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DR. ANNA HOWARD SHAW.

Vice-President-at-Large of the National American Woman Suffrage Association 1 892- 1 904 and President 1904-1915.

. »

TH HISTORY

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WOMAN SUFFRAGE

RATED WITH COPPERPLATE AND PHOTOGRAVURE ENGRAVINGS

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(P. u 9 3

1900—1920

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THE HISTORY

OF

WOMAN SUFFRAGE

EDITED BY

IDA HUSTED HARPER

ILLUSTRATED WITH COPPERPLATE AND PHOTOGRAVURE ENGRAVINGS

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VOLUMES \

VOLUME V 6) . ^| • 9 3 »

1900—1920

AFTER SKVKNTY YEARS CAME THE VICTORY

NATIONAL AMERICAN WOMAN SUFFRAGE ASSOCIATION

C'ul'YKIC.M I, 1>)J2, BY

NATIONAL AMI-KUAN WOMAN SIIIK.\<,I: ASSOCIATION

PRINTED AND BOUND BY

J. J. LITTLE & IVES COMPANY

NEW YORK

PREFACE

The History of Woman Suffrage is comprised in six volumes axe-raging about one thousand pages each, of which the two just finished are the last. While it is primarily a history of this great movement in the United States it covers to some degree that of the whole world. The chapter on Great Britain was prepared for Volume VI by Mrs. Millicent Garrett Fawcett, leader of the movement there for half a century. The accounts of the gaining of woman suffrage in other countries come from the highest authorities. Their contest was short compared to that in the two oldest countries on the globe with a constitutional form of government — the United States and Great Britain — and in the former it began nearly twenty years earlier than in the latter. The effort of women in the "greatest republic on earth" to obtain a voice in its government began in 1848 and ended in complete victory in 1920. In Great Britain it is not yet entirely accomplished, although in all her colonies except Smith Africa women vote on the same terms as men.

Doubtless other histories of this world wide movement will

•.n't ten but at present the student will find himself largely

confined to these six volumes. This is especially true of the

United States and many of the documents of the earliest period

would have been lost for all time if they had not been preserved

in the first three volumes. These also contain much information

which does not exist elsewhere regarding the struggle of women

'ther rights besides that of the franchise. That the materials

were collected and cared for until they could be utilized was

due to Miss Susan B. Anthony's appreciation of their value. The

story of the trials and tribulations of preparing those volumes

during ten years is told in Volume II, page 612, and in the

•ice of Volume IV. They were written and edited principally

by Miss Anthony and Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton and covered

their rom the beginning of the century to iSSj. The \\-rit

when they l»rg;m in 1877 !•• bring out one small

iii

IV PREFACE

volume, perhaps only a large pamphlet. When these three huge volumes were finished they still had enough material for a fourth, which never was used.

Miss Anthony continued her habit of preserving the records and in 1900, when at the age of 80 she resigned the presidency of the National American Woman Suffrage Association, she immediately commenced preparations for another volume of the History. She called to her assistance Mrs. Ida Husted Harper, who had recently finished her Biography, and in her home in Rochester, N. Y., they spent the next two years on the book, Mrs. Stanton, who was 85 years old, taking the keenest interest in the work.1 When the manuscript was completed hundreds of pages had to be eliminated in order to bring it within the compass of one volume of 1,144 pages.

Miss Anthony then said : "Twenty years from now another volume will be written and it will record universal suffrage for women by a Federal Amendment." Her prophecy was fulfilled to the letter. She put upon younger women the duty of collecting and preserving the records and this was done in some degree by officers of the association. In 1917, after the legacy of Mrs. Frank Leslie had been received by Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, president of the association, she formed the Leslie Suffrage Com- mission and established a Bureau of Suffrage Education, one feature of which was a research department. Here under the direction of an expert an immense amount of material was collected from many sources and arranged for use. After the strenuous work for a Federal Suffrage Amendment had brought it very near, Mrs. Catt turned her attention to the publishing ol the last volume of the History of Woman Suffrage while the resources of the large national headquarters in New York and the archives of the research bureau were available, and she re- quested Mrs. Harper to prepare it. The work was begun Jan 2, 1019, and it was to be entirely completed in eighteen months. No account had been taken of the enormous growth of the suffrage movement. It had entered every State in the Union and it extended around the world. It was occupying the

1 See Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony, pages 1210, 1256, 1269. Placing in libraries, 1279 to 1282. Bequeathed to National Suffrage Association, History of Woman Suffrage, Volume V, page 205.

PREFACE V

attention of Parliaments and Legislatures. In the United States conventions had multiplied and campaigns had increased in number; it had become a national issue with a center in every State and defeats and victories were of constant record.

To select from the mass of material, to preserve the most important, to condense, to verify, was an almost impossible task. A comparison will illustrate the difference between the work re< i u i red on Volume IV and that on the present volumes. The Minutes of the national convention in 1901 filled 130 pages of e type; those of the convention of 1919 filled 320 pages, many of small type; reports of congressional hearings increased in proportion. Of the State chapters, describing all the work that had been done before 1901, 29 contained less than 8 pages, 18 of these less than 5 and 7 less than 3; only 6 had over i j s. For Volume VI not more than half a dozen State writers sent manuscript for less than 14 and the rest ranged from 20 to 95 pages. The report on Canada in Volume IV occupied pages; in this volume it fills 18. The chapter on Woman Suffrage in Europe outside of Great Britain found plenty of room in 4 pages; in this one it requires 32.

The very full reports of the national suffrage conventions, the congressional documents, the files of the Woman's Journal and the Woman Citizen and the newspapers furnished a wealth of material on the general status of the question in the United Slates. It was, however, the evolution of the movement in the States that gave it national strength and compelled the action which always was the ultimate goal. The attcmp; to give the story of every State, in many of which no records had been kept or those which had were lost or destroyed; the difficulty in getting correct dates and proper names U all ralculations on the amount of material and length of time, ult the time lengthened to three and a half years and the one voln: iiided into two, with enough excellent matter

eliminated to have made a third. In each of these chapters will be inplete history of the effort to seanv the

by means of the State constitution, also the part taken t«> obtain tin ' Amendment :m;l the action of the

tnre in latilsm. meiMmcnt.

Vi PREFACE

The accounts of the annual conventions of the National American Suffrage Association demonstrate as nothing else could do the commanding force of that organization, for fifty years the foundation and bulwark of the movement. The hearings before committees of every Congress indicate the never ceasing effort to obtain an amendment to the Federal Constitution and the extracts from the speeches show the logic, the justice and the patriotism of the arguments made in its behalf. The delay of that body in responding will be something for future genera- tions to marvel at. In Chapter XX will be found the full history of this amendment by which all women were enfranchised.

In one chapter is a graphic account of the effort for half a century to get a woman suffrage "plank" into the national plat- forms of the political parties and its success in 1916, with one for the Federal Amendment in 1920. A chapter is devoted to the forming of the National League of Woman Voters after the women of the United States had become a part of the electorate. All questions as to the part taken in the war of 1914-1918 by the women who were working for their enfranchisement are conclusively answered in the chapter on War Service of Organized Suffragists. In one chapter will be found an account of other organizations besides the National American Association that worked to obtain the vote for women and of those that worked against it. A full description is given of the organizing of the International Woman Suffrage Alliance and its congresses in the various cities of Europe.

Volumes V and VI take up the history of the contest in the United States from the beginning of the present century to Aug. 26, 1920, when Secretary of State Bainbridge Colby pro- claimed that the I9th Amendment, submitted by Congress on June 4, 1919, had been ratified by the Legislatures of three- fourths of the States and was now a part of the National Constitution. This ended a movement for political liberty which had continued without cessation for over seventy years. The story closes with uncounted millions of women in all parts of the world possessing the same voice as men in their government and enjoying the same rights as citizens.

TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER I.

PAGE

FOUNDING OF NATIONAL ASSOCIATION 3

Work of the National American Woman Suffrage Association for an amendment to the Federal Constitution, to State consti- tutions and for other reforms — Annual convention in Minne- apolis in 1901 — Mrs. Stanton's address on the Church, the Bible and Woman Suffrage — Miss Anthony's and others' opin- ions— President's address of Mrs. Catt on obstacles — Dr. Shaw's vice-president's address on Anti-suffragists — Plan for national work — Miss Anthony's report on work with Congress — Protest against "regulated vice" in Manila — New York Sun and Woman Suffrage — Discriminating against women in government de- partments— A tribute to the national suffrage conventions.

CHAPTER II.

THE NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1902 23

Meeting in Washington, D. C, of committee to form an Inter- national Woman Suffrage Alliance — Greeting of Clara Bar- ton to foreign delegates — Letters from Norway and Germany —Response of Mrs. Friedland of Russia — Mrs. Catt's presi- dent's address on World Progress leading to the International Alliance — Mrs. Stanton's address on Educated Suffrage — Miss Anthony's introduction of Pioneers — Addresses on The New Woman and The New Man — Women in New York municipal election — Miss Anthony's 82d birthday — Mr. Blackwell on Presidential suffrage for women — Hearings before committees of Congress — Addresses of Norwegian and Australian dele- gates before Senate Committee — Dr. Shaw's plea for a com- mittee to investigate conditions in Equal Suffrage States — Speeches of Russian, Swedish and English delegates — Mrs. Catt's insistence on a Congressional Committee to investigate the working of woman suffrage where it exists.

CHAPTER III.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1903 55

Very successful meeting in New Orleans — Description of Picayune — Ovation to Miss Anthony and Mrs. Caroline E. Merrick — Dr. Sh.v .nse — Mrs. Catt's president's address

—Times Democrat brings up Negro Question, official board of the association states its position — Visit to colored women's club — Reports of officers — Presidential suffrage for women — Colby's report mi Industrial Problems relating to Women and Children — Addresses of Dr. Henry Dixon Bruns, M. J.

vii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE

Sanders, president of Progressive Union— Memorial service for Mrs. Stanton — Speeches on Educational Qualification for

voting "Dorothy Dix" on The Woman with the Broom —

Address of Edwin Merrick— Belle Kearney on Woman Suf- frage to insure White Supremacy — Tribute to Misses Kate and Jean Gordon.

CHAPTER IV.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1904 86

Letter of greeting to the convention in Washington from Mrs. Florence Fenwick Miller, suffrage leader in Great Britain — Delegates appointed to International Alliance meeting in Ber- lin— Mrs. Catt's president's address on an Educational Re- quirement for the Suffrage — Address of Mrs. Watson Lister of Australia — Charlotte Perkins Gilman's biological plea for woman suffrage — Report from new headquarters — Addresses on Women and Philanthropy by the Rev. Anna Garlin Spencer and Dr. Samuel J. Barrows — Mrs. Mead on Peace and Mrs. Nathan on The Wage Earner and the Ballot — Miss Anthony's 84th birthday — A Colorado Jubilee, speeches by Governor Alva Adams, Mrs. Grenfell and Mrs. Meredith — Mrs. Terrell asks for moral support of colored women — Declaration of Principles adopted — Mrs. Catt Resigns the Presidency, tributes — Hearings before Congressional Committees — Distinguished testimony from Colorado — Mrs. Catt's strong appeal for a re- port even if adverse.

CHAPTER V.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1905 117

The convention in Portland, Ore., first held in the West — Enthusiastic welcome and great hospitality — Miss Anthony speaks of her visit in 1871 — Speech of Jefferson Myers, presi- dent of the Exposition — Mrs. Duniway on the Pioneers — Dr. Shaw's president's address, answers ex-President Cleveland and Cardinal Gibbons — Committee appointed to interview President Roosevelt — Protest to committee of Congress against statehood constitution for Oklahoma and other Territories — Fine work of Press Committee — Woman's Day at Exposition — Unveiling of Sacajawea statue — Convention adopts Initia- tive and Referendum — Decision to have an amendment cam- paign in Oregon — Tribute to Mr. Blackwell — Mrs. Catt's noble address — Memorial resolutions for eminent members — Speeches by prominent politicians.

CHAPTER VI.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1906 151

The convention held in Baltimore one of the most notable — Miss Anthony, Julia Ward Howe and Clara Barton on the platform — Welcome by Governor Warfield and Collector of the Port Stone — Dr. Shaw scores President Roosevelt's reference

TABLE OF CONTENTS IX

PAGE

to Women in Industry in his message to Congress — Ridicules Cardinal Gibbons' and Dr. Lyman Abbott's recent pronounce- ments on woman suffrage — Organization of College Women's League — Florence Kelley speaks on Child Labor — College Women's Evening — Women professors from five large colleges speak — Week of hospitality by Miss Mary E. Garrett — Speeches on Women in Municipal Government by Wm. Dudley Foulke, Frederick C. Howe, Rudolph Blankenburg, Jane Addams — Miss Anthony speaks her last words to a national suffrage convention — Mrs. Howe's farewell address — President Thomas and Miss Garrett decide to raise large fund for woman suf- frage— Delegates go to Washington for hearings before Con- gn-jssional Committees — Miss Anthony's 86th birthday cele- brated—Her last words on the public platform.

CHAPTER VII.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1907 193

Bishop Fallows welcomes convention to Chicago — Professor Breckinridge on Municipal Housekeeping — Florence Kelley on same — Mary McDowell, Anna Nicholes and others on Work- ingwomen's Need of a Vote — Addresses by Professor C. R. Henderson, Hon. Oliver W. Stewart — Memorials and service for Miss Anthony — Organizations for Woman Suffrage — Fare- well letter of Mary Anthony — Rabbi Hirsch on woman suf- frage— Near victories in many States.

CHAPTER VIII.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1908 213

Celebrates 4Oth anniversary in Buffalo — Emily Howland on Spirit of '48 — Kate Gordon describes interview with President Roosevelt — Widespread work of national headquarters — Pro- gram of 1848 convention — Responses to its Resolutions by Mrs. (iilman, Miss Blackwell, Mrs. Blatch, the Rev. Caroline Hartlett Crane and others — The Scriptures and St. Paul ana- lyzed by Judith 1 lyams Douglas — Discussion on the Social Evil led by the Rev. Anna Garlin Spencer— College Women's Eve- ning; addresses by Dr. M. Carey Thomas, Professor Frances Squire Potter, Professor Breckinridge and others — Mrs. Kelley on Laws for Women and Wage Earners — Stirring speech by an Gordon, factory inspector — Maude Miner on Night Courts .vomen — Mrs. William C. Gannett on Woman's Duty — Katharine Reed Balentinc on Disfranchised Influence — Mrs. Philip Snowdcn describes Knglish situation l.r-al Phases of by llarriette Jdhn.M.n Wood I 'n.-ress since 1848 — Mrs. Catt's inspiring addn

CHAPTER IX.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1909 243

Aninia • held in Seattle Delightful journey across

continent— Reception in Spokane— Mrs. Villard tells of open-

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ing of Northern Pacific R. R. — Welcomed to Seattle by Mayor — Elizabeth J. Hauser's report of headquarters work — Mrs. Belmont's offer of headquarters in New York City — Mrs. Mead urges association to work for Peace — Professor Potter's address on College Women and Democracy — Mr. Blackwell's last suffrage convention — Mrs. Avery reports on National Association's petition to Congress — Mary E. Craigie tells of suffrage work with the churches — Professor Potter elected corresponding secretary — Political work for suffrage before elections urged, Illinois cited — Suffrage Day at the Exposition.

CHAPTER X.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1910 ....... 266

Convention returns to Washington after six years — President Taft makes speech of welcome — Delegates show displeasure — Exchange of letters between national officers and the Presi- dent— Official resolution of regret — Comment of Woman's Journal — Report of association's vast work from New York headquarters — Great Petition officially received by Congress — Mrs. Upton resigns as treasurer — Memorial addresses for Mr. Blackwell and Wm. Lloyd Garrison — Alice Paul on "mili- tant" suffrage in Great Britain— "Dorothy Dix" on The Real Reason why Women can not Vote — Max Eastman on Democ- racy and Woman — Mrs. Harper's report as chairman of Na- tional Press Committee — Hearings before Committees of Con- gress; speeches by Dr. Shaw, Mrs. McCulloch, Eveline Gano of New York on teachers' need of the vote; Dr. Anna E. Blount of Chicago on professional women's need; Minnie J. Reynolds on writers signing petitions — U. S. Senator Shafroth's notable speech to Senate Committee — House Committee: Mrs. Raymond Robins, Elizabeth Schauss, factory inspector; Laura J. Graddick of a District Labor Union and Florence Kelley argue for the working women's need of vote — Speeches of Mrs. Upton and Laura Clay.

CHAPTER XI

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1911 310

Convention in Louisville, Ky., celebrates victories in Wash- ington and California — Welcomed by Laura Clay — Mr. Braly tells of California campaign — Mary Ware Dennett, new cor- responding secretary, reports world wide work — Caroline Reilly, new chairman, describes press work in 41 States — Jane Addams, on College League's Evening shows what women might accomplish with the franchise — Dr. Thomas what the suffrage means to college women — Dr. Harvey W. Wiley speaks on Women's Influence in Public Affairs — Katharine Dexter McCormick on Effect of Suffrage Work on Women themselves — Mrs. McCulloch on Equal Guardianship Laws — Church needs Woman Suffrage — Mrs. Desha Breckinridge dis- cusses Prospect for Woman Suffrage in the South — Mrs. Pankhurst receives ovation.

TABLE OF CONTENTS XI

CHAPTER XII.

PAGE

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1912 332

Three victories celebrated at convention in Philadelphia, suf- frage gained in Oregon, Arizona and Kansas — Welcomed by Mayor Blankenburg — Rally in Independence Square — Reports show wonderful progress — An Evening by Men's Suffrage League — Discussion on officers of the association taking part in political campaigns— Great meeting in Metropolitan Opera House, speeches by Julia Lathrop, Miss Addams and Dr. Burghardt DuBois — On last evening addresses by Bishop Darlington, Baroness von Suttner and Mrs. Catt — Hearings before Congressional Committees, Dr. Shaw and Miss Addams presiding — Speeches on Senate side by James Lees Laidlaw, president of Men's League; Jean Nelson Penfield, speaking for women in civic work; Elsie Cole Phillips and Caroline A. Lowe for the wage-earning women — On the House side, Rep- resentatives Raker, Taylor, Lafferty and Berger; Mary E. McDowell, Ida Husted Harper — Colloquy with committee — Klla C. Brehaut speaks for anti-suffrage women.

CHAPTER XIII.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1913 364

Convention opened in Washington Sunday afternoon with mass meeting — Women's trade unions represented by speakers — Victories in Illinois and Alaska — Dr. Shaw's account of Demo- cratic National convention in Baltimore — President Wilson urged to put woman suffrage in his Message — He receives a delegation — Report of year's work for the Federal Amend- ment by Alice Paul, chairman of association's Congressional •mmittee — Objection to Congressional Union — New Con- gressional Committee appointed — Vote on Federal Amend- nt in Senate — Three days' hearings by House Committee on Rules on appeal for a Committee on Woman Suffrage, Dr. Shaw presiding — Speeches by Mrs. Catt, Mrs. Gardener, Mrs. Harper, Jane Addams, Mrs. Breckinridge, Mary R. Beard and Representative Raker — Women's Anti-Suffrage Associations out in force — In rebuttal Miss Blackwell, Mrs. McCulloch and Mrs. Mondell — Representative Mondell closes — Rules Commit- tee refuses the appeal.

CHAPTER XIV.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE C >N OF 1914 398

Convention met in I louse «»t" Representatives at Nashville, wel- comed by Mayor Howse — Dr. Shaw eulogizes Southern women — Governor Hooper welcomes to State — Anne Martin tells of victory in Nevada, Jc.mmtte Knnkin in Montana — National Association's worl ip.iit^is — Dr. Shaw on the War —

Tribute of convention to her — Address by U. S. Senator Luke Lea — Heated com over Shafroth Federal Amendment

— Defense by Ruth Hanna McCormick — Antoinette Funk

xii TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE

before Judiciary Committee — Her "brief" for amendment — Jier report of the campaigns — Miss Clay's and Mrs. Bennett's bill — Committee Hearings: speakers, Mrs. Funk, Mrs. Colby, Mrs. Beard, Crystal Eastman Benedict, Dr. Cora Smith King, Mrs. Gardener — National Anti-Suffrage Association headed by Mrs. Arthur M. Dodge, with array of men and women speakers.

CHAPTER XV.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1915 439

At the convention in Washington defeats and victories to con- sider— First vote in House on Federal Amendment — President Wilson receives delegates — All reports show progress — Dr. Shaw refuses to stand for reelection — Her farewell address — Beautiful ceremonies — Mrs. Catt elected — Ethel M. Smith's report on political work — Congressmen card-indexed — Ruth Hanna McCormick on first House vote — Shafroth Amendment dropped — Conference with Congressional Union, its policy of lighting party in power condemned — Hearing before friendly Senate Suit rage Committee — House Committee controversies with "antis" and Congressional Union — Men "antis" grilled.

CHAPTER XVI.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1916 480

Great meeting in Atlantic City — President Wilson attends and announces his allegiance — His address — Dr. Shaw responds — Mrs. Catt on State campaigns — Shall association work for Federal and State amendments? — Mrs. Catt sounds key-note in speech on The Crisis — Mrs. Dudley, Mrs. Cotnam and Mrs. Valentine represent South — The "golden flier" — Sharp debate on endorsing candidates — Speeches of Owen Lovejoy, Julia Lathrop and Katherine Bement Davis — Important report of Mrs. Roessing on work in Congress; woman suffrage planks in national conventions at Chicago and St. Louis; interview- ing presidential candidates; revised plan for work of associa- tion— Dr. Shaw on Americanism and the Flag.

CHAPTER XVII.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1917 5x3

Convention in Washington under war conditions — Distin- guished reception committee — Delegates interview their Con- gressmen; Association pledges loyalty to Government; its officers in service — New York victory celebrated — Secretary Lane brings President Wilson's greetings — Mrs. Catt's great address to Congress — Maud Wood Park's full report of work with Congress — New Washington headquarters — Report of Leslie Bureau of Suffrage Education — Speech of Secretary of War Baker — Dr. Shaw on Woman's Committee of Council of National Defense — Miss Hay on New York's Socialist vote —

TABLE OF CONTENTS Xlll

PAGF

"Suffrage Schools" begun — Last Hearing before Senate Com- mittee.

CHAPTER XVIII.

NATIONAL SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1918-1919 550

Convention of 1918 first ever omitted — War conditions — Many suffrage gains — Jubilee Convention in St. Louis in 1919 — Mrs. Catt calls for League of Women Voters — Mrs. Shuler's secre- tary's report of greatest year's work, State campaigns, war service, work with Congress — Missouri Legislature gives Presidential suffrage — Mrs. Park's report on congressional work — Votes in House and Senate — President Wilson asks Congress for woman suffrage — Tributes to Pioneers — League of Women Voters formed — Work with Editors — Non-partisan- ship reaffirmed — In Washington: Hearing before new Com- mittee on Woman Suffrage — Dr. Shaw on association's war record — Mrs. Catt's survey of situation; urges committee to talk with President — Ex-Senator Bailey's anti-suffrage speech — Mrs. Catt and Mrs. Park answer — Last suffrage hearing.

CHAPTER XIX.

X \TIO\AT, SUFFRAGE CONVENTION OF 1920 594

Call to convention in Chicago the last — Mrs. Catt's Jubilee speech — Executive Council's recommendations — Mrs. Shuler's secretary's report of year's gains and losses, work in southern States, great effort for Ratification — Mrs. Rogers' last treas- urer's report — Smithsonian Institution gives space for suffrage mementoes — Memorial meeting for Dr. Shaw, college founda- tions— Miss Anthony's centennial celebrated — League of Women Voters perfected.

CHAPTER XX.

KKAI. Sri-KK\<;K AMENDMENT 618

The "war amendments" discriminate against women — National

Association formed for Federal Woman Suffrage Amendment

\\onun vote undi-r the I4th - - Supreme Court decides

them— Eifty \ cars' struggle with Congress for woman

n- inlnicnt — Hearings before committees — Stubborn

opi -Votes and defeats — Support of parties finally

Planks in their platforms— Amendment submitted to

Matures— Strenuous efforts for ratification— Victory at last.

CHAPTER XXL

VARIOUS WOMAN SUFFRAGE ASSOCIATIONS 656

ral Suffrage Association— U. S. Elections Bill— College Women's League—Friends' Equal ! ition— Mi

es — Southern Women' -In-

: national and National Me ;ues — National Worna;

XIV TABLE OF CONTENTS

PACT

Party — Women's Anti-Suffrage Association — Man Suffrage Association.

CHAPTER XXII.

LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS 683

Formed in St. Louis — Mrs. Catt outlines its work — Its eight departments presented — Perfected and officers elected at Chi- cago— Reports from department chairmen — Laws for women demanded — Citizenship Schools — League asks planks in na- tional political conventions — Visits presidential candidates.

CHAPTER XXIII.

WOMAN SUFFRAGE IN PRESIDENTIAL CONVENTIONS 702

Long struggle for planks in national platforms — Refused for nearly fifty years — Woman suffrage by State action approved in 1916 — Federal Amendment endorsed in 1920 — Graphic story of opposition.

CHAPTER XXIV.

WAR SERVICE OF ORGANIZED SUFFRAGISTS 720

Mrs. Catt calls Executive Council of One Hundred to Wash- ington— It sends letter to President Wilson offering services of National American Association — Organizes four departments of work — Mass meeting held, Secretary of War Baker speaks — President expresses approval of the association's work — Woman's Committee of Government Council of National De- fense formed, Dr. Shaw appointed chairman, Mrs. Catt and other leading suffragists made members — Reports of depart- ment heads at National Suffrage convention — Report of as- sociation's Oversea Hospitals, their important work — Anti- suffrage women attack suffrage leaders — After Armistice Mrs. Catt calls meeting in New York, which requests President Wil- son to appoint women delegates to Peace Conference in Paris — Woman's Committee of National Defense ends work — Sec- retary Baker's tribute to Dr. Shaw.

APPENDIX

APPENDIX 741

Moncure D. Conway's address at Mrs. Stanton's funeral — Miss Anthony's last letter to her — National American Asso- ciation's Declaration of Principles — Memorial building in Rochester for Miss Anthony — Speech of Mrs. Catt at Senate hearing in 1910 — Same in 1915 — Review of Shafroth Federal Suffrage Amendment — Different National headquarters — Be- quest of Mrs. Frank Leslie — Memorial tributes to Dr. Shaw — Present Status of National American Association.

INTRODUCTION

A voice in the Government under which one lives is absolutely necessary to personal liberty and the right of a whole people to a voice in their Government is the first requisite for a free country. There must be government by a constitution made with the consent and help of the people which guarantees this right. It is only within the last century and a half that a con- stitutional form of government has been secured by any coun- tries and in the most of those where it now exists, not excepting the United States, it was won through war and bloodshed. Largely for this reason its principal advantage was monopolized by men, who made and carried on war, and who held that such rnment must be maintained by physical force and only those should have a voice in it who could fight for it if necessary. There were many other reasons why those who had thus secured their right to a vote should use their new power to withhold it from women, which was done in every country. Women then had to begin their own contest for what by the law of justice theirs as much as men's when government by constitution established.

Their struggle lasted for nearly three-quarters of a century

in the United States and half a century in Great Britain, the two

institutional governments, and a shorter time in other

countries, but it was a peaceful revolution. Not a drop of

1 was spilled and toward the end of it, when in Great

in the only "militancy" occurred, its leaders gave the

;cst orders that human life must be held sacred. Although

at the la-t the women of Central Europe were enfranchised as

the result of war it was not of their making and their part in

-t on the battlefield. This was the most unequal contest

that . is waged, for one side had to fight without weapons.

It was held ;< ..(.men that I hey were not educated, but the

of all institutions of learning were closed against them;

xv

XVI INTRODUCTION

*

that they were nut taxpayers, although money-earning occupations were barred to them and if married they were not allowed to own property. They were kept in subjection by authority of the Scriptures and were not permitted to expound them from the woman's point of view, and they were prevented from plead- ing their cause on the public platform. When they had largely overcome these handicaps they found themselves facing a political fight without political power.

The long story of the early period of this contest will be found in the preceding volumes of this History and it is one without parallel. No class of men ever strove seventy or even fifty years for the suffrage. In every other reform which had to be won through legislative bodies those who were working for it had the power of the vote over these bodies. In the Introduction to Volume IV is an extended review of the helpless position of woman when in 1848 the first demand for equality of rights was made and her gradual emergence from its bondage. No sudden revolution could have gained it but only the slow processes of evolution. The founding of the public school system with its high schools, from which girls could not be excluded, solved the question of their education and inevitably led to the opening of the colleges. In the causes of temperance and anti- slavery women made their way to the platform and remained to speak for their own. During the Civil War they entered by thousands the places vacated by men and retained them partly from necessity and partly from choice.

One step led to another ; business opportunities increased ; women accumulated property; Legislatures were compelled to revise the laws and the church was obliged to liberalize its interpretation of the Scriptures. Women began to organize; their missionary and charity societies prepared the way to clubs for self -improvement; these in turn broadened into civic organ- izations whose public work carried them to city councils and State Legislatures, where they found themselves in the midst of politics and wholly without influence. Thus they were led into the movement for the suffrage. It was only a few of the clear thinkers, the far seeing, who realized at the beginning that the principal cause of women's inferior position and helplessness

INTRODUCTION

lay in their disfranchisement and until they could be made to see it they were a dead weight on the movement. Men fully understood the power that the vote would place in the hands of women, with a lessening of their own, and in the mass they did not intend to concede it.

The pioneers in the movement for the rights of women, of which the suffrage was only one, contested every inch of ground and little by little the old prejudice weakened, public sentiment was educated, barriers were broken down and women pressed forward. At the opening of the present century, while they had not obtained entire equality of rights, their status had been completely transformed in most respects and they were prepared to get what was lacking. None of these gains, however, had required the permission of the masses of men but only of selected groups, boards of trustees, committees, legislators. It was when women found that with all their rights they were at tremendous disadvantage without political influence and asked for the suf- frage that they learned the difficulty of changing constitutions. They found that either National or State constitutions had to he amended and in the latter case the consent of a majority of all men was necessary. In Volume VI the attempt to obtain the vote through State action is described in 48 chapters and their reading is recommended to those who insisted that this was the way women should be enfranchised. Fifty-six strenuous cam- paicms were conducted, with their heavy demands on time, strength and money, and as a result 13 States gave suffrage to women ! Wyoming and Utah entered the Union with it in their

'itutirms. Compare this result with the proclamation of the adaption of a Federal Amendment, which in a moment and a sentence conferred the complete franchise on the women of all

ther States.

The leaders recognized this advantage and the National Suf-

ition was formed for the express purpose of securing

a Federal Amendment in 1869, as soon as it was learned through

enfranchisement of negro men that this method was possible. A short experience with Congress convinced them that there

'd have to be some demonstration of woman suffrage in the e they could hope for Federal action and therefore

XV111 INTRODUCTION

they carried on the work along both lines. The question had to be presented purely as one of abstract justice without appeal to the special interests of any party, but from 1890 to 1896 woman suffrage had been placed in the constitutions of four States and there was hope that it was now on the way to general success. From this time, however, such idealism in politics as may have existed in the United States gradually disappeared. The Republican party was in complete control of the Govern- ment at Washington and was largely dominated by the great financial interests of the country, and this was also practically the situation in the majority of the States. The campaign fund controlled the elections and the largest contributors to this fund were the corporations, which had secured immense power, and the liquor interests, which had become a dominant force in State and national politics, without regard to party. Both of these supreme influences were implacably opposed to suffrage for women; the corporations because it would vastly increase the votes of the working classes, the liquor interests because they were fully aware of the hostility of women to their business and everything connected with it.

This was the situation faced by those who were striving for the enfranchisement of women. Congress was stone deaf to their pleadings and arguments and from 1894 to 1913 its com- mittees utterly ignored the question. When a Legislature was persuaded to submit an amendment to the State constitution to the decision of the voters it met the big campaign fund of the employers of labor and the thoroughly organized forces of the liquor interests, which appealed not only to the many lines of business connected with the traffic but to the people who for personal reasons favored the saloons and their collateral branches of gambling, wine rooms, etc. They were a valuable adjunct to both political parties. The suffragists met these powerful opponents without money and without votes. A reading of the State chapters will demonstrate these facts. From 1896 for fourteen years not one State enfranchised its women.

These were years, however, of marvelous development in the status of women, which every year brought nearer their political recognition. Girls outnumbered boys in the high schools ; women

INTRODUCTION

crowded the colleges and almost monopolized the teaching in the public schools. Their organizations increased in size until they numbered millions and stretched across the seas. In 1904 the International Woman Suffrage Alliance was formed which soon encircled the globe. This year the International Council of Women, the largest organi/ed body of women in existence, formed a standing committee on woman suffrage with branches in every country. In 10,14 the General Federation of Women's Clubs, the largest organization in the United States, declared for woman suffrage and this was preceded or followed by a similar declaration by every State Federation. National asso- ciations of women for whatever purpose, with almost no excep- tions, demanded the franchise as an aid to their objects, until the stock objection that women do not want to vote was silenced. Women who opposed the movement became alarmed and under- took to organize in opposition, thereby exposing their weakness. Their organization was largely confined to a small group of eastern States and developed no strength west of the Allegheny mountains. Its leaders were for the most part connected with corporate interests and did not believe in universal suffrage for men. There was no evidence that they exercised any con- siderable influence in Congress or in any State where a vote was taken on granting the franchise to women.

An outstanding feature of the present century has been the entrance of women into the industrial field, following the work whirli under modern conditions was taken from the homes to the f . Thus without their volition they became the com-

petitors of men in practically every field of labor. ITnorgani/od and without the protection of a vote they were underpaid and nace to working mm. In use, therefore, the labor

unions v. •• 'polled to demand the ballot for women. They

followed by other organizations of men until hundreds were on as favoring woman suffrage. Men trying to

bring about civic or political reforms in, the old parties or Tiew ones and feeling their weakness turned to women with their gr- nizations bul JOOfl rcali/ed their inefficiency

without political power. The old objections were losing their The lessening size of families and the removal of the

XX INTRODUCTION

old time household tasks from the home left women with a great deal of leisure which they were utilizing in countless ways that took them out into the world, so that there was no longer any weight in the charge that the suffrage would cause women to forsake their domestic duties for public life. Women of means began coming into the movement for the suffrage and relieving the financial stringency which had constantly limited the activities of the organized work. The opening of large national headquarters in New York, the great news center of the country, in 1909, marked a distinct advance in the movement which was immediately apparent throughout the country. The friendly attitude of the metropolitan papers extended to the press at large. Following the example of England, parades and processions and various picturesque features were introduced in New York and other large cities which gave the syndicates and motion pictures material and interested the public. Woman suffrage became a topic of general discussion and women flocked into the suffrage organizations.

Politicians took notice but they remained cold. This political question had not yet entered politics. The leaders of the National Suffrage Association strengthened its lines and established its outposts in every State, but they still made their appeals to unyielding committees of Congress. The Republican "machine" was in absolute control and woman suffrage had long been under its wheels with other reform measures. Then came in 1909-10 the "insurgency" in its own ranks led by members from the western States, and in those States the voters repudiated the railroad and lumber and other corporate interests and instituted a new regime. One of its first acts was the submission of a woman suffrage amendment in the State of Washington and with a free election and a fair count it was carried in every county and received a majority of more than two to one. The revolt extended to California, whose Legislature sent an amend- ment to the voters in 1911 after having persistently refused to do so for the past 15 years, and here again there was victory at the polls. With the gaining of this old and influential State the extension of the movement to the Mississippi was assured.

The insurgency in the Republican party resulted in a division

INTRODUCTION XXI

at the national convention in 1912 and the forming of the Pro- gressive party headed by Theodore Roosevelt. The Resolutions Committee of the regular party gave the suffragists seven minutes to present their claims and ignored them. The new party needed a fresh, live issue and found it in woman suffrage, which was made a plank in its platform. The leaders of the National Suf- frage Association were required by its constitution to remain non-partisan and with one exception did so, but thousands of women rallied to the standard of the new party. As most of them were disfranchised they brought little voting strength but the other parties were forced to admit them and for the first time they gained a foothold in politics. The division in Repub- lican ranks resulted in putting into power the Democratic party, with an unfavorable record on woman suffrage and a President who was opposed to it, but " votes for women" was now a national political issue.

When the suffrage leaders went to the new Congress for a Federal Amendment they met a Senate Committee every member but one of which was in favor of it. The vote in the Senate on March 14, 1914, resulted in a majority but not the required two-thirds, and it was a majority of Republicans. The history of the struggle for this amendment for the next six years, through Democratic and Republican administrations, will be found in Chapter XX. Speaker Champ Clark was a steadfast friend. In 1914 William Jennings Bryan declared for it and thence- forth spoke for it many times. In 1915 President Woodrow Wilson announced his conversion to woman suffrage and in 1918 to the Federal Amendment and never wavered in his loyalty, rendering every assistance in his power. His record will be found in these volumes. In 1916, after Justice Charles A as nominated by the Republicans for the presi- . IK announced his adherence to the Federal Amendment, in advance of his party. This year the Republican and hemorraiir national platforms for the first time contained a plank in favor of woman suffrage but by State and not Federal action. A remarkable feature of the progress of this amend- in Congress was the increase of its advocates among mem- from the South, who for the most part believed it to be

xxii INTRODUCTION

an interference with the State's rights. In 1887, when the first vote was taken in the Senate not one southern member voted for it. On the second occasion in 1914 Senators Lea of Tennessee, Ransdell of Louisiana, Sheppard of Texas, Ashurst of Arizona and Owen of Oklahoma voted in favor. In 1919 on the final vote, if Arizona, New Mexico and Delaware are included, 17 Senators from southern States cast their ballots for the Federal Amendment, and four from northern States who did so were born in the South. It received the votes of 75 Representatives from southern States. The women of every southern State suffrage association worked for this amendment, believing that it was hopeless to expect their enfranchisement from State action, and the above members took the same view. It received a large Republican majority in Senate and House.

While this contest was in progress many events were taking place which had an influence on it. The movement for woman suffrage was progressing in Europe but when the war broke out in 1914, involving all countries, it was thought that all advance was lost. On the contrary the splendid service of the women obtained the franchise for them in Great Britain, The Netherlands and other countries, and at the close of the war the revolution in the Central countries resulted in the suffrage for men and women alike. The war work of Canadian women brought full enfranchisement to them. When the United States entered the war the patriotic response of the women to every demand of the Government and the magnificent service they rendered swept away forever the objection to their voting because they could not do military duty.

Stimulated by the action of Washington and California other western States gave suffrage to their women and its practical working effectually disproved every charge that had been made against it. At the close of 1915 Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt became president of the National Association and bringing to bear her great executive and organizing ability she re-formed it along the lines followed by the political parties, created a large, active working force and prepared for intensive State and national campaigns. Soon afterwards she received a legacy of almost a million dollars from Mrs. Frank Leslie to be used for

INTRODUCTION XX111

promoting the cause of woman suffrage and thus she was equipped for carrying the movement to certain victory.

In 1917 the voters of New York State by an immense ma- jority gave the full suffrage to women, guaranteeing probably 45 votes in Congress for the Federal Amendment. In 1917 and 1918 the great "drive" was made on the Legislatures to give women the right to vote for Presidential electors and this was done in i 4 States, granting this important privilege to millions of women. In several States the Legislature added the franchise for munici- pal and county officers. In 1917 the Legislature of Arkansas gave them the right to vote at all Primary elections and in 1918 that of Texas conferred the same, which is equivalent to the full suffrage, as the primaries decide the elections. By 1918 in 15 States women had equal suffrage with men through amendment of their constitutions.1

In January, 1918, the Federal Prohibition Amendment went into effect, putting an end to the powerful opposition of the liquor interests to woman suffrage. All political parties were committed to the Federal Amendment. In January, 1918, it passed the Lower House of Congress but the opposition of two Senators and finally of one prevented its submission. Meanwhile the I )i niocratic administration of eight years had been succeeded by a Republican. This party during 44 years in power had refused to enfranchise women but now it atoned for the wrong and with the help of Democratic members the Amendment was submitted in the Legislatures on June 4, 1919. Nearly all had adjourned ;wo years and if women were to vote at the next presidential ial sessions would be necessary. One of the most \orihy political feats on record \\as that of the president of the National Suf'fra-e Association, with the assistance of others, in managing to have the (iovcrnors of the various States call i

It is told in the State chapters with the dramatic ending in Tennessee.

'I he certificate was delivered to Secretary of State Hainhridge

1 It is worthy of note tli ' : the only instance in the world

the voters them»elv< ••

•it li.i'l nut tin- |io.\cr to K'Ve

Dominion election*. In all • suffrage was con

by a simple majority vote Tin- U. S. r<>m:r« ss ha«l not tliis

c was necessary to setnl it to the 48

Legislatures for on. The Federal SuffraK' "t h.td to l.« passed upon by about 6,000 legislator*.

XXIV

INTRODUCTION

Colby at 4 o'clock in the morning on August 26, 1920, and at 9 he issued the official proclamation that the I9th Amendment having been duly ratified by 36 State Legislatures "has become valid to all intents and purposes as a part of the Constitution of the United States." It reads as follows :

"The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on ac- count of sex.

"Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appro- priate legislation."

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN WOMAN SUFFRAGE ASSOCIATION

FOREWORD

The National Woman Suffrage Association was organized in New York City, May 15, 1869, with Elizabeth Cady Stanton president and Susan B. Anthony chairman of executive com- mittee. [History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II, page 400.] It held annual conventions for the next half century, always in Washington, D. C, until 1895, after -which date they were taken in alternate years to other cities, meeting in the national capital during the first session of each Congress. The object of the asso- ciation from its beginning was to obtain an amendment to the Federal Constitution which would confer full, universal suffrage on the women of the United States, and its work for amending the constitutions of the States to enfranchise their women was under- taken as one means to achieve this main purpose. The American Woman Suffrage Association was organized in Cleveland, Ohio, Nov. 24, 1869, wiln Henry Ward Beecher president and Lucy Stone chairman of executive committee, principally for action through the States, and it also held annual conventions. [Volume II, page 756.] In 1890 the two united in Washington under the name National American Woman Suffrage Association [Volume IV, page 164], and the work was continued by both methods. Full reports of conventions may be found in preceding volumes of the History of Woman Suffrage, the list ending in Volume IV with that of 1900. This convention was especially distinguished by the public celebration of the Soth birthday of Susan B. Anthony and her retirement from the presidency of tin- association which she had helped to found and in which she had continuously held official position, and by the election of Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt as her successor.1

» History of Woman SuffraRe, Volume IV, Chapters XX and XXI.

2 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

The assertion is frequently made that the enfranchisement of women was due to a natural evolution of public sentiment. A reading of the following chapters, which give the history of the work of the National American Woman Suffrage Association, will show how largely the creation of this sentiment was due to this organization to which all the State associations were aux- iliary. It represented the organized movement during half a century to secure the vote for women — a struggle such as was never made by men for this right in any country in the world. It was the only large organization for this purpose that ever existed in the United States and its efforts never ceased in the more than fifty years. At each annual convention some advance was recorded. These chapters show that, while the principal object of the association was a Federal Amendment, it gave valuable assistance to every campaign for the amendment of State con- stitutions and that it was responsible for the granting of the Presidential franchise, which was so important a factor in gain- ing the final victory. The reports of its officers each year show the large amount of money raised and expended, the hundreds of thousands of letters written, the millions of pieces of literature circulated, the thousands of meetings held, the many workers in the field. The committee reports and the resolutions adopted show that all reforms vital to the welfare of women and chil- dren and many of a wider scope were included in the work of the association. The names of the speakers at the national con- ventions and at the hearings before the committees of Congress during all these years prove that this cause was championed by the leaders among the men and women of their generation. Such quotations from their speeches as space has permitted show that in eloquence, logic and strength they were unsurpassed and that their arguments were unanswerable.

If this volume contained only the first nineteen chapters tin- reader could not fail to be convinced that principally to the efforts of the National American Woman Suffrage Association the women of the United States owe their enfranchisement, but it shows too that in the forty-eight auxiliary States they also fought their own hard battles.

CHAPTER I.

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQOI.

The Thirty-third annual convention opened on the afternoon of May 30, 1901, in the First Baptist Church of Minneapolis, -with the new president, Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, in the chair, and continued through June 4, with 144 delegates from twenty-six States present.1

Miss Anthony was present at this Minneapolis convention, alert and vigorous but happy to relinquish her official duties to one in whose ability and judgment she had implicit confidence; and the rest of the official board were there ready to give the same allegiance and loyalty to the new chief which they had rendered for many years to the supreme leader. The Minneapolis Journal said : "The formal opening of the suffrage convention yesterday afternoon was an impressive affair. Among the national officers seated on the platform were women who saw the first dawn of the suffrage movement, those who came into its fold midway of its life and those whose earnest endeavors are of more recent record. Among the first was the most honored member of the body, Miss iii B. Anthony, and among the latter is the president, Mrs. ie Chapman Catt. When the delegates rose and the Rev. < )lympia P.rown of Wisconsin stepped to the front of the plat-

* Part of Call: The first years of the new century are destined to witness the most strenuous and intense struggle of the movement. Iniquity lias become afraid of the votes of women. Vice and immorality are consequently organized in opposition, while con- servative morality stands shoulder to shoulder with them, blind to the nature of the illicit partnership. Believers in this cause are legion, but many satisfied th.it victory will come without their help, do nothing. We are approaching the climax of the great contest and every friend is needed. If the final victory is long in coming, the respon- sibility rents with those who believe but who do not a«t.

ELIZABETH CADY STANTON, , Hon Presidents.

SUSAN B. ANTHONY,

CARRIE CHAPMAN CATT, President.

ANNA HOWARD SHAW, Vice l'r< -si. lent.

I.L FOSTER AVERY, Corresponding Secretary.

AIHE STONE BLACK v. i.ling Secretary.

HARRIET TAYLOI UPTON, Treasurer.

LAURA CLAY, /

CATHARINE WAUOU McCuu.ocH,

3

4 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

form and turned her face heavenward, saying, "In the name of liberty, Our Father, we thank thee," the impression even upon an unbeliever must have been that of entire consecration and one was reminded of when the early Christians met and consulted, fought and endured for the faith that was in them."

Although this was the first convention in many years over which Miss Anthony had not presided she was the first to speak, as Mrs. Catt at once presented her to the audience. With the loyalty which had characterized her life Miss Anthony first read a letter from the honorary president, Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stan- ton, then in her 86th year, which she prefaced by saying: "It is fitting that I should read this greeting from her, as I have stood by Mrs. Stanton's side for fifty years." The letter urged the same vigorous work in the church for woman's emancipation as had been kept up in the States and said : "The canon law, with all the subtle influences that grow out of it, is more responsible for woman's slavery today than the civil code. With the pro- gressive legislation of the last half century we have an interest in tracing the lessons taught to women in the churches to their true origin and a right to demand from our theologians the same full and free discussion in the church that we have had in the State, as the time has fully come for women to be heard in the ecclesiastical councils of the nation. To this end I suggest that committees and delegates from all our State and national asso- ciations visit the clergy in their several localities and assemblies to press on their consideration the true position of woman as a factor in Christian civilization."

Press reports of Mrs. Stanton's paper were as follows :

"Woman today, as ever, supplies the enthusiasm that sustains the church and she has a right in turn to ask that the church sustain her in this struggle for liberty and take some decided action with reference to this momentous and far-reaching movement. It matters little that here and there some clergyman advocates our cause on our platform, so long as no religious organization has yet recognized our demand as a principle of justice. Discussion is rarely held in their councils but it is generally treated as a speculative, sentimental question unworthy of serious consideration. Neither would it be sufficient if they gave their adhesion to the demand for political equality, so long as by scriptural teachings they perpetuate our racial and religious subordination." Mrs. Stanton would demand that an ex-

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQOI 5

purgated Bible be read in churches. "Such parables as refer to woman as 'the author of sin/ 'an inferior/ 'a subject/ 'a weaker vessel/ " she says, "should be relegated to the ancient mythologies as mere allegories, having no application whatever to the womanhood of this generation. It is not civil nor political power that holds the Mormon woman in polygamy, the Turkish woman in the harem, the American woman as a subordinate everywhere. The central false- hood from which all these different forms of slavery spring is the doctrine of original sin and woman as a medium for the machinations of Satan, its author. The greatest block today in the way of woman's emancipation is the church, the canon law, the Bible and the priest- hood. Canon Charles Kingsley said not long ago : 'This will never l>e a good world for woman till the last remnant of canon law is stricken from the face of the earth/ " 1

After finishing Mrs. Stanton's letter Miss Anthony presented her own greeting, in the course of which she said :

"If the divine law visits the sins of the parents upon the chil- dren, equally so does it transmit to them the virtues of the parents. Therefore if it is through woman's ignorant subjection to man's appetites and passions that the life current of the race is corrupted, then must it be through her intelligent emancipation that it shall be purified and her children rise up and call her blessed. ... I am a full and firm believer in the revelation that it is through woman the race is to be redeemed. For this reason I ask for her immediate and unconditional emancipation from all political, industrial, social and religious subjection. It is said, 'Men are what their mothers made them/ but I say that to hold mothers responsible for the characters of their sons while deny- ing to them any control over the surroundings of the sons' lives orse than mockery, it is cruelty. Responsibilities grow out of rights and powers. Therefore before mothers can rightfully l>o held responsible for the vices and crimes, for the general demoralization of society, they must possess all possible rights ami

1 ^fi*s Anthony had entreated Mrs. Stanton to send instead of this letter to the con- vention one of her grand, old-time arguments for woman suffrage but she refused, saying the time was past for these and the church must he recognized as the greatest of obstacles to its success. Miss Anthony felt that it would arouse criticism and prejmliYr .it thr very beginning but declared that no matter what the effect she would give what would probably be Mrs. Stanton's last message. A number of the officers and delegates were interviewed for the press and none was found who fully agreed with Mrs. Stanton's views. The Rev. Olympia Brown and the Rev. Anna Howard Shaw believed the obstacles to be in the false interpretation of the Scriptures and its application to The Methodist General Conference had this year admitted women delegates.

6 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

powers to control the conditions and circumstances of their own and their children's lives."

The audience then listened with keen appreciation to the presi- dent's address, during which she said : "If I were asked what are the great obstacles to the speedy enfranchisement of women I should answer: There are three; the first is militarism, which once dominated the entire thought of the world and made its history. Although its old power is gone and its influence upon public thought grows constantly less, it still molds the opinions of mil- lions of people and holds them to the old ideals of force in govern- ment and headship in the family. The second obstacle is the unconscious, unmeasured influence upon the estimate in which women as a whole are held that emanates from that most debasing of our evil institutions, prostitution. . . . The third great cause is the inertia in the growth of democracy which has come as a re- action following the aggressive movements that with possibly ill- advised haste enfranchised the foreigner, the negro and the Indian. Perilous conditions, seeming to follow from the introduction into the body politic of vast numbers of irresponsible citizens, have made the nation timid. These three influences, born of centuries of tradition, shape every opinion of the opponents of woman suf- frage. Not an objection, argument or excuse can be urged against the movement which may not be traced to one of these causes."

At the close of Mrs. Catt's address Mrs. Mary C. C. Bradford of Denver presented her with a handsome gavel in behalf of the suffrage association of Colorado. The gavel was made of Colorado silver and the settings and engravings of Colorado gold. In one side was a Colorado amethyst' and the Colorado flower, the columbine, was burned into the gavel by a Colorado girl. Mrs. Bradford said she wished Mrs. Catt the good luck said to follow the possessor of an amethyst, who "shall speak the right word at the right time." She presented it as an expression of gratitude for her aid in their successful suffrage campaign of 1893. "We are apt to attribute everything good in Colorado to woman suffrage," said Mrs. Catt in response, "but in my secret mind I think much of it is due to the progressiveness of the Colorado men. They must be better than other men or they would not have enfranchised their women. I cannot love Colo-

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQOI 7

rado any better than I do but I shall always value this gavel as a precious souvenir of that wonderful campaign."

In her report as vice-president at large the Rev. Anna Howard Shaw said regarding her many suffrage speeches during the year : "The manager of a bureau lately said to me: 'If you would only give up for a time the two reforms in which you are most inter- ested, woman suffrage and prohibition, you could earn enough money on the regular lecture platform in a few years to live on for the rest of your life.' Any woman who does not live for unselfish service is a useless cumberer of the earth. I would rather be known as an advocate of equal suffrage and starve than to speak every night on the best-paying platforms in the United States and ignore it."

The first evening of the convention was opened with prayer by the Rev. Marion H. Shutter.1 The audience was far beyond the seating capacity of the large church and in presenting the offi- cial speakers Mrs. Catt said : "This is a great contrast to the early days when we did not use to be welcomed because we were not welcome. Now we are welcomed wherever we go but not often, as here, by the representative of a whole State." Governor Samuel R. Van Sant gave a hearty western greeting, which, he said, he wanted to make as cordial as he could express it and as broad as the State he lived in. He made this point among others : "You are doing a splendid work and the reason you do not get the ballot sooner is because you do not convert your own sex. I know for I have been a member of the Legislature. If you wanted to vote as much as you want other things you would go there ami block the legislators so they couldn't get to their ." Mayor Albert A. Ames extended the welcome of the city and declared his belief in woman suffrage. Former Mayor Wil- liam Henry Eustis ended his address in behalf of the Commercial Club and Board of Trade by saying: "Commercial bodies are temporary but a great movement like this is eternal." Former Mayor James Gray, representing the press, assured them of its cooperation and said that from a dozen to twenty women were

1 Invocation* were pronounced at difTrrcnt sessions by the resident ministers, C. B. Mitchell, George F. Holt and Martin D. Hardin, and by thr visitinR ministers, Alice Ball Lootnis, Celia Parker Woolley, Kate Hughes and Margaret T. Olmstead.

8 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

doing important work on the papers of the city. Mrs. Maud C. Stockwell, president of the State Suffrage Association, welcomed them to "the hearts of the women of Minneapolis/'

Dr. Shaw closed the evening with a stirring address on An Invisible Foe, in which she referred to the many refusals they had had from the anti-suffrage leaders to come to the convention and debate the question. She accused them of wearing a khaki- colored uniform to conceal themselves from the foe and declared they were always careful to make their attacks when the enemy was not present, saying: "The anti-suffragists are not fighting woman suffrage, they are fighting the ideals of democracy and leaning toward an aristocracy. Take note of the words they use to designate the people, 'mob/ 'hordes,' etc. They look at the people as not only incapable and ignorant now but so for all time and they never learn that in the heart of every individual in the mob lie the forces which make for martyrs or for brutes." "From point to point through long and close argument the bril- liant speaker moved with lightning velocity," said a press report. "She called up the anti-suffrage arguments made by the Rev. Samuel G. Smith of St. Paul, in his recent series of sermons on women, and laughed to scorn their plea for 'the days of chivalry/ which, she said, were a man's protection of his own women against other men. Woman must work out God's ideal of what a woman should be and she cannot do it until she is absolutely free as man is free."

Mrs. Catt brought to the presidency a definite belief that Con- gress would not submit a Federal Suffrage Amendment nor would important States be gained on referendum until national and State officers and workers were better trained for the work re- quired. The increasing evidence of a united and politically expe- rienced opposition as manifested in legislative action and referen- dum results had convinced her that the cause would never be won unless its campaigns were equipped, guided and conducted by women fully aware of the nature of opposition tactics and pre- pared to meet every maneuver of the enemy by an equally telling counteraction. She had been appointed by Miss Anthony chair- man of a Plan of Work Committee at the convention of 1895 and assembling the practical workers they agreed upon recommen-

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 190! 9

dations which proved a turning point in the association's policy. These were presented to that convention and adopted. A Com- mittee on Organization was established with Mrs. Catt as chair- man and contrary to the usual custom the convention voted that she be made a member of the National Board. For the last five years her committee had held conferences in connection with each convention which discussed and adopted plans for more effi- cient work. As president, she now determined to link more closely the work of national and State auxiliary organizations and in the pursuance of this aim and as ex-officio chairman of the conven- tion program committee, she appointed the Executive Committee (consisting of the Board of Officers, the president and one mem- ber from each auxiliary State) to be the Committee on Plan of Work. For two entire days preceding this convention the Execu- tive Committee had discussed methods of procedure, as presented by the Board of Officers, who had prepared these recommenda- tions at a mid-year meeting held in Miss Anthony's home at Rochester in August.

The convention accepted the report which included the follow- ing: (i) Organization. That organization be continually the first aim of each State auxiliary as the certain key to success ; that each State keep at least one organizer employed and endeavor to establish a county organization in each county or at least to form an organization in each county seat and at four other points ; that organization work be done among women wage earners and that definite work be undertaken to win the endorsement and cooperation of other associations, chiefly the General Federation of Women's Clubs and the National Education Association. (2) Nation. That each auxiliary State association appeal to ;ress to submit to the Legislatures a i6th Amendment to the Federal constitution prohibiting the disfranchisement of U. S. citizens on account of sex ; that the plan initiated by Miss Anthony be continued, namely, that all kinds of national and State con- ions be asked to pass resolutions in favor of this amendment, •'t to Congress; that State societies also a^k their Legis- lature^ to pass resolutions in favor of a l6th Amendment, these Tit to Congress; that auxiliaries whose States offer a reasonable possibility of a successful referendum try to secure the

IO HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

submission of State suffrage amendments to the voters, with as- surance of national cooperation ; that auxiliaries whose State con- stitutions present obstacles to such procedure work to secure statu- tory suffrage, such as School, Municipal or Presidential; that auxiliaries not strong enough to attempt a campaign work for the removal of legal discriminations against women and attempt to secure co-guardianship of children, equal property rights, the rais- ing of the age of consent, the appointment of police matrons, etc.; that a leaflet be prepared by Mrs. Laura M. Johns advising best methods for successful legislative -work. To carry out this plan the Committees on Congressional Work, Presidential Suf- frage and Civil Rights found their work for the year. (3) Press. Recommendations were made for rendering this department of work more efficient in the States; enrollment of persons believing in woman suffrage to be continued in order to secure evidence of the strength of general favorable sentiment; the literature of the association to include a plan of work for local clubs.

Work conferences were interspersed during the convention ; one on Organization presided over by Miss Mary Garrett Tlav: one by Mrs. Priscilla D. TTackstaff, chairman Enrollment Com- mittee; one by Mrs. Babcock, chairman Press Committee. A chart showing the date of the opening of the Legislature in each State; the provision for amending its constitution; the suffrage and initiative and referendum laws and all other information bearing upon the technical procedure of securing the vote State by State was carefully drawn by the Organization Committee. With this in hand each State was given its legislative task. It was voted to urge the auxiliaries of Kansas, Indiana, New York, Washington and South Dakota to ask for submission of State constitutional amendments. It was voted that the corresponding secretary be elected with the understanding that she would serve at the national headquarters and be paid a salary.

The Executive Committee at a preliminary meeting repeated the resolution of the preceding year against the official regulation of vice in Manila, which -was under United States control. It closed : "We protest in the name of American womanhood and we believe that this represents also the opinion of the best American

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQOI II

manhood.1 This resolution was unanimously adopted by the dele- gates after strong addresses, and Miss Anthony, Dr. Shaw, Mrs. Catt, Mrs. Avery and Miss Blackwell were deputized to ask a hearing and present it to the American Medical Association meet- ing in St. Paul at this time. That body allowed them ten minutes to state their earnest wish that it would endorse the resolution hut it took no action.

Miss Anthony had consented to act as chairman of the Con- gressional Committee and her report was heard with deep inter- I ler work during the year was upon two distinct lines, the old familiar petition to Congress to pass the i6th Amendment granting full suffrage to women, and another brought about by new conditions — a petition that the word "male" should not be inserted in the electoral clause of the constitutions proposed by Congress for Hawaii and Porto Rico. These petitions were se- cured from every State and Territory, a tremendous work, and were laid before the members of Congress from each State. The most interesting petition for the amendment -was from Wyoming, where one sheet was signed by every State officer, several U. S. officials and other prominent citizens. They had signed in dupli- cate several petitions and thus Miss Anthony had an autograph copy with her. The work of securing this petition was done chiefly by Mrs. Joseph M. Cary, wife of the Senator. Miss An thony was chairman also of the Committee on Convention Reso- lutions and believed strongly that to present the question of woman suffrage to conventions of various kinds and secure resolutions from them \va^ an eH Various means of propaganda. Tier inter

1 WHEREAS, Judge William Howard Taft and the Philippine Commissioners in a tele- gram to Secretary Root dated January 17, 1901, affirm that ever since November, 1898, the military authorities in Manila have subjected women of bad character to "certified examination," and General MacArthur in his recent report does not deny this but defends it; and whereas the Hawaiian government has taken similar action; therefore

RESOLVED, That we earnestly protest against the introduction of the European system of State-regulated vice in the new possessions of the United States for the following reasons:

1. To subject women of bad character to regular examinations and furnish them with official health certificates is contrary to good morals and must impress both our soldiers and the natives as giving official sanction to vice.

2. It is a violation of justice to apply to vicious women compulsory medical measures that are not applied to vicious men.

3. Official regulation of vice, while it lowers the moral tone of the community, every- where fails to protect the public health.

Examples were given from Paris, garrison towns of England and Switzerland, and St. Louis, the only city in the United States that had ever tried the system.

12 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

esting report for 1900 made at this time will be found in full in the History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV, page 439.

In introducing Mr. Blackwell (Mass.), Mrs. Catt said: "The woman suffrage movement has known many women who have devoted their lives and energies to it. I know of only one man. Years ago when Lucy Stone was a sweet and beautiful girl he heard her speak and afterwards proposed to her to form a mar- riage partnership. When she said that this might prevent her from doing the large work she wanted to do for equal rights he promised to help her in it and loyally and faithfully all through their married life he did so, as constantly and earnestly as Lucy Stone herself; and even after her death he continues to give his time, his money and his effort to the same end. I am glad to introduce Henry B. Blackwell." Mr. Blackwell was the pio- neer in urging the suffragists of every State to try to obtain from their Legislature a law giving them a vote for presidential electors. Their authority for this action was conferred by the National Constitution in Article 2, Section 2: "Each State shall appoint in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct a number of electors equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Con- gress." His comprehensive report made to this and other con- ventions was an unanswerable argument in favor of the right of a Legislature to confer this vote on women and eventually it was widely recognized.

The treasurer, Mrs. Harriet Taylor Upton (O.), reported the total receipts of the year $22,522. Mrs. Catt stated the needs of the association for the coming year and under the skilful man- agement of Miss Hay subscriptions of $5,000 were soon ob- tained. On motion of Dr. Shaw a vote of thanks was given to Miss Hay for her "able and efficient work in securing these pledges." The report for the Federal Suffrage Committee was given by Mrs. Sallie Clay Bennett (Ky.) x

The corresponding secretary, Mrs. Avery of Philadelphia, made the report of the great bazaar which had been held before the Christmas holidays in Madison Square Garden, New York City,

1 The question of giving to women a vote for Representatives by an Act of Congress is considered in Chapter I, Volume IV, History of Woman Suffrage.

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF ICpI 13

and netted about $8,500. It was accompanied by the carefully prepared report of its treasurer, Mrs. Priscilla D. Hackstaff of Brooklyn. An exact duplicate of a beautiful vase three feet high which had been presented to Admiral Dewey by the citizens of Wheeling, West Virginia, at a cost of $250, with the exception that his face on it was replaced by Miss Anthony's, was pre- sented to the bazaar by Mrs. Fannie J. Wheat of that city. As no "chances" were allowed at suffrage fairs it was purchased by subscriptions and presented to Miss Anthony.1

A letter to Miss Blackwell from Mrs. Mary A. Livermore, then past 80 years of age, expressing her regret at not being able to attend the convention, closed : "It is not for lack of interest in our great cause or indifference to the dear western women with whom I was associated so many years ago and who, like myself, have grown gray in the work for women. . . . God bless you all and give you an ennobling season together, harmonious and uplifting in its results. Remember me in love to the old friends and pledge my affectionate regard to the new friends with whom I will try to keep step here on the Massachusetts coast. Yours with a thousand good wishes/' A telegram of greeting was sent to Mrs. Stanton and others to Mrs. Cornelia C. Hussey of New Jersey, Mrs. Jane H. Spofford of Maine and Mrs. Abigail Scott Duniway of Oregon, all pioneer workers for the cause. Miss Laura Clay (Ky.) gave a strong, logical address on Counter- parts, "the dualism of the race," in which she said:

Any social system founded on a theory designed for the elevation of one sex alone, regardless of the other, is altogether false and delusive to the expectations built upon it, for the human race is dual and heredity keeps the stock common from which both men and women spring. Since the common stock is improved and invigo- rated by the acquired qualities of individuals, without regard to sex, it is to the advantage of both that all possibilities of development shall be extended to both sexes. In animals acquired qualities can be imparted to the stock only by parenthood; in the human family they are imparted even more widely and permanently through the influence of ideas. All that woman has lost by social systems which

1 Among the donations which brought in the largest sums were the locomobile from Mr. and Mrs. A. L. Barber of New York; the Kansas consignment of fine flour and butter secured by Miss Helen Kimber of that State; the carload of hogs from Iowa farmers obtained by Mrs. Eleanor Stockman of Mason City; the handsomely dressed doll from Mrs. William McKinley and a fine oil painting by the noted landscape painter, William Keith of California.

H HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

denied to her education and the free expression of her genius in literature, art or statesmanship, has been lost to man also, because it has diminished the inheritable riches of the nature from which he draws his existence. He has been less, though unhampered by the shackles which bound her, because she was less. The world is not more called upon to rejoice in the triumphs of his genius in freedom than to mourn over the wasted possibilities of hers in bonds. . . .

The forward movement of either sex is possible only when the other moves also and the obstacles to progress exist in the attitude of both sexes to it, not in that of one alone. So in this woman suf- frage movement we have learned that the apathy of women to their own political freedom is as great an obstacle to our success as the unwillingness of men to grant our claims. It is of the same impor- tance to us to educate women out of their indifference as it is to educate men out of their unwillingness. If it should happen that this education shall come to women first, they will never need the argu- ment of force to induce men to remove the legal obstacles, for men and women cannot loiu>- think unlike on any subject.

One of the most interesting reports was that of the Press Com- mittee, made by its efficient chairman, Mrs. Elnora Monroe J 'alt- cock (N. Y.). Illustrating its work she said: "About 50,000 stiff rage articles have been sent out from the press headquarters since our last annual convention; 2,400 of these were specials; 5,155 articles and items advertising the Bazaar; many articles on prominent women were furnished to illustrated papers and news- paper syndicates; a page of plate matter was issued every six weeks and seven large press associations were supplied with occa- sional articles." The names of State chairmen were given and the number of papers they supplied — New York, 500; Pennsyl- vania, 336; Iowa, 237; Massachusetts, 97; Indiana, 91 ; Illinois, S5 ; Ohio, f>3, etc. Mrs. Babcock asked for a vote of thanks, which was unanimous, to Paul Dana, proprietor and editor of the New York Sun, for having given during the past two and a half years and for still giving two columns of its Sunday issue to an article by Mrs. Ida Husted Harper, an unprecedented concession by a great metropolitan paper. Miss Anthony added her words of praise to Mr. Dana and to the department which she her-elf had been largely instrumental in securing-.1

1 At Miss Anthony's request Mrs. Harper had sent her a letter to read to the conven- tion giving some details as to the scope of the Sun articles, in which she said: "I consider the success of this department due above all else to the fact that it deals with current events. Its text each Sunday is taken from the occurrences of the preceding week as they relate to women. . . . Letters of commendation and of criticism have been received

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQOI 15

One of the most popular addresses of the convention was made by Mrs. Ellis Meredith of Denver — The Menace of Podtmk — a clever satire showing that narrow partisanship and dishonest politics were to be found alike in New York and Podunk, Indiana.

Podunk is the place where the country is nothing, the caucus everything; where patriotism languishes and party spirit runs riot. It is the centre of intelligence where they hold back the returns until advices are received from headquarters as to how many votes are needed. The Podunkians believe it is a good thing to have a strong man at the head of the ticket, not because they care about electing strong men but because by putting a good nominee at the head of the ballot it is possible they may be able to pull through the seven saloon keepers and three professional politicians who go to make up the rest of the ticket. . . . But there lives in Podunk another class that is a greater menace to the life of the nation, the noble army of Pharisees. They have read Bryce's American Commonwealth and have an intellectual understanding of the theory and form of our government but they do not know what ward they live in, they are vague as to the district, have never met their Congressman and do not know a primary from a kettle drum. . . .

The politician and the shirk of Podunk are the creatures who are doing their noble best to blot out the words of Lincoln and make it possible for the government he died to save to perish from the earth. And between these two evils the least apparent is the most real. The man who votes more than once is nearer right than the man who refuses to vote at all. The activity of the repeater in the pool of politics may be wholly pernicious but is no worse than the stagnation caused by the inertia of his self-righteous brother. The republic has less to fear from her illiterate and venal voters than from those who, knowing her peril, refuse to come to the rescue.

The resolutions were presented by Mr. Blackwell, who, at con- ventions almost without number, served as chairman of this im- portant committee, and the first ones set forth the political status of the women in the year 1901 as follows:

"We congratulate the women of America upon the measure of success already attained — school suffrage in twenty-two States and Territories; municipal suffrage in Kansas; suffrage on ques-

from all parti of the United States and from London, Paris, Copenhagen, Berlin, Dresden, Zurich and Rome and from Melbourne. Among the writers are bishops and ministers, publishers, educators, authors, college presidents, physicians, women's societies, working- men's organizations and scores of men and women in the private walks of life. One article brought twenty-five pages of legal cap from lawyers in New York and Brooklyn. It is a noteworthy fact that it is the first metropolitan daily paper to make a woman suffrage department a regular feature."

The articles were published until the autumn of 1903, almost five years. Mr. Dana old the paper and it went under the control of William A. La (Tan, an anti-suf- fragist, who discontinued them.

1 6 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

tions of taxation in Iowa, Montana, Louisiana and New York; full suffrage in Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and Idaho — States containing more than a million inhabitants, with eight Senators and nine Representatives in Congress elected in part by the votes of women.

"We rejoice in important gains during the past year; the ex- tension of suffrage upon questions of taxation to 200,000 women in the towns and villages of New York and to the tax-paying women of Norway; the voting of women for the first time for members of Parliament in West Australia; the almost unanimous refusal of the Kansas Legislature to repeal municipal woman suffrage and the acquittal in Denver of the only woman ever charged with fraudulent voting."

A tribute was paid to the tried and true friends of woman suf- frage who had died during the year, many of them veterans in the cause: Sarah Anthony Burtis, aged 90, secretary of the first Woman's Rights Convention in 1848 when adjourned to Rochester, N. Y. ; Charles K. Whipple, aged 91, for many years secretary of the Massachusetts and New England Woman Suf- frage Associations; Zerelda G. Wallace of Indiana, the "mother" of "Ben Hur"; Paulina Gerry, the Rev. Cyrus Bartol, Carrie Anders, Dr. Salome Merritt, Matilda Goddard and Mary Shan- non of Massachusetts ; Mary J. Clay of Kentucky ; Eliza J. Patrick of Missouri; Fanny C. Wooley and Nettie Laub Romans of Iowa; Eliza Scudder Fenton, the widow of New York's war governor; Charlotte A. Cleveland and Henry Villard of New York ; John Hooker of Connecticut ; Giles F. Stebbins and George Willard of Michigan; Ruth C. Dennison, D. C., Theron Nye of Nebraska; Elizabeth Coit of Ohio; Major Niles Meriwether of Tennessee; M. B. Castle of Illinois; John Bidwell of California; Wendell Phillips Garrison of New Jersey.

On the evening when Miss Anthony presided she introduced to the audience with tender words Mrs. Charlotte Pierce of Phila- delphia, as one of the few left who attended the first Woman's Rights Convention at Seneca Falls, N. Y., in 1*848; Mrs. Eliza Wright Osborne of Auburn, N. Y., niece of Lucretia Mott and daughter of Martha Wright, two of the four women who called that convention; Miss Emily Howland, a devoted pioneer of

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQOI 17

Sherwood, N. Y. ; the Rev. Olympia Brown of Racine, second woman to be ordained as minister; Mrs. Ellen Sulley Fray, a pioneer of Toledo, O., and Mrs. Caroline E. Merrick, wife of a Chief Justice of Louisiana, who organized the first suffrage club in New Orleans.

Mrs. Rachel Foster Avery, who had been the corresponding secretary of the association for twenty-one years, had insisted that she should be allowed to resign from the office. A pleasant inci- dent not on the program took place one morning during the con- vention when Miss Anthony came to the front of the platform and said : "1 have in my hand a thousand dollars for Rachel Foster Avery. It has been contributed without her knowledge by about four hundred different persons; most of you are on the list. I asked for this testimonial because I felt that you would all rejoice to show your appreciation of her long and faithful services and her great liberality to the cause. I should never have been able to carry on the work of the society as its president for so many years but for her able cooperation. She thinks she cannot talk but we know that she can work. She has done the drudgery of this association for more than twenty years and I hope the woman who will be chosen in her place, whoever she may be, will be as consecrated and free from all self-seeking."

Miss Kate M. Gordon, president of the Era Club of New Or- leans, was almost unanimously elected as corresponding secre- The only other change in the official board was the retire- ment of Mrs. Catharine Waugh McCulloch as second auditor and the election of Dr. Cora Smith Eaton in her place. In referring to Dr. Eaton, Mr. Blackwell said : "In my attendance upon thirty-three successive annual national conventions I have never one with such complete and faithful preparation by the local committee and such abundant and cordial welcome. ... It seemed natural to recognize the generous hospitality thus extended to the convention by the people of Minnesota by choosing Dr. •n of Minneapolis, chairman of this local committee, as one of ;Or the coming

1 Other local chairmen were Irnn Win. hell Stacy, Mrs. A. T. Anderson, J. Bryan Bushnell, Dr. Margaret Koch, Mrs. James Harndcn, Mrs. II. A. Tuttle, Mrs. Marion D. Shutter. Lora C. Little, Nellie Keyes, Mrs. Sanford Miles. Martha Scott Anderson, Josie A. Wanous, Gracia L. Jcnks, Dr. Corene J. Biasonette, Mrs. Stock well and Mrs. Gregory.

l8 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

A closely reasoned address on the Ethics of Suffrage was made by Louis F. Post of Chicago, in the course of which he said :

Suffrage is a right, not a privilege. That it is a right of every individual is the only basis for women's demanding it. If it is not a right but a privilege that may be granted to men and withheld from women, be granted to ihe white and withheld from the black, be given to those who have red hair and kept from those with black hair; if it may be rightfully given to the millionaire and kept from the day laborer; rightfully extended to those who can read and withheld from those who cannot, or to those with a college education and from those who have onlv u common-school education — if these arc the only bases on which women claim a share in government, then the fundamental argument for woman sntVra^' disappears.

Reason hack far enough on the privilege line of argument and you soon come to that fetish of tradition, the divine right of kings. So it" yon cannot put your claim on any better ground than privilege you would better not go on. . . . Being a right, it is also a duty. I le who has a right to maintain has a duty to perform. This is the firm rock upon which woman suffrage must rest. It must be de- manded because women are members of the community, because they have common interests in the common property and affairs of the community; in a wc.nl, they have rights in the community and duties toward it which are the same as the rights and duties of every other sane per. son of mature age. who keeps out of the penitentiary.

An unexpected pleasure was a brief address by Dr. Mary Put- nam Jacobi, a veteran suffragist and prominent physician of New York, who was attending the convention of the American Medical Association. She based her argument for equal suffrage on the injustice practiced toward women physicians when they seek the opportunity for hospital practice. Mrs. F. W. Hunt, wife of the Governor of Idaho, testified to the good results of woman suf- frage in that State for the past five years. Others who gave addresses were the Rev. Alice Ball Loomis (Wis.), The Femi- nine Doctor in Society; Mrs. Lydia Phillips Williams, president of the Minnesota Federation of Clubs, Growth and Greetings; Mrs. Elizabeth Boynton Harbert (III), For the Sake of the Child; Miss Frances Griffin (Ala.), A Southern Tour; the Rev. Olympia Brown (Wis.), The Tabooed Trio; Mrs. Annie L. Digges (Kas.), The Duty of the Hour; Miss Laura A. Gregg (Neb.), Who Will Defend the Flag?; the Rev. Celia Parker Woolley (111.) i W Oman's Worth in the Community; the Rev.

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQOI IQ

William B. Riley (Minn.), Woman's Rights and Political Right- eousness.1

An inadequate newspaper account of the very able address of Miss Gail Laughlin (N. Y.), on The Industrial Laggard, said:

Miss Laughlin described the nineteenth as the industrial century of which the factory was a notable product and co-operation the spirit. Men were trained to do one thing well and by division of labor the maximum result was attained with the minimum expendi- ture of labor and capital. This principal of division of labor has been applied everywhere except in the household, the field which espe- cially concerns women. Household labor is outside the current of industrial progress. It is not even recognized as an industrial prob- lem because it is not a wealth-producing industry. Students of economics will sometime understand that the industries which con- sume wealth should receive attention as well as those which produce it. Business principles are not applied to the domestic service prob- lem. There are no business hours. The person is hired, not the labor. One woman described the situation: "If you have a girl, you want her, no matter at what time." There is no standard of work and the result is confusion worse confounded. The servant's goings- out and comings-in are watched and she has no hours to herself. Is it any wonder that so many women prefer to go into factory life1 at Irss pay but where they can have some hours of their own?

The report of the Committee on Legislation for Civil Rights, Mrs. Laura M. Johns (Kans.), chairman, showed that it had been in correspondence with many State associations which were work- ing for the repeal of bad laws and the enactment of good ones; for raising the age of consent; for child-labor bills; for women

icians in State institutions; for women on school boards and in high educational positions and for many other civil and legal measures. Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby's report on Industrial IVobk-ms affecting Women and Children showed much diligent

I rch into the discriminations against women in the business and educational world and ^ave many flagrant instances. "In

1 Among those who took part in conferences and on committees were Helen Rand

Annie K. Wood fCal.): Kllen Powell Thompson (D. C.); Mariana W.

I ila K. Willrti and Florence Gregory (N. Y.); Clara Bright and Jean Gordon

Maud Starker (Mich.); Maude I. w* (N. D.); Eleanor M. Hall (O.) ; Helm Kimber (Kas.); Eleanor C. Stockman.

Is and Dollie R. Bradley (la.); Kmily S. Richards (Utah); Ben

Wade (Ind.); Clara A. Young (Neb.); Evelyn H. Belden (la.); Addie N. Johnson (Mo.); Mrs. i -vn (Minn.); Cornelia Gary (Brooklyn); Ida Porter Boyer (Pcnn.).

Valuable reports were made by all of the State presidents.

2O HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

Government positions," she said, "this was clearly due to their lack of a vote."

The Government departments at Washington are almost entirely governed by politics and women are greatly discriminated against, notwithstanding civil service rules. The report of A. R. Severn, chief examiner for the Civil Service Commission, shows that during the last ten years less than ten per cent, of the women who have passed the examinations have been appointed, while more than 25 per cent, of the men who passed obtained positions. To prevent the possibility of women obtaining high-class positions the examina- tions for these are not open to women. Of the 58 employments for which examinations were held, women were admitted to only 22. The per cent, of women employed of those who had passed was 13 in 1898; 6 per cent, in 1899, and lower in 1900, not a woman being appointed to a clerk's position from the waiting list. The Post Office Department in the last year sent out an order that women should not be made distributing clerks wherever it was pos- sible to appoint men. . . . Legislation for the protection of children has been defeated in Georgia, Alabama and South Carolina. In the factories of Birmingham, it is stated, children of six and seven are obliged to be at work by 5 130 a.m. and to work twelve hours daily, attending spindles for ten cents a day. Jane Addams says she knows from personal observations that in certain States the condi- tions of child labor are as bad as they were in England half a century ago. In the great cotton mills at Columbia, S. C, she found a little girl scarcely five years old doing night work thirteen hours at a Mixuh, for three days in the week.

Sunday afternoon the Rev. Olympia Brown gave the conven- tion sermon — The Forward March — in the First Baptist Church, with scripture reading by Mrs. Catt, prayer by the Rev. Margaret T. Olmstead, hymns by the Rev. Kate Hughes and the Rev. Mrs. Woolley ; responsive reading by the Rev. Alice Ball Loomis. The Rev. Anna Howard Shaw preached in the Church of the Redeemer in the morning and Louis F. Post in the evening. Dr. Shaw preached in the evening at the Hennepin Avenue Methodist Church; Miss Laura Clay spoke at the Central Baptist; Dr. Frances Woods at the first Unitarian; Miss Laura Gregg at Plymouth ; Mrs. Mary C. C. Bradford at the Wesley Methodist in the morning and the Rev. Olympia Brown in the evening ; Mrs. Elizabeth Boynton Harbert in the Chicago Avenue Baptist; the Rev. Margaret F. Olmstead at All Souls; the Rev. Alice Ball Loomis at Tuttle Universalist ; Mrs. Mariana W. Chapman at

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 190! 21

the Friends' Church ; Miss Ella Moffatt at the Bloomington Ave- nue Methodist, and Mr. and Miss Blackwell at the Trinity Methodist.

An official letter was sent by request to the Constitutional Con- vention of Alabama asking for a woman suffrage clause. An invi- tation to hold a conference in Baltimore was accepted. Arrange- ments were made to have a National Suffrage Conference Septem- ber 9, 10, in Buffalo, N. Y., during the Pan-American Exposition. It was decided also to accept an invitation from the Inter-State and West Indian Exposition Board to hold a conference during the Exposition in Charleston, S. C. Official invitations were re- ceived from various public bodies to hold the next convention in \Yashington, Atlantic City, Milwaukee and New Orleans.

The president made the closing address to a large audience on the last evening, a keen, analytical review of the demand for woman suffrage. "Its fundamental principle," she said, "is that 'all governments derive their just power from the consent of the governed/ It is the argument that has enfranchised men every- where at all times and it is the one which will enfranchise women." As it was extemporaneous no adequate report can be given.

Nothing was left undone by this hospitable city for the success and pleasure of the convention. Very favorable reports and commendatory editorials were given by the newspapers. An ex- cellent program by the best musical talent was furnished at each <>n under the direction of Mrs. Cleone Daniels Bergren. An iti£ reception in honor of the national officers, to which eight hundred invitations were sent, took place in the beautiful home of Mr. and Mrs. W. D. Gregory. The Business Woman's Club, Martha Scott Anderson, president, gave an afternoon reception in its rooms, the invitations reading: "The club desires to show in a measure its appreciation of the labor by the members of the National Suffrage Association in behalf of women." Trolley rides tlimiudi the hand-nine suburbs and a visit to the big flouring milN were among the diversions.1

1 At the close of the convention twenty-seven of the visitors made a trip in a special ' Park, which was arranged by Mrs. Catt and MI'M Hay. They had a most interesting time which was graphically described by Miss Black \v< II in (lie H Journal of June 22. It also published some of the humorous pot ins writim en route by the fay excursionists.

22 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

This chapter has tried to picture the first convention of the National American Suffrage Association in the new century, typi- cal of many which preceded and followed. If it and other chap- ters seem overburdened with personal mention it must be remem- bered that it is a precious privilege to those who assisted in this great movement, and to their descendants, to have their names thus preserved in history. In the biography of Susan B. Anthony (page 1246) may be found the following tribute to these con- ventions, which were held annually for over fifty years.

It can be said without fear of contradiction that the National Suffrage Conventions will go down in history as the most notable Ill-Id by women during the present age, excepting, of course, those of an international nature. The lofty character of their demands. (lie courage, ability and earnestness of their speakers, the unswerving fidelity to one central idea, give them a dominating position which they will hold for all time. They are pervaded by a remarkable spirit of democracy and fraternity. Those who come to scoff remain—not to pray but to have a good time. The reporters are all converted during the first two or three meetings and become mem- bers of the family. The delegates never wait for an introduction to each other; all have come together on the same mission and that is a sufficient guarantee. Nobody can remember afterwards what her neighbor wore and this proves that all were well dressed. The meetings are so systematic and business-like that one never feels she has wasted a minute. If points of serious difference arise they are taken up and settled by the Business Committee, out of sight of the public, but in all matters directly connected with the association every delegate has a voice and vote.

These are trained and disciplined women. There is nothing hys- terical, nothing fanatical about them. They are animated by the most serious and determined purpose, and, in order to effect this, all sectarian bias, all political preference, all fads and hobbies in any direction are rigidly barred. Woman suffrage — that is the sole object. The offices all represent hard work and no salary, therefore no unseemly scramble takes place to secure them, and the association has the most profound confidence in its National Board. Every dollar subscribed has a definite channel designated for its expendi- ture and so there is no big treasury fund to quarrel over. There is always a sufficient number of experienced members to hold the younger and more impulsive recruits in check. Being one of the oldest women's organizations in existence it has accumulated a large store of wisdom and judgment. Even where people disapprove its purposes they cannot fail to respect its dignified, orderly methods.

CHAPTER II.

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 1902.

The association held its Thirty- fourth annual convention, which

especially distinguished by the presence of visitors from other

lands, in the First Presbyterian Church, Washington, D. C., Feb.

u-iS, 1902. 1 There was special significance in this meeting

place, as the pastor of the church for many years was the Rev.

>n Sutherland,2 who from its pulpit had more than once

denounced woman suffrage and its advocates ; but it was now

under the liberal ministry of the Rev. T. DeWitt Talmage, their

1 Part of Call: An International Woman Suffrage Conference will be held in connec- tion with this annual convention, to which suffrage associations of fourteen countries have been invited to send delegates.

The principles which for a century have stood as the guarantee of political liberty to American men, "Taxation without representation is tyranny," and "Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed," can no longer be claimed as belong- ing to the United States alone for they have been adopted by all civilized nations. The steadily increasing acceptance of the belief that self-government is the highest form of government has revolutionized the popular thought of the world within the last fifty During that period all newly established governments have been fashioned after the model of a Republic; while in most European nations and their colonies the suffrage has been so largely extended that the mere skeleton of a monarchy remains.

Logical thinkers the world over have been led in consequence to ask: Are not women

jr capable with men of self-government? What necessary qualification fits men for

the exercise of this sacred right which is not likewise possessed by women? Are they

iiclligent? The statistics of schools, colleges and educational bureaus answer "No."

Arc they less moral, peaceful and law-abiding than men? The statistics of churches,

police courts and penitentiaries answer "No." Are they less public spirited and patriotic

than men? The labors of millions of organized women in noble reforms, in helpful

ics and wise philanthropies answer "No." . . .

An International Woman Suffrage Conference for the exchange of greetings, reports

and methods forms a natural mile-stone on the march of progress. All persons believing

c fundamental principles o; unient contained in the Declaration of Imlr-

• ce and the Constitution of the United States apply to women as well as to men,

ited to visit the convention and to unite in welcome to our foreign guests.

ELIZABETH CADY STANTON, ) _,

I Honorary Presidents. SUSAN B. ANTHONY,

CARRIE CHAPMAN CATT, President.

ANNA HOWARD SHAW, Vice-President-at-Large.

KATE M. GORDON, Corresponding Secretary.

r. STONE BLACKWELL, Recording Secretary. KIET TAYLOR UPTON, Treasurer.

LAI-RA CLAY. ) .

v Auditors. CORA SMITH EATON, f

: History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I, page 543.

23

24 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

strong and valued advocate. The Washington Post said : "More than a thousand visitors were present yesterday afternoon at the first session of the National American Suffrage Convention and the first International Woman Suffrage Conference. Perhaps no other meeting of its kind ever has occasioned as much interest on the part of Washington women generally.1 The large audi- ence room was packed to the doors . . . and it has been ar- ranged to hold overflow meetings in the church parlors." The platform was banked with flowers over which waved the flags of thirty nations, lent by Miss Clara Barton, founder of the Red Cross, to whom they had been presented by representatives of each individual nation. Above them all hung the "suffrage flag" with four golden stars on its blue ground for the four States where women were fully enfranchised — Wyoming, Colo- rado, Utah and Idaho. The president, Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, was in the chair.

This convention will be ever memorable because under its auspices the First International Woman Suffrage Confrence was held which resulted later in the founding of the International Alliance. The proceedings of this conference are described in the chapter devoted to the Alliance. Ten countries were repre- sented and their delegates took part in the convention, which was •welcomed on the opening afternoon by the Hon. Henry B. F. McFarland, president of the board of commissioners of the Dis- trict of Columbia. He addressed the delegates as "stockholders in the national capital" and said: "Personally I welcome not only you but your cause. In common, I believe, with the majority of intelligent men I think you have won your case on the argu- ment. Equal suffrage is equal justice and there is no reason why such women as you should be classed in the States with idiots and criminals." Mrs. May Wright Sewall, who was to

1 "February could be appropriately marked on the calendar as woman's month at the national capital. For many years one or more national bodies of women have met in Washington some time in February. This year an unusually large number are assem- bling. On February 17, the day before the National Suffrage Convention ends, the Continental Congress of the Daughters of the American Revolution will open to continue five days. The fourth triennial of the National Council of Women of the United States will begin on February 19 and extend over the 25th. The National Congress of Mothers will convene February 25 and be in session until the zSlh."

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQO2 25

greet the foreign guests in the name of the International Council of \Yoinen, of which she was president, was detained until later. Mrs. Catt with words of highest eulogy introduced Miss Barton, who said :

Madam President, Ladies and Delegates: Among many honors which from time to time have been tendered me by my generous country people, not one has been more appreciated than the privi- lege of giving this word of public welcome to the honored delega- tion of women present with us.

Indies of Europe, if a hundred tongues were mine they could not speak the glad welcome in our hearts. It is an epoch in the history of the world that your coming marks. For the first time within the written history of mankind have the women of the nations left their homes and assembled in council to declare the position of women before the world, bringing to national and international view the injustice and the folly of the barriers which ignorance has created and tradition fostered and preserved through the unthink- ing ages until they came to be held not only as a part of the natural laws and rights of man but as the immutable decrees of Divinity itself. ... If woman alone had suffered under these mistaken tradi- tions, if she could have borne the evil by herself, it would have been • it if ul. hut her brother man, in the laws he created and igno- rantly worshipped, has suffered with her. He has lost her highest help ; he has crippled the intelligence he needed ; he has belittled the very source of his own being and dwarfed the image of his Maker.

Ladies, there is a propriety in your crossing the seas to hold the first council in America, for it was in this new untrammeled land of freedom, free birth, free thought and free speech that the first outspoken notes were given, the first concerted action taken toward the release of woman, the enlightenment of man as a lawmaker, and the attention of the world directed to the injustice, unwisdom and folly of the code under which it lived. It was here that the first hard blows were struck. It was here the paths were marked out that have 1»een trodden with bleeding1 feet for half a century, until •icfth the blows no longer rebound and the hands of the grateful, loving womanhood of the world struggle for a place to scatter roses in the paths which erstwhile were flint and thorns ; and an admiring world of women and men alike breathe in tones of respect, gratitude and love the names of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony.

Miss Anthony. I am glad to stand beside you while I tell these

ri from the other side of the world who has brought them here.

This .f Euro! • prototype- -this the woman

'den the >f the pioneer till the thorns

: tin's, the woman who has lived to hear the hisses

turn to dulcet strains of music; the woman who has dared to plead

for every good cause under heaven, who opened her door to the

26 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

fleeing slave and claimed the outcast for a brother; the woman beloved of her own country and honored in all countries.

Although a slow lesson to learn it has always proved that the grandeur of a nation was shown by the respect paid to woman. The brightest garlands of Spain, linked with immortelles, twine about the name of Isabella. The highest glory of England today is not that she placed her crown on the brow of her trusted and beloved new monarch, a man whom the nations of the earth welcome to their galaxy of rulers, but that she lays her mantle of fifty years' rule through war and peace and progress such as never was known before, upon the grave of a woman — that mantle on which no stain has ever rested and on which the sunlight of happiness is shadowed and dimmed only by the tears of a sorrowing nation, as it is reverently borne to its honored rest. England, thank God you had no Salic law! America has none, and, Miss Anthony, the path which you have trodden through these oft painful years leads to that goal ; and, though your eyes will have opened upon the blessed light of the heaven beyond, verily there may be some standing here who shall not taste death until these things come.

Ladies and Delegates: In the name of the noble leader who has called you, we welcome you. In the name of our country, its great institutions of learning and equal privileges to all, we welcome you. In the name of the brotherhood of man, we welcome you. In the name of our never-forgotten pioneers, a Mott, a Stone, a Gage, a Griffing, a Garrison, a May, a Foster, a Douglass, a Phillips, we reverently welcome you. In the name of God and humanity, in the name of the angels of earth and the angels of heaven, we welcome you to our shores, to our halls, to our homes and to our hearts.

Miss Susan B. Anthony, honorary president of the association, •who was next presented and enthusiastically received, closed her brief welcome by saying that Mrs. Stanton and herself con- ceived the idea of holding an International Suffrage Conference in 1883 when they were in Europe but the time was too early for it, and now, twenty years later, European women had come as delegates to one in the United States and henceforth the women of the two countries would go forward together in this cause. Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, vice-president-at-large, referred to the fact that she was born in England and transplanted to America, and said : "While you are divided from us by geographical lines, which are imaginary, and by a language which is not the same, you have not come to an alien people or land. In the realm of the heart, in the domain of mind, there are no geographical lines dividing the nations. You come to us as members of one family.

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQO2 27

You come that we may all stand on one plane of freedom. I wish we could take you to our four 'star States' where women vote. \Ve mean to give you of our best but we expect to get from you much more than we give. You will show us thai those who speak English are not the only ones whose hearts are alive to the great flame of liberty."

The national corresponding secretary, Miss Kate Gordon, read a telegram from Dr. Augusta Stowe Gullen, leader of the suffrage movement in Canada: "Greetings and best -wishes from your sis- ter- across the line": a cablegram from Christiana: "Success to your work, from the National \Yoman Suffrage Association of Xorway." A letter was read by the delegate from Norway, Mrs. ( iudrun Drewsen, from the president of the association, Miss Gina Krog, which said in part : "The woman suffrage move- ment ! I know of no movement, no cause that is at the same time so national and so international. The victory now gained in Xorway, municipal suffrage and eligibility to municipal office for a great many women, will no doubt in time influence every home in our country; but we could not have won this victory without receiving impulses from other civilized nations. We are indeed indebted to men and women in several European coun- tries for the privileges which we now possess, but from no other country in the world have we received the inspiration in our work which we have had from the United States; to no women in the world are we so indebted as to the women of this country. Those great and noble pioneers and their fervent struggle — how they have inspired us and awakened our enthusiasm! Thai siduoux work, year after year — how it lias strengthened our hands! That glorious example, those results attained in your count r\ how we have brought them before our legislalo; awaken their sen^e of justice! I sincerely wish that the news of the victory achieved in our country may prove an imix-lus to you in your work. To be assured of this would give us the great ;on of feeling that at all events a small fraction of our debt to you -was paid."

Miss Gordon read a letter from the Federation of Progressive

n < iennaiiv \\hi-1i declared that its InM and

nost object was to Of ( « nnan women full jxilitical

28 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

rights and continued: "We watch with especial interest and sympathy the effort of those who persistently and courageously work for the full citizenship of women. The women of the United States have, in this struggle, set a noble example to the women of Europe. In Germany we recall with tender veneration such names as Lucy Stone, Frances Willard, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, the Rev. Anna Howard Shaw and Susan B. Anthony. The women of Germany are without political rights. It is far easier to fight for equality and freedom in a young country, like the United States, than in an old civilization, cumbered with tradi- tions— a country that looks back on a history of many centuries, that only a few decades ago fought its way through severe con- flicts and painful changes to political unity and is now slowly growing into responsibilities which social and political problems impose on a modern State."

"The Woman's Christian Temperance Union of Tasmania sends hearty greetings and trusts that the International Suffrage Conference may be successful and that it -will bring nearer that day when man and woman shall sit 'side by side, full summed in all their powers,' " was the message signed by Jessie S. Rooke, its president, which was given by Miss Anna Gordon, president of the W. C. T. U. of the United States. The response to the addresses of welcome was made by Madame Sofja Levovna Friedland of Russia, who said in beautiful English:

I am a loyal daughter of a friendly country, who thanks you for your welcome and brings greetings from her distant home. Russia and the United States have l>een friends for many a year and are friends today, proven friends, who have stood by each other in the hour of need. In 1863 the French ambassador at the court of St. Petersburg laid before the Czar the propostion of Napoleon III, to interfere in your civil war for the purpose of perpetuating the divi- sion between the North and the South. After listening to this bold proposal of the French Emperor, Czar Alexander, the man who had freed twenty-five million slaves in one stroke of his pen, replied : "Tell your Emperor that the United States is our friend and tell him also that it has the same right to maintain a republican form of government as we have to choose a monarchy. Tell him also that he must keep his hands off and not meddle in its affairs for I will not allow anyone to interfere on the other side of the Atlantic. He who strikes my friend, strikes me." This answer in diplomatic language went the same day to Paris and soon after Russian battle-

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQO2 2O,

ships arrived in the harbors of New York and San Francisco. There are still men and women who remember them. They used to wonder why the Russian men-of-war were lying peacefully in Ameri- can waters. President Lincoln could have given the answer, for in a private message from the Czar he had been assured of the friend- ship of the great Eastern Empire. He knew that the commanders of the Russian ships had secret orders to act in case of necessity.

But the American people have done more, for there came a morn- ing when the glorious winter sun of Russia greeted the Star-Spangled Banner, when American ships landed on Russian shores ready to pro- tect us from a more cruel enemy — hunger. The cry of distress from our famine-stricken villages had found an echo in American hearts and the ships which came did not bear government orders, they bore the tokens of love from one brother to another; they brought us wheat and corn to feed our people.

Madame Friedland told of the visit of the Grand Duke Alexis to this country and of the poem read by Oliver Wendell Holmes at a banquet given in his honor, and closed : "Thus an American poet has expressed the feelings of his countrymen and 'women. God bless the United States! Long life to President Roosevelt and prosperity to you all! In the days to come and the years to follow may our two great nations stand side by side in harmony and peace. May the Star-Spangled Banner and the Russian Double Eagle soar aloft, not on battlefields, not against any nation, but for a brotherhood of men in the federation of the world.'' The opening session ended with the president's address by Mrs. Catt, in the course of which she said:

In ready response to growing intelligence and individualism the principle of self-government has been planted in every civilized nation of the world. Before the force of this onward movement the most cherished ideals of conservatism have fallen. Out of the

ilie old, phojnix-like has arisen a new institution, vigorous and strong, yea, one which will endure as long as men occupy the earth. The little band of Americans who initiated the modern move- would never have predicted that within a century "Taxation ten without representation is tyranny" would have been written into the fundamental law of all the monarchies of Europe except . and that even there self-government would obtain in the nmiiidpnlities. The most optimistic seer among them would not have prophesied that Mongolian Japan, then tightly shutting h mnicrce of the world and jealously guardi would before the century dosed lia\e \v< i d established universal suffrage for

3O HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

its men. He would not have dreamed that every inch of the great continent of South America, then chiefly an unexplored region over which bands of savages roved at will, would he covered by written constitutions guaranteeing self-government to men inspired by Dec- larations of Independence similar to that of this country; that the settlements in Mexico and Central America and many islands of the ocean would grow into republics, and least of all that the island con- tinent of Australia, with its associates of New Zealand and Tas- mania, then unexplored wildernesses, would Income great democ- racies where self-government would be carried on with such enthusi- asm, fervor and wisdom that they would give lessons in methods and principles to all the rest of the world. . . .

Hard upon the track of the man suffrage movement presses the movement for woman suffrage, a logical step onward. It has come as inevitably and naturally as the flower unfolds from the bud or the fruit develops from the flower. Why should woman suffrage not come? Men throughout the world hold their suffrage by the guar- antee of the two principles of liberty and for these reasons only: ( )ne, "Taxation without representation is tyranny" ; who dares deny it? And are not women taxed? The other, "Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed." How simple and unanswerable that petition of justice! . . . Woman suffrage must meet precisely the same objections which have been urged against man suffrage and in addition it must combat sex-prejudice, a prejudice against the rights, liberties and opportunities of women.

Mrs. Catt closed her address with these words : "Yet before the attainment of equal rights for men and women there will be years of struggle and disappointment. We of a younger genera- tion have taken up the work where our noble and consecrated pioneers left it. We in turn are enlisted for life and generations yet unborn will take up the work where we lay it down. So through centuries if need be the education will continue, until a regenerated race of men and women who are equal before God and man shall control the destinies of the earth. It will be the proud duty of the new International Alliance, if one shall be formed, to extend its helping hand to the women of every nation and every people and its completed duty will not have been performed until the last vestige of the old obedience of one human being to an- other shall have been destroyed."

The presence of the foreign visitors and the greetings from abroad made an original and pleasing variation of the usual pro- gram at national conventions. The Evening with the Pioneers

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQO2 31

opened with the singing by the audience of The Battle Hymn of the Republic, written by one of them, Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, led by another, John Hutchinson, a member of the famous family of singers, who the day before had celebrated his goth birthday. Miss Anthony presided and the Washington Times said that she "was greeted with a storm of applause, the convention rising as one woman and with waving handkerchiefs cheering her to the echo for several minutes." The Loyal Legion of Women through its president gave her an armful of red roses and in accepting them she observed smilingly : "I can only say what I have often said in late years — it is much pleasanter to be pelted with roses than stones! The National Suffrage Association stands like a Mother Church with her arms wide open to those who want to come in and we are especially glad to receive loyal women."

Mrs. Florence Fenwick Miller, a member of the London School Board for nine years, brought greetings from Mrs. Priscilla Bright McLaren, 87 years old, of whom Miss Anthony said : "She is an elder sister of John and Jacob Bright. John was the great champion of manhood suffrage but Jacob was still greater, for he was a champion of suffrage for women also. Mrs. Mc- Laren sent a loving and appreciative message to "the dear Ameri- can women who have so steadfastly held up the banner of woman suffrage and especially to the octogenarians, Elizabeth Cady Stan- ton and Susan B. Anthony," and closed it with a Christmas poem. Miss Anthony recalled her last visit to Mrs. McLaren in Kdin- burgh three years before and said : "I wish you could see how beautiful she looked as she lay on the bed in her pretty white

iiid blue dressing sack. She is an inspiration to the women

: eat Britain and she has been to me." Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby (D. C), gave a greeting from Mrs.

'The following pioneer workers for woman suffrage were seated on die platform. their ages averaging more than 75 years: Mrs. Virginia < nil. y.

the II. Wolf. Mrs. S. E. Wall. Mrs. Olive Logan.

layo. Miss 1 Mrs. Caro-

Merrick. La.; Mrs. Helen Coti M. I ulm,,

Thom;, i irriet Jackson, Md.; Mrs. William Uoyd Garrison. Mass.;

\ J.; Mrs. ^ Mary Anthony. Mi Smith M,

Meyers, Mrs „ K.

Newlin Iv • Emmeline B. Wells, Utah; Miu Laura Moore, Vt.; Mrs. M. II. Grov< . W

32 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

Stan ton, in her 87th year, and read her paper on Educated Suf- frage.1 In this able and scholarly document Mrs. Stanton said:

The proposition to demand of immigrants a reading and writing qualification on landing strikes me as arbitrary and equally detri- mental to our mutual interests. The danger is not in their landing and living in this country but in their speedy appearance at the ballot-box, there becoming an impoverished and ignorant balance of power in the hands of wily politicians. While we should not allow our country to be a dumping-ground for the refuse population of the old world, still we should welcome all hardy, common-sense laborers here, as we have plenty of room and work for them. . . . The one demand I would make for this class is that they should not become a part of our ruling power until they can read and write the English language intelligently and understand the principles of re- publican government. ... To prevent the thousands of immigrants daily landing on our shores from marching from the steerage to the polls the national Government should prohibit the States from allow- ing them to vote in less than five years and not then unless the ap- plicant can read and write the English language. ... To this end, Congress should enact a law for "educated suffrage" for our native- born as well as foreign rulers, alike ignorant of our institutions. With free schools and compulsory education, no one has an excuse for not understanding the language of the country. As women are governed by a "male aristocracy" we are doubly interested in having our rulers able at least to read and write.

The popular objection to woman suffrage is that it would "double the ignorant vote." The patent answer to this is, abolish the igno- rant vote. Our legislators have this power in their own hands. There have been various restrictions in the past for men. We are willing to abide by the same for women, provided the insurmount- able qualification of sex be forever removed. . . . Surely, when we compel all classes to learn to read and write and thus open to them- selves the door of knowledge not by force but by the promise of a privilege all intelligent citizens enjoy, we are benefactors, not tyrants. To stimulate them to climb the first rounds of the ladder that they may reach the divine heights where they shall be as gods, knowing good and evil, by withholding the citizen's right to vote for a few years will be a blessing to them as well as to the State. . . .

Mrs. Stanton had made her last address in person to a national convention in 1892, when she resigned the presidency of the asso- ciation— that incomparable essay on The Solitude of Self — but she never had failed to send her annual battle cry. The one to

1 Miss Anthony had objected strongly to Mrs. Stanton's letter to the convention of 1901 criticising the church, and she did not approve of demanding an educational require- ment for the suffrage when women would have to obtain it by consent of men of all classes. Mrs. Stanton's letter, therefore, was sent for Mrs. Colby to read, who was in sympathy with its sentiment.

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQO2 33

this convention, which began the fulfilment of her dream of a world-wide movement for woman suffrage, was written with all her old-time logic and forceful argument and it proved to be her last, as her long and valuable life was ended the next November.

Mrs. Harriet Taylor Upton (O.) read the paper of Mrs. Caro- line Hallowell Miller (Md.), detained at the last moment, on \Yliy We Come Again, in which she explained why the suf- fragists would continue to come to Washington and haunt Con- gress until their object, a Federal Amendment, had been attained. The humor for which Mrs. Miller, a staid "Quaker," was noted sparkled in its sentences although she protested that she was en- tirely serious. Miss Anthony introduced Henry B. Blackwell (Mass.) with the quaint remark: "He was the husband of Lucy Stone ; I don't think he can quite represent her but he will do the best he can!" Mr. Blackwell briefly reviewed the agitation for women suffrage during the first half of the I9th century. He told of meeting Lucy Stone in 1850 and being so charmed he advised his elder brother to make her acquaintance; of hearing her address a Massachusetts constitutional convention in 1852 with \Yilliam Lloyd Garrison and Wendell Phillips; of making his own first suffrage speech in Cleveland, O., in 1853 and of his marriage in 1855. In presenting the next speaker Miss An- thony said : "Mr. Blackwell alluded to his brother, who did not marry Lucy but Antoinette — the Rev. Antoinette Brown Black - . the first ordained woman minister — who will now address Her paper on Chivalry was a clear analysis of the changed ideas of this word, touching with sarcasm on that of the days when the effort for the rights of women began, a chivalry which gave the person and property of the wife, the guardianship of

hildren, all her legal privileges, to the husband. She ti the evolution from the early privations of the pioneer suffragists

<• honors that arc now showered upon them and drew a strik- ast between "ti old chivalry, which made itself

ole umpire of the benef its to I.e -ranted, and the mere.

chivalry, which consult the l>eneficiaries themselves as to

Miss \nthonv then introduced the first woman ordained by the Univers arch, th > Mvmpia Kruwn, who struck

34 TITSTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

the keynote of her address in saying: "When we are vexed by the seeming irrationality of some of our Congressmen, may we not explain it as due to the fact that they are thinking of the kind of men who elected them? The United States debars in- telligent American women from voting and says to the riffraff of Europe, 'Come over and help govern us.' It is an experiment which no other country in the world ever did make and no other ever will make and 1 predict that it will be a failure. It will be necessary to call in the aid of the intelligent American women and soon or late this will be done."

Mrs. Elizabeth Smith Miller, daughter of the noted Abolition- ist, Gerrit Smith, was asked to rise and Miss Anthony paid glow- ing tribute to him and to many men and women who had stood by the cause of woman suffrage in its early days. The audience were pleased to enjoy once more her informal and unique method of presiding, as glancing over the audience she singled out veteran suffragists who had come to hear and not to speak, calling them by name with some reminiscent comment. Her eye fell upon William H. Bright, who sponsored the bill in the Legislature of Wyoming -which gave the first equal suffrage ever granted any- where to women. In answering the demand of the audience for a speech he told how Mrs. Esther Morris had come from New York State to Wyoming in 1867 and how she and his wife had persuaded him to prepare the bill, which was passed by a Democratic Legislature and signed by a Republican Gov- ernor. In response to a general request Miss Anthony told the story, of which audiences never seemed to tire, of that his- toric occasion when she broke all precedents by addressing a Teachers' Convention in 1853. This interesting session closed with the singing of Auld Lang Syne led by the venerable John Hutchinson.

During a morning session Miss Gordon made her report as corresponding secretary, saying that although it covered only the seven months since the last convention it showed that 6,500 letters had been sent out from the headquarters during this period. In 1895, when Mrs. Catt became chairman of the Organization Committee, she had established headquarters for her work in one little room in the New York World building, that was really an

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQO2 35

annex of her husband's offices, and begun the publication of a Bulletin, -which was the organ of the committee. In 1897 it be- came the organ of the National Association and had now ex- panded into a quarterly paper called Progress, which was edited Mice Stone Blackwell, Ellis Meredith and Laura Gregg. A preliminary edition of 100,000 had been sent out from the head- quarters, the expense borne by Boston women, and later 16,000 c( >pies of the October and 20,000 of the January editions had gone to the 14,000 newspapers of the country, to members of Congress and others. A monthly series of Political Equality Leaflets was also commenced and a Course of Study for Clubs and individuals was established for which a dozen or more books were published. These two valuable features were carried on without any expense to the association, as they paid for themselves.

Miss Gordon described the National Conference held in Charleston, S. C., February 3-4, at the invitation of the board of the Inter-State and West Indian Exposition; told of the con- ference in Baltimore x and said of the one in Buffalo : "The far- reaching effect and impetus given to the woman's movement by the Congress of Women held in connection with the Chicago Imposition, determined the Business Committee's acceptance of an invitation to hold a National Conference during the Pan- American Exposition. Too late did we learn that the invitation extended included no responsibility whatever upon the Exposition t< > further the success of the conference. Buffalo did not represent an organized center and after several fruitless attempts to form a local committee, the headquarters realized that every little detail essential to success must be attended to by the board. From all reports of the most discouraging nature -were received as

1 The Charleston conference was held in the Assembly Room of the Woman's Huild ing, welcomed by Mayor Smyth, Mrs. S. C. Simons, president of the women's depart m< nt. s. Virginia D. Young in behalf of the State Press Assou .it ion. \hv C.ttt impended arid Inter Mr. Blackwell made an address. Among the speakers here and in German Artillery Hall was the lion. K. K. ilrmphill (S. ('.), always a staunch advocate of v. suffrage. An afternoon reception was given !>> tin- Woman's Board. The News and Couritr and other papers had ports.

The Baltimore was In Id a few days later in tin- main auditorium of the

Central Y. M. C. A. Hall, with the Rev. Anna Howard S img. It was wel-

comed of Johns Hopkins M< : l. and tin national speakers

were Miss Laura Clay, president of ti v l-.M;i.il Rights Association; Dr. Cora

KAIOH. Judge J. (I. Flrnncr of Idaho; the Rev. Olympta Brown, Mrs. Colby, Mis* Gordon and Mr. and Miss Blackwell.

36 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

to the absolute failure attending all conferences there but never- theless we started a vigorous correspondence and for five preced- ing weeks every Sunday paper in Buffalo was supplied with matter from headquarters. To make a long story short, September 9-10 witnessed our conference well attended, with the night sessions crowded and success acknowledged on all sides, even though we labored under the disadvantage of its being held during the season of sorrow and distress in that city while President McKinley's life hovered in the valley of the shadow of death."

Miss Gordon said that during the year Mrs. Catt had made a tour of nine States and taken part in forty meetings. Referring to the efforts made to have a woman suffrage clause put into new constitutions that were being framed in several States she said : "The clause which lived twenty-four hours in the Alabama Con- stitution, granting to taxpaying women owning $500 worth of property the suffrage on questions of bonded indebtedness, was killed by a disease peculiar to the genus homo known as chivalry. In the case in point, the diagnosis revealed that the fairest, purest and brightest jewels that ever shone under the brilliant rays of God's shining sun would be immeasurably lowered by voting upon questions relating to the taxation of their own property. Yet, under the vagaries of this disease, this same convention conferred on husbands the right to vote on their wives' property. This is the same character of chivalry which gives the wages of the brightest, fairest jewels to the husband, which makes im- possible equal pay for equal work and which classes the jewels with the idiots, insane and criminals in that and other States."

The program was so crowded with attractions that it left no time for the usual conferences on work and campaigns, so they were placed at 9 130 a.m. As they had been so largely attended by visitors the preceding year as to call forth a rule from the Board of Officers that thereafter delegates only should be per- mitted to attend them, this was not disastrous. Early morning conferences therefore were held on Organization and Press and two others took the form of State presidents' councils. The Plan of Work recommended again by the Executive Committee and adopted by the convention urged work in Congressional districts for the 1 6th Amendment; an attempt to secure tax-paying

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQO2 37

suffrage; more resolutions by national and State conventions; a campaign to secure suffrage speakers at Chautauqua assemblies and State and county fairs; prizes for essays on woman suf- frage in schools and colleges; circulating suffrage libraries and the general use of a suffrage stamp on letters.

Two novel evening programs were devoted to The New Woman and The New Man, the first with the following speakers: Mrs. Helen Adelaide Shaw of Boston; Mrs. Elizabeth M. Gil- mer of New Orleans, known far and wide as "Dorothy Dix," said to receive the highest salary of any woman journalist; Dr. Cora Smith Eaton, a prominent physician and surgeon of Minne- apolis; Miss Gail Laughlin (N. Y.) who had taken the highest honors in the Law Class of Cornell University; the Rev. Ida C. TTultin, a successful Unitarian minister of Boston. Miss Mar- garet Haley of Chicago, who led the great fight of the Teachers' Federation of that city to compel the big corporations to pay their taxes in order that the public schools should not be crippled for lack of funds, could not be present because of a crisis in the legal proceedings. Each of the women representing the four professions of law, medicine, theology and journalism, in ad- dresses scintillating with humor, reviewed the early prejudices which had been overcome, told of the large number of women •who had entered the field when the opportunity came but showed that they could never have an even chance until there was com- plete obliteration of sex prejudice. Little idea of their interest could be obtained fn.m fragmentary paragraphs.

The house was crowded to hear about The New Man,1 repre- sented first on the program by Oswald Garrison Villard, grand- son of William Lloyd Garrison and owner and editor of the New York I'^'cniuf/ Post, who gave a spirited and effective account nf Women in the New York Municipal Campaign. This was

'A Washington paper said: "There were a good many men in the audience and they <Ii'I not look much as they do in the comic papers. The suffragists' husbands in car

nsumptive, cadaverous tit mortals, trailing around in the wake of ram-

bunctious and overwhelming wives; but most of the men who mixed themselves up with this convention looked as if they could not very easily have been dragged there if they bad not wanted to come. Some < re six feet tall and broad in proportion and

none of them looked as if they had been in the habit of asking their wives for permission k. They did not net like cats in a strange garret cither but as if they were having the time of their lives. No does make up his mind to come out for

woman suffrage he can depend upon it he is going to be appreciated."

38 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

the first in which women ever had taken a prominent part and it had attracted wide attention, a revolt against Tammany cor- ruption under Richard Croker. Mr. Villard told of the remark- able work done by the Women's Municipal League under direc- tion of the Citizen's Union for the election of Seth Low as Mayor and a reform ticket. He paid a sarcastic tribute to the assistance of the women anti-suffragists. 'To have been really consistent," he said, "they should have urged upon their more emancipated sisters that woman's sphere is the home and any steps that lead beyond it tend in the long run to the destruction both of the home and of the eternal feminine." He closed by declaring that "the Titanic struggle between right and wrong in the great cities can not be won without the cooperation of that half of the na- tion's citizens in whose hearts are ever found the truest ideals of family and society, of city life and State life and of national existence." At its conclusion Mrs. Catt said: "And yet after Mr. Low was elected Mayor of Greater New York a large num- ber of the women who had helped him win the victory urged him to appoint some women on the school board and he refused. So we must suppose that he is willing to have women pull the chestnuts out of the fire for men but is not willing to give them a share of the chestnuts."

A feature of the evening was the scholarly address of the Hon. William Dudley Foulke (Ind.), president of the U. S. Civil Service Commission. He objected to being classed as a "new man," since long ago he was for several years president of the American Suffrage Association. "Men would not be satisfied with indirect influence," he declared and continued : "It is often said that woman suffrage is just but that there is no need of it, because women have no interests separate from those of men. That argument was used to me only lately by an eminent political economist. I said: 'Suppose a railroad runs through a town and a woman owns a large property in that town and yet cannot vote on the question of raising a subsidy: are her interests necessarily the same as those of every man in the town?' My friends, that case is universal. Suppose a widow is trying to bring up her son in the principles of rporality and a saloon is opened on the corner opposite her home. I do not speak as

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 1902 39

an advocate of prohibition but I do say that the interest of the mother is different from that of the man who sells liquor^ .Or suppose she is bringing up a daughter ; she has a sacred right to protect that daughter from a libertine. Her interest is cer- tainly different from that of the tempter. . . . We do not realize what an immense waste there is in denying woman entrance to political life. She ought to have free access to any- thing she is qualified to do and where she is not qualified she will drop out."

John S. Crosby, a prominent Democratic leader of New York, made a thorough analysis of the functions of the State and the Government, showed the utter fallacy of constituting men the governing and women the governed class and closed as follows : "Attempt to prove that woman's claim to the right of suffrage is as valid as any that man can make would be like try- ing to demonstrate the truth of a self-evident proposition. . . . \Ye ask the ballot for woman not merely because she has a right to it but quite as much because it is her duty to exercise that right. The irresistible power of that all-embracing organ- ization, the State, holds you and me and all that are dear to us as its helpless and often hopeless subjects. The combined wisdom of all of us would be none too great for its intelligent administra- tion and we demand for our own sake and for the sake of those that shall come after us that the wisdom of woman shall be in- cluded; not only that her delicate, intuitional sense of justice shall leaven the lump of public opinion but that her deft hand shall help to knead it into the bread of righteous law. We ask as one of the rights that government is bound to secure that in the administration of its power it shall make use of the fullest lom of the whole people; that the entire popular brain and il conscience shall take cognizance of and be responsible for all acts of government. Not until then shall we see true de- mocracy; not until then shall we indeed have a government of the people, by the people and for the people."

The next day was one always commemorated by suffragists —

the birthday of Susan B. Anthony — this time the Sjnd. The

• •uin's Journal began its account: "As Miss Anthony sat at

breakfast on February 1 5, with one of the jars of delicious cream

4O HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

before her that were sent her daily by the president of the Mary- land Woman Suffrage Association, she was unexpectedly sur- rounded by the foreign delegates in a body. A birthday greeting drawn up and signed by them was read aloud by Mrs. Florence Fenwick Miller of England, while the rest, grouped behind her, bent forward listening with attentive faces — a pretty picture. Among the gifts which she received during the afternoon session were a canoe full of flowers from 'one of the girls' with a poem ; a handsome feather boa from Mrs. Swift and Mrs. Sperry of California; a cup made from the wood of the floor under the table on which the Declaration of Independence was signed, pre- sented in the name of Mrs. General Geddes; a bouquet of red roses from Prof. Theodosia Ammons of Colorado Agricultural College; potted plants from the Swedish and Norwegian dele- gates ; over $500 from Mrs. Fanny Garrison Villard, Miss Emily Howland, Mrs. Kenyon, Mrs. W. W. Trimble, Miss Nettie Lovisa White, Mrs. William M. Ivins and other friends; also quantities of fruit and flowers. The address was as follows :

We, the undersigned, Foreign Delegates to the first International Woman Suffrage Congress, gladly take the opportunity of your 82nd birthday to express to you our love and reverence, our grati- tude for your lifelong work for women, and are rejoicing that you have lived to see such great steps onward made by the world at large in the direction in which you led at first under such prejudice. Praying that you may enjoy years of health, cheered by every fresh advance, we remain, your loving friends,

Florence Fenwick Miller, England ; Sof ja Levovna Friedland, Russia ; Carolina Hplman Huidobro, Chili ; Gudrun Drewsen, Nor- way ; Vida Goldstein, Australia ; Emmy Evald, Sweden ; Antonie Stolle, Germany.

[Later the foreign delegates gave Mrs. Catt a handsomely en- graved silver card case.]

The Washington Times said of the occasion :

The Rev. Anna Howard Shaw presented a large basket of fruit from some of the principal suffrage workers with these touching words : "Miss Anthony, you have been more than a leader to us of your own country, more than a teacher, more than a counselor, you have been our beloved friend. Take this with our love for you, dear, dear friend." This completed Miss Anthony's conquest and she almost broke down. There has been very little emotionalism in

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQO2 4!

this convention but for some minutes there was ample proof all over the hall that being delegates to a suffrage convention had not made any woman forget how to cry. Mrs. Catt finally came to Miss An- thony's rescue in a little speech full of tender appreciation: "The greatest thing about Miss Anthony to my mind is her utter unselfish- and lack of self -consciousness. As we came up the aisle the other night and the audience broke into a thunder of applause for •••bom all love. Miss Anthony looked about to see what caused it and then asked: 'What are they applauding for?' She credits all attentions to herself as for the cause and it is dearer to her than life, night at an hour when all respectable women suffragists should been in bed, the treasurer and I put our heads together and decided that we would ask all of you to give a present to the associa- tion on Miss Anthony's birthday instead of giving it to her. We know her well enough to be sure this is what she would like best."

Miss Mary Garrett Hay, the champion money raiser, then made the appeal to the audience, who quickly responded with over $5,000 and she received an appreciative vote of thanks from the convention. Mrs. Harriet Taylor Upton, the treasurer, re- ported the receipts of the preceding year as $13,581, with a carefully itemized and audited statement.

Among the most interesting and valuable features of all na- tional conventions are the reports of the work in the various Slates and yet because of the large number it is impossible to specific mention or quotations. They were varied on this -inn by the reports from foreign countries — Venezuela, Chili, Japan, China, Australia, New Zealand, the Philippines, Porto . Canada. Clreat Britain, Norway, Sweden, Russia, Turkey, iany, Italy, Switzerland, Belgium and France. These had obtained at the request of Mrs. Catt from ambassadors, nls or persons appointed by them and represented months of r. Several evenings were largely devoted to addresses by from other countries; one by Public School Inspector lames L. Iln-hcs, Toronto; the KinJMi \Vnman in Politics, Flor- Kemvick Miller; the Australian Woman in Politics, Vida Istcin; Women in South American Republics, Carolina Huidnbrn; Women in Porto Rico. Resident Commissioner Fed- 11 : Women in the Philippines, Harriet Potter Nourse; . Kmmy Kvald, Sweden: Women in Egypt and Jeru- i von KmkeKtein Mountford ; Women in Turkey,

42 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

Florence Fensham, Dean of American College for Girls in Con- stantinople ; Women in Germany, Antoine Stolle.

When the report for Porto Rico -was made Miss Shaw supple- mented it with a graphic account of a trip to the West Indies with Mrs. Lydia Avery Coonley Ward of Chicago, which she had just finished, telling of the position of women, the marriage laws, etc. The work of the National Council of Women was presented by the Rev. Anna Garlin Spencer (R. I.) ; the report of the affiliated Friends' Equal Rights Association by Mrs. Mariana W. Chapman (N. Y.), its president.

The Sunday afternoon services in the church were conducted by the Rev. Anna Garlin Spencer, assisted by the Rev. Olympia Brown and the Rev. Anna Howard Shaw.1 Mrs. Spencer first defined the ideal of womanly character held by the older poets and philosophers, quoting Milton's line describing Adam and Eve: "He for God only; she for God in him," and the expres- sion used by the hard, old father of Tennyson's "Princess" : "Man to command and woman to obey." She then expressed the modern ideal as that of devotion to the same essentials but different in expression. "Woman is not called to a new king- dom but to a larger occupancy of that which has been hers from the beginning. The woman with the child in her arms was the beginning of the family; the hearth fire and the altar fire grew from this ; the elder child teaching the younger was the beginning of the school. We are making over all these inherited tradi- tions and inherited tendencies and socializing them. . . . The ideal woman is no longer a far-away Madonna with her feet on the clouds; she is as divine but she is human. What means the humanizing of religion and the passing of harsh, old creeds but that a greater, more human, more womanly influence is felt in all the relations of life."

1 Besides the women ministers mentioned in this chapter sessions were opened by the Rev. Ulysses G. B. Pierce, the Rev. John Van Schaick, Jr., the Rev. Alexander Kent and the Rev. Donald C. McLeod, all of Washington.

The excellent musical program was in charge of Miss Etta Maddox of Baltimore. She was a graduated lawyer but the courts of Maryland had refused her permission to practice, as contrary to law. After the convention she was accompanied to Baltimore by Miss Laura Clay, Mrs. J. Ellen Foster, an attorney of Iowa; Miss Gail Laughlin, a New York lawyer; Dr. Cora Smith Eaton and Mr. Blackwell. The Judiciary Committee of the State Senate granted a hearing conducted by Miss Maddox. By the end of March both Senate and House had passed a bill giving women the right to practice law.

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 1902 43

Mr. Blackwell, chairman of the committee on Presidential suf- frage, said in his report: 'This is the open door for woman suffrage in every State in the Union. Any Legislature at any inn by a majority vote of both Houses, either separately or in joint session, without any change of State constitution, can empower women to help select the presidential electors on the same terms as male citizens. The power is absolute and un- qualified. Let women in every State petition their Legislature nable women to take part in this most important form of suffrage known to the American people. It is objected to our demand for woman suffrage that women do not want it and will not exercise it if granted. This is now the only method of testing women's wish to take part in their government. If by a general exercise of the right they show their public spirit, the Legislature by submitting an amendment to the State con- stitution can afterwards extend suffrage to its citizens in State and local elections. This step will be the most conservative way <>f procedure. The control will remain, as now, in the hands of a Legislature elected by men alone. If it prove unsatisfactory to the men of the State any subsequent Legislature can repeal

aw."

A report of the International Suffrage Conference, which had in progress during the convention, and the forming of a committee to further permanent organization, was made by its tary, Miss Goldstein, and the convention voted that the Na- tional American Woman Suffrage Association should cooperate with this committee. The nominations for office were made as 1 by secret ballot and as usual were so nearly unanimous thai '•crctary was instructed to cast the vote. The only change in the present board was the election of Mrs. Mary J. Coggeshall, for many years prominent in the work in Iowa, as second auditor in place of Dr. Eaton, whose professional duties required all her time. Invitations for the next convention were received from Niagara Falls, Detroit, St. Louis, Denver, Baltimore and New ins. The Board of Trade, the Era Club and the Progressive i united in the one from New Orleans, which was accepted

lial thanks returned for the others, lli picM-nted by Mr. I'.larku <•]!, chairman of the

44 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

committee, rejoiced in the suffrage already gained and the secur- ing in the past year of laws in various States giving equal guar- dianship of their children to mothers and increased property rights to wives. They called the attention of the Civil Service Commission to discriminations made against women and em- phasized the protest of the preceding year against government regulation of vice in the Philippines. Later at an executive meet- ing of the board a vigorous set of resolutions was prepared, stat- ing that the reports of Governor William H. Taft and General McArthur admitted and defended "certified examinations of wo- men" in the new possessions of the United States. It showed at length the results of government regulation in other countries which had caused it to be abandoned and declared that "such things ought not to be permitted under the American flag."

Mrs. Colby's report on Industrial Problems Relating to Women cited as one example of discrimination: "An effort is now being made in Congress to do away with the annual sick leave of employees, because, it is claimed, women take so much advantage of it. Investigation shows, however, that the per cent. of sick leave is highest in the Inter-State Commerce Commission, where not a woman is employed — twelve per cent. — and only seven per cent, in the Agricultural Department, where a very large number are employed." She gave numerous instances of unfair- ness against women on the civil service lists, said that women wage earners must find a forum on the suffrage platform where they can plead their cause and carefully analyze the industrial problems especially affecting women. Mrs. Klnora M. Habcock, chairman of the Press Committee, gave a comprehensive report stating that while 50,000 news stories and articles had been sent to the papers in 1900 the number bad increased to 175,000 dur- ing the last year and there was reason to believe that three-fourths of them had been used. The largest city papers freely accepted the articles.

1 Miss Anthony, Mrs. Catt, Mrs. Upton and Miss Blackwell were made a committee to present the matter to President Roosevelt. Protests arose from all parts of the country and before they had time to call on him he declared himself opposed to "regu- lated vice." The dispatches of March 22 announced that a general order signed by Secretary Root had gone from the War Department to Manila that no more "certificates" would be issued but that soldiers as well as women would be inspected and cases of disease would be sent to the hospital.

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IO/)2 45

Former U. S. Senator Henry W. Blair of New Hampshire came in for one session and was called to the platform for a speech. He was much loved by the suffragists, as he had been one of the strongest champions of woman suffrage during his many years in the Senate and had brought the Federal Amend- ment to a vote on Jan. 25, 1887. (History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV, chapter VI.) Letters of affectionate greeting were sent to the pioneers and veteran workers, Mrs. Stanton, Isabella her Hooker, Mary S. Anthony, Jane H. Spofford, Sallie Bennett, Caroline Hallowell Miller and Abigail S. Duniway. The deaths among the older and more prominent members dur- ing the year had been many and fifty were mentioned in the memo- rial resolutions.

The notable social features of the week were the afternoon

receptions given by Mrs. Julia Langdon Barber at her beautiful

home, Belmont, and by Mrs. John B. Henderson at Boundary

le, the latter followed the next day by a dinner for the

•rs of the association and the delegates from abroad. Both

of these well-known Washington hostesses were early suffragists

and had often extended the hospitality of their spacious homes

to the individual leaders and to the conventions.

A very interesting address was given on the last evening by

Madame Fricdland on Russian Women of Past Centuries. U. S.

Thomas M. Patterson of Colorado presented a vigorous

and convincing endorsement of the practical working of woman

suffrage in that State for the past nineteen years and its benefits

.omen and to civic life. U. S. Senator John F. Shafroth of

. always a strong and loyal supporter of suffrage for

on the platform. Dr. Shaw, introduced by Mrs.

tlie Demosthenes of the movement," delivered for the

time her impressive speech, The Power of an Incentive, in

whir lowed how laws, customs and lack of opportunity

ay the incentive for great work from the life of women.

I "mil they can have the same that inspires men, she said, they

•i rise to their highest capabilities. No adequate reports

>f these addresses exist

C audience waited to hear from Miss Anthony, who was 1 by a writer present: "The picture that Miss An

46 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

thony made during the evening was one which the delegates will carry away with them to keep. She wore a black satin gown with a handsome point lace fichu and draped over her shoulders a soft, white shawl, while close by was a large jar of lavender hyacinths. Her expressive face reflected every mood of the eve- ning and it now spoke pride, satisfaction and sorrow. She told of the joy and gratification she felt in the wonderful galaxy of women at the convention and the progress of her loved cause, and when she voiced the wish that she might be with them at the next convention her words were almost lost in a whirlwind of applause."

Mrs. Catt in closing with a brief address one of the most note- worthy conventions on record, called attention to what had been the key-note of her speech before the House Judiciary Committee and said: "We have asked of Congress the most reasonable thing a great cause ever demanded — an investigation of conditions in the equal suffrage States — and on its results we rest our case."

Under the heading Impressions of a Non-combatant a writer in the Washington Times gave the following opinion :

If there is one convention among the many Washington has seen which may be called unique, it is that of the National Suffrage Asso- ciation. There is nothing like it in the world. There is onl\ Susan B. Anthony and there is practically only one suffrage fight. ... In the old days the power of an idea was the only thing that could have waked up an interest and held the suffragists together. It took faith and zeal and lots of other things to be a believer in woman suffrage then. Now it only takes executive ability and vim and a general interest in public affairs. . . . The problems discussed were almost purely legal and economic, dealing with the suf- frage question proper, the wages of women and their occupations. There was very little empty rhetoric but a good deal of fun. In short, there are two extra senses with which most of the delegates seem to be provided — common sense and a sense of humor — excel- lent substitutes for emotion when it comes to practical affairs. If the association ever loses the idealism which is still its backbone it will be a political machine of much power; it seems likely to be for the present a decided force in the direction of civic reform.

For a quarter of a century during the first session of each Con- gress committees of Senate and House had given a hearing to representatives of the National Suffrage Association to present

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 1902 47

arguments for the submission of an amendment to the Federal Constitution which would enfranchise women, and at an earlier date to advocate other suffrage measures. Because of the dis- tinguished speakers from abroad the hearings at this time -were of unusual interest. The convention adjourned for them on the morning of February 18 and the Senate and House Committee rooms were crowded.

All the members of the Senate Committee were present — Augustus O. Bacon (Ga.) chairman; James H. Berry (Ark.); George P. Wetmore (R. I.) ; Thomas R. Bard (Calif.) ; John H. Mitchell (Ore.). Miss Susan B. Anthony, honorary president of the association, presided and said :

Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, this is the seven- teenth Congress that has been addressed by the women of this na- tion, which means that we have been coming to Congress thirty-four years. Once, in 1887, the Senate brought the measure to a dis- cussion and vote and defeated it by 34 to 16, with 26 not wishing to go on record. We ask for a i6th Amendment because it is much easier to persuade the members of a Legislature to ratify this amendment than it is to get the whole three million or six million, as the case may be, of the rank and file of the men of the State to vote for woman suffrage. We think we are of as much importance as the Filipinos, Porto Ricans, Hawaiians, Cubans and all of the different sorts of men that you are carefully considering. The six hundred teachers sent over to the Philippines are a thousand times better en- titled to vote than are the men who go there to make money. The women of the islands are quite as well qualified to govern and have charge of affairs as are the men. I do not propose to talk. I am here to introduce those who are to address you.

Miss Anthony then presented Miss Harriet May Mills (N. Y.), who spoke from the standpoint of tax paying women, who in the •:s and villages alone of her State paid taxes on over $5,000,- ooo worth of property; Mrs. Lucretia L. Blankenburg, president of the Pennsylvania Suffrage Association, -who showed the con- nection between politics and conditions in Philadelphia; the Rev. < Jlympia Brown, president of the Wisconsin association, who pointed out the need of both the reason and the intuition in the country to govern it wisely. Mrs. Mariana W. Chapman, presi- dent of the New York association, called for a Federal Amend- ment to enfranchise women because of the principles on which Government was founded. Miss Gail Laughlin, a graduate

4 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

of Wellesley College and Cornell University Law School, made a strong argument on the effect enfranchisement would have on woman's economic independence and greater efficiency. Mrs. Jennie A. Brown, of Minneapolis, told of the unlimited opportu- nities allowed to the women of the great northwest which were largely counteracted by their political restrictions. Mrs. Mary Wood Swift of California, president of the National Council of Women, declared that the countless thousands of the educated, developed women of today were fully equal to the responsibilities of citizenship. Mrs. Lucy Hobart Day, president of the Maine association, demonstrated the inferior and unfortunate position of disfranchised women. Miss Alice Stone Blackwell, editor of the Woman's Journal (Boston), indicated how every step of the progress of women had been opposed by the same objections now made to woman suffrage and submitted these objections and the answers to them in a convincing statement which filled ten pages of the printed report of the hearing.

Miss Anthony introduced Mrs. Gudrun Drewsen, one of the foreign delegates to the convention, who said in part: "Nor- wegian women look back to the 25th of May, 1901, as a day of great victory, for on that day a bill was passed in our Parliament which granted Municipal suffrage to all women paying taxes on a certain limited income, about $100 a year, or whose husbands paid on such income. This law has thoroughly changed the position of the married woman and from having always been a minor she has suddenly become of age. It may be of interest to you of the United States, who can show so many tax paying women without any right to vote, to know that we -were not able to get our Parliament interested in tax paying woman suf- frage until the bill included wives also. The immediate result of this law has been the election of several women to impor- tant municipal positions ; for instance, members of the com- mon council in the capital; members of the board of aldermen; at one place chief assessor. Women may serve on juries and grand juries and have been appointed members of special con- gressional commissions. Several women doctors have been ap- pointed in public institutions, on boards of health as experts for the Government, etc. Matrons have been employed at prisons

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQO2 49

where women are and special prisons for women in charge of a matron have been established. On the whole we begin to see the glory of the rising sun -which will give us in a little while the bright, clear day."

Miss Vida Goldstein, a delegate from Australia, began her address : "I am very proud that I have come here from a country where the woman suffrage movement has made such rapid strides. The note was first struck in America and yet women today are struggling here for what we have had in Australia for years, and we have proved all the statements and arguments against woman suffrage to be utterly -without foundation. It seems in- credible to us that the women here have not even the School and Municipal suffrage except in a very few States: We have had this for over forty years and we have never heard a word against it. It is simply taken as a matter of course that the women should They say that as soon as women get this privilege they are ^ to lose the chivalrous attentions of men. Let me assure \ ( iu that a woman has not the slightest conception of what chivalry means until she gets a vote. . . ." Miss Goldstein told of woman suffrage in New Zealand and produced the highest testimony as to its good results in both countries.

In closing the hearing Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, national vice dent, said in part:

< )ur association desires you not only to report the resolution for this amendment favorably but to recommend the appointment of a ;iittee to investigate this subject. Years ago when our women before you we had nothing out theory to give you, what we be- 1 would be the good results of woman suffrage if it were The opponents had their theories and they stated the evils would follow. The theory of one person is as good it of another until it has been put to the test, but after that both must lay aside all theory and stand or fall upon facts. In four unen have the full suffrage. For more than thirty years have been exercising it in Wyoming equally with men; in Colo- nine vears and in I 'tali and Malm !"<>r -i\ years. \\'e do lie- that from six to thirty years is lonij enough time to measure t What we would like better tban anything else is that nld ap]>oint a committee of investigation, and that a committee should investigate the result of woman Buffi in tl .- if ha< al: • ranted. ... So sun-

avorablc that \v< • fectly willii

• future on it. While we do not claim that only good would

5O HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

come from woman suffrage, we do believe that among all the people of a community or of a nation there are more good men and women than there are bad men and women, and that when we unite the good men and good women they will be able to carry measures for the general welfare and we will have better laws and conditions.

At the hearing' before the House Judiciary Committee, Repre- sentative John J. Jenkins, in the chair, expressed regret that George W. Ray of New York, the chairman, was unavoidably absent and said : "He is very much in sympathy with -what the ladies desire to say this morning — much more so than the present occupant of the chair." Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, president of the National American Suffrage Association, who had charge of the hearing, said : "Mr. Chairman, we have just been holding an International Woman Suffrage Conference in the city of Washington, eight nations having sent official delegates from woman suffrage organizations, and several others have cooperated through correspondence, and we have invited representatives of these nations to come to you this morning and present some facts concerning the practical operation of suffrage in countries other than our own. Our first speaker will be Miss Vida Gold- stein of Australia." Miss Goldstein gave in substance the address which will be found in the report of the Senate hearing, after which Mrs. Catt said: " Although I have been a resident and taxpayer in four different States and able to qualify as a voter I have never been permitted any suffrage whatever. I now have the privilege of introducing a Russian woman who has been a voter in her country ever since she was 21." Madame Friedland said in part :

Mr. Chairman and Gentlemen of the Committee : In a country like Russia, with an absolute government, there is but little suffrage for either men or women but the little there is is equally shared by both. We do not, of course, vote for Czars; neither do we vote for Gov- ernors but the municipal officers are elected by the votes of the real- estate owners regardless of sex. The woman, however, does not vote in person but transfers her vote to her husband, her son or her son-in-law and in case these are unable to vote for her she has the right to delegate her vote to an outsider. He simply has the proxy and votes as the woman dictates.

Russia, whose political institutions are the least liberal in Europe, has the most liberal laws in regard to the civil capacity of her women.

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQO2 51

Every woman, married or single, if she is of age, enjoys complete civil capacity. Marriage does not in any way change the rights of husband and wife over the property they possess or may acquire. The husband has no legal right whatever over the property of his wife and she is by no means under his guardianship. This may account for the fact that we have less divorce than in many other countries. We have different laws for the different social classes. A nobleman will pay his taxes according to the law for the nobility, while his wife may be a commoner and have to pay hers according to the laws for the commoners, but both are taxpayers and conse- quently both are voters. It is quite a common thing to see a woman uf the people, a peasant woman, take her place and often her hus- band's place, as he has a right to delegate his vote to her at elections, and she may also take it at county meetings and assemblies of every kind. Lately the government of the peasantry have made an effort to deprive the women of the right to hold office but the Senate has ] IR vented them on the ground that if women share the hard struggle for existence with the men, as they do in our remote rural districts, they must also share the privileges. Gentlemen, I hope I have your sympathy with the ideas practiced in my country for our women.

Mrs. Catt said of her next speaker: "It is eminently proper that a woman of Sweden should address you, where women have voted longer than anywhere else in the world/'

Mrs. Emmy Evald. I stand before this legislative power of America representing a country where women have voted since the 1 8th century, sanctioned in 1736 by the King. The men gave suf- frage to the women without their requesting it, because they be- 1 that taxation without representation is tyranny. The tax- i's vote is irrespective of sex. Women vote for every office for which their brothers do and on the same terms, except for the first chamber of the Riksdag. They have the Municipal and School suf- e, votes for the provincial representatives and thus indirectly for

' if the I louse of I ,ords.

Women are admitted to the postal service on equal salaries with men. In the railway service, which is controlled by the Government, w.meii have ever since iSho been employed in the controlling office and ticket department and in the telegraph and telephone service, which arc owned by the ( ,o\ eminent . In I S< >< j women were sjiven Mice and in the same year equal matrimonial ! he colleges arid universities are open to them and they re- men. All professions are open except the Women tea. ned equally with men. Tax

A omen have voted in church matters since 1736. Every e<l in the Lutheran < 'hnrch in America but has no vote and ' H-n blame the Americans hrcatise the clergy educated

here imbibed the i it of liberty and justice.

52 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

You can not trust the ballot into the hands of women teachers in the public schools but you give it to men who can not read or write. You can not trust the ballot to women who are controlling millions of money and helping support the country but you give it to loafers and vagabonds who know nothing, have nothing and represent noth- ing. You can not trust the ballot in the hands of women who are the wives and daughters of your heroes but you give it to those who are willing to sell it for a glass of beer and you trust it in the hands of anarchists. Oh, men, let justice speak and may the public weal demand that this disfranchisement of the noble American women shall be stopped.

Mrs. Catt then introduced to the committee Miss Isabel Camp- bell, daughter of former Governor Campbell of Wyoming, who in 1869 signed the bill which enfranchised the women of the Territory; Prof. Theodosia Ammons of the Colorado University of Agriculture and Mrs. Ida M. Weaver, a resident of Idaho. Each gave a comprehensive report of the practical -working of woman suffrage in her State; the large proportion of women who voted; their appointment on boards and 'election to offices; the result in improved polling places, better candidates and cleaner politics; higher pay for working women; the advantages to the community; the comradeship between men and women and the general satisfaction of the people with the experiment. Their reports as a whole offered unimpeachable testimony in favor of the enfranchisement of women.

Mrs. Florence Fenwick Miller in her address said:

I have been asked to direct especially my attention to the position of women in England. I hope you, as members of a republic, will be ashamed to hear that the monarchy of England gives its women citizens a great many rights which you deny to yours, that we have had those rights for so many years that nobody talks about them. When I am asked to give you testimony as to the smooth working of the women's vote in all local affairs, I am at a loss to know what to say, because it runs along so easily and naturally, so like breath- ing the air in a thoroughly healthy state of the lungs, that there is absolutely nothing to be said. Men and women vote on equal terms and the woman's vote is as much a matter of course as the man's.

The local government of England is divided among a number of different bodies. We have the school boards, established in 1870, which have managed the elementary education of the country, now compulsory and free. They spend very large sums of the taxpayers' money and for them every woman who pays taxes has a vote. Any woman whom the electors choose is entitled to take a seat on them.

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN' CONVENTION OF ] •. 53

There are at present not only hundreds of thousands of women voting for the school boards but there are 276 women sitting- as rep- resentatives upon those of England alone. I myself have for nine years been a member of the school board of London, sitting for one of the great divisions called Hackney, which has 60,000 voters. My election committee was composed of men and women. Men worked for me very hard indeed! . . . The next great local governing bodies are the boards of guardians of the poor. These bodies spend annually about $127,000,000, which they raise from the taxpayers, men and women. These are huge organizations. Many of the workhouses contain over T.OOO persons; besides which, outside relief in money or food or medical aid is given. Every woman who is a taxpayer can vote for a member of these boards. Women are eligible to sit on them the same as men. There are nearly 1,000

en on the boards.

Women may vote for the municipalities, for the town councils. I can not offer you any illustration of how the women's vote has im- proved them for the simple reason that when those councils were in- stituted in 1860 the Parliament of a monarchy was sufficiently large- minded to perceive that women ought to vote for them; that they have to pay their taxes and where a woman stands at the head of a household she is not only equally entitled to representation in regard to the spending of her money but also she is as much concerned with the work that the councils have to do as any man. This was so obviously just that women were given the right to vote on them and have exercised that right ever since. . . . The women vote as fully

he men do.

We have district, parish and county councils, which have to a considerable extent the moral and the intellectual government of the

3 under them, licensing of places of amusement, public parks, technical education for young people over school age and so on. The building of homes for the poor, the oversight of lunatic asylums and matters of that kind, thev have under their authority. These were

•lished in 1884 and the women who had voted so well for many for school boards and town councils of course were given the right to vote for the new county councils.

Mrs. Miller went fully into the work of women on borough

and county councils and closed her valuable address by saying:

tlenien, the work of women in English public life has not

only been unattended with any mischief but has been a iM'eat force

for service and benefit. Surely American men can trust thcir

UT men have for the past generation trusted i: their o-un as well as our advant.:

In closing the hearing to which the committee rave the •ition, Mrs. Catt said in part :

54 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

I have a favor to ask of this committee in an official capacity; it is something we have never asked before. . . . We have brought to you testimonials of the success of woman suffrage in operation throughout the world and I think that if any man among you were called to stand before a committee and give in five or ten minutes some proof of the favorable results of man suffrage, he would find it a very difficult thing to do. What I now ask in behalf of 9ur association is that this committee will request the House of Repre- sentatives to appoint a commission to investigate the results of woman suffrage in operation. This has never been done. . . .

We ask you in the interest of fairness to see that this commission is appointed to investigate woman suffrage in exactly the same spirit it would use if it were investigating man suffrage in Cuba. We ask you to chase down to its lair every single charge and objection that has been made and if when an honest commission has made an honest investigation you discover that woman suffrage has proved a good thing, if you find that it has proved as beneficial to women as man suffrage has proved to men, then we shall expect that another Judiciary Committee will give a favorable report and ask Congress to submit a i6th Amendment. And if you discover that it is not a good thing, then I promise you in behalf of our association that we will turn our guns into those States and see that it is made a good thing; for never so long as there are women who are educated, women who think for themselves, will they rest content until they have the only weapon that governments can give them for defending liberty and pursuit of happiness. We stand before you as citizens of the United States, qualified, intelligent, taxpaying women, who de- mand for ourselves the same right to make the Government under which we live that has been given to men.

No commission was appointed, no report was made by Senate or House Committee and there were no definite results of such appeals as never had been made by men for the franchise in this or any other country.

CHAPTER III.

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 1903.

Tn 1903 the National American Suffrage Association for the <1 time took its annual convention to a southern State and held it in New Orleans, March 15-25, in Athenaeum Hall.1 The Iranian's Journal said: "To the northern delegates there was something almost magical in the sudden change from snowdrifts and nipping winds to balmy air and a temperature like June. The delicious climate of Louisiana in spring has not been exaggerated and it seems wonderful to find roses in bloom in March, the

1 Part of Call : The association goes to New Orleans in response to an invitation from the Progressive Union, the Era Club of women and many prominent individuals. It is illy appropriate that the advocates of this important reform should assemble in Louisiana in honor of the action taken by this State in 1898, when its constitutional con- vention incorporated a clause giving to tax-paying women a vote on all questions of taxation submitted to the electors; and in commemoration of the splendid use they made of this privilege at the election held to secure to New Orleans the completion of its drainage and the establishment of a sewerage system and free water supply. . . .

er in the fifty years of this movement have its advocates had such a victory to as was achieved in Australia in June, 1902, when almost the first act of Parlia- ment of the new Federation of States was to confer the full national suffrage with the right to a seat in the Parliament on all qualified women of the entire commonwealth. This one act enfranchised about 800,000. These added to those of New Zealand and of Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and Idaho, it will be found that 1,125,000 English- speaking women are at the present time in possession of the complete suffrage and all those of Wyoming have been enfranchised within the past ten years. By adding -c the women of Great Britain and Ireland, who have all except the Parliamentary hose of Kansas with Municipal, of Louisiana, Montana, and New York with the <yers' and of over one-half of the States with the school ballot, the 1,125,000 will be multiplied several times. . . .

-. therefore, with courage and hope inspired by the glorious promise of the new crntury for greater material and moral progress in all directions than the world has ever known, that the advocates of this measure, which ultimately will affect the destinies of the whole American people, are called in convention to review the labor of the past year, to plan that of the future, to strengthen the old comradeship and greet new workers and friends.

SUSAN B. ANTHONY, Honorary President. CARRIE CHAPMAN CATT, President. ANNA HOWARD SHAW, Vice-President-at-Large. KATE M. GORDON, Corresponding Secretary. ALICE STONE BLACK WELL, Recording Secretary. HARRIET TAYLOE UPTON, Treasurer. LAURA Ci AY. )

MAMY J. COGGESHALL, *

55

56 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

wistaria vines in a cloud of purple blossom and the grass an emerald green. . . . The delegates were enthusiastic over the quaint houses surrounded by palms, bananas and great live oaks, a pleasing novelty to most of them/'

The hostess of the convention was the Era Club, the largest organization of women in the city, its title — ERA — cleverly con- cealing Equal Rights Association. It was founded in 1896; Miss Kate Gordon, the present secretary of the National Associa- tion, was formerly its president and her sister, Miss Jean M. Gordon, now filled that office. On the first afternoon the spacious and beautiful home of Mrs. Reuben Bush, prominent in club and civic -work, was opened for the club to entertain the officers, delegates and a large number of invited guests. Sunday evening all were received informally in the charming home of Misses Kate, Fanny and Jean Gordon.

The excellent convention program was prepared by Miss Kate Gordon. The first evening session was opened with prayer by the Right Reverend Davis Sessums, Episcopal Bishop of Louis- iana, who said in the course of it : "Prosper, we beseech thee, the deliberations of this association whose representatives are here assembled and direct and rule their judgment and actions in all things to the furtherance of truth and justice, so that their work may be an abiding -work and contribute to the growth of true religion and civilization, to the happiness of homes and to the advancement of Thy Kingdom."

The Picayune thus described the occasion: "In the presence of a magnificent audience that packed the Atlien;eum to its utmo.-t capacity, the thirty-fifth annual convention of the National American Woman Suffrage Association was formally opened last night, with the president, Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, in the chair. Seldom perhaps in its history has the association received such a greeting, for the audience was not only deeply interested and sympathetic but it was representative of the finest culture in the city and State. Distinguished jurists, physicians and teachers, staid men of business and leaders in many lines united with women of the highest social standing in giving the con- vention a hearty and earnest welcome. Many were no doubt attracted by the memory of the former visits of Miss Susan B.

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 1903 57

Anthony and Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt and the remarkable personality of the pioneer suffrage -workers, but whether they came from pure interest in these famous leaders or deep sympathy with the cause, all were generous in giving to both the credit and applause they justly deserved. . . .

Mayor Paul Capdeville, who was to welcome the convention, was ill and this was very acceptably done by "Tom" Richardson, tary of the Progressive Union, an important commercial body of 1, 600 members that had joined in the invitation for it to conic to New Orleans and contributed the rent of the Athenaeum. TTc expressed his pleasure at being associated with the suffragists of the city, "who had never neglected any opportunity to promote its best interests," and said : "No other class of our citizens have done it so much good." He was followed by the Hon. Edgar H. Farrar, an eminent lawyer, author of the Drainage and Sewerage plan, who told of the valuable assistance of women in the strenu- ous fight against the State lottery ten years before and described the splendid work of the women since the constitutional conven- tion of 1898 had given them taxpayers' suffrage. Miss Gordon read a poem of welcome by Mrs. Grace G. Watts and gave the Fra Club's welcome and then Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, who was presiding, introduced Miss Anthony to respond. The Picayune

1 in its report:

ted upon the platform was Miss Susan "R. Anthony, the woman who for two-score years stood the brunt of ridicule, sarcasm and •ninof and never once was deterred from the course that she fully believed to be the just and true one. Of the sreat leaders in this movement she alone remains. . . . Spanning a distance of forty stood nt her side Mrs. Cart, the younger woman who has taken 1 o brittle, and grouped around were earnest young twirls and middle- a of ed women firrd with her enthusiasm and looking up to her with -re that was very l>eantifnl and a most rrracions tribute

from youth to old a?e. When Miss loan Gordon advanced to pre- sent her with a creat cluster of Marechal Neil roses and took her •Ttlv bv the hand and in the name of the young women of nnd of the Era Hub thanked her for the battles she bad *. the crono WPS most touching, representing as it did the two '»f the suffrage workers, those of half-a-centnrv a^o and those of today.

There wns another there, n woman who has been very near to the

M people, who has never been ncfGfr^s<?ivr in

her r ' but whose niiiet approval, whose earnest

58 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

sympathy, whose expenditure of time and money and whose high so- cial standing gave to it a strength even in those early days that one of less ability and social position and more pronounced opposition could not have secured. Mrs. Caroline E. Merrick, the pioneer suf- fragist of Louisiana and the lifelong friend of Miss Anthony, came in for her share of the honors of the evening. With equal grace and tenderness Miss Gordon advanced to her and offered her too the fra- grant expressions of more youthful workers. For a moment Miss Anthony and Mrs. Merrick stood together, and the audience, rising to its feet in a great wave of enthusiasm, waved handkerchiefs and fans in greeting. Perhaps that precious hour of triumph, away down here in this old southern State, as she stands nearing the border land of another world, recompensed the great pioneer for much that she had borne when life was young and audiences, as she said, less sympa- thetic. Mrs. Merrick's remarks, also, touched a deep chord and roused the audience to a state of earnest sympathy.

Miss Anthony told of her visit to New Orleans in 1884 during the Centennial Exposition, -when she was the guest of Mrs. Mer- rick, and spoke of Mrs. Eliza J. Nicholson, owner and editor of the Picayune, paying a tribute to her and to the gifted writer, "Catharine Cole," of its editorial staff, both now passed from earth. In Dr. Shaw's eloquent response to the greetings she said : "Nothing has given me greater hope for women and has made me prouder of women than the splendid reserve power shown by southern womanhood for the last twenty-five years. When your hearthstones were left desolate and your bravest and strong- est had gone forth never to come back, your women, who had been cared for as no other women ever were cared for, who were uneducated to toil, unacquainted with business requirements, averse to them by instinct and tradition — -when they had to face the world they went out uncomplaining and worked with sublime heroism. ... I am glad to come among you southern women and to say that you have been an inspiration to the women of the North and to whole world. The daughters of those women of twenty-five years ago are the ones who have made this splendid convention possible. Over our country now there floats only one flag but that is a flag for women as well as men. If there are any men who ought to have faith in -women and in their power to dare and do it is southern men, who owe so much to southern women."

Mrs. Catt then gave her president's address of which an ex-

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF IQO3 59

tended press notice said: "Never was there a more masterly exposition of a theme, never a more earnest or cogent argument. A distinguished Justice of the Supreme Court who -was present remarked to the writer : 'I have heard many men but not one who can compare with Mrs. Catt in eloquence and logical power.' So the entire audience felt and at the close of her magnificent discourse she was the recipient of an ovation that came spontane- ously from their hearts. The scene presented in the Athenaeum \vas indeed a remarkable one." The address was not -written and no essential part of it can be reproduced from fragmentary news- paper reports.

A discordant note in the harmony was struck by the Times- Democrat, which, in a long editorial, Woman Suffrage and the South, assailed the association because of its attitude on the race question. The board of officers immediately prepared a signed statement which said in part :

The association as such has no view on this subject. Like every

other national association it is made up of persons of all shades of

opinion on the race question and on all other questions except those

relating to its particular object. The northern and western members

hold the views on the race question that are customary in their sec-

; the southern members hold the views that are customary in

the South. The doctrine of State's rights is recognized in the na-

1 body and each auxiliary State association arranges its own

affairs in accordance with its own ideas and in harmony with the

MIS of its own section. Individual members in addresses made

outside of the National Association are of course free to express

their ts of extraneous questions but they speak for

themselves as individuals and not for the association. . . .

The National American Woman Suffrage Association is seeking

away with the requirement of a sex qualification for suffrage.

' other qualifications shall he asked for it leaves to each State.

Ithertl women most active in it have always in their own

emphasized the fact that granting suffrage to women who can

and write and who pay taxes would insure white supremacy

without resort ini: to any methods of doubtful constitutionality. The

ion asks for the ballot for educated and taxpaying

• 11 only and its officers believe that in this lies "the only perma-

rahle solution of the race question." . . .

Cations of the northern and western States

For the ballot for all women, though Maine and several other

ve lately asked for it with an educational or t;ix qualifica-

To ad\ 'lern women to In-ware of lending "svnpathy

or support" to the National Association because its auxiliary so-

60 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

cieties in the northern States hold the usual views of northerners on the color question is as irrelevant as to advise them to beware of the National Woman's Christian Temperance Union because in the northern and western States it draws no color line; or to beware of the General Federation of Women's Clubs because the State Federa- tions of the North and West do not draw it ; or to beware of Chris- tianity because the churches in the North and West do not draw it. ...

The Times-Democrat published this letter in full and en- deavored by its press reports afterwards to atone for its blunder. It had been feared that trouble over this question would arise but no other paper referred to it. The Picayuiie, Item and Stairs •were most generous with space and complimentary in expression throughout the convention.1

The reports at the executive sessions were possibly of more interest to the delegates than the public addresses. Miss Gordon in her secretary's report spoke of the 12,000 or 13,000 letters which had been sent out since the last convention, many of them made necessary by the International Conference of the preceding year, and of the ending of its proceedings. To the 14,000 news- papers on the list to receive the quarterly Progress the names of legislators in various States had been added, and to the latter leaflets attractively prepared by Miss Blackwell also were sent. She described the new suffrage postage stamp, a college girl in cap and gown holding a tablet inscribed : "In Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and Idaho women vote on the same terms as men," to off- set the prevailing ignorance of this fact. Resolutions endorsing woman suffrage had been secured from the National Grange, the

1 The colored women had some excellent organizations in New Orleans, the most notable being the Phyllis Wheatley Club, which in addition to its literary and social features maintained a training school for nurses, a kindergarten and a night school. It invited Miss Anthony. Miss Blackwell and Mrs. Elizabeth Smith Miller to address it and they wore accompanied by "Dorothy Dix," the well-known writer, a New Orleans woman. In the large assemblage were some of the teachers from the four colleges for colored students — Methodist, Congregational, Baptist and the State. "Dorothy Dix" said in her brief address that no woman in the city was more respected or had more influence than Mrs. Sylvanie Williams, the club's president, and gave several instances to illustrate it. After the addresses Mrs. Williams presented Miss Anthony with a large bouquet tied with yellow satin ribbon and said: "Flowers in their beauty and sweetness may represent the womanhood of the world. Some flowers are fragile and delicate, some strong and hardy, some are carefully guarded and cherished, others are roughly treated and trodden under foot. These last are the colored women. They have a crown of thorns continually pressed upon their brow, yet they are advancing and sometimes you find them further on than you would have expected. When women like you, Miss Anthony, come to see us and speak to us it helps us to believe in the Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Man, and at least for the time being in the sympathy of woman."

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 1903 6l

American Federation of Labor and a number of large labor unions. For the first time in the history of the National Educa- tion Association, three-fourths of whose members are women, a woman had been invited to address their annual convention and the one selected was the president of the National American Suf- frage Association. Mrs. Catt was cordially received by them in July at Minneapolis.

Four of the five morning sessions were given over completely to Work Conferences. The usual ones on Organization and I Yess were held with Miss Mary Garrett Hay and Mrs. Flnora Mubcock respectively presiding. The conference on Enrollment -a \-e way to one on Literature, Dr. Mary D. Hussey presiding, and a new one on Legislation was added. A president's and a delegates' conference completed the list. The Plan of Work again presented by the Executive Committee emphasized the line of action adopted in the first year of Mrs. Catt's presidency and urged that the States endeavor to secure recommendations of their Legislatures asking the submission of a i(>th Amendment ; that special efforts be made to secure the appointment of a Com- ion to investigate the working of full suffrage in States where it now exists; that correspondence be taken up vigorously with all members of Congress giving them the arguments in favor i Federal Amendment and of a Commission on Investiga- tion ; that the association aim to double its membership the coming and that a catalogue of woman suffrage literature be pre- pared for libraries.

< hily $3,000 in pledges were called for and $3,200 -were quickly Milj-rribcd.1 The treasurer, Mrs. Harriet Taylor Upton, an- nounced receipts during the year of $18,310 with a balance of in the treasury. "New York has always been the "iitributor and paid the largest auxiliary fee," she said, "and it never lins any aid from the national treasury. Its temper

1 TV inn was made at this convention to remove the headquarters on

May i from New York to Warren, O., the home of the national treasurer, Mrs. Upton.

The I) charge of them had borne heavily upon Mrs. Catt for the past

vrars and it Rrcw more difTn tilt as each year she had to spend more time in field

Miss Gordon, the corresponding secretary, wished to remain in New Orleans

because of 1 r*§ failing health and it was necessary to have a national oflu

charge. Mrs. Upton consent iK to assume the responsibility and only on the

assurance of Miss Elizabeth Mauser, a capable < that she would manage the

details of tl i he arrangement was to )«• temporary hut it t. ntmued for six years.

62 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

is always sweet and its methods always business-like but to be sure it has always been blessed by having one of its citizens as national president. This year, however, Massachusetts has won the place at the head of the list." Mrs. Catt reported for the Congressional Committee that Congress had entirely ignored the urgent appeals of last year for a committee to investigate the effects of woman suffrage in the equal franchise States. Mrs. Sallie Clay Bennett (Ky.) made her usual strong plea for an effort to secure from Congress Federal suffrage or the right to vote for members of Senate and House Representatives. For many years Mrs. Ben- nett, as chairman of the committee, had appealed to the associa- tion for action but while it considered that the measure would be perfectly valid it believed it to be hopeless of attainment. [History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV, page 6.] Mrs. Elnora M. Babcock (N. Y.), chairman of the Press Committee, made a comprehensive report of the constantly increasing favorable com- ment of the newspapers. Mrs. Boyer, chairman for Pennsyl- vania, had placed 5,700 suffrage articles and the chairmen of various other States had a proportionate record. Miss Blackwell gave as a recipe for finding favor with editors: "Make your articles short ; make them newsy ; don't denounce the men." Mrs. Priscilla D. Hackstaff (N. Y.), chairman of the Enrollment Com- mittee, reported a good start on the nation-wide enrollment of men and women who believe in woman suffrage.

Henry B. Blackwell, chairman of the Presidential Suffrage Committee, urged the southern women to petition their Legisla- tures, seven of which would meet during the year, to give women the right to vote for presidential electors. "The choice of Presi- dent and Vice-president of the United States/' he said, "is the most important form of suffrage exercised by an American citi- zen. . . . The King of England and the Emperor of Germany are practically possessed of no greater political power than our President during his official term," and he continued :

Here then is an open door to equal suffrage. Once let the women of any State take their equal part in this great national election and their complete equality is assured. Without change of State or Federal Constitution, without ratification by the individual voters, a simple majority of both houses of any Legislature at any time in any

THE NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 1903 63

State can confer upon women citizens this magnificent privilege, which will carry with it a certainty of speedy future concessions of all minor rights and privileges. It is amazing that no concerted effort has been made until recently to secure this right, so easily ob- tained and of so much transcendent importance. Especially is it strange that in States where iron-bound constitutional restrictions forbid any exercise whatever of local or municipal woman suffrage and where the social conditions make an amendment of State con- stitution almost impossible, suffragists allow year after year to elapse without any effort to get the only practical thing possible, action by the State Legislature conferring Presidential suffrage on women. Suffrage in school or municipal elections cannot give us a full and fair test of the value of equal suffrage or of woman's willingness to participate. Suffrage in State elections cannot be had without amendment of State constitutions, always difficult and usually im- possible of attainment in the face of organized opposition. Why not then avail ourselves of this unique, this providential opportunity?

Among other committees reporting was that on Church work, Miss Laura De Merritte (Me.) chairman, and her recommenda- tions were adopted that the committee on National Sunday School lessons be asked to prepare one each year on the rights and duties of -women citizens; that ministers of all denominations be urged to preach one sermon each year on this topic; that all wo- men's missionary societies be requested to make it a part of their regular program at their annual conventions and that a place be sought on the program of national conventions of the Epworth League and Christian Endeavor Societies to present the question of woman's enfranchisement. The valuable report of the Com- mittee on Industrial Problems Relating to Women and Children by the chairman, Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby (D. C.) said : "Every- one- can recall instances of discrimination against women by iac- J, lni>iness firms, school boards and municipalities, making it plain that women are at a disadvantage- as non-voting members of the community. As a recent fact in regard to the I;M\ eminent :ild cite the order by 1 '< »simaster-< ieneral Payne that a woman employee muM .L^ive up her po-iliun ii >hc m;irr; The report

Nearly all the appointments in the departments obtained hst •.omen were as ]>riir' ^tanls ;it ;i small salary. \

•c<\ by the I'ensinn < M'lice in si In i«i'»J

women and stenographers

64 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE

and 114 men. The Civil Service Commissioners are compelled by law to keep separate lists of men and women who have passed ex- aminations and must certify to the appointing officers from either list as specified by the heads of the bureaus, so that it is quite possible for these to keep women out and fill the places with voters. Commis- sioner W. D. Foulke not long ago called the attention of the chiefs of bureaus to the fact that by taking from the men's list down to the lowest point of eligibility, while women who passed with a rank of 90 and over were not chosen, the Government was not getting the skilled labor to which it was entitled.

The continued defeat of child labor protection