EMMELINE S. WELLS, Salt Lake City, Utah.
MARY SMITH HAYWARD.
Chadron, Neb.
JULIA B. NELSON.
Red Wing, Minn.
President Cleveland signed the const.i.tution of Utah, Jan. 4, 1896, and the inaugural ceremonies were held in the great tabernacle in Salt Lake City, January 6, "Utah completing the trinity of true Republics at the summit of the Rockies." Gov. Heber M. Wells took the oath administered by Chief Justice Charles S. Zane, and at a given signal the booming of artillery was heard from Capitol Hill.
Secretary-of-State Hammond read the Governor"s first proclamation convening the Legislature at 3 o"clock that day. Mrs. Pardee was elected clerk of the Senate and entered upon the duties of the office at the opening session, signing the credentials of the U. S.
Senators--the first case of the kind on record. C. E. Allen had been elected representative to Congress, and the Legislature at once selected Frank J. Cannon and Arthur Brown as United States Senators.
At the National Suffrage Convention in Washington, the evening of January 27 was devoted to welcoming Utah. Representative Allen and wife were on the platform. The Rev. Miss Shaw tendered the welcome of the a.s.sociation. Senator Cannon, who had just arrived in the city, responded declaring that woman was the power needed to reform politics. Mrs. Allen and Mrs. S. A. Boyer spoke of the courage and persistence of the women, and Mrs. Richards gave a graphic account of the faithful work done by the Utah Suffrage a.s.sociation.
In January, 1897, Mrs. Wells attended the National Convention in Des Moines, Iowa, and described the first year"s accomplishments to an appreciative audience.
On Oct. 30, 1899, Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, chairman of the National organization committee, and Miss Mary G. Hay, secretary, came to Salt Lake City on the homeward way from Montana, and a meeting was held in the office of the _Woman"s Exponent_, Mrs. Wells in the chair and about twenty-five ladies present, all ardent suffragists. After due deliberation a committee was appointed, Mrs. Richards, chairman, Mrs.
J. Fewson Smith, secretary, to work for suffrage in other States, especially Arizona. Subsequently this committee organized properly, adopted the name Utah Council of Women, and did all in their power to raise means and carry on the proposed work, and dues were sent to the national treasury.
In February, 1900, Mrs. Richards, president, and Mrs. Lucy A. Clark, delegate, went to Washington and took part in the National Convention and the celebration of Miss Anthony"s eightieth birthday. On this occasion the Utah Silk Commission presented to her a handsome black silk dress pattern, which possessed an especial value from the fact that the raising of the silk worms, the spinning of the thread and all the work connected with its manufacture except the weaving was done by women.
During this year the Council of Women worked a.s.siduously to make a creditable exhibit at the national suffrage bazar, Mrs. Mary T. Gilmer having personal charge of it in New York City.
LAWS: Dower and curtesy are abolished. The law reserves for the widow one-third of all the real property possessed by the husband free from his debts, but the value of such portion of the homestead as is set apart for her shall be deducted from this share. If either husband or wife die without a will leaving only one child or the lawful issue of one, the survivor takes one-half the real estate; if there are more than one or issue of one living, then one-third. If there is issue the survivor has one-half the personal estate. If none he or she is ent.i.tled to all the real and personal estate if not over $5,000 in value, exclusive of debts and expenses. Of all over that amount the survivor receives one-half and the parents of the deceased the other half in equal shares; if not living it goes to the brothers and sisters and their heirs.
Also the widow or widower is ent.i.tled to one-half the community property subject to community debts, and if there is no will, to the other half provided there are no children living.
A homestead not exceeding $2,000 in value and $250 additional for each minor child, together with all the personal property exempt from execution, shall be wholly exempt from the payment of the debts of decedent, and shall be the absolute property of the surviving husband or wife and minor children. This section shall not be construed to prevent the disposition by will of the homestead and exempt personal property.
A married woman has absolute control over her separate property and may mortgage or convey it or dispose of it by will without the husband"s consent. The husband has the same right, but in conveying real estate which is community property, the wife"s signature is necessary.
A married woman may engage in business in her own name and "her earnings, wages and savings become her separate estate without any express gift or contract of the husband, when she is permitted to receive and retain them and to loan and invest them in her own name and for her own benefit, and they are exempt from execution for her husband"s debts." (1894.)
A married woman may make contracts, sue and be sued in her own name.
The father is the legal guardian of the children, and at his death the mother. The survivor may appoint a guardian.
Support for the wife may be granted by the court the same as alimony in divorce, if the husband have property in the State. If not there is no punishment for non-support. (1896.)
The "age of protection" for girls was raised from 10 to 13 years in 1888, and to 18 years in 1896. The penalty is imprisonment in the penitentiary not less than five years.
SUFFRAGE: The Territorial Legislature conferred the Full Suffrage on women in 1870, and they exercised it very generally until 1887 when they were deprived of it by Congress through what is known as the Edmunds-Tucker Act. Utah entered the Union in 1896 with Full Suffrage for women as an article of the State const.i.tution.
That they exercise this privilege quite as extensively as men is shown by the following table prepared from the election statistics of 1900.
It is not customary to make separate returns of the women"s votes and these were obtained through the courtesy of Governor Wells, who, at the request of the Utah Council of Women, wrote personal letters to the county officials to secure them. Eleven of the more remote counties did not respond but those having the largest population did so, and, judging from previous statistics, the others would not change the proportion of the vote.
Counties. Registered. Voted.
Men. Women. Total. Men. Women. Total.
Salt Lake 14,083 13,328 27,411 13,102 12,802 25,904 Utah 5,921 5,922 11,843 5,649 5,650 11,299 Cache 3,112 3,210 6,322 2,946 3,085 6,031 Box Elder 1,759 1,548 3,307 1,677 1,466 3,143 Davis 1,175 1,327 2,502 1,133 1,277 2,410 Carbon 986 511 1,497 937 477 1,414 Uintah 851 683 1,534 796 622 1,418 Iron 743 672 1,415 708 646 1,354 Washington 690 752 1,442 690 752 1,442 Piute 409 264 673 399 246 645 Morgan 408 387 795 398 378 775 Rich 404 289 693 398 286 684 Wayne 342 302 644 318 309 627 Grand 285 135 420 263 129 392 Kane 280 341 621 219 285 504 San Juan 123 61 184 106 56 162
31,571 29,732 61,313 29,738 28,486 58,198
Total registration of men 31,571 " vote " " 29,738 Registered but not voting 1,833 Total registration of women 29,732 " vote " " 28,486 Registered but not voting 1,246
It will be seen that in five counties the registration and vote of women was larger than that of men, and in the State a considerably larger proportion of women than of men who registered voted. Women cast nearly 50 per cent. of the entire vote and yet the U. S. Census of this year showed that males comprised over 51 per cent. of the population.
All of the testimony which is given in the chapters on Wyoming, Colorado and Idaho might be duplicated for Utah. From Mormon and Gentile alike, from the press, from the highest officials, from all who represent the best interests of the State, it is unanimously in favor of suffrage for women. The evidence proves beyond dispute that they use it judiciously and conscientiously, that it has tended to the benefit of themselves and their homes, and that political conditions have been distinctly improved.[449]
OFFICE HOLDING: Governor Heber M. Wells at once carried into effect the spirit of the const.i.tution, adopted in 1895, by appointing women on all State boards of public inst.i.tutions where it was wise and possible. Two out of five places on the Board of the Deaf and Dumb Inst.i.tute were given to women, Harriet F. Emerson and Dr. Martha Hughes Cannon.
The first Legislature, 1896, pa.s.sed "An act for the establishment of sericulture" (raising of silk worms). Women had worked energetically to secure this measure, and it was appropriate that five of them, three Republican and two Democratic, should be appointed as a silk commission, Zina D. H. Young, Isabella E. Bennett, Margaret A. Caine, Ann C. Woodbury and Mary A. Cazier. Each was required to give a thousand-dollar bond. A later Legislature appropriated $1,000 per annum to pay the secretary.
Two women were appointed on the Board of Regents of the State University, Mrs. Emma J. McVicker, Republican and Gentile; Mrs.
Rebecca E. Little, Democrat and Mormon. Both are still serving. Two were appointed Regents of the Agricultural College, Mrs. Sarah B.
Goodwin and Mrs. Emily S. Richards.
At the close of the Legislature the Republican State Central Committee was reorganized; Mrs. Emmeline B. Wells was made vice-chairman, Miss Julia Farnsworth, secretary. The Democratic party was quite as liberal toward women and the feeling prevailed that at the next election women would be placed in various State and county offices. There were many women delegates in the county and also in the State conventions of both parties in 1896, and a number of women were nominated.
It was a Democratic victory and the women on that ticket were elected--Dr. Martha Hughes Cannon to the Senate, Eurithe Le Barthe and Sarah A. Anderson to the House; Margaret A. Caine, auditor of Salt Lake County; Ellen Jakeman, treasurer Utah County; Delilah K. Olson, recorder Millard County; Fannie Graehl (Rep.), recorder Box Elder County, and possibly some others.
In the Legislature of 1897, Mrs. Le Barthe introduced a bill forbidding women to wear large hats in places of public entertainment, which was pa.s.sed. Dr. Cannon championed the measure by which a State Board of Health was created, and was appointed by the Governor as one of its first members. She had part in the defeat of the strong lobby that sought to abolish the existing State Board of Public Examiners, which prevents incompetents from practicing medicine. She introduced a bill compelling the State to educate the deaf, mute and blind; another requiring seats for women employes; what was known as the Medical Bill, by which all the sanitary measures of the State are regulated and put in operation; and another providing for the erection of a hospital for the State School of the Deaf, Dumb and Blind, carrying with it the necessary appropriation. All the bills introduced or championed by Dr. Cannon became laws. She served on the Committees on Public Health, Apportionment, Fish and Game, Banks and Banking, Education, Labor, etc.
At the close of their second term the Senate presented her with a handsome silver-mounted alb.u.m containing the autographs of all the Senators and employes. She had drawn what is known as the long term, and at its close she was chosen to present a handsome gavel to the president of the Senate in behalf of the members. Thus far she has been the only woman Senator.
In 1899 Mrs. Alice Merrill Horne (Dem.), the third woman elected to the House, was appointed chairman of the State University Land Site Committee, to which was referred the bill authorizing the State to take advantage of the congressional land grant offered for expending $301,000 in buildings and providing for the removal of the State University to the new site. At a jubilee in recognition of the gift, held by the faculty and students, at which the Governor and Legislature were guests, Mrs. Horne was the only woman to make a speech and was introduced by President Joseph T. Kingsbury in most flattering terms for the work she had done in behalf of education. She championed the Free Scholarship Bill giving one hundred annual Normal School appointments, each for a term of four years; and one creating a State Inst.i.tute of Art for the encouragement of the fine arts and for art in public school education and in manufactures, for an annual exhibition, a course of lectures and a State art collection, both of which pa.s.sed. She was a member of committees on Art, Education, Rules and Insane Asylum; was the only member sent to visit the State Insane Asylum, going by direction of the Speaker of the House, as a committee of one, to surprise the superintendent and report actual conditions.
Mrs. Horne was presented with a photographed group of the members of the House, herself the only woman in the picture.
The November election of 1900 was fraught with great interest to the women, as the State officials were to be elected as well as the Legislature, and they were anxious that there should be some women"s names on the tickets for both the House and Senate, and that a woman should be nominated for State Superintendent of Public Instruction by both parties. For this office the Republican and the Democratic women presented candidates,--Mrs. Emma J. McVicker and Miss Ada Faust,--but both conventions gave the nomination to men. Meantime Dr. John R.
Park, the superintendent, died suddenly and Gov. Wells appointed Mrs.
McVicker as his successor for the unfinished term.
Mrs. J. Ellen Foster, of Washington, D. C. was sent to Utah by the Republican National Committee, and with Mrs. W. F. Boynton and others, made a spirited and successful campaign.
There never has been any scramble for office on the part of women, and here, as in the other States where they have the suffrage, there is but little disposition on the part of men to divide with them the "positions of emolument and trust." Only one woman was nominated for a State office in 1900, Mrs. Elizabeth Cohen for the Legislature, and she was defeated with the rest of the Democratic ticket. All of the women who have served in the Legislature have been elected by the Democrats.
Several women were elected to important city and county offices. In many of these offices more women than men are employed as deputies and clerks.
In 1900 Mrs. W. H. Jones was sent as delegate to the National Republican Convention in Philadelphia, and Mrs. Elizabeth Cohen to the Democratic in Kansas City, and both served throughout the sessions.
This is the first instance of the kind on record, although women were sent as alternates from Wyoming to the National Republican Convention at Minneapolis in 1888.
Women are exempted from sitting on juries, the same as editors, lawyers and ministers, but they are not excluded if they wish to serve or the persons on trial desire them. None has thus far been summoned.
OCCUPATIONS: No profession or occupation is legally forbidden to women except that of working in mines.
EDUCATION: All of the higher inst.i.tutions of learning are open to both s.e.xes. In the public schools there are 527 men and 892 women teachers.