E. Cady Stanton, President.
Susan B. Anthony, Secretary W. L. N. League, Room 20, Cooper Institute, N. Y.
Office of the Women's Loyal National League }
Room No. 20, Cooper Institute, N. Y., April 7, 1864. }
Dear Friend:—With this you will receive a Form of a Petition to Congress, the object of which you can not mistake nor regard with indifference. To procure on it the largest possible number of adult names, at the earliest practicable moment, it is hoped you will regard as less a duty than a pleasure. Already we have sent one installment of our petition forward, signed by one hundred thousand persons; the presentation of which, by Senator Sumner, produced a marked effect on both Congress and the country. We hope to send a million before the adjournment of Congress, which we shall easily do and even more, if you and the twenty thousand others to whom we have sent petitions will promptly, generously co-operate with us. For nearly three years has the scourge of war desolated us; sweeping away at least three hundred thousand of the strength, bloom, and beauty of our nation. And the war-chariot still rolls onward, its iron wheels deep in human blood! The God, at whose justice Jefferson long ago trembled, has awaked to the woes of the bondmen.
"For the sighing of the oppressed, and for the crying of the needy, now will I arise, saith the Lord." The redemption of that pledge we now behold in this dread Apocalypse of war. Nor should we expect or hope the calamity will cease while the fearful cause of it remains. Slavery has long been our national sin. War is its natural and just retribution. But the war has made it the constitutional right of the Government, as it always has been the moral duty of the people, to abolish slavery. We are, therefore, without excuse, if the solemn duty be not now performed. With us, the people, is the power to achieve the work by our agents in Congress. On us, therefore, rests the momentous responsibility. Shall we not all join then in one loud, earnest, effectual prayer to Congress, which will swell on its ear like the voice of many waters, that this bloody, desolating war shall be arrested and ended, by the immediate and final removal, by Statute Law and amended Constitution, of that crime and curse which alone has brought it upon us? Now surely is our accepted time. On our own heads will be the blood of our thousands slain, if, with the power in our own hands, we do not end that system forever, which is so plainly autographed all over with the Divine displeasure. In the name of justice and of freedom then let us rise and decree the destruction of our destroyer. Let us with myriad voice compel Congress to
"Consign it to remorseless fire!
Watch till the last faint spark expire;
Then strew its ashes on the wind,
Nor leave one atom wreck behind."
Susan B. Anthony, Secretary.
In behalf of the Women's League,