In this connection, I deem it right and proper that I should acknowledge the aid I have received from the public Press—those newspapers whose manliness has prompted them to espouse the cause of woman, by using their columns to help me on in my arduous enterprise. My object can only be achieved, by enlightening the public mind into the need and necessities of the case. The people do not make laws until they see the need of them. Now, when one case is presented showing the need of a law to meet it, and this is found to be a representative case, that is, a case fairly representing an important class, then, and only till then, is the public mind prepared to act efficiently in reference to it. And as the Press is the People’s great engine of power in getting up an agitation on any subject of public interest, it is always a great and desirable object to secure its patronage in helping it forward. This help it has been my good fortune to secure, both in Illinois and Massachusetts.
And my most grateful acknowledgments are especially due the Journal of Commerce of Chicago, also the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Times, the Post, the New Covenant, and the North Western Christian Advocate. All these Chicago Journals aided me more or less in getting up an agitation in Illinois, besides a multitude of other papers throughout that State too numerous to mention.
Some of the papers in Massachusetts, to whom my acknowledgments are due, are the Boston Journal, the Transcript, the Traveller, the Daily Advertiser, the Courier, the Post, the Recorder, the Commonwealth, the Investigator, the Nation, the Universalist, the Christian Register, the Congregationalist, the Banner of Light, and the Liberator. All these Boston Journals have aided me, more or less, in getting up an excitement in Massachusetts, and bringing the subject before the Massachusett’s Legislature. Many other papers throughout the State have noticed my cause with grateful interest.
As the public came to apprehend the merits of my case, and look upon it as a mirror, wherein the laws in relation to married women are reflected, they will doubtless join with me in thanks to these Journals who have been used as means of bringing this light before them.
TESTIMONIALS.
Although my cause, being based in eternal truth, does not depend upon certificates and testimonials to sustain it, and stands therefore in no need of them; yet, as they are sometimes called for, as a confirmation of my statements, I have asked for just such testimonials as the following gentlemen felt self-moved to give me. I needed no testimonials while prosecuting my business in Illinois, for the facts of the case were so well known there, by the papers reporting my trial so generally. I needed no other passport to the confidence of the public.
But when I came to Boston to commence my business in Massachusetts, being an entire stranger there, I found the need of some credentials or testimonials in confirmation of my strange and novel statements. And it was right and proper, under such circumstances, that I should have them. I therefore wrote to Judge Boardman and Hon. S. S. Jones, my personal friends, in Illinois, and told them the difficulty I found in getting my story believed, and asked them to send me anything in the form of a certificate, that they in their judgment felt disposed to send me, that might help me in surmounting this obstacle. Very promptly did these gentlemen respond to my request, and sent me the following testimonials, which were soon printed in several of the Boston papers, with such editorials accompanying them, as gave them additional weight and influence in securing to me the confidence of the public.
Judge Boardman is an old and distinguished Judge in Illinois, receiving, as he justly merits, the highest esteem and confidence of his cotemporaries, as a distinguished scholar, an eminent Judge, and a practical Christian.
Mr. Jones is a middle aged man, of the same stamp as the Judge, receiving proof of the esteem in which he is held by his cotemporaries, in being sent to Congress by vote of Illinois’ citizens, and by having been for successive years a member of the Legislature of that State. He was in that position when he sent me his certificate.