An Introduction to the History of Women's Suffrage E-Book

Susan B. Anthony

• Herausgeber: Renard Press
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 168

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

In 1881, three writers and rights activists, Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Matilda Joslyn Gage, came together to publish the first volume in their groundbreaking History of Woman Suffrage series – a series that eventually went on to fill 5700 pages and lend weight to a movement that changed the course of history for ever. Taking its dedication from the first volume of the History – to the memory of pioneering women whose 'earnest lives and fearless words have been, in the preparation of these pages, a constant inspiration' – this volume collects together four essays that give an insight into the work as a whole, and provide a rounded introduction to the history of women's suffrage on both sides of the Atlantic.

Leseprobe

An Introduction to the History of Women’s Suffrage

susan b. anthony

elizabeth cady stanton

matilda joslyn gage

ida husted harper

milllicent fawcett

renard press

Renard Press Ltd

124 City Road

London EC1V 2NX

United Kingdom

[email protected]

020 8050 2928

www.renardpress.com

‘Preface’, ‘Introduction’, ‘Chapter 1: Preceding Causes’ and ‘Appendix’ first published in The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I in 1881

‘Chapter 51: Progress of the Women’s Movement in the United Kingdom’ and ‘Appendix: Nebraska Men’s Association Opposed to Woman Suffrage’ first published in The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI in 1922

This edition first published by Renard Press Ltd in 2021

Edited text, notes and selection © Renard Press Ltd, 2021

Cover design by Will Dady

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contents

Preface

An Introduction to Women’s Suffrage

Preceding Causes

Appendix

Progress of the Women’s Movement

Appendix

Note on the Text

Notes

note from the publisher

The fight for the enfranchisement of women was a long and tortuous process, and yet it is today (fortunately) something that most are able to take for granted.

In 1881, when Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Matilda Joslyn Gage started to compile their History of Woman Suffrage, this certainly wasn’t the case, and the idea of women and men, irrespective of class and skin colour, voting together and having an equal say in the running of their country was merely the stuff of dreams.

This little volume has as its foundation the opening essays of the first volume of the History, which gives a comprehensive overview of the leading names and battles on the road to enfranchisement (particularly in the United States), and takes in Millicent Fawcett’s essay (from the final volume) on the battles on the British side of the pond, as well as an example of the depths of institutional misogyny these extraordinary women were faced with.

It is our hope that this volume can act as a helpful introduction to and overview of women’s suffrage, and that it can stand as a celebration of the literary and democratic achievement of those who filled the pages of the History.

an introduction to the history of women’s suffrage

‘Governments derive their just powers from the

consent of the governed.’*

Affectionately inscribed to the memory of

Mary Wollstonecraft, Frances Wright, Lucretia Mott, Harriet Martineau, Lydia Maria Child, Margaret Fuller, Sarah and Angelina Grimké, Josephine S. Griffing, Martha C. Wright,

Harriot K. Hunt, MD, Mariana W. Johnson,

Alice and Phebe Cary, Ann Preston, MD,

Lydia Mott, Eliza W. Farnham, Lydia F. Fowler, MD, Paulina Wright Davis,*

whose earnest lives and fearless words in demanding

political rights for women have been,

in the preparation of these pages,

a constant inspiration.

preface

In preparing this work,*our object has been to put into permanent shape the few scattered reports of the Woman Suffrage Movement* still to be found, and to make it an arsenal of facts for those who are beginning to inquire into the demands and arguments of the leaders of this reform. Although the continued discussion of the political rights of woman during the last thirty years forms a most important link in the chain of influences tending to her emancipation, no attempt at its history has been made. In giving the inception and progress of this agitation, we who have undertaken the task have been moved by the consideration that many of our co-workers have already fallen asleep, and that in a few years all who could tell the story will have passed away.

In collecting material for these volumes, most of those of whom we solicited facts have expressed themselves deeply interested in our undertaking, and have gladly contributed all they could, feeling that those identified with this reform were better qualified to prepare a faithful history with greater patience and pleasure than those of another generation possibly could.

A few have replied, ‘It is too early to write the history of this movement – wait until our object is attained; the actors themselves cannot write an impartial history; they have had their discords, divisions, personal hostilities that unfit them for the work.’ Viewing the enfranchisement of woman as the most important demand of the century, we have felt no temptation to linger over individual differences. These occur in all associations, and may be regarded in this case as an evidence of the growing self-assertion and individualism in woman.

Woven with the threads of this history, we have given some personal reminiscences and brief biographical sketches. To the few who, through ill-timed humility, have refused to contribute any of their early experiences, we would suggest that, as each brick in a magnificent structure might have had no special value alone on the roadside, yet, in combination with many others, its size, position, quality becomes of vital consequence; so with the actors in any great reform: though they may be of little value in themselves, as a part of a great movement they may be worthy of mention – even important to the completion of a historical record.

To be historians of a reform in which we have been among the chief actors has its points of embarrassment as well as advantage. Those who fight the battle can best give what all readers like to know: the impelling motives to action; the struggle in the face of opposition; the vexation under ridicule; and the despair in success too long deferred. Moreover, there is an interest in history written from a subjective point of view that may compensate the reader in this case for any seeming egotism or partiality he may discover. As an autobiography is more interesting than a sketch by another, so is a history written by its actors, as in both cases we get nearer the soul of the subject.

We have finished our task, and we hope the contribution we have made may enable some other hand in the future to write a more complete history of ‘the most momentous reform that has yet been launched on the world – the first organised protest against the injustice which has brooded over the character and destiny of one half the human race.’*

an introduction to women’s suffrage

The prolonged slavery of woman is the darkest page in human history. A survey of the condition of the race through those barbarous periods when physical force governed the world, when the motto ‘might makes right’ was the law, enables one to account for the origin of woman’s subjection to man without referring the fact to the general inferiority of the sex, or Nature’s law.

Writers on this question differ as to the cause of the universal degradation of woman in all periods and nations.

One of the greatest minds of the century has thrown a ray of light on this gloomy picture by tracing the origin of woman’s slavery to the same principle of selfishness and love of power in man that has thus far dominated all weaker nations and classes. This brings hope of final emancipation, for as all nations and classes are gradually, one after another, asserting and maintaining their independence, the path is clear for woman to follow. The slavish instinct of an oppressed class has led her to toil patiently through the ages, giving all and asking little, cheerfully sharing with man all perils and privations by land and sea, that husband and sons might attain honour and success. Justice and freedom for herself is her latest and highest demand.

Another writer asserts that the tyranny of man over woman has its roots, after all, in his nobler feelings – his love, his chivalry and his desire to protect woman in the barbarous periods of pillage, lust and war. But wherever the roots may be traced, the results at this hour are equally disastrous to woman. Her best interests and happiness do not seem to have been consulted in the arrangements made for her protection. She has been bought and sold, caressed and crucified at the will and pleasure of her master. But if a chivalrous desire to protect woman has always been the mainspring of man’s dominion over her, it should have prompted him to place in her hands the same weapons of defence he has found to be most effective against wrong and oppression.

It is often asserted that as woman has always been man’s slave – subject, inferior, dependent, under all forms of government and religion – slavery must be her normal condition. This might have some weight had not the vast majority of men also been enslaved for centuries to kings and popes and orders of nobility, who, in the progress of civilisation, have reached complete equality. And did we not also see the great changes in woman’s condition, the marvellous transformation in her character, from a toy in the Turkish harem or a drudge in the German fields to a leader of thought in the literary circles of France, England and America!

In an age when the wrongs of society are adjusted in the courts and at the ballot box, material force yields to reason and majorities.

Woman’s steady march onward, and her growing desire for a broader outlook, prove that she has not reached her normal condition, and that society has not yet conceded all that is necessary for its attainment.

Moreover, woman’s discontent increases in exact proportion to her development. Instead of a feeling of gratitude for rights accorded, the wisest are indignant at the assumption of any legal disability based on sex, and their feelings in this matter are a surer test of what her nature demands than the feelings and prejudices of the sex claiming to be superior. American men may quiet their consciences with the delusion that no such injustice exists in this country as in Eastern nations, though, with the general improvement in our institutions, woman’s condition must inevitably have improved also, yet the same principle that degrades her in Turkey insults her in this republic. Custom forbids a woman there to enter a mosque, or call the hour for prayers; here it forbids her a voice in Church councils or State legislatures. The same taint of her primitive state of slavery affects both latitudes.

The condition of married women, under the laws of all countries, has been essentially that of slaves, until modified, in some respects, within the last quarter of a century in the United States. The change from the old common law of England, in regard to the civil rights of women, from 1848 to the advance legislation in most of the northern states in 1880, marks an era both in the status of woman as a citizen and in our American system of jurisprudence. When the State of New York gave married women certain rights of property,* the individual existence of the wife was recognised, and the old idea that ‘husband and wife are one, and that one the husband’* received its death blow. From that hour the statutes of the several states have been steadily diverging from the old English codes. Most of the western states copied the advance legislation of New York, and some are now even more liberal.

The broader demand for political rights has not commanded the thought its merits and dignity should have secured. While complaining of many wrongs and oppressions, women themselves did not see that the political disability of sex was the cause of all their special grievances, and that to secure equality anywhere, it must be recognised everywhere. Like all disfranchised classes, they began by asking to have certain wrongs redressed, and not by asserting their own right to make laws for themselves.

Overburdened with cares in the isolated home, women had not the time, education, opportunity and pecuniary independence to put their thoughts clearly and concisely into propositions, nor the courage to compare their opinions with one another, nor to publish them to any great extent to the world.

It requires philosophy and heroism to rise above the opinion of the wise men of all nations and races, that to be unknown is the highest testimonial woman can have to her virtue, delicacy and refinement.

A certain odium has ever rested on those who have risen above the conventional level and sought new spheres for thought and action, and especially on the few who demand complete equality in political rights. The leaders in this movement have been women of superior mental and physical organisation, of good social standing and education, remarkable alike for their domestic virtues, knowledge of public affairs and rare executive ability, good speakers and writers, inspiring and conducting the genuine reforms of the day, everywhere exerting themselves to promote the best interests of society; yet they have been uniformly ridiculed, misrepresented and denounced in public and private by all classes of society.

Woman’s political equality with man is the legitimate outgrowth of the fundamental principles of our Government, clearly set forth in the Declaration of Independence in 1776, in the United States Constitution, adopted in 1784, in the prolonged debates on the origin of human rights in the anti-slavery conflict in 1840, and in the more recent discussions of the party in power since 1865,* on the thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth amendments to the national Constitution;* and the majority of our leading statesmen have taken the ground that suffrage is a natural right that may be regulated, but can not be abolished by state law.

Under the influence of these liberal principles of republicanism that pervades all classes of American minds, however vaguely, if suddenly called out, they might be stated: woman readily perceives the anomalous position she occupies in a republic, where the Government and religion alike are based on individual conscience and judgement – where the natural rights of all citizens have been exhaustively discussed, and repeatedly declared equal.

From the inauguration of the Government, representative women have expostulated against the inconsistencies between our principles and practices as a nation. Beginning with special grievances, woman’s protests soon took a larger scope. Having petitioned state legislatures to change the statutes that robbed her of children, wages and property, she demanded that the constitutions – state and national – be so amended as to give her a voice in the laws, a choice in the rulers and protection in the exercise of her rights as a citizen of the United States.

While the laws affecting woman’s civil rights have been greatly improved during the past thirty years, the political demand has made but a questionable progress, though it must be counted as the chief influence in modifying the laws. The selfishness of man was readily enlisted in securing woman’s civil rights, while the same element in his character antagonised her demand for political equality.

Fathers who had estates to bequeath to their daughters could see the advantage of securing to woman certain property rights that might limit the legal power of profligate husbands.

Husbands in extensive business operations could see the advantage of allowing the wife the right to hold separate property, settled on her in times of prosperity, that might not be seized for his debts. Hence in the several states able men championed these early measures. But political rights, involving in their last results equality everywhere, roused all the antagonism of a dominant power against the self-assertion of a class hitherto subservient. Men saw that, with political equality for woman, they could no longer keep her in social subordination, and ‘the majority of the male sex’, says John Stuart Mill, ‘can not yet tolerate the idea of living with an equal.’* The fear of a social revolution thus complicated the discussion. The Church, too, took alarm, knowing that with the freedom and education acquired in becoming a component part of the Government, woman would not only outgrow the power of the priesthood and religious superstitions, but would also invade the pulpit, interpret the Bible anew from her own standpoint and claim an equal voice in all ecclesiastical councils. With fierce warnings and denunciations from the pulpit, and false interpretations of scripture, women have been intimidated and misled, and their religious feelings have been played upon for their more complete subjugation. While the general principles of the Bible are in favour of the most enlarged freedom and equality of the race, isolated texts have been used to block the wheels of progress in all periods; thus bigots have defended capital punishment, intemperance, slavery, polygamy and the subjection of woman. The creeds of all nations make obedience to man the cornerstone of her religious character. Fortunately, however, more liberal minds are now giving us higher and purer expositions of the scriptures.

As the social and religious objections appeared against the demand for political rights, the discussion became many-sided, contradictory and as varied as the idiosyncrasies of individual character. Some said, ‘Man is woman’s natural protector, and she can safely trust him to make laws for her.’ She might with fairness reply, as he uniformly robbed her of all property rights to 1848, ‘He can not safely be trusted with her personal rights in 1880, though the fact that he did make some restitution at last might modify her distrust in the future.’ However, the calendars of our courts still show that fathers deal unjustly with daughters, husbands with wives, brothers with sisters and sons with their own mothers. Though woman needs the protection of one man against his whole sex, in pioneer life, in threading her way through a lonely forest, on the highway or in the streets of the metropolis on a dark night, she sometimes needs, too, the protection of all men against this one. But even if she could be sure, as she is not, of the ever-present, all-protecting power of one strong arm, that would be weak indeed compared with the subtle, all-pervading influence of just and equal laws for all women. Hence woman’s need of the ballot, that she may hold in her own right hand the weapon of self-protection and self-defence.

Again it is said: ‘The women who make the demand are few in number, and their feelings and opinions are abnormal, and therefore of no weight in considering the aggregate judgement on the question.’ The number is larger than appears on the surface, for the fear of public ridicule and the loss of private favours from those who shelter, feed and clothe them withhold many from declaring their opinions and demanding their rights. The ignorance and indifference of the majority of women as to their status as citizens of a republic is not remarkable, for history shows that the masses of all oppressed classes, in the most degraded conditions, have been stolid and apathetic until partial success had crowned the faith and enthusiasm of the few.

The insurrections on Southern plantations were always defeated by the doubt and duplicity of the slaves themselves. That little band of heroes who precipitated the American Revolution in 1776* were so ostracised that they walked the streets with bowed heads, from a sense of loneliness and apprehension. Woman’s apathy to the wrongs of her sex, instead of being a plea for her remaining in her present condition, is the strongest argument against it. How completely demoralised by her subjection must she be who does not feel her personal dignity assailed when all women are ranked in every state constitution with idiots, lunatics, criminals and minors;* when in the name of Justice man holds one scale for woman, another for himself; when by the spirit and letter of the laws she is made responsible for crimes committed against her, while the male criminal goes free;*