History of Woman Suffrage/Volume 3/Chapter 33
CHAPTER XXXIII.
RHODE ISLAND.
Rhode Island, though one of the smallest, is, in proportion to the number of its inhabitants, one of the wealthiest states in the Union. In political organization Rhode Island, in colonial times, contrasted favorably with the other colonies, nearly all of which required a larger property qualifiation, and some a religious test for the suffrage. The home of Roger Williams knew nothing of such narrowness, but was an asylum for those who suffered persecution elsewhere. Nevertheless this is now, in many respects, the most conservative of all the States.
In the November number of the North American Review for 1883, Senator Anthony, in an article on the restricted suffrage in Rhode Island, stoutly maintains that suffrage is not a natural. right, and that in adhering to her property qualification for foreigners his State has wisely protected the best interests of the people. In his whole argument on the question, he ignores the idea of women being a part of the people, and ranks together qualifications of sex, age, and residence. He quite unfairly attributes much of Rhode Island's prosperity—the result of many causes—to her restricted suffrage. His position in this article, written so late in life, is the more remarkable as he had always spoken and voted in his place in the United States Senate (where he had served nearly thirty years) strongly in favor of woman's enfranchisement. And the Providence Journal, which he owned and controlled, was invariably respectful and complimentary towards the movement.
While such a man as Senator Anthony, one of the political leaders in his State, regarded suffrage as a privilege which society may concede or withhold at pleasure, we need not wonder that so little has been accomplished there in the way of legislative enactments and supreme-court decisions. Nevertheless that State has shared in the general agitation and can boast many noble men and women who have taken part in the discussion of this subject.
The first woman suffrage association was formed in Rhode Island in December, 1868. In describing the initiative steps, Elizabeth B. Chace in a letter to a friend, says:
In October 1868, while in Boston attending the convention that formed the New England society, Paulina Wright Davis[1] conceived the idea that the time had come to organize the friends of suffrage in Rhode Island. After consultation with a few of the most prominent friends of the cause, a call was issued for a convention, to be held in Roger Williams Hall, Providence, December 11th, signed by many leading names. No sooner did the call appear than, as usual, some clergyman publicly declared himself in opposition. The Rev. Mark Trafton, a Methodist minister, gave a lecture in his vestry on "The Coming Woman," who was to be a good housekeeper, dress simply, and not to vote. This was published in the Providence Journal, and called out a gracefull vindication of woman's modern demands from the pen of Mrs. Sarah Helen Whitman, the poet, and Miss Norah Perry, a popular writer of both prose and verse. The convention was all that its most ardent friends could have desired, and resulted in forming an association.[2] The audience numbered over a thousand, at the different sessions, and among the speakers were some of the ablest men in the State. Though the friends were comparatively few in the early days, yet there was no lack of enthusiasm and self-sacrifice. Weekly meetings were held, tracts and petitions circulated; conventions[3]and legislative hearings were as regular as the changing seasons, now in Providence, and now in Newport, following the migratory government.
Mrs. Davis was president of the association for several successive years in which her labors were indefatigable. Finally failing health compelled her to resign her position as president of the association.[4]Since then her able coadjutor Elizabeth B. Chace, has been president of the Rhode Island Suffrage Association, and with equal faithfulness and persistence, carried on the work. She steadily keeps up the annual conventions and makes her appeals to the legislature. Among the names[5] of those who have appeared from year to year before the Rhode Island legislature we find many able men and women from other States as well as many of their own distinguished citizens.
In this State an effort was made early to get women on the board of managers for schools, prisons and charitable institutions. In a letter to Mrs. Davis, John Stuart Mill says:
I am very glad to hear of the step in advance made by Rhode Island in creating a board of women for some very important administrative purpose. Your proposal that women should be empanneled on every jury where women are to be tried seems to me very good, and calculated to place the injustice to which women are subjected at present by the entire legal system in a very striking light.
In 1873 an effort was made to place women on the Providence School Board, with what success the following extracts from the daily papers show. The Providence Press of April 25, 1873, says:
A shabby trick was perpetrated by the friends of John W. Angell, which was certainly anything but "angelic," and which ought to consign the parties who committed it to political infamy.
Yesterday, for the first time in the history of this city, women were candidates for political honors—in the fifth ward, Mrs. Sarah E. H. Doyle, and in the fourth ward, Mrs. Rhoda A. F. Peckham, were candidates for positions on the school committee; both, however, failed of an election. Mrs. Doyle received the unanimous nomination of the large primary meeting of the National Union Republican party, and Mrs. Peckham was run as an outside candidate against the regular nominee. These ladies would undoubtedly have made excellent members of the committee, and unlike a great portion of that body, would have been found in their places at the meetings, and we should have been glad to have seen the experiment tried of women in the position for which their names were presented. When the polls opened in the fifth ward, instead of Mrs. Doyle's name being on the ballots for the place to which she had been nominated there appeared the name of John W. Angell, esq., and until about 11 o'clock a. m. he had the field to himself. At that hour, however, Mrs. Doyle's friends appeared with the "regular" nomination, and from that time to the close of the polls she received 145 votes; Mr. Angell, notwithstanding his several hours' start in the race, only winning by a majority of 38. From this fact it is clear that had Mrs. Doyle's name been in its proper place at the opening of the polls she would have beaten her opponent handsomely. Mrs. Peckham's opponent obtained but 23 majority in a poll of 349. It is evident from the vote yesterday, that if they have but a fair show, women will at the next election be successful as candidates for the school committee. Had the intelligent ladies of the fifth ward been allowed to vote, Mrs. Doyle would have led even the gubernatorial vote of that ward.
The Providence Journal makes the following comment:
We are sorry to observe that the two estimable and admirably qualified ladies whose names were presented for school committee in this city, failed of success. Their influence in official connection with the schools could not have been other than salutary. The treatment accorded Mrs. Doyle in the fifth ward was wofully shabby. Without her solicitation, the Republican caucus unanimously nominated her for a member of the school committee. Being a novice in political proceedings, she naturally enough supposed that the party that desired her services so much as to place her in nomination, would make provision for electing their candidate. There was not gallantry enough in the ward, however, for that duty, and it was not until 11 o'clock on election day that any tickets bearing the name of Mrs. Doyle were to be found in the ward-room; but a ticket with the names of two men was on hand at sunrise, and the time lost in procuring tickets for the regular nominee proved fatal to her success. Mrs. Doyle has now learned something of the ways of politicians, and is not likely to put her trust again in the faithfulness of ward committees.
At a meeting of the State association, held in Providence, on Thursday, May 18, 1871, the following preamble and resolutions were, after a full and earnest discussion, unanimously adopted:
Whereas, It is claimed, in opposition to the demand that the elective franchise shall be given to women, that they are represented in the government by men, so that they do not need the ballot for their protection, inasmuch as all their rights are secured to them by the interest of these men in their welfare; and, whereas, in February last, in view of the appalling facts frequently coming to our notice, consequent upon the mismanagement of poor-houses and asylums for the insane, this association did earnestly petition our State legislature to enact a law providing for the appointment of women in all the towns in our State to act as joint commissioners with men in the care and control of these institutions; and, whereas, in utter disregard of our request, the Committee on State Charities, to whom it was referred, in reporting back our petition to the House of Representatives, did recommend that the petitioners be given leave to withdraw, and the House, without (so far as we could learn) one word of protest from any member thereof, did so dispose of our petition; therefore,
Resolved, That this association do most solemnly declare, that so far from being represented in our legislature, the rights of the women of this State were in this instance trampled under foot therein, and the best interests of humanity, in the persons of the poorest and most unfortunate classes, were not sufficiently regarded, under this system of class legislation.
Resolved, That, despairing of obtaining for women even the privileges which would enable them to look after the welfare of the destitute and the suffering, with any power or authority to improve their condition, until equal rights in the government itself are guaranteed to all without regard to sex, we will henceforth make use of this treatment we have received as a new argument in favor of the emancipation of women from the legal status of idiots and criminals, and, with this weapon in our hands, we will endeavor to arouse the women of our State to a keener sense of their degraded condition, and we will never abate our demand until an amendment to the constitution is submitted to the people granting suffrage to the women of Rhode Island.
Resolved, That this preamble and these resolutions be offered for publication to the daily papers of this city.
Elizabeth B. Chace, President.
For several years the philanthropic women of Rhode Island made many determined efforts to secure some official positions in the charitable institutions of the State, with what success the following report by Elizabeth B. Chace, at the annual meeting of the American Association, in Philadelphia, in 1876, will show:
The Rhode Island Woman Suffrage Association, while holding its monthly meetings through the year, circulating petitions to the legislature, and, in other ways, constantly endeavoring to revolutionize the entire sentiment of the State on the question of woman suffrage, still has less progress to report than its friends would have desired. Our last annual meeting, as usual, drew together a large audience. Among our speakers from abroad was William Lloyd Garrison, who, in a speech of almost anti-slavery force and fervor, appeared to send conviction into many minds. Our home speakers included a clergyman of Providence and one of our ablest lawyers, and an ex-legislator who had never stood on our platform before.
As usual, our petitions went into the legislature. They were referred to the Judiciary Committee, before whom we had a hearing, at which three Providence lawyers gave us their unqualified support and earnest advocacy. One of these men set forth in the strongest light the injustice of our laws in regard to the property of married women and their non-ownership of their minor children. The committee made no report to the legislature, and so our petitions lie over until the next session, when we hope for some evidence of progress. In the meantime we intend to very much increase their number. For many years we have been begging of our law-makers to permit women to share in the management of the penal, correctional and charitable institutions of the State; we have, however, only succeeded in obtaining an advisory board of women, which has been in operation for the last six years.
Last spring a majority of these women, having become weary of the service in which they had no power to decide that any improvement should be made in the management of these institutions, resigned their positions on this board, some of them giving through the press their reasons therefor. When the time came for making the new appointments for the year, the governor earnestly urged these women to permit him to appoint them, voluntarily pledging himself to recommend at the opening of the next session of the legislature, that a bill should be passed providing for the appointment of women on the boards of management of all these prisons and reformatories, with the same power and authority with which the men are invested, who now alone decide all questions concerning them. On this condition these women consented to serve on the advisory board a few months longer, with the understanding that, if the legislature fails to make this important provision, their advice will be withdrawn, and the men will be left to take care of thieves, criminals and paupers until they are ready to ask for our help on terms of equality and justice.
In the Providence Journal appeared the following:
Mrs. Doyle seems to have learned by experience that the board, as now constituted under the law, can have no real efficiency. The ladies are responsible for the management of no part of any of the institutions which they are permitted officially to visit. Their reports are not made to the boards which are charged with the responsibility of managing these institutions, and, in the case of the reform school, are not made to the body which elects and controls the board of management. The State ought not to place ladies in such an anomalous position. The women's board should have positive duties and direct responsibilities in its appropriate sphere, or it should be abolished. The following is Mrs. Doyle's letter of resignation:
To His Excellency Henry Lippitt, Governor of the State: Sir: Please accept my resignation as member of the Board of Lady Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State. The recent action of a part of the board, in regard to the annual report made to the General Assembly, makes it impossible for me to continue longer as a member. Before the report was submitted, it was carefully examined by the members signing it, and was acquiesced in by them, as their signatures testify. Still further, I am confirmed in the opinion that so important a trust as this should be coupled with some power for action; without this we are necessarily confined to suggestions only to the male boards, which suggestions receive only the attention they may consider proper. Believing that this board, as now empowered, can have no efficiency except where its suggestions or criticisms meet the entire approval of the male boards, and failing to see any good which can result from our inspections under such conditions, or any honor to the board thus examining, I respectfully tender my resignation.
Sarah E. H. Doyle,
Three more ladies of the Women's Board of Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State attest the correctness of the repeated suggestions that the board, as organized under the existing laws, must be comparatively powerless for good. The question now comes, will the Rhode Island General Assembly enact a law which shall give to women certain definite duties and responsibilities in connection with the care and correction of female offenders? We propose to refer to this matter further. We are requested to publish the following communications to his excellency, the governor: To Henry Lippitt, Governor of Rhode Island: My appointment on the Women's Board of Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State, which I received from your hands for this year, I am now compelled respectfully to resign. My experience in this board for nearly six years has convinced me that this office, which confers on its holders no power to decide that any improvement shall be made in the government or workings of these institutions, is so nearly useless that I am forced to the conclusion that, for myself, the time spent in the performance of its duties can be more effectively employed elsewhere. That the influence of women is indispensable to the proper management of these institutions I was never more sure than I am at this moment; but to make it effectual, that influence must be obtained by placing women on the boards of direct control, where their judgment shall be expressed by argument and by vote.
A board of women, whose only duties, as defined by the law, are to visit the penal and correctional institutions, elect its own officers and report annually to the legislature, bears within itself the elements of weakness and insufficiency. And if the annual reports contain any exposure of abuses, they are sure to give offense to the managers, to be followed by timidity and vacillation in the board of women itself. Our late report, written with great care and conscientious adherence to the truth, which called the attention of the legislature to certain abuses in one of our institutions, and to some defect in the systems established in the others, has, thus far, elicited no official action, has brought censure upon us from the press, while great dissatisfaction has been created in our own body by the failure of a portion of its members to sustain the allegations to which the entire board, with the exception of one absentee, had affixed their names.
When the State of Rhode Island shall call its best women to an equal participation with men in the direction of its penal and reformatory institutions, I have no doubt they will gladly assume the duties and responsibilities of such positions; and I am also sure that the beneficent results of such coöperation will soon be manifest, both in benefit to individuals and in safety to the State. But under present circumstances I most respectfully decline to serve any longer on the advisory board of women.
Elizabeth B. Chace.
Governor Lippitt: Dear Sir: When I accepted an appointment on the Ladies' Board of Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State, I did so with the hope that much good might be accomplished, especially toward the young girls at the reform school, in whose welfare I felt a deep interest. To that institution my attention has been chiefly devoted during my brief experience in this office. This experience, however, has convinced me that a board of officers constituted and limited like this can have very little influence toward improvement in an institution whose methods are fixed, and which is under the exclusive control of another set of officers, who see no necessity for change. Those causes render this women's board so weak in itself that I cannot consent to retain my position therein. I therefore respectfully tender to you my resignation.
Abby D. Weaver.
Governor Lippitt: Please accept the resignation of my commission as a member of the Ladies' Board of Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State, conferred by you in June, 1875.
Yours respectfully,Eliza C. Weeden.
Early in the year 1880 the State association issued the following address:
To the friends of Woman Suffrage throughout the State of Rhode Island: In behalf of the Rhode Island Woman Suffrage Association, we beg leave to call your attention to the result of our last year's work, and to our plans for future effort. We went before the General Assembly with petitions for suffrage for women on all subjects, and also with petitions asking only for school suffrage. The former, bearing nearly 2,500 names, was presented in the Senate and finally referred, with other unfinished business, to the next legislature; they will thus be subject to attention the coming year. The latter, bearing nearly 3,500 names, was presented in the House and referred to the Committee on Education. This committee reported unanimously:
Resolved, That the following amendment to the constitution of the State is hereby proposed: Article ——. Women otherwise qualified are entitled to vote in the election of school committees and in all legally organized school-district meetings.
This resolution was adopted in the House by 48 to 11, but rejected in the Senate by 20 to 13.[6]Nineteen members being required to make a majority of a full Senate, the amendment failed by six votes. Had the ballots in the two branches been upon a proposition to extend general suffrage to women, they would have been the most encouraging, and, as it is, they show signs of progress; but a resolve to submit the question of school suffrage to the voters of Rhode Island, ought to have been successful this year. Why was it defeated? Simply for the lack of political power behind it. To gain this, our cause needs a foothold in every part of the State. We need some person or persons in each town, to whom we can look for hearty coöperation. If our work is to be effective, it must not only continue as heretofore—one of petitioning—but must include also a constant vigilance in securing senators and representatives in the General Assembly, favorable to woman suffrage. We propose the coming year:
First—To petition congress in behalf of the following amendment to our national constitution, viz.:
Article XVI. Section 1—The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex. Section 2—Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Second—To secure a hearing and action upon the petitions referred from the last Assembly, for such amendment to our State constitution as shall extend general suffrage to women. Third—To petition the General Assembly for the necessary legislation to secure school suffrage to women.[7]
The arguments in the various hearings before the legislature with the majority and minority reports, are the same as many already published, in fact nothing new can be said on the question. As none of the women in this State, by trying to vote, or resisting taxation, have tested the justice of their laws, they have no supreme-court decisions to record.
Honorable mention should be made of Dr. William F. Channing, who has stood for many years in Providence the noblest representative of liberal thought. He is a worthy son of that great leader of reform in New England, Rev. William Ellery Channing. In him the advocates of woman's rights have always found a steadfast friend. He sees that this is the fundamental reform; that it is the key to the problems of labor, temperance, social purity and the coöperative home. Those who have had the good fortune of a personal acquaintance with Dr. Channing have felt the sense of dignity and self-respect that the delicate courtesy and sincere reference of a noble man must always give to woman. Though Mrs. Channing has not been an active participant in the popular reforms, having led a rather retired life, yet her sympathies have been with her husband in all his endeavors to benefit mankind. She has given the influence of her name to the suffrage movement, and extended the most generous hospitalities to the speakers at the annual conventions. Their charming daughters, Mary and Grace, fully respond to the humanitarian sentiments of their parents, constituting a happy family united in life's purposes and ambitions.
The New York Evening Post of September, 1875, gives the following of one of Rhode Island's brave women, but the State has not as yet, thought it worth while to honor her in any fitting manner:
Yesterday noon Miss Ida Lewis again distinguished herself by rescuing a man who was in danger of drowning in the lower Newport harbor. Miss Lewis first came into prominence in 1866, when she saved the life of a soldier who had set out for a sail in a light skiff. It was one of the coldest and most blustering days ever known in this latitude, yet a girl but 25 years old, impelled by the noblest spirit of humanity, ventured to the assistance of a man who had brought himself into a sorry plight through sheer fool-hardiness. One day, during the autumn of the next year, while a terrible gale was raging, two men sat out to cross the harbor with several sheep. One of the animals fell overboard while the boat was rocked by the heavy sea, and its keepers, in trying to save it, were in imminent peril of swamping their craft. Ida Lewis saw them from the window of her father's lighthouse on Lime Rock, and in a few minutes was rowing them in safety toward the shore. After landing the men, she went back again and rescued the sheep.
These brave deeds, with others of a less striking character, made Miss Lewis' name famous throughout the world, and won for her the title of "the Grace Darling of America"; but in 1869 the newspapers were filled with the story of what was perhaps her greatest exploit. On March 29 two young soldiers set sail from Newport for Fort Adams in a small boat, under the guidance of a boy who pretended to understand the simple rules of navigation. Mrs. Lewis chanced to be looking out of the lighthouse window, and saw a squall strike the boat and overturn it. She called to her daughter, telling her of the casualty. Ida, though ill at the time, rushed out of the house, launched her life-boat and sprang in, with neither hat on her head nor shoes on her feet. By the time she reached the scene of the disaster the boy had perished, and the two soldiers were clinging desperately to the wreck, almost ready to loose their hold from exhaustion. They were dragged into the life-boat, and carried to Lime Rock, and, with careful nursing, were soon sufficiently restored to proceed to Fort Adams.
Miss Lewis' repeated acts of philanthropy have been recognized by gifts at various times, but no national testimonial, so far as we are aware, has yet been offered to her. True generosity, like true virtue, is its own reward, and we of the world are not often disposed to meddle with its quiet enjoyment by its possessor. It seems eminently fitting, however, that among the first to receive the new decoration to be bestowed by congress for heroic deeds in saving life, should be the heroine of Newport harbor.
Writing from Valley Falls September 9, 1885, Elizabeth B. Chace, president of the Rhode Island Association, in summing up the steps of progress, says:
nicality, for which no one seemed to blame, it was not legally started on its round to the vote of the people. Hence the proposition to submit the amendment will be again passed upon this year, and with every promise of success. We have strong hopes of making our little commonwealth the banner State in this grand step of progress.
The following letter from Frederick A. Hinckley, makes a fitting mention of some of the noble women who have represented this movement in his State:
Providence, R. I., Sept. 14, 1885.
Dear Friends: You ask for a few words from me concerning salient points in the history of the woman suffrage movement in Rhode Island. As you know, ours is a very small State—the smallest in the Union—and has a very closely compacted population. With us the manufacturing interest overshadows everything else, representing large investments of capital. On the one hand we have great accumulations of wealth by the few; on the other hand, a large percentage of unskilled foreign labor. For good or for ill we feel all those conservative influences which naturally grow out of this two-fold condition. This accounts in the main, for the Rhode Islander's extreme and exceptionally tenacious regard for the institutions of his ancestors. This is why we have the most limited suffrage of any State, many men being debarred from voting by reason of the property qualification still required here of foreign-born citizens. Such a social atmosphere is not favorable to the extension of the franchise, either to men or women, and makes peculiarly necessary with us, the educational process of a very large amount of moral agitation before much can be expected in the way of political changes.
My own residence here dates back only to 1878, though before that from my Massachusetts home I was somewhat familiar with Rhode-Island people and laws. Our work has consisted of monthly meetings, made up usually of an afternoon session for address and discussion, followed by a social tea; of an annual State convention in the city of Providence; and of petitioning the legislature each year, with the appointment of the customary committees and hearings. For many years the centre of the woman movement with us has been the State association, and since my own connection with that, the leader about whom we have all rallied, has been your beloved friend and mine, Elizabeth B. Chace. Hers is that clear conception of, and untiring devotion to principles, which make invincible leadership, tide over all disaster, and overcome all doubt. By her constant appearance before legislative committees, her model newspaper articles which never fail to command general attention even among those who would not think of agreeing with her, and by her persistent fidelity to her sense of duty in social life, she is the recognized head of our agitation in Rhode Island. But she has not stood alone. She has been the centre of a group of women whose names will always be associated with our cause in this locality. Elizabeth K. Churchill lived and died a faithful and successful worker. The Woman's Club in this city was her child; temperance, suffrage, and the interests of working-women were dear to her heart. She was independent in her convictions, and true to herself, even when it compelled dissent from the attitude of trusted leaders and friends, but her work on the platform, in the press, and in society, made her life a tower of strength to the woman's rights cause and her death a lamentable loss. Another active leader in the work here, though not a speaker, who has passed on since my residence in Providence, was Susan B. P. Martin. I think those of us accustomed to act with her always respected Mrs. Martin's judgment and felt sure of her fidelity. What more can be said of any one than that?
It is difficult to speak publicly of one's friends while living. But no history of woman suffrage agitation in Rhode Island would be complete which did not place among those ever to be relied on, the names of Anna Garlin Spencer, Sarah E. H. Doyle, Anna E. Aldrich and Fanny P. Palmer. Mrs. Spencer moved from the State just as I came into it, but the influence of her logical mind was left behind her and the loss of her quick womanly tact has been keenly felt. Mrs. Doyle has long been chairman of the executive committee of the association, Mrs. Aldrich a safe and trusted counsellor, and Mrs. Palmer as member of the Providence school committee, and more recently as president of the Woman's Club, has rendered the cause eminent service.
If final victory seems farther off here than in some of the newer States, as it certainly does, that is only the greater reason for earnest, and ceaseless work. We know we are right, and be it short or long I am sure we have all enlisted for the war.
Always sincerely yours,Frederic A. Hinckley.
Below is the last utterance of Senator Anthony on this question. In writing to Susan B. Anthony, he said:
United States Senate Chamber, Washington, March 4, 1884.
My Dear Cousin: I am honored by your invitation to address the National Woman Suffrage Association at the convention to be held in this city. I regret that it is not in my power to comply with your complimentary request. The enfranchisement of woman is one of those great reforms which will come with the progress of civilization, and when it comes those who witness it will wonder that it has been so long delayed. The main argument against it is that the women themselves do not desire it. Many men do not desire it, as is evidenced by their omission to exercise it, but they are not therefore deprived of it. I do not understand that you propose compulsory suffrage, although I am not sure that that would not be for the public advantage as applied to both sexes. A woman has a right to vote in a corporation of which she is a stockholder, and that she does not generally exercise that right is not an argument against the right itself. The progress that is making in the direction of your efforts is satisfactory and encouraging.
Faithfully yours,H. B. Anthony.
Senator Anthony was one of the ever-to-be-remembered nine senators who voted for woman suffrage on the floor of the United States Senate in 1866. He also made a most logical speech on our behalf and has ever since been true to our demands.
- ↑ To Mrs. Davis, a native of the State of New York, belongs the honor of inaugurating this movement in New England, as she called and managed the first convention held in Massachusetts in 1850, and helped to arouse all these States to action in 1868. With New England reformers slavery was always the preëminently pressing question, even after the emancipation of the slaves, while in New York woman's civil and political rights were considered the more vital question.—[E. C. S.
- ↑ The Revolution of December 17, 1868, says: The meeting last week in Providence, was, in numbers and ability, eminently successful. Mrs. Elizabeth B. Chace, of Valley Falls, presided, and addresses were made by Colonel Higginson, Paulina Wright Davis, Lucy Stone, Frederick Douglass, Mrs. O. Shepard, Rev. John Boyden, Dr. Mercy B. Jackson, Stephen S. and Abbey Kelly Foster. The officers of the association were: President, Paulina Wright Davis. Vice-presidents, Elizabeth B. Chace of Valley Falls, Col. T. W. Higginson of Newport, Mrs. George Cushing, J. W. Stillman, Mrs. Buffum of Woonsocket and P. W. Aldrich. Recording Secretary, Martha W. Chase. Corresponding Secretary, Mrs. Rhoda Fairbanks. Treasurer, Mrs. Susan B. Harris. Executive Committee, Mrs. James Bucklin, Catharine W. Hunt, Mrs. Lewis Doyle, Anna Aldrich, Mrs. S. B. G. Martin, Dr. Perry, Mrs. Churchill, Arnold B. Chace.
- ↑ Among the speakers at these annual conventions we find Rowland G. Hazard, Rev. John Boyden, Rev. Charles Howard Malcolm, the brilliant John Neal, Portland, Maine, Hon. James M. Stillman Gen. F. G. Lippett, Theodore Tilton, Rev. Olympia Brown, Rev. Phebe A. Hanaford, Elizabeth K. Churchill. For a report of the convention held at Newport during the fashionable season, August 25, 26, 1869, see vol. II., page 403, also The Revolution, September 2, 1869.
- ↑ Mrs. Chace says in a letter, speaking of Mrs. Davis: "After several years absence in Europe she returned, a helpless invalid, unable to resume her labors. But her devotion in early years will long remain fresh in the memory of those associated with her, who were inspired by her self-sacrifice and enthusiasm." For farther details of Mrs. Davis' earlier labors, see vol. I, pages 215, 283.
- ↑ Julia Ward Howe, Celia Burleigh, William Lloyd Garrison, Aaron M. Powell, Caroline H. Dall, Mrs. Ednah D. Cheney, Miss Mary F. Eastman, Elizabeth K. Churchill, Rev. Augustus Woodbury Hon. Amasa M. Eaton, Mr. Stillman, Hon. Thomas Davis, Hon George L. Clarke, Rev. Frederick Hinckley, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Hon. A. Payne.
- ↑ In the House. For the Amendment.—Davis Aldrich, North Smithfield; Thomas Arnold, Warwick; Clark Barber, Richmond; Thos. P. Barnefield, Pawtucket; Frank M. Bates, Pawtucket; John Beattie, Cranston; Amos M. Bowen, Providence; Issac B. Briggs, Jamestown; Albert Buffum, Burillville; John C. Barrington, Barrington; Chas. Capwell, West Greenwich; Geo. B. Carpenter, Hopkinton; Obadiah Chase, Warren; Albert I. Chester, Westerly; Chas. E. Chickering, Pawtucket; John F. Clark, Cumberland; LeBaron B. Colt, Bristol; James Davis, Pawtucket; Benjamin T. Eames, Providence; Henry H. Fay, Newport; Edward L. Freeman, Lincoln; Z. Herbert Gardner, Exeter; John P. Gregory, Lincoln; Henry D. Heydon, Warwick; Edwin Jenckes, Pawtucket; Thos. E. Kenyon, East Greenwich; Israel B. Mason, Providence; B. B. Mitchell, jr., New Shoreham; Francis L. O'Reilly, Woonsocket; Joseph Osborn, Tiverton; Abraham Payne, Providence; James M. Pendleton, Westerly; Wm. A. Pirce, Johnston; Clinton Puffer, Woonsocket; Olney W. Randall, No. Providence; John P. Sanborn, Newport; Wm. P. Sheffield, Newport; Israel R. Sheldon, Warwick; Martin S. Smith, Scituate; Wm. H. Spooner, Bristol; Henry A. Stearns, Lincoln; Simon S. Steere, Smithfield; Joseph Tillinghast, Coventry; Wm. C. Townsend, Newport; Stephen A. Watson, Portsmouth; Stillman White, Providence; Benj. F. Wilbor, Little Compton; Andrew Winsor, Providence—48.
In the Senate. For the Amendment.—Lieut.-Gov. Howard, E. Providence; Ariel Ballou, Woonsocket; Cyrus F. Cooke, Foster; Edward T. DeBlois, Portsmouth; Rodney F. Dyer, Johnston; Anson Greene, Exeter; Daniel W. Lyman, No. Providence; Jabez W. Mowry, Smithfield; Dexter B. Potter, Coventry; Stafford W. Razee, Cumberland; T. Mumford Seabury, Newport; Lewis B. Smith, Barrington; John F. Tobey, Providence—13.
- ↑ [Signed:] President, Elizabeth B. Chace; Secretaries, Fanny P. Palmer, Elizabeth C. Hinckley; Treasurer, Susan B. P. Martin; Executive Committee, Sarah E. H. Doyle, Susan Sisson, William Barker, Francis C. Frost, Anna E. Aldrich, Frederick A. Hinckley, Susan G. Kenyon, Rachael E. Fry, A. A. Tyng, Arnold B. Chace.
- ↑ The speakers were Abraham Payne, John Wyman, Matilda Hindman, Frederick A. Hinckley, Rev. Mr. Wendt, Elizabeth B. Chace, William I. Bowditch, Mary F. Eastman, William Lloyd Garrison, jr., Lucy Stone, Susan B. Anthony, Frederick Douglass, Henry B. Blackwell.