“To the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States:—

“The undersigned, women of the United States above the age of eighteen years, earnestly pray that your honorable body will pass, at the earliest practicable day, an act emancipating all persons of African descent held to involuntary service or labor in the United States.”

There is also a duplicate of the petition, signed by “men above the age of eighteen years.”

It will be perceived that the petition is in rolls. Each roll represents a State. For instance, here is New York with a list of seventeen thousand seven hundred and six names, Illinois with fifteen thousand three hundred and eighty, and Massachusetts with eleven thousand six hundred and forty-one. But I will read the abstract with which I have been furnished.

State.Men.Women.Total.
New York6,51911,18717,706
Illinois6,3828,99815,380
Massachusetts4,2497,39211,641
Pennsylvania2,2596,3668,625
Ohio3,6764,6548,330
Michigan1,7414,4416,182
Iowa2,0254,0146,039
Maine1,2254,3625,587
Wisconsin1,6392,3914,030
Indiana1,0752,5913,666
New Hampshire3932,2612,654
New Jersey8241,7092,533
Rhode Island8271,4512,278
Vermont3751,1831,558
Connecticut3931,1621,555
Minnesota3961,0941,490
West Virginia82100182
Maryland11550165
Kansas8474158
Delaware6770137
Nebraska1320 33
Kentucky21..21
Louisiana..1414
Citizens of the United States living in New Brunswick191736
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34,39965,601100,000

These several petitions are consolidated into one, being another illustration of the motto on our coin,—E pluribus unum.

This unprecedented petition is signed by one hundred thousand men and women, who unite in this unparalleled number to support its prayer. They are from all parts of the country, and from every condition of life: from the seaboard, fanned by the free airs of the ocean, and from the Mississippi and the prairies of the West, fanned by the free airs which vitalize that extensive region; from the families of the educated and uneducated, rich and poor, of every profession, business, and calling in life, representing every sentiment, thought, hope, passion, activity, intelligence, that inspires, strengthens, and adorns our social system. Here they are, a mighty army, one hundred thousand strong, without arms or banners, the advance-guard of a yet larger army.

Though memorable for numbers, these petitioners are more memorable for the prayer in which they unite. They ask nothing less than Universal Emancipation; and this they ask directly at the hands of Congress. No reason is assigned. The prayer speaks. It is simple, positive. So far as it proceeds from the women of the country, it is naturally a petition and not an argument. But I need not remind the Senate that there is no reason so strong as the reason of the heart. Do not all great thoughts come from the heart?

It is not for me at this moment to offer reasons which the one hundred thousand petitioners have forborne. But I may properly add, that, naturally and obviously, they all feel in their hearts, what reason and knowledge confirm, not only that Slavery as a Unit, one and indivisible, is the guilty origin of the Rebellion, but that its influence everywhere, even outside the Rebel States, is hostile to the Union, always impairing loyalty, and sometimes openly menacing the national cause. It requires no difficult logic to conclude that such a monster, wherever it shows its head, is a National Enemy, to be pursued and destroyed as such, or at least a nuisance to the national cause, to be abated as such.