For several years the philanthropic women of Rhode Island made many determined efforts to secure some official positions in the charitable institutions of the State, with what success the following report by Elizabeth B. Chace, at the annual meeting of the American Association, in Philadelphia, in 1876, will show:
The Rhode Island Woman Suffrage Association, while holding its monthly meetings through the year, circulating petitions to the legislature, and, in other ways, constantly endeavoring to revolutionize the entire sentiment of the State on the question of woman suffrage, still has less progress to report than its friends would have desired. Our last annual meeting, as usual, drew together a large audience. Among our speakers from abroad was William Lloyd Garrison, who, in a speech of almost anti-slavery force and fervor, appeared to send conviction into many minds. Our home speakers included a clergyman of Providence and one of our ablest lawyers, and an ex-legislator who had never stood on our platform before.
As usual, our petitions went into the legislature. They were referred to the Judiciary Committee, before whom we had a hearing, at which three Providence lawyers gave us their unqualified support and earnest advocacy. One of these men set forth in the strongest light the injustice of our laws in regard to the property of married women and their non-ownership of their minor children. The committee made no report to the legislature, and so our petitions lie over until the next session, when we hope for some evidence of progress. In the meantime we intend to very much increase their number. For many years we have been begging of our law-makers to permit women to share in the management of the penal, correctional and charitable institutions of the State; we have, however, only succeeded in obtaining an advisory board of women, which has been in operation for the last six years.
Last spring a majority of these women, having become weary of the service in which they had no power to decide that any improvement should be made in the management of these institutions, resigned their positions on this board, some of them giving through the press their reasons therefor. When the time came for making the new appointments for the year, the governor earnestly urged these women to permit him to appoint them, voluntarily pledging himself to recommend at the opening of the next session of the legislature, that a bill should be passed providing for the appointment of women on the boards of management of all these prisons and reformatories, with the same power and authority with which the men are invested, who now alone decide all questions concerning them. On this condition these women consented to serve on the advisory board a few months longer, with the understanding that, if the legislature fails to make this important provision, their advice will be withdrawn, and the men will be left to take care of thieves, criminals and paupers until they are ready to ask for our help on terms of equality and justice.
In the Providence Journal appeared the following:
Mrs. Doyle seems to have learned by experience that the board, as now constituted under the law, can have no real efficiency. The ladies are responsible for the management of no part of any of the institutions which they are permitted officially to visit. Their reports are not made to the boards which are charged with the responsibility of managing these institutions, and, in the case of the reform school, are not made to the body which elects and controls the board of management. The State ought not to place ladies in such an anomalous position. The women's board should have positive duties and direct responsibilities in its appropriate sphere, or it should be abolished. The following is Mrs. Doyle's letter of resignation:
To His Excellency Henry Lippitt, Governor of the State:
Sir: Please accept my resignation as member of the Board of Lady Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State. The recent action of a part of the board, in regard to the annual report made to the General Assembly, makes it impossible for me to continue longer as a member. Before the report was submitted, it was carefully examined by the members signing it, and was acquiesced in by them, as their signatures testify. Still further, I am confirmed in the opinion that so important a trust as this should be coupled with some power for action; without this we are necessarily confined to suggestions only to the male boards, which suggestions receive only the attention they may consider proper. Believing that this board, as now empowered, can have no efficiency except where its suggestions or criticisms meet the entire approval of the male boards, and failing to see any good which can result from our inspections under such conditions, or any honor to the board thus examining, I respectfully tender my resignation.
Sarah E. H. Doyle,
Providence, R. I.
Three more ladies of the Women's Board of Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State attest the correctness of the repeated suggestions that the board, as organized under the existing laws, must be comparatively powerless for good. The question now comes, will the Rhode Island General Assembly enact a law which shall give to women certain definite duties and responsibilities in connection with the care and correction of female offenders? We propose to refer to this matter further. We are requested to publish the following communications to his excellency, the governor:
To Henry Lippitt, Governor of Rhode Island:
My appointment on the Women's Board of Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State, which I received from your hands for this year, I am now compelled respectfully to resign. My experience in this board for nearly six years has convinced me that this office, which confers on its holders no power to decide that any improvement shall be made in the government or workings of these institutions, is so nearly useless that I am forced to the conclusion that, for myself, the time spent in the performance of its duties can be more effectively employed elsewhere. That the influence of women is indispensable to the proper management of these institutions I was never more sure than I am at this moment; but to make it effectual, that influence must be obtained by placing women on the boards of direct control, where their judgment shall be expressed by argument and by vote.
A board of women, whose only duties, as defined by the law, are to visit the penal and correctional institutions, elect its own officers and report annually to the legislature, bears within itself the elements of weakness and insufficiency. And if the annual reports contain any exposure of abuses, they are sure to give offense to the managers, to be followed by timidity and vacillation in the board of women itself. Our late report, written with great care and conscientious adherence to the truth, which called the attention of the legislature to certain abuses in one of our institutions, and to some defect in the systems established in the others, has, thus far, elicited no official action, has brought censure upon us from the press, while great dissatisfaction has been created in our own body by the failure of a portion of its members to sustain the allegations to which the entire board, with the exception of one absentee, had affixed their names.
When the State of Rhode Island shall call its best women to an equal participation with men in the direction of its penal and reformatory institutions, I have no doubt they will gladly assume the duties and responsibilities of such positions; and I am also sure that the beneficent results of such coöperation will soon be manifest, both in benefit to individuals and in safety to the State. But under present circumstances I most respectfully decline to serve any longer on the advisory board of women.
Elizabeth B. Chace.
Valley Falls, R. I.
Governor Lippitt: Dear Sir: When I accepted an appointment on the Ladies' Board of Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State, I did so with the hope that much good might be accomplished, especially toward the young girls at the reform school, in whose welfare I felt a deep interest. To that institution my attention has been chiefly devoted during my brief experience in this office. This experience, however, has convinced me that a board of officers constituted and limited like this can have very little influence toward improvement in an institution whose methods are fixed, and which is under the exclusive control of another set of officers, who see no necessity for change. Those causes render this women's board so weak in itself that I cannot consent to retain my position therein. I therefore respectfully tender to you my resignation.
Abby D. Weaver.
Providence, R. I.
Governor Lippitt: Please accept the resignation of my commission as a member of the Ladies' Board of Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State, conferred by you in June, 1875.
Eliza C. Weeden.
Yours respectfully,
Westerly, R. I.
To His Excellency Henry Lippitt, Governor of the State:
Sir: Please accept my resignation as member of the Board of Lady Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State. The recent action of a part of the board, in regard to the annual report made to the General Assembly, makes it impossible for me to continue longer as a member. Before the report was submitted, it was carefully examined by the members signing it, and was acquiesced in by them, as their signatures testify. Still further, I am confirmed in the opinion that so important a trust as this should be coupled with some power for action; without this we are necessarily confined to suggestions only to the male boards, which suggestions receive only the attention they may consider proper. Believing that this board, as now empowered, can have no efficiency except where its suggestions or criticisms meet the entire approval of the male boards, and failing to see any good which can result from our inspections under such conditions, or any honor to the board thus examining, I respectfully tender my resignation.
Sarah E. H. Doyle,
Providence, R. I.
To Henry Lippitt, Governor of Rhode Island:
My appointment on the Women's Board of Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State, which I received from your hands for this year, I am now compelled respectfully to resign. My experience in this board for nearly six years has convinced me that this office, which confers on its holders no power to decide that any improvement shall be made in the government or workings of these institutions, is so nearly useless that I am forced to the conclusion that, for myself, the time spent in the performance of its duties can be more effectively employed elsewhere. That the influence of women is indispensable to the proper management of these institutions I was never more sure than I am at this moment; but to make it effectual, that influence must be obtained by placing women on the boards of direct control, where their judgment shall be expressed by argument and by vote.
A board of women, whose only duties, as defined by the law, are to visit the penal and correctional institutions, elect its own officers and report annually to the legislature, bears within itself the elements of weakness and insufficiency. And if the annual reports contain any exposure of abuses, they are sure to give offense to the managers, to be followed by timidity and vacillation in the board of women itself. Our late report, written with great care and conscientious adherence to the truth, which called the attention of the legislature to certain abuses in one of our institutions, and to some defect in the systems established in the others, has, thus far, elicited no official action, has brought censure upon us from the press, while great dissatisfaction has been created in our own body by the failure of a portion of its members to sustain the allegations to which the entire board, with the exception of one absentee, had affixed their names.
When the State of Rhode Island shall call its best women to an equal participation with men in the direction of its penal and reformatory institutions, I have no doubt they will gladly assume the duties and responsibilities of such positions; and I am also sure that the beneficent results of such coöperation will soon be manifest, both in benefit to individuals and in safety to the State. But under present circumstances I most respectfully decline to serve any longer on the advisory board of women.
Elizabeth B. Chace.
Valley Falls, R. I.
Governor Lippitt: Dear Sir: When I accepted an appointment on the Ladies' Board of Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State, I did so with the hope that much good might be accomplished, especially toward the young girls at the reform school, in whose welfare I felt a deep interest. To that institution my attention has been chiefly devoted during my brief experience in this office. This experience, however, has convinced me that a board of officers constituted and limited like this can have very little influence toward improvement in an institution whose methods are fixed, and which is under the exclusive control of another set of officers, who see no necessity for change. Those causes render this women's board so weak in itself that I cannot consent to retain my position therein. I therefore respectfully tender to you my resignation.
Abby D. Weaver.
Providence, R. I.
Governor Lippitt: Please accept the resignation of my commission as a member of the Ladies' Board of Visitors to the Penal and Correctional Institutions of the State, conferred by you in June, 1875.
Eliza C. Weeden.
Yours respectfully,
Westerly, R. I.
Early in the year 1880 the State association issued the following address:
To the friends of Woman Suffrage throughout the State of Rhode Island:
In behalf of the Rhode Island Woman Suffrage Association, we beg leave to call your attention to the result of our last year's work, and to our plans for future effort. We went before the General Assembly with petitions for suffrage for women on all subjects, and also with petitions asking only for school suffrage. The former, bearing nearly 2,500 names, was presented in the Senate and finally referred, with other unfinished business, to the next legislature; they will thus be subject to attention the coming year. The latter, bearing nearly 3,500 names, was presented in the House and referred to the Committee on Education. This committee reported unanimously:
Resolved, That the following amendment to the constitution of the State is hereby proposed: Article ——. Women otherwise qualified are entitled to vote in the election of school committees and in all legally organized school-district meetings.
This resolution was adopted in the House by 48 to 11, but rejected in the Senate by 20 to 13.[176] Nineteen members being required to make a majority of a full Senate, the amendment failed by six votes. Had the ballots in the two branches been upon a proposition to extend general suffrage to women, they would have been the most encouraging, and, as it is, they show signs of progress; but a resolve to submit the question of school suffrage to the voters of Rhode Island, ought to have been successful this year. Why was it defeated? Simply for the lack of political power behind it. To gain this, our cause needs a foothold in every part of the State. We need some person or persons in each town, to whom we can look for hearty coöperation. If our work is to be effective, it must not only continue as heretofore—one of petitioning—but must include also a constant vigilance in securing senators and representatives in the General Assembly, favorable to woman suffrage. We propose the coming year:
First—To petition congress in behalf of the following amendment to our national constitution, viz.:
Article XVI. Section 1—The right 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. Section 2—Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Second—To secure a hearing and action upon the petitions referred from the last Assembly, for such amendment to our State constitution as shall extend general suffrage to women.
Third—To petition the General Assembly for the necessary legislation to secure school suffrage to women.[177]
Resolved, That the following amendment to the constitution of the State is hereby proposed: Article ——. Women otherwise qualified are entitled to vote in the election of school committees and in all legally organized school-district meetings.
Article XVI. Section 1—The right 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. Section 2—Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.