The demand we to-day make, is not the idiosyncrasy of a few discontented minds, but a universal movement. Woman is everywhere throwing off the lethargy of ages, and is already close upon you in the whole realm of thought--in art, science, literature and government. Everything heralds the dawn of the new era when moral power is to govern nations. In asking you, Honorable Gentlemen, to extend suffrage to woman, we do not press on you the risk and responsibility of a new step, but simply to try a measure that has already proved wise and safe the world over. So long as political power was absolute and hereditary, woman shared it with man by birth. In Hungary and some provinces of France and Germany, women holding this inherited right confer their right of franchise on their husbands. In 1858, in the old town of Upsal, the authorities granted the right of suffrage to fifty women holding real estate, and to thirty-one doing business in their own name. The representative their votes elected was to sit in the House of Burgesses. In Ireland, the Court of Queen"s Bench, Dublin, restored to women, in 1864, the old right of voting for town commissioners. In 1864, too, the government of Moravia decided that all women who are tax-payers had the right to vote.
In Canada, in 1850, an electoral privilege was conferred on women, in the hope that the Protestant might balance the Roman Catholic power in the school system. "I lived," says a friend of mine, "where I saw this right exercised for four years by female property holders, and never heard the most cultivated man, even Lord Elgin, object to its results." Women vote in Austria, Australia, Holland and Sweden, on property qualifications. There is a bill now before the British Parliament, presented by John Stuart Mill, asking for household suffrage, accompanied by a pet.i.tion from eleven thousand of the best educated women in England.
Would you be willing to admit, gentlemen, that women know less, have less virtue, less pride and dignity of character under Republican inst.i.tutions than in the despotisms and monarchies of the old world? Your Codes and Const.i.tutions savor of such an opinion. Fortunately, history furnishes a few saving facts, even under our Republican inst.i.tutions. From a recent examination of the archives of the State of New Jersey we learn that, owing to a liberal Quaker influence, women and negroes exercised the right of suffrage in that State thirty-one years--from 1776 to 1807--when "white males" ignored the const.i.tution, and arbitrarily a.s.sumed the reins of government. This act of injustice is sufficient to account for the moral darkness that seems to have settled down upon that unhappy State. During the dynasty of women and negroes, does history record any social revolution peculiar to that period? Because women voted there, was the inst.i.tution of marriage annulled, the sanct.i.ty of home invaded, cradles annihilated, and the stockings, like Governor Marcy"s pantaloons, mended by the State? Did the men of that period become mere satellites of the dinner-pot, the wash-tub, or the spinning-wheel? Were they dwarfed and crippled in body and soul, while their enfranchised wives and mothers became giants in stature and intellect? Did the children, fully armed and equipped for the battle of life, spring, Minerva-like, from the brains of their fathers? Were the laws of nature suspended? Did the s.e.xes change places? Was everything turned upside down? No, life went on as smoothly in New Jersey as in any other State in the Union.
And the fact that women did vote there, created so slight a ripple on the popular wave, and made so ordinary a page in history, that probably nine-tenths of the people of this country never heard of its existence, until recent discussions in the United States Senate brought out the facts of the case. In Kansas, women vote for school officers and are themselves eligible to the office of trustee. There is a resolution now before the Legislature of Ohio to strike the words "white male"
from the Const.i.tution of that State. The Hon. Mr. Noel, of Missouri, has presented a bill in the House of Representatives to extend suffrage to the women of the District of Columbia.
I think, Honorable Gentlemen, I have given you facts enough to show that you need not hesitate to give the ballot to the women of New York, on the ground that it is a new thing; for, as you see, the right has long ago been exercised by certain cla.s.ses of women in many countries. And if it were a new thing, and had never been heard of before, that would be no argument against the experiment. Had the world never done a new thing, Columbus would not have discovered this country, nor the ocean telegraph brought our old enemy--Great Britain--within friendly speaking distance.
When it was proposed to end slavery in this country, croakers and conservatives protested because it was a new thing, and must of necessity produce a social convulsion. When it was proposed to give woman her rights of property in this State, the same cla.s.ses opposed that on the same ground; but the spirit of the age carried both measures over their heads and "n.o.body was hurt."
You Republicans can not oppose our demand on that ground, for your present party-cry "negro suffrage" is a new thing, and startling too, in the ears of the Southern States, and a very inconsistent thing, so long as the $250 qualification remains in your Const.i.tution. "If you would know your faults," says Cicero, "ask your enemies." Hear his Excellency Andrew Johnson, in his veto on the District of Columbia Bill; he says: "It hardly seems consistent with the principles of right and justice, that representatives of States where suffrage is either denied the colored man or granted to him on qualifications requiring intelligence or property, should compel the people of the District of Columbia to try an experiment which their const.i.tuents have thus far shown an unwillingness to try for themselves." Senator Sumner, a leading radical, expresses the same opinion. In the debate on the admission of Nebraska, he says: "When we demand equal rights of the Southern States, we must not be so inconsistent as to admit any new State with a const.i.tution disfranchising citizens on account of color.
Congress must be itself just, if it would recommend it to others.
Reconstruction must begin at home." Consistency is a jewel. Every thoughtful person must see that Northern representatives are in no condition to reconstruct the South until their own State Const.i.tutions are purged of all invidious distinctions among their citizens. As the fountain rises no higher than its source, how can New York press on South Carolina a civilization she has never tried herself. But say you, we can coerce the South to do what we have no right to force on a loyal State. Has not each State a right to amend her own Const.i.tution and establish a genuine republic within her own boundaries? "Let each man mend one," says the old proverb, "and the world is mended." Let each State bring its own Const.i.tution into harmony with the Federal Const.i.tution, and the Union will be a republic.
We are soon to hold a convention to revise the Const.i.tution of the State of New York; and it is the duty of the people to insist that it be so amended as to make all its citizens equal before the law. Could the Empire State now take the lead in making herself a genuine republic, all the States would, in time, follow her example, and the problem of reconstruction be thus settled to the satisfaction of all. Example is more powerful than precept in all cases. Were our const.i.tutions free from all cla.s.s distinctions, with what power our representatives could now press their example on the Southern States. Is there anything more rasping to a proud spirit than to be rebuked for shortcomings by those who are themselves guilty of the grossest violations of law and justice? Does the North think it absurd for its women to vote and hold office, the South thinks the same of its negroes. Does the North consider its women a part of the family to be represented by the "white male citizen," so views the South her negroes. And thus viewing them, the South has never taxed her slaves; but our chivalry never fails to send its tax-gatherers to the poorest widow that owns a homestead. Would you press impartial suffrage on the South, recognize it first at home.
Would you have Congress do its duty in the coming session, let the action of every State Legislature teach it what that duty is.
The work of this hour is a broader one than the reconstruction of the Rebel States. It is the lifting of the entire nation into higher ideas of justice and equality. It is the realization of what the world has never yet seen, a GENUINE REPUBLIC.
As the ballot is the key to reconstruction, a right knowledge of its use and power is the first step in the work before us. Hence, the consideration of the question of suffrage is the duty of every American citizen.
The legal disabilities to the exercise of suffrage (for persons of sound mind and body) in the several States, are five--age, color, s.e.x, property and education. As age depends on a fixed law, beyond the control of fallible man, viz., the revolution of the earth around the sun, it must be impartial, for, _nolens volens_, all men must revolve with their native planet; and as no Republican or Democratic majority can make the earth stand still, even for a Presidential campaign, they must in time perform that journey often enough to become legal voters. As the right to the ballot is not based on intelligence, it matters not that some boys of eighteen do know more than some men of thirty. Inasmuch as boys are not bound by any contract--except marriage--can not sell a horse, or piece of land, or be sued for debt until they are twenty-one, this qualification of age seems to be in harmony with the laws of the land, and based on common sense.
As to color and s.e.x, neither time, money or education can make black white, or woman man; therefore such insurmountable qualifications, not to be tolerated in a republican government, are unworthy our serious consideration. "Qualifications," says Senator Sumner, "can not be in their nature permanent or insurmountable. Color can not be a qualification any more than size, or quality of the hair. A permanent or insurmountable qualification is equivalent to a deprivation of the suffrage. In other words, it is the tyranny of taxation without representation; and this tyranny, I insist, is not intrusted to any State in the Union."
As to property and education, there are some plausible arguments in favor of such qualifications, but they are all alike unsatisfactory, illogical and unjust. A limited suffrage creates a privileged cla.s.s, and is based on the false idea that government is the natural arbiter of its citizens, while in fact it is the creature of their will. In the old days of the colonies when the property qualification was five pounds--that being just the price of a jacka.s.s--Benjamin Franklin facetiously asked, "If a man must own a jacka.s.s in order to vote, who does the voting, the man or the jacka.s.s?" If reading and money-making were a sure gauge of character, if intelligence and virtue were twin sisters, these qualifications might do; but such is not the case. In our late war black men were loyal, generous and heroic without the alphabet or multiplication table, while men of wealth, educated by the nation, graduates of West Point, were false to their country and traitors to their flag. There was a time in England"s history, when the House of Lords even, could neither read nor write. Before the art of printing, were all men fools? Were the Apostles and martyrs worth $250? The early Christians, the children of art, science and literature, have in all ages struggled with poverty, while they blessed the world with their inspirations. The Hero of Judea had not where to lay His head!!
As capital has ever ground labor to the dust, is it just and generous to disfranchise the poor and ignorant because they are so? If a man can not read, give him the ballot, it is schoolmaster. If he does not own a dollar give him the ballot, it is the key to wealth and power. Says Lamartine, "universal suffrage is the first truth and only basis of every national republic." "The ballot," says Senator Sumner, "is the columbiad of our political life, and every citizen who has it is a full-armed monitor."
But while such grand truths are uttered in the ears of the world, by an infamous amendment of the Federal Const.i.tution, the people have sanctioned the disfranchis.e.m.e.nt of a majority of the loyal citizens of the nation. With sorrow we learn that the Legislature of New York has ratified this change of the Const.i.tution.
Happily for the cause of freedom, the organization we represent here to-day, "THE AMERICAN EQUAL RIGHTS a.s.sOCIATION," has registered its protest in the archives of the State against this desecration of the last will and testament of the Fathers. It was a mistake for you to confirm to-day what Congress proposed a year ago. Recent debates in the Senate show a hearty repentance for their past action, and an entire revolution in their opinions on this whole question. It was gratifying to find in the discussion of the District Franchise Bill, how unanimously the Senate favored the extension of suffrage. The thanks of the women of the Nation are especially due to Senator Cowan for his motion to strike out the word "male," and to the nine distinguished Senators who voted for his amendment. It was pleasant to see into what fraternal relations this question at once brought all opposing elements. The very able and exhaustive manner in which both Republicans and Democrats pressed their claims to the ballot, through two entire sessions of the Senate, is most encouraging to the advocates of the political rights of women.
In view of this liberal discussion in the Senate, and the recent action of Congress on the Territories, it is rather singular that our Republican Governor, in referring to the Const.i.tutional Convention in his late message, while recommending consideration of many minor matters, should have failed to call attention to Art. 2d, Sec. 1, of the Const.i.tution, which denies the fundamental rights of citizenship. As the executive head of the party in this State whose political capital is "negro suffrage,"
it would have been highly proper for our worthy Governor to have given his opinion on that odious $250 clause in the Const.i.tution.
No doubt our judiciary, our criminal legislation, our city governments need reforming; our railroads, prisons and schools need attention; but all these are of minor consideration to the personal and property rights of the man himself. Said Lalor Shiels, in the House of Commons, "strike the Const.i.tution to the center and the lawyer sleeps in his closet. But touch the cobwebs in Westminster Hall and the spiders start from their hiding places."
I have called your attention, gentlemen, to some of the flaws in your Const.i.tution that you may see that there is more important work to be done in the coming Convention than any to which Governor Fenton has referred in his message. I would also call your attention to the fact, that while His Excellency suggests the number of delegates at large to be chosen by the two political parties, he makes no provision for the representatives of women and "men of color" not worth $250. I would, therefore, suggest to your honorable body that you provide for the election of an equal number of delegates at large from the disfranchised cla.s.ses. But a response to our present demand does not legitimately thrust on you the final consideration of the whole broad question of suffrage, on which many of you may be unprepared to give an opinion. The simple point we now press is this: that in a revision of our Const.i.tution, when the State is, as it were, resolved into its original elements, ALL THE PEOPLE should be represented in the Convention which is to enact the laws by which they are to be governed the next twenty years.
Women and negroes, being seven-twelfths of the people, are a majority; and according to our republican theory, are the rightful rulers of the nation. In this view of the case, honorable gentlemen, is it not a very unpretending demand we make, that we shall vote once in twenty years in revising and amending our State Const.i.tution?
But, say you, the majority of women do not make the demand. Grant it. What then? When you proclaimed emanc.i.p.ation, did you go to slaveholders and ask if a majority of them were in favor of freeing their slaves? When you ring the changes on "negro suffrage" from Maine to California, have you proof positive that a majority of the freedmen demand the ballot? On the contrary, knowing that the very existence of republican inst.i.tutions depends on the virtue, education and equality of the people, did you not, as wise statesmen, legislate in all these cases for the highest good of the individual and the nation? We ask that the same far-seeing wisdom may guide your decision on the question now before you. Remember, the gay and fashionable throng who whisper in the ears of statesmen, judges, lawyers, merchants, "_We have all the rights we want_," are but the mummies of civilization, to be brought back to life only by earthquakes and revolutions. Would you know what is in the soul of woman, ask not the wives and daughters of merchant princes; but the creators of wealth--those who earn their bread by honest toil--those who, by a turn in the wheel of fortune, stand face to face with the stern realities of life.
"If you would enslave a people," says Cicero, "first, through ease and luxury, make them effeminate." When you subsidize labor to your selfish interests, there is ever a healthy resistance.
But, when you exalt weakness and imbecility above your heads, give it an imaginary realm of power, illimitable, unmeasured, unrecognized, you have founded a throne for woman on pride, selfishness and complacency, before which you may well stand appalled. In banishing Madame De Stael from Paris, the Emperor Napoleon, even, bowed to the power of that scepter which rules the world of fashion. The most insidious enemy to our republican inst.i.tutions, at this hour, is found in the aristocracy of our women. The ballot-box, that great leveler among men, is beneath their dignity. "_They have all the rights they want._" So, in his spiritual supremacy, has the Pope of Rome! But what of the mult.i.tude outside the Vatican!!!
This speech was published in full by the Metropolitan press and many of the leading journals[93] of the State, with fair editorial comments.
On June 4th, 1867, the Const.i.tutional Convention a.s.sembled in Albany, and on the 10th Mr. Graves of Herkimer, moved "that a committee of five be appointed by the chair to report at an early day whether the Convention should provide that when a majority of women voted that they wanted the right of suffrage, they should have it," and on the 19th the President, William A. Wheeler, appointed the committee[94] on the "right of suffrage, and the qualifications for holding office."
The first pet.i.tion brought before the committee in favor of suffrage for women was presented by George William Curtis, of Richmond Co., sent by the friends of Human Progress from their Annual meeting at Waterloo.
Martin I. Townsend next presented a pet.i.tion from William Johnson, Chairman of the "Colored Men"s State Committee," praying for "equal manhood suffrage." Similar pet.i.tions, without any concert of action between the parties, were presented simultaneously whenever any discussion arose on the suffrage question. But in this Convention the demands made by the women were more pressing and mult.i.tudinous.
Mr. GRAVES, June 21st, 1867, moved to take up his resolution, "That a committee of five be appointed by the chair to report to the convention at as early a day as possible, whether, in their opinion, a provision should be incorporated in the Const.i.tution authorizing the women in this State to exercise the elective franchise, when they shall ask that right by a majority of all the votes given by female citizens over twenty-one years of age, at an election called for that purpose, at which women alone shall have the right to vote."
Mr. GRAVES said:--Mr. President. I do not desire at this time to discuss the merits of the resolution; but allow me to suggest that there are four cla.s.ses of persons interested in the questions involved in it. The first cla.s.s is what is opprobriously known as "strong-minded women," who claim the right to vote upon the ground that they are interested and identified with ourselves in the stability and permanency of our inst.i.tutions, and that their property is made liable for the maintenance of our Government, while they have no right to choose the law-makers or select the persons who are to a.s.sess the value of their property liable to taxation. They claim that they are not untaught in the science of government to which the right of administration is denied to them.
The second cla.s.s includes both males and females who sympathize with the first cla.s.s, and who claim that there is no disparity in the intellect of men and women, when an equal opportunity is afforded by education for progress and advancement. They also claim that our country is diminishing all the time in moral integrity and virtue, and ask that a new element be introduced into our governmental affairs by which crime shall be lessened and the estimate of moral virtue be made higher.
The third cla.s.s urges that there should be no distinction between males and females in the exercise of the elective franchise, and they claim that it is anti-democratic that there should be a minority in this country to rule its destinies.
There is a fourth cla.s.s who believe that the right to exercise the elective franchise is not inherent, but permissive, and that the people are the Government, and that this power of the elective franchise is under their immediate control, and they claim the right to become part and parcel of the Government which they help to support and maintain.
Now these four cla.s.ses, differing in opinion upon this great question, const.i.tute a very large body of worthy, high-minded, and intelligent men and women of this State who have long sought to enlarge the elective franchise, and they claim the deliberate consideration of this body upon the ground of equality, as their innumerable pet.i.tions[95] to this Convention fully show. This resolution gives to women themselves the power of discussing and comparing of minds to settle the question whether they will avail themselves of the desired right to exercise the power of voting.
And as it differs from all other questions which have originated here with reference to this right of women to vote, I submit it is a proper resolution to be referred to a select committee to be appointed for that purpose.
Mr. Graves" resolution was referred to the Committee on Suffrage.
June 27th Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony were granted a hearing[96]
before the Convention, and at the close of their addresses were asked by different members to reply to various objections that readily suggested themselves. Among others, Mr. Greeley said: "Ladies, you will please remember that the bullet and ballot go together. If you vote, are you ready to fight?" "Certainly," was the prompt reply. "We are ready to fight, sir, just as you fought in the late war, by sending our subst.i.tutes." The colloquy between the members and the ladies, prolonged until a late hour, was both spicy and instructive.[97] On the 10th of July a hearing was granted to Lucy Stone,[98] which called out deep interest and consideration from the members of that body. Later still, George Francis Train[99] was most cordially received by the Convention.
C. C. DWIGHT, June 26th, offered a resolution that "The Standing Committee on the Right of Suffrage be instructed to provide for women to vote as to whether they wanted the right to vote after the adoption of the New Const.i.tution.
Mr. MERRITT, July 11th, moved that "The question of Woman Suffrage be submitted at the election of 1868 or 1869. Referred to the Committee of the Whole.
Horace Greeley, Chairman of the Committee, in his report, after recommending universal "manhood suffrage," said:
Having thus briefly set forth the considerations which seem to us decisive in favor of the few and moderate changes proposed, we proceed to indicate our controlling reasons for declining to recommend other and in some respects more important innovations.
Your committee does not recommend an extension of the elective franchise to women. However defensible in theory, we are satisfied that public sentiment does not demand and would not sustain an innovation so revolutionary and sweeping, so openly at war with a distribution of duties and functions between the s.e.xes as venerable and pervading as government itself, and involving transformations so radical in social and domestic life. Should we prove to be in error on this head, the Convention may overrule us by changing a few words in the first section of our proposed article.
Nor have we seen fit to propose the enfranchis.e.m.e.nt of boys above the age of eighteen years. The current ideas and usages in our day, but especially in this country, seem already to set too strongly in favor of the relaxation, if not total overthrow of parental authority, especially over half-grown boys. With the sincerest good-will for the cla.s.s in question, we submit that they may spend the hours which they can spare from their labors and their lessons more usefully and profitably in mastering the wisdom of the sages and philosophers who have elucidated the science of government, than in attendance on midnight caucuses, or in wrangling around the polls.
ALBANY, June 28, 1867.
HORACE GREELEY, _Chairman_, WM. H. MERRILL, LESLIE W. RUSSELL, GEO. WILLIAMS.
Mr. Ca.s.sidy presented a minority report urging a separate submission of the question of negro suffrage, in which he said:
If the regeneration of political society is to be sought in the incorporation of this element into the const.i.tuency, it must be done by the direct and explicit vote of the electors. We are foreclosed from any other course by the repeated action[100] of the State.... It would be unfair to the people to declare that whereas they have again and again refused to accept this change, therefore we will incorporate it into the Const.i.tution, and compel them either to repeal that instrument, or to accept this measure.... As to the extension of suffrage to women, the undersigned reserve, for the present, any expression of opinion.
WILLIAM Ca.s.sIDY, JOHN G. SCHUMAKER.
The pet.i.tions[101] for woman suffrage were presented in the Convention until they reached in round numbers 20,000. The morning Mr. Greeley gave his report the galleries were crowded with ladies, and every member present, Democrat as well as Republican, was supplied with a pet.i.tion. As it had been rumored about that Mr. Greeley"s report would be against suffrage for women, the Democrats entered with great zest into the presentation. George William Curtis, at the special request[102] of the ladies, reserved his for the last, and when he arose and said: "Mr. President, I hold in my hand a pet.i.tion from Mrs.
Horace Greeley and three hundred other women citizens of Westchester, asking that the word "male" be stricken from the Const.i.tution," the sensation throughout the house was as profound as unexpected. Mr.
Greeley"s chagrin was only equaled by the amus.e.m.e.nt of the other members, and of the ladies in the gallery. As he arose to read his report, it being the next thing in order, he was evidently embarra.s.sed in view of such a flood of pet.i.tions from all parts of the State; from his own wife, and most of the ladies in his immediate social circle, by seeming to antagonize the measure.
After Mr. Greeley"s report, Mr. Graves made several efforts to get his resolution adopted in time for the women to vote upon it in the spring of 1868. Mr. Weed, of Clinton, also desired that the vote for the measure should consist of the majority of the women of the State. The great event of the Convention was the speech of George William Curtis on the report of the "Committee on the right of suffrage and the qualifications to hold office."
GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS offered the following amendment:[103]
"In the first section, strike out the word "man"; and wherever in that section the word "he" occurs, add "or she"; and wherever the word "his" occurs, add "or her.""