# History of Woman Suffrage/Volume 5/Chapter 9

Contents
CHAPTER IX.
NATIONAL AMERICAN CONVENTION OF 1909.
The invitation to hold the Forty-first annual convention of the association in Seattle was accepted for two special reasons. The Washington Legislature had submitted a woman suffrage amendment to be voted on in 1910; similar action had been taken by the Legislatures of Oregon and South Dakota, and a convention on the Pacific Coast would attract western people and create sentiment in favor of these amendments. The Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition in progress during the summer, by causing reduced railroad rates, would enable those of the east and middle west to attend the convention and visit this beautiful section of the country. The date fixed was July 1-6.
The eastern delegates assembled in Chicago on June 25 to take the "suffrage special” train for Seattle and a reception was given ​to them at Hotel Stratford by the Chicago suffragists. At St. Paul the next morning ex-Senator S. A. Stockwell and Mrs. Stockwell, president of the Minnesota Association, with a delegation of suffragists, met them at the station and escorted them to the Woman's Exchange, where a delicious breakfast was served on tables adorned with golden iris and ferns. Many club officials were there and brief addresses were made by Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, Mrs. Florence Kelley, Miss Laura Clay, Mrs, Fanny Garrison Villard, Mrs. Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Miss Alice Stone Blackwell, Miss Kate M. Gordon and Mrs. Harriet Taylor Upton. Mrs. Villard recalled a visit she had made there twenty-six years before with her husband, Henry Villard, who had just completed the Northern Pacific Railroad and his train was making a kind of triumphal tour across the continent. "St. Paul welcomed him with a procession ten miles long," she said, and Minneapolis, determined not to be outdone, got up one fifteen miles long. It gives me joy to remember that not only my father, William Lloyd Garrison, but also my good German-born husband believed in equal rights for women."
The train sped through the Great Northwest and continuous business meetings were held by the board of officers in what was usually the smoking car until the next stop was made at Spokane, Washington. Here the Chamber of Commerce had appropriated $500 for their entertainment. They were presented with buttons and badges and taken in automobiles through the beautiful residence district, the handsome grounds of the three colleges and to the picturesque Falls. Then they saw the fine exhibits in the Chamber of Commerce and were taken to the Amateur Athletic Club, whose facilities for rest and recreation were placed at their disposal. An elaborate banquet followed with Mrs. May Arkwright Hutton, president of the Spokane Equal Suffrage Club, presiding. Mrs. Emma Smith De Voe, president of the State Suffrage Association, welcomed them to Washington, and Mayor N. S. Pratt to the city. "I have welcomed many organizations to Spokane," he said, "but none with so much pleasure as this. My belief in equal suffrage is no new conviction; I have voted for it twice and hope soon to do so again. The coming of equal rights for women is the in​evitable result of progress and enlightenment." He presented Dr. Shaw with a gavel made of wood from the four suffrage States bound together with a band of Idaho silver and expressed the hope that when she used it to open the convention in Seattle the sound would be like "the shot heard round the world."
The account in the Woman's Journal said: "Dr. Shaw, in returning thanks, said: 'It is an apt simile, for the blow will be struck on the Pacific Coast and it needs to be heard to the Atlantic and not only from the west to the east but from the north to the south. I hope it will be answered by men who, having known themselves what freedom is, wish to give women the benefits of it also. The only man who can be in any way excused for wanting to withhold freedom from women is the man who is himself a slave.' She recalled the times when the suffragists were offered not banquets but abuse and compared them to the pioneer days of clearing the forest. She closed with a beautiful tribute to the pioneer mothers and called upon the men to pay their debt to them next November."
Mrs. Villard, recalling here also her visit of more than a quarter of a century before, said in part: "Never could I have believed that such changes could have been wrought since that historic train. Then there was nothing at Spokane but Indians and cowboys and the beautiful Falls. I am glad you want women to share the full life of the city. 'The woman's cause is man's.' This movement is as wide as the world and will benefit men as well as women. I have come on this trip largely because I like to connect my husband's name not merely with the building of a great railroad but also with the cause of justice to women in which he believed. I wish greater and greater prosperity to Spokane but with her material prosperity let her not forget the larger things which must go hand in hand with it if cities are not to perish from the earth."
Mrs. Abigail Scott Duniway of Portland, Ore., the renowned suffrage pioneer of the northwest, was enthusiastically received and in the course of her interesting reminiscences said: "I remember when 'Old Oregon' comprised most of the Pacific Northwest. At that time I was living in a log cabin engaged in the very domestic occupation of raising a large family of small children. ​.... On my first visit to Spokane I came by stage from Walla Walla. It went bumping and careening over the rocks and the one hotel of the village had not accommodations for the three or four passengers. They made up improvised beds for us on slats and all the food we had for several days was bread and sugar, but I enjoyed it for after such a journey anything tasted good. There was only one little hall in the town and I was importuned by Captain Wilkinson of Portland to speak. So I hired the hall for Sunday and he advised me to offer it to a clergyman there for the afternoon service. I did so and asked him to announce after his sermon that my meeting would be held in the evening. He accepted the use of the hall but failed to give the notice. When I asked him about it he said: 'Do you think I would notice a woman's meeting?' But we had a good one and almost everybody in Spokane subscribed for my paper, the "New Northwest". The next time I came here was to celebrate the completion of the Northern Pacific Railroad. I had the honor of writing a poem for the occasion and reading it in that little hall and Henry Villard wrote me a letter about it."
A large evening meeting was held in the First Methodist Church with Mrs. LaReine Baker presiding. Henry B. Blackwell and Prof. Frances Squire Potter were among the national speakers. A tired lot of travellers but happy over their cordial welcome took the night train. Next day they stopped for a brief time at North Yakima and Ellensburg and spoke from the rear platform to the crowds awaiting them. Women, girls and children dressed in white greeted them with banners, songs and quantities of the lovely roses for which that section is noted and with fancy baskets of the wonderful cherries and apples. During several hours spent in Tacoma they had the famous ride around the city in special trolley cars, supper at sunset on the veranda of a hotel overlooking the beautiful Puget Sound and a walk through the magnificent park.
The never to be forgotten convention in Seattle was preceded by an evening reception on June 30 in Lincoln Hotel, given by the State suffrage association, whose former president, Mrs. Homer M. Hill, extended its welcome to the delegates. Dr. Shaw, the national president, called the convention to order ​the next afternoon in the large Plymouth Congregational Church and the audience sang The March of the Mothers. Mrs. Margaret B. Platt brought the greetings of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, pointing out that "there are wrongs which can never be righted until woman holds in her hand the ballot. symbol of the power to right them." In introducing Mrs. M. B. Lord to speak for the Grange, Dr. Shaw said she herself was a member of it. Mrs. Lord said in part: "From the first of it women came into our organization on a perfect equality and for forty years the Grange has carried on an education for woman suffrage. It was the proudest moment of my life when I got a resolution for it through the New York State Grange. Here in Washington it has increased three-fold in five years and always passes a resolution in favor of suffrage for women." Mrs. De Voe gave a big-hearted welcome from the State and Mrs. Mary S. Sperry, president of the California suffrage association, made a gracious response. By a rising vote the convention sent a message of warm regard to Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt of New York, the former national president, and regret that she was not able to be present. Dr. Shaw spoke of the "masterly way" in which she had presided at the meeting of the International Suffrage Alliance in London in May, "her power and dignity commanding universal respect,' and told of the message of greeting from Queen Maud of Norway and other incidents of the congress.
Leaving more formal ceremonies for the evening the convention proceeded to business and listened to the report of the corresponding secretary, Miss Gordon (La.). In referring to the specialized literature which had been sent out, she spoke of the letter of the Brewers' and Wholesale Liquor Dealers' Association, so widely circulated during the recent Oregon Suffrage campaign, calling the attention of all retailers in the State to the necessity of defeating the amendment, and to the postal instructing them how to mark their ballot, with a return card signifying their willingness. This had been put into an "exhibit" by Miss Blackwell and her Literature Committee and Miss Gordon urged that clergymen of all denominations should be circularized with it. She said: "I believe the association should not be dissuaded ​from this undertaking because of the amount of work and its costliness. The burden of responsibility rests upon us to prove with such evidence that the worst enemy of the church and the most active enemy of woman suffrage is a mutual foe, the 'organized liquor and vice power.' If in the face of such direct evidence representatives of the church still allow prejudice, ignorance or indifference to woman suffrage to influence them, then they knowingly become the common allies of this power."
Miss Gordon gave instances to show the great change taking place in the attitude of the public toward woman suffrage and said the present difficulty was to utilize the opportunities which presented themselves. She urged more concentrated effort from the national headquarters and a substantial appropriation to enable the chairmen of the standing committees to carry on their work; also that they should be elected instead of appointed and be members of the official board, and she concluded: "It is earnestly recommended that suffragists take steps to politicalize their methods. The primaries, affording in many States an opportunity for women to secure the nominations of favorable candidates; active interest in defeating the election of those opposed to suffrage; the questioning of candidates, etc., are all instances where intelligent interest and activity on the part of suffragists will educate the public far more effectively than debates, lectures and literature—to see that women are determined to take an active part in so-called politics, so intimately associated for weal or woe in their lives."
The reports of the headquarters secretary and national press chairman, Miss Elizabeth J. Hauser (Ohio) were read by Mrs. Upton. The first in speaking of the increased demands on the headquarters began: 'In no previous presidential campaign in the United States were the views of candidates on the enfranchisement of women ever so generally commented on by the press. Perhaps never before did candidates consider the question of sufficient importance to have any opinion upon it. Never before did the newspaper interviewer put to every possible personage—politician or preacher, writer or speaker, inventor or explorer, captain of industry, social worker, actor, prize-fighter, maid, matron, widow—the burning query, 'What about votes for women?'" She told of about 30,000 letters having been ​sent out and an average of nearly 1,000 pieces of literature a day, as many in the first half of the present year as in all of 1908. The Book Department, in charge of Miss Caroline I. Reilly, reported that the sales of the Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony had amounted to $800: 200 sets of the History of Woman Suffrage had been placed in the libraries of the leading colleges and universities: 100 copies of the Reports of the last two national conventions had been put into the libraries which keep the file.
The delegates to the presidential nominating conventions had been appealed to by letter for a suffrage plank in the platform but without result. The Independence Party convention in Chicago voted it down. The usual work had been done in international and national conventions and many had adopted favorable resolutions, among them those of the International Bricklayers' and Stone Masons' Union meeting in Detroit: the International Cotton Spinners' Union in Boston and the Woman's National Trade Union League in that city: the National Council of Women and the Johns Hopkins Alumni Association. The United Mine Workers of America, meeting at Indianapolis, passed the woman suffrage resolution by unanimous vote and sent to the headquarters 500 copies of it, which were promptly mailed to members of Congress. The American Federation of Labor, representing 2,000,000 members, at its convention in Denver, followed its long established custom of passing this resolution. Dr. Shaw attended the National Conference of Charities and Corrections: Mrs. Julia Ward Howe was received as a fraternal delegate from the National American Suffrage Association by the General Federation of Women's Clubs at its biennial in Boston: Mrs. Stockwell by the convention of the American Library Association: Mrs. Sperry and Mrs. Alice L. Park of California, by the Nurses Associated Alumnæ of the United States; Mrs. Coryell by the American Baptist Home Missionary Society, and the association had representatives at many other conventions. "To summarize, 29 national associations have endorsed woman suffrage: 14 others have taken action on some phase of the question; 20 State Federations of Labor, 16 State Granges and seven State Letter Carriers' Associations have endorsed it. Some of the States have carried on a very ​active propaganda in this direction, securing endorsements from hundreds of local organizations representing labor unions, educational and religious societies, Farmers' Institutes, etc."
In the press report Miss Hauser said that 43,000 copies of Progress had been sent out and 52,095 pages of material representing 190 different subjects had been distributed, including 1,262 copies of Mrs. Catt's address to the International Suffrage Alliance. She told of the special articles, of the full pages, of the personal work wit h editors—a report of remarkable accomplishment, filling eight printed pages of the Minutes. In concluding she said: "The day of old methods has gone by and if new methods are to be successfully developed there must be for press chairman a woman who is not only acquainted with the philosophy and history of the woman suffrage movement but who is possessed of the newspaper instinct and the ability to make friends readily. Nothing but press work should be expected of her and she should be enabled to get in touch with the controlling forces in the newspaper world." This report was supplemented with that of Miss Blackwell, chairman of the Committee on Literature.
As the headquarters were soon to be removed from Warren, Ohio, and Miss Hauser had resigned as secretary, this was the last of her excellent reports and the convention sent her a letter of thanks and appreciation for her admirable work. Dr. Shaw said of her: "There never was a woman who gave more consecrated service; she dreamed of woman suffrage by night and toiled for it by day." [Afterward Miss Hauser went to the headquarters in New York as vice-chairman of the National Press Committee.]
In the evening Mayor John F. Miller welcomed the convention and congratulated the association on the personnel of its members in Washington. "This has been a pioneer State in the woman's rights movement," he said. "In 1854 Arthur Denny introduced a woman suffrage bill in the Territorial Legislature. In 1878 the civil disabilities of married women were removed and this was the first State west of the Rocky Mountains to say that a wife's property should be her own. Women here have all the rights of men except to vote and hold office. I do not know ​whether woman suffrage will bring in everything good and abolish everything evil but if it will by all means let us have it." He closed with a tribute to the mothers in the State.
In an eloquent response Mrs. Villard reminded the Mayor that if a cause is just the consequences following in its path need not be feared and said: "I was early taught by my father that moral principle in vigorous exercise is irresistible. It has an immortal essence. It may disappear for a time but it can no more be trod out of existence by the iron foot of time or the ponderous march of iniquity than matter can be annihilated. It lives somewhere, somehow, and rises again in renovated strength. The women of this country who are advocating the cause of woman suffrage are animated by a great moral principle. They are armed with a spiritual weapon of finest caliber and one that is sure to win." She told of the great reception given in 1883 to her husband and his guests when they reached Seattle for the opening of the railroad after its completion; of his response and that of the Hon., Carl Schurz. She described an address made by a young girl, the daughter of Professor Powell of the university, the entire expenses of which Mr. Villard had paid for several years, in which she said he would be remembered more for what he had done for education than for the building of the railroad. "In the retrospect of time," said Mrs. Villard, "I can see her, sweetly modest and gracious, standing as it were with outstretched arms inviting the women who are gathered here today to come and help make the State of Washington free." Then in an appeal for the pending suffrage amendment she said: "Many tributes of respect and admiration have been paid to my noble companion' in the great northwest, which are carefully cherished by me and my children, but I crave one more and it is this—that Mr. Villard's keen sense of justice and fair play for women shall find echo in the hearts of the men of Washington, to whose extraordinary development he gave such powerful impetus, so that in November, 1910, they will proclaim with loud accord that the women: of Washington are no longer bond but free, no longer disfranchised but regenerated and disenthralled, equal partners in the unending struggle of the human race for nobler laws and higher moral standards."
​The evening session closed with the president’s address of Dr. Shaw, which the Woman’s Journal described as “inimitable” but not a paragraph of it can be found after the lapse of years. Her speeches always were inspired by the occasion and only a stenographic report could give an adequate idea of them. Miss Anthony mourned because this was not made and others often spoke of it but Dr. Shaw herself was indifferent. There were pressing demands for money and the endless details of these meetings absorbed the time and strength of those who might otherwise have attended to it.
Mrs. Upton in her report as treasurer made a stirring appeal in which she said: ‘The most important question before this convention is that of money. A grave responsibility rests upon the shoulders of each delegate. She should know how much money we have had in the last year, where it went and why. More than this, she should decide for herself how money for the coming year shall be disbursed and suggest ways of raising the same. No delegate ought to quiet her conscience with the thought that the judgment of the general officers is the best judgment. Each State has entrusted into the hands of its delegates precious business and the responsibility is great and cannot honestly be disregarded. In the long ago we worked until our money gave out. Now, as the beginning of the end of our work is in sight, demands for money are many and if business rules are followed they must be met. The small self-sacrifices must be continued and larger ways of obtaining money created. We are all shouting for a fifth star on our suffrage flag but we must remember that no star was ever placed upon any flag without cost, without sacrifice. Our fifth star will find its place because we explain to voters what a fifth star really means. These voters will not come to us; we must go to them. To go anywhere costs money. To go to the voters of a large and thinly populated State means much money. Shall we be content with four stars or shall we provide the means to get a fifth?”
The total receipts of the past year were $15,420; disbursements, $14,480. She told of the many ways in which the money was being used—over $2,000 added to several other thousands spent in field work in Oklahoma for the next year’s amendment ​campaign; $3,000 to the College League; headquarters' expenses, literature, posters, etc. Part of the money came from the Anthony Memorial Fund, part from the fund raised by Dr. Thomas and Miss Garrett, the rest from individual subscriptions. The convention, which was not a large one, subscribed over $3,000. The following recommendations of the Business Committee were adopted by the convention: Appropriations shall be made for educational, church and petition work; financial aid shall not be given to States having campaigns on hand unless there be perfect harmony within the ranks of the workers of those States; an organizer shall be sent to Arizona to prepare the Territory for constitutional or legislative work and a campaign organizer to South Dakota.
There was much interest in the question of returning the national headquarters to New York City. It was long the desire of Miss Anthony to do this on a scale befitting so large a city and so important a cause and the funds had never been available. Mrs. Oliver H. P. Belmont, who had lately come into the suffrage movement, had taken the entire twentieth floor of a new office building for two years and invited the New York State Suffrage Association to occupy a part of it. She now extended an invitation to the National Association to use for this period as many rooms as it needed and she would pay the difference in the rent between these and the headquarters at Warren, O. In addition she would maintain the press bureau. The advantages of this great newspaper and magazine center were recognized by the general officers, executive committee and delegates, the offer was gladly accepted and a rising vote of thanks was sent to Mrs. Belmont.
Miss Perle Penfield (Texas) read the report of Mrs. Lucia Ames Mead, chairman of the Committee on Peace and Arbitration. She told of the tenth anniversary this year of The Hague Conference, which was attended by representatives of forty-six instead of twenty-six nations and had made various international agreements that would lessen the likelihood of war. She spoke of attending the second National Peace Congress in Chicago in May, at which all the women who took part were suffragists. Mrs. Mead referred to having spoken eighty-six times during the ​year. In pointing out the work that should be done in the United States for peace she said:
Several delegates expressed the need and the right of. mothers to strive to prevent war. Mrs. Duniway, Mrs. Philena Everett Johnson and Mrs. DeVoe spoke on the pending amendment campaigns in their respective States of Oregon, South Dakota and Washington. Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby's subject was the American Situation vs. the English Situation and she described the conditions in England which caused the "suffragette' or "militant" movement. Mrs. Florence Kelley, chairman of the Industrial Committee, spoke on the Wage Earning Woman and the Ballot. "Because of the decision of the United States Supreme Court in the Oregon case," she said, "fourteen State Legislatures in the past year have considered bills for shortening the workday for women and six have enacted laws for it. South Carolina has taken a step backward by changing the hours from ten to twelve. Child labor is constantly increasing in spite of our efforts. I have seen the evolution of modern industry and it has meant the sacrifice of thousands of young lives." At the ​close of the afternoon session the delegates enjoyed an automobile ride of many miles amidst scenery which many who had travelled widely declared was unsurpassed in the whole world.
The most brilliant session of the convention probably was that of the College Women's Evening, with Dr. Shaw presiding. Miss Caroline Lexow (N. Y.), secretary of the College Women's League, spoke of its remarkable growth since its organization the preceding year and said that it now had twenty-four branches in as many States and twenty-five chapters in as many colleges. She called attention to the fact that no College Anti-Suffrage Association had ever been formed and said that college women remembered the words of one of the pioneers: 'Make the best use you can of your freedom for we have bought it at a great price." Mrs. Eva Emery Dye (Ore.) gave an able address on College Women in Civic Life. The Law and the Woman was the subject considered by Miss Adella M. Parker, a popular lawyer, president of the Washington College League. 'I have been looking for years," she said, "to find any legislation that does not affect women, from a tariff on gloves to a declaration of war. The great problems which face the human race demand the genius of both men and women to solve them. The law needs women quite as much as women need the law." The closing address on College Women and Democracy by Frances Squire Potter, professor of English at the University of Minnesota, was a masterly review of the relation of college women to the life of the present, and later it was printed by the College League as a part of its literature. In the course of it she said:
The Legislative Evening was in charge of the State suffrage association, Mrs. De Voe in the chair, and it was the intention to have those members of the Legislature who were principally responsible for submitting the amendment address the convention but an extra session at that time spoiled this program. The Hon. Alonzo Wardell spoke for Charles R. Case, president of the State Federation of Labor, which was strongly in favor of the amendment, he said, and had votes enough to carry it if the members would go to the polls. Mrs. Lord represented the Grange, which she said could be depended on for an affirmative vote. Miss Parker gave a graphic description of the "illegal and dishonorable methods" by which the vote was taken away from the women while Washington was a Territory., Mrs. John Moore of Tacoma read a powerful scene from The Spanish Gypsy by George Eliot. After a lively collection speech by Mrs. Upton, Dr. Shaw closed the evening with a mirth-provoking "question box." ​At an afternoon session Mrs. Rachel Foster Avery read the report of the National Committee on the Petition to Congress. It had been the plan of Mrs. Catt, as presented and adopted at the convention of 1908, to have one final petition to Congress for the submission of the Federal Amendment and she had consented to take the chairmanship temporarily. Headquarters had been opened in the Martha Washington, the woman's hotel in New York City, where the headquarters of the Interurban Woman Suffrage Council, of which Mrs. Catt was chairman, were located. Here she and Miss Mary Garrett Hay spent many months from 9 a. m. to 5 p. m., assisted by Miss Minnie J. Reynolds, who did press work and correspondence with the States. Mrs. Priscilla D. Hackstaff of Brooklyn, a former Missourian, took charge of the work in that State from these headquarters and there was an energetic volunteer sub-committee of New York suffragists. The report continued:
The report of Mrs. Lucretia L. Blankenburg (Penn.), chairman of the Committee on Civil Rights, showed the usual painstaking year's work. Her letters to all the State presidents for information had brought answers from twenty-two and eleven of these showed advanced legislation for women and children. In some of them it was amended labor laws or new ones; in others for a Juvenile Court, for improving the position of teachers, for the advantage of children in the public schools, for property rights of wives. Maine reported nearly a dozen such new laws. Minnesota was in the lead with thirty Acts of the Legislature.
Mrs. Mary E. Craigie (N. Y.), chairman of the Committee on Church Work, introduced her excellent report by saying: "President Taft recently said in a public address: 'Christianity and the spirit of Christianity are the only basis for the hope of modern civilization and the growth of popular self-government.' .... Women are to-day and always have been the mainstay and chief support of the churches and the leaders in all great moral reforms; yet as a disfranchised class they are powerless to aid in bringing about any reforms that depend upon legislative or governmental action and the church is thereby deprived of more than two-thirds of its power to help extend civic righteousness throughout the land. Now that there is a world-wide movement among women to. demand the political power to do their part in the world's work, they have a right to ask and to receive from ministers and from all Christian people support and help in working for this greatest of all reforms.".... Mrs. Craigie told of addressing the ministerial association of Canada at Toronto, where fifteen minutes had been allotted to her but by unanimous insistence she was obliged to keep on for an hour. An interesting discussion followed, after which an endorsement of the principle of woman suffrage was unanimously voted. She spoke at a meeting of the Dominion Temperance Alliance, where there were 600 delegates, many of them clergymen, and a resolution by the chairman endorsing the woman suffrage bill then before the Provincial Legislature was carried without a dissenting vote. Reports were included of the good ​work accomplished by the members of her committee in the various States.
The usual Sunday afternoon convention meeting was held in the auditorium on the Exposition grounds, under the auspices of this church committee, with a large audience who listened to an able presentation of The Sacred Duties and Obligations of Citizenship. Dr. Shaw presided and the speakers were the Rev. C. Lyng Hansen, Mrs. Craigie, Professor Potter and Miss Janet Richards. Mrs. Kelley spoke in the First Christian Church, Mrs. Eva Emery Dye in the Second Avenue Congregational Church and the Rev. Mary G. Andrews preached for the Universalists on The Freedom of Truth. At the First Methodist Protestant Church, Miss Laura Clay talked on Christian Citizenship in the morning and Dr. Shaw preached in the evening. Mrs. Charlotte Perkins Gilman spoke at the Boylston Avenue Unitarian Church in the morning and Mrs. Gilman and Mrs. Pauline Steinem at a patriotic service in Plymouth Church in the evening. Mr. Blackwell and Mrs. Steinem spoke in the Jewish synagogue. In the evening the officers of the association were "at home" to the members of the convention and friends at the Lincoln Hotel.
The election of officers took place Monday morning. At Miss Blackwell's request she was permitted to retire from the office of recording secretary, which she had filled for twenty years, and the convention gave her a rising vote of thanks for her most efficient service. Her complete and satisfactory reports of the national conventions in her paper, the Woman's Journal, had formed a standard record that nowhere else could be found. She exchanged places with Mrs. Ella S. Stewart, second auditor, and was thus retained on the board. The remainder of the officers were re-elected but Miss Gordon, the corresponding secretary, stated that with the removal of the headquarters to New York and the increased work which would follow, this officer should ​be there all the time, which was impossible for her. Professor Potter was the unanimous choice of the convention, and, after communicating with the university and securing a leave of absense for two years, she accepted the office. Her assistant and friend, Professor Mary Gray Peck, accepted the office of headquarters secretary. Both were prominent in the College Suffrage League in that State. The convention by a rising vote expressed its appreciation of the excellent work Miss Gordon had done, "and for the still greater work that she will yet do," added Dr. Shaw.
It was voted to change the name of the Business Committee to the Official Board and to add Mrs. Catt, the only ex-president, to this board. Urgent invitations were received from Governor Robert S. Vessey of South Dakota and the Mayor and Chamber of Commerce of Sioux Falls to hold the convention of 1910 there, as an amendment was to be voted on in the autumn. Dr. Shaw commented: "Governor Vessey is a man who has convictions and is not afraid to stand by them. I am grateful that he dares to do this while he is in office." A delegate spoke of the appointment of a woman for the first time to an office in . her State and immediately delegates from other States gave the same announcement until it was necessary to stop the flood. Miss Penfield, one of a number of national organizers who were kept constantly in the field, told of having worked in six States in the past six months. In Pennsylvania she visited thirty-five small towns, holding parlor meetings, which she advocated as leading to the formation of suffrage clubs. In Kentucky she addressed fifteen colleges and schools. Mrs. Ida Porter Boyer (Penn.), Miss Mary N. Chase (N. H.) and Miss Laura Gregg (Kans.) gave experiences in field work.
Mrs. Villard presided Monday evening and in introducing Mr. Blackwell, whom the audience rose to greet, she said: "It is a pleasure for me to pay also a tribute to the loveliness of his wife, Lucy Stone. To my childish vision she was a type of perpetual sunshine." Mr. Blackwell gave the opinion.of a man of long observation and experience on How to Get Votes for Women. Mrs. Craigie spoke on Citizenship—What Is It? Mrs. Stewart relieved Mrs. Upton of her usual task of taking a col​lection and among her witty remarks was one on Bartholdi's statue of Liberty. "The real goddesses of Liberty in this country do not spend a large amount of time standing on pedestals in public places; they use their torches to startle the bats in political cellars." Referring to the ignoring of women's work in the histories she said: "When I was a child and studied about the Pilgrim Fathers I supposed they were all bachelors, as I never found a word about their wives." Mrs. Charlotte Perkins Gilman's topic was Masculine, Feminine and Human, discussed with her usual keen analysis and illuminated with her pungent epigrams.
A spirited symposium took place on Pre-Election Methods, led by Mrs. Stewart, who outlined the work done in Illinois, where it had been reduced to a system. "We find candidates much less tractable after election than before," she said, "although we always send literature and letters to the members-elect and subscribe for the Woman's Journal for them. We are now strong enough in some districts for pre-election work to elect our friends and defeat our enemies. Mrs. Catharine Waugh McCulloch sent a circular letter to every member of the last Legislature, with questions as to his attitude on woman suffrage and from the answers she compiled a leaflet recommending the election of the men who promised to vote for our measures. She sent this to every paper in Illinois and distributed it as widely as possible among the women's clubs and women at large. She did the same with our Congressmen. Not one of the legislators who promised to vote for our bill voted against it. Our most important measure was lost in the Senate by a majority of only one vote. Eight of the Senators who voted against it are up for re-election and we shall do our best to keep them from going back. Illinois has printed for several years a Roll of Honor of the legislators who have voted right on our bills."
The discussion showed a general opinion that it was high time for action of this kind. Mrs. Kelley asked: "Why not do prenomination work?" and Dr. Shaw said: "I do not know a political method when I see it and I haven't an ounce of political sense but I do believe heartily in this sort of work." Led by Mrs. Ella Hawley Crossett, president of the New York asso​ciation, "Should there be concentration on one bill or work for several"? was discussed. Miss Gordon said: "Ask for everything in sight and you will get a little." Mrs. Cornelia Telford Jewett, editor of the Union Signal, brought a fraternal greeting from the National Woman's Christian Temperance Union and when she said that most of the criticism she received was that she gave the readers too much suffrage, Dr. Shaw remarked in her jovial way: "They would get more if I could write, as Mrs. Jewett has often asked me for articles."
Among the symposiums and round table conferences in the morning and afternoon sessions were those on "How to make existing suffrage sentiment politically effective," Miss Clay presiding; "The tariff in its relation to women," and "Taxation without representation is tyranny in 1909 as much as in 1776," Mrs. Villard presiding in place of Mrs. DeVoe, who was ill; "Parents' organizations, their value in creating public sentiment," and "The self-government plan in our public schools as an aid in preparing the coming generations for woman suffrage," Mrs. B. W. Dawley (Ohio), presiding. The report of the Committee on Education, presented by its chairman, Mrs. Steinem, said that the principal work of the half-year had been to carry out the resolutions adopted at the Buffalo convention to investigate the text books on History and Civics used in the public schools and she had secured a valuable expression of opinion through letters sent to 400 superintendents of schools and twenty-six school book publishing houses. Some of them quoted the names of Betsy Ross, Molly Pitcher, Martha Washington and Dolly Madison to show that women were not neglected in the text books. Many declared they had given the subject no thought but were open to conviction. In summing up Mrs. Steinem expressed the belief that this lack of recognition of woman's influence in history was not so much the result of intention as of the masculine point of view which has dominated civilization. "The impression conveyed by our text books," she said, "is that this world has been made by men and for men and the ideals they are putting forth are colored by masculine thought.... Our text books on Civics do not show the slightest appreciation of the significance of the 'woman's movement.'....
​On the closing night Miss Richards, the noted lecturer of Washington, D. C., made a delightfully clever and sparkling speech on Sex Antagonism, Why and What is the Cure? Professor Potter gave a second splendid address and Dr. Shaw's eloquent farewell sent the audience home in an exalted mood.
The excellent arrangements for the convention and the entertainment of the officers and delegates had been made with much care and judgment by the State association and the Seattle society, which appropriated $1,000 for the purpose. The surpassing beauty of the city and the Exposition was an unceasing delight. Miss Blackwell said in her description in the Woman's Journal: "The splendid setting of the convention was a constant pleasure—the tall firs, the beautiful water and picturesque mountains. Large bunches of sweet peas and of the enormous roses never seen but on the Pacific coast were constantly being handed up to the president and speakers in the course of the convention by the pretty little pages. All the delegates agreed that the display of flowers on the grounds was more beautiful than they had seen at any previous Exposition. Some of the delegates from the Atlantic coast said it was worth coming across the continent just to see this flower garden."
The always-to-be-remembered feature of the week was Suffrage Day at the Exposition, arranged by its officials for the day following the convention. To quote again from Miss Blackwell:
In the afternoon there was a reception in the magnificent room occupying the ground floor of the Washington State building with more addresses of welcome by prominent men connected with the Exposition and more short speeches by the visitors. Later in the afternoon there was another reception at the Idaho building by the Idaho and Utah women with more refreshments served by motherly matrons and pretty girls. The day closed with a "daylight dinner" given by the Washington Equal Suffrage Association at The Firs, the headquarters of the Young Women's Christian Association. Hundreds of suffragists sat down to the table within the building and on the large veranda looking off over a delightful prospect and there were many appreciative speeches. It was long after nightfall when the happy gathering broke up and the visitors then had a chance to see the fairy-like spectacle of the Exposition by night, with every building outlined in electric lights, the pools shimmering, the fountain gleaming and a series of cascades coming down in foam, with electric lights of different colors glowing through each waterfall.Stewart, Miss Clay, Mrs. Kelley, Mrs. Gilman and Professor Potter.... After the morning exercises, the national officers were taken to the Education building and treated to an excellent lunch cooked and served by the domestic science class of the high school.
* ↑ Part of Call: In entering upon the fifth decade of its work for the enfranchisement of women in the United States, the National American Woman Suffrage Association invites all those to share in its councils who believe that the help of women is needed by the Government. It is a grave mistake of statesmanship to continue to ignore the wisdom of the thousands of our women citizens, who, fitted by education and home interests, are anxious to help solve the many and vital problems upon which our country's future safety and prosperity depend. . . .   During the year 1908 our cause won four solid victories. Michigan gave taxpaying women a vote on questions of local taxation and the granting of franchises; Denmark gave women who are taxpayers or wives taxpayers a vote for all officers but members of Parliament; Belgium gave women engaged in trade a vote for the Conseils des Prud. hommes; and Victoria in Australia gave full State suffrage to all women. The legislative hearings in New York, Massachusetts and Nebraska have called out unprecedented crowds showing the growth of popular interest. . . . The Legislatures of Oregon, Washington and South Dakota have voted to submit the question of woman suffrage to the electors in 1910. The workers for woman's political freedom have great cause for rejoicing.   Anna Howard Shaw, President. Rachel Foster Avery, First Vice-President. Florence Kelley, Second Vice-President Kate M. Gordon, Corresponding Secretary. Alice Stone Blackwell, Recording Secretary. Harriet Taylor Upton, Treasurer, Laura Clay, $\scriptstyle {\left.{\begin{matrix}\ \\\ \end{matrix}}\right\}\,$ Auditors Ella S. Stewart,
* ↑ The resolutions declared the movement for woman suffrage to be but a part of the great struggle for human liberty; called for the enactment of initiative and referendum laws; equal pay for women and men in public and private employment; uniform State laws against child labor and for compulsory education; more industrial training for boys and girls in the public schools; more strenuous effort against the white slave traffic. They demanded that the United States should take the lead in an international movement for the limitation of armaments. A cordial vote of thanks was given for the hospitality and courtesies of the city and the people of Seattle.
* ↑ See History of Woman Suffrage, Volume IV, page 1096.
* ↑ The ministers of Seattle who opened the various sessions with prayer were: Doctors A. Norman Ward, Protestant Methodist; Thomas E. Elliott, Queen Anne Methodist; George Robert Cairns, Temple Baptist; Edward Lincoln Smith, Pilgrim Congregational; Sydney Strong, Queen Anne Congregational; the Reverends J. D. O. Powers, Unitarian; W. H. W. Rees, First Methodist Episcopal; W. A. Major, Bethany Presbyterian; Joseph L. Garvin, First Christian; C. Lyng Hanson, Scandinavian Methodist; F. O. Iverson, Norwegian Lutheran; P. Nelson, Norwegian Congregational Missionary.