Miss Anthony still continued on her weary round-through the inclement winter and spring, sometimes lecturing to meager and sometimes to crowded houses but netting an average of $100 a week, which was religiously applied to the payment of the debt. She returned to Chicago to lecture again in the Dime course, Sunday, March 26, and says in her diary: "An immense audience, hall packed, my speech was free, easy and happy, my audience quick to see and appreciate." The address on this occasion was "Bread and the Ballot."[85] She returned at once to Iowa, Kansas and Missouri, and by May 1, 1876, was able to write, "The day of Jubilee for me has come. I have paid the last dollar of The Revolution debt!" It was just six years to the very month since she had given up her cherished paper and undertaken to pay off its heavy indebtedness, and all her friends rejoiced with her that it was finally rolled from her shoulders and she was free. Even the newspapers offered congratulations in pleasant editorial paragraphs.[86] In a long notice, the Chicago Daily News said:

Her paper lived a few years and then went down. In the heart of the woman whose hopes went down with it, the little paper that cost so much and died so prematurely occupies, perhaps, the place which in other women's hearts is occupied by the remembrance of a baby's face, now shrouded in folds of white satin and hushed in death. But The Revolution left behind a debt of several thousand dollars. Susan B. Anthony was poor, yet she stepped forward and assumed, individually, the entire indebtedness. By working six years and devoting to the purpose all the money she could earn she has paid the debt and interest. And now, when the creditors of that paper and others who really know her, whatever they may think of her political opinions, hear the name of Susan B. Anthony, they feel inclined to raise their hats in reverence.

The Rochester Post-Express thus voiced the opinion of her own townspeople:

The thousands of friends of the plucky and noble woman of whom we speak will rejoice with her over this success. There are a good many men who have hidden behind their wives' petticoats for a much smaller sum than $10,000. It should be remembered, furthermore, that Miss Anthony has labored indefatigably in the cause of woman suffrage, paying her own expenses most of the time; has undergone a contemptible and outrageous persecution at the hands of the United States court for violating the election laws; has bent for months over the bed of a brother wounded almost to death by an assassin's bullet; has watched tenderly over the steps of an aged mother; and has always, everywhere, been the soul of helpfulness and benevolence. Here is an example, in a woman, who our laws say is not fit to exercise the active and defensive privilege of citizenship, that puts to shame the lives of ninety-nine in every hundred men.

It is not surprising that the letters of her friends during these past months should speak of "the pale, sad face, so worn by lines of care and toil," but now all was over and she returned home. To rest? Far from it. The third day found her en route for New York to attend the Suffrage Anniversary, May 10 and 11.

The thinking women of the country were justly indignant, in this great centennial year of the Republic, at the high-handed manner in which they had been ignored in the vast preparations for its celebration, in spite of their protests and in face of the fact that women had purchased $100,000 of the centennial stock issued to pay expenses. It had been decided at the Washington convention that the National Association should open headquarters in Philadelphia, and at this May meeting Miss Anthony was made chairman of the 1876 campaign committee. The resolutions adopted show the spirit of the convention:

WHEREAS, The right of self-government inheres in the individual before governments are founded, constitutions framed or courts created; and whereas, Governments exist to protect the people in the enjoyment of their natural rights, and when one becomes destructive of this end, it is the right of the people to resist and abolish it; and whereas, The women of the United States for one hundred years have been denied the exercise of their natural right of self-government; therefore

Resolved, That it is their natural right and most sacred duty to rebel against the injustice, usurpation and tyranny of our present government.

WHEREAS, The men of 1776 rebelled against a government which did not claim to be of the people, but on the contrary upheld the "divine right of kings;" and whereas, The women of this nation today, under a government which claims to be based upon individual rights, in an infinitely greater degree are suffering all the wrongs which led to the war of the Revolution; and whereas, the oppression is all the more keenly felt because our masters, instead of dwelling in a foreign land, are our husbands, fathers, brothers and sons; therefore

Resolved, That the women of this nation, in 1876, have greater cause for discontent, rebellion and revolution, than had the men of 1776.

Resolved, That with Abigail Adams we believe "the passion for liberty can not be strong in the breasts of those who are accustomed to deprive their fellow-creatures of liberty;" that, as she predicted in 1776, "we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by laws in which we have no voice or representation."

WHEREAS, We believe in the principles of the Declaration of Independence and of the Constitution of the United States, and that a true republic is the best form of government in the world; and whereas, This government is false to its underlying principles in denying to women the only means of self-government, the ballot; and one-half of the citizens of this nation, after a century of boasted liberty, are still political slaves; therefore

Resolved, That we protest against calling the present centennial a celebration of the independence of the people of the United States.

Resolved, That we meet in our respective towns and districts on the Fourth of July, 1876, and declare ourselves no longer bound to obey laws in whose making we have had no voice and, in presence of the assembled nations of the world gathered on this soil to celebrate our nation's centennial, demand justice for the women of this land.

Miss Anthony, Mrs. Stanton and Mrs. Gage had long had in view the preparation of a history of the woman's rights movement, which they expected to be a pamphlet of several hundred pages, and they offered this as a premium to every one who should send $5 toward the contemplated headquarters.[87] Fifty-two women responded at once, and with this $260 they ventured to rent fine, large parlors in a desirable part of Philadelphia and fit them up in an attractive manner. By the laws of Pennsylvania a married woman could not make a contract and Miss Anthony, being the only femme sole, was obliged to assume the financial responsibility. She and Mrs. Gage took charge of the headquarters May 25, and issued the following announcement:

The National Woman Suffrage Association has established its Centennial headquarters in Philadelphia at No. 1431 Chestnut street. The parlors, in charge of the officers of the association, are devoted to the special work of the year, pertaining to the centennial celebration and the political party conventions; also to calls, receptions, etc. On the table a Centennial autograph book receives the names of visitors....

On July 4th, while the men of this nation and the world are rejoicing that "all men are free and equal" in the United States, a declaration of rights for women will be issued from these headquarters, and a protest against calling this Centennial a celebration of the independence of the people, while one-half are still political slaves. Let the women of the whole land, on that day, in meetings, in parlors, in kitchens, wherever they may be, unite with us in this declaration and protest; and immediately thereafter send full reports for record in our centennial book, that the world may see that the women of 1876 know and feel their political degradation no less than did the men of 1776.

In commemoration of the twenty-eighth anniversary of the first woman's rights convention, the National Suffrage Association will hold in Philadelphia, July 19 and 20, of the present year, a grand mass convention, in which eminent reformers from the new and the old world will take part.

From these headquarters eloquent letters were written to the national political conventions and sent by delegations of prominent women, asking for a woman suffrage plank. The Democrats ignored the question in their platform; the Republicans adopted the following: "The Republican party recognizes with approval the substantial advance recently made toward the establishment of equal rights for women by the many important amendments effected by the Republican legislatures, in the laws which concern the personal and property relations of wives, mothers and widows, and by the election and appointment of women to the superintendence of education, charities and other public trusts. The honest demands of this class of citizens for additional rights, privileges and immunities should be treated with respectful consideration." In a letter from Mrs. Duniway, of Oregon, she says, "Well, the Republicans have thickened the old sop and re-served it."

The women were determined to obtain a recognition at the centennial celebration to be held July 4, in Independence Square. "It is the hour, the golden hour, for woman to speak her word which shall roll down our second century as has man's Fourth of July manifesto through the last one hundred years," wrote Miss Anthony. Then she and Mrs. Stanton and Mrs. Gage put their heads together and framed a document which had all the holy fire of the immortal Declaration of Independence, and this they proposed to have made a part of the-great day's proceedings.[88] Their efforts to this end, their repulse and their subsequent action are so delightfully described in the History of Woman Suffrage that it would be presumptuous to attempt to improve upon it. Their utmost efforts could obtain but four seats on the platform. Miss Anthony had a ticket as reporter for her brother's paper. The earnest request of Mrs. Stanton, president of the National Suffrage Association, to General Joseph R. Hawley, president of the Centennial Commission, not that the women might read but simply might present their declaration, was refused on the ground that the program could not be changed. The report thus continues:

As President Grant was not to attend the celebration, the acting Vice-President, Thomas W. Ferry, representing the government, was to officiate in his place and he, too, was addressed by note, and courteously requested to make time for the reception of this declaration. As Mr. Ferry was a well-known sympathizer with the demands of woman for political rights, it was presumable that he would render his aid. Yet he was forgetful that in his position that day he represented, not the exposition, but the government of a hundred years, and he too refused; thus the simple request of woman for a half moment's recognition on the nation's centennial birthday was denied by all in authority.

While the women of the nation were thus absolutely forbidden the right of public protest, lavish preparations were made for the reception and entertainment of foreign potentates and the myrmidons of monarchial institutions. Dom Pedro, emperor of Brazil, a representative of that form of government against which the United States is a perpetual defiance and protest, was welcomed with fulsome adulation, and given a seat of honor near the officers of the day; Prince Oscar of Sweden, a stripling of sixteen, on whose shoulders rests the promise of a future kingship, was seated near. Count Rochambeau of France, the Japanese commissioners, high officials from Russia and Prussia, from Austria, Spain, England, Turkey, representing the barbarism and semi-civilization of the day, found no difficulty in securing recognition and places of honor upon that platform, where representative womanhood was denied.

Though refused by their own countrymen a place and part in the centennial celebration, the women who had taken this presentation in hand were not to be conquered. They had respectfully asked for recognition; now that it had been denied, they determined to seize upon the moment when the reading of the Declaration of Independence closed, to proclaim to the world the tyranny and injustice of the nation toward one-half its people. Five officers of the National Suffrage Association, with that heroic spirit which has ever animated lovers of liberty in resistance to tyranny, determined, whatever the result, to present the Woman's Declaration of Rights at the chosen hour. They would not, they dared not sacrifice the golden opportunity to which they had so long looked forward; their work was not for themselves alone, nor for the present generation, but for all women of all time. The hopes of posterity were in their hands and they determined to place on record for the daughters of 1976 the fact that their mothers of 1876 had asserted their equality of rights, and impeached the government of that day for its injustice toward woman. Thus, in taking a grander step toward freedom than ever before, they would leave one bright remembrance for the women of the next Centennial.

That historic Fourth of July dawned at last, one of the most oppressive days of that terribly heated season. Susan B. Anthony, Matilda Joslyn Gage, Sara Andrews Spencer, Lillie Devereux Blake and Phoebe Couzins made their way through the crowds under the broiling sun to Independence Square, carrying the Woman's Declaration of Rights. This declaration had been handsomely engrossed by Mrs. Spencer and signed by the oldest and most prominent advocates of woman's enfranchisement. Their tickets of admission proved an open sesame through the military and all other barriers, and a few moments before the opening of the ceremonies, these women found themselves within the precincts from which most of their sex were excluded.

The declaration of 1776 was read by Richard Henry Lee, of Virginia, about whose family clusters so much of historic fame. The close of his reading was deemed the appropriate moment for the presentation of the Woman's Declaration. Not quite sure how their approach might be met—not quite certain if at this final moment they would be permitted to reach the presiding officer—these ladies arose from their seats at the back of the stage and walked down the aisle. The bustle of preparation for the Brazilian hymn covered their advance. The foreign guests, the military and civil officers who filled the space directly around the speaker's stand, courteously made way, while Miss Anthony in fitting words presented the Declaration. Mr. Ferry's face paled, as bowing low, with no word, he received it, and it thus became a part of the day's proceedings; the ladies turned, scattering printed copies as they deliberately passed up the aisle and off the platform. On every side eager hands were stretched; men stood on seats and asked for them, while General Hawley, thus defied and beaten in his audacious denial to women of the right to present their Declaration, shouted, "Order, order!"

Going out through the crowd, they made their way to a platform erected for the musicians in front of Independence Hall. Here on this historic ground, under the shadow of of Washington's statue, back of them the old bell which proclaimed "liberty to all the land and all the inhabitants thereof," they took their places, and to a listening, applauding crowd, Miss Anthony read a copy of the Declaration just presented to Mr. Ferry. It was warmly applauded at many points, and after again scattering a number of printed copies, the delegation descended from the platform and hastened to the convention of the National Association. A meeting had been appointed at 12 o'clock, in the First Unitarian church, where Rev. William H. Furness preached for fifty years, but whose pulpit was then filled by Joseph May, a son of Rev. Samuel J. May. They found the church crowded with an expectant audience, which greeted them with thanks for what they had just done; the first act of this memorable day taking place on the old centennial platform in Independence Square, the last in a church so long devoted to equality and justice.

The venerable Lucretia Mott, then in her eighty-fourth year, presided. Belva A. Lockwood took up the judiciary, showing the way that body lends itself to party politics. Matilda Joslyn Gage spoke upon the writ of habeas corpus, pointing out what a mockery to married women was that constitutional guarantee. Lucretia Mott reviewed the progress of the reform from the first convention. Sara Andrews Spencer illustrated the evils arising from two codes of morality. Lillie Devereux Blake spoke upon trial by jury; Susan B. Anthony upon taxation without representation, illustrating her remarks by incidents of unjust taxation of women during the present year. Elizabeth Cady Stanton pictured the aristocracy of sex and the evils arising from manhood suffrage. Judge Esther Morris, of Wyoming, said a few words in regard to suffrage in that territory. Phoebe Couzins, with great pathos, told of woman's work in the war. Margaret Parker, president of the women's suffrage club of Dundee, Scotland, and of the newly formed International W.C.T.U., declared this was worth the journey across the Atlantic. Mr. J.H. Raper, of Manchester, England, characterized it as the grandest meeting of the day, and said the patriot of a hundred years hence would seek for every incident connected with it, and the next Centennial would be adorned by the portraits of the women who sat upon that platform.

The Hutchinsons were present and in their best vein interspersed the speeches with appropriate and felicitous songs. Lucretia Mott did not confine herself to a single speech but, in Quaker style, whenever the spirit moved made many happy points. As her sweet and placid countenance appeared above the pulpit, the Hutchinsons burst into, "Nearer, My God, to Thee." The effect was marvellous; the audience at once arose, and spontaneously joined in the hymn. For five long hours of that hot midsummer day, that crowded audience listened earnestly to woman's demand for equality of rights before the law. When the meeting at last adjourned, the Hutchinsons singing, "A Hundred Years Hence," it was slowly and reluctantly that the great audience left the house.

The headquarters were kept open for two months, the weekly receptions were largely attended and the rooms each day crowded with visitors. The immense autograph book was signed by hundreds, most of whom also affixed their names to the Woman's Declaration of Rights. Lucretia Mott always came in after attending the mid-week meeting of the Friends, and the ladies had a pot of tea ready for her coming.[89] When she left she never failed to hand them $5 "to pay for the trouble she had made," her contributions in this way amounting to $50. George W. Childs gave $100, Dr. Clemence Lozier, $100, Ellen C. Sargent, $50, Elizabeth B. Phelps, $50, Miss Anthony herself contributed $175, and altogether about two hundred people donated nearly $1,700, all of which was expended in keeping up the headquarters and printing and circulating thousands of documents. When the accounts were audited they showed a balance of just $4.64.

At this time Mrs. Mott sent Miss Anthony this little note, accompanied by a large package of fine tea: "I forgot to take the tea I promised thee, so please accept it now. Thank thee for so oft remembering me with the delicious drinks of it. After leaving thee so hurriedly yesterday, I feared that thou wast still short of an even balance, and now enclose another $10 for thy own personal use. It is too hard for our widely extended national society to suffer thee to labor so unceasingly without a consideration." But Miss Anthony did not work for personal reward and said in a letter to her old friend Clarina Howard Nichols: "The Kansas women say, 'All we have of freedom we owe to Mrs. Nichols and yet we never have given her a testimonial.' Well, you and I and all who labor to make the conditions of the world better for coming generations, must find our testimonials in the good accomplished through our work."

As soon as the Centennial headquarters were closed Miss Anthony proceeded to carry out her cherished plan of writing the history of the woman's rights movement. She had sent the most peremptory orders to Mrs. Stanton not to make a lecture engagement before December 1, so that in August, September, October and November they might prepare this history. She then shipped to Mrs. Stanton's home several large trunks and boxes full of letters, reports and various documents which she had carefully preserved during the past quarter of a century, and the first day of August they set to work. The entries in the diary for the next two months give some idea of her state of mind: "I am immersed to my ears and feel almost discouraged.... The work before me is simply appalling.... The prospect of ever getting out a satisfactory history grows less each day.... Would that the good spirits in my own brain would come to the rescue!... O, these old letters! It makes me sad and tired to read them over, to see the terrible strain I was under every minute then, have been ever since, am now and shall be, I think, the rest of my life."[90]

On August 24 occurred the death of Paulina Wright Davis and, at the husband's request, Miss Anthony and Mrs. Stanton spoke at the funeral. The former felt that again she had lost a friend who never could be replaced. Mrs. Davis was a woman of beauty, culture, wealth and social position and a life-long advocate of woman suffrage. In October the dear cousin Anson Lapham passed away, and in the diary that night was written: "No man except my father ever gave me such love and confidence, and his acts were equal to his faith."

[Autograph:

With truest and tenderest friendship for my co-workers, I am as ever, Pauline Wright Davis.]

Work was pressing upon her from every side. In the spring of this year she had been engaged by the editors of Johnson's Universal Cyclopedia to write the chapter on suffrage and prepare the biographies of a number of eminent women. Amidst all the other cares of the summer and fall, she had been endeavoring to collect the materials for these sketches, having the usual experience. Some failed to answer; others wrote asking a score of questions; many sent four times as many words as were requested, with the statement that not one single line could be cut out; while a number forwarded a mass of unintelligible matter and requested her to make a good sketch out of it. The history also was occupying her waking and sleeping thoughts, and the depleted condition of her pocket-book foreshadowed the necessity of another lecture tour. Meanwhile, the mother at home was growing very feeble, and on Thanksgiving Day Miss Anthony wrote to her: "I feel as if I were robbing myself of the last moments which I may ever have to be with you, but I can not see the way clear to stay at home this coming winter. It is ever thus with me, so hard to know which is the strongest duty, the one that ought to be done first, and so I grope on in the dark. That I am always away from home may look to the world as if I care less for it than other people, whereas my longing for it almost makes me weak; but you, dear mother, understand my love."

[Footnote 82: See Appendix for full speech.]

[Footnote 83: At Carbondale she addressed the students of the Normal School, the day after her lecture, emphasizing the necessity of woman's being able to care for herself, urging them to marry only for love and not for support, and to look upon marriage as a luxury and not a necessity. She was a little doubtful as to the effect of this talk upon both faculty and students, but one of the professors called to tell her how fitting was every word and how he had longed to have just those things said. The girl students sent her a handsome bouquet as she was taking her train.]

[Footnote 84: President M.B. Anderson, of Rochester University, wrote a friend in this connection: "I always remember Miss Anthony as an angel of mercy in the house of a sister who was crushed by the loss of a son."]

[Footnote 85: See Appendix for full speech.]

[Footnote 86: From a large number of clippings, the following are selected as specimens:

Miss Anthony has now earned the money and discharged the last obligation of her paper. This is the work of a brave and good woman.... She is a woman who pays her debts and sets a watch upon her lips.—Cincinnati Enquirer.

It is the fashion among fools of both sexes to sneer at Susan B. Anthony and use her name to point witless jokes. But it seems to us—and we differ from her most emphatically on the question of woman suffrage—that her brave, unselfish life reflects a credit on womanhood which the follies of a thousand others can not remove.—Utica Observer.

"She has paid her debts like a man," says an exchange. Like a man? Not so. Not one man in a thousand but would have "squealed," "laid down" and settled at ten or twenty cents on the dollar. As people go in this wicked world, it is no more than fair to say in good faith that Miss Anthony is a very admirable person. She is in business, as in other matters, one of the few—the select few—who steer by their own compass and not by the shifting winds.—Buffalo Express.

Miss Susan B. Anthony has done a noble thing, which deserves to be widely known. She has lectured 120 times during this season and has paid off the last debt of The Revolution. That she has felt obliged to work thus for years when thousands of men avail themselves of the privileges of the bankrupt act, is a phenomenal exhibition of personal honor. A woman is thoroughly qualified to plead for the claims of her own sex when she respects the rights of human nature so keenly.—New York Graphic.

We are thankful to see the recognition accorded to the worth of our townswoman. She has been often misjudged and sometimes abused; but unfalteringly and unselfishly she has devoted herself to her life-work, and despite cavilling and sneers, has deeply impressed her thought upon the age in which she has been placed. Her executive talent has unceasingly declared itself and her character has been without reproach. She is today a power in the land, respected even by those who oppose her. She may not witness the full triumph of her cause; but her fame as a brave, truthful and consistent advocate of a conquering cause is secure. Even in her lifetime she is receiving something of the reward to which her fidelity to principle entities her.—Rochester Democrat and Chronicle.]

[Footnote 87: When this work finally was issued at $15 per set, every one of these pledges was carefully fulfilled, necessarily at a great pecuniary loss.]

[Footnote 88: For full text of this magnificent document see History of Woman Suffrage, Vol. III, p. 31.]

[Footnote 89: The little teapot and the cup and saucer which she used now stand upon Miss Anthony's sideboard.]

[Footnote 90: To this work, which these women expected to accomplish in four months, they gave every day that could be spared from other duties for the next ten years!]



CHAPTER XXVIII.

COLORADO CAMPAIGN—POLITICAL ATTITUDE.

1877-1878.

The decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of Virginia L. Minor rendered useless any further efforts to obtain suffrage under the National Constitution until it should be amended for this special purpose. The agitation of the last eight years, however, had not been without its value. The student of history will observe that the ablest constitutional arguments ever made in favor of the practical application of the great underlying principles of our government, were those of Benjamin F. Butler, A.G. Riddle, Henry R. Selden, William Loughridge, Francis Minor, Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Matilda Joslyn Gage on the right of women to vote under the Fourteenth Amendment. These were reviewed by the newspapers and law journals and widely discussed by the people, while the congressional debates, published in the Record, became a part of history.

Although from the standpoint of justice these arguments were unanswerable, they did not succeed in establishing the political rights of women, and the advocates therefore were compelled to return to their former policy of demanding a Sixteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which should protect them as the Fifteenth protected the negroes. To this end, in November, 1876, an earnest appeal was sent out by Mrs. Stanton, president; Miss Anthony, secretary; and Mrs. Gage, chairman of the executive committee of the National Association, asking the women to secure petitions for the amendment and send them to the annual meeting. Two letters received by Miss Anthony in January, 1877, illustrate the wide difference of opinion which prevailed. Wm. Lloyd Garrison wrote:

You desire me to send you a letter, to be read at the Washington convention, in favor of a petition to Congress, asking that body to submit to the several States a Sixteenth Amendment securing suffrage for all, irrespective of sex. On fully considering the subject, I must decline doing so, because such a petition I deem to be quite premature. If its request were complied with by the present Congress—a supposition simply preposterous—the proposed amendment would be rejected by every State in the Union, and in nearly every instance by such an overwhelming majority as to bring the movement into needless contempt. Even as a matter of "agitation," I do not think it would pay. Look over the whole country and see in the present state of public sentiment on the question of woman suffrage what a mighty primary work remains to be done in enlightening the masses, who know nothing and care nothing about it and, consequently, are not at all prepared to cast their vote for any such thing. I think it is a mistake to look for a favorable consideration of the question on the part of legislators under such circumstances. More light is needed for the popular mind.

In the early days of the anti-slavery agitation, Mr. Garrison never waited for the popular mind to become prepared but, by the ploughshare of bold, aggressive action, he turned up the soil and made it ready for the seed. When "more light" was needed, by vigorous effort he stirred up a blaze which illuminated the world.

From Wendell Phillips came the old-time clarion note: "I think you are on the right track—the best method to agitate the question—and I am with you, though, between you and me, I still think the individual States must lead off and that this reform must advance piecemeal, State by State. But I mean always to help everywhere and every one."

The convention met in Lincoln Hall, January 16 and 17. Although there had been but a few weeks for the work, petitions asking a Sixteenth Amendment were received from twenty-six different States, aggregating over 10,000 names. The History says: "To Sara Andrews Spencer we are indebted for the great labor of receiving, assorting, counting, rolling-up and planning the presentation of the petitions. It was by a well-considered coup d'etat that, with her brave coadjutors, she appeared on the floor of the House and gave each member a petition from his own State. Even Miss Anthony, always calm in the hour of danger, on finding herself suddenly whisked into those sacred enclosures, amid a crowd of stalwart men, spittoons and scrap-baskets, when brought vis-a-vis with our champion, Mr. Hoar, hastily apologized for the intrusion, to which the honorable gentleman promptly replied, 'I hope, madam, yet to see you on this floor in your own right and in business hours too.'"

The spectacle is variously described.[91] The trustworthy correspondent of the Independent, Mary Clemmer, looked at the proceedings with a woman's eyes and, in her weekly letter, thus vented her indignation:

A few read the petitions as they would any other, with dignity and without comment; but the majority seemed intensely conscious of holding something unutterably funny in their hands. They appeared to consider it a huge joke. The entire Senate presented the appearance of a laughing-school practising side-splitting and ear-extended grins. Mr. Wadleigh leaned back in his chair and shook with laughter, after portraying to his next neighbor, Pinkney Whyte, of Maryland, the apparition of Pinkney's landlady descending upon the polls like a wolf on the fold, to annihilate his election. Oglesby, erst warrior of Illinois, spake with such endearing gallantry of his "dear constituents," whom he did all his wit could do to make ridiculous, that the Senate laughed, and even Roscoe Conkling, who never condescends to sneer at a woman in public, turned and listened and smiled his most sardonic smile. Then Thurman blew his loudest regulation blast—sure portent of approaching battle—and rose and moved that the petition be referred to the committee on public lands, of which Oglesby is chairman. At this proposition—intended to be equally humorous and contemptuous—the whole Senate laughed aloud.

There was one senator man enough and gentleman enough to lift the petition from this insulting proposition. It was Senator Sargent, of California, the husband of the woman who, though a senator's wife, is brave enough to be the treasurer of the National Suffrage Association. He turned to Mr. Thurman and demanded for the petition of more than 10,000 women at least the courtesy which would be given to any other.... Then the craven Senate declared Thurman's motion, which was only an insult, carried. Let it be recorded of the Senate of the Forty-fifth Congress that the one petition which it received as a preposterous joke and treated with utter contempt and outrage was that of tens of thousands of the mothers, wives and daughters of the land.

The Capital of Sunday was perfectly correct when it said: "The ladies managed the business badly. If they had employed the female lobby, the venerable Solons would have softened and thrown open their doors as readily as their hearts." It seems an ungracious thing to say; but it is the truth. The woman who wins her way with the majority of these men is the siren of the gallery and the anteroom, who sends in her card and her invitation to the senator at his desk. She never talks of "rights." She cares for no "cause" but her own cause of ease and pelf. She shakes her tresses, "banged" and usually blonde; she lifts her alluring eyes, and nine times out of ten makes him do as she listeth. No wonder when the earnest appeal of honest women reaches his hands, he has neither response, honor nor justice to give it.

Miss Anthony had been speaking in all parts of the country for a quarter of a century and generally had been her own manager. The preceding year she had given the Slayton Lyceum Bureau a partial trial and at the beginning of 1877 made a contract with it, commencing the last of January. The entire first page of the circular for the season was devoted to this new engagement and began:

The manager takes pride in announcing the name of Susan B. Anthony, the most earnest, fearless advocate of the ballot for woman. She has hitherto confined herself entirely to this one question, which to her is most sacred and righteous, but this season we are to have something different, as will be seen from the titles of her new lectures. Her great speeches, "Woman and the Sixteenth Amendment," and "Woman wants Bread, not the Ballot," will still be called for, and committees will have their choice in all cases.... A certain gentleman frequently wrote us last year to avoid "all night rides" after his lectures; Miss Anthony never makes such a request. She can lecture every night in the season.... When a list of fifty or one hundred engagements has been mapped out and fixed, nothing but an act of God will prevent her filling them.... Of nearly fifty consecutive lectures, delivered by Miss Anthony last spring in the State of Illinois alone, only two failed to realize a profit.... She is always making converts among the men as well as the women.

Among the notices quoted is one from Col. John W. Forney, of the Philadelphia Press, saying: "I must accept woman suffrage as I did negro emancipation; as a necessity made urgent and imperative by the times in which we live. Put me down then, if you please, as being an ardent woman's rights man, fighting under the banner of Susan B. Anthony, and proud of following such a leader."

[Autograph:

Very truly yours. J W Forney]

Miss Anthony found both advantages and disadvantages in this new arrangement; for while it relieved her of much responsibility, it took away the control of her own time and movements, a situation which she soon found very trying. She lectured through February and March, but by this time her sister, Mrs. Hannah Mosher, whose failing health had sent her to Kansas in the hope of benefit, was declared by the physicians beyond recovery. Miss Anthony's first impulse was to hasten to her side, but she was confronted with her lecture engagements and told that it would be impossible to release her until May. She was almost desperate to be with the loved one and at last could bear it no longer, so telegraphing Mr. Slayton to cancel everything after April 5, regardless of consequences, she took the train at Chicago and reached Leavenworth on the 7th. She found her sister rapidly declining with the same inexorable disease which had claimed another four years before, and at once installed herself beside the invalid, who was rejoiced indeed to have her companionship and ministrations. All that loving hands could do she had had from husband, children and brothers, but she had longed for the presence of her sister and it filled her with joy and peace.

In just a week, though her heart was breaking, Miss Anthony was obliged to return to Illinois to fill four or five engagements in places which threatened claims for damages if this were not done. She hastened back to Leavenworth, reaching the bedside of her sister at midnight, April 20, and scarcely leaving it a moment until the end came, May 12. Between herself and this sister, just nineteen months younger, beautiful in character and strong in affection, there ever had existed the closest sympathy. For the last decade they had been separated only by a dooryard, they had shared each other's every joy and sorrow, and the severing of these ties of over a half-century seemed more than she could endure.

She remained at Leavenworth,[92] trying to renew her strength and courage, until the last of June, when she returned to Rochester, taking with her the orphaned daughter Louise. Many comforting letters and tokens of affection came to her during these months, among them a gift of $100 from Helen Potter, the famous impersonator. Her imitations of Gough, Ristori, Charlotte Cushman, Anna Dickinson, Mrs. Stanton and even Miss Anthony herself were most remarkable. During the Centennial they had become warm personal friends, and in giving the money she said: "Now, this is not for any society or committee or cause, but for your very self."

Mrs. Stanton wrote her: "Do be careful, dear Susan, you can not stand what you once did. I should feel desolate indeed with you gone." When the lecturing had commenced she again wrote: "As I go dragging around in these despicable hotels, I think of you and often wish we had at least the little comfort of enduring it together. When is your agony over?" Referring to a young woman speaker who was being spoiled by flattery, she said: "We should be thankful, Susan, for the ridicule and abuse on which we have fed." To one who tried to make trouble between Miss Anthony and herself she sent this reply: "Our friendship is of too long standing and has too deep roots to be easily shattered. I think we have said worse things to each other, face to face, than we have ever said about each other. Nothing that Susan could say or do could break my friendship with her; and I know nothing could uproot her affection for me." And to Miss Anthony she wrote: "I send you letters from our children. As the environments of the mother influence the child in prenatal life, and you were with me so much, there is no doubt you have had a part in making them what they are. There are a depth and earnestness in these younger ones and a love for you that delight my heart." Such letters as these are scattered thickly through the correspondence of nearly fifty years, and while Miss Anthony seldom put her own feelings into words, her absolute loyalty and devotion to Mrs. Stanton during all the half-century bear their own testimony.

The talented contributor to the Philadelphia Sunday Republic, Annie McDowell, paid a beautiful tribute to Miss Anthony at this time, illustrating how much she was loved by women:

"Some one wishes to know which of the advocates of woman's rights we think the ablest. Why, Susan B., of course. Without her, the organization would have been utterly broken to pieces and scattered. She is the guiding spirit, the executive power that leads the forlorn hope and brings order out of chaos. Others seek to promote their own interests, but Susan, earnest, honest, self-sacrificing, much-enduring, thinks only of the work she has in hand, and speculates solely on the chances of living long enough to accomplish it. She has given up home, friends, her profession of teacher and the modest competence acquired by her labor; has been caricatured, ridiculed, maligned and persecuted, but has never turned aside or faltered in the work to which she has given her life. Whatever may be the opinion of the conservative or fogy world with regard to Susan B. Anthony, those who know her well and have watched her career most attentively, know her to be rich in all the best and most tender of womanly virtues, and possessed of as brave and noble a spirit and as great integrity of character as ever fell to the lot of mortal woman."

The legislature of Colorado had submitted the question of woman suffrage to be voted on October 2, 1877, and notwithstanding the lucrative business under the lyceum bureau, Miss Anthony could not resist offering her services to the women of Colorado with their little money and few speakers. From Dr. Alida C. Avery, president of the State Suffrage Association, came the quick response: "Your generous proposal was duly received, and laid before the executive committee, who resolved that the thanks of the association be tendered you for your friendly offer, which we gratefully accept."

Although inured to hardship, Miss Anthony found this Colorado campaign the most trying she ever had experienced, not excepting that of Kansas ten years before. The country was new, many of the towns were off the railroad among the mountains and in most of them woman suffrage never had been heard of; there was no one to advertise the meetings, nobody to meet her when she reached her destination, hotels were of the most primitive nature and there were few public halls. There were, of course, some oases in this desert, and occasionally she found a good hotel or was hospitably entertained in a comfortable home. At one place she spoke in the railroad station to about twenty-five men who could not understand what it was she wanted them to do, though all were voters. Sometimes a landlord would clear out the hotel dining-room and she would gather her audience there, but they would have to stand and soon would grow tired. The mining towns were filled with a densely ignorant class of foreigners, and some of the southern counties were almost wholly populated by Mexicans. It was to these men that an American woman, her grandfather a soldier of the Revolution, appealed for the right of women to representation in this government.

To reach Del Norte Miss Anthony rode sixty-five miles by stage over a vast, arid tract evidently once the bed of an inland sea, but the terrible discomforts of the journey were almost overlooked in the enjoyment of the magnificent scenery. She travelled all the next night; at Wagon Wheel Gap the stage stopped for a while and, taking a cup, she went alone down to the river, drank of its icy waters and stood a long time absorbed in the glory of the moonlight on the mountain peaks. In all this weary journey of two days, she was the only woman in a stage filled with men. When she reached Lake City she was delightfully entertained, finding her hostess to be a college graduate, and spoke in the evening from a dry-goods box on the courthouse steps to an enthusiastic audience of a thousand persons. Ouray was the next place marked on the route sent her, but to reach it would require a ride of fifty miles over a dangerous mountain trail or a three days' journey of 150 miles around, for which she must hire a private conveyance, so she gave it up.

She rested one whole day and night and started at 6 A.M. on a buckboard for the next place, wound around the mountainsides by the picturesque Gunnison river, and reached her destination at 5 o'clock. She found a disbeliever of equal rights in her landlady, whom she describes as "a weak, silly woman and a wretched cook and housekeeper." To be an opponent of suffrage and a poor housekeeper Miss Anthony always regarded as two unpardonable sins. The husband, however, intended to vote for it. At the next stopping-place her hostess was a cultured woman, her house neatly kept and meals well-cooked, and she wanted to vote. The husband in this case was violently opposed and expected to cast his ballot against the amendment. Thus it is that wives are "represented by their husbands."

On she went, over mountain and through canyon, across the "great divide," sometimes having large audiences, more often only a handful, and enduring every possible hardship in the way of travel, sleep and food. At Oro City she lectured in a saloon, as she had done at a number of places, and Governor Routt, happening to be in town, stood by her and spoke also in favor of woman suffrage. At many places she slept on a straw-filled tick laid on planks, with sometimes a "corded" bed for a luxury. A door with a lock scarcely ever was found. Once she had a room with a board partition which extended only half-way up, separating it from one adjoining where half a dozen men slept. It is hardly necessary to say that this was a wakeful night and the dawn was hailed with rejoicing. At Leadville the gold fever was at its height and she spoke in a big saloon to the roughest crowd she had encountered. They were good-natured, however, and when they saw she was coughing from the tobacco smoke, put out their pipes and made up for the sacrifice by more frequent drinks. At Fair Play she found the Democratic editor had placarded the town with bills announcing in big letters: "A New Version! Suffrage! Free Love in the Ascendency. Anthony! On the Gale Tonight." The citizens were indignant, there was a large and respectful audience, Miss Anthony was introduced by Judge Henry and resolutions were unanimously passed denouncing the posters.

On election day, her work finished, she started on a stage ride of eighty-five miles to Denver. The collections at her twenty-four meetings amounted to $165. Her fare to Colorado and return, exclusive of some passes furnished by her brother and including sleeper and meals, was $100, and her expenses during the tour more than used up the other $65, so it hardly could be called a good financial speculation. Soon afterwards she received from Mr. and Mrs. Israel Hall, of Ann Arbor, Mich., a deed for 320 acres of well-timbered land in St. Francis county, Ark., "as a tribute to her life-work for woman suffrage and especially her hard campaign in Colorado." There came also a letter from the ever-generous and faithful Mrs. Knox Goodrich, of San Jose, Cal., with a draft for $50 "to be used for your campaign expenses;" and in her diary Miss Anthony writes: "It is a great comfort, after all these years of financially unrequited work, to receive such marks of appreciation."

At Denver she met Margaret Campbell, of Iowa, and Matilda Hindman, of Pennsylvania, who also had been campaigning in Colorado. They had an amusing time comparing notes, but as Mrs. Campbell had travelled in her own carriage with her husband, and Miss Hindman had spoken mostly in towns along the railroad, their experiences had been less picturesque and less harrowing. She also met here Abby Sage Richardson, who was giving a course of readings in Denver. It was in this locality that her sister Hannah had spent many weary weeks the year before, seeking for health, and Miss Anthony hunted up every person who had known her, hoping each would recall some incident of her stay; visited every spot her sister had loved, and felt the whole place haunted with her hallowed memory.

Dr. Alida C. Avery was going East for some time, but was to leave two young women medical students in her house and she invited Miss Anthony to stay there while she remained in Denver. She was soon installed in the large, airy front chamber of this lovely home, looking down on a grassy and well-irrigated lawn and outward towards the rugged and massive Rocky mountains. It was an inspiring spot and, as she had promised a new lecture for the Slayton Bureau, she decided to remain and write it here. Her surroundings recalled the many charming homes made and maintained by unmarried women whom she had visited, and so in the three weeks that she enjoyed Dr. Avery's hospitality, she wrote her lecture, "Homes of Single Women." During this time she spoke at Boulder; and also in the opera house at Denver under the auspices of a committee, receiving $100.

She started, October 23, on a long lecture tour arranged for her through Nebraska,[93] Kansas, Missouri, Iowa and Wisconsin, which lasted the remainder of the year. She almost perished with cold and fatigue before it was finished but found some compensation in the $30 a night which the lectures yielded. At this time she received an urgent request from a San Francisco lecture committee to come to that State, but was unable to accept. "If I only could have sister Mary with me over Sunday in these dull and lonely little towns, I could stand it the rest of the week," she wrote; and to a friend who sent her an account of a visit to her mother: "I am very glad you do go occasionally to see dear mother, sitting there in her rocking-chair by the window as life ebbs out and out. O, how I fear the final ebb will come when I am away, but still I hope and trust it may not, and work and work on."

As Miss Anthony was still under contract with the lecture bureau, she was once more compelled to forego the satisfaction of attending the annual convention in Washington, January 8 and 9, 1878, but as in 1876 she sent $100 of the money she had worked so hard to earn. "It is not quite just to myself to do it," she wrote a friend, "but if the women of wealth and leisure will not help us, we must give both the labor and the money." While this convention was a success as to numbers and enthusiasm, several things occurred which the ladies thought might have been avoided if Miss Anthony had been in command with her cool head and firm hand. Especially was this true in regard to a prayer meeting which some of the religious zealots, in spite of the most urgent appeals from the other members, persisted in holding in the reception room of the Capitol directly after a morning session of the convention. The affair itself was most inopportune but, to make it still worse, the cranks and bores who always are watching for an opportunity, gained control and turned it into a farce.

In her disgust and wrath Mrs. Stanton wrote Miss Anthony: "Mrs. Sargent and I did not attend the prayer meeting. As God has never taken a very active part in the suffrage movement, I thought I would stay at home and get ready to implore the committee, having more faith in their power to render us the desired aid." Mrs. Sargent, with her usual calm and beautiful philosophy, wrote: "Do not let yourself be troubled. We can not take down and rebuild without a great deal of dirt and rubbish, and we must endure it all for the sake of the grand edifice that is to appear in due time. Work and let work, each in her own way. We can not all work alike any more than we can look alike. We must not require impossibilities. All action helps us, it shows life; inaction, we know, means death. I hope you can be with us next convention. The women of this country and of the world owe you a debt they never can repay. I know, however, that you will get your reward."

Virginia L. Minor sent this earnest plea: "Can not you and Mrs. Stanton, before another convention, manage in some way to civilize our platform and keep off that element which is doing us so much harm? I think the ship never floated that had so many barnacles attached as has ours.... I have a compliment for you, my dear. Wendell Phillips has just told a reporter of the St. Louis Post that, 'of all the advocates of the woman's movement, Miss Anthony stands at the head.'"

In her usual racy style Phoebe Couzins concluded her description by saying: "It seems very strange that when you are not about, things generally break loose and no woman can be found who unites the moderation, brains and common sense necessary to carry matters to a respectable conclusion. That meeting was like those they used to have in the District of Columbia. Not until the National Association, in the persons of Mrs. Stanton and yourself, came to the rescue and raised them to a dignified standard did they attain any degree of hearing from the thoughtful people of the capital." And so Miss Anthony determined that no lecture bureau should keep her away from another National convention.

The entire year of 1878, with the exception of the three summer months, was spent in the lecture field. On July 19 Miss Anthony and other workers arranged a celebration at Rochester of the thirtieth anniversary of the first woman's rights convention. This was held in place of the usual May Anniversary in New York and was attended by a distinguished body of women. The Unitarian church, in spite of the intense heat, was filled with a representative audience. The noble Quaker, Amy Post, now seventy-seven years old, who had been the leading spirit in the convention of thirty years before, assisted in the arrangements. The usual brilliant and logical speeches were made by Mrs. Mott, Mrs. Stanton, Miss Anthony, Mrs, Gage, Dr. Lozier, Mrs. Spencer, Mrs. Sargent, Frederick Douglass, Miss Couzins and others. This was the first appearance on the National platform of Mrs. May Wright Sewall, of Indianapolis, from that time one of the leaders of the movement. Almost one hundred interesting and encouraging letters were received from Phillips, Garrison, Senator Sargent, Frances E. Willard, Clara Barton and many others in this country and in England.

This was the last convention Lucretia Mott ever attended, and she had made the journey hither under protest from her family, for she was nearly eighty-six years old, but her devoted friend Sarah Pugh accompanied her. She spoke several times in her old, gentle, half-humorous but convincing manner and was heard with rapt attention. As she walked down the aisle to leave the church, the whole audience arose and Frederick Douglass called out with emotion, "Good-by, Lucretia." The convention received a telegram of congratulation from the International Congress at Paris, presided over by Victor Hugo. Mrs. Stanton was re-elected president and Miss Anthony chairman of the executive committee. The Rochester Democrat and Chronicle said:

The assemblage was composed of as fine a body of American women as ever met in convention or anywhere else. Among them were many noted for their culture and refinement, and for their attainments in the departments of literature, medicine, divinity and law. As Douglass said, to which the president bowed her acquiescence, any cause which could stand the test of thirty years' agitation, was bound to succeed. The foremost ladies engaged in the movement today are those who initiated it in this country and have bravely and grandly upheld their cause from that day to this. Among them we must first speak of Susan B. Anthony, one of the most sensible and worthy citizens of this republic, a lady of warm and tender heart but indomitable purpose and energy, and a resident of whom Rochester may well be proud.

Miss Anthony was very tired after the labors of this convention and was glad to remain with the invalid mother while sister Mary went to the White mountains for rest and change. She received an invitation from the board of directors to address the Kansas State Fair in September, and also one from Col. John P. St. John, Republican candidate for governor, to speak at a Grand National Temperance Camp Meeting near Lawrence, but was obliged to decline both.

During the summer of 1878 reports were so constantly circulated declaring woman suffrage a failure in Wyoming that Miss Anthony wrote to J.H. Hayford, postmaster and editor of the Sentinel at Laramie City, in regard to one of these in the New York World, which paper declared it would vouch for the integrity of the writer. She received the following answer:

The enclosed slander upon Wyoming women I had seen before, but did not deem it worthy reply. Some of my Cheyenne friends took pains to ascertain the writer and they assure me (and the Cheyenne papers have published the fact) that he is a worthless, drunken dead-beat, who worked out a ten days' sentence on the streets of that city with a ball and chain to his leg.

I have not time to go into a detailed history of the practical working of woman suffrage in Wyoming, but I can add my testimony to the fact that its effect has been most salutary and beneficial. Not one of the imaginary evils which its opponents predicted has ever been realized here. On this frontier, where the roughest element is supposed to exist, and where women are so largely in the minority—even here, under these adverse circumstances, woman's influence has redeemed our politics. Our elections are conducted as quietly and civilly as any other public gatherings. Republicans are not always elected, the most desirable men are not always elected, perhaps; but the influence of our women is almost universally given for the best men and the best laws, and we would as soon be without woman's assistance in the government of the family as in that of the Territory.

After having tried the experiment for nine years, it is safe to say there is not one citizen of the Territory—man or woman—who desires good order, good laws and good government, who would be willing to see it abolished. Woman's influence in the government of our Territory is a terror only to evil-doers, and they, and they only, are the ones who desire its repeal. Such base slanders as the specimen you sent me excite in the minds of Wyoming citizens only feelings of disgust and contempt for the author, and wonder at the ignorance of any one who is gullible enough to believe them.

In August she received a letter from Lucy Stone, asking if she had been correctly reported by the papers as saying that "the suffragists would advocate any party which would declare for woman suffrage," to which she replied:

I answer "yes," save that I used the pronoun "I" instead of the word "suffragists." I spoke for myself alone, because I know many of our women are so much more intensely Republican or Democratic, Hard-Money or Green-back, Prohibition or License, than they are "Equal Rights for All," that now, as in the past, they will hold the question of woman's enfranchisement in abeyance, while they give their money and their energies to secure the success of one or another of the contending parties, even though it wholly ignore their just claim to a voice in the government. It is not that I have no opinions or preferences on the many grave questions which distract and divide the parties; but it is that, in my judgment, the right of self-government for one-half the people is of far more vital consequence to the nation than any or all other questions.

This has been my position ever since the abolition of slavery, by which the black race were raised from chattels to citizens, and invested also with civil rights equally with the cultured, tax-paying, white women of the country. Have you forgotten the cry "This is the negro's hour," which came back to us in 1866, when we urged the Abolitionists to make common cause with us and demand suffrage as a right for all United States citizens, instead of asking it simply as an expediency for only another class of men? Do you not remember, too how the taunt "false to the negro" was flung into the face of every one of us who insisted that it was "humanity's hour," and that to talk of "freedom without the ballot" was no less "mockery" to woman than to the negro?

If, in those most trying reconstruction years, I could not subordinate the fundamental principle of "Equal Rights for All" to Republican party necessity for negro suffrage—if, in that fearful national emergency, I would not sacrifice the greater to the less—I surely can not and will not today hold any of the far less important party questions paramount to that most sacred principle of our republic. So long as you and I and all women are political slaves, it ill becomes us to meddle with the weightier discussions of our sovereign masters. It will be quite time enough for us, with self-respect, to declare ourselves for or against any party upon the intrinsic merit of its policy, when men shall recognize us as their political equals, duly register our names and respectfully count our opinions at the ballot-box, as a constitutional right—not as a high crime, punishable with "$500 fine or six months' imprisonment, or both, at the discretion of the court."

If all the "suffragists" of all the States could see eye to eye on this point, and stand shoulder to shoulder against every party and politician not fully and unequivocally committed to "Equal Rights for Women," we should become at once a moral balance of power which could not fail to compel the party of highest intelligence to proclaim woman suffrage the chief plank of its platform. "In union alone there is strength." Until that good day comes, I shall continue to invoke the party in power, and each party struggling to get into power, to pledge itself to the emancipation of our enslaved half of the people; and in turn, I shall promise to do all a "subject" can do, for the success of the party which thus declares its purpose "to undo the heavy burdens and let the oppressed go free."

[Footnote 91: That women will, by voting, lose nothing of man's courteous, chivalric attention and respect is admirably proven by the manner in which Congress, in the midst of the most anxious and perplexing presidential conflict in our history, received their appeals for a Sixteenth Amendment protecting the rights of women. In both Houses, by unanimous consent, the petitions were presented and read in open session, and the most prominent senators impressed upon the Senate the importance of the question.... The ladies naturally feel greatly encouraged by the evident interest of both parties in the proposed amendment.—Washington Star.

The time has evidently arrived when demands for a recognition of the personal, civil and political rights of one-half—unquestionably the better half—of the people can not be laughed down or sneered down, and recent indications are that they can not much longer be voted down. The speaker of the House set a commendable example by proposing that the petitions be delivered in open session, to which there was no objection. The early advocates of equal rights for women—Hoar, Kelley, Banks, Kasson, Lawrence and Lapham—were, if possible, surpassed in courtesy by those who are not committed, but are beginning to see that a finer element, in the body politic would clear the vision, purify the atmosphere and help to settle many vexed questions on the basis of exact and equal justice. In the Senate the unprecedented courtesy was extended to women of half an hour's time on the floor and while this kind of business has usually been transacted with an attendance of from seven to ten senators, it was observed that only two out of the twenty-six who had Sixteenth Amendment petitions to present were out of their seats.—National Republican.]

[Footnote 92: For the first time in twenty years Miss Anthony missed the May Suffrage Anniversary in New York City.]

[Footnote 93: At Beatrice, Neb., Miss Anthony met for the first time Mrs. Clara B. Colby, who said in a bright letter received soon afterwards: "Everybody was delighted with your lecture, except one man who sat there with a child on each arm, and he said you never looked at him or gave him a bit of credit for it."]



CHAPTER XXIX.

SENATE COMMITTEE REPORT—PRESS COMMENT.

1879-1880.

At the beginning of 1879 Miss Anthony put all lecture work aside until after the Washington convention, January 9 and 10. The thunderbolts forged by the resolution committee were a little more fiery even than those of former years, and the combined workmanship of the two Vulcans, Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony, is quite apparent, with vivid sparks from the chairman, Mrs. Spencer:

Resolved, That the Forty-fifth Congress, in ignoring the individual petitions of more than 300 women of high social standing and culture, asking for the removal of their political disabilities, while promptly enacting special legislation for the removal of those of every man who petitioned, illustrates the indifference of Congress to the rights of a sex deprived of political power.

WHEREAS, Senator Blaine says it is the very essence of tyranny to count any citizens in the basis of representation who are denied a voice in the laws and a choice in their rulers; therefore

Resolved, That counting women in the basis of representation, while denying them the right of suffrage, is compelling them to swell the number of their tyrants and is an unwarrantable usurpation of power over one-half the citizens of this republic.

WHEREAS, In President Hayes' last message, he makes a truly paternal review of the interests of this republic, both great and small, from the army, the navy and our foreign relations, to the ten little Indians in Hampton, Va., our timber on the western mountains, and the switches of the Washington railroads; from the Paris Exposition, the postal service, the abundant harvests, and the possible bulldozing of some colored men in various southern districts, to cruelty to live animals and the crowded condition of the mummies, dead ducks and fishes in the Smithsonian Institute—yet forgets to mention 20,000,000 women robbed of their social, civil and political rights; therefore

Resolved, That a committee of three be appointed to wait upon the President and remind him of the existence of one-half the American people ....

WHEREAS, All the vital principles involved in the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments have been denied in their application to women by courts, legislatures and political parties; therefore

Resolved, That it is logical that these amendments should fail to protect even the male African for whom said courts, legislatures and parties declare they were expressly designed and enacted.

WHEREAS, The general government has refused to exercise federal power to protect women in their right to vote in the various States and Territories; therefore

Resolved, That it should forbear to exercise federal power to disfranchise the women of Utah, who have had a more just and liberal spirit shown them by Mormon men than Gentile women in the States have yet received from their rulers.

WHEREAS, The proposed legislation for Chinese women on the Pacific slope and for outcast women in our cities, and the opinion of the press that no respectable woman should be seen in the streets after dark, are all based upon the presumption that woman's freedom must be forever sacrificed to man's license; therefore

Resolved, That the ballot in woman's hand is the only power by which she can restrain the liberty of those men who make our streets and highways dangerous to her, and secure the freedom which belongs to her by day and by night.

An address to President Hayes, asking that in his next message he recommend that women should be protected in their civil and political rights, was signed by Mrs. Stanton, Miss Anthony and Mrs. Gage. Several ladies, by appointment, had a private audience in the President's library and a courteous and friendly hearing. The petition for a Sixteenth Amendment was sent in printed form to every member of Congress, presented in the Senate by Vice-President Wheeler and, at the request of Senator Ferry, was read at length and referred to the committee on privileges and elections. This was done by the special desire of its chairman, Senator Oliver P. Morton, of Indiana, who stated that he wished to bring in a report in favor of the amendment.[94]

[Autograph: O.P. Morton]

Before the committee could act upon this question Senator Morton passed away. An adverse report was presented by his successor, Senator Bainbridge Wadleigh, of New Hampshire, June 14, 1878. Among many severe scorings received by this honorable gentleman, the following from Mary Clemmer will serve as an example:

... You can not be unconscious of the fact that a new race of women is born into the world who, while they lack no womanly attribute, are the peers of any man in intellect and aspiration. It will be impossible long to deny to such women that equality before the law granted to the lowest creature that crawls, if he happen to be a man; denied to the highest creature that asks it, if she happen to be a woman.

On what authority, save that of the gross regality of physical strength, do you deny to a thoughtful, educated, tax-paying person the common rights of citizenship because she is a woman? I am a property-owner, the head of a household. By what right do you assume to define and curtail for me my prerogatives as a citizen, while as a tax-payer you make not the slightest distinction between me and a man? Leave to my own perception what is proper for me as a lady, to my own discretion what is wise for me as a woman, to my own conscience what is my duty to my race and to my God. Leave to unerring nature to protect the subtle boundaries which define the distinctive life and action of the sexes, while you as a legislator do everything in your power to secure to every creature of God an equal chance to make the best and most of himself.

If American men could say, as Huxley says, "I scorn to lay a single obstacle in the way of those whom nature from the beginning has so heavily burdened," the sexes would cease to war, men and women would reign together, the equal companions, friends, helpers and lovers that nature intended they should be. But what is love, tenderness, protection, even, unless rooted in justice? Tyranny and servitude, that is all, brute supremacy, spiritual slavery. By what authority do you say that the country is not prepared for a more enlightened franchise, for political equality, if even six women citizens, earnest, eloquent, long-suffering, come to you and demand both?

All the women's papers expressed indignation, and there was general rejoicing when, at the next election, Mr. Wadleigh was superseded by Hon. Henry W. Blair.

The first favorable consideration this question ever received from the Senate was the minority report of this committee, signed by Senators George F. Hoar, John H. Mitchell and Angus Cameron, an unanswerable argument for the enfranchisement of women.[95] It declared that "the people of the United States are committed to the doctrine of universal suffrage by their constitution, their history and their opinions, and by it they must stand or fall." One week later the bill admitting women to practice before the Supreme Court passed the Senate, grandly advocated by Senators McDonald, Sargent and Hoar.

[Autograph: I am yrs very truly Geo F Hoar]

After the convention Miss Anthony went to Tenafly with Mrs. Stanton for a few days, to aid in disentangling the mass of material which was being prepared for the History; then started again into the lecture field, commencing at Skowhegan, Me. She lectured through New Hampshire and Vermont, taking long sleigh-rides from point to point, through wind and sleet, but comforted by the thought that many of her audience had done likewise to receive the gospel she preached. On her way westward she stopped at home for one short day, the first for four months, and then started on the old route through the States of the Middle West, this year adding Kentucky to the list. It is not essential to a full appreciation of her work to follow in detail these tours, which extended through a number of years and were full of pleasant as well as disagreeable features; nor is it possible to quote extensively the comments of the press. Miss Anthony undoubtedly has been as widely written up as any lecturer, and she seldom received less than a column in each paper of every town visited. Large numbers of these notices have been carefully preserved in those wonderful scrap-books which cover a period of fifty years.

At first her demands seemed so radical and the idea of a woman on the platform was so contrary to the precedent of all the ages, that the tone of the press, almost without exception, was contemptuous or denunciatory. As the justice of her claims began to dawn upon the minds of enlightened people, as many other prominent women joined in advocating the same reforms, and as these were adopted, one after another, without serious consequences, the public mind awakened to the remarkable change which was being wrought, and in a large measure gave its approval. When the masses of people throughout the country came to see and hear and know Miss Anthony, they resented the way in which she had been misrepresented. There was in her manner and words so much of dignity, earnestness and sincerity that "those who came to scoff remained to pray," and this change of sentiment was nowhere so marked as in the newspapers. Even those who differed radically from her views paid tribute to the persistence with which she had urged them and the sacrifices she had made for them during the past thirty years. Not only had there been developed a recognition of her high purposes and noble life, but also of her great intellectual ability and clear comprehension of all the issues of the day. An extract from the Terre Haute Express, February 12, 1879, illustrates this:

Miss Anthony's lecture was full of fine passages and strong appeals, and replete with well-stated facts in support of her arguments. She has wonderful command of language, and her speech at times flows with such rapidity that no reporter could do her justice or catch a tithe of the brilliance of her sayings. Moreover, there are not half of our public men who are nearly so well posted in the political affairs of our country as she, or who, knowing them, could frame them so solidly in argument. If the women of the nation were half so high-minded or even half so earnest, their title to the franchise might soon be granted.[96]

Another Indiana paper thus voiced the changing sentiment: "The fact is, that like the advance agent of any great reform—especially if a woman—Susan B. Anthony has been so belied and maligned by the press in years gone by that many who do not stop to think had come to believe her a perfect ogre, a cross-grained, incongruous old maid whom nobody could like, when the truth of the matter is, one has but to look at and listen to her, either in public or private, to realize that she is a pure, generous, deep-thinking, womanly woman. Simply because she has lived her own life, spoken her own thoughts and stood upon her own platform, the masses have condemned her; but history has already recorded her as one of the most earnest, hard-working reformers of the day. If the women of this country only knew how many changes and ameliorations have been made in the laws regarding themselves through her unselfish, persistent efforts, at her approach they would all rise up and call her blessed." But that there still existed editors of the old-time caliber, this extract from the Richmond, Ky., Herald, October 29, 1879, shows:

Miss Anthony is above the medium height for women, dresses plainly, is uncomely in person, has rather coarse, rugged features and masculine manners. Her piece, which doubtless she has been studying for thirty or forty years, was very well delivered for a woman, containing no original thought, but full of old hackneyed ideas, which every female suffrage shrieker has hurled from the stump against "ignorant men and small boys," for time out of mind all over this country and every other country where they could command an audience of curious people willing to throw away an hour or two on a vain, futile and foolish harangue, proposing to transform men into women and women into men. Such dissatisfied females should not hurl anathemas at men, forsooth, because they happened to be born into the world women instead of men. God alone is responsible for the difference between the sexes, and he is able to bear it. Men are not to blame that women are women, for there is not a man in this whole land who wouldn't rather have a boy baby than a gal baby any time. There never was a newly-married man when he learned that his first born was a girl, that didn't try to tear out his hair by the roots because it wasn't a boy.... If this tirade against men is to be persisted in, we see no escape for man except to quit his foolishness and have no more children, unless he can have some sort of guarantee that they will all be boys. It will have come to a strange pass indeed when the good women of this land, who, as mothers, have the nurture, training and admonition of every boy from his cradle to mature manhood, are unwilling to trust in the hands of their own offspring the destinies of the nation.

That such an attack can not be attributed to sectional prejudice may be proved by this extract from a column of vituperation in the Grand Rapids, Mich., Times, during this same trip, headed "Spinster Susan's Suffrage Show:"

A "miss" of an uncertain number of years, more or less brains, a slimsy figure, nut-cracker face and store teeth, goes raiding about the country attempting to teach mothers and wives their duty.... As is the yellow-fever to the South, the grasshopper to the plains, and diphtheria to our northern cities, so is Susan B. Anthony and her class to all true, pure, lovely women. The sirocco of the desert blows no hotter or more tainting breath in the face of the traveller, than does this woman against all men who do not believe as she does, and no pestilence makes sadder havoc among them than would Susan B. Anthony if she had the power. The women who make homes, who are sources of comfort to husbands, fathers, brothers, sisters or themselves, who wish to keep sacred all that goes to make their lives noble, refined and worth the living, will be as diametrically opposed to the lecturer of last evening as are most intelligent men. Susan B. Anthony may find her remedy in suffrage, but alas! there is no remedy for us against Susan and her ilk.

Each lecture usually was followed by letters not only from friends but from entire strangers, asking her forgiveness for having misjudged her so many years, and closing something like this from a lady in St. Paul, Minn.: "For the last ten years your name has been familiar to me through the newspapers, or rather through newspaper ridicule, and has always been associated with what was pretentious and wholly unamiable. Your lecture tonight has been a revelation to me. I wanted to come and touch your hand, but I felt too guilty. Henceforth I am the avowed defender of woman suffrage. Never again shall a word of mine be heard derogatory to the noble women who are working with heart and hand for the best welfare of humanity."

A two-column interview in the Chicago Tribune during this tour gives Miss Anthony's views on many public matters, concluding thus:

"If men would only think of the question without paying attention to prejudice or precedent, simply as one of political economy, they would soon begin to regard woman, and woman's rights, just as they regard themselves and their own rights," said she.

"The W.C.T.U. are doing good work, are they not?"

"Yes, Miss Willard is doing noble work, but I can not coincide with her views, and my new lecture, 'Will Home Protection Protect,' will combat them. The officer who holds his position by the votes of men who want free whiskey, can not prosecute the whiskey-sellers. The district-attorney and the judge can not enforce the law when they know that to do so will defeat them at the next election. If women had votes the officials would no longer fear to enforce the law, as they would know that though they lost the votes of 5,000 whiskey-sellers and drinkers, they would gain those of 20,000 women. Miss Willard has a lever, but she has no fulcrum on which to place it."

"Where do you find the strongest antipathy to woman suffrage?"

"In the fears of various parties that it might he disastrous to their interests. The Protestants fear it lest there should be a majority of Catholic women to increase the power of that church; the free-thinkers are afraid that, as the majority of church-members are women, they would put God in the Constitution; the free-whiskey men are opposed because they think women would vote down their interests; the Republicans would put a suffrage plank in their platform if they knew they could secure the majority vote of the women, and so would the Democrats, but each party fears the result might help the other. Thus, you see, we can not appeal to the self-interest of anybody and this is our great source of weakness."

It was decided to bold this year's May Anniversary in St. Louis instead of New York, and all arrangements having been made by Virginia L. Minor and Phoebe Couzins, the convention opened formally on the evening of May 7, to quote the newspapers, "in the presence of a magnificent audience which packed every part of St. George's Hall, crowding gallery and stairs and leaving hardly standing room in the aisles." They also paid many compliments to the intellectual character of the audience, its evident sympathy with the cause for which the convention was assembled, and the elegant costumes worn by the ladies both in the body of the house and on the platform. Mrs. Minor presided and a beautiful address of welcome was delivered by Miss Couzins. The ladies were invited to the Merchants' Exchange by its president, and also visited the Fair grounds by invitation of the board. Miss Couzins gave a reception at her home, and the evening before the convention opened, Mrs. Minor entertained the delegates informally. Of this latter occasion the Globe-Democrat said:

Miss Susan B. Anthony, perhaps the only lady present of national reputation, commanded attention at a glance. Her face is one which would attract notice anywhere; full of energy, character and intellect, the strong lines soften on a closer inspection. There is a good deal that is "pure womanly" in the face which has been held up to the country so often as a gaunt and hungry specter's crying for universal war upon mankind. The spectacles sit upon a nose strong enough to be masculine, but hide eyes which can beam with kindliness as well as flash with wit, irony and satire. Angular she may be—"angular as a Lebanon Shakeress" she said the New York Herald once termed her—but if so, the irregularities of outline were completely hidden under the folds of the modest and dignified black silk which covered her most becomingly.

At this convention occurred that touching scene which has been so often described, when May Wright Sewall presented Miss Anthony, to her complete surprise, with a beautiful floral offering from the delegates. The Globe-Democrat thus reports:

Miss Anthony, visibly affected, responded: "Mrs. President and Friends: I am not accustomed to demonstrations of gratitude or of praise. I don't know how to behave tonight. Had you thrown stones at me, had you called me hard names, had you said I should not speak, had you declared I had done women more harm than good and deserved to be burned at the stake; had you done anything, or said anything, against the cause which I have tried to serve for the last thirty years, I should have known how to answer, but now I do not. I have been as a hewer of wood and a drawer of water to this movement. I know nothing and have known nothing of oratory or rhetoric. Whatever I have done has been done because I wanted to see better conditions, better surroundings, better circumstances for women. Now, friends, don't expect me to make any proper acknowledgments for such a demonstration as has been made here tonight. I can not; I am overwhelmed."

As the association wished to continue Mrs. Stanton at the head, they created the office of vice-president-at-large and elected Miss Anthony to fill it. Senator Sargent's term having expired, he returned with his family to San Francisco, and Mrs. Jane H. Spofford was elected national treasurer in place of Mrs. Sargent, who had served so acceptably for six years. Her return to California was deeply regretted by Miss Anthony. From the time of their first acquaintance, on that long snow-bound journey in 1871, they had been devoted friends, and on all her annual trips to Washington she was a guest at the spacious and comfortable home of the Sargents. The senator always was a true and consistent friend of suffrage, and frequently said to Miss Anthony: "Tell my wife what you want done and, if she indorses it, I will try to bring it about." Mrs. Sargent was of a serene, philosophical nature, with an unwavering faith in the evolution of humanity into a broader and better life. She was thoroughly without personal ends to serve, ready to receive new ideas and those who brought them, weigh them carefully in her well-balanced mind and pronounce the judgment which was usually correct. The closing of their Washington house was a severe loss to the many who had enjoyed their free and gracious hospitality.

On May 24, 1879, Miss Anthony received notice of the death of her old and revered fellow-laborer, Wm. Lloyd Garrison. She could not attend the funeral but wrote at once, saying in part:

The telegrams of the last few days had prepared us for this morning's tidings that your dear father and humanity's devoted friend had passed on to the beyond, where so many of his brave co-workers had gone before; and where his devoted life-companion, your precious mother, awaited his coming.... It is impossible for me to express my feelings of love and respect, of honor and gratitude, for the life, the words, the works, of your father; but you all know, I trust, that few mortals had greater veneration for him than I. His approbation was my delight; his disapproval, my regret.... That each and all of you may strive to be to the injustice of your day and generation what he was to that of his, is the best wish—the best aspiration—I can offer. Blessed are you indeed, that you mourn so true, so noble, so grand a man as your loved and loving father.

In her diary that night she wrote: "I sent a letter, but how paltry it seemed compared to what was in my heart. Why can I not put my thought into words?"

The last of May she went home, having lectured and worked every day since the previous October. She records with much delight that she has now snugly tucked away in bank $4,500, the result of her last two lecture seasons. During the one just closed she spoke 140 nights, besides attending various conventions. This bank account did not represent all she had earned, for she always gave with a lavish hand. How much she has given never can be known, but in the year 1879, for instance, one friend acknowledges the receipt of $50 to enable her to buy a dress and other articles so that she can attend the Washington convention. Another writes: "I have just learned that the $25 you handed me to pay my way home from the meeting had been given you to pay your own." To an old and faithful fellow-worker, now in California, she sends by express a warm flannel wrapper. There is scarcely a month which does not record some gift varying from $100 in value down to a trinket for remembrance. Each year she contributed $100 to the suffrage work, besides many smaller sums at intervals, and the account-books show that her benefactions were many. She never spared money if an end were to be accomplished, and never failed to keep an engagement, no matter at what risk or expense. On several occasions she chartered an engine, even though the cost was more than she would receive for the lecture. As she was now approaching her sixtieth birthday, relatives and friends were most anxious that she should lay aside part of her earnings for a time when even her indomitable spirit might have to succumb to physical weakness, but she herself never seemed to feel any anxiety as to the future.

Notwithstanding her own disastrous experiment, Miss Anthony never ceased to desire a woman's paper, one which not only should present the questions relating directly to women but should be edited and controlled entirely by women, and discuss all the issues of the day. Scattered through the correspondence of years are letters on this subject, either wanting to resurrect The Revolution or to start a new paper. At intervals some wealthy woman would seem half-inclined to advance money for the purpose and then hope would be revived, only to be again destroyed. During the summer of 1872 a clever journalist, Mrs. Helen Barnard, had edited a paper called the Woman's Campaign, supported by Republican funds. Miss Anthony had hoped to convert this into her ideal paper after the election, and spent considerable time in trying to form a stock company. A large amount was subscribed but not enough, and all was returned by Mrs. Sargent, then national treasurer. Sarah L. Williams, editor of the woman's department of the Toledo Blade, started a bright suffrage paper called the Ballot-Box and edited it for several years. Miss Anthony assisted her in every possible way, and spoiled the effect of many a fine speech by asking at its close for subscribers to this paper. In 1878, '79 and '80 she secured 2,500 names. In 1878 Mrs. Williams turned her paper over to Matilda Joslyn Gage, who added National Citizen to the title. Miss Anthony's and Mrs. Stanton's names were placed at the head as corresponding editors, and the paper was ably conducted by Mrs. Gage, but it had not the financial backing necessary to success; when Miss Anthony ceased lecturing, new subscribers no longer came and, after much tribulation, it finally suspended in 1881.

While Miss Anthony continued for many years to cherish this idea of a distinctively woman's paper, the daily press grew more and more liberal, devoting larger space to the interests of women every year, and she became of the opinion that possibly the most effective work might be accomplished through this medium. She held, however, that there should be one woman upon each paper whose special business it should be to look after this department, and who should be permitted to discuss not only the "woman question" but all others from a woman's standpoint. As newspapers are now managed, the readers have only man's views of all the vital issues attracting public attention. Woman occupies a subordinate position and must write on all subjects in a spirit which will be acceptable to the masculine head of the paper; so the public gets in reality his thought and not hers. She had come to see, also, that the newspaper work should be a leading and distinctive feature of the National Association to a far greater extent than hitherto had been attempted, and which, until of late years, had not been possible. No man or woman ever had a higher opinion of the influence of the press, which she considered the most powerful agency in the world for good or for evil.

In the summer of 1879, Miss Anthony received from her friend, A. Bronson Alcott, a complimentary ticket for three seasons of lectures at the Concord School of Philosophy; but the living questions of the day were too pressing for her to withdraw to this classic and sequestered retreat, outside the busy and practical world.

[Autograph: A. Bronson Alcott]

During the decade from 1870 to 1880, there was a large accession of valuable workers to the cause of woman suffrage and many new friends came into Miss Anthony's life. Among these were May Wright Sewall; the sisters, Julia and Rachel Foster; Clara B. Colby; Zerelda G. Wallace; Frances E. Willard; J. Ellen Foster; the wife and three talented daughters of Cassius M. Clay, Mary B., Laura and Sallie Clay Bennett; M. Louise Thomas; Elizabeth Boynton Harbert and others, who became her devoted adherents and fellow-workers, and whose homes and hospitality she enjoyed during all the years which followed.

At the close of her lecture season in 1879 she was able to spend Christmas and New Year's at her own home for the first time in many years; but she left on January 2 to fill engagements, reaching Washington on the eve of the National Convention, which assembled at Lincoln Hall, January 21, 1880. As Mrs. Stanton was absent, Miss Anthony presided over the sessions. During this meeting, 250 new petitions for a Sixteenth Amendment, signed by over 12,000 women, were sent to Congress, besides over 300 petitions from individual women praying for a removal of their political disabilities. These were presented by sixty-five different representatives. Hon. T.W. Ferry, of Michigan, in the Senate, and Hon. George B. Loring, of Massachusetts, in the House, introduced a resolution for a Sixteenth Amendment. This with all the petitions was referred to the judiciary committees, each of which granted a hearing of two hours to the ladies. Among the delegates who addressed them was Julia Smith Parker, of Glastonbury, Conn., at that time over eighty years old, who with her sister Abby annually resisted the payment of taxes because they were denied representation, and whose property was in consequence annually seized and sold. Mrs. Zerelda G. Wallace, the mother so beautifully pictured in Ben Hur, addressed a congressional committee for the first time, and among the other speakers were Mrs. Gage, Mrs. Blake, Miss Couzins, Mrs. Emma Mont McRae, of Indiana, and Mrs. Elizabeth Lyle Saxon, of Louisiana. It was at this hearing that Senator Edmunds complimented Miss Anthony by saying, "Most speeches on this question are platform oratory; yours is argument." Through the influence of Hon. E.G. Lapham, all these addresses were printed in pamphlet form.

THE END