At the annual meeting, in 1897, the speakers included the Rev. George L. Perin and Augusta Chapin, D. D. As the laws were about to be revised and codified it was decided to ask for an equalization of those bearing on domestic relations. The _Women"s Journal_ noted that never before had so many pet.i.tions for suffrage been sent in within so short a time. On February 16 the a.s.sociation gave a large and brilliant reception at the Vendome to Miss Jane Addams of Chicago.
Col. Higginson presided, and Miss Addams, Mrs. Howe and Mrs. Livermore spoke. On April 17 a reception was given in the suffrage parlors to Mrs. Harriet Tubman, the colored woman so noted in anti-slavery days for her a.s.sistance to fugitive slaves, Mrs. Ednah D. Cheney a.s.sisting.
Mr. Blackwell presided at the Festival, May 27, and eloquent addresses were made by the Rev. Dr. George C. Lorimer, Lieutenant-Governor John L. Bates, Mrs. Florence Howe Hall and many others, while letters of greeting were read from Lady Henry Somerset and Mrs. Millicent Garrett Fawcett of England. It was Mrs. Howe"s seventy-eighth birthday and she was received with cheers and presented with flowers.
On July 29 the annual meeting of the Berkshire Historical and Scientific Society, held at Adams, was "a woman suffrage convention from end to end," with Miss Susan B. Anthony as the guest of honor in her native town. Her friends and relatives from all parts of the country were present and addresses were made by the vice-president of the society, the Rev. A. B. Whipple, by Miss Shaw, Mrs. Chapman Catt, Mrs. Rachel Foster Avery, Mrs. Harriet Taylor Upton and Miss Blackwell, officers of the National Suffrage a.s.sociation, and by Mrs.
May Wright Sewall, vice-president of the International Council of Women, Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby, editor of the _Woman"s Tribune_ and Mrs. Ida Husted Harper, Miss Anthony"s biographer.
The Prohibition State Convention in September resolved that "educational qualifications and not s.e.x should be the test of the elective franchise." The next year it adopted a woman suffrage plank.
In December the a.s.sociation held a bazar under the management of Miss Harriet E. Turner which cleared $3,200. During the year the usual large amount of educational work was done, which included 1,024 suffrage articles furnished to 230 newspapers, and the holding of 176 public meetings. The New England Historical and Genealogical Society voted unanimously to admit women to membership. Strong efforts were made to have the Boston school board elect several eminently qualified women as submasters, but s.e.x prejudice defeated them.
The Anti-Suffrage a.s.sociation published an anonymous pamphlet ent.i.tled Tested by its Fruits. The Ma.s.sachusetts W. S. A. published a counter-pamphlet by Chief-Justice Groesbeck of Wyoming, who testified that some of the laws which it represented as then in force had been repealed many years before, and that upon some "an absurd construction" had been placed.
The convention of Jan. 26, 1898, was addressed by J. M. Robertson of England. At the May Festival in Hotel Brunswick, the Hon. Hugh H. Lusk of New Zealand gave an address, and the occasion was made noteworthy by bright speeches from young women--Mrs. Helen Adelaide Shaw, Miss Maud Wood (Park) of Radcliffe and Miss Hanscom of Boston University and Smith College. Several members of the Legislature spoke and reports were received from all the New England States.
Woman"s Day was celebrated at the Mechanics" Fair in Boston. This year the a.s.sociation began to issue a monthly letter to the local leagues.
As an addition to the literature, Secretary-of-the-Navy John D. Long"s suffrage address with his portrait was issued as a handsome pamphlet.
In response to an appeal from the president, Mrs. Livermore (so well known through the Sanitary Commission during the Civil War), $500 and many boxes of supplies were sent to the soldiers in the Spanish-American War, and the secretary of the State a.s.sociation, Mrs. Ellie A. Hilt, literally worked herself to death in this service.
The usual meetings were held in 1899 and 1900 and the same great amount of work was done. To increase the school vote of women in 1899 thirty-eight public meetings were held by the a.s.sociation, with the result that in Boston 3,000 new names were added to the registration list. In 1900 the a.s.sociation contributed liberally to the suffrage campaign in Oregon. A large and brilliant reception was given at the Hotel Vendome in honor of Mrs. Livermore"s 80th birthday.
Presidents of the State a.s.sociation since 1883 have been the Hon.
William I. Bowditch (1878) to 1891; Mrs. Julia Ward Howe to 1893; Mrs.
Lucy Stone elected that year but died in October; Mrs. Mary A.
Livermore, 1893 and still in office. Henry B. Blackwell has been corresponding secretary over thirty years.[313]
The first president of the New England a.s.sociation was Mrs. Howe. In 1877 Mrs. Lucy Stone was elected, and at her death in 1893 Mrs. Howe was again chosen and is still serving.[314]
LEGISLATIVE ACTION:[315] The first pet.i.tion for the rights of women was presented to the Legislature by William Lloyd Garrison in 1849. In 1853 Lucy Stone, Theodore Parker, Wendell Phillips and Thomas Wentworth Higginson went before the const.i.tutional convention held in the State House, with a pet.i.tion signed by 2,000 names, and pleaded for an amendment conferring suffrage on women.
The first appearance of a woman in this State before a legislative committee was made in 1857, when Lucy Stone, with the Rev. James Freeman Clarke and Mr. Phillips, addressed the House Judiciary asking suffrage for women and equal property rights for wives. The next year Samuel E. Sewall and Dr. Harriot K. Hunt were granted a similar hearing. In 1869, through the efforts of the New England Suffrage a.s.sociation, two hearings were secured to present the claims of 8,000 women who had pet.i.tioned for the franchise on the same terms as men.
This was the beginning of annual hearings on this question, which have been continued without intermission for over thirty years. Henry B.
Blackwell has spoken at every hearing and Lucy Stone at every one until her death.
_1884_--Pet.i.tions were presented for Munic.i.p.al Suffrage, for the appointment of police matrons; also for laws permitting husbands and wives to contract with each other and make gifts directly to each other; allowing a woman to hold any office to which she might be elected or appointed; and requiring that a certain number of women should be appointed on Boards of Overseers of the Poor, on State Boards of Charities and as physicians in the women"s wards of insane asylums. Hearings were given on most of these pet.i.tions. At that of January 25 for Munic.i.p.al Suffrage the speakers were William I.
Bowditch, Mrs. Stone, Mr. Blackwell, Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, Mrs. Ednah D. Cheney, the Rev. J. W. and Mrs. Jennie F. Bashford, Mary F.
Eastman, Mrs. H. H. Robinson, Mrs. Harriette Robinson Shattuck and Miss Nancy Covell.
On January 29 a hearing was given to the remonstrants conducted by Thornton K. Lothrop. The speakers were Francis Parkman (whose paper was read for him by Mr. Lothrop) Louis B. Brandeis, Mrs. Kate Gannett Wells, William H. Sayward, Mrs. Lydia Warner and George C. Crocker. A letter was read from Mrs. Clara T. Leonard. Mr. Parkman a.s.serted that the suffragists "have thrown to the wind every political, not to say every moral principle;" that "three-fourths of the agitators are in mutiny against Providence because it made them women;" and that "if the ballot were granted to women it would be a burden so crushing that life would be a misery."
This year 315 pet.i.tions for suffrage with 21,608 signatures were presented. The remonstrants who set out with the avowed intention of getting more secured about 3,000. A number of persons who signed the anti-suffrage pet.i.tion in Boston published letters afterwards over their own names and addresses saying that they had signed without reading, upon the a.s.surance of the canva.s.ser employed by the remonstrants that it was a pet.i.tion to permit women to vote on the question of liquor license.
In the House Munic.i.p.al Suffrage was discussed March 12, 13, and finally was defeated by 61 yeas, 155 nays. A bill to let women vote on the license question, which had not been asked for by the suffrage a.s.sociation, was voted down without a count.
A law was enacted requiring two women trustees on the board of every State lunatic hospital, and one woman physician in each. Samuel E.
Sewall, Frank B. Sanborn, Mr. Blackwell and Miss Mary A. Brigham had been the speakers at the hearing in behalf of this measure. All the other pet.i.tions were refused.
_1885_--On Munic.i.p.al Suffrage and the submission of a const.i.tutional amendment a hearing was given February 17. As usual the Green Room was crowded. There were before the committee pet.i.tions for suffrage with 16,113 signatures, and pet.i.tions against it with 285. The speakers in favor were the Rev. James Freeman Clarke, Mrs. Cheney, Lucy Stone, Mr.
Blackwell, Mr. Bowditch, William Lloyd Garrison, Jr., Miss Eastman, Mrs. Adelaide A. Claflin, Mrs. Abby M. Gannett and Miss Lelia J.
Robinson. The opposition was conducted by Mr. Brandeis and the speakers were Judge Francis C. Lowell, Mrs. Gannett Wells, Thomas Weston, Jr., Henry Parkman and the Rev. Brooke Hereford, lately from England, with letters from President L. Clark Seelye of Smith College, Miss Mary E. Dewey and Mr. Sayward. The committee reported in favor of Munic.i.p.al Suffrage with only one dissenting. The House on May 4 rejected the bill by 61 yeas, 131 nays.
While the women sat in the gallery waiting for the measure to be discussed, the bill proposing to limit the working day for women and children to ten hours was "guyed, laughed at and voted down amid ridicule and uproar." This Legislature also refused the pet.i.tion of Mr. Sewall and others for one or more women on every Board of Overseers of the Poor; for the better protection of wives; for the submission of a const.i.tutional amendment granting women full suffrage; and for the amendment of the school suffrage law to make it as easy for women as for men to register. (See Suffrage.)
_1886_--At the hearing, January 28, a letter was read from the Hon.
Josiah G. Abbott, and addresses were made by Mr. Garrison, Lucy Stone, Mr. Blackwell, Mrs. Cheney, Mrs. Eliza Trask Hill, the Rev. Ada C.
Bowles, Mrs. Shattuck, Mrs. Robinson, Miss Eastman and Mrs. Claflin.
The remonstrants" hearing had been appointed for January 29. Their attorney, E. N. Hill, tried at the last moment to get a postponement but failed. The leaders of the "antis" declined to speak but several of the rank and file appeared and made the usual objections. The committee reported in favor of Munic.i.p.al Suffrage. It was discussed in the House April 14, about the same number speaking on each side, and defeated by 77 yeas, 132 nays, the most favorable vote since 1879.
On May 20, before the Senate Judiciary Committee, representatives of the suffrage a.s.sociation and other societies had a hearing in behalf of bills to raise the "age of protection" and to provide adequate penalties for seduction, but no action was taken.
_1887_--On January 6 Governor Oliver Ames, in his inaugural address to the Legislature, said, "I earnestly recommend, as a measure of simple justice, the enactment of a law securing Munic.i.p.al Suffrage to women."
The suffrage pet.i.tions this year had 5,741 signatures, the remonstrant pet.i.tions 81. On February 2 it was ordered in the House, on motion of Josiah Quincy, that the Committee on Woman Suffrage consider the expediency of submitting the question of Munic.i.p.al Suffrage to the women of the different cities and towns, the right to be given to them in any city or town where the majority of those who voted on the question should vote in favor; or where a number of women should pet.i.tion for it equal to a majority of the number of men who voted at the last annual munic.i.p.al or town election; or where a majority vote of the men should be given for it at the annual election.
On motion of Mr. Quincy an order for legislation to equalize the interest of husbands and wives in each other"s property had been previously introduced but was lost.
On February 9 a hearing was given to the pet.i.tioners. The speakers were the same as the previous year with the addition of Col. T. W.
Higginson. Mr. Blackwell presented two letters in favor of the bill, one addressed to Republicans, one to Democrats.[316] Clement K. Fay spoke for the remonstrants.
The committee reported in favor of Munic.i.p.al Suffrage, two dissenting.
It was discussed in the House March 3 and 10. Mr. Bailey of Everett offered an amendment that the provisions of the bill be tried for ten years, but it was not put to a vote. The bill was lost by 86 yeas, 122 nays, including pairs.
A bill to let women vote on the license question pa.s.sed the House by 116 yeas to 88 nays, including pairs, but was defeated in the Senate, 24 yeas, 13 nays.
The bill was pa.s.sed providing for police matrons in all cities of 30,000 or more inhabitants.
_1888_--The Legislature was asked for Munic.i.p.al and Presidential Suffrage and for the submission of a const.i.tutional amendment; also for various improvements in the laws relating to women. The Woman"s Christian Temperance Union pet.i.tioned for License Suffrage. Several thousand women signed the pet.i.tion and one hundred the remonstrance.
On January 25 a hearing was given on the pet.i.tions for Munic.i.p.al and License Suffrage. Mr. Bowditch, Lucy Stone, Mr. Blackwell, Mrs. Howe and Mrs. Cheney spoke for Munic.i.p.al Suffrage and Miss Elizabeth S.
Tobey for License Suffrage. Mr. Brandeis made an argument as attorney for the remonstrants. Charles Carleton Coffin, A. A. Miner, D. D., Mrs. Claflin, the Rev. Ada C. Bowles and Miss Cora Scott Pond replied for the pet.i.tioners.
On February 20 and 25 hearings were given on the pet.i.tions for six bills drawn by Mr. Sewall: 1. To give mothers the equal care, custody and education of their minor children. 2. To give married women a right to appoint guardians for their minor children by will. 3. To repeal the act of 1887 limiting the inheritance of personal property.
4. To regulate and equalize the descent of personal property between husband and wife. 5. To equalize curtesy and dower and the descent of real estate between husband and wife. 6. To enable husbands and wives to make gifts, contracts and conveyances directly with one another, and to authorize suits between them.
Addresses in support of the pet.i.tions were made by Mr. Sewall, Mrs.
Howe, Mrs. Stone, Mr. Blackwell, the Hon. George A. O. Ernst, Miss Robinson, George H. Fall and others. All these measures were refused.
Several new statutes for the better protection of women were pa.s.sed this year, however, at the instance of Mr. Sewall, among them one providing severe penalties for any person who should aid in sending a woman as inmate or servant to a house of ill fame; one prohibiting railroads from requiring women or children to ride in smoking cars; one providing that women arrested should be placed in charge of police matrons.
On April 23 Munic.i.p.al Suffrage was defeated in the House, 50 yeas, 121 nays. License Suffrage, after a prolonged contest, pa.s.sed by 118 yeas, 110 nays, and was defeated in the Senate, 20 yeas, 19 nays.
_1889_--At the hearing of January 31 the attendance was larger than ever before. Prof. W. H. Carruth, Franklyn Howland and the Rev. J. W.
Hamilton (afterwards Bishop of the Methodist Episcopal Church) were added to the usual list of speakers.
On February 4 a hearing was granted to the W. C. T. U. for Munic.i.p.al Suffrage, and on February 8 one was given to the remonstrants. The Hon. John M. Ropes, the Rev. Charles B. Rice, the Rev. Dr. Dexter of the _Congregationalist_ and Arthur Lord spoke in the negative. They said they were employed as counsel by the remonstrants, whose names and numbers they declined to give. As Mr. Lord was unable to complete his argument in the allotted time, at his request a further hearing was granted on February 11. Extracts were read from letters by Mrs.
Clara T. Leonard and Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney.[317] Mrs. Howe, Lucy Stone, Mr. Blackwell, Col. L. Edwin Dudley and Miss Tobey replied.
Chester W. Kingsley, chairman of the legislative committee, said that as no pet.i.tions against suffrage had been sent in he would ask all the remonstrants present to rise. Not a person rose, but the men standing in the aisles tried to sit down. Mr. Lord suggested that the remonstrants were averse to notoriety, whereupon Senator Kingsley asked all in favor to rise, and the great audience rose in a body.
Among the pet.i.tions sent in this year for Munic.i.p.al Suffrage was one signed by President Helen A. Shafer of Wellesley College, a number of the professors and about seventy students who were over twenty-one.
The committee reported in favor of both Munic.i.p.al and License Suffrage. The former was discussed March 12 and lost by a vote, including pairs, of 90 yeas, 139 nays. The _Woman"s Journal_ said: "Although not a majority, the weight of character, talent and experience was overwhelmingly in favor of the bill, as is shown by the fact that _the chairmen of thirty of the House Committees_, out of a total of forty-one, were recorded in its favor."
License Suffrage pa.s.sed the Senate, 15 yeas, 12 nays, after a long fight, and was defeated in the House, 101 yeas, 42 nays.