Latest / Susan B. Anthony Rebel, Crusader, Humanitarian / 21 - Susan B. Anthony Rebel, Crusader, Humanitarian by Alma Lutz
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: Chapter twenty one of Susan b Anthony by all Malutz.
- 0:05Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter twenty one.
- 0:12Speaker 1: Impetus from the West. My heart almost stands still. I hope,
- 0:18Speaker 1: against hope, but still I hope, Susan wrote in her
- 0:22Speaker 1: diary in eighteen eighty five, as she waited for news
- 0:27Speaker 1: from Oregon Territory regarding the vote of the people on
- 0:31Speaker 1: a woman's suffrage amendment. Woman's suffrage was defeated in Oregon
- 0:37Speaker 1: and in Washington Territory, where in eighteen eighty three it
- 0:41Speaker 1: had carried a contest was being waged in the courts
- 0:45Speaker 1: to invalidate it. In Nebraska, it had also been defeated
- 0:50Speaker 1: in eighteen eighty two. Since the victories in Wyoming and
- 0:55Speaker 1: Utah in eighteen sixty nine and eighteen seventy, another state
- 1:01Speaker 1: or territory had written women's suffrage into law. In spite
- 1:06Speaker 1: of these setbacks, Susan still saw a great promise in
- 1:10Speaker 1: the West and resumed her lecturing there. She knew the
- 1:14Speaker 1: rapidly growing young Western states and territories as few Easterners did,
- 1:20Speaker 1: and she understood their people. Here women were making themselves
- 1:25Speaker 1: indispensable as teachers, and state universities now open to them,
- 1:31Speaker 1: graduated over two thousand women a year. The Farmer's Alliance,
- 1:36Speaker 1: the Grange, and the Prohibition Party, all distinctly Western in origin,
- 1:43Speaker 1: admitted women to membership and were friendly to women's suffrage.
- 1:48Speaker 1: School suffrage had been won in twelve Western states as
- 1:52Speaker 1: against five in the East, and Kansas women were now
- 1:57Speaker 1: voting in municipal elections. In a sense, woman's suffrage was
- 2:02Speaker 1: becoming respectable in the West, and a woman was no
- 2:06Speaker 1: longer ostracized by her friends for working with Susan b. Anthony.
- 2:12Speaker 1: Still critical of her own speaking, Susan was often discouraged
- 2:17Speaker 1: over her lectures, but her vitality, her naturalness, and her
- 2:22Speaker 1: flashes of wit seldom failed to win over her audiences.
- 2:27Speaker 1: Her nephew, Daniel Junior, a student at the University of Michigan,
- 2:33Speaker 1: hearing her speak, wrote his parents, at the beginning of
- 2:37Speaker 1: her lecture, Aunt Susan does not do so well, But
- 2:41Speaker 1: when she is in the midst of her argument and
- 2:43Speaker 1: all her energies brought into play, I think she is
- 2:47Speaker 1: a very powerful speaker. On these trips through the West,
- 2:52Speaker 1: she kept in close touch with her brothers. Daniel and
- 2:55Speaker 1: Merritt in Kansas, frequently visiting in their homes, and taken
- 3:00Speaker 1: her numerous nieces to Rochester. She valued Daniel's judgment highly,
- 3:05Speaker 1: and he well to do and influential, was a great
- 3:09Speaker 1: help to her in many ways, investing her savings and
- 3:14Speaker 1: furnishing her with railroad passes which greatly reduced her ever
- 3:18Speaker 1: increasing traveling expenses. Everywhere she met active zealous members of
- 3:25Speaker 1: the Women's Christian Temperance Union. Since the Civil War, Temperance
- 3:30Speaker 1: had become a vigorous movement in the Middle West, doing
- 3:34Speaker 1: its utmost to counteract the influence of the many large
- 3:39Speaker 1: new breweries and saloons. Through the Prohibition Party, organized on
- 3:45Speaker 1: a national basis in eighteen seventy two, Temperance was now
- 3:49Speaker 1: a political issue in Kansas, Iowa, and the territory of Dakota,
- 3:56Speaker 1: and through the WCTU women waged in an effective total abstinence
- 4:02Speaker 1: campaign brought into the suffrage movement by Francis Willard under
- 4:08Speaker 1: the slogan for God and Home and Country. These women
- 4:12Speaker 1: quickly sense the value of their votes to the Temperance cause.
- 4:17Speaker 1: Nor was Susan slow to recognize their importance to her
- 4:21Speaker 1: and her work for they represented an entirely new group
- 4:25Speaker 1: churchwomen who heretofore had been suspicious of and hostile toward
- 4:31Speaker 1: women's rights. Through them, she anticipated a powerful impetus for
- 4:36Speaker 1: her cause. With admiration she had watched Francis Willard's career.
- 4:43Speaker 1: This vivid, consecrated young woman was a born leader, quick
- 4:47Speaker 1: to understand women's need of the vote, and eager to
- 4:51Speaker 1: lead women forward. It was a disappointment, however, when she
- 4:56Speaker 1: joined the American rather than the National Woman's Suffrage Association.
- 5:02Speaker 1: The reasons for this, Susan readily understood were Francis Willard's
- 5:07Speaker 1: warm friendship with Mary Livermore and her own preference for
- 5:12Speaker 1: the American's state by state method, similar to that she
- 5:16Speaker 1: had so successfully followed in her w C. T U. Yet,
- 5:21Speaker 1: Francis Willard whenever she could, cooperated with Susan, whom she
- 5:26Speaker 1: admired and loved, and through the years these two great
- 5:30Speaker 1: leaders valued and respected each other, even though they frequently
- 5:35Speaker 1: differed over policy and method Susan, for example, was often
- 5:41Speaker 1: troubled because woman's suffrage and temperance were more and more
- 5:46Speaker 1: linked together in the public mind, thus confusing the issues
- 5:51Speaker 1: and arousing the hostility of those who might have been
- 5:54Speaker 1: friendly toward woman's suffrage had they not feared that woman's
- 5:58Speaker 1: votes would bring in pro phibition. She did her best
- 6:02Speaker 1: to make it clear to her audiences that she did
- 6:05Speaker 1: not ask for the ballot in order that women might
- 6:08Speaker 1: vote against saloons and for prohibition. She demanded only that
- 6:14Speaker 1: women have the same right as men to express their
- 6:17Speaker 1: opinions at the polls. Such an attitude was hard for
- 6:22Speaker 1: many Temperance women to understand and to forgive. Over women's
- 6:27Speaker 1: support of specific political parties, Susan and Francis Willard were
- 6:33Speaker 1: never able to agree. Susan had never been willing to
- 6:38Speaker 1: ally herself with a minority party. Therefore, to Francis Willard's disappointment,
- 6:45Speaker 1: she withheld her support from the Prohibition Party in eighteen
- 6:49Speaker 1: eighty although their platform acknowledged women's need of the ballot
- 6:54Speaker 1: and directed them to use it to settle the liquor question,
- 6:58Speaker 1: and in eighteen eighty four, when they recommended state suffrage
- 7:02Speaker 1: for women. Finding women eager to support the Prohibitionists and
- 7:07Speaker 1: gratitude for these inadequate planks, Susan even issued a statement
- 7:13Speaker 1: urging them to support the Republicans who held out the
- 7:17Speaker 1: most hope to them. Even if women's suffrage had not
- 7:20Speaker 1: been mentioned in their platform, their experience in Washington had
- 7:25Speaker 1: proved to her the friendliness and loyalty of individual Republicans,
- 7:31Speaker 1: and she was unwilling to jeopardize their support. Her judgment
- 7:36Speaker 1: was confirmed during the next few years when friendly Republicans
- 7:41Speaker 1: spoke for women's suffrage in the Senate, and when in
- 7:45Speaker 1: eighteen eighty seven, the Woman's Suffrage Amendment was debated and
- 7:50Speaker 1: voted on in the Senate. In the Senate gallery, eagerly listening,
- 7:55Speaker 1: Susan took notice that the sixteen votes cast for them
- 8:00Speaker 1: were those of Republicans still hoping to win. Susan's endorsement
- 8:06Speaker 1: of the Prohibition Party in eighteen eighty eight, Francis Willard
- 8:10Speaker 1: asked her to outline what kind of plank would satisfy her.
- 8:16Speaker 1: Do you mean so satisfy me? Susan replied that I
- 8:20Speaker 1: would work and recommend to all women to work for
- 8:24Speaker 1: the success of the third party ticket. Not until a
- 8:28Speaker 1: third party gets into power, which promises a larger percent
- 8:33Speaker 1: of representatives on the floor of Congress and in the
- 8:37Speaker 1: several state legislatures, who will speak and vote for women's enfranchisement,
- 8:43Speaker 1: then does the Republican shall I work for it? You see,
- 8:48Speaker 1: as yet there is not a single Prohibitionist in Congress,
- 8:53Speaker 1: while there are at least twenty Republicans on the floor
- 8:56Speaker 1: of the United States Senate, besides fully one half of
- 9:01Speaker 1: the members of the House of Representatives who are in
- 9:04Speaker 1: favor of woman's suffrage. I do not propose to work
- 9:09Speaker 1: for the defeat of the party, which thus far has
- 9:12Speaker 1: furnished nearly every vote in that direction. Nor was she
- 9:17Speaker 1: lured away when in eighteen eighty eight the Prohibition Party
- 9:22Speaker 1: endorsed women's suffrage and granted Francis Willard the honor of
- 9:27Speaker 1: addressing its convention and serving on the Resolutions Committee. The
- 9:32Speaker 1: temperance issue also cropped up in the annual Washington conventions
- 9:38Speaker 1: of the National Woman's Suffrage Association, preparations for which Susan
- 9:43Speaker 1: now left to Rachel Foster, May Wright Sewell, a capable
- 9:48Speaker 1: young recruit from Indiana, and Jane Spofford. However, she still
- 9:54Speaker 1: supervised these conventions, prodding and interfering in what she called
- 9:59Speaker 1: her most Andrew Jackson like manner, she always returned to
- 10:04Speaker 1: Washington with excitement and pleasure, and with the hope of
- 10:08Speaker 1: some outstanding victory, and the suite at the Riggs House
- 10:12Speaker 1: given her by generous Jane Spofford, was a delight after
- 10:17Speaker 1: months of hard travel in the West. I shall come
- 10:21Speaker 1: both ragged and dirty, she wrote Missus Spofford in eighteen
- 10:25Speaker 1: eighty seven. Though the apparel will be tattered and torn,
- 10:30Speaker 1: the mind, the essence of me is sound to the core.
- 10:35Speaker 1: Please tell the little Milliner to have a bonnet picked
- 10:38Speaker 1: out for me, and get a dressmaker who will patch
- 10:42Speaker 1: me together, so that I shall be presentable, open to
- 10:46Speaker 1: all women, irrespective of race or creed. The National Woman's
- 10:51Speaker 1: Suffrage Association attracted fearless, independent, devoted members. They welcomed Mormon
- 10:58Speaker 1: women into the fold, and when the bill to disfranchise
- 11:02Speaker 1: Mormon women as a punishment for polygamy was before Congress
- 11:07Speaker 1: in eighteen eighty seven, they did their utmost to help
- 11:11Speaker 1: Mormon women retain the vote, but were defeated. They welcomed
- 11:16Speaker 1: as well many temperance advocates. A few delegates, however, among
- 11:21Speaker 1: them Missus Stanton, Missus Gage, and Missus Colby, scorned what
- 11:26Speaker 1: they called the singing and Praying Temperance group and protested
- 11:32Speaker 1: that temperance and religion were getting too strong a hold
- 11:36Speaker 1: on the organization. Abigail done Away from Oregon contended that
- 11:41Speaker 1: suffragists should not join forces with temperance groups and blamed
- 11:47Speaker 1: the defeat of women's suffrage in Oregon, Idaho, and Washington
- 11:52Speaker 1: in eighteen eighty seven on men's fear that women would
- 11:56Speaker 1: vote for prohibition. Often, Susan was obliged to act as
- 12:02Speaker 1: arbiter between the temperance and non temperance groups. She did
- 12:07Speaker 1: not underestimate the momentum which the well organized WCTU had
- 12:13Speaker 1: already given the suffrage cause, particularly in states where the
- 12:18Speaker 1: National Association had only a few and scattered workers. She
- 12:23Speaker 1: needed and wanted the help of these temperance women, and
- 12:27Speaker 1: of Francis Willard's forceful and winning personality. She also saw
- 12:32Speaker 1: the importance of breaking down with Francis Willard's aid the
- 12:36Speaker 1: slow yielding opposition of the church. Occasionally, enthusiastic workers undertook
- 12:45Speaker 1: projects which to her seemed unwise. She told them frankly
- 12:49Speaker 1: how she felt and left it at that, But most
- 12:53Speaker 1: of them had to learn by experience. When Bellevill Lockwood,
- 12:58Speaker 1: one of her most able colleagues in Washington, accepted the
- 13:02Speaker 1: nomination for President of the United States offered her by
- 13:06Speaker 1: the Women of California in eighteen eighty four and by
- 13:10Speaker 1: the Women of Iowa in eighteen eighty eight through their
- 13:13Speaker 1: Equal Rights Party. She did not lend her support or
- 13:17Speaker 1: that of the National Association, but followed her consistent policy
- 13:23Speaker 1: of no alignment with a minority party. Nevertheless, she heartily
- 13:28Speaker 1: believed in women's right an ability to hold the highest
- 13:32Speaker 1: office in the land. Ever since her trip to Europe
- 13:37Speaker 1: in eighteen eighty three, Susan had been planning for an
- 13:41Speaker 1: international gathering of women. Interest in this project was kept
- 13:46Speaker 1: alive among European women by missus Stanton during her frequent
- 13:51Speaker 1: visits with her daughter Harriet in England and her son
- 13:55Speaker 1: Theodore in France. It was Susan, however, who put the
- 14:00Speaker 1: machinery and motion through the National Woman's Suffrage Association and
- 14:05Speaker 1: issued a call for an international conference in Washington in
- 14:10Speaker 1: March eighteen eighty eight to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of
- 14:15Speaker 1: the First Women's Rights Convention. Ten thousand invitations were sent
- 14:20Speaker 1: out to organizations of women in all parts of the world,
- 14:25Speaker 1: to professional business and reform groups, as well as to
- 14:30Speaker 1: those advocating political and civil rights for women, and an
- 14:34Speaker 1: ambitious program was prepared. Most of the work for the conference,
- 14:40Speaker 1: and the raising of thirteen thousand dollars to finance it,
- 14:44Speaker 1: fell upon the shoulders of Susan, Rachel Foster, and May
- 14:49Speaker 1: Wright Sewell, but they also had the enthusiastic cooperation of
- 14:54Speaker 1: Francis Willard, who, with her nationwide contacts, was of inestimable
- 15:00Speaker 1: value an arousing interest among the many and varied women's
- 15:04Speaker 1: organizations and the labor groups. Another happy development was Clara
- 15:10Speaker 1: Colby's decision to publish her Women's Tribune in Washington during
- 15:15Speaker 1: the conference. Missus Colby's Tribune, established in Beatrice, Nebraska in
- 15:21Speaker 1: eighteen eighty three, had since then met in a measure
- 15:25Speaker 1: Susan's need for a paper for the National Association, and
- 15:29Speaker 1: she welcomed its transfer to Washington. Women from all parts
- 15:34Speaker 1: of the world assembled in all Baugh's Opera House in
- 15:38Speaker 1: Washington for the Epoch Making International Conference, which opened on Sunday,
- 15:44Speaker 1: March twenty fifth, eighteen eighty eight, with religious services conducted
- 15:49Speaker 1: entirely by women, as if to prove to the world
- 15:53Speaker 1: that women in the pulpit were appropriate and adequate fifty
- 15:58Speaker 1: three national organisms sent representatives and delegates came from England, France, Norway, Denmark, Finland, India,
- 16:09Speaker 1: and Canada. Presiding over all sixteen sessions. Susan rejoiced over
- 16:16Speaker 1: a record attendance. Her thoughts went back to the winter
- 16:19Speaker 1: of eighteen fifty four, when she and Ernestine Rose had
- 16:24Speaker 1: held their first women's rights meetings in Washington, finding only
- 16:29Speaker 1: a handful ready to listen. The intervening thirty four years
- 16:34Speaker 1: had worked, wonders. Now women were willing to travel not
- 16:39Speaker 1: only across the continent, but from Europe and Asia to
- 16:43Speaker 1: discuss and demand equal educational advantages, equal opportunities for training
- 16:49Speaker 1: in the professions and in business, equal pay for equal work,
- 16:55Speaker 1: equal suffrage, and the same standard of morals for all.
- 17:00Speaker 1: Aware of their responsibility to their countries, they asked for
- 17:04Speaker 1: the tools, education, and the franchise to help solve the
- 17:09Speaker 1: world's problems. They were listened to with interest and respect,
- 17:14Speaker 1: and were received at the White House by President and
- 17:17Speaker 1: Missus Cleveland. Through it all, a dynamic, gray haired woman
- 17:22Speaker 1: and a black silk dress with a red shawl about
- 17:26Speaker 1: her shoulders was without question the heroine of the occasion.
- 17:32Speaker 1: This lady observed the Baltimore Son Daily grows upon all present.
- 17:38Speaker 1: The Woman's suffragists love her for her good works, the
- 17:42Speaker 1: audience for her brightness and wit, and the multitude of
- 17:46Speaker 1: press representatives for her frank, plain, open, business like way
- 17:52Speaker 1: of doing everything connected with the Council. Her word is
- 17:56Speaker 1: the parliamentary law of the meeting. Whatever she says is
- 18:01Speaker 1: done without murmur or dissent. A permanent International Council of Women,
- 18:08Speaker 1: to meet once every five years, was organized, with Millicent
- 18:12Speaker 1: Garrett Fawcett of England as president, and a National Council
- 18:17Speaker 1: to meet every three years was formed as an affiliate,
- 18:21Speaker 1: with Francis Willard as president and Susan as Vice President.
- 18:25Speaker 1: At large, emphasizing education and social and moral reform, the
- 18:32Speaker 1: International Council did not rank suffrage first, as Susan had hoped. Nevertheless,
- 18:38Speaker 1: she was happy that an international movement of enterprising women
- 18:43Speaker 1: was well on its way. They would learn by experience
- 18:48Speaker 1: of all the favorable results of the International Council of Women.
- 18:53Speaker 1: Two were of special importance to Susan. Meeting Anna Howard
- 18:58Speaker 1: Shaw and overtures from Lucy Stone for a union of
- 19:03Speaker 1: the National and American woman Suffrage associations prejudiced against Anna
- 19:10Speaker 1: Howard Shaw, who had aligned herself with Mary Livermore and
- 19:14Speaker 1: Lucy Stone, and who she assumed was a narrow Methodist minister.
- 19:20Speaker 1: Susan was unprepared to find that the pleasing young woman
- 19:23Speaker 1: in the pulpit on the first day of the conference,
- 19:27Speaker 1: holding her audience spellbound with her oratory, was Anna howard Shaw.
- 19:33Speaker 1: Here was a warm personality, a crusader eager to right
- 19:38Speaker 1: human wrongs, and above all, a matchless public speaker. Anna
- 19:43Speaker 1: too had heard much criticism of Susan and had formed
- 19:48Speaker 1: a distorted opinion of her, which was quickly dispelled as
- 19:52Speaker 1: she watched her preside. They liked each other the moment
- 19:55Speaker 1: they met. Anna Howard Shaw had grown up on the
- 20:00Speaker 1: Michigan Frontier, her indomitable spirit and her eagerness for learning,
- 20:06Speaker 1: conquering the hardships and the limitations of her surroundings. Encouraged
- 20:11Speaker 1: by Mary Livermore, who by chance lectured in her little town,
- 20:16Speaker 1: she worked her way through Albion College and Boston University
- 20:20Speaker 1: Theological School, from which she graduated in eighteen seventy eight.
- 20:26Speaker 1: She then served as the pastor of two Cape Cod churches,
- 20:30Speaker 1: but was refused ordination by the Methodist Episcopal Church because
- 20:36Speaker 1: of her sex. Eventually she was ordained by the Methodist
- 20:40Speaker 1: Protestant Church. During her pastorate, she studied medicine at Boston University,
- 20:48Speaker 1: and because of her ability as a speaker, was in
- 20:51Speaker 1: demand as a lecturer for temperance and women's suffrage groups.
- 20:56Speaker 1: Through the Massachusetts Women's Suffrage Association, she met an inspiring
- 21:01Speaker 1: group of reformers, and their influence and that of Francis Willard,
- 21:06Speaker 1: in whose work she was intensely interested, led her to
- 21:10Speaker 1: leave the ministry for active work in the temperance and
- 21:14Speaker 1: women's suffrage movements. After several years as a lecturer and
- 21:18Speaker 1: organizer for the Massachusetts Women's Suffrage Association, she was placed
- 21:24Speaker 1: at the head of the Franchise department of the WCTU.
- 21:29Speaker 1: This was her work when she met Susan B. Anthony.
- 21:33Speaker 1: The more Susan talked with Anna, the better she liked her,
- 21:37Speaker 1: and the feeling was mutual. This wholesome woman of forty one,
- 21:42Speaker 1: with abundant vitality, unmarried and without pressing family ties to
- 21:48Speaker 1: divert her, seemed particularly well fitted to assist Susan in
- 21:53Speaker 1: the arduous campaigns which lay ahead. A natural orator, she could,
- 21:59Speaker 1: in a measure, take the place of missus Stanton, who
- 22:02Speaker 1: could no longer undertake Western tours. Before the International Council adjourned,
- 22:09Speaker 1: Susan had Anna's promise that she would lecture for the
- 22:13Speaker 1: National Association. One of Susan's nieces, Lucy E. Anthony, also
- 22:20Speaker 1: felt drawn to Anna after meeting her at the International Council.
- 22:25Speaker 1: A warm friendship quickly developed and continued throughout their lives.
- 22:31Speaker 1: Within a few years they were living together, Lucy serving
- 22:35Speaker 1: as Anna's secretary and planning her lecture tours and campaign trips.
- 22:41Speaker 1: Educated in Rochester through the help of her aunts Susan
- 22:45Speaker 1: and Mary, living in their home and loving them both,
- 22:49Speaker 1: Lucy readily made their interests her own and devoted her
- 22:53Speaker 1: life to the suffrage movement. Neither a public speaker nor
- 22:58Speaker 1: a campaigner, she put her executive ability to work, and
- 23:02Speaker 1: her tasks, though less spectacular, were important and freed both
- 23:07Speaker 1: Susan and Anna from many details. Just as the International
- 23:13Speaker 1: Council of Women had broken down, Anna Howard Shaw's prejudice
- 23:18Speaker 1: regarding Susan B. Anthony and her National Woman's Suffrage Association
- 23:24Speaker 1: just so it clarified the opinions of the other young women,
- 23:28Speaker 1: now aligning themselves with the cause. Admiring the leaders of
- 23:33Speaker 1: both factions, these young women saw no reason why the
- 23:37Speaker 1: two groups should not work together in one large, strong, organization,
- 23:43Speaker 1: and this seemed increasingly important as they welcomed women from
- 23:47Speaker 1: other countries to this first international conference. Unfamiliar with the
- 23:53Speaker 1: personal antagonisms and the sincere differences in policy which had
- 23:58Speaker 1: caused the separation ACA after the Civil War, they did
- 24:02Speaker 1: not understand the difficulties still in the way of union.
- 24:06Speaker 1: So strongly, however, did they press for a united front
- 24:11Speaker 1: that the leaders of both groups felt themselves swept along
- 24:15Speaker 1: toward that goal. Susan herself had long looked forward to
- 24:20Speaker 1: the time when all suffragists would again work together, but
- 24:25Speaker 1: since the unsuccessful overtures of her group in eighteen seventy,
- 24:29Speaker 1: she had made no further efforts in that direction. She
- 24:34Speaker 1: was completely taken by surprise when, in the fall of
- 24:37Speaker 1: eighteen eighty seven, the American Association proposed that she and
- 24:42Speaker 1: Lucy Stone confer regarding union. The negotiations revived old arguments
- 24:50Speaker 1: in the minds of zealous partisans, and in the Women's
- 24:54Speaker 1: journal The Woman's Tribune and elsewhere. Attempts were made to
- 24:59Speaker 1: fasten the blame for the twenty year old rift upon
- 25:02Speaker 1: this one and that one, but so strong ran the
- 25:06Speaker 1: tide for union among the younger women that this excursion
- 25:10Speaker 1: into the past aroused little interest. The election of the
- 25:15Speaker 1: president of the merged organizations was the most difficult hurdle.
- 25:20Speaker 1: Lucy Stone suggested that neither she missus Stanton, nor Susan
- 25:26Speaker 1: allow their names to be proposed, since they had been
- 25:29Speaker 1: blamed for the division, But this was easier said than done.
- 25:34Speaker 1: The clamor for Susan and missus Stanton was so strong
- 25:39Speaker 1: and continuous among the younger members that it soon became
- 25:43Speaker 1: apparent that unless one or the other were chosen, there
- 25:47Speaker 1: would be no hope of union. The odds were in
- 25:51Speaker 1: Susan's favor. Her popularity in the National Association was tremendous.
- 25:57Speaker 1: Although Missus Stanton was revered as the mother of woman's
- 26:01Speaker 1: suffrage and admired for her brilliant mind and her poise
- 26:05Speaker 1: as presiding officer, she now spent so much time in
- 26:09Speaker 1: Europe with her daughter Harriet, that many who might otherwise
- 26:13Speaker 1: have voted for her felt that the office should go
- 26:16Speaker 1: to Susan, who was always on the job. Most of
- 26:21Speaker 1: the American Association regarded Susan as safer and less radical
- 26:26Speaker 1: than Missus Stanton, less likely to stray from the straight
- 26:30Speaker 1: path of women's suffrage, and Henry Blackwell recommended her election.
- 26:37Speaker 1: Susan did not want the presidency. She wanted it for
- 26:40Speaker 1: Missus Stanton, who had headed the National Association so ably
- 26:45Speaker 1: for so many years. She pleaded earnestly with the delegates
- 26:50Speaker 1: of the National Association. I will say to every woman
- 26:56Speaker 1: who is a National and who has any love for
- 26:59Speaker 1: the Old Association or for Susan B. Anthony, that I
- 27:03Speaker 1: hope you will not vote for her for president. Don't
- 27:08Speaker 1: you vote for any human being but Missus Stanton. When
- 27:13Speaker 1: the division was made twenty two years ago, it was
- 27:16Speaker 1: because our platform was too broad, because Missus Stanton was
- 27:21Speaker 1: too radical. And now if missus Stanton shall be deposed,
- 27:26Speaker 1: you virtually degrade her. I want our platform to be
- 27:31Speaker 1: kept broad enough for the infidel, the atheist, the Mohammadan,
- 27:36Speaker 1: or the Christian. These are their broad principles I want
- 27:41Speaker 1: you to stand upon. When the two organizations met in
- 27:46Speaker 1: February eighteen ninety to affect formal union as the National
- 27:51Speaker 1: American Woman Suffrage Association. Elizabeth K. D. Stanton was elected
- 27:57Speaker 1: president by a majority of fourty votes, while Susan was
- 28:02Speaker 1: the almost unanimous choice for vice president at large. With
- 28:07Speaker 1: Lucy Stone chosen chairman of the executive committee, Jane Spofford treasurer,
- 28:14Speaker 1: and Rachel Foster and Alice Stone Blackwell secretaries, the new
- 28:19Speaker 1: organization was well equipped with able leaders for the work ahead.
- 28:24Speaker 1: It was dedicated to work for both state and federal
- 28:28Speaker 1: women's suffrage amendments, and its official organ would be the
- 28:32Speaker 1: Woman's Journal. Susan now faced the future with gratitude that
- 28:38Speaker 1: a strong, unified organization could be handed down to the
- 28:42Speaker 1: younger women who would gradually take over the work she
- 28:46Speaker 1: had started, and her confidence in these young women grew
- 28:50Speaker 1: day by day. Working closely with Rachel Foster and May
- 28:55Speaker 1: Wright Sewell, she knew their caliber. Anna Howe Lord Shaw
- 29:00Speaker 1: and Alice Stone Blackwell showed great promise, and Harriet Stanton
- 29:06Speaker 1: Blatch was living up to her expectations. In England, where
- 29:11Speaker 1: Harriet had made her home since her marriage in eighteen
- 29:14Speaker 1: eighty two, she was active in the cause, and on
- 29:18Speaker 1: her visits to her mother in New York. She kept
- 29:21Speaker 1: in touch with the suffrage movement in the United States.
- 29:25Speaker 1: She took part in the Union meeting, and in her
- 29:28Speaker 1: diary Susan recorded these words of commendation. Harriet said, but
- 29:35Speaker 1: a few words, yet showed herself worthy of her mother
- 29:39Speaker 1: and her mother's life long friend and co worker. It
- 29:43Speaker 1: was a proud moment for me to such she could
- 29:48Speaker 1: entrust her beloved cause. End of Chapter twenty one.