Miss Anthony received many pleasant letters after the council; among them one from her friend Mrs. Samuel E. Sewall, of Boston, in which she said: "We want to congratulate you upon the very satisfactory and gratifying result of the council. I hear from the delegates on all sides most enthusiastic accounts of the whole affair, and of your wonderful powers and energy. Mr. Blackwell is loud in your praise. All this might be expected from the delegates, but what pleases me still more is the respectful tone of nearly all the newspapers. Even the sneering Nation has admitted an article in praise of the council." In all Miss Anthony's own letters there was not the slightest reference to any feeling of fatigue or desire for rest, but she seemed only to be stimulated to greater energy. It was impossible for her to respond to half the invitations which came from all parts of the country, but usually she selected the places where she felt herself most needed, without any regard to her own pleasure or comfort. She did, however, accept a cordial invitation to attend the annual Boston Suffrage Festival, and was royally entertained for several days.
On the afternoon of June 9, Central Music Hall, Chicago, was packed with an audience of representative men and women. Frances E. Willard presided,[43] prayer was offered by Rev. Florence Kollock, and Mrs. Ormiston Chant gave a wonderfully electric address on the "Moral Relations of Men and Women to Each Other." She was followed by Dr. Kate Bushnell in a thrilling talk on "Legislation as it Deals with Social Purity." Miss Anthony closed the program with a ringing speech showing the need of the ballot in the hands of women to remedy such evils as had been depicted by the other speakers. No abstract can give an idea of her magnetic force when profoundly stirred by such recitals as had been made at this meeting.
A few days afterwards a largely-attended reception was given by the Woman's Club of Chicago to Miss Anthony, Isabella Beecher Hooker and Baroness Gripenberg, of Finland.
In the summer of 1888, the National Association as usual sent delegates to each of the presidential conventions, asking for a suffrage plank, and as usual they were ignored by Republicans and Democrats. Miss Anthony and Mrs. Hooker had headquarters in the parlors of Mrs. Celia Whipple Wallace, at the Sherman House, Chicago, during the Republican convention in June. They issued an open letter citing the record of the party in regard to women, and asking for recognition, but received no consideration. In the Woman's Tribune, Miss Anthony made this forcible statement:
Had the best representative suffrage women of every State in the Union been in Chicago, established in national headquarters, working with the men of their State delegations, as well as with the resolution committee, I have not a doubt that the Republican platform would have contained a splendid plank, pledging the party to this broad and true interpretation of the Constitution. Every other reform had its scores and hundreds of representatives here, pleading for the incorporation of its principles in the platform and working for the nomination of the men who would best voice their plans. Women never will be heard and heeded until they make themselves a power, irresistible in numbers and strength, moral, intellectual and financial, in all the formative gatherings of the parties they would influence. Therefore, I now beg of our women not to lose another opportunity to be present at every political convention during this summer, to urge the adoption of woman suffrage resolutions and the nomination of men pledged to support them. "Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty" for women as well as for men.
From Chicago Miss Anthony went directly to Indianapolis and, with Mrs. Sewall, called at the Harrison residence. She says: "We met a most cordial reception and while the general did not declare himself in favor of woman's enfranchisement, he expressed great respect for those who are seeking it." The two ladies then addressed an open letter to General Harrison, urging that in accepting the nomination he would interpret as including women that plank in the Republican platform which declared: "We recognize the supreme and sovereign right of every lawful citizen to cast one free ballot in all public elections and to have that ballot duly counted;"[44] but this reasonable request was politely ignored.
Sarah Knox Goodrich and Ellen Clark Sargent, of California, sent the following telegram to their fellow-citizen, Morris M. Estee, chairman of the National Republican Convention: "Please ascertain, for many interested women, if the clause in the platform concerning the sovereign right of every lawful citizen to a free ballot, includes the women of the United States." To this Mr. Estee telegraphed reply, "I do not think the platform is so construed here." This ended the battle of 1888, as far as women were concerned, and those who might have been the ablest advocates which any political party could put upon its platform were relegated to silence during the campaign.
On August 7, Miss Anthony and Mrs. Stanton spoke at Byron Center, and were entertained by Mrs. Newton Green. Miss Anthony addressed a large audience at Jamestown on the 10th and was the guest of Mrs. Reuben E. Fenton. During part of the summer, for a little recreation, she took hold of the great heterogeneous mass of bills and receipts of the National W. S. A. for the past four years and compiled them into a neat, accurate financial report of seventeen pages, in which every dollar received and disbursed during that time was acknowledged and accounted for, without any "sundries" or other makeshifts for the sake of accuracy. As the total amount reached nearly $18,000, a large part of which had been received in sums of one or two dollars, the labor involved may be appreciated. Miss Anthony did this, as she did many other disagreeable things, not because they were officially her duty, but because they ought to be done and there was no one else ready to undertake them. She always was restive under red tape regulations. For many years she was forced to take the lead in all departments of the suffrage work and when they finally became systematized, with a head at each, she sometimes grew impatient at delay and usurped the functions of others without intending any breach of official etiquette. And so when this financial statement was completed, she published it without waiting for money or authority, and wrote to the national treasurer, Mrs. Spofford, who had recently returned from Europe:
Andrew Jackson-like, I decided to assume the responsibility of sending to each member of the association a copy of the Council Report with one of the National's financial statement. I am writing a personal letter to all, explaining our double keeping of our pledge and asking them to return contributions, if they are able, for this permanent and nice report. I do not know what results in cash will come of it to the National, but I do know that the poorest and hardest-working women who pinched out their dollars to send, think that we promised them therefor this book-report of the council. So all in all I decided, against Miss Foster, Mrs. Stanton and your own dear self, to give each the report, leaving her to do as she feels most comfortable about sending to the treasurer payment in return.
A few days later she writes: "I mailed 800 letters yesterday, and we have sent over 1,500 Reports, with 800 more promised." Could any pen give an adequate idea of the amount of work accomplished by that tireless brain and those never-resting hands?