The first petition brought before the committee in favor of suffrage for women was presented by George William Curtis, of Richmond Co., sent by the friends of Human Progress from their Annual meeting at Waterloo.
Martin I. Townsend next presented a petition from William Johnson, Chairman of the "Colored Men's State Committee," praying for "equal manhood suffrage." Similar petitions, without any concert of action between the parties, were presented simultaneously whenever any discussion arose on the suffrage question. But in this Convention the demands made by the women were more pressing and multitudinous.
Mr. Graves, June 21st, 1867, moved to take up his resolution, "That a committee of five be appointed by the chair to report to the convention at as early a day as possible, whether, in their opinion, a provision should be incorporated in the Constitution authorizing the women in this State to exercise the elective franchise, when they shall ask that right by a majority of all the votes given by female citizens over twenty-one years of age, at an election called for that purpose, at which women alone shall have the right to vote."
Mr. Graves said:—Mr. President. I do not desire at this time to discuss the merits of the resolution; but allow me to suggest that there are four classes of persons interested in the questions involved in it. The first class is what is opprobriously known as "strong-minded women," who claim the right to vote upon the ground that they are interested and identified with ourselves in the stability and permanency of our institutions, and that their property is made liable for the maintenance of our Government, while they have no right to choose the law-makers or select the persons who are to assess the value of their property liable to taxation. They claim that they are not untaught in the science of government to which the right of administration is denied to them.
The second class includes both males and females who sympathize with the first class, and who claim that there is no disparity in the intellect of men and women, when an equal opportunity is afforded by education for progress and advancement. They also claim that our country is diminishing all the time in moral integrity and virtue, and ask that a new element be introduced into our governmental affairs by which crime shall be lessened and the estimate of moral virtue be made higher.
The third class urges that there should be no distinction between males and females in the exercise of the elective franchise, and they claim that it is anti-democratic that there should be a minority in this country to rule its destinies.
There is a fourth class who believe that the right to exercise the elective franchise is not inherent, but permissive, and that the people are the Government, and that this power of the elective franchise is under their immediate control, and they claim the right to become part and parcel of the Government which they help to support and maintain.
Now these four classes, differing in opinion upon this great question, constitute a very large body of worthy, high-minded, and intelligent men and women of this State who have long sought to enlarge the elective franchise, and they claim the deliberate consideration of this body upon the ground of equality, as their innumerable petitions[95] to this Convention fully show. This resolution gives to women themselves the power of discussing and comparing of minds to settle the question whether they will avail themselves of the desired right to exercise the power of voting. And as it differs from all other questions which have originated here with reference to this right of women to vote, I submit it is a proper resolution to be referred to a select committee to be appointed for that purpose.
Mr. Graves' resolution was referred to the Committee on Suffrage.
June 27th Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony were granted a hearing[96] before the Convention, and at the close of their addresses were asked by different members to reply to various objections that readily suggested themselves. Among others, Mr. Greeley said: "Ladies, you will please remember that the bullet and ballot go together. If you vote, are you ready to fight?" "Certainly," was the prompt reply. "We are ready to fight, sir, just as you fought in the late war, by sending our substitutes." The colloquy between the members and the ladies, prolonged until a late hour, was both spicy and instructive.[97] On the 10th of July a hearing was granted to Lucy Stone,[98] which called out deep interest and consideration from the members of that body. Later still, George Francis Train[99] was most cordially received by the Convention.
C. C. Dwight, June 26th, offered a resolution that "The Standing Committee on the Right of Suffrage be instructed to provide for women to vote as to whether they wanted the right to vote after the adoption of the New Constitution.
Mr. Merritt, July 11th, moved that "The question of Woman Suffrage be submitted at the election of 1868 or 1869. Referred to the Committee of the Whole.
Horace Greeley, Chairman of the Committee, in his report, after recommending universal "manhood suffrage," said:
Having thus briefly set forth the considerations which seem to us decisive in favor of the few and moderate changes proposed, we proceed to indicate our controlling reasons for declining to recommend other and in some respects more important innovations. Your committee does not recommend an extension of the elective franchise to women. However defensible in theory, we are satisfied that public sentiment does not demand and would not sustain an innovation so revolutionary and sweeping, so openly at war with a distribution of duties and functions between the sexes as venerable and pervading as government itself, and involving transformations so radical in social and domestic life. Should we prove to be in error on this head, the Convention may overrule us by changing a few words in the first section of our proposed article.
Nor have we seen fit to propose the enfranchisement of boys above the age of eighteen years. The current ideas and usages in our day, but especially in this country, seem already to set too strongly in favor of the relaxation, if not total overthrow of parental authority, especially over half-grown boys. With the sincerest good-will for the class in question, we submit that they may spend the hours which they can spare from their labors and their lessons more usefully and profitably in mastering the wisdom of the sages and philosophers who have elucidated the science of government, than in attendance on midnight caucuses, or in wrangling around the polls.
Albany, June 28, 1867.
Horace Greeley, Chairman, Wm. H. Merrill,
Leslie W. Russell, Geo. Williams.
Mr. Cassidy presented a minority report urging a separate submission of the question of negro suffrage, in which he said:
If the regeneration of political society is to be sought in the incorporation of this element into the constituency, it must be done by the direct and explicit vote of the electors. We are foreclosed from any other course by the repeated action[100] of the State.... It would be unfair to the people to declare that whereas they have again and again refused to accept this change, therefore we will incorporate it into the Constitution, and compel them either to repeal that instrument, or to accept this measure.... As to the extension of suffrage to women, the undersigned reserve, for the present, any expression of opinion.
William Cassidy,
John G. Schumaker.
The petitions[101] for woman suffrage were presented in the Convention until they reached in round numbers 20,000. The morning Mr. Greeley gave his report the galleries were crowded with ladies, and every member present, Democrat as well as Republican, was supplied with a petition. As it had been rumored about that Mr. Greeley's report would be against suffrage for women, the Democrats entered with great zest into the presentation. George William Curtis, at the special request[102] of the ladies, reserved his for the last, and when he arose and said: "Mr. President, I hold in my hand a petition from Mrs. Horace Greeley and three hundred other women citizens of Westchester, asking that the word 'male' be stricken from the Constitution," the sensation throughout the house was as profound as unexpected. Mr. Greeley's chagrin was only equaled by the amusement of the other members, and of the ladies in the gallery. As he arose to read his report, it being the next thing in order, he was evidently embarrassed in view of such a flood of petitions from all parts of the State; from his own wife, and most of the ladies in his immediate social circle, by seeming to antagonize the measure.