No family in Rochester stood more steadfastly by Miss Anthony during all her long and eventful life than the Wilders—Carter, Samuel, Mrs. Maria Wilder Depuy and D. Webster. The last, in acknowledging the receipt of the books, wrote: "How much you have contributed to history in this grand publication! With woman as a part of humanity, what a revolution will be wrought! Changes everywhere—in social life, in morals, politics, business—and all for the better. In this world-revolution you have done a great work. My children are proud of the fact that you are my personal friend. I fully appreciate your gift. It will be a Bible in my home." From the philanthropist, Sarah B. Cooper, revered for her work in the kindergartens on the Pacific coast, came this tribute:
This book is the fruitage of all the years of your faith and work. It tells of the long preparation—the opening up of the forest; the blazing of the trail; the clearing of the underbrush; the deep sub-soiling; the lying fallow; the ploughing, sowing, harrowing, the patient tillage—and now comes the harvest. What courage, endurance, fidelity and faith! The pioneers of new thoughts and principles are the loneliest of mortals. Those who live ahead of their time must wait for the honors and plaudits of posterity to get their full meed of appreciation and reward. But after all, dear, honored friend, the richest reward of such a life as yours is to have lived it.
The History also was given to the libraries of those towns whose women would raise a certain amount towards various State suffrage campaigns, and in every possible way it always has been used for missionary work.[29]
The first week in 1887, in most inclement weather and against the protest of friends, Miss Anthony went all the way to Nebraska, to keep a promise to Mrs. Colby and other women of that State to attend their annual convention, January 7. She found a pleasant letter awaiting her at Lincoln, from her old friend, Mary Rogers Kimball, daughter of the noted Abolitionist, Nathaniel P. Rogers, and wife of the General Passenger Agent of the Union Pacific R. R., now living at Omaha, which closed: "How I wish you could come to us and rest a few days. Mr. Kimball would welcome you, as would every one of this household. You ought to make our home happy by coming once in a while.... Mother, who is able to walk a little and is interested in all you do and say, sends her love and hopes to see you." She spoke at Chicago, January 13, in the First Methodist church, where she was introduced by the well-known Rev. H. W. Thomas.[30] She went from there to the Michigan convention at Lansing, January 14, and here was presented to the audience by Governor Cyrus G. Luce.
She reached Washington January 17, 1887, and rushed the preparations for the Nineteenth National Convention, which opened on the 25th at the Metropolitan M. E. church. Zerelda G. Wallace gave a noteworthy address; Senator Carey, of Wyoming, made an able speech and Mrs. Carey sat by Miss Anthony during the proceedings. The second day of the convention, January 26, marked a great epoch, the first vote ever taken in Congress on a Sixteenth Amendment. The previous month, December 8, 1886, Henry W. Blair had asked the Senate to consider the following joint resolution: "The rights of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex." He supported this in a long and comprehensive speech covering the whole ground on which the demand is based, quoting from the favorable reports of the judiciary committees, exposing the weakness and fallacy of the objections, and making an unanswerable argument on the justice of granting political liberty to women.
At the urgent request of opposing senators the matter had been postponed until January 25, when it was again called up by Mr. Blair. The opposition was led by Joseph A. Brown, of Georgia, who described in detail the intentions of the Creator when he made woman, and declared that females had not the physical strength to perform military duty, build railroads, raise crops, sit on juries or attend night caucuses, but that God had endowed men with strength and faculties for all these things. He stated that it was a grave mistake to say that woman is taxed without being represented, and added, "It is very doubtful whether the male or the female sex has more influence in the administration of the affairs of government and the enactment of laws!" He asserted that "the baser class of females would rush to the polls, and this would compel the intelligent, virtuous and refined females, including wives and mothers, to relinquish for a time their God-given trust and go, contrary to their wishes, to the polls and vote to counteract the other class;" and followed this by saying that "the ignorant female voters would be at the polls en masse, while the refined and educated, shrinking from public contact, would remain at home." He continued: "The ballot will not protect females against the tyranny of bad husbands, as the latter will compel them to vote as they dictate;" then in the next breath he declared: "Wives will form political alliances antagonistic to the husbands, and the result will be discord and divorce." In his entire speech Senator Brown ignored the existence of unmarried women and widows. He closed with copious extracts from "Letters from a Chimney Corner," written by some Chicago woman.
Senator Dolph, of Oregon, followed in a clear, concise argument, brushing away these sophistries by showing that such evils did not exist where women were enfranchised and voted at every election. He was interrupted by Senator Eustis, of Louisiana, who inquired whether he thought "it would be a decent spectacle to take a mother away from her nursing infant and lock her up all night with a jury?" Senator Dolph replied that there was not a judge in the world who would not excuse a woman under such circumstances, just as there were many causes which exempted men. He continued:
Government is but organized society.... It can only derive its just powers from the consent of the governed, and can be established only under a fundamental law which is self-imposed. Every citizen of suitable age and discretion has, in my judgment, a natural right to participate in its formation. The fathers of the republic enunciated the doctrine "that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights." It is strange that any one in this enlightened age should be found to contend that this is true only of men, and that a man is endowed by his Creator with inalienable rights not possessed by a woman. The lamented Lincoln immortalized the expression that ours is a government "of the people, by the people, and for the people," and yet in reality it is far from that. There can be no government by the people where half of them are allowed no voice in its organization and control.... God speed the day when not only in all the States of the Union and in all the Territories, but everywhere, woman shall stand before the law freed from the last shackle which has been riveted upon her by tyranny, and the last disability which has been imposed upon her by ignorance; not only in respect to the right of suffrage, but in every other respect the peer and equal of her brother, man.
Senator Vest, of Missouri, came to the rescue of Senator Brown and in the course of his speech said: