Mrs. Claudia Quigley Murphy (O.) expressed the sentiment of the other side in saying:

It seems better to sow the seed of suffrage throughout the country by means of our national conventions. We may give the people mass meetings and district and State conventions and various other things, but we can never give them anything as good as the national convention. We must get down to the unit of our civilization, which is the individual voter or person. We have worked for twenty-five years here among the legislators at Washington; we have gone to the halls of Congress and to the Legislatures, and we have found the average legislator to be but a reflex of the sentiment of his constituents. If we wish representation at Washington we can send our delegation to the halls of Congress this year and next year, the same as we have done in the past. This great convention does not go to Congress; it sends a committee.... Let us get down to the people and sow the seed among them. It is the people we want to reach if we expect good results.

The amendment was warmly advocated by Mr. and Miss Blackwell, Miss Clay, Mrs. Dietrick, Mrs. Esther F. Boland and others. It was finally adopted by a vote of 37 yeas, 28 nays.

Among the many excellent State reports that of Kansas, prepared by Mrs. Laura M. Johns and read by Miss Jennie, daughter of Representative Case Broderick, was of special interest, as a suffrage campaign was imminent in that State and the National Association had resolved to contribute speakers and money. It spoke of the great canvass of thirty conventions the previous year, with Mrs. Johns as chairman and a large corps of speakers from outside and inside the State; of their cordial reception by the Republican State Convention; of the benefits of Municipal Suffrage; and ended with an earnest appeal for the friends to rally to the support of Kansas.

Brief remarks were made by the wives of Representatives John G. Otis of Kansas and Halbert S. Greenleaf of New York. Letters of greeting were received from Mrs. Annie Besant of England, and many others. Bishop John F. Hurst, of the Methodist Episcopal Church, in regretting that it was impossible to accept the invitation to address the convention, said: "I have the fullest sympathy with your work and have had for many years. I believe that every year brings nearer the great achievement when women will have the right of the ballot if they please to use it."

FOOTNOTES:

[88] Bishop Phillips Brooks, who declared himself unequivocally for woman suffrage, died the week following the convention.

[89] See History of Woman Suffrage, Vol. II, p. 482.

[90] For other instances see Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony, pp. 132, 251.

[91] The Rev. Anna Oliver left $1,000 to the National Suffrage Association.

[92] For the part of Miss Anthony and others in securing this board, see Chap. XIV.

[93] As Mrs. Chapman Catt spoke always without MS., it is impossible to give extracts from her speeches, which were among the ablest made at the national conventions.

[94] Resolved, That without expressing any opinion on the proper qualifications for voting, we call attention to the significant facts that in every State there are more women who can read and write than the whole number of illiterate male voters; more white women who can read and write than all negro voters; more American women who can read and write than all foreign voters; so that the enfranchisement of such women would settle the vexed question of rule by illiteracy, whether of home-grown or foreign-born production.

Resolved, That as all experience proves that the rights of the laboring man are best preserved in governments where he has possession of the ballot, we therefore demand on behalf of the laboring woman the same powerful instrument, that she may herself protect her own interests; and we urge all organized bodies of working women, whether in the field of philanthropy, education, trade, manufacture or general industry, to join our association in the endeavor to make woman legally and politically a free agent, as the best means for furthering any and every line of woman's work.

Resolved, That in all States possessing School Suffrage for women, suffragists are advised to organize in each representative district thereof, for the purpose of training and stimulating women voters to exercise regularly this right, using it as a preparatory school for the coming work of full-grown citizenship with an unlimited ballot. We also advise that women everywhere work for the election of an equal number of women and men upon school boards, that the State in taking upon itself the education of children may provide them with as many official mothers as fathers.

WHEREAS, Many forms of woman suffrage may be granted by State Legislatures without change in existing constitutions; therefore,

Resolved, That the suffragists in every State should petition for Municipal, School and Presidential Suffrage by statute, and take every practicable step toward securing such legislation.

Resolved, That we urge all women to enter protest, at the time of paying taxes, at being compelled to submit to taxation without representation.

[95] Rachel Foster Avery, Susan B. Anthony, Alice Stone Blackwell, Ellen Battelle Dietrick, Elizabeth Boynton Harbert, the Rev. Florence Kollock, Lida A. Meriwether, the Rev. Anna Howard Shaw, May Wright Sewall, Mrs. Leland Stanford, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucy Stone, Jane H. Spofford, Harriet Taylor Upton.

[96] During the years when Mrs. Upton's father, the Hon. Ezra B. Taylor of Ohio, was in Congress, she made it her especial business to press this matter upon the members. At least two favorable reports were due to her efforts, and the association greatly missed her congressional work when she left Washington.

[97] The arguments for Federal Suffrage are contained in Chapter I.



CHAPTER XIV.

THE NATIONAL-AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 1894.

The Call for the Twenty-sixth annual convention contained this paragraph of hope and joy: "The Government's recognition of women on the Board of Managers for the World's Columbian Exposition; the World's Congress of Representative Women—the greatest convocation of women ever assembled; their participation in the entire series of Congresses; the gaining of Full Suffrage in Colorado—all give to our demand for equality for women unprecedented prestige in the world of thought."

The meetings were held in Metzerott's Music Hall, Washington, D. C., Feb. 15-20, 1894. An excellent summary of the week was given by the secretary, Miss Alice Stone Blackwell, in the Woman's Journal, of which she was editor:

Over the platform was draped a large suffrage flag, bearing two full stars for Wyoming and Colorado, and two more merely outlined in gold for Kansas and New York, which have equal suffrage amendments now pending and hope to add their stars to the galaxy next November. Instead of "Old Glory," the equal rights banner might be called "New Glory." Beside it hung the American flag, the great golden flag of Spain with its two red bars, the crimson flag of Turkey with its crescent and star, and the British flag—these last three in honor respectively of Senorita Catalina de Alcala of Spain, Madame Hanna Korany of Syria and Miss Catherine Spence of Australia, who were on the program. At one side the serene face of Lucy Stone looked down upon the audience. On the afternoon of the memorial service the frame of the portrait was draped with smilax, entwining bunches of violets from South Carolina, and beneath stood a jar of great white lilies....

Kansas and New York divided the interest of the convention, and the importance of the two campaigns was ably presented by the respective State presidents, stately Mrs. Greenleaf and graceful Mrs. Johns. The appeals of the former were warmly supported by Mrs. Lillie Devereux Blake, and of the latter by Mrs. Annie L. Diggs. Mrs. Johns is a strong Republican, and Mrs. Diggs an equally ardent Populist, but they were perfectly agreed in their devotion to the woman suffrage amendment and in their desire that help should be given to the Kansas campaign. Both are small women of gentle and feminine aspect, though known as mighty workers; and when Mrs. Diggs, a soft-voiced, bright-eyed morsel of humanity, said in presenting the needs of the Kansas Equal Suffrage Association, "Mrs. Johns is our president, and I am vice-president; she is the gentle officer, I am the savage one; my business is to frighten people"—the audience roared with laughter. The New York women generously declared that they would carry the financial burden of their own campaign and would ask no outside help except in speakers and sympathy. This left the field clear for Kansas and more than $2,200 were raised at one session towards the expenses of the campaign....

The two delegates from Colorado, Mrs. Ellis Meredith and Mrs. Hattie E. Fox, were the objects of much interest and of hearty congratulations. They seemed very happy over their recent enfranchisement, as they well might be. Mrs. Meredith, who is very small, looked up brightly at a tall Maryland lady, who was congratulating her, and said, "I feel as tall as you." These two ladies looked just like other women and had developed no horns or hoofs or other unamiable and unfeminine characteristics in consequence of their having obtained the right to vote.... The Southern women have distinguished themselves in the national suffrage conventions during the last few years. This year, on "presidents' evening," among a number of brilliant addresses that of Mrs. Virginia D. Young of South Carolina fairly brought down the house....

A beautiful silk flag, bearing the two suffrage stars, was presented to Miss Anthony in honor of her seventy-fourth birthday, on the first evening of the convention, a gift from the enfranchised women of Wyoming and Colorado. One of these women had been called upon to act as a judge of elections and had received three dollars for her services. She spent two dollars on shoes for her little boy and sent the third dollar as her contribution toward the suffrage flag.

It was a pleasure to see the gathering of the clans—so many good and able and interesting women assembled together to report their work for equal rights and to plan more for the future. One with a pleasant, honest face and wistful brown eyes, had been lecturing in the interest of the amendment in the country districts of New York, riding from village to village in an open sleigh, with the thermometer many degrees below zero, and speaking sometimes in unwarmed halls. She did not expect to take a day's rest until the 6th of next November, and then if the amendment carried, she said quietly, she should be willing to lie down and die....

It is pleasant also to note the increasing number of bright, sensible, earnest young women coming from all parts of the country to aid the older workers and to close up their thinning ranks. The sight would be a revelation to that Massachusetts legislator who was lately reported as saying that the petitioners who had been asking for suffrage for so many years were fast dying off, and soon there would be none left. He would have seen how greatly he was reckoning without his host—or his hostesses. A sound and righteous reform does not die with any leader, however beloved.

The Rev. Anna Howard Shaw pronounced the invocation at the opening session. In the course of her president's address Miss Susan B. Anthony said:

For the twenty-sixth time we have come together under the shadow of the Capitol, asking that Congress shall take the necessary steps to secure to the women of the nation their right to a voice in the national government as well as that of their respective States. For twelve successive Congresses we have appeared before committees of the two Houses making this plea, that the underlying principle of our Government, the right of consent, shall have practical application to the other half of the people. Such a little simple thing we have been asking for a quarter of a century. For over forty years, longer than the children of Israel wandered through the wilderness, we have been begging and praying and pleading for this act of justice. We shall some day be heeded, and when we shall have our amendment to the Constitution of the United States, everybody will think it was always so, just exactly as many young people believe that all the privileges, all the freedom, all the enjoyments which woman now possesses always were hers. They have no idea of how every single inch of ground that she stands upon to-day has been gained by the hard work of some little handful of women of the past.

This was Miss Anthony's birthday and Mrs. Chapman Catt concluded her little speech in presenting a silk flag by saying: "And now, our beloved leader, the enfranchised women of Wyoming and Colorado, upon this the seventy-fourth anniversary of your life—a life every year of which has been devoted to the advancement of womankind—have sent this emblem and with it the message that they hope you will bear it at the head of our armies until there shall be on this blue field not two stars but forty-four. They have sent it with the especial wish that its silent lesson shall teach such justice to the men of the State of New York that in November they will rise as one man to crown you, as well as their own wives and daughters, with the sovereignty of American citizenship."

For a few moments Miss Anthony was unable to reply and then she said: "I have heard of standard bearers in the army who carried the banner to the topmost ramparts of the enemy, and there I am going to try to carry this one. You know without my telling how proud I am of this flag and how my heart is touched by this manifestation." Large boxes of flowers were sent her from Georgia and South Carolina, a telegram of greeting was received from ex-Governor and Mrs. Routt of Colorado, and there were many other pleasant remembrances.

The convention was welcomed by the Hon. John Ross, commissioner of the District of Columbia. Miss Catherine H. Spence of South Australia said in speaking of the suffrage there: "This country was not only the birthplace of the Australian ballot, by which you now vote in the United States, but it was the birthplace of woman suffrage, because six years before the Municipal Franchise was granted to women in England it was in effect in the towns and cities in South Australia." At a later session Miss Spence gave a practical illustration of what is known as proportional representation. Miss Windeyer also represented the women electors of Australia.

In response to Mrs. Young, bearing the greetings of South Carolina, Miss Anthony said with much feeling:

I think the most beautiful part of our coming together in Washington for the last twenty-five years has been that more friendships, more knowledge of each other, have come through the hand-shakes here than would have been possible through any other instrumentality. I shall never cease to be grateful for all the splendid women who have come up to this great center for these twenty-six conventions, and have learned that the North was not such a cold place as they had believed; I have been equally glad when we came down here and met the women from the sunny South and found they were just like ourselves, if not a little better. In this great association we know no North, no South, no East, no West. This has been our pride for all these years. We have no political party. We never have inquired what anybody's religion is. All we ever have asked is simply, "Do you believe in perfect equality for women?" This is the one article in our creed.

Senator Joseph M. Carey of Wyoming and Representative Lafayette Pence of Colorado referred with great pride to the enfranchisement of the women of their respective States. Mrs. Johns was introduced by Miss Anthony as "the general of the Kansas army;" Mrs. Greenleaf as the Democratic nominee for member of the N. Y. Constitutional Convention; Mrs. Henry as the woman who received 4,500 votes for Clerk of the Supreme Court of Kentucky. Miss Anthony's spicy introductions of the various speakers were always greatly relished by the audiences.

No more impressive or beautiful memorial service ever was held than that in remembrance of Lucy Stone. The principal address was made by Mrs. Julia Ward Howe (Mass.), in the course of which she said:

In all action taken under her supervision, Mrs. Stone was most careful that the main issue should be constantly presented and kept in view. While welcoming every reform which gave evidence of the ethical progress of the community, she yet held to woman suffrage, pure and simple, as the first condition upon which the new womanhood should base itself. Efforts were often made to entangle suffrage with the promise of endless reforms in various directions, but firm as Cato, who always repeated his words that Carthage should be destroyed, Lucy Stone always asked for suffrage because it is right and just that women should have it, and not on the ground of a swiftly-coming millennium which should follow it....

When Lucy Stone first resolved to devote her life to the rehabilitation of her sex, to what a task did she pledge herself! The high road to reform which she held so dear was not even measured before her. The ground was covered with a growth of centuries. Could this small hand that held a sickle hope to cut down those forests of time-honored prejudice and superstition? What had she to work with? A silver voice, a winning smile, the great gift of a persuasive utterance. What had she to work from? A deep and abiding faith in divine justice and in man's ability to follow its laws and to execute its decrees.

The prophetic sense of good to come, vouchsafed to her in the morning of life, did not forsake her at its close. Her mind was of a very practical cast and in her many days of labor her eyes were always fixed upon her work. But when her work was taken from her, she saw at once the heavens open before her and the eternal life and light beckoning to her to go up higher. With a smile she passed from the struggle of earthly existence to the peace of the saints made perfect. Here she was still debarred the right to cast her ballot at the polls, but lo, in the blue urn of heaven her life was received, one glowing and perfect vote for the rights of women, for the good of humanity, for the Kingdom of God on earth.

A few sentences may be given as the key-note of the eulogy of the Hon. Wm. Dudley Foulke (Ind.): "Her career, while different from that of most women, was characterized throughout by entire and consistent womanliness. Among the many admirable qualities that she possessed, it is difficult to single out the one for which she will hereafter be best remembered, but as dauntless moral courage is a rarer quality perhaps than any other, it seems to me that this will remain her brightest jewel."

In the address of Mrs. Josephine K. Henry (Ky.) she referred to the marriage of Lucy Stone and Henry B. Blackwell as follows:

Their matrimonial contract is the grandest chart of the absolute equality of man and woman that has ever been made, and it throws a new halo of consecration and sanctity around the institution of marriage. It has not yet been written in our ecclesiastical and civil codes that every woman shall retain and dignify her own name through life, but civilization is preparing now to issue this edict. The coming woman will not resign her name at the marriage altar, and it will be told in future years of these two great souls who were the first to recognize the dignity of human individuality. The domestic life of this couple who set up the standard of absolute equality of husband and wife was an exquisite idyl, fragrant with love and tenderness, a poem whose rhythm was not marred, a divine melody that rose above the discords and dissensions of domestic life upon the lowlands where man is the ruler and woman the subject.

In the touching tribute of Miss Laura Clay (Ky.) she said: "Lucy Stone is one of those who paid what must be paid for liberty or for any high good of humanity. She made sacrifices and did things that none of us to-day would be called upon to do, did them bravely, did them without shrinking, did them almost without knowing that she was doing anything which would call forth the blessing, the gratitude of the human race."

Mrs. Lillie Devereux Blake (N. Y.) referred more especially to the domestic qualities, saying:

When the gift of a little child came it was more to her than all else beside. For a while the world centered in that tiny cradle, and the hand which rocked that cradle had rather perform this gentle office than rule the world. It will ever be thus. With the true woman, dearer than wealth or fame is the touch of baby hands, sweeter than the applause of multitudes is the ripple of a baby's laughter. As the years passed by, the mother gave more of her life to the public, but always with the thought of the young girl who was growing up beside her and making of her home the dearest and most sacred spot.

This part of the memorial services appropriately closed with the tender reminiscences of forty-five years of married life, by the husband, Mr. Blackwell.

Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton (N. Y.) sent an eloquent tribute to the memory of Lucy Stone, Leland Stanford, George W. Childs, Elizabeth Oakes Smith and Elizabeth Peabody. After reciting the contributions of each in the cause of woman, she closed with these words from The Prince of India in reference to the last great record: "There is thy history and mine, and all of little and great and good and bad that shall befall us in this life. Death does not blot out the records. Everlastingly writ, they shall be everlastingly read; for the shame of some, for the glory of others."

Mrs. Lucretia L. Blankenburg of Philadelphia told of the loyalty to women of Mr. Child's paper, the Public Ledger, and of his many benefactions. Frederick Douglass gave the offering of his eloquence and ended as follows:

It is not alone because of the goodness of any cause that men can safely predicate success. Much depends on the character and quality of the men and women who are its advocates. The Redeemer must ever come from above. Only the best of mankind can afford to support unpopular opinions. The common sort will drift with the tide. No good cause can fail when supported by such women as were Lucretia Mott, Abby Kelly, Angelina Grimke, Lydia Maria Child, Maria W. Chapman, Thankful Southwick, Sally Holly, Ernestine L. Rose, E. Oakes Smith, Elizabeth Peabody and the noble and gifted Lucy Stone. Not only have we a glorious constellation of women on the silent continent to assure us that our cause is good and that it must finally prevail, but we have such men as William Lloyd Garrison, Wendell Phillips, William Henry Channing, Francis Jackson, Gerrit Smith, Samuel J. May, Samuel E. Sewall—now no longer with us in body, but in spirit and memory to cheer us on in the good work of lifting women in the fullest sense to the dignity of American liberty and American citizenship.

Miss Anthony closed the services with heartfelt testimonials to Mrs. Myra Bradwell, one of the first woman lawyers and founder and editor of The Legal News; Miss Mary F. Seymour, founder of The Business Woman's Journal; and Col. John Thompson, a founder of the Patrons of Husbandry, the first national organization of men to indorse woman suffrage.

At one of the evening sessions Miss Anthony presented Dr. John Trimble, secretary of the National Grange, and Leonard Rhone, chairman of its executive committee. The latter said in course of a few brief remarks: "When the farmers of this country organized they took with them their wives and daughters, and for twenty-seven years we have tried woman suffrage in the Grange and it has worked well. What we have demonstrated by experience in our organization we are ready to indorse, and by almost a unanimous vote at our last national convention we passed a resolution in favor of woman suffrage."

Mrs. Orra Langhorne read a clever paper on House Cleaning in Old Virginia, describing present social and political conditions and showing the need of woman's participation. Mrs. Mary Lowe Dickinson (N. Y.), secretary of the King's Daughters, gave a talk which sparkled with anecdotes and illustrations, every one scoring a point for woman suffrage. Madame Hanna Korany, from Syria, told in her soft, broken English how the women of the old world looked to those of America to free them from the slavery of customs and laws.

Mrs. Miriam Howard DuBose took for her subject Some Georgia Curiosities, which she showed to be "men who love women too dearly to accord them justice; women who are deceived by such affection; the self-supporting woman, who crowds all places where there is any money to be made without encountering the masculine frown and declares she has all the rights she wants. Georgia's motto should read: Unwisdom, Injustice, Immoderation."

Miss Harriet A. Shinn (Ills.), president of the National Association of Women Stenographers, gave unanswerable testimony from employers in many different kinds of business expressing a preference for women stenographers. Miss Elizabeth Upham Yates (Me.) illustrated how class distinctions, public schools, religious liberty and social life have been affected by the thought of the times, by fashionable thought. The official report said: "So bristling with humor was this address that there were several times when the speaker had to stop and wait for the laughter to subside. At the conclusion, her effort was acknowledged by long applause."

Miss Shaw closed an evening which had been full of mirth, saying in the course of her vivacious remarks:

I spoke at a woman's club in Philadelphia yesterday and a young lady said to me afterwards: "Well, that sounds very nice, but don't you think it is better to be the power behind the throne?" I answered that I had not had much experience with thrones, but a woman who has been on a throne, and who is now behind it, seems to prefer to be on the throne.[98] Mr. Edward Bok, editor of the Ladies' Home Journal, says that by careful watching for many years, he has come to the conclusion that no woman has had any business relations with men who has not been contaminated by them; and this same individual who does not want us to have business relations with men, lest we be contaminated by the association, wants us to marry these same men and live with them three hundred and sixty-five and one-fourth days a year!

On Sunday Mrs. Chapman Catt gave a sermon in the People's Church, Mrs. Ellen Battelle Dietrick in All Soul's Church (Unitarian), and the Rev. Anna Howard Shaw in Metzerott's Music Hall. At the last named meeting Mrs. Howe offered the prayer and, at the close, recited her Battle Hymn of the Republic. Miss Shaw preached from the text, "Let no man take thy crown."

....Since the beginning of the Christian era those who have expounded the Scriptures have been principally men, and the Gospel has been presented to us from the standpoint of men. In all these interpretations Heaven has been peopled with men, God has been pictured as a man, and even the earth has been represented as masculine.

In the beginning this was wise, because people have always been more impressed by law, order, system and government than by the spirit of faith. But we have passed the stage of force in nature, of force in physical life, and have arrived at the age of spiritual thought and earthly needs when the mother comes to the front. In the Old World I have seen venerable men, strong men, and women kneeling together at the shrine of Mary pouring out their sufferings into the mother heart of the Virgin and rising refreshed and solaced. What Catholicism has done for its church, Protestantism must do for Christianity everywhere, by revealing the mother-life and the mother-spirit of divine nature. In the lesson of life there is not only a father but a mother-love.

Jesus Christ, we are told, was a man and so were His disciples, and this is given as the reason why men only should preach the Gospel, yet the Scriptures tell us that the first divinely-ordained preacher was a woman. All the way down in the history of Christianity are found women side by side with men, always ready and willing to bear the burdens and sorrows of life in order to better their fellows. In this country every reformation has been urged by women as well as men. The names of William Lloyd Garrison and Wendell Phillips will go down to posterity linked with those of Lucretia Mott, Harriet Beecher Stowe and Susan B. Anthony. In the great temperance movement the name of Gough will at once bring to mind Frances E. Willard. There is no name more prominently identified in the effort to uplift the Indian than that of Helen Hunt Jackson. Wherever there has been a wrong committed there have always been women to defend the wronged. Julia Ward Howe gave us the "Battle Hymn of the Republic," while Lucy Stone's last words should be the motto of every young girl's life, "Make the world better."

With respect to my text, "Let no man take thy crown," these words were written to the church, and not to the men alone, and the command should be obeyed by every woman. If the churches then were anything like the churches of to-day, they were composed of three-fourths women. Hence this injunction was intended especially for women. This crown, I take it, means the crown of righteousness, of regeneration, of redemption, of purity, and applies to the whole body of the church. I believe the crown of womanhood in its highest sense means womanly character and nature. We never can wear a higher or nobler crown than pure and womanly womanhood....

The world has always been more particular how we did things than what things we did.... All human beings are under obligations first to themselves. If self-sacrifice seems best, then we should practice that; while if self-assertion seems best, then we should assert ourselves. The abominable doctrine taught in the pulpit, the press, in books and elsewhere, is that the whole duty of women is self-abasement and self-sacrifice. I do not believe subjection is woman's duty any more than it is the duty of a man to be under subjection to another man or to many men. Women have the right of independence, of conscience, of will and of responsibility.

Women are robbed of themselves by the laws of the country and by fashion. The time has not passed when women are bought and sold. Social custom makes the world a market-place in which women are bought and sold, and sometimes they are given away. In the marriage ceremony woman loses her name, and under the old Common Law a married woman had no legal rights. She occupied the same position to her husband as the slave to his master. These things degraded marriage, but the home would be the holiest of spots if the wife asserted her individuality and worked hand-in-hand with her husband, each uplifting the other. Women are robbed of the right of conscience. Their silence and subjection in the church have been the curse not only of womanhood but of manhood. No other human being should decide for us in questions pertaining to our own moral and spiritual welfare. Women are beginning to believe that God will listen to a woman as quickly as to a man. The time has come when councils of women will gather and do their work in their quiet way without regard to men.

No person is human who may not "will" to be anything he can be. When the woman says "I will," there is not anything this side of the throne of God to stop her, and the girls of the present day should learn this lesson. Now there is placed upon women the obligation of service without the responsibility of their actions. The man who leads feels the responsibility of his acts, and this urges him to make them noble. Women should have this same responsibility and be made to feel it. The most dangerous thing in the world is power without responsibility....

Monday night's session was designated "president's evening" and many short, clever talks were given.[99] James L. Hughes, Superintendent of Schools in Toronto and president of the Equal Suffrage Association of that city, told how the women of Canada voted, sat on the public and High School boards and even served as president of the Toronto board.

At the Tuesday evening meeting Miss Anthony introduced Senator W. A. Peffer and Representatives Jerry Simpson, John C. Davis, Case Broderick and Charles Curtis of Kansas, and Henry A. Coffeen of Wyoming. Ex-Senator Blanche K. Bruce of Mississippi was invited to the platform and responded by saying he hoped to see the day when every qualified woman could exercise the suffrage. The Hon. Simon Wolf, commissioner of the District, urged equality of rights for women.

Grace Greenwood was presented as one of the pioneer woman suffragists. Mrs. Mary Seymour Howell (N. Y.), the heroine of many campaigns, in a stirring speech related her varied experiences and said: "Ours is one of the greatest wars of the centuries. Indeed, it is a continuation of the same battle which has been waged almost since the world began but carried on with different tactics. It stands unique. No cannon is heard. No smoke tells of defeat or victory. No bloody battlefields lift their blushing faces to the heavens. It is a battle of ideas, a battle of prejudices, the right and the wrong, the new and the old, meeting in close contact. It is the 'war of the roses,' if you so please to call it. It is the motherhood of the republic asking for full political recognition."

The last address of the convention was made by the Rev. Ida C. Hultin, on the Crowning Race, whose men and women should be equally free. Gov. Davis H. Waite of Colorado sent a letter in relation to the enfranchising of women the previous year, in which he said:

The Populists more than any other political party in Colorado favored equal suffrage, but many Republicans and Democrats also voted for it, and in my opinion the result may be considered as due to the enlightened public sentiment of the common people of the State. The more I consider the matter the more it grows upon me in importance, and the more I realize the fact that all the patriotism, all the intelligence and all the virtue of the commonwealth are necessary to preserve it from the corrupt and mercenary attacks made upon it from all points by corporate trusts and monopolies. Equal suffrage can not fail to encourage purity in both private and public life, and to elevate the official standard of fitness.

A letter from Mrs. May Wright Sewall, regretting her enforced absence, closed by saying:

Many of you know that the last few months I have spent in editing the papers presented at the World's Congress of Representative Women, held in Chicago last May. It is a remarkable and to me quite an unexpected fact that the papers upon the subject of Civil and Political Reform are hardly more earnest appeals for political equality than are the addresses to be found in every other chapter. Hereafter if one asserts that the interest in the woman suffrage movement is not growing, let him be cited to this galaxy of witnesses, whose testimony is all the more valuable because in the large majority of instances it proceeds from women who never have identified themselves with it, and are not at all known as advocates of political equality. The meaning of the entire report is equality, co-operation, organization; that is, the demand made by the National Suffrage Association is the demand borne to us by the echoes of that great congress.

Among the committee reports that of Mrs. Rachel Foster Avery, Chairman of Columbian Exposition Work, attracted especial attention and was in part as follows:

There is a most valuable and interesting bit of unpublished history which seems to me to form an integral part of your committee's report. It concerns the origin of the Board of Lady Managers, and this association should be proud to be able to feel that to our president is largely due the recognition of women in official capacity at the World's Fair. The fact that women were not officially recognized during the Centennial Exposition in 1876 was a great disappointment to all interested in the advancement of womankind, and while it was suggested on every side that women must have a voice in the management of the World's Fair in 1893, it remained for Susan B. Anthony to take the initiatory step which led to the creation of the Board of Lady Managers. She had invitations sent to women of official and social position to meet in the Riggs House parlors to consider this matter, in December, 1889. At this meeting Mrs. Conger, wife of Senator Omar D. Conger of Michigan, was made chairman, and Mrs. Harriet Taylor Upton, secretary. Miss Anthony was not present, fearing lest her well-known radical views might hinder the progress of affairs in the direction she wished them to take, but she restlessly walked about her room in the hotel anxiously awaiting the result.

Several meetings followed this and a committee was appointed to wait upon Congress, asking that the commission should consist of both men and women. Meanwhile the World's Fair Bill had been brought before the House and Miss Anthony soon saw that there would not be time for this committee to act. She therefore prepared petitions, sent them to women in official life and asked them to obtain signatures of official people.[100] On the strength of these petitions there was added to the bill, in March, 1890, an amendment providing for the appointment of women on the Board.

Miss Anthony's self-effacement was perhaps the wisest thing under the circumstances, for the Board, as appointed, being unconnected with woman suffrage, proved an immense source of education to the conservative women of the whole world—an education not needed by the radical women of our own ranks. I think the time has surely come when the truth of this history should be known to all.

The election of officers resulted in Miss Anthony's receiving for president 139 out of 140 possible votes; Miss Shaw for vice-president-at-large, 130; Rachel Foster Avery for corresponding secretary, unanimous; Alice Stone Blackwell for recording secretary, 136; Harriet Taylor Upton for treasurer, unanimous.

During the convention the death of Miss Anna Ella Carroll was announced. A resolution of sympathy with her sister was adopted and a collection was taken up, as had been done for Miss Carroll a number of times during the past twenty-five years, which resulted in over forty dollars.

Mrs. Sallie Clay Bennett (Ky.), the faithful champion of Federal Suffrage, insisted that, instead of asking for an amendment to confer suffrage, we should demand protection in the right already guaranteed by the U. S. Constitution: "Even when asking for Municipal Suffrage, we never should fail to assert that it is already ours under the Constitution, and that there is strength enough in our national government to protect every woman in the Union provided the men had interpreted the laws right." Miss Sara Winthrop Smith (Conn.) supported Mrs. Bennett, saying: "It is useless labor to petition for a Sixteenth Amendment—we do not need it. Our fundamental institutions most adequately protect the rights of all citizens of the United States, irrespective of sex. In the twenty-four years since the passage of the Fifteenth Amendment, 300 amendments to the Constitution have been introduced into Congress which never met with any approval from either House. I think it is wasted time for us to continue in this work, and therefore I feel that it concerns our dignity as a part of the people of this great United States that we declare and ask only for that which recognizes the dignity of such citizens." Mrs. Diggs, Mrs. Dietrick, Mrs. Colby and others supported this view.

In expressing his dissent Mr. Blackwell said: "I do not believe in Federal Suffrage. I agree with the State's Rights party in their views." Miss Blackwell and others took the same position, and Miss Anthony closed the debate by saying: "There is no doubt that the spirit of the Constitution guarantees full equality of rights and the protection of citizens of the United States in the exercise of these rights, but the powers that be have decided against us, and until we can get a broader Supreme Court—which will not be until after the women of every State in the Union are enfranchised—we never will get the needed liberal interpretation of that document." The majority concurred in this view.

The most spirited discussion of the convention was in regard to the place of holding the next annual meeting. Urgent invitations were received from Detroit and Cincinnati, but the persuasive Southern advocates, Claudia Howard Maxwell, Miriam Howard DuBose and H. Augusta Howard, three Georgia delegates, carried off the prize for Atlanta.

This was the first and last appearance on the suffrage platform of Miss Kate Field, who was introduced by Miss Anthony with her characteristic abruptness: "Now, friends, here is Kate Field, who has been talking all these years against woman suffrage. She wants to tell you of the faith that is in her." Miss Field responded quickly:

I take exception to what Miss Anthony has said, because I think she has misconstrued my position entirely. I never have been against woman suffrage. I have been against universal suffrage of any kind, regardless of sex. I think that morally woman has exactly as much right to the suffrage as man. It is a disgrace that such women as you and I have not the suffrage, but I do think that all suffrage should be regarded as a privilege and should not be demanded as a right. It should be the privilege of education and, if you please—I will not quarrel about that—of a certain property qualification. I have not changed my opinion, but I did say that I was tired of waiting for men to have common sense, that there evidently never would be any restriction in suffrage and that I should come in for the whole thing, woman included. Now, that is my position.... I withdraw my former attitude and take my stand on this platform.

The usual able "hearings" were held. Before the Senate committee—Senators Hoar, Teller, Wolcott, Blackburn and Hill—the speakers were the Rev. Ida C. Hultin, Miss Blackwell, Mrs. Lucretia Mitchell, Mrs. Diggs, Mrs. Phoebe C. Wright, Miss Alice Smith, Mrs. Bennett, Mrs. Colby, Representative John C. Davis of Kansas. Although the majority of the committee were in favor of woman suffrage no report was made.

The Hon. Isaac H. Goodnight (Ky.) was in the chair of the House Judiciary Committee, which was addressed by the Reverends Miss Shaw and Miss Hultin, Mrs. Young, Mrs. Emily G. Ketcham, Miss Lavina A. Hatch, Prof. Jennie Gifford, Mrs. Alice Waugh, Mrs. Pickler, Miss Howard, Mrs. Meredith, Mrs. Greenleaf, Mr. Blackwell. Miss Anthony presented the speakers and closed the discussion. Later Mr. Goodnight submitted an adverse report for a majority of the committee.

FOOTNOTES:

[98] The Hawaiian ex-queen, then in the United States endeavoring to have her throne restored to her.

[99] Among the speakers were Mrs. Mary L. Bennett, Mrs. Lucretia L. Blankenburg, Miss Laura Clay, Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby, Mrs. Etta Grymes Farrah, Mrs. Jean Brooks Greenleaf, Mrs. Florence Howe Hall, Mrs. Rebecca Henry Hayes, Mrs. Laura M. Johns, Mrs. Emily B. Ketcham, Mrs. Claudia Howard Maxwell, Mrs. Ellis Meredith, Mrs. Mary Bentley Thomas, Mrs. Emmeline B. Wells, Mrs. Virginia D. Young.

[100] Miss Anthony herself also went among prominent persons of her own acquaintance obtaining signatures. In a few days 111 names were secured of the wives and daughters of Judges of the Supreme Court, the Cabinet, Senators, Representatives, Army and Navy officers—as influential a list as the national capital could offer. These names may be found in the published minutes of this convention of 1894, p. 135.

At the time Miss Anthony secured this petition no organization of women had considered the question and, if she had not been on the ground and taken immediate action, there is every reason to believe that the bill would have passed Congress without any provision for a board of women. For a further account of this matter, and for a description of this great Congress of Women, see Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony, Chap. XLI; also chapter on Illinois in this volume of the History.



CHAPTER XV.

THE NATIONAL-AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 1895.

The Twenty-seventh annual convention—Jan. 31-Feb. 5, 1895—possessed an unusual interest because of its being held outside of Washington. The American society had been accustomed to migratory conventions, but the National had gone to the capital for twenty-six winters. The Woman's Journal, whose editors were strongly in favor of the former plan, said of the Atlanta meeting:

There had been some fears that holding the convention so far south might result in a smaller attendance of delegates than usual; but there were ninety-three delegates, representing twenty-eight States, and also a large number of visitors. Some, like Mrs. Abigail Scott Duniway of Oregon, had come nearly 4,000 miles to be present. De Give's Opera House was crowded. Even at the morning meetings the seats were full and men stood for hours, several rows deep all around the sides and back of the house—a novel and gratifying sight at a business meeting. The proportion of men among the delegates and in the audiences, both day and evening, was larger than usual....

Over the platform hung two large flags, that of the association, with the two stars of Wyoming and Colorado, and another flag, the work of Georgia ladies, on which was ingeniously depicted the relative standing of the different States on this question. The States where women have no form of suffrage were represented by black stars. Those where they can vote for school committee or on certain local questions had a golden rim. Kansas and Iowa had a wider golden rim, to indicate municipal and bond suffrage. Wyoming and Colorado shone with full and undimmed luster. Portraits of Lucy Stone and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, draped in yellow, adorned opposite sides of the platform.

Many of the delegates were from the Southern States, and some of them strikingly illustrated Miss Anthony's assertion, "These Southern women are born orators." In sweetness of voice, grace of manner and personal charm they have all the qualities to make most effective speakers, while in the fervor of their equal rights sentiments they go even beyond their sisters from the North and West. One handsome young lady, who sat on the platform a good deal of the time, was supposed to be from New England, because she wore her hair short. It turned out, however, that she was from New Orleans and was a cousin of Jefferson Davis. The announcement of this fact caused her to be received by the audience with roars of enthusiasm.

The Atlanta papers devoted columns every day to friendly reports and innumerable portraits. Ministers of different denominations opened the convention with prayer and their pulpits afterwards for addresses by the ladies. Some of the best people of the city took visitors into their homes, entertaining them hospitably and delightfully, and showing them what a Southern home is like. The national officers and speakers were entertained by the Georgia W. S. A. at the Aragon, and the State officers generously insisted upon taking almost the entire expenses of the great convention upon their own young shoulders. These "Georgia girls" devoted unlimited time, thought and work to getting up the convention, and then effaced themselves as far as possible....[101]

Perhaps no one person did more, unintentionally, to promote the enthusiasm of the convention than the Rev. Dr. Hawthorne, a Baptist preacher. He had felt called upon to denounce all woman suffragists from his pulpit, not only with severity but with discourtesy, and had been so misguided as to declare that the husbands of suffragists were all feeble-minded men. As the average equal-rights woman is firmly convinced that her husband is the very best man in the world, this remark stirred the women up to a degree of wrath which no amount of abuse leveled against themselves would have aroused. On the other hand, the Atlanta people, even those who were not in favor of suffrage, felt mortified by this unprovoked insult to their guests, and many of them took occasion in private to express their regret. Several speakers at the convention criticised Dr. Hawthorne's utterances, and every such allusion was received with warm applause by the audience....

At the beginning of the convention four announcements were made which added much to the general good cheer—that South Australia had followed the example of New Zealand in extending Full Suffrage to women; that the Supreme Court of Ohio had pronounced the School Suffrage Law constitutional; that the Governor of Illinois had filled a vacancy on the Board of Trustees of the State University by appointing a woman; that the Idaho Legislature had submitted a woman suffrage amendment.

The most perfect arrangements had been made for the meetings, and the novelty of the occasion attracted large crowds, but there was also much genuine interest. The success was partly due to the excellent work of the press of Atlanta. There was, however, no editorial endorsement except by The Sunny South, Col. Henry Clay Fairman, editor.

The national president, Miss Susan B. Anthony, said in opening the convention: "With this gavel was called to order in 1869 that Legislature of Wyoming which established the first true republic under the Stars and Stripes and gave the franchise to what men call the better-half of the people. We women do not say that, but we do claim to be half."

Miss Anthony seldom made a stated address either in opening or closing, but throughout the entire convention kept up a running fire of quaint, piquant, original and characteristic observations which delighted the audience and gave a distinctive attraction to the meetings. It was impossible to keep a record of these and they would lose their zest and appropriateness if separated from the circumstances which called them forth. They can not be transmitted to future generations, but the thousands who heard them during the fifty years of her itineracy will preserve them among their delightful memories. Perfectly at home on the platform, she would indulge in the same informality of remarks which others use in private conversation, but always with a quick wit, a fine satire and a keen discrimination. Words of praise or criticism were given with equal impartiality, and accepted with a grace which would have been impossible had the giver been any other than the recognized Mentor of them all. Her wonderful power of reminiscence never failed, and she had always some personal recollection of every speaker or of her parents or other relatives. She kept the audience in continuous good-humor and furnished a variety to the program of which the newspaper reporters joyfully availed themselves. At the morning business meetings which were always informal there would often be a running dialogue something like the following, when Mrs. Alberta C. Taylor was called to the platform:

MISS ANTHONY: This is an Alabama girl, transplanted to the Rockies—a daughter of Governor Chapman of Alabama. She is as good a Southerner as any one, and also as good a Northerner and Westerner.

MRS. TAYLOR: A Southern paper lately said no Southern woman could read the report of the late election in Colorado without blushing. I went through the election itself without blushing, except with gratification.

MISS ANTHONY: Instead of degrading a woman it makes her feel nobler not to be counted with idiots, lunatics and criminals. It even changes the expression of her face.

VOICE IN THE AUDIENCE: How many women are there in the Colorado Legislature?

MRS. TAYLOR: Three.

MISS ANTHONY: It has always been thought perfectly womanly to be a scrub-woman in the Legislature and to take care of the spittoons; that is entirely within the charmed circle of woman's sphere; but for women to occupy any of those official seats would be degrading.

MISS LUCY E. ANTHONY: What salaries do the women legislators receive?

MRS. TAYLOR: The same as the men, $4 a day. The pay of our legislators is small. A prosperous business man has to make a great sacrifice to go to the Legislature, and we can not always get the best men to serve. This is an additional reason for making women eligible. There are more first-class women than first-class men who have the leisure.

MISS SHAW: We are accused of wishing to belittle men, but in Colorado they think a man's time is worth only as much as a woman's.

MRS. CLARA B. COLBY: The Hon. Mrs. Holley has just introduced in the Colorado House, and carried through it against strong opposition, a bill raising the age of protection for girls to eighteen years.

MRS. DUNIWAY: I was in the Colorado House and saw it done. The women members are highly respected. I have never seen women so honored since those of Washington were disfranchised. The leading men are as proud of the enfranchisement of their women as Georgia men will be when the time comes. The Colorado women have organized a Good Government League to promote education, sanitation and general prosperity.

MRS. TAYLOR: A bookseller in Denver told me that since women were given the suffrage he had sold more books on political economy than he had sold since Colorado was admitted into the Union.

MISS ANTHONY: The bill raising the age of protection for girls shows that suffrage does not make a woman forget her children, and the bookseller's remark shows that she will study the science of government.

MRS. MARY BENTLEY THOMAS: One of our most conservative Maryland women, who married in Colorado ten years ago, writes to me: "I enjoyed every moment of the campaign, especially the primary meetings." A Virginia woman who also married a Colorado man writes back: "Come West, where women are appreciated, and where they are proud and happy citizens." She adds: "If you will come I will show you the sweetest girl baby you ever saw."

MRS. HENRY: Let it be recorded that the first bill introduced by a woman member in any State Legislature was a bill for the protection of girls.

On motion of Mrs. Colby, it was voted to send a telegram of congratulation to the Hon. Mrs. Holley.

Again:

Before introducing the president of the Florida W. S. A. Miss Anthony said: "For several years a big box of oranges has come to me from Florida. Not long ago, I got home on one of the coldest nights of the year, and found a box standing in my woodshed, full of magnificent oranges. Next morning the papers reported that all the oranges in Florida were frozen; but the president of the suffrage association saved that boxful for me."

MRS. ELLA C. CHAMBERLAIN: Those were all we saved.... A man in Florida who hires himself and his wife out to hoe corn, charges $1.25 for his own services and 75 cents for hers, although she does just as much work as he, so the men who employ them tell me. It costs his wife 50 cents a day to be a woman.

VOICE IN THE AUDIENCE: And the 75 cents paid for her work belongs to her husband.

MISS ANTHONY: I suppose those are colored men.

MRS. CHAMBERLAIN: No, they are white.

MISS ANTHONY: White men have always controlled their wives' wages. Colored men were not able to do so until they themselves became free. Then they owned both their wives and their wages.

The delegate from the District of Columbia answered in a very faint tone of voice, and Miss Anthony remarked that "this was through mortification because even the men there had no more rights than women." When another delegate could not be heard she said: "Women have always been taught that it is immodest to speak in a loud voice, and it is hard for them to get out of the old rut." At another time:

MISS LAVINA A. HATCH: In Massachusetts there are between 103,000 and 105,000 families which have no male head. Some of these pay large taxes and none of them has any representation.

MRS. MARIANA W. CHAPMAN: In about two-thirds of the State of New York, and not including New York City, women are assessed on $348,177,107.

MRS. LOUISA SOUTHWORTH: This year, with the new income tax, I shall pay in taxes, national, State and municipal, $5,300.

MISS ANTHONY: Yet why should she have a right to vote? Inconsistency is the jewel of the American people.

MRS. MERIWETHER: Tennessee caps the climax in taxation without representation. In Shelby County there are two young women, sisters, who own farms. Both are married, and both were sensible enough to have their farms secured to themselves and their children. In one case, at least, it proved a wise precaution. One of these young women asked the other, when she went to town, to pay a few bills for her and settle her taxes. Accordingly she went to the tax office, and as she handed in the papers she noticed written at the foot of her sister's tax bill, "Poll tax, $1.00." She exclaimed, "Oh, when did Mrs. A. become a voter? I am so glad Tennessee has granted suffrage to women!" "Oh, she hasn't; it doesn't," said the young clerk with a smile. "That is her husband's poll tax." "And why is she required to pay her husband's poll tax?" "It is the custom," he said. She replied, "Then Tennessee will change its custom this time. I will see the tax collector dead and very cold before I will pay Mr. A.'s poll tax out of my sister's property in order that he may vote, while she is not allowed to do so!"

MISS ANTHONY: It seems to me that these Southern women are in a state of chronic rebellion.

MRS. MERIWETHER: We are.

In closing this meeting Miss Anthony said: "Now, don't all of you come to me to tell me how glad you are that I have worked for fifty years, but say rather that you are going to begin work yourselves."

The delegates were eloquently welcomed in behalf of the South by Bennett J. Conyers of Atlanta, who declared that "suffrage for women is demanded by the divine law of human development." He said in part:

The work of Miss Anthony needs no apology. She has blazed a way for advanced thought in her lonely course over the red-hot plowshares of resistance. Now almost at the summit she looks back to see following her an army with banners. May she long worship where she stands at Truth's mountain altar, as, with the royal sunset flush upon her brow, she catches the beckoning of the lights twinkling on the heavenly shore.... The South is a maiden well worthy of the allegiance of this cause, and when her aid is given it will be as devoted as it has been reserved. The South is the land where has lingered latest on earth the chivalry which idealized its objects of worship. What though it may have meant repression? Is it any wonder that the tender grace of a day that is dead even now lingers and makes men loath to welcome change? Perhaps it can not be told how much it has cost men to surrender the ideal, even though it be to change it for the perfected womanhood....

The address of welcome for the State was made by Mrs. Mary L. McLendon, who spoke earnestly in favor of equal suffrage, saying:

If Georgia women could vote, this National Convention could hold its session in our million dollar capitol, which rears its grand proportions on yonder hill. Crowning its loftiest pinnacle is the statue of a woman representing Liberty, and on its front the motto, "Justice, Wisdom and Moderation." It was built with money paid into our State's treasury by women as well as men, both white and black; but men alone, white and black, have the privilege of meeting in legislative session to make laws to govern women. Men are also allowed to hold their Democratic, Republican, Prohibition and Populist Conventions in its halls. It is with difficulty that women can secure a hearing before a legislative committee to petition for laws to ameliorate their own condition, or to secure compulsory training in the public schools, that their children may be brought up in the way they should go, and become sober, virtuous citizens.

Major Charles W. Hubner extended the welcome of the city, saying in conclusion: "Reason and right are with you, and these, in the name of God, will at last prevail." Afterwards he contributed the poem, "Thank God that Thought is Free." Miss Anthony was presented by Miss H. Augusta Howard and, after a speech complimentary to Southern women, introduced Mrs. Lillie Devereux Blake (N. Y.), who eulogized Southern Chivalry, and Mrs. Lida A. Meriwether (Tenn.), who spoke in behalf of Motherhood. Miss Elizabeth Upham Yates (Me.) made the closing address, in which she said: "As surely as I want to vote—and nothing is more certain—the man for whom I have most wished to vote was your own beloved Henry W. Grady. There is something else for women to do than to sit at home and fan themselves, 'cherishing their femininity.' Womanliness will never be sacrificed in following the path of duty and service."

One of the principal addresses of the convention was that of Gen. Robert R. Hemphill of South Carolina, who began by saying that in 1892 he introduced a woman suffrage resolution in his State Senate, which received fourteen out of thirty-five votes. He closed as follows: "The cause is making headway, though slowly it is true, for it has the prejudices of hundreds of years to contend against. The peaceful revolution is upon us. It will not turn backward but will go on conquering until its final triumph. Woman will be exalted, she will enjoy equal rights; pure politics and good government will be insured, the cause of morality advanced, and the happiness of the people established."

Miss Alice Stone Blackwell (Mass.) discussed The Strongholds of Opposition, showing what they are and how they must be attacked. Woman as a Subject was presented by Mrs. Caroline E. Merrick (La.), who said in part:

Women are, and ever will be, loyal, tender, true and devoted to their well beloved men; for they naturally love them better than they do themselves. It is the brave soldier submissive to authority who deserves promotion to rank and honor; so woman, having proved herself a good subject, is now ready for her promotion and advancement. She is urgently asking, not to rule over men, but to take command of herself and all her rightful belongings....

As a self-respecting, reasonable being, she has grave responsibilities, and from her is required an accountability strict and severe. If she owns stock in one of your banks, she has an influence in the management of the institution which takes care of her money. The possession of children makes her a large stockholder in public morality, but her self-constituted agents act as her proxy without her authorization, as though she were of unsound mind, or not in existence.

The great truths of liberty and equality are dear to her heart. She would die before she would imperil the well-being of her home. She has no design to subvert church government, nor is she organized to tear up the social fabric of polite society. But she has now come squarely up to a crisis, a new epoch in her history here in the South, and asks for a womanly right to participate by vote in this representative government.

Gentlemen, you value the power and privilege which the right of suffrage has conferred upon you, and in your honest, manly souls you can not but disdain the meanness and injustice which might prompt you to deny it to women. Language utterly fails me when I try to describe the painful humiliation and mortification which attend this abject condition of total disfranchisement, and how anxiously and earnestly women desire to be taken out of the list of idiots, criminals and imbeciles, where they do not belong, and placed in the respectable company of men who choose their lawmakers, and give an intelligent consent to the legal power which controls them.

Do women deserve nothing? Are they not worthy? They have a noble cause, and they beg you to treat it magnanimously.

Mrs. Elizabeth Lyle Saxon (La.) described in an interesting manner Club Life among the Women of the South. Mrs. Blake gave a powerful address on Wife, Mother and Citizen. Miss Shaw closed the meeting with an impromptu speech in which, according to the reporter, she said: "It is declared that women are too emotional to vote; but the morning paper described a pugilistic encounter between two members of Congress which looked as if excitability were not limited to women. It is said that 'the legal male mind' is the only mind fit for suffrage." Miss Shaw then made her wit play around the legal male mind like chain lightning. "It is said that women are illogical, and jump to their conclusions, flea-like. I shall not try to prove that women are logical, for I know they are not, but it is beyond me how men ever got it into their heads that they are. When we read the arguments against woman suffrage, we see that flea-like jumping is by no means confined to women."

On one evening the Hon. Henry C. Hammond of Georgia made the opening address, which was thus reported:

After declaring that the atmosphere of the nineteenth century is surcharged with the sentiment of woman's emancipation, he traced the gradual evolution of this sentiment, showing that one by one the shackles had been stricken from the limbs of woman until now she was making her final protest against tyranny and her last appeal for liberty. "What is meant," said he, "by this mysterious dictum, 'Out of her sphere?' It is merely a sentimental phrase without either sense or reason." He then proceeded to say that if woman had a sphere the privilege of voting was clearly within its limitations. There was no doubt in his mind as to woman's moral superiority, and the politics of the country was in need of her purifying touch. In its present distracted and unhappy condition, the adoption of the woman suffrage platform and the incorporation of equal rights into the supreme law of the land was the only hope of its ultimate salvation....

J. Colton Lynes of Georgia, taking for his subject Women to the Front, gave a valuable historical review of their progress during the last half century. Mrs. Josephine K. Henry was introduced as "the daughter of Kentucky," and the Constitution said the next day: "If the spirit of old Patrick Henry could have heard the eloquent plea of his namesake, he would have had no reason to blush for a decadence of the oratory which gave the name to the world." In considering Woman Suffrage in the South, Mrs. Henry said:

It is asserted on all sides that the women of the South do not want the ballot. The real truth is the women of the South never have been asked what they want. When Pundita Ramabai was in this country she saw a hen carried to market with its head downward. This Christian method of treating a poor, dumb creature caused the heathen woman to cry out, "Oh, how cruel to carry a hen with its head down!" and she quickly received the reply, "Why, the hen does not mind it"; and in her heathen innocence she inquired, "Did you ask the hen?" Past civilization has not troubled either dumb creatures or women by consulting them in regard to their own affairs. For woman everything in sociology, law or politics has been arranged without consulting her in any way, and when her rights are trampled on and money extorted from her by the votes of the vicious and ignorant, the glib tongue of tyranny says, "Tax her again, she has no wish or right to tell what she wants." ...

Where the laws rob her in marriage of her property, she does want possession and control of her inheritance and earnings. Where she is a mother, she wants co-guardianship of her own children. Where she is a breadwinner she wants equal pay for equal work. She wants to wipe out the law that in its savagery protects brutality when it preys upon innocent, defenseless girlhood. She wants the streets and highways of the land made safe for the child whose life cost her a hand to hand conflict with death. She wants a single standard of morals established, where a woman may have an equal chance with a man in this hard, old world, and it may not be possible to crowd a fallen woman out of society and close against her every avenue whereby she can make an honest living, while the fallen man runs for Congress and is heaped with honors. More than all, she needs and wants the ballot, the only weapon for the protection of individual rights recognized in this government.

In short, this New Woman of the New South wants to be a citizen queen as well as a queen of hearts and a queen of home, whose throne under the present regime rests on the sandy foundation of human generosity and human caprice. It should be remembered that the women of the South are the daughters of their fathers, and have as invincible a spirit in their convictions in the cause of liberty and justice as had those fathers.

We come asking the men of our section for the right of suffrage, not that it be bestowed on us as a gift on a suppliant, but that our birthright, bequeathed to us by the immortal Jefferson, be restored to us....

The most pathetic picture in all history is this great conflict which women are waging for their liberty. Men armed with all the death-dealing weapons devised by human ingenuity, and with the wealth of nations at their backs, have waged wars of extermination to gain freedom; but women with no weapon save argument, and no wealth save the justice of their cause, are carrying on a war of education for their liberty, and no earthly power can keep them from winning the victory.

The Next Phase of the Woman Question was considered by Miss Mary C. Francis (O.) from the standpoint of a practical newspaper woman. Mrs. Chapman Catt, chairman of the national organization committee, made the last address, taking for a subject Eternal Justice. The Constitution said: "As a rapid, logical and fluent speaker it is doubtful if America ever has produced one more gifted, and the suffrage movement is fortunate in having so brilliant a woman for its champion."

Henry B. Blackwell urged the South to adopt woman suffrage as one solution of the negro problem:

Apply it to your own State of Georgia, where there are 149,895 white women who can read and write, and 143,471 negro voters, of whom 116,516 are illiterates.

The time has come when this question should be considered. An educational qualification for suffrage may or may not be wise, but it is not necessarily unjust. If each voter governed only himself, his intelligence would concern himself alone, but his vote helps to govern everybody else. Society in conceding his right has itself a right to require from him a suitable preparation. Ability to read and write is absolutely necessary as a means of obtaining accurate political information. Without it the voter is almost sure to become the tool of political demagogues. With free schools provided by the States, every citizen can qualify himself without money and without price. Under such circumstances there is no infringement of rights in requiring an educational qualification as a pre-requisite of voting. Indeed, without this, suffrage is often little more than a name. "Suffrage is the authoritative exercise of rational choice in regard to principles, measures and men." The comparison of an unintelligent voter to a "trained monkey," who goes through the motion of dropping a paper ballot into a box, has in it an element of truth. Society, therefore, has a right to prescribe, in the admission of any new class of voters, such a qualification as every one can attain and as will enable the voter to cast an intelligent and responsible vote.

In the development of our complex political society we have to-day two great bodies of illiterate citizens: In the North, people of foreign birth; in the South, people of the African race and a considerable portion of the native white population. Against foreigners and negroes, as such, we would not discriminate. But in every State, save one, there are more educated women than all the illiterate voters, white and black, native and foreign.

The convention proper closed on Saturday night, but the exercises Sunday afternoon may be said to have been a continuation of it. The official report said:

The services began at 3 o'clock and more than half an hour before this time the theatre was filled almost to its fullest capacity. When the opening hour arrived there was not an empty chair in the house, every aisle was crowded, and people anxious to hear the sermon of the Rev. Anna Howard Shaw had invaded the stage. So dense became the crowd that the doors were ordered closed and people were refused admission even before the services began. After the doors were closed the disappointed ones stood on the stairs and many of them remained in the streets. The vast congregation was made up of all classes of citizens. Every chair that could be found in the theatre had been either placed in the aisles or on the stage, and then boxes and benches were pressed into service. Many of the most prominent professional and business men were standing on the stage and in different parts of the house.

Miss Shaw gave her great sermon The Heavenly Vision. She told of the visions of the man which it depended upon himself to make reality; of the visions of the woman which were forever placed beyond her reach by the church, by society and by the laws, and closed with these words: "We ask for nothing which God can not give us. God created nature, and if our demands are contrary to nature, trust nature to take care of itself without the aid of man. It is better to be true to what you believe, though that be wrong, than to be false to what you believe, even if that belief is correct."

Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby (D. C.) preached to more than a thousand people at the Bethel (colored) Church; Mrs. Meriwether at the Unitarian Church; Miss Yates and Miss Emily Howland (N. Y.) also occupied pulpits.

The evening programs with their formal addresses naturally attracted the largest audiences and occupied the most space in the newspapers, but the morning and afternoon sessions, devoted to State and committee reports and the business of the association, were really the life and soul of this as of all the conventions. Among the most interesting of the excellent State reports presented to the Atlanta meeting were those of New York and Kansas, because during the previous year suffrage campaigns had been carried on in those States. The former, presented by Mrs. Jean Brooks Greenleaf, State president, said in part:

The New York Constitutional Convention before whom we hopefully carried our cause—"so old, so new, so ever true"—is a thing of the past. We presented our petition, asking that the word "male" be eliminated from the organic law, with the endorsement of over half a million citizens of the State. We laid before the convention statistics showing that outside the city of New York the property on which women pay taxes is assessed at $348,177,107; the number of women taxed, 146,806 in 571 cities and towns; not reported, 389.

We had the satisfaction of knowing that the delegates assembled were kept upon a strong equal suffrage diet for days and nights together. At the public hearings, graciously granted us, we saw the great jury listen not only with patience but with evident pleasure and enthusiasm, while women representing twenty-six districts gave reasons for wanting to be enfranchised; and we also saw the creative body itself turned into a woman suffrage meeting for three evenings. At the close of the last we learned that there were in this convention ninety-eight men who dared to say that the freemen of the State should not be allowed to decide whether their wives, mothers and daughters should be enfranchised or not. We learned also, that there were fifty-eight men, constituting a noble minority, who loved justice better than party power, and were willing to risk the latter to sustain the former.[102]

The report of the Press Committee Chairman, Mrs. Ellen Battelle Dietrick (Mass.), called especial attention to the flood of matter relating to the woman question which was now appearing in the newspapers and magazines of the country, to the activity of the enemy and to the necessity for suffragists to "publish an antidote wherever the poison appears." The Legislative Committee, Mrs. Blake, Mrs. Henry and Mrs. Diggs, closed their report as follows:

In a State where there is hope of support from the political parties, where there has been long agitation and everything points to a favorable result, it is wise to urge a constitutional amendment striking out the word "male" as a qualification for voters. This must pass both Houses in the form of concurrent resolution; in some States it must pass two successive Legislatures; and it must be ratified at the polls by a majority of the voters.

When the conditions are not yet ripe for a constitutional amendment, there are many measures which are valuable in arousing public interest and preparing the way for final triumph, as well as important in ameliorating the condition of women. Among these are laws to secure school suffrage for women; women on boards of education and as school trustees; equality of property rights for husbands and wives; equal guardianship of children for mother and father; women factory inspectors; women physicians in hospitals and insane asylums; women trustees in all State institutions; police matrons; seats for saleswomen; the raising of "the age of consent."

The report of the Plan of Work Committee, Mrs. Chapman Catt, chairman, began by saying:

The great need of the hour is organization. There can be no doubt that the advocates of woman suffrage in the United States are to be numbered by millions, but it is a lamentable fact that our organization can count its numbers only by thousands. There are illustrious men and women in every State, and there are men and women innumerable, who are not known to the public, who are openly and avowedly woman suffragists, yet we do not possess the benefit of their names on our membership lists or the financial help of their dues. In other words, the size of our membership is not at all commensurate with the sentiment for woman suffrage. The reason for this condition is plain; the chief work of suffragists for the past forty years has been education and agitation, and not organization. The time has come when the educational work has borne its fruit, and there are States in which there is sentiment enough to carry a woman suffrage amendment, but it is individual and not organized sentiment, and is, therefore, ineffective.

The audience was greatly amused when Miss Anthony commented on this: "There never yet was a young woman who did not feel that if she had had the management of the work from the beginning the cause would have been carried long ago. I felt just so when I was young." There was much laughter also over one of Mrs. Abigail Scott Duniway's short speeches in which she said:

There are in Oregon three classes of women opposed to suffrage. 1. Women who are so overworked that they have no time to think of it. They are joined to their wash-tubs; let them alone. But the children of these overworked women are coming on. 2. Women who have usurped all the rights in the matrimonial category, their husbands' as well as their own. The husbands of such women are always loudly opposed to suffrage. The "sassiest" man in any community is the hen-pecked husband away from home. 3. Young girls matrimonially inclined, who fear the avowal of a belief in suffrage would injure their chances. I can assure such girls that a woman who wishes to vote gets more offers than one who does not. Their motto should be "Liberty first, and union afterwards." The man whose wife is a clinging vine is apt to be like the oaks in the forest that are found wrapped in vines—dead at the top.

When Miss Anthony said, "One reason why politicians hesitate to grant suffrage to woman is because she is an unknown quantity," Mrs. Henry responded quickly, "There are two great unknown forces to-day, electricity and woman, but men can reckon much better on electricity than they can on woman." A resolution was adopted for a public celebration in New York City of Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton's eightieth birthday, November 12, by the association.[103]

The treasurer, Mrs. Harriet Taylor Upton, reported the receipts of the past year to be $5,820, of which $2,571 went to the Kansas campaign. The contributions and pledges of this convention for the coming year were about $2,000. In addition, Mrs. Louisa Southworth of Cleveland gave $1,000 to Miss Anthony to use as she thought best, and she announced that it would be applied to opening national headquarters. A National Organization Committee was for the first time formally organized and Mrs. Chapman Catt was made its chairman by unanimous vote.

Mrs. Colby presented the memorial resolutions, saying in part:

During the past year our association has lost by death a number of members whose devotion to the cause of woman's liberty has contributed largely to the position she holds to-day, and whose labors are a part of the history of this great struggle for the amelioration of her condition. Among these beloved friends and co-workers three stood, each as the foremost representative in a distinct line of action: Myra Bradwell of Chicago, Virginia L. Minor of St. Louis, Amelia Bloomer of Council Bluffs, Ia.

Mrs. Bradwell was the first to make a test case with regard to the civil rights of women, and to prove that the disfranchised citizen is unprotected. [Her struggle to secure from the U.S. Supreme Court a decision enabling women to practice law was related.] The special importance of Mrs. Minor's connection with the suffrage work lies in the fact that she first formulated and enunciated the idea that women have the right to vote under the United States Constitution. [The story was then told of Mrs. Minor's case in the U.S. Supreme Court to test the right of women to vote under the Fourteenth Amendment.][104] Mrs. Amelia Bloomer was the first woman to own and edit a paper devoted to woman suffrage and temperance, the Lily, published in Seneca Falls, N. Y. She was also an eloquent lecturer for both these reforms and one of the first women to hold an office under the Government, as deputy postmaster. The costume which bears her name she did not originate, but wore and advocated for a number of years.

Of the noble band that started in 1848, few now remain, but a host of young women are already on the stage of action, even better equipped than were our pioneers to plead their own cases in the courts, the halls of legislation, the pulpit and the press.

Two large receptions were given to the delegates and visitors, one at the Hotel Aragon, and one by Mrs. W. A. Hemphill, chairman of the Committee on the Professional Work of Women at the approaching Cotton States Exposition soon to be held in Atlanta. She was assisted by Mrs. W. Y. Atkinson, wife of the newly-elected Governor of Georgia.

During several weeks before the convention Miss Anthony and Mrs. Chapman Catt had made a tour of the Southern States, speaking in the principal cities to arouse suffrage sentiment, as this section was practically an unvisited field. Immediately after the convention closed a mass meeting was held in the court-house of Atlanta. Afterwards Mrs. Blake was requested to address the Legislature of North Carolina, Miss Anthony lectured in a number of cities on the way northward, and others were invited to hold meetings in the neighboring States. Most of the speakers and delegates met in Washington on February 15 to celebrate Miss Anthony's seventy-fifth birthday and participate in the triennial convention of the National Council of Women.

FOOTNOTES:

[101] The three sisters, Claudia Howard Maxwell, Miriam Howard Du Bose and H. Augusta Howard, who as delegates at Washington the previous winter had invited the association to Atlanta, bore the principal part of these expenses and were largely responsible for the success of the convention.

[102] The facts and figures presented in the report from Kansas by the president, Mrs. Laura M. Johns, will be found in the chapter on that State.

[103] For an account of this beautiful celebration in the Metropolitan Opera House with an audience of 3,000, see Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony, p. 848; also Reminiscences of Elizabeth Cady Stanton.

[104] For account of Mrs. Bradwell's case see History of Woman Suffrage, Vol. II, p. 601; of Mrs. Minor's, same, p. 715.



CHAPTER XVI.

THE NATIONAL-AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 1896.

The suffrage association held its Twenty-eighth annual convention in the Church of Our Father, Washington, D. C., Jan. 23-28, 1896. In her opening remarks the president, Miss Susan B. Anthony, said:

The thought that brought us here twenty-eight years ago was that, if the Federal Constitution could be invoked to protect black men in the right to vote, the same great authority could be invoked to protect women. The question has been urged upon every Congress since 1869. We asked at first for a Sixteenth Amendment enfranchising women; then for suffrage under the Fourteenth Amendment; then, when the Supreme Court had decided that against us, we returned to the Sixteenth Amendment and have pressed it ever since. The same thing has been done in this Fifty-fourth Congress which has been done in every Congress for a decade, namely, the introducing of a bill providing for the new amendment....

You will notice that the seats of the delegation from Utah are marked by a large United States flag bearing three stars, a big one and two smaller ones. The big star is for Wyoming, because it stood alone for a quarter of a century as the only place where women had full suffrage. Colorado comes next, because it is the first State where a majority of the men voted to grant women equal rights. Then comes Utah, because its men in convention assembled—in spite of the bad example of Congress, which took the right away from its women nine years ago—those men, having seen the good effects of woman suffrage for years, voted by an overwhelming majority to leave out the little word "male" from the suffrage clause of their new State Constitution, and their action was ratified by the electors. Next year, if I am here, I hope to rejoice with you over woman suffrage in California and Idaho.

Some one whispered to Miss Anthony that the convention had not been opened with prayer, and she answered without the slightest confusion: "Now, friends, you all know I am a Quaker. We give thanks in silence. I do not think the heart of any one here has been fuller of silent thankfulness than mine, but I should not have remembered to have the meeting formally opened with prayer if somebody had not reminded me. The Rev. Anna Howard Shaw will offer prayer."

Miss Shaw's report as vice-president-at-large was full of the little touches of humor for which she was noted:

The report of my specific work would not take long; but the work that really did count for our association began last May, when your president and I were invited to California. On the way we stopped first at St. Louis, where Miss Anthony spoke before the Women's Federation, the Woman's Council, and the State W. S. A. From there we went to Denver, where we had a remarkable meeting, and a warm greeting was given to Miss Anthony by the newly enfranchised women of Colorado. It was pleasant to find them so grateful to the pioneers. The large opera house was packed, and a reception, in which the newspapers estimated that 1,500 persons took part, was afterwards given at the Palace Hotel.

From Denver we went to Cheyenne, where we addressed the citizens, men and women. For once there were present at our meeting quite as many men as women, and not only ordinary but extraordinary men. After introducing us to the audience, Mrs. Theresa A. Jenkins introduced the audience to us. It included the Governor, Senators, Representatives, Judges of the Supreme Court, city officials, and never so many majors and colonels, and it showed that where women have a vote, men think their meetings are worth going to. We were the guests of the Governor during our stay in Colorado, and guests of a U. S. Senator in Wyoming. At Salt Lake all the city turned out, and I spoke in the Tabernacle to the largest audience I ever had. It was sympathetic too, for Utah people are accustomed to go to church and listen. At Ogden they had to take two buildings for the meeting. At Reno, Nevada, there was a large audience.

The Woman's Congress at San Francisco was the most marvelous gathering I ever saw. The newspapers said the men were all hypnotized, or they would not stand on the sidewalk two hours to get into a church. Every subject considered during the whole week, whether it was the care of children or the decoration of the home, turned on the ballot for women, and Susan B. Anthony was the belle of the ball. The superintendent of San Francisco closed the schools that Miss Anthony might address the 900 teachers. The Ministers' Association passed resolutions favoring the amendment. We went the whole length of the State and the meetings were just as enthusiastic.

The Citizens' Committee asked women to take part in the Fourth of July celebration. The women accepted more than the men meant they should, for they insisted that a woman should be on the program. The Program Committee refused, and the Executive Committee said if they did not put a woman on they should be discharged. Instead of this they proposed that Mrs. Sarah B. Cooper should provide sandwiches for over 5,000 kindergarten children. That was the kind of work they invited such women to do.

The Program Committee discussed the matter, and their discussion could be heard four blocks away, but they finally yielded and invited me to speak. So Miss Anthony and I rode for three miles in a highly-decorated carriage, just behind the mayor and followed by a brass band and the fire brigade, and I wore a big badge that almost covered me, just like the badge worn by the masculine orator. The dispute between the Executive and the Program Committees had excited so much interest that there were more cheers for your president and vice-president as we passed along than there were for the mayor....

They wanted us both to come back in the fall. I went and spoke thirty-four times in thirty-seven evenings.

As the vice-president finished, Miss Anthony observed in her characteristic manner: "Miss Shaw said she only went to California to hold Miss Anthony's bonnet, but, when we left, everybody thought that I had come to hold her bonnet. It is my delight to see these girls develop and outdo their elders. There is another little woman that I want to come up here to the platform, Mrs. Chapman Catt. While she is blushing and getting ready, there is a delegation here from the Woman's National Press Association." Mesdames Lockwood, Gates, Cromwell and Emerson were introduced, and Miss Anthony remarked: "Our movement depends greatly on the press. The worst mistake any woman can make is to get crosswise with the newspapers."[105]

By this time Mrs. Chapman Catt had reached the platform, and Miss Anthony continued: "Mrs. Catt went down South with me last year to hold my bonnet; and wherever we were, at Memphis or New Orleans or elsewhere, when she had spoken, Miss Anthony was nowhere. It is she who has done the splendid organization work which has brought into the association nearly every State in the Union, and every Territory except the Indian and Alaska and we shall have them next year."

An able address was given by Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby (D. C.) on The Philosophy of Woman Suffrage, in which she said:

Woman suffrage is in harmony with the evolution of the race. The progress of civilization has developed the finer forces of mankind and made ready for the entrance of woman into government. As long as man was merely a slayer of men and animals he did not feel the need of the co-partnership of woman, but as his fatherhood was developed he felt his inadequacy and the necessity of the maternal element by his side. Woman suffrage is in harmony with the growth of the idea of the worth of the individual, which has its best expression in our republic. Our nation is heir of all the struggles for freedom which have been made....

The Magna Charta belongs to us as much as does the Declaration of Independence. In all these achievements for liberty women have borne their share. Not only have they inspired men but the record of the past is illumined with the story of their own brave deeds. Women love liberty as well as men do. The love of liberty is the corollary of the right of consent to government. All the progress of our nation has been along the line of extending the application of this basic idea....

Woman suffrage is in harmony with the evolution in the status of women. They always have done their share in the development of the race. There always has been a "new woman," some one stepping out in advance of the rest and gaining a place for others to stand upon.... We have no cause to blush for our ancestors. We may save our blushes for the women of to-day who do not live up to their privileges.

Now that woman has made such advance in personal and property rights, educational and industrial opportunities, to deny her the ballot is to force her to occupy a much more degrading position than did the women of the past. We think the savage woman degraded because she walks behind her husband bearing the burden to leave his hands free for the weapon which is his sign of sovereignty; what shall we say of the woman of to-day who may not follow her husband and brother as he goes forth to wield the weapon of civilization, the ballot? If the evolution in the status of woman does not point to the franchise it is meaningless.

Mrs. Colby was followed by Miss Julie R. Jenney, a member of the bar in Syracuse, N. Y., with a thoughtful address on Law and the Ballot. She showed that woman's present legal rights are in the nature of a license, and therefore revocable at the will of the bodies granting them, and that until women elect the lawmakers they can not be entirely sure of any rights whatever. Between Daybreak and Sunrise was the title of the address of Mrs. May Stocking Knaggs (Mich.), who pleaded for the opportunity of complete co-operation between men and women, declaring that "each human being is a whole, single and responsible; each human unit is concerned in the social compact which is formed to protect individual and mutual rights."

This was the first appearance of Mrs. Stetson on this national platform. She came as representative of the Pacific Coast Woman's Congress and California Suffrage Association. The Woman's Journal said: "Those of us who have for years admired Mrs. Stetson's remarkably bright poems were delighted to meet her, and to find her even more interesting than her writings. She is still a young woman, tall, lithe and graceful, with fine dark eyes, and spirit and originality flashing from her at every turn like light from a diamond. She read several poems to the convention, made an address one evening and preached twice on Sunday; and the delegates followed her around, as iron filings follow a magnet."

Mrs. Catharine E. Hirst, president of the Ladies of the G. A. R.; Mrs. Lillian M. Hollister, representing the Supreme Hive Ladies of the Maccabees; Miss Harriette A. Keyser, from the Political Study Club of New York; Mrs. Rose E. Lumpkin, president Virginia King's Daughters, were presented as fraternal delegates. Grace Greenwood and Mrs. Caroline B. Buell were introduced to the convention.

Mrs. Chapman Catt spoke for the Course of Study in Political Science, which had been in operation only five months, had sold five hundred full sets of books and reported over one hundred clubs formed. The committee on credentials reported 138 delegates present, and all the States and Territories represented except thirteen. A very satisfactory report of the first year's work of the organization committee was presented by its chairman, Mrs. Chapman Catt, which closed as follows:

Our committee are more than ever convinced that it is possible to build a great organization based upon the one platform of the enfranchisement of women. With harmony, co-operation and determination we shall yet build this organization, of such numbers and political strength that through the power of constituency it can dictate at least one plank in the platform of every political party, and secure an amendment from any Legislature it petitions. We believe it will yet have its auxiliaries in every village and hamlet, township and school district, to influence majorities when the amendment is submitted. More—we believe ere many years its powers will be so subtle and widespread that it can besiege the conservatism of Congress itself, and come away with the laurel wreath of victory.

Nearly $3,300 were at once pledged for the committee, Miss Anthony herself agreeing to raise $600 of this amount.

Mrs. Chapman Catt presented also a detailed Plan of Work, which included Organization, Club Work, Letter Writing, Raising of Money and Political Work. Of the last she said: "The time has fully come when we should carry the rub-a-dub of our agitation into 'the political Africa,' that is into every town meeting of every township of every county, and every caucus or primary meeting of every ward of every city of every State.... For a whole half century we have held special suffrage meetings, with audiences largely of women; that is, women have talked to women. We must now carry our discussion of the question into all of the different political party gatherings, for it is only there that the rank and file of the voters ever go. They won't come to our meetings, so we must carry our gospel into theirs. It will be of no more avail in the future than it has been in the past to send appeals to State and national conventions, so long as they are not backed by petitions from a vast majority of the voting constituents of their members."