The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony Volume I Part 32

Miss Anthony, however, declined to be snubbed, subdued or displaced, and wrote to Mrs. Stanton in the following vigorous style:

Mrs. Hooker's att.i.tude is not in the least surprising. She is precisely like every new convert in every reform. I have no doubt but each of the Apostles in turn, as he came into the ranks, believed he could improve upon Christ's methods. I know every new one thought so of Garrison's and Phillips'. The only thing surprising in this case is that you, the pioneer, should drop, and say to each of these converts: "Yes, you may manage. I grant your knowledge, judgment, taste, culture, are all superior to mine. I resign the good old craft to you altogether." To my mind there never was such suicidal letting go as has been yours these last two years.

But I am now teetotally discouraged, and shall make no more attempts to hold you up to what I know is not only the best for our cause, but equally so for yourself, from the moral standpoint if not the financial. O, how I have agonized over my utter failure to make you feel and see the importance of standing fast and holding the helm of our good s.h.i.+p to the end of the storm. Mr. Greeley's "On to Richmond" backdown was not more sad to me, not half so sad.

How you can excuse yourself, is more than I can understand.

Mrs. Stanton commented to Mrs. Wright: "For your instruction in the ways of the world, I send you Susan's letter. You see I am between two fires all the time. Some are determined to throw me overboard, and she is equally determined that I shall stand at the masthead, no matter how pitiless the storm."

Mrs. Hooker found hers was a greater task than she had antic.i.p.ated and finally wrote Miss Anthony: "G.o.d knows, and you ought to know, that any one who undertakes a convention has put self-seeking one side and is nearer to being a martyr, stake, f.a.gots and all, than any of us care to be unless called by duty with a loud and unmistakable call. I s.h.i.+rked the labor last year and pitied you because so much fell upon you, and out of pure love to you and to the cause determined this time to take all I could on my own shoulders, but you must come and help out."

Mrs. Stanton still persisted in her determination not to go to this convention but Miss Anthony cancelled eight or ten lecture engagements, at from $50 to $75 each, in order to be present in person and see that the affair was properly managed. Mrs. Hooker, however, was fully equal to the occasion, her convention was a marked success and she proved to be one of the most valuable acquisitions to the ranks of workers for woman suffrage. She soon learned that the opposition to be overcome was far greater than she had imagined, and after nearly thirty years'

effort, not even in her own State have women been able to secure their enfranchis.e.m.e.nt. It seems, however, a bit of poetic justice that this convention, which was to lift the movement for woman suffrage to a higher plane than it ever before had occupied, should have been the first to invite to its platform Victoria C. Woodhull, whose advent precipitated a storm of criticism compared to which all those that had gone before were as a summer shower to a Missouri cyclone.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Isabella Beecher Hooker]

On December 21, 1870, Mrs. Woodhull had gone to Was.h.i.+ngton with a memorial praying Congress to enact such laws as were necessary for enabling women to exercise the right to vote vested in them by the Fourteenth Amendment to the Const.i.tution of the United States. This was presented in the Senate by Harris, of Louisiana, and in the House by Julian, of Indiana, referred to the judiciary committees and ordered printed. She had taken this action without consulting any of the suffrage leaders and they were as much astonished to hear of it as were the rest of the world. When they arrived at the capital another surprise awaited them. On taking up the papers they learned that Mrs.

Woodhull was to address the judiciary committee of the House of Representatives the very morning their convention was to open. Miss Anthony hastened to confer with Mrs. Hooker, who was a guest at the home of Senator Pomeroy, and to urge that they should be present at this hearing and learn what Mrs. Woodhull proposed to do. Mrs. Hooker emphatically declined, but the senator said: "This is not politics. Men never could work in a political party if they stopped to investigate each member's antecedents and a.s.sociates. If you are going into a fight, you must accept every help that offers."

Finally they postponed the opening of their convention till afternoon and, on the morning of January 11, Miss Anthony, Mrs. Hooker, Paulina Wright Davis and Hon. A. G. Riddle appeared in the judiciary committee room. None of them had met Mrs. Woodhull, whom they found to be a beautiful woman, refined in appearance and plainly dressed. She read her argument in a clear, musical voice with a modest and engaging manner, captivating not only the men but the ladies, who invited her to come to their convention and repeat it. Mrs. Hooker and Judge Riddle also addressed the committee and Miss Anthony closed the proceedings with a short speech, thus reported by the Philadelphia Press:

She said few women had persecuted Congress as she had done, and she was glad that new, fresh voices were heard today. "But, gentlemen,"

she continued, "I entreat you to bring this matter before the House. You let our pet.i.tion, presented by Mr. Julian last winter, come to its death. I ask you to grant our appeal so that I can lay off my armor, for I am tired of fighting. The old Const.i.tution did not disfranchise women, and we begged you not to put the word 'male' into the Fourteenth Amendment. I wish, General Butler, you would say _contraband_ for us. But, gentlemen, bring in a report of some kind, either for or against; don't let the matter die in committee. Make it imperative that every man in the House shall show whether he is for or against it." Mrs. Hooker caught the refrain as Miss Anthony sat down, and said: "Pledge yourselves that we shall have a hearing before Congress."

The Daily Patriot, of Was.h.i.+ngton, gave this account of the opening of the convention:

About 3 o'clock the princ.i.p.al actors came upon the stage in Lincoln Hall. In the center of the front row was Paulina Wright Davis, a stately, dignified lady with a full suit of frosted hair. On her right was Isabella Beecher Hooker, the ruling genius of the a.s.sembly, of commanding voice and look, and evidently at home on the rostrum. On the left was Josephine S. Griffing, of this city, wearing the calm, imperturbable expression which is so eminently her characteristic. Further on was Susan B. Anthony, "the hero of a hundred fights," but still as eager for the fray as when she first enlisted under the banner of woman's rights.... Then came the two New York sensations, Woodhull and Claflin, both in dark dresses, with blue neckties, short, curly brown hair, and n.o.bby Alpine hats, the very picture of the advanced ideas they are advocating. All were fresh from the scene of their contest in the Capitol, wreathed with smiles, flushed with victory, and evidently determined to let the world know that the goal of their ambition was nearly reached; that Congress had virtually surrendered at discretion, and hereafter they were to be considered part and parcel of that great body denominated American citizens.

Mrs. Hooker introduced Victoria Woodhull, saying it was her first attempt at public speaking, but her heart was so in the movement that she was determined to try. She advanced to the front of the platform, but was so nervous that she required the a.s.suring arm of the president and her kindly voice to give her courage to proceed.

When she did, it was with a perceptible tremor in her tones. After an apology, she read her memorial, which had been presented to the judiciary committee, reported the result of her interview with them, and said she had the a.s.surance that it would be favorably reported, and that the heart of every man in Congress was in the movement. Thus ended the first effort of the great Wall street broker as a public speaker.

She was followed by Josephine S. Griffing, Lillie Devereux Blake, Frederick Dougla.s.s and others. Judge Riddle made the address of the evening. Senator Nye, of Nevada, presided over one evening session; Senator Warner, of Alabama, over one; and Senator Wilson, of Ma.s.sachusetts, over another. The correspondent of the Philadelphia Press wrote: "Mrs. Woodhull sat sphynx-like during the convention.

General Grant himself might learn a lesson of silence from the pale, sad face of this unflinching woman. No chance to send an arrow through the opening seams of her mail.... She reminds one of the forces in nature behind the storm, or of a small splinter of the indestructible; and if her veins were opened they would be found to contain ice." The National Republican thus describes one session:

The attendance yesterday morning clearly demonstrated that the woman's movement has received an immense addition in numbers, quality and earnestness.... Miss Anthony, with her face all aglow, her eyes sparkling with indignation, said that a pet.i.tion against suffrage had been presented in the Senate by Mr. Edmunds, signed by Mrs. General Sherman, Mrs. Admiral Dahlgren and others. She was glad the enemies of the movement at last had shown themselves. They were women who never knew a want, and had no feeling for those who were less fortunate. They had boasted that if necessary they could get one thousand more signatures of the best women in the land to their pet.i.tion. What are a thousand names, and who are the best women in the land? In answer to the one thousand the advocates of suffrage could bring tens, aye, hundreds of thousands of women who desire the ballot for self-protection. The fight had now commenced in earnest, and it would not be ended until every woman in this broad land was vested with the full rights of citizens.h.i.+p.

The tenor of all the speeches was the right of women to vote under the recently adopted Fourteenth Amendment. There was an absence of the usual long series of resolutions, and all were concentrated in the following, presented by Miss Anthony:

Whereas, The Fourteenth Article of the Const.i.tution of the United States declares that all persons born or naturalized in the United States are citizens thereof, and of the State wherein they reside, and as such ent.i.tled to the unabridged exercise of the privileges and immunities of citizens, among which are the rights of the elective franchise; therefore

_Resolved_, That the Congress of the United States be earnestly requested to pa.s.s an _act declaratory_ of the true extent and meaning of the said Fourteenth Article.

_Resolved_, That it is the duty of American women in the several States to apply for registration at the proper times and places, and in all cases when they fail to secure it to see that suits be inst.i.tuted in the courts having jurisdiction, and that their right to the franchise shall secure general and judicial recognition.

In presenting the resolutions she said that if Congress failed to do what was asked, and if the courts decided that "persons" are not citizens, then the women had another resource; they could go back to first principles and push the Sixteenth Amendment. A national woman suffrage and educational committee of six was formed, herself among the number; and a large book was opened containing a "Declaration and Pledge of Women of the United States," written by Mrs. Hooker, a.s.serting their belief in their right to the suffrage and their desire to use it. This was signed within a few months by 80,000 women and presented to Congress. The following spring large numbers attempted to vote in various parts of the country.

The advent of Mrs. Woodhull on the woman suffrage platform created a wide-spread commotion. The old cry of "free love" was redoubled, the enemies exulted loud and long, the friends censured and protested.

Regarding this matter, Mrs. Hooker wrote:

My sister Catharine says she is convinced now that I am right and that Mrs. Woodhull is a pure woman, holding a wrong social theory, and ought to be treated with kindness if we wish to win her to the truth. Catharine wanted me to write her a letter of introduction, so that when she went to New York she could make her acquaintance and try to convince her that she is in error in regard to her views on marriage. I gave her the letter and she is in New York now. When she sees her she will be just as much in love with her as the rest of us. Imagine the Dahlgren coterie when they get Catharine to Was.h.i.+ngton to fight suffrage and find her visiting Victoria and proclaiming her sweetness and excellence.

The rest of the story is told in a subsequent letter: "Sister Catharine returned last night. She saw Victoria and, attacking her on the marriage question, got such a black eye as filled her with horror and amazement. I had to laugh inwardly at her relation of the interview and am now waiting for her to cool down!"

The men especially were exercised over the new convert to suffrage and flooded the ladies with letters of protest. To one of these Mrs.

Stanton replied:

In regard to the gossip about Mrs. Woodhull I have one answer to give to all my gentlemen friends: When the men who make laws for us in Was.h.i.+ngton can stand forth and declare themselves pure and unspotted from all the sins mentioned in the Decalogue, then we will demand that every woman who makes a const.i.tutional argument on our platform shall be as chaste as Diana. If our good men will only trouble themselves as much about the virtue of their own s.e.x as they do about ours, if they will make one moral code for both men and women, we shall have a n.o.bler type of manhood and womanhood in the next generation than the world has yet seen.

We have had women enough sacrificed to this sentimental, hypocritical prating about purity. This is one of man's most effective engines for our division and subjugation. He creates the public sentiment, builds the gallows, and then makes us hangmen for our s.e.x. Women have crucified the Mary Wollstonecrafts, the f.a.n.n.y Wrights, the George Sands, the f.a.n.n.y Kembles, of all ages; and now men mock us with the fact, and say we are ever cruel to each other.

Let us end this ign.o.ble record and henceforth stand by womanhood.

If Victoria Woodhull must be crucified, let men drive the spikes and plait the crown of thorns.

[Autograph: Lucinda Hinsdale Stone]

Immediately after the Was.h.i.+ngton convention, Miss Anthony went to fill a lecture engagement at Kalamazoo, the arrangements made by her friend, the widely-known and revered Lucinda H. Stone. She spoke also at Grand Rapids and other points in Michigan. At Chicago she was fortunate enough to have a day with Mrs. Stanton, also on a lecturing tour, and then took the train for Leavenworth. At Kansas City the papers said she made "the success of the lecture season." She spoke in Leavenworth, Lawrence, Topeka, Paola, Olathe and other places throughout the State.

Although it was very cold and the half-frozen mud knee deep, she usually had good audiences. At Lincoln, Neb., she was entertained at the home of Governor Butler and introduced by him at her lecture. At Omaha her share of the receipts was $100. At Council Bluffs she was the guest of her old fellow-worker, Amelia Bloomer. Cedar Rapids and Des Moines gave packed houses. She lectured in a number of Illinois towns, taking trains at midnight and at daybreak; and, waiting four hours at one little station, the diary says she was so thoroughly worn-out she was compelled to lie down on the dirty floor. On the homeward route she spoke at Antioch College, and was the guest of President Hosmer's family. According to the infallible little journal: "The president said he had listened to all the woman suffrage lecturers in the field, but tonight, for the first time, he had heard an _argument_; a compliment above all others, coming from an aged and conservative minister."

She spoke also at Wilberforce University, at Dayton, Springfield, Crestline, and in Columbus before the two Houses of the Legislature. At Salem she ran across Parker Pillsbury, who was lecturing there. When she took the train at Columbus "there sat Mrs. Stanton, fast asleep, her gray curls sticking out." Then again into Michigan she went, speaking at Jackson, Lansing, Ann Arbor and other cities. Mrs. Stanton had preceded her and it was many times said that her lecture needed Miss Anthony's to make it complete. Then to Chicago, where she spoke at a suffrage matinee in Farwell Hall and at the Cook county annual suffrage convention, and dined at Robert Collyer's; back to Iowa, speaking at Burlington, Davenport, Mount Pleasant and Ottumwa; over into Nebraska once more, from there returning to Illinois; into Indiana, thence to Milwaukee and points in Wisconsin; and once more to Chicago, where, as was often the case, she was the guest of Mr. and Mrs. Fernando Jones; from here across to Painesville and other towns in northern Ohio; then on to numerous places in western New York, and finally home to Rochester, April 25, having slept scarcely two nights in the same bed for over three months.

Such is the hard life of the public lecturer, the most exhausting and exacting which man or woman can experience. During all this long trip Miss Anthony had met everywhere a cordial welcome and had been entertained in scores of delightful homes. Her speech on this tour was ent.i.tled "The New Situation," and was a clear and comprehensive argument to prove that the Fourteenth Amendment gave women the right to vote. Although composed largely of legal and const.i.tutional references, it was not written but drawn from the storehouse of her wonderful memory, aided only by a few notes.

At the close of the Was.h.i.+ngton convention the advocates of woman suffrage honestly believed that the battle was almost won. They felt sure Congress would pa.s.s the enabling act, permitting them to exercise the right that they claimed to be conferred by the Fourteenth Amendment, in which claim they were sustained by some of the best const.i.tutional lawyers in the country. The agricultural committee room in the Capitol was placed at the disposal of the national woman suffrage committee, who put Josephine S. Griffing in charge. The latter part of January she wrote:

Our room is thronged. Yesterday and today no less than twelve wives of members of Congress were here and large numbers of the aristocratic women of Was.h.i.+ngton. Blanche Butler Ames a.s.sures me that all her sympathies are with us. President Grant's sister, Mrs.

Cramer, has been here and given her name, saying that Mrs. Grant sent her regards and sympathized with our movement, and that she had refused from principle to sign Mrs. Sherman's protest.... The daily press is on its knees and is publis.h.i.+ng long editorials in our favor. You ask if this is a Republican dodge. I do not know. I feel as Dougla.s.s did, ready to welcome the bolt from heaven or h.e.l.l that s.h.i.+vers the chains. If the Republicans hope to save their lives by our enfranchis.e.m.e.nt, let them live.

Mrs. Hooker wrote from Was.h.i.+ngton: "Everything conspires to bring about the early confirmation of our hopes. Republicans are discovering that without this new, live issue, they are dead, and once more party necessity is to be G.o.d's opportunity. Let us, who know so many good men and true who are in this party, be thankful that through it, rather than through the Democratic, deliverance is to come, for to owe grat.i.tude to a pro-slavery party would nearly choke my thanksgiving."

To this Mrs. Stanton replied: "That is not the point, but which party, as a party, has the best record on our question. For four years I have chafed under the Republican maneuvering to keep us still. Let me call your attention to my speech on the Fifteenth Amendment, in which I said 'this is a new stab at womanhood, to result in deeper degradation to her than she has ever known before.'... Sometimes I exclaim in agony, 'Can nothing raise the self-respect of women?' I despise the Republican party for the political serfdom we suffer today, under the heel of every foreign lord and lackey who treads our soil. If all of you have turned to such idols, I will go alone to Jerusalem."

When the judiciary committee made its adverse report[57] which was merely that Congress had not the power to act, most of the friends were not discouraged but believed another committee would decide differently. Mrs. Hooker, however, was at the boiling point of indignation over the report and reversed her decision in regard to the Republican party, writing: "Thank G.o.d! that party is dead; every one here knows it, feels it, and is waiting to see what will take its place. A great labor and woman suffrage party is ready to spring into life, and a hundred aristocratic Democrats are pledged to the work. You can have no conception of the new conditions unless you are here in the midst of things and read the telegrams from all parts of the country.

Early next winter we shall be declared voting citizens." She then quotes a number of prominent Democratic politicians whom she has interviewed and who have given her reason for having faith in that party. But many of the women were fooled then by both political parties, just as they have continued to be up to the present time.

A letter from Phoebe Couzins expressed the sentiment of numbers which were received this spring: "We made a grand mistake in giving up the National. If you and Mrs. Stanton think best, as your fingers are on the pulse of the people, let us resolve the Union Society into the National a.s.sociation. So say Mr. and Mrs. Minor, but whatever is done, the two grand women who have the qualifications for leaders.h.i.+p _must be at the head_; the cause will languish until you are back in your old places."

The suffrage anniversary was held in Apollo Hall, New York, May 11 and 12, 1871. Mrs. Griffing read an able report on the work at Was.h.i.+ngton the previous winter. There were strong objections by a number of ladies to sitting on the platform with Mrs. Woodhull, but Mrs. Stanton said she should be sandwiched between Lucretia Mott and herself and that surely would give her sufficient respectability. She made a fine const.i.tutional argument, to which the most captious could not object.

The excitement created by her appearance at the Was.h.i.+ngton meeting was mild compared to that in New York City where she was becoming so well-known. The great dailies headed all reports, "The Woodhull Convention." The injustice and vindictiveness of the Tribune, that paper which once had been the champion of woman's cause, were especially hard to bear. It rang the changes upon the term "free love,"

insisted that, because the women allowed Mrs. Woodhull to stand upon their platform and advocate suffrage, they thereby indorsed all her ideas on social questions, and by every possible means it cast odium on the convention.

There is no doubt that the advocates of "free love," in its usually accepted sense, did endeavor to insinuate themselves among the suffrage women and make this movement responsible for their social doctrines, but every great reform has to suffer from similar parasites. The lives of Miss Anthony, Mrs. Mott, Mrs. Stanton, Mrs. Hooker, Mrs. Davis, and of all the old and tried leaders in this cause, form the strongest testimony of their utter repudiation of any such heresy. It was impossible, however, for the world in general to understand their broad ground that it was their business to accept valuable services without inquiring into the private life of the persons who offered them. If this were a mistake, these pioneers, who fought single-handed such a battle as the women of later days can not comprehend, had to learn the fact by experience.

The notorious Stephen Pearl Andrews prepared a set of involved and intricate resolutions which were read by Paulina Wright Davis, the chairman, without any thought of their possessing a deeper meaning than appeared on the surface, but they fell flat on the convention, and were neither discussed nor voted upon. The papers got possession of them, nevertheless, declared that they were adopted as part of the platform, read "free love" between the lines, and used them as the basis of many ponderous and prophetic editorials.

A national committee was formed of one woman from each State, with Mrs.

Stanton as chairman, of which the New York Standard, edited by John Russell Young, said: "Miss Susan B. Anthony holds a modest position, but we can well believe that in any movement for the enfranchis.e.m.e.nt of women, like MacGregor, wherever she sits will be the head of the table." The New York Democrat commented: "She deals with facts, not theories, but just gets hold of one nail after another and drives it home.... Her words were to the point, as they always are, and abounded in telling hits in every direction." Even the Tribune was generous enough to say: "The ranks of the agitators with whom Captain Anthony is identified contain no one more indiscreet, more reckless or more honest. We have no sort of sympathy with the object to which the fair captain is now devoting her life; but we know no person before the country more single-minded, sincere and unselfish and, for these reasons, more honestly ent.i.tled to the regard of a public which will always appreciate upright intentions and disinterested devotion."

In the closing days of May, she wrote to her old paper, The Revolution:

Your "Stand by the Cause," this week, is the timely word to the friends of woman suffrage. The present howl is an old trick of the arch-fiend to divert public thought from the main question, viz: woman's equal freedom and equal power to make and control her own conditions in the state, in the church and, most of all, in the home.