The Collected Works. Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Читать онлайн книгу.able to do. If he is bold and ambitious, and desires fame, every avenue is open to him. He may blend science and art, producing a competence for his support, until he chains them to the car of his genius, and, with Fulton and Morse, wins a crown of imperishable gratitude. If he desires to tread the path of knowledge up to its glorious temple-summit, he can, as he pleases, take either of the learned professions as instruments of pecuniary independence, while he plumes his wings for a higher and higher ascent. Not so with woman. Her rights are not recognized as equal; her sphere is circumscribed—not by her ability, but by her sex. If, perchance, her taste leads her to excellence, in the way they give her leave to tread, she is worshiped as almost divine; but if she reaches for laurels they have in view, the wings of her genius are clipped because she is a woman.
Dr. Harriot K. Hunt, of Boston, the first woman who practiced medicine in this country, spoke on the medical education of women.
Sarah Tyndale, a successful merchant in Philadelphia, on the business capacity of woman.
Antoinette L. Brown, a graduate of Oberlin College, and a student in Theology, made a logical argument on woman's position in the Bible, claiming her complete equality with man, the simultaneous creation of the sexes, and their moral responsibilities as individual and imperative.
The debates on the resolutions were spicy, pointed, and logical, and were deeply interesting, continuing with crowded audiences through two entire days. In these debates Lucy Stone, Lucretia Mott, Wendell Phillips, William Henry Channing, Ernestine L. Rose, Frederick Douglass, Martha Mowry, Abby Kelly and Stephen Foster, Elizabeth B. Chase, James N. Buffam, Sojourner Truth, Eliab Capron, and Joseph C. Hathaway, took part. As there was no phonographic reporter present, most of the best speaking, that was extemporaneous, can not be handed down to history.
Among the letters to the Convention, there was one quite novel and interesting from Helene Marie Weber,44 a lady of high literary character, who had published numerous tracts on the Rights of Woman. She contended that the physical development of woman was impossible in her present costume, and that her consequent enfeebled condition made her incapable of entering many of the most profitable employments in the world of work. Miss Weber exemplified her teachings by her practice. She usually wore a dress coat and pantaloons of black cloth; on full-dress occasions, a dark blue dress coat, with plain flat gilt buttons, and drab-colored pantaloons. Her waistcoat was of buff cassimere, richly trimmed with plain, flat-surfaced, gold buttons, exquisitely polished; this was an elegant costume, and one she wore to great advantage. Her clothes were all perfect in their fit, and of Paris make; and her figure was singularly well adapted to male attire. No gentleman in Paris made a finer appearance.
One of the grand results of this Convention was the thought roused in England. A good report of the proceedings in the New York Tribune, for Europe, of October 29, 1850, was read by the future Mrs. John Stuart Mill, then Mrs. Taylor, and at once called out from her pen an able essay in the Westminster and Foreign Quarterly Review, entitled "Enfranchisement of Woman." This attracted the attention of many liberal thinkers, and foremost of these, one of England's greatest philosophers and scholars, the Hon. John Stuart Mill, who became soon after the champion of woman's cause in the British Parliament. The essayist in speaking of this Convention says:
Most of our readers will probably learn, from these pages, for the first time, that there has risen in the United States, and in the most Civilized and enlightened portion of them, an organized agitation, on a new question, new not to thinkers, nor to any one by whom the principles of free and popular government are felt, as well as acknowledged; but new, and even unheard of, as a subject for public meetings, and practical political action. This question is the enfranchisement of women, their admission in law, and in fact, to equality in all rights, political, civil, social, with the male citizens of the community.
It will add to the surprise with which many will receive this intelligence, that the agitation which has commenced is not a pleading by male writers and orators for women, those who are professedly to be benefited remaining either indifferent, or ostensibly hostile; it is a political movement, practical in its objects, carried on in a form which denotes an intention to persevere. And it is a movement not merely for women, but by them....
A succession of public meetings was held, under the name of a "Woman's Rights Convention," of which the President was a woman, and nearly all the chief speakers women; numerously reinforced, however, by men, among whom were some of the most distinguished leaders in the kindred cause of negro emancipation....
According to the report in the New York Tribune, above a thousand persons were present, throughout, and "if a larger place could have been had, many thousands more would have attended."
In regard to the quality of the speaking, the proceedings bear an advantageous comparison with those of any popular movement with which we are acquainted, either in this country or in America. Very rarely in the oratory of public meetings is the part of verbiage and declamation so small, and that of calm good sense and reason so considerable.
The result of the convention was in every respect encouraging to those by whom it was summoned; and it is probably destined to inaugurate one of the most important of the movements toward political and social reform, which are the best characteristic of the present age. That the promoters of this new agitation take their stand on principles, and do not fear to declare these in their widest extent, without time-serving or compromise, will be seen from the resolutions adopted by the Convention45.
After giving an able argument in favor of all the demands made in the Convention with a fair criticism of some of the weak things uttered there, she concludes by saying:
There are indications that the example of America will be followed on this side of the Atlantic; and the first step has been taken in that part of England where every serious movement in the direction of political progress has its commencement—the manufacturing districts of the north. On the 13th of February, 1851, a petition of women, agreed to by a public meeting at Sheffield, and claiming the elective franchise, was presented to the House of Lords by the Earl of Carlisle.
William Henry Channing, from the Business Committee, suggested a plan for organization and the principles that should govern the movement. In accordance with his views a National Central Committee was appointed, in which every State was represented46. Paulina Wright Davis, Chairman; Sarah H. Earle, Secretary; Wendell Phillips, Treasurer.
This Convention was a very creditable one in every point of view. The order and perfection of the arrangements, the character of the papers presented, and the sustained enthusiasm, reflect honor on the men and women who conducted the proceedings. The large number of letters addressed to Mrs. Davis show how extensive had been her correspondence, both in the old world and the new. Her wealth, culture, and position gave her much social influence; her beauty, grace, and gentle manners drew around her a large circle of admiring friends. These, with her tall fine figure, her classic head and features, and exquisite taste in dress; her organizing talent and knowledge of the question under consideration, altogether made her so desirable a presiding officer, that she was often chosen for that position.
THE SECOND NATIONAL CONVENTION IN WORCESTER.
In accordance with a call from the Central Committee, the friends of Woman Suffrage assembled again in Brinley Hall, Oct. 15th and 16th, 1851. At an early hour the house was filled, and was called to order by Paulina Wright Davis, who was again chosen permanent President. This Convention was conducted mainly by the same persons who had so successfully managed the proceedings of the previous year. Mrs. Davis, on taking the chair, gave a brief resumé of the steps of progress during the year, and at the close of her remarks, letters were read from Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry Ward Beecher, Horace Mann, Angelina Grimke Weld, Frances D. Gage, Estelle Anna Lewis, Marion Blackwell, Oliver Johnson, and Eliza Barney, all giving a hearty welcome to the new idea. Mrs. Emma R. Coe, of the Business Committee, called upon Wendell Phillips to read the resolutions