History of Woman Suffrage Volume II Part 49

_Const.i.tution_--Article 1. This organization shall be called the National Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation.

Article 2. Its object shall be to secure the Ballot to the women of the nation on equal terms with men.

Article 3. Any citizen of the United States favoring this object, shall, by the payment of the sum of one dollar annually into the treasury, be considered a member of the a.s.sociation, and no other shall be ent.i.tled to vote in its deliberations.

Article 4. The officers of the a.s.sociation shall be a President, a Vice-President from each of the States and Territories, Corresponding and Recording Secretaries, Treasurer, an Executive Committee of not less than five nor more than nine members, located in New York City, and an Advisory Counsel of one person from each State and Territory, who shall be members of the National Executive Committee. The officers shall be chosen at each annual meeting of the a.s.sociation.

Article 5. Any Woman's Suffrage a.s.sociation may become auxiliary to the National a.s.sociation by its officers becoming members of the Parent a.s.sociation and sending an annual contribution of not less than twenty-five dollars.

PEt.i.tION FOR WOMEN SUFFRAGE.--The following Pet.i.tion was adopted by the National Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation at their meeting held at the Woman's Bureau, June 1, 1869:

_To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States_:

The undersigned men and women of the United States ask for the prompt pa.s.sage by your Honorable Bodies of a Sixteenth Amendment to the Const.i.tution, to be submitted to the Legislatures of the several States for ratification, which shall secure to all citizens the right of suffrage without distinction of s.e.x.

_The Revolution_ of May 27, 1869, said: "NATIONAL WOMAN SUFFRAGE a.s.sOCIATION.--It is with great pleasure that we announce that Anna E.

d.i.c.kinson will deliver the inaugural address of the new National Woman Suffrage movement at the Cooper Inst.i.tute to-morrow (Friday) evening at eight o'clock, also that Miss d.i.c.kinson consents to represent Pennsylvania in that a.s.sociation as its Vice-President. The t.i.tle of Anna d.i.c.kinson's lecture is "Nothing Unreasonable."

CHICAGO, Illinois.

_Dear Miss Anthony_: As to the new Society, G.o.d bless and speed it.

Write me down for anything in which I can serve it. I feel like "a new hand," but I am not so dull but I can learn. Please put my name on your list of members, and also on your list of subscribers.

With entire sympathy, KATE N. DOGGETT.

MANHATTAN, Kansas, _June 3, 1869_.

I shall be indeed proud to represent Kansas in the new National Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation, whose formation meets my hearty approval.

Definiteness of purpose is always conducive to success, and I think it would be well now to concentrate all our efforts upon the one idea of "Suffrage for Women." You may rely upon me to do whatever lies within my power and ability to further the cause.

Yours truly, MARY A. HUMPHREY.

[125] NATIONAL WOMAN SUFFRAGE CONVENTION AT NEWPORT, R.I.--A Woman Suffrage Convention will be held in the Academy of Music at Newport, R.I., on Wednesday and Thursday the 25th and 26th days of August next.

The success attending the recent gathering at Saratoga warrants the most sanguine hopes and expectations from this also. The intense interest now everywhere felt on the great question renders all appeal for a full attendance unnecessary. Among the speakers will be Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Mrs. Paulina Wright Davis, Mrs. Celia Burleigh, Rev. Phebe A. Hanaford, Mrs. Wilbour, and Miss Susan B.

Anthony. The Misses Alice and Phoebe Cary, Mrs. Isabella Beecher Hooker, Mrs. E. H. Bullard, and many other of the most eminent women of the country will be in attendance. Names of other speakers will be announced hereafter.

In behalf of the National Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation.

ELIZABETH CADY STANTON, President.

A. L. NORTON, PAULINA W. DAVIS, Advisory Counsel for the State of Rhode Island.

[126]

LONDON, July 18, 1869.

_Mrs. President and Members of the Woman's National Suffrage a.s.sociation_:

I send an account of the first woman suffrage meeting ever held in London. But if we may judge anything of the prospects of the movement from the list of men and women who have interested themselves in the cause, it will not be the last. When such men as John Stuart Mill, Charles Kingsley, Prof. Newman, and their peers, put the shoulder to the wheel, a cause is bound to move on and crush all obstacles in the way of its progress. No old stumbling blocks of prejudice, or deep ruts of conventionality can impede the onward movement. As in America, I find that intellect, genius, wealth, and fashion even, are beginning in England to fall into the ranks and push on the woman suffrage question. Miss Frances Power Cobbe writes me: "The uprising of a s.e.x throughout the civilized world, is certainly an unique fact in history, and can hardly fail of some important results."

With the confident expectation that her prophecy will find a speedy and perhaps grander fulfillment than she or any of us dream of now, I remain yours, respectfully,

LAURA C. BULLARD, _Cor. Sec'y N. W. S. a.s.sociation_.

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE NEW DEPARTURE.

UNDER THE FOURTEENTH AMENDMENT.

Francis Minor's Resolutions--Hearing before Congressional Committee--Descriptions by Mrs. Fannie Howland and Grace Greenwood--Washington Convention, 1870--Rev. Samuel J.

May--Senator Carpenter--Professor Sprague, of Cornell University--Notes of Mrs. Hooker--May Anniversary in New York--The Fifth Avenue Conference--Second Decade Celebration--Washington, 1871--Victoria Woodhull's Memorial--Judiciary Committee--Majority and Minority Reports--George W. Julian and A. A. Sargent in the House--May Anniversary, 1871--Washington in 1872--Senate Judiciary Committee--Benjamin F. Butler--The Sherman-Dahlgren Protest--Women in Grant and Wilson Campaign.

Although with Charles Sumner many believed that under the original Const.i.tution women were citizens and therefore voters in our Republic, much more bold and invincible were their claims when the XIV.

Amendment added new barriers to the already strong bulwarks of the Supreme Law of the land.

The significance of these amendments in reference to women was first seen by Francis Minor, of Missouri, a member of the legal profession in St. Louis. He called attention to the view of the question, afterward adopted by many leading lawyers of the American bar, that women were enfranchised by the letter and spirit of the XIV.

Amendment. On this interpretation the officers of the National a.s.sociation began soon after to base their speeches, resolutions, and hearings before Congress, and to make divers attempts to vote in different parts of the country.

At a woman suffrage convention in St. Louis, October, 1869, the following suggestive resolutions were presented by Francis Minor, Esq., enclosed in the accompanying letter to _The Revolution_:

ST. LOUIS, Oct. 14, 1869.

DEAR REVOLUTION:--I wish to say a few words about the action of the Woman's Suffrage Convention just held here. It is everywhere spoken of as a complete success, both in point of numbers and the orderly decorum with which its proceedings were conducted. But I desire to call special attention to the resolutions adopted. When I framed them, I looked beyond the action of this Convention.

These resolutions place the cause of equal rights far in advance of any position heretofore taken. Now, for the first time, the views and purposes of our organization a.s.sume a fixed purpose and definite end. We no longer beat the air--no longer a.s.sume merely the att.i.tude of pet.i.tioners. We claim a right, based upon citizenship. These resolutions will stand the test of legal criticism--and I write now to ask, if a case can not be made at your coming election. If this were done, in no other way could our cause be more widely, and at the same time definitely brought before the public. Every newspaper in the land would tell the story, every fireside would hear the news. The question would be thoroughly discussed by thousands, who now give it no thought--and by the time it reached the court of final resort, the popular verdict would be in accord with the judgment that is sure to be rendered. If these resolutions are right, let the question be settled by individual determination. A case could not be made here for a year to come, but you could make one in New York at the coming election.

Respectfully, FRANCIS MINOR.

THE ST. LOUIS RESOLUTIONS.

WHEREAS, In the adjustment of the question of suffrage now before the people of this country for settlement, it is of the highest importance that the organic law of the land should be so framed and construed as to work injustice to none, but secure as far as possible perfect political equality among all cla.s.ses of citizens; and,

WHEREAS, All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States, and of the State wherein they reside; be it

_Resolved_, 1. That the immunities and privileges of American citizenship, however defined, are National in character and paramount to all State authority.

2. That while the Const.i.tution of the United States leaves the qualification of electors to the several States, it nowhere gives them the right to deprive any citizen of the elective franchise which is possessed by any other citizen--to regulate, not including the right to prohibit the franchise.

3. That, as the Const.i.tution of the United States expressly declares that no State shall make or enforce any laws that shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States, those provisions of the several State Const.i.tutions that exclude women from the franchise on account of s.e.x, are violative alike of the spirit and letter of the Federal Const.i.tution.

4. That, as the subject of naturalization is expressly withheld from the States, and as the States clearly would have no right to deprive of the franchise naturalized citizens, among whom women are expressly included, still more clearly have they no right to deprive native-born women citizens of this right.