History of Woman Suffrage/Volume 4/Chapter 68

 

CHAPTER LXVIII.

VIRGINIA.

As early as 1870 and 1871 Miss Susan B. Anthony, Mrs. Matilda Joslyn Gage of New York and Mrs. Paulina Wright Davis of Rhode Island lectured on woman suffrage in Richmond. There has been, however, very little organized effort in its behalf, although the movement has many individual advocates. Since 1880 the State has been represented at the national conventions by Mrs. Orra Langhorne, who has been its most active worker for twenty years. Other names which appear at intervals are Miss Etta Grimes Farrar, Miss Brill and Miss Henderson Dangerfield. A few local societies have been formed, and in 1893 a State Association was organized, with Mrs. Langhorne as president and Mrs. Elizabeth B. Dodge as secretary and treasurer. Its efforts have been confined chiefly to discovering the friends of the movement, distributing literature and securing favorable matter in the newspapers. The Richmond Star is especially mentioned as a champion of the enfranchisement of women. In 1895 Miss Anthony, president of the National Association, on her way home from its convention in Atlanta, addressed a large audience at the opera house in Culpeper. Later this year Miss Elizabeth Upham Yates of Maine spoke in the same place. Mrs. Ruth D. Havens of Washington, D. C, lectured on The Girls of the Future before the State Teachers' Normal Institute.

Legislative Action And Laws: Petitions have been sent to the Legislature from time to time, by the State association and by individuals for woman suffrage with educational qualifications, the opening of State colleges to women, the appointment of women physicians in the prisons and insane asylums, women on school boards, proper accommodations in jails for women prisoners and the separation of juvenile offenders from the old and hardened. None of these ever has been acted upon.

In 1898 a bill to permit women to serve as notaries public was vetoed by the Governor as unconstitutional.

Dower and curtesy both obtain. The wife inherits a life interest in one-third of the real estate. If there are children she has one-third of the personal property absolutely; if none, onehalf. The husband inherits all of the wife's personal property whether there are children or not, and the entire real estate for life if there has been issue born alive. If this has not been the case he has no interest in the wife's separate real estate. The homestead, to the value of $2,000, is exempted for the wife.

By Act of 1900, a married woman may dispose as though unmarried of all property heretofore or hereafter acquired. She can

sell her personal property without her husband's uniting. He

has the same right. She can sell her land without his uniting, but unless he does so, if curtesy exist, he will be entitled to a life estate. Unless the wife unites with the husband in the sale of his real estate, she will be entitled to dower.

By the above Act a married woman may contract and be contracted with, sue and be sued, in the same manner and with the same consequences as if she were unmarried, whether the right or liability asserted by or against her accrued before or after the passage of the act. The husband is not responsible for any contract, liability or tort of the wife, whether the liability was incurred or the tort was committed before or after marriage.

There has been no decision as to the wages of a married woman since the above Act; but it is believed they would be held to belong to her absolutely, even if not engaged in business as a sole trader.

The father is the legal guardian of the minor children, and may appoint a guardian for such time as he pleases.

The husband is liable for necessaries for the support of the family, and can be sued therefor by any one who supplies them.

The "age of protection" for girls was raised from 12 to 14 years in 1896. The penalty is death or imprisonment in the penitentiary not less than five nor more than twenty years.

Suffrage: Women possess no form of suffrage.

Office Holding: No offices are filled by women except that there is one physician at the Western Insane Asylum and, through the efforts of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, a matron in the woman's ward of the State prison.

Women are employed as clerks in various county offices. They can not serve as notaries public.

Occupations: Under the ruling of the courts, a woman can not practice law. No other profession or occupation is legally forbidden to women.

Education: For the higher education the women of Virginia must go outside of their State.^[1] The State Superintendent of Free Schools and the Secretary of the State Board of Education both express great regret at this fact, and the hope that all institutions of learning will soon be opened to them. Secretary Frank P. Brent says:

We have as yet no women acting as school superintendents or members of school boards, but I feel sure the Constitutional Convention will make women eligible to one or both of these positions.

 

Last year I had the honor to decide that in matters pertaining to the educational affairs of this State, the wife may be regarded as the head of the family, although the husband is living; and this decision has just been reaffirmed by the United States Court of Appeals.^[2]

Women are admitted to several of the smaller colleges. The Randolph-Macon College in Ashland, and the Woman's College at Lynchburgh, both under the same presidency, rank well among institutions for women only. Miss Celestia C. Parrish is vice-president. Hampton Institute, for negroes and Indians, is co-educational.

The public schools make no distinction of sex.. There are 2,909 men and 5,927 women teachers. The average monthly salary of the men is $32.09; of the women, $26.39.

 

1. The State Universities are closed to women only in Virginia, Georgia and Louisiana, and the undergraduate departments in North Carolina.
2. The decision of the court was: "When an intelligent, active, industrious, frugal woman finds she has married a man who, instead of coming up to the standard of a husband, is a mere dependent .... and leaves to her the support of the family, it would be contradictory of fact and an absurd construction of the law to say that he, and not she, is the head of the family."   This is believed to be the first legal decision of the kind and hes created wide discussion.