He then introduced Miss Kate Stanton, of Rhode Island, as one of the fairest daughters of the State. Senator Nye added that she had undertaken to work in a field where strong men often fail, but he trusted, in her case, that she would meet with success. Miss Stanton then came forward, half hesitating, her eyes brilliant with excitement and true carnation in her cheek. This was the second time in her life that she had faced an audience, and the ordeal was quite as much as she could bear. She commenced reading her lecture, and when she became accustomed to her own voice she glided along gracefully, as only a truly gifted woman can. Miss Stanton will be one of the stars in the lecture field if she speaks equally well on other subjects as the one at present under discussion. She has a remarkably clear, fine voice, a most pleasing personal presence, an unusually cultivated mind, and the true vim of a young American woman. It is true she did not give us any new ideas about woman suffrage, but she treated the subject in a natural, girlish way; and if sentiment predominated, it seemed a halo around her head, for young people are romantic, and when they are otherwise, the gloss of youth has gone forever. Miss Stanton’s great point in her so-called argument may be summed up in a few words. The laws made by man are fractional. The woman must be added to make the unit.
After Miss Stanton’s logic was finished, Senator Nye introduced Mr. Riddle. The lawyer went over exactly the same ground traversed in the morning before the Judiciary Committee. It is true he enlarged here, cropped off there, but it was the same thing altogether. He commenced by asserting that women were as broadly and deeply citizens as the men of this nation. That the right of government is a natural right. The right to govern is inherent in the people. That there is no right to be conferred, for there is nothing to confer; and that all who stand in the way would have to get out or else get crushed. Mr. Riddle did not make his case clear, and the audience yawned in his presence for applause.
After he had finished, Mrs. Hooker arose and said she did not agree with Mr. Riddle in his denunciation of men; that women equally were to blame for the state of things. “A great many women say they do not wish the ballot, but I can prove to them that they do wish to vote. There are three vital questions equally dear to every woman’s heart: First, there is temperance. Are women indifferent to this? Then, there is education. Are not all women interested in the manner it shall be brought about, whether it shall be secular or religious, or whether education shall be compulsory or otherwise? And there is a third, of most absorbing interest, and this is chastity. The Bible says, ‘The wages of sin is death.’ Sin is sin, no matter who is the sinner. In England, a country governed by a queen, has been the battle-ground of great strife. It has attempted on behalf of the military to pass laws that should make the passage of vice easy, and the wages of sin not death. By some secret iniquity these laws passed Parliament, and then the attempt was made to include the cities with the military, but such women as Harriet Martineau and Florence Nightingale, as well as those belonging to royal families, went to work to prevent this great wrong. Petitions were gotten up, signed by thousands of the workingmen’s wives and daughters, and these petitions were brought to the feet of Parliament and they have, for a time at least, prevented the wrong. France sends word to England that her downfall in a great measure is owing to her social crimes. This subject is now being agitated in our own country. St. Louis and Cincinnati are shaking with doubts. Would you, women of America, have the passage to iniquity and sin made easy for your husbands and sons? These are the great questions upon you which we are obliged to think and speak.” When Mrs. Hooker finished, a kind of awe took possession of her hearers; and whilst this woman dwelt upon this last subject she spoke with all the force of a Beecher and with the purity and delicacy of an angel.
Olivia.
[AN OPPOSING PETITION.]
Signatures of Notable Ladies Against Granting the Ballot to Women.
Washington, January 13, 1871.
A bitter contest is going on in Washington between the women who do want their rights and those who do not. The following petition has been handed into the Senate, signed by a thousand of our countrywomen.