and saw the fields already white with the harvest.

The different agencies employed by this and kindred associations have plowed and furrowed the land far and near. They have dropped everywhere the seed of a true word, of a right feeling. How small a thing may this dropping of a seed seem to a careless observer! Yet it is the very life of the world which the patient farmer sows and reaps. So, our laborious meetings and small measures; our speeches, soon forgotten; our writings, soon dismissed; our petitions to Legislatures, never entertained; all these seem small things to do. The world says: "Why do you not labor to build up fortunes and reputations for yourselves if you will labor? Why do you waste your time and efforts on this ungrateful soil?" But we may reply that we have the joy of Christ in our hearts. In every furrow, some seed springs up; from every effort, some sympathy, some conviction results. When we look about us and see the number of suffrage associations formed in the different States, we too can say that the fields are white already to harvest.

White already. Yet centuries of martyrdom lay between the sowing of Christ and the harvest which we reap to-day. All of those centuries brought and took away faithful souls who continued the work, who gathered and reaped and sowed again. And we, too, know not what years of patient endeavor may yet be in store for us before we see the end of our suffrage work. We know not whether most of us shall not taste of death before we do see it, passing away on the borders of the promised land, with its fair regions still unknown to us. And yet we see the end as by faith. By faith we can prophesy of what shall come. The new state, in which for the first time ideal justice shall be crowned and recognized; the new church, in which there shall be neither male nor female; but the new creature that shall represent on either side free and perfect humanity. Like a bride coming down from Heaven, like a resurrection coming out of the earth, it shall appear and abide. And we, whether we shall see it as living souls or as quickening spirits, shall rejoice in it.

Miss Eastman read the following letter:

Laramie City, W. T., Sept. 22, 1874.

Mrs. Lucy Stone, Chairman of the Executive Committee:—Your favor of the 12th inst. is received. I wish I could be with you at your meeting in Detroit next month, but I am so crowded with engagements here that I do not think I can get away. We have just had another election, and at no time have we had so full a vote. Our women have taken a lively interest, and have voted quite as universally as the men. Their influence has been felt more than ever and generally on the side of the best men. Several candidates have been defeated on account of their want of good characters, who expected success on party grounds. It is the general sentiment with us now that it will not do to nominate men for whom the women will not vote. Is not this a great step in advance? When candidates for office must come with a character that will stand the criticism of the women or be sure of defeat, we shall have a higher tone of political morals.

I hear it urged abroad that woman suffrage is not popular in Wyoming, but I hear nothing of the kind here. All parties now favor it. Those who once opposed it oppose it no longer, while its friends are more and more attached to it, as they see its practical benefits and feel its capacity for good. No one that I hear of wishes it abolished, and no one would dare propose its repeal. The women are beginning to feel their power and influence, and are growing up to a wider and stronger exertion of it. I think I can see a conscious appreciation of this in a higher dignity and a better self-respect among them. They talk and think of graver subjects and of responsibilities which ennoble them. A woman will not consent to be a butterfly when she can of her own choice become an eagle! Let her enjoy the ambitions of life; let her be able to secure its honors, its riches, its high places, and she will not consent to be its toy or its simple ornament.

J. W. Kingman.

Very respectfully,

Miss Eastman said that this letter presented just the evidence on the result and experience of woman suffrage that was wanted. She said that women were very inconsiderate and indifferent to this question. Women, until they are brought to think upon the matter, generally say they do not want to vote. She spoke of the laws of some States which allow the taking away from a mother of her children, by a person who had been appointed as their guardian, in place of her dead husband, and of the laws severe in other respects which States have made in relation to women. She wished all persons had the question put to them conscientiously whether woman had all the power she wanted. We do want, she said, every legitimate power, and we shall never be content with a tithe less than we can command.

Gen. A. C. Voris, of Ohio, read letters from the following persons, regretting their inability to attend the Convention: Bishop Gilbert Haven, D.D., of the Methodist Episcopal Church; from Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, Judge Wm. H. West, of Ohio; Hon. C. W. Willard, of Vermont; Hon. G. W. Julian, of Indiana; Hon. D. H. Chamberlain, of South Carolina; William Lloyd Garrison, George William Curtis, the Smith sisters, Richard Fiske, Jr.

Rev. Mrs. Gillette, of Rochester, Mich., said every woman as well as every man should speak for what she believes to be necessary for her own well-being and for the well-being of the community. Charles Sumner once said that a woman's reason was the reason of the heart. She would give a few womanly reasons why she wanted the voters of Michigan to give the ballot to women. The want of the ballot prevents woman from possessing knowledge and power. If a woman performs the most menial services for the sake of her children, to eke out for them a subsistence, she does not do it because the law demands it, but because there is no other way open to her to obtain a livelihood. She did not ask for the ballot because the laws of the State are barbarous. She did not believe that men can make laws that will answer to the needs of women. Only when men and women together make laws can they be just and equal, and for that reason there should be both men and women in the Legislature.

Mrs. Blackwell read some additional resolutions[196] to those that had been adopted at an earlier stage of the Convention.

At the first evening session Mrs. Lucy Stone presiding, Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, of Boston, was the first speaker. In opening she spoke of the silent weary work, of the results of which the afternoon's reports told, and showed that the equal suffragists' labor is not comprised in facing pleasant audiences and listening to the applause which so many say is the one thing for which the women in this movement work. Her entire speech was in a tone that could not fail to convince all, that she, at least, works for something higher.

Mrs. Stone said that in every time of need, wherever the womanly workers for woman go, they find men to whom their gratitude flows as the rivers flow to the sea—they are the men who stand up to speak in woman's name in behalf of woman's rights. As one of these men she introduced Gen. Voris, of Ohio, the champion of equal suffrage in the Ohio Constitutional Convention. The speech of Gen. Voris was a close, logical argument. It reviewed the entire question of suffrage, and bristled with points. He was so frequently interrupted by applause that he was obliged to ask the audience to withhold their tokens of approbation till he got through, but it was to little purpose, for enthusiastic suffragists couldn't help letting their hands tell their ears how good the General's hard hits at the anti-suffragists made them feel, and the applause would still break out once in a while.