History of Woman Suffrage/Volume 4/Chapter 63
CHAPTER LXIII.
SOUTH CAROLINA.[1]
In 1890 Mrs. Virginia Durant Young being on a visit to Mrs. Adelaide Viola Neblett at Greenville, these two did so inspire each other that then and there they held a suffrage conference with Mrs. S. Odie Sirrene, Mrs. Mary Putnam Gridley and others, and pledged themselves to work for woman's enfranchisement in South Carolina.
Mrs. Young made a suffrage address to the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of Beaufort in 1891, and later spoke on the subject by invitation at Lexington and in the Baptist church at Marion. She eventually succeeded in forming a State association of 250 men and women who believed in equal rights, and interested themselves in circulating literature on this question. Its officers for 1900 are Mrs. Young, president; Mrs. Mary P. Prentiss, vice-president; Miss Harriet B. Manville, corresponding secretary; Mrs. Gridley, treasurer.
In 1895 Miss Susan B. Anthony, president of the National Association, Mrs. Lillie Devereux Blake of New York, and Mrs. Ellen Battelle Dietrick of Massachusetts, made addresses at various places, on their way home from the national convention in Atlanta. In April of this year Miss Laura Clay of Kentucky, Miss Helen Morris Lewis of North Carolina, and Miss Elizabeth Upham Yates of Maine, with Mrs. Young and Mrs. Neblett, began a suffrage campaign at Greenville. They went thence to Spartanburg, Columbia and Charleston. Here the party divided, Miss Clay and Mrs. Young going to Georgetown, Florence, Marion, Latta, Darlington, Timmonsville and Sumter. Later Mrs. Neblett, Miss Clay and Mrs. Young spoke at Allendale, Barn well, Hampton and Beaufort.
Miss Clay, auditor of the National Association, worked four months in South Carolina this year at her own expense. . Half of the time was spent in Columbia, assisting Mrs. Young and others in the effort to have an amendment giving suffrage to taxpaying women incorporated in the new constitution then being framed. They had hearings before two committees in September, and presented their arguments to the entire Constitutional Convention in the State House, with a large number of citizens present. The amendment failed by a vote of 26 yeas, 121 nays.
President D. B. Johnston, of the Girls' Industrial and Normal College, and John J. McMahan, State superintendent of instruction, have done much to advance the educational status of women, and both believe in perfect equality of rights. Among other advocates may be mentioned the Hon. Walter Hazard, Dr. William J. Young, McDonald Furman, B. Odell Duncan, George Sirrene, Col. John J. Dargan, Col. Ellison Keith, the Rev. Sidi H. Brown, Col. V. P. Clayton, the Rev. John T. Morrison, Samuel G. Lawton, J. Gordon Coogler and William D. Evans, president of the State Agricultural Society.
Miss Martha Schofield, superintendent of the Colored Industrial School at Aiken, regularly enters a protest against paying taxes without representation. Other women who have been devoted workers in the cause of suffrage are Miss Mary I. Hemphill, editor with her father of the Abbeville Medium; Mesdames Marion Morgan Buckner, Daisy P. Bailey, Florence Durant Evans, Lillian D. Clayton, Gertrude D. Lido, Cora S. Lott, Abbie Christensen, Martha Corley and Mary P. Screven; Dr. Sarah Allen; Misses Claudia G. Tharin, Iva Youmans, Annie Durant, Kate Lily Blue and Floride Cunningham.
Legislative Action And Laws: In 1892 Mrs. Virginia Durant Young petitioned the Legislature for her personal enfranchisement, adopting this method of presenting the arguments in a nutshell, and as "news" they were widely published and commented on. At this session Gen. Robert R. Hemphill, a stanch advocate, presented a bill in the Senate to give women the franchise and the right of holding office, and brought it to a vote on December 17; yeas, 14, nays, 21.
In 1895 numerously signed petitions for suffrage were sent to the Legislature by the women of Fairfax, Lexington and Marion. The right of petition was also frequently used by the members of the State W. C. T. U.
In 1896 Mrs. Young addressed the Legislature in behalf of Presidential Suffrage for women. .
In 1892, '93, '95 and '98 the laws were improved.in regard to married women's property rights, allowing them to hold real) estate independently of their husbands, restraining husbands from collecting debts or wages owing to their wives, and making the wife's signature necessary to the legality of mortgage.
In 1895 it was enacted by the Constitutional Convention that, "The real and personal property of a woman, held at the time of her marriage, or that which she may thereafter acquire, either by gift, grant, inheritance, devise or otherwise, shall be her separate property, and she shall have all the rights incident to the same, to which an unmarried woman or a man is entitled. She shall have the power to contract and be contracted with, in the same manner as if she were unmarried."
Dower prevails but not curtesy. If either husband or wife die without a will the other has an equal claim on the property. Should there be one or more children, the survivor receives one-third of the real and the personal estate. If there are no lineal descendants, but collateral heirs, the survivor takes one-half of the entire estate. If there are no lineal descendants, father, mother, brother, sister, child of such brother or sister, brother of the half-blood or lineal ancestor, the survivor receives two-thirds of the estate and the other third goes to the next of kin. If there is no kin, the survivor takes the whole estate.
A homestead to the value of $1,000 is exempted to "the head of the family."
South Carolina is the only State which does not allow divorce.
The father is the legal guardian of the children, and may appoint a guardian of their persons and property by will.
The law requires the husband to support the family, but there is no effective way for its enforcement. Any one may sell the wife necessaries and subject the husband's property to the payment of the bills, if he does not furnish a suitable support, but he can claim his homestead against such a debt and in many ways render this remedy unavailing.
In 1895 the "age of protection for girls" was raised from 10 to 14 years. The penalty is "death, with privilege of the jury to recommend to mercy, whereupon the penalty may be reduced to imprisonment in the penitentiary at hard labor during the whole lifetime of the prisoner."
Seduction under promise of marriage is punished by a fine of not less than $500 nor more than $5,000, or imprisonment for not less than six months nor more than five years.
Suffrage: Women possess no form of suffrage.
Office Holding: In the early '90's Gov. Benjamin R. Tillman secured the election of the first woman State librarian. Ever since this office has been filled by a woman, elected annually by the Legislature. No other elective office is open to women.
A number of the engrossing clerks in the Senate are women.
Through the efforts of the W. C. T. U. there is a police matron at Charleston.
Dr. Sarah Allen was appointed physician in the State hospital for the insane in 1896, and still holds the position.
There are women directors on the board of the Columbia Library Association.
Women do not serve on the board of any State institution.
They can not be notaries public.
Occupations: Women are not permitted to practice law. No other profession or occupation is legally forbidden to them.
Education: In 1894 the State University at Columbia opened its doors to women. In the same year the Medical College of Charleston admitted them, and still later Furman University (Baptist) at Greenville. These were direct results of the agitation for equal rights Charleston College and Clemson Agricultural College are closed to women, but they may enter the other educational institutions. Gov. Benjamin R. Tillman was largely instrumental in securing the Girls' Industrial and Normal College at Rock Hill, in 1894.
In the public schools there are 2,245 men and 2,728 women teachers. The average monthly salary of the men is $25.18; of the women, $24.29.
- ↑ The History is indebted for this chapter to Mrs. Virginia D. Young of Fairfax, owner and editor of the Enterprise and president of the State Woman Suffrage Association.