The History of Woman Suffrage Volume I Part 103

Southwick, Joseph A. Howland, Adeline H. Howland, O. T. Harris, Julia T. Harris, John M. Spear, E. D. Draper, D. R. P. Hewitt, L. C.

Wilkins, J. H. Binney, Mary Adams, Anna Goulding, E. A. Parrington, Mrs. Parrington, Harriot K. Hunt, Chas. F. Hovey, Mrs. J. G. Hodgden, C. M. Shaw, Ophelia D. Hill, Mrs. P. Allen, Anna Q. T. Parsons, C. D.

McLane, W. H. Channing, Wendell Phillips, Abby K. Foster, S. S.

Foster, Effingham L. Cap.r.o.n, Frances H. Drake, E. M. Dodge, Eliza Barney, Lydia Barney, Wm. D. Cady, C. S. Dow, E. G.o.ddard, Mary F.

Gilbert, Josiah Henshaw, Andrew Wellington, Louisa Gleason, Paulina Gerry, Lucy Stone, Mary Abbot, Anna E. Fish, C. G. Munyan, Maria L.

Southwick, F. H. Underwood, J. B. Willard, Perry Joslin, Elizabeth Johnson, Seneth Smith, Marian Hill, Wm. Coe, E. T. Smith, S. Aldrich, M. A. Maynard, S. P. R., J. M. c.u.mmings, Nancy Fay, M. Jane Davis, D.

R. Crandell, E. M. Burleigh, Sarah Chafee, Adeline Perry, Lydia E.

Chase, J. A. Fuller, Sarah Prentice, Emily Prentice, H. N. Fairbanks, Mrs. A. Crowl, Dwight Tracy, J. S. Perry, Isaac Norcross, Julia A.

McIntyre, Emily Sanford, H. M. Sanford, C. D. M. Lane, Elizabeth Firth, S. C. Sargeant, C. A. K. Ball, M. A. Thompson, Lucinda Safford, S. E. Hall, S. D. Holmes, Z. W. Harlow, N. B. Spooner, Ignatius Sargent, A. B. Humphrey, M. R. Hadwen, J. H. Shaw, Olive Darling, M.

A. Walden, Mrs. Chickery, Mrs. F. A. Pierce, C. M. Trenor, R. C.

Cap.r.o.n, Wm. Lloyd Garrison, Emily Loveland, Mrs. S. Worcester, Phebe Worcester, Adeline Worcester, Joanna R. Ballou, Abby H. Price, B.

Willard, T. Pool, M. B. Kent, E. H. Knowlton, G. Valentine, A. Prince, Lydia Wilmarth, J. G. Warren, Mrs. E. A. Stowell, Martin Stowell, Mrs.

E. Stamp, C. M. Barbour, Annie E. Ruggles, T. B. Elliot, A. H.

Metcalf, Eliza J. Kenney, Rev. J. G. Forman, Andrew Stone, M.D., Samuel May, Jr., Sarah R. May, M. S. Firth, A. P. B. Rawson, Nathaniel Barney, Sarah H. Earle, F. C. Johnson.

_Maine_.--Anna R. Blake, Ellen M. Prescott, Oliver Dennett, Lydia Dennett.

_New York_.--Frederick Dougla.s.s, Lydia Mott, S. H. Hallock, Ernestine L. Rose, Joseph Carpenter, Pliny s.e.xton, J. C. Hathaway, Lucy N.

Colman, Antoinette L. Brown, Edgar Hicks.

_New Hampshire._--P. B. Cogswell, Julia Worcester, Parker Pillsbury, Sarah Pillsbury, Asa Foster.

_Vermont._--Clarina I. Howard Nichols. Mrs. A. E. Brown.

_Pennsylvania._--Hannah M. Darlington, Sarah Tyndale, Emma Parker, Lucretia Mott, S. L. Miller, Isaac L. Miller, Alice Jackson, Janette Jackson, Anna R. c.o.x, Jacob Pierce, Lewis E. Capen, Olive W. Hastings, Rebecca Plumley, S. L. Hastings, Phebe Goodwin.

_Connecticut._--C. C. Burleigh, Martha Smith, Lucius Holmes, Benj.

Segur, Buel Picket, Asa Cutler, Lucy T. Dike, C. M. Collins, Anna Cornell, S. Monroe, Anna E. Price, M. C. Monroe, Gertrude R. Burleigh.

_Rhode Island._--Betsy F. Lawton, Paulina W. Davis, Cynthia P. Bliss, Rebecca C. Cap.r.o.n, Martha Mowry, Mary Eddy, Daniel Mitch.e.l.l, G. Davis, Susan Sisson, Dr. S. Mowry, Elizabeth B. Chase, Rebecca B. Spring, Susan R. Harris, A. Barnes.

_Iowa._--Silas Smith.

_Ohio._--Mariana Johnson, Oliver Johnson, Ellen Blackwell, Marian Blackwell, Diana W. Ballou.

_California._--Mrs. Mary G. Wright.

Asenath Fuller, Denney M. F. Walker, Eunice D. F. Pierce, Elijah Houghton, L. H. Ober, A. Wyman, Silence Bigelow, Adeline S. Greene, Josephine Reglar, Anna T. Draper, E. J. Alden, Sophia Taft, Alice H.

Easton, Calvin Fairbanks, D. H. Knowlton, E. W. K. Thompson, Caroline Farnum, Mary R. Hubbard.

SECOND WORCESTER CONVENTION, 1851.

RESOLUTIONS.

1. _Resolved_, That while we would not undervalue other methods, the Right of Suffrage for Women is, in our opinion, the corner-stone of this enterprise, since we do not seek to protect woman, but rather to place her in a position to protect herself.

2. _Resolved_, That it will be woman's fault if, the ballot once in her hand, all the barbarous, demoralizing, and unequal laws relating to marriage and property, do not speedily vanish from the statute-book; and while we acknowledge that the hope of a share in the higher professions and profitable employments of society is one of the strongest motives to intellectual culture, we know, also, that an interest in political questions is an equally powerful stimulus; and we see, beside, that we do our best to insure education to an individual when we put the ballot into his hands; it being so clearly the interest of the community that one upon whose decisions depend its welfare and safety, should both have free access to the best means of education, and be urged to make use of them.

3. _Resolved_, That we do not feel called upon to a.s.sert or establish the equality of the s.e.xes, in an intellectual or any other point of view. It is enough for our argument that natural and political justice, and the axioms of English and American liberty, alike determine that rights and burdens--taxation and representation--should be co-extensive; hence women, as individual citizens, liable to punishment for acts which the laws call criminal, or to be taxed in their labor and property for the support of government, have a self-evident and indisputable right, identically the same right that men have, to a direct voice in the enactment of those laws and the formation of that government.

4. _Resolved_, That the democrat, or reformer, who denies suffrage to women, is a democrat only because he was not born a n.o.ble, and one of those levelers who are willing to level only down to themselves.

5. _Resolved_, That while political and natural justice accords civil equality to woman; while great thinkers of every age, from Plato to Condorcet and Mill, have supported their claim; while voluntary a.s.sociations, religious and secular, have been organized on this basis, still, it is a favorite argument against it, that no political community or nation ever existed in which women have not been in a state of political inferiority. But, in reply, we remind our opponents that the same fact has been alleged, with equal truth, in favor of slavery; has been urged against freedom of industry, freedom of conscience, and the freedom of the press; none of these liberties having been thought compatible with a well-ordered state, until they had proved their possibility by springing into existence as facts.

Besides, there is no difficulty in understanding why the subjection of woman has been a _uniform custom_, when we recollect that we are just emerging from the ages in which _might_ has been always right.

6. _Resolved_, That, so far from denying the overwhelming social and civil influence of women, we are fully aware of its vast extent; aware, with Demosthenes, that "measures which the statesman has meditated a whole year may be overturned in a day by a woman"; and for this very reason we proclaim it the very highest expediency to endow her with full civil rights, since only then will she exercise this mighty influence under a just sense of her duty and responsibility; the history of all ages bearing witness, that the only safe course for nations is to add open responsibility wherever there already exists un.o.bserved power.

7. _Resolved_, That we deny the right of any portion of the species to decide for another portion, or of any individual to decide for another individual what is and what is not their "proper sphere"; that the proper sphere for all human beings is the largest and highest to which they are able to attain; what this is, can not be ascertained without complete liberty of choice; woman, therefore, ought to choose for herself what sphere she will fill, what education she will seek, and what employment she will follow, and not be held bound to accept, in submission, the rights, the education, and the sphere which man thinks proper to allow her.

8. _Resolved_, That we hold these truths to be self-evident: That all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that, to secure these rights, governments are inst.i.tuted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; and we charge that man with gross dishonesty or ignorance, who shall contend that "men," in the memorable doc.u.ment from which we quote, does not stand for the human race; that "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," are the "inalienable rights"

of half only of the human species; and that, by "the governed," whose consent is affirmed to be the only source of just power, is meant that _half_ of mankind only who, in relation to the other, have hitherto a.s.sumed the character of _governors_.

9. _Resolved_, That we see no weight in the argument that it is _necessary_ to exclude women from civil life because domestic cares and political engagements are incompatible; since we do not see the fact to be so in the case of men; and because, if the incompatibility be real, it will take care of itself, neither men nor women needing any law to exclude them from an occupation when they have undertaken another incompatible with it. Second, we see nothing in the a.s.sertion that women, themselves, do not desire a change, since we a.s.sert that superst.i.tious fears and dread of losing men's regard, smother all frank expression on this point; and further, if it be their real wish to avoid civil life, laws to keep them out of it are absurd, no legislator having ever yet thought it necessary to compel people by law to follow their own inclination.

10. _Resolved_, That it is as absurd to deny all women their civil rights because the cares of household and family take up all the time of some, as it would be to exclude the whole male s.e.x from Congress, because some men are sailors, or soldiers in active service or merchants, whose business requires all their attention and energies.

GLEN HAVEN, _Feb. 18, 1853_.

PAULINA WRIGHT DAVIS.--_My Dear Friend_:--Bless you for _The Una_, and for sending me a copy. I am pleased with its appearance and with the heartiness of your correspondents. Would you find room for some of my lucubrations? If so, I will drive my quill a little for you some of these evenings. Perhaps I might utter something readable.

I do not ask you to send me _The Una_, for the dollar must go with the request, and the dollar has yet to be earned by _quill-work_, a task quite as hard as was work when a child at the _quill-wheel_, winding yarn from the reel.

Drop me a line if you would like my a.s.sistance as a correspondent, and what I can do, I will cheerfully.

Very truly, your friend, J. C. JACKSON, M.D.[227]

FOOTNOTES:

[227] At present the head of the water-cure establishment, Dansville, New York. Dr. Jackson has been identified with all the leading reforms of his generation--Anti-slavery, Temperance, Woman Suffrage--and an earnest advocate for a new dress for woman that shall give freedom to her lungs and powers of locomotion.

PEt.i.tION OF HARRIOT K. HUNT TO THE Ma.s.sACHUSETTS CONSt.i.tUTIONAL CONVENTION.

_To the Const.i.tutional Convention now sitting in Boston_:

Your pet.i.tioner respectfully prays your honorable body to insert into the Const.i.tution a clause securing to females paying town, county, and States taxes upon property held in their own right, and who have no husbands or other guardians to represent and act for them, the same right of voting possessed by male tax-paying citizens; or, should your honorable body not deem such females capable of exercising the right of suffrage with due discretion, at least excuse them from the paying of taxes, in the appropriation of which they have no voice, thus carrying out the great principle on which the American Revolution was based--that taxation and representation ought to go together. All of which your pet.i.tioner will ever pray.

PAULINA WRIGHT DAVIS

Died August 24, 1876, after two years of great suffering. A large circle of friends gathered at her elegant residence near Providence, Rhode Island, to pay their last tributes of friendship and respect.

The chief speaker on the occasion was, at her request, Elizabeth Cady Stanton. She left her n.o.ble husband, Hon. Thomas Davis, and two adopted daughters, to mourn her loss. It was a soft, balmy day, just such as our friend would have chosen, when she was laid in her last resting-place. Dr. and Mrs. Channing, Theodore Tilton, and Joaquin Miller, were among those who followed in the funeral _cortege_.