The Complete History of the Women's Suffrage Movement in U.S.. Jane Addams
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acknowledging our mutual affection by publicly assuming the relationship of husband and wife, yet in justice to ourselves and a great principle, we deem it a duty to declare that this act on our part implies no sanction of, nor promise of voluntary obedience to such of the present laws of marriage, as refuse to recognize the wife as an independent, rational being, while they confer upon the husband an injurious and unnatural superiority, investing him with legal powers which no honorable man would exercise, and which no man should possess. We protest especially against the laws which give to the husband:
1. The custody of the wife's person.
2. The exclusive control and guardianship of their children.
3. The sole ownership of her personal, and use of her real estate, unless previously settled upon her, or placed in the hands of trustees, as in the case of minors, lunatics, and idiots.
4. The absolute right to the product of her industry.
5. Also against laws which give to the widower so much larger and more permanent an interest in the property of his deceased wife, than they give to the widow in that of the deceased husband.
6. Finally, against the whole system by which "the legal existence of the wife is suspended during marriage," so that in most States, she neither has a legal part in the choice of her residence, nor can she make a will, nor sue or be sued in her own name, nor inherit property.
We believe that personal independence and equal human rights can never be forfeited, except for crime; that marriage should be an equal and permanent partnership, and so recognized by law; that until it is so recognized, married partners should provide against the radical injustice of present laws, by every means in their power.
We believe that where domestic difficulties arise, no appeal should be made to legal tribunals under existing laws, but that all difficulties should be submitted to the equitable adjustment of arbitrators mutually chosen.
Thus reverencing law, we enter our protest against rules and customs which are unworthy of the name, since they violate justice, the essence of law.
(Signed), Henry. B. Blackwell,
Lucy Stone.
Worcester Spy, 1855.
To the above The Liberator appended the following:
We are very sorry (as will be a host of others) to lose Lucy Stone, and certainly no less glad to gain Lucy Blackwell. Our most fervent benediction upon the heads of the parties thus united.
This was a timely protest against the whole idea of the old Blackstone code, which made woman a nonentity in marriage. Lucy Stone took an equally brave step in refusing to take her husband's name, respecting her own individuality and the name that represented it. These protests have called down on Mrs. Stone much ridicule and persecution, but she has firmly maintained her position, although at great inconvenience in the execution of legal documents, and suffering the injustice of having her vote refused as Lucy Stone, soon after the bill passed in Massachusetts giving all women the right to vote on the school question.
In 1858, Caroline H. Dall, of Boston, gave a series of literary lectures in different parts of the country, on "Woman's Claims to Education," beginning in her native city. Her subjects were:
Nov. 1st.—The ideal standard of education, depressed by public opinion, but developed by the spirit of the age; Egypt and Algiers.
Nov. 8th.—Public opinion, as it is influenced by the study of the Classics and History, by general literature, newspapers, and customs.
Nov. 15th.—Public opinion as modified by individual lives: Mary Wollstonecroft, Anna Jamieson, Charlotte Bronté, and Margaret Fuller.
In June 11th, of this year, Mrs. Dall writes to the Liberator of her efforts to circulate the following petition:
To the Honorable, the Senate and House of Representatives of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, in General Court assembled:
Whereas, The women of Massachusetts are disfranchised by its State Constitution solely on account of sex.
We do respectfully demand the right of suffrage, which involves all other rights of citizenship, and one that can not justly be withheld, as the following admitted principles of government show:
1st. "All men are born free and equal."
2d. "Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed."
3d. "Taxation and representation are inseparable." We, the undersigned, therefore petition your Honorable Body to take the necessary steps to revise the Constitution so that all citizens may enjoy equal political rights.
NEW ENGLAND CONVENTION.
May 27th, 1859, an enthusiastic Convention was held in Mercantile Hall. Long before the hour announced the aisles, ante-rooms,, and lobbies were crowded. At three o'clock Mrs. Caroline H. Dall called the meeting to order. Mrs. Caroline M. Severance was chosen President. On taking the chair, she said:
This movement enrolls itself among the efforts of the age, and the anniversaries of the week as the most radical, and yet in the best sense the most conservative of them all. It bears the same relation, to all the charities of the day, which strive nobly to serve woman, that the Anti-Slavery movement bears to all superficial palliations of slavery. Like that, it goes beneath effects, and seeks to remove causes. After showing in a very lucid manner the difference in the family institution, when the mother is ignorant and enslaved, and when an educated, harmoniously developed equal, she closed by saying: It will be seen then, that instead of confounding the philosophy of the new movement with theories that claim unlimited indulgence for appetite or passion, the world should recognize in this the only radical cure.... No statement could better define this movement than Tennyson's beautiful stanzas:
The woman's cause is man's; they sink or rise
Together, dwarfed or godlike, bond or free,
If she be small, slight-natured, miserable,
How shall man grow?
The woman is not undeveloped man,
But diverse.
Yet in the long years, liker must they grow; The man be more of woman, she of man: He gain in sweetness and in moral height— She mental breadth, nor fail in childward care, Nor lose the childlike in the larger mind.
And so these twain, upon the skirts of Time
Sit side by side, full-summed in all their powers,
Self-reverent each, and reverencing each;
Distinct in individualities,
But like each other, as are those who love.
Then comes the statelier Eden back to man;
Then reign the world's great bridals, chaste and calm;
Then springs the crowning race of humankind.
And we who are privileged with the poet to foresee this better Eden; we who have
The Future grand and great,—
The safe appeal of Truth to Time,—
adopting the victorious cry of the Crusaders, "God wills it!" may listen to hear above the present din and discord, the stern mandate of His laws, bidding the world "Onward! onward!" and catch the rhythmical reply of all its movements, "We advance."
Mrs. Severance then read an appropriate poem from the pen of Mrs. Sarah Nowell, in which she eulogizes Florence Nightingale, Rosa Bonheur, Harriet Hosmer, and asserts the equality of man and woman in the creation.
Dr. Harriot K. Hunt made some pointed remarks on the education of woman.
The Rev. James Freeman Clarke was then introduced. He said:
I understand the cause advocated on this platform to be an unpopular one. It is a feeble