liberty, we wonder that under such governments there should have been a class of citizens held in slavery. Our descendants will be still more surprised to know that our disfranchised citizens, our pariahs, our slaves, belonged to the most highly educated, moral, virtuous class in the nation, women of wealth and position who paid millions of taxes every year into the State and national treasuries; women who had given thousands to build colleges and churches and to encourage the sciences and arts. From the dawn of creation to this hour history affords no other instance of so large a class of such a character subordinated politically to the ignorant masses.
105 Letters and telegrams of greeting were received from the Hon. Mrs. C. C. Holly, member Colorado Legislature, Mrs. Henry M. Teller, Mrs. Francis E. Warren, Mrs. Foster, from the National Woman's Christian Temperance Union, State and local associations of various kinds.
106 Now Bishop in the Methodist Episcopal Church.
107 George W. Catt presented a significant paper showing that the victory of Utah was almost wholly due to the excellent organization of the suffrage forces, as with a population of 206,000 it had over 1,000 active workers for the franchise. If the same proportion existed in other States nothing could prevent the success of the movement to enfranchise women. This report was printed by the association as a leaflet.
108 Yeas: Rachel Foster Avery, Katie R. Addison, Lucy E. Anthony, Mary O. Arnold, Lucretia L. Blankenburg, Caroline Brown Buell, Sallie Clay Bennett, Henry B. Blackwell, Alice Stone Blackwell, Emma E. Bower, Jennie Broderick, Jessie J. Cassidy, Carrie Chapman Catt, Mariana W. Chapman, Mary N. Chase, Laura Clay, Elizabeth B. Dodge, Annie L. Diggs, Matilda E. Gerrigus, Caroline Gibbons, John T. Hughes, Mary Louise Haworth, Mrs. Frank L. Hubbard, Mary N. Hubbard, Mary G. Hay, Mary D. Hussey, Hetty Y. Hallowell, Laura M. Johns, Mary Stocking Knaggs, Helen Morris Lewis, Mary Elizabeth Milligan, Rebecca T. Miller, Jessie G. Manley, Alice M. A. Pickler, Florence M. Post, Florence Post, the Rev G. Simmons, Anna R. Simmons, Alice Clinton Smith, Sarah H. Sawyer, Amanthus Shipp, Mrs. M. R. Stockwell, Mary Clarke Smith, D. Viola Smith, Anna H. Shaw, Sarah Vail Thompson, Harriet Taylor Upton, Laura H. Van Cise, Frances A. Williamson, Mary J. Williamson, Eliza R. Whiting, Elizabeth A. Willard, Elizabeth Upham Yates—53
Nays: Susan B. Anthony, Mary S. Anthony, S. Augusta Armstrong, Elizabeth D. Bacon, Lillie Devereux Blake, Elisan Brown, Annie Caldwell Boyd, Cornelia H. Cary, Clara Bewick Colby, Dr. Cora Smith Eaton, Caroline McCullough Everhard, Dr. M. Virginia Glauner, Mary E. Gilmer, Mrs. L. C. Hughes, Lavina A. Hatch, Emily Howland, Isabel Howland, Julie R. Jenney, Harriette A. Keyser, Jean Lockwood, Orra Langhorne, Mary E. Moore, J. B. Merwin, Harriet May Mills, Mrs. M. J. McMillan, Julia B. Nelson, Adda G. Quigley, Charlotte Perkins Stetson, Althea B. Stryker, Mary B. Sackett, Harriet Brown Stanton, Mrs. R. W. Southard, Ellen Powell Thompson, Helen Rand Tindall, Mary Bentley Thomas, Martha S. Townsend, Mary Wood, Victoria Conkling Whitney, Mary B. Wickersham, Mrs. George K. Wheat, Virginia D. Young—41.
109 The Senate Committee on Woman Suffrage—Senators Wilkinson Call, James Z. George, George F. Hoar, Matthew S. Quay and William A. Peffer—were addressed by Elizabeth D. Bacon (Conn.), Sallie Clay Bennett (Ky.), Lillie Devereux Blake (N. Y.), Lucretia L. Blankenburg (Penn.), Mariana W. Chapman (N. Y.), Mary N. Chase (Vt.), Dr. Mary D. Hussey (N. J.), Mrs. Frank Hubbard (Ills.), Lavina A. Hatch (Mass.), May Stocking Knaggs (Mich.), Helen Morris Lewis (N. C.), Orra Langhorne (Va.), Mary Elizabeth Milligan (Del.), Caroline Hallowell Miller (Md.), Julia B. Nelson (Minn.), Mrs. R. W. Southard (Ok.), Ellen Powell Thompson (D. C.), Victoria Conkling Whitney (Mo.), Virginia D. Young (S. C.).
110 On April 23 Senator Call submitted the Bill for a Sixteenth Amendment without recommendation, and for himself and Senator George the same old adverse report which had begun to do duty in 1882, and which, he said, expressed their views. It will be found in the History of Woman Suffrage, Vol. III, p. 237. Senator Quay evidently allowed himself to be counted in the opposition.
111 The members of the committee present were Representatives David B. Henderson (chairman), Broderick, Updegraff, Gillett (Mass.) Baker (N. H.), Burton (Mo.), Brown, Culberson, Boatner, Washington, Terry and De Armond. Absent: Ray, Connolly, Bailey, Strong and Lewis. The speakers were Mrs. L. C. Hughes (Ariz.), Charlotte Perkins Stetson (Cal.), Annie L. Diggs, Katie R. Addison (Kan.), Elizabeth Upham Yates (Me.), Henry B. Blackwell (Mass.), Harriet P. Sanders (Mont.), Clara B. Colby (Neb.), Frances A. Williamson (Nev.), Dr. Cora Smith Eaton (N. D.), Caroline McCullough Everhard (O.), Anna R. Simmons (S. D.), Emily S. Richards (Utah), Jessie G. Manley (W. Va.).
CHAPTER XVII.
The National-American Convention of 1897.
This year the suffrage association took its convention west of the Mississippi River, the Twenty-ninth annual meeting being held in Des Moines, Ia., Jan. 26-29, 1897. Circumstances were unfavorable, the thermometer registering twenty-four degrees below zero and a heavy blizzard prevailing throughout the West. Nevertheless sixty-three delegates, representing twenty States, were present. All the visitors were entertained in the hospitable homes of this city, and the entire executive board were the guests of James and Martha C. Callanan at their handsome home in the suburbs. Receptions were given by the Des Moines Woman's Club, by the Young Women's Christian Association and by Mr. and Mrs. F. M. Hubbell at their palatial residence, Terrace Hill. The convention was welcomed in behalf of the State by Gov. Francis M. Drake, who paid the highest possible tribute to the social and intellectual qualities of women, pointed out the liberality of Iowa in respect to manhood suffrage and congratulated the association generally, but was extremely careful not to commit himself on the question of woman suffrage. Mayor John McVicar extended the welcome of the city in eloquent language. He also skirted all around the suffrage question, came much nearer an expression of approval than did the Governor, but cleverly avoided a direct assertion in favor. He was followed by the Rev. H. O. Breeden, pastor of the Christian Church in which the convention was assembled. Not being in politics he dared express an honest opinion and said in the course of his remarks:
It is my privilege to address you in behalf of the churches, and I do so with great pleasure, because I have a robust faith that you are right, and also that the churches are with you in sympathy and heart. I belong to one which welcomes women to its pulpit and to all its offices. I should distrust the Christianity of any that would deny to my mother and wife the rights it accords to my father and myself. We welcome you to this city of churches and to the churches of the city, and to its homes.
Woman shows her capacity for the highest functions in proportion as she is admitted to them. I hold it true, with Dr. Storrs, that as Dante measured his progress in Paradise not by outer objects but by the increased beauty upon the face of Beatrice, so the progress of the race is measured by the increasing beauty of character shown in its women. The fanaticism of yesterday is the reform of to-day, and the victory of to-morrow. Truth always goes onward and never back. The day of equal rights for women is surely coming. You are fighting a good warfare, with God, with conscience and with right to inspire you, and the triumph is near at hand.
Mrs. Mattie Locke Macomber extended the greetings of the Women's Clubs of the State; Mrs. Adelaide Ballard, president of the Iowa Suffrage Association, presented its welcome, and greetings were read from various Women's Christian Temperance Unions. Miss Anthony responded briefly, contrasting the welcome by Governor, mayor and different societies with the olden times when perhaps not one person would extend a friendly hand to those who attempted to hold a suffrage meeting. "I hardly know what to say now," she continued. "It is so much easier to speak when brickbats are flying. But I do rejoice with