Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1892-01-09
OF WOMEN.
The Effort to Secure q Constitutional
Amendment to Be Renewed.
THE COMING CONVENTION.
Wcll-Known Women Who VIII BE Here
Elizabeth Cady Stanton to Preside-Twcnty-
Five Year, OF Enort-What the Association
Hopes For.
THE NATIONAL AMERICAN WOMAN SUI

January17, 18, 10, 20. The average reader has
grown accustomed to this announcement with
the coming OF each new year and tho presence
of Congress in our midst The two things are
synonymous, for with each convention there
goes forth fresh appeals or, let us say, demands
upon the national Legislators for the enfranchise-
ment Of woman. The suffrage movement is
| entering upon its twenty fifth year, old enough
in years to have itself firmly established as a
movement that will no. be downed in the
public mind, dignified and serious enough
problem to have the best minds Of
the age engage in its discussion and
having achieved results in its quarter of q CEN
fury of work that the most sanguine could not
have dreamed Of, although the great object is
not yet attained. The suffrage movement is
widespread. thirty states and territories being
represented in the last annual convention. and
the prospects for this one that nearly all
the forty states and six territories will have
showing in this.
THE HOPES OF THE CONVENTION.
A couple Of paragraphs from the call to this
convention gives the most concise statement of
what it hopes to accomplish.
Gas in December the twelfth congress to
which we have made an appeal will assemble
the women Of the entire nation should concen-
trate their influence on their respective Rep
resentatives and demand more earnestly than
ever before full recognition of their political
rights as citizens of the United States. The
necessary step to this end is the submission by
Congress Of a proposition for a sixteenth
amendment to the national Constitution pro-
hibiting the Acknowledgement of citizens in
any state on account of sex.
Though womans struggle for emancipation
has been long and weary, yet her indomitable
determination to secure the blessings of liberty
has ever made the struggle hopeful, and must
make the end triumphant. With woman's
present position in trades and professions. with
school suffrage in half the states in the Union
municipal suffrage in Kansas and full
suffrage in Wyoming, we behold the dawn
Of brighter day for the mothers
of the race. The discussion OF tho great prin-
ciples Of individual conscience aud Judgment
in this republic for the last half century has
given US new type OF womankind that can no
longer be subordrated to the caprice and tyr
amy OF the powers that be in the church or
the state.
LET US, then, with renewed hope and deter
mination, assemble in the coming convention,
and with united voices make our demands
heard"
WORK BEFORE CONGRESS.
Now to get down to details. During the con-
vention the House judiciary committee and the
select committee on suffrage will each give the
congressional committee of the association a
hearing. The head of this committee is Susan
b. Anthony, who has valiantly fought the cause
OF women before eleven preceding Congresses.
Her associates are Mrs Harriet Taylor Upton
and Mrs. Jean Brooks Greenlcaf. The history
OF these appeals to Congress is interesting. In
the early part OF the movement no action was
ever taken. little later an adverse report
was rendered-and ex-Speaker Reed has the
credit OF submitting the first minority report.
In the next Congress Hon. f. 3. Taylor of Ohio
made a minority report.
The only majority report ever made in the
House was made by the judiciary committee in
the Fifty first Congress, Mr.. Casweu Of Wis
consin making it.
There was more discussion upon suffrage
In the Senate and House last Con-
gress than over before, because the
bill for the admission of Wyoming
provided for woman's suffrage. During the
consideration Of the amendment which was
offered to defeat this portion of the bill the
subject was more thoroughly discussed than 1t
ever had been before.
wELL-KNowN WOMEN COMING.
One OF the signs of the increase in the suf-
frage:movementis thatso many young women are
taking hold of the work. About half of those
who are upon the program for the coming con-
vention are middle aged and younger. OF the
pioneers in the cause Elizabeth Cady Stanton,
Susan b. Anthony, Lucy Stone and Isabella
Beecher Hooker are as we'll known as the cause
itself-and yet being women, it is always easy
to find something new to say about them.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton, the president of the
! association, will be here in spite of the fact
that when she went abroad few years ago few
of her admirers, and she numbers them by
thousands ever expected to feast their eyes on
her face again. More than coming to the con-
vention, she will be heard before it in one of
her characteristic addresses entitled 1.-The
Solitude of Self"
For Susan B. Anthony the years seem to be
going backward There is a legend to the
effect that couple of years ago, in this city,
she celebrated her SEVENTEEN birthday. After
| career of exceptional usefulness, hard work,
uphill work much Of it, constant travel, a
public life in fact, she has Just accomplished
what she never yet had time to do and that is
to go housekeeping. "Aunt Susan" as all the
| suffragists affectionately call her, has always
contended that a suffragist need not necessarily
mean poor or ind 'fferent housekeeper. On
the contrary, she brought thousands of examples
to prove that being good suffragist naturally
Implied the other. She is the latest great ex-
| ample herself. Susan and Mary Anthony went
to housekeeping last summer in Rochester, and
they are the happiest pair OF women you can
find anywhere. They give teas and dinners
| and luncheons ad lIbitum and their hospitable
board presents many pleasant scenes. More
than all that, II Madison street, Rochester,
means home for two busy women in the midst
OF surroundings to which they have been IA
mlliar since their childhood.
AMONG THE YOUNGER MEMBERS
OF the younger women May Wright Sewall of
Indianapolis is the best known. She is on the
board Of lady managers of the worlds fair and
is president Of the National Woman's Council.
Rev. Anna H. Shaw is the national lecturer
and is regularly ordained minister in the
Methodist Protestant Church. The NJ. p.
Church is split off from the NJ. E. and num-
bcrs many more among its COMMITMENTS than
is generally supposed After Miss Shaw was
ordained the denomination was afraid it was a
bad precedent and refused to perform the
same rite for any other woman. Miss Shaw is
an interesting speaker and is well known to
Washington audiences.
Mrs. Lide Meriweather OF Tennessee made
most favorable impression at the convention
last year. She is humorous talker and her
speech on 1.-THE Silent Seven" was one Of tho
hits.