The History of Woman Suffrage Volume I Part 66

Mrs. NICHOLS said: As widow, too, the law bears heavily on woman.

If her children have property, she is adjudged unworthy of their guardians.h.i.+p; and although the decree of G.o.d has made her the true and natural guardian of her children, she is obliged to pay from her scanty means to be const.i.tuted so by law.

I have conversed with judges and legislators, and tried to learn a reason for these things, but failed to find it. A n.o.ble man once gave me what he probably thought was a good one. "Women," he said to me, "can not earn as much as men!" We say they should be allowed to earn as much. They have the ability, and the means should not be shut out from them. I have heard of another man who held woman's industrial ability at a low rate. "His wife," he said, "had never been able to do anything but attend to her children." "How many have you?" he was asked; and the answer was, "Nine." Nine children to attend to! nine children cared for! and she could do nothing more, the wife of this most reasonable man.

Now, which is of more importance to the community, the property which that reasonable husband made, or the nine children whom that mother brought, with affectionate and tender toil, through the perils of infancy and youth, until they were men and women?

Which was of more importance to this land, the property which the father of George Was.h.i.+ngton ama.s.sed, or the George Was.h.i.+ngton whom a n.o.ble mother gave to his country? The name of Was.h.i.+ngton, his glorious deeds, and the enduring benefits he secured for us, still remain, and will long after the estates of Was.h.i.+ngton have pa.s.sed from his name forever!

In the State of Vermont, a wife sought a divorce from her husband on the ground of his intemperance. They were persons moving among our highest circles--wealthy people; and the wife knew that she could, through the aid of her friends and relations, with the influence and sympathy of the community, obtain a divorce and a support for her children. That father carried away into Canada one child, a little girl, and paid three hundred dollars to a low, vile Frenchman, that he might keep her from her mother and friends. Three times her almost heart-broken mother went in search of her; twice in vain, but the third time she was found.

So badly had the poor child been treated in the vile hands in which her father had placed her, that, when recovered, she was almost insensible; and when, by her mother's nursing care, her intelligence was at length restored, her joy at seeing her mother was so violent, that it was feared its excess might prove fatal.

The case came into court, and the judge decided that the two daughters should be given to their mother, but that the custody of the son should be given to the father. She was acquitted of the least impropriety or indiscretion; yet, though the obscenity and profanity of her husband in his own family was shocking, and it was in the last degree painful to that high-minded woman to see her son brought up under the charge of such a man, the law decided that the unworthy father was the more proper guardian for the boy!

In the Green Mountain State a great many sermons have lately been preached on the text, "Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands." The remaining words, "in the Lord," are generally omitted; so that the text is made to appear like an injunction that the wives should submit to their husbands, whether they were in the Lord or in the devil. And the best of all is, that we are told that if we would be submissive, we could change our husbands from devils into angels.

Mrs. MOTT: I now introduce to the Convention Frances Dana Gage, of St. Louis, Mo., better known as "Aunt f.a.n.n.y," the poet.

Mrs. GAGE said: This morning, when I was leaving my boarding-house, some one said to me, "So you are ready armed and equipped to go and fight the men." I was sorry, truly sorry, to hear the words--they fell heavily on my heart. I have no fight with men. I am a daughter, a sister, a wife, and a mother, and in all these relations I live in harmony with man. Neither I, nor any of the sisters with whom I am united in this movement, have any quarrel with men. What is it that we oppose? What do we seek to overturn? The bad laws and customs of society. These are our only enemies, and against these alone is our hostility directed; although they be "hallowed by time," we seek to eradicate them, because the day for which they were suited, if such ever existed, is long since gone by. The men, we may suppose, are above and beyond the laws, and we a.s.sail the laws only.

There is one law which I do not remember having heard any of my sisters touch upon, that is the Law of Wills, as far as it relates to married women, and as far as it allows a husband (which it fully does), along with his power to determine the lot of his wife while he is alive, also to control her when he is dead. Would any gentleman like to have that law reversed? Let me read to you a will after that odd fas.h.i.+on. It will fall on your ears, gentlemen, with as loud a tone of injustice as it does on mine:

WILL OF BRIDGET SMITH.--In the name of G.o.d, amen. I, Bridget Smith, being weak in body, though sound in mind, blessed be G.o.d for the same, do make and declare this my last will and testament. Item first: I give my soul to G.o.d, and my body to the earth, from which it came. Item second: I give to my beloved husband, John Smith, Sen., my Bible, and forty acres of wild land which I own in Bear Marsh, Ill, for the term of his natural life, when it shall descend to our son, John Smith, Jr. Item third: I give and bequeath to my daughter, Tabitha, my farm, house, outhouse, barns, and all the stock on said farm, situated in Pleasant Valley, and which said farm consists of 160 acres. I also give to my said daughter Tabitha, the wagons, carriages, harnesses, carts, plows, and all other property that shall be on said farm at the time of my death. Item fourth: I give to my son, John Smith, Jr., my family horse, my buggy, harness, and saddle, and also eighty acres of wild land which I own in the State of Iowa, for which I have a patent. Item fifth: I give to my beloved husband, John Smith, Sen., the use of the house in which we live, together with my bed, so long as he shall live, or remain my widower; but in case he shall die, or get married, then it is my will that my house and bed shall descend to my said daughter, Tabitha. Recommending my said husband to her care, whom I make the sole executrix of this my last will and testament, hereby revoking all others.

Signed, sealed, and proclaimed this ---- day of ----, 1853, in the presence of John Doe and Richard Roe.

BRIDGET SMITH.

Would any of you like such power as that to be placed in our hands? Yet, is it not as fair that married women should dispose of their property, as that married men should dispose of theirs?

It is true, the power thus given to husbands is not always used to the detriment of women, and this is frequently urged in support of the law. But I reply, that law is made for extreme cases; and while any such statutes remain on the books, no good man will cease to exert himself for their removal. I ask the right to vote, not because it would create antagonism, but because it would create harmony. I want to do away with antagonism by removing oppression, for where oppression exists, there antagonism must exist also.

ERNESTINE L. ROSE: In allusion to the law respecting wills, I wish to say that, according to the Revised Statutes of our State, a married woman has not a right to make a will. The law says that wills may be made by all persons, except idiots, persons of unsound mind, married women, and infants. Mark well, all but idiots, lunatics, married women, and infants. Male infants ought to consider it quite an insult to be placed in the same category with married women. No, a married woman has no right to bequeath a dollar of the property, no matter how much she may have brought into the marriage, or acc.u.mulated in it. Not a dollar to a friend, a relative, or even to her own child, to keep him from starving. And this is the law in the nineteenth century, in the enlightened United States, under a Republic that declares all men to be free and equal.

LUCY STONE: Just one word. I think Mrs. Rose is a little mistaken; I wish to correct her by saying that of some States in--

Mrs. ROSE: I did not say this was the universal law; I said it was the law in the State of New York.

LUCY STONE: I was not paying close attention, and must have been mistaken. In Ma.s.sachusetts the law makes a married woman's will valid in two cases: the first is, where the consent of her husband is written on the will; the second, where she wills all she has to her husband, in which case his written consent is not deemed requisite.

Dr. HARRIOT K. HUNT spoke on the fruitful theme of taxation without representation! and read her annual protest[120] to the authorities of Boston against being compelled to submit to that injustice. She said: I wish to vote, that women may have, by law, an equal right with men in property. In October, 1851, I went to pay my taxes in Boston. Going into the a.s.sessor's office, I saw a tall, thin, weak, stupid-looking Irish boy. It was near election time, and I looked at him scrutinizingly. He held in his hand a doc.u.ment, which, I found on inquiry, was one of naturalization; and this hopeful son of Erin was made a citizen of the United States, and he could have a voice in determining the destinies of this mighty nation, while thousands of intellectual women, daughters of the soil, no matter how intelligent, how respectable, or what amount of taxes they paid, were forced to be dumb!

Now, I am glad to pay my taxes, am glad that my profession enables me to pay them; but I would like very much to have a voice in directing what is to be done with the money I pay. I meditated on what I had seen, and, in 1852, when paying my taxes, I took to the Treasurer's office my protest.

The case of the Hon. Mrs. Norton before the English courts, then attracting much attention, was a fair exemplification of the injustice of the law to married women.

LUCY STONE said: I have before me, in a newspaper, a case which shows strongly the necessity for woman's legislating for herself.

I mean the case of the Hon. Mrs. Norton, which lately transpired in a court in London, and which fully proves that it is never right for one cla.s.s to legislate for another. There are, probably, few here who have not been made better and wiser by the beautiful things which have fallen from the pen of that lady. In 1836 her husband obtained a separation from her on the charge of infidelity. Eighteen years of a blameless life since, and the conviction every pure mind must feel, that nothing impure could ever dwell in a mind such as her productions show hers to be, will fully relieve her of any suspicion that she ever was guilty of acts justifying that charge. She was a woman of transcendent abilities; and her works brought her in 1,000 a year--sometimes more, sometimes less. This her husband procured to be paid over to himself, by securing the profits of her copyrights; and this husband allowed her only 400 a year! and, at last, refused to pay her even this sum; so that, for her necessary expenses, she was obliged to go into debt, and her debtors brought a suit against her husband, which was taken into court. In the court she stood before her husband's lawyer, and said to him: "If you are afraid of what I may say, beware how you ask me questions!"

Wealth and power were against her, and the lawyer _did_ ask questions which wrung from her what she had concealed for seventeen long years, and the world at last knew how her husband had kept the money she earned by her pen. She stood in court, and said: "I do not ask for rights; I have no rights, I have only wrongs. I will go abroad, and live with my son." Her husband had proposed to take her children from her, but she said: "I would rather starve than give them up." And for a time she did starve.

I will read for you her poem of "Twilight," and you will all see what kind of woman has been so wronged, and has so suffered.

That woman, gifted, n.o.ble, and wealthy, with such great yearnings in her soul, whose heart was so bound up in her children, was thus robbed not only of her own rights, but also of theirs. Men!

we can not trust you! You have deceived us too long! Since this movement began, _some_ laws have been pa.s.sed, securing to woman her personal property, but they are as nothing in the great reform that is needed. I can tell you a case. A woman married a man, whom she did not love, because he had a fortune. He died, and she married the man whom she loved before her first marriage.

He died, too, and the fortune which was hers through her first husband was seized on by the relatives of the second, and she was left penniless in the wide world. Here, as in England, women earn large sums by their literary fame and talents; and I know a _man_ who watches the post-office, and, because the Law gives him the power, secures the letters which contain the wages of his wife's intellectual toil, and pockets them for his own use.

I will conclude by reading a letter from an esteemed friend, Mr.

Higginson. It proposes certain questions which I should wish to hear our enemies answer.

WORCESTER, _Sept. 4, 1853_.

DEAR FRIEND:--You are aware that domestic duties alone prevent my prolonging my stay in New York during the session of the Woman's Rights Convention. But you know, also, that all my sympathies are there. I hope you will have a large representation of the friends of the great movement--the most important of the century; and that you will also a.s.semble a good many of the opposition during the discussion. Perhaps from such opponents I might obtain answers to certain questions which have hara.s.sed my mind, and are the following:

If there be a woman's sphere, as a man's sphere, why has not woman an equal voice in fixing the limits? If it be unwomanly for a girl to have a whole education, why is it not unwomanly for her to have even a half one? Should she not be left where the Turkish women are left? If women have sufficient political influence through their husbands and brothers, how is it that the worst laws are confessedly those relating to female property? If politics are necessarily corrupting, ought not good men, as well as good women, to be exhorted to quit voting?

If, however, man's theory be correct--that none should be appointed jurors but those whose occupations fit them to understand the matters in dispute--where is the propriety of empanneling a jury of men to decide on the right of a divorced mother to her child? If it be proper for a woman to open her lips in jubilee to sing nonsense, how can it be improper for her to open them and speak sense? These afford a sample of the questions to which I have been trying in vain to find an answer. If the reasonings of men on this subject are a fair specimen of the masculine intellect of the nineteenth century, I think it is certainly quite time to call in women to do the thinking.

Yours, respectfully and cordially, T. W. HIGGINSON.

MISS LUCY STONE.

MATILDA JOSLYN GAGE cited the Convention to a case recently tried before the Court of Common Pleas of New York, as ill.u.s.trating the husband's owners.h.i.+p of the wife, the Court deciding that the friends of a woman who had "harbored" and detained her from her husband, though with her own consent and desire, should pay him $10,000. He recovered this sum on the principle of owners.h.i.+p; the wife's services were due him, and he recovered their value.

Mrs. Gage also commented on the divorce laws, which she declared were less just in Christian than in Mohammedan countries. In those countries if the husband sues for a divorce he is obliged to restore the dower, but in Christian America the husband not only retains all the property in case he sues for a divorce, but where the wife, being the innocent party, sues, she even then receives neither property nor children, unless by an express decree of the court. She is alike punished, whether innocent or guilty. Mrs. Gage also discussed the question so often put, "What has woman to do with politics?" She said the country must look to women for its salvation.

Sojourner Truth, a tall colored woman, well known in anti-slavery circles, and called the Lybian Sybil, made her appearance on the platform. This was the signal for a fresh outburst from the mob; for at every session every man of them was promptly in his place, at twenty-five cents a head. And this was the one redeeming feature of this mob--it paid all expenses, and left a surplus in the treasury.

Sojourner combined in herself, as an individual, the two most hated elements of humanity. She was black, and she was a woman, and all the insults that could be cast upon color and s.e.x were together hurled at her; but there she stood, calm and dignified, a grand, wise woman, who could neither read nor write, and yet with deep insight could penetrate the very soul of the universe about her. As soon as the terrible turmoil was in a measure quelled

SHE SAID: Is it not good for me to come and draw forth a spirit, to see what kind of spirit people are of? I see that some of you have got the spirit of a goose, and some have got the spirit of a snake. I feel at home here. I come to you, citizens of New York, as I suppose you ought to be. I am a citizen of the State of New York; I was born in it, and I was a slave in the State of New York; and now I am a good citizen of this State. I was born here, and I can tell you I feel at home here. I've been lookin' round and watchin' things, and I know a little mite 'bout Woman's Rights, too. I come forth to speak 'bout Woman's Rights, and want to throw in my little mite, to keep the scales a-movin'. I know that it feels a kind o' hissin' and ticklin' like to see a colored woman get up and tell you about things, and Woman's Rights. We have all been thrown down so low that n.o.body thought we'd ever get up again; but we have been long enough trodden now; we will come up again, and now I am here.

I was a-thinkin', when I see women contendin' for their rights, I was a-thinkin' what a difference there is now, and what there was in old times. I have only a few minutes to speak; but in the old times the kings of the earth would hear a woman. There was a king in the Scriptures; and then it was the kings of the earth would kill a woman if she come into their presence; but Queen Esther come forth, for she was oppressed, and felt there was a great wrong, and she said I will die or I will bring my complaint before the king. Should the king of the United States be greater, or more crueler, or more harder? But the king, he raised up his sceptre and said: "Thy request shall be granted unto thee--to the half of my kingdom will I grant it to thee!" Then he said he would hang Haman on the gallows he had made up high. But that is not what women come forward to contend. The women want their rights as Esther. She only wanted to explain her rights. And he was so liberal that he said, "the half of my kingdom shall be granted to thee," and he did not wait for her to ask, he was so liberal with her.

Now, women do not ask half of a kingdom, but their rights, and they don't get 'em. When she comes to demand 'em, don't you hear how sons hiss their mothers like snakes, because they ask for their rights; and can they ask for anything less? The king ordered Haman to be hung on the gallows which he prepared to hang others; but I do not want any man to be killed, but I am sorry to see them so short-minded. But we'll have our rights; see if we don't; and you can't stop us from them; see if you can. You may hiss as much as you like, but it is comin'. Women don't get half as much rights as they ought to; we want more, and we will have it. Jesus says: "What I say to one, I say to all--watch!" I'm a-watehin'. G.o.d says: "Honor your father and your mother." Sons and daughters ought to behave themselves before their mothers, but they do not. I can see them a-laughin', and pointin' at their mothers up here on the stage. They hiss when an aged woman comes forth. If they'd been brought up proper they'd have known better than hissing like snakes and geese. I'm 'round watchin' these things, and I wanted to come up and say these few things to you, and I'm glad of the hearin' you give me. I wanted to tell you a mite about Woman's Rights, and so I came out and said so. I am sittin' among you to watch; and every once and awhile I will come out and tell you what time of night it is.

_The Times_ next day commented as follows:

_The New York Times, Sept. 9, 1853._

THE ROW OF YESTERDAY.--Row No. 3 was a very jolly affair, a regular break-down, at the Woman's Convention. The women had their rights, and more beside. The cause was simply that the rowdyish diathesis is just now prevalent. True, a colored woman made a speech, but there was nothing in that to excite a mult.i.tude; she did not speak too low to be heard; she did not insult them with improper language; nor did the audience respond at all insultingly. They did not curse, they only called for "half a dozen on the sh.e.l.l." They did not swear, they only "hurried up that stew." They did wrong, however.

If we had our own way every rascally rowdy among them should have Bloomers of all colors preaching at them by the year--a year for every naughty word they uttered, a score of them for every hiss.

Out upon the villains who go to any meeting to disturb it. Let anybody who can hire a house and pay for it have his way, and let none be disturbed; the opposers can stay away. But for us, let us be thankful that in such hot weather there is something to amuse us, something to season our insipid dishes, something to spice our dull days with. _Mem._ It was cooler in the evening.

CAROLINE M. SEVERANCE, of Ohio, presented an argument and appeal based upon the following propositions: That as the manifest dissimilarities which cause the _nations_ of the earth to differ, physically, and in degree of mental and moral development and cultivation, are not found justly to invalidate their claim to a place in the vast brotherhood of man--to fullness of family communion and rights; so there are no radical differences of _the s.e.xes_ in these respects, which can at all impair the integrity of an equal humanity--no sufficient basis for a distinction in so comprehensive a cla.s.sification.

The fundamental facts and faculties--the higher and more essential attributes which make up the accepted definition of humanity in our day, are identical in both--are no more confined or unduly allotted to one s.e.x than to one nation.

On the broad basis of this philosophy, on the ground of woman's undeniable and equal humanity, proven by the possession of identical human faculties, and equal human needs, we claim for her the recognition of that humanity and its rights--for the freedom, protection, development, and use of those faculties, and the supply of those needs. And we maintain that no accident of s.e.x, no prejudged or proven dissimilarity _in degree_ of physical, mental, or moral endowment, or development, can at all stand in the way of the admission of such just claim; and no denial of such claim but must necessarily be fraught with evil, as subversive of the Creator's economy and design. [Shouts and laughter.]

Rev. JOHN PIERPONT, who, for the first time, took part in a Woman's Rights Convention, said: Ladies and gentlemen, a woman, at this hour, occupies the throne of the mightiest kingdom of the globe. Under her sway there are some hundred and fifty millions of the human race. Has she a right to sit there? [Several voices, "No!"] The vote here is--no; but a hundred and fifty millions vote the contrary. If a woman can thus have the highest right conceded to her, why should not woman have a lower? Therefore, some women have some rights. Is not the question a fair one,--how many women have any rights? And, also, how many rights has any woman? Are not these fair subjects for discussion? I do not come here to advocate any specific right for women; I come merely for the consideration of the question, what right she has. What are the rights which can not rightfully be denied her? Surely, some belong to the s.e.x at large, as part of the great family of man.

We lay it, down as the foundation of our civil theory, that man, as man, has, and by nature is endowed with certain natural, inviolable, indefeasible rights; not that men who have attained the age of majority alone possess those rights; not that the older, the young, the fair, or the dark, are alone endowed with them; but that they belong to _all_. The rights are not of man's giving; G.o.d gave them; and if you deny or withhold them, you place yourself in antagonism with your Creator. The more humble and despised is the human being claiming those rights, the more prompt should be the feeling of every manly bosom to stand by that humble creature of G.o.d, and see that its right is not withheld from it! Is it a new thing in this country to allow civil rights to a woman?

Susan B. Anthony, who had been a teacher for fifteen years, gave an amusing description of her recent experience in attempting to speak at a teachers' convention. Paulina Wright Davis offered the following resolution: