Miss Anthony spoke several times at the noon-hour meetings held in the Woman's Building.[86] Mrs. James P. Eagle, chairman, who edited the report of the noon-hour addresses, wrote her: "I would not take much pleasure in publishing our book if I could not have something from your addresses to go in it. You must not deny me. One of your talks was 'Woman's Influence vs. Political Power,' another 'The Benefits of Organization.' If it is your best and easiest way, make the speeches and employ a stenographer to take them and send me the bill. I can not afford to miss them. You have been so very kind and encouraging to me all along that I shall feel it a Brutus blow if you fail me now." As she never wrote a speech in these days and could not make the same one twice, she was unable to comply with this request.
Miss Anthony was invited to speak at the Press Congress May 27, the day when the religious press as a leader of reforms was under consideration. The managers became very uneasy and began trying to find out how she meant to handle the question. Her only reply was, "I shall speak the truth." The speech, delivered before an audience containing many ministers, caused a tremendous sensation. She took up the reforms, temperance, anti-slavery, woman's rights, labor, and showed conclusively that in every one the church and the religious press, instead of being leaders, were laggards. At the close the chairman remarked apologetically that of course the speaker did not expect people in general to agree with everything she had said. The Chicago Tribune thus finished its report: "As Miss Anthony had an engagement she was obliged to leave at this point, and most of the audience went with her."
The Congress on Government convened August 7 and, at Mr. Bonney's request, Miss Anthony was present at the opening ceremony and responded to an address of welcome in behalf of the civil service commission. Five sessions of this Government Congress were devoted to a discussion of equal suffrage, the speakers being women. The chairman, Hon. Wm. Dudley Foulke, said it was not the intention to give this subject such prominence, but women had shown so much more interest than men, half of them accepting the invitation to take part and only one man in twenty responding, that he was compelled thus to arrange the program.
Soon after the adjournment of the Woman's Congress Miss Anthony left the Palmer House, which had been its headquarters, and, accepting the invitation of Mrs. Lydia Avery Coonley, enjoyed the congenial atmosphere of her beautiful home for a month. At the conclusion of her visit with Mrs. Coonley she went for six weeks with Mr. and Mrs. Sewall, who had taken a large house for the season. This was a social center and the weekly receptions were a prominent feature, bringing together distinguished people from all countries, who were in Chicago, as officials or visitors, during this wonderful summer. While at Mrs. Coonley's Miss Anthony formed two acquaintances who from that date have been among her most valued friends—Mr. and Mrs. Samuel E. Gross. After leaving the Sewalls she spent a delightful month with them at their residence on the Lake Shore drive, where she was surrounded with every luxury which wealth and affection could bestow. This added another to the homes in that city always open to her, and Mrs. Gross often wrote: "Your visits are a sweet benediction to our family."[87]
Among the most elegant of the many social affairs to which she was invited was the luncheon in the great banquet hall of the Hotel Richelieu, given by the officers of the National Council to those of the International, the foreign delegates and a few other guests, 150 in all. May Wright Sewall presided with great dignity and charm over the "after dinner speech-making" of this assemblage of the representative women from the most highly civilized nations of the world, and Miss Anthony sat at her right hand.
Once she went to Harvey and spoke at a camp meeting of 3,000 persons; and later to the Bloomington Chautauqua to give an address; then all the way to Kansas to speak at the State Fair in Topeka and fill a month's lecture engagements. Two weeks she spent in her own home visiting with relatives; then rushed down to Long Island to hurry Mrs. Stanton with her paper; and back again to Chicago to read it for her at the Educational Congress. Many days and evenings were passed among the wealth of attractions on the exposition grounds; and so the summer waxed and waned, one of the longest holidays she ever had known, and yet with not an idle hour through all the four months of delightful associations and cherished acquaintances. She writes in the diary October 30: "This was my last sight of the White City in its full glory by night."
Among the many graceful words of farewell spoken by the press of Chicago, may be quoted the following from the Inter-Ocean, which suggests the strong and graceful pen of Mary H. Krout:
It is pleasant in these reminiscent days when we talk over the glories and delights of the World's Fair, to recall the honors heaped upon Susan B. Anthony. Her personal friends vied with each other in arranging elaborate entertainments of which she was the central figure. There were dinners and luncheons, banquets and receptions, and at each and all the refined and delicate face shone above the board with a beauty and tranquillity far exceeding the mere beauty of youth and faultlessness of feature. It was the beauty of experience, sweetened and purified by success and appreciation....
It must seem a strange contrast to the woman who has worked so perseveringly in the face of untold difficulties—this change that a few years have wrought. It has not been so very long since she was the universal butt of ridicule, lampooned and caricatured, with all that malice, in its coarsest and most brutal form, could suggest. Her age was the favorite theme of the callow witling, her cause a never-failing subject for reproach and abuse. It is all over and done with, thanks to the new race of men which women themselves are training and educating. There are no words for her nowadays but those of praise and affection. She has lived to see truth survive and justice vindicated. Men no longer regard her as the arch-enemy to domestic peace, disseminating doctrines that mean the destruction of home and the disorganization of society. They perceive in her, rather, the advocate of that liberty which knows no limitations either of sex or of condition—a freedom which, achieved, means the incalculable advancement of the race.
In all the assemblages where Miss Anthony was present during those memorable months—the observed of all observers, holding a veritable court—her admirers were both men and women, and no belle at a ball was ever more unmistakably deferred to. It made her happy, as it should have done. But it made far happier those who have believed in her all these years, that she should have triumphed over ignorance and prejudice, and at threescore and ten have come into her kingdom at last. When it is asked what woman was most prominent, most honored, most in demand in all the public ceremonials and private functions held in Chicago during the Columbian Exposition, there can be but one answer—Susan B. Anthony.
Through all the summer and autumn of 1893 a campaign had been going forward in Colorado, where the legislature had submitted the question of woman suffrage to the voters. The national association was represented by Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, who rendered splendid service. Mrs. Leonora Barry Lake spoke under the auspices of the Knights of Labor. The rest of the work was done by the women of Colorado, who proved a host in themselves. Miss Anthony held herself in readiness to go at any time but the friends felt that, unless vitally necessary, she should be spared the hardships. Circumstances were favorable; there had been a vast change in public sentiment since the defeat of 1877; the question was submitted at a time when only county elections were held and there was no political excitement; Populists and Republicans not only endorsed it but worked for it; Democrats offered no party opposition and many of them gave it cordial support; more than half of the newspapers in the State advocated it. The campaign in Colorado differed from all those which had been conducted in other States in the fact that it was not left for women to carry on alone, but the most prominent men in all parties lent their assistance and made the victory possible.[88] The amendment was carried by nearly 6,000 majority, about three to one in favor. Miss Anthony received the telegram announcing the fact November 8, the day after election, and she was the happiest woman in America.