The Greenback and the People's parties have welcomed women as assistants. Prominent among these have been Marian Todd, Martha E. Strickland and Elizabeth Eaglesfield. In 1896 Mrs. Emery and Mrs. Root were placed upon the State Central Committee of the People's Party. The Prohibitionists also have received women as party workers.
Besides those already named, others who have been foremost in every plan to forward equality for women are Giles B. and Catharine A. F. Stebbins, Sara Philleo Skinner, Lila E. Bliss, H. Margaret Downs, Delisle P. Holmes, Wesley Emery, Brent Harding, Smith G. Ketcham and John Wesley Knaggs; among the younger women, Florence Jenkins Spalding and Edith Frances Hall.
Legislative Action: Prior to 1885 the charters of twelve cities made inoperative the early State law which gave School Suffrage to women. By appealing to the Legislature of that year the charters of Grand Rapids and Bay City were so amended that the right to vote at school meetings was conferred upon women.
The new State association organized in 1884 adopted as its principal plan of work a bill which had been drawn by the Hon. Samuel Fowler and introduced in the Legislature of 1883, to grant Municipal Suffrage to women.
In 1885 this bill was presented in the Senate by John W. Belknap, a strong supporter. Independent of the State association, Theodore G. Houk introduced in the House a joint resolution to strike the word "male" from the constitution. The Joint Judiciary Committees granted a hearing to the friends of woman suffrage in February. The Municipal Bill came to a vote in the Senate on May 21, which resulted in 14 ayes, 15 noes, but was not acted upon in the House. The Houk joint resolution passed the House by 81 ayes, 10 noes, but was not brought up in the Senate.
In 1887 the Municipal Suffrage Bill was again taken up, being introduced simultaneously in both Houses, in the lower by Henry Watson, in the upper by Charles J. Monroe, both staunch friends. A hearing was had before the Senate Judiciary and the House Committee on Elections in March. Miss Frances E. Willard aided the suffragists by a brief address. On April 12 the House committee reported in favor of striking out all after the enacting clause, thus completely obliterating the bill, which report was accepted by a vote of 50 ayes, 33 noes. The Senate Bill was not considered.
In 1889 the Municipal Suffrage Bill was introduced in the Senate by Arthur D. Gilmore and in the House by Dr. James B. F. Curtis. It was referred to the Judiciary Committees, and at their request the hearing was had before the entire Legislature during the annual convention of the State E. S. A. No outside lecturers were invited, because the friends of the measure were met by a strongly-expressed wish that the women of Michigan should speak for themselves. Short speeches were made by May Stocking Knaggs, Catharine A. F. Stebbins, Emily B. Ketcham, Lucy F. Andrews, Elizabeth Eaglesfield, Frances Riddle Stafford, Harriet A. Cook, Mrs. R. M. Kellogg, Phebe B. Whitfield and Mary B. Clay of Kentucky who was then residing in the State. Mrs. Clara Bewick Colby being present, she was invited to make the closing remarks.
Just before this hearing the bevy of officers and speakers passing through the corridor on their way to the House were warned by Joseph Greusel, a friendly journalist, that a circular of protest had been placed upon the desk of each member. This was headed: "Massachusetts Remonstrants against Woman Suffrage, to the Members of the Michigan Legislature;" and contained the familiar array of misrepresentations. With the co-operation of Lucy Stone, a reply was printed immediately after the convention and likewise distributed in the Legislature.
The House Bill remained under the judicious guardianship of Dr. Curtis. The chairman of the legislative committee, Mrs. Knaggs, was in constant attendance and secured valuable information on the practical working of Municipal Suffrage from Gov. Lyman U. Humphrey, Attorney-General Simeon B. Bradford, ex-Attorney-General L. B. Kellogg and Laura M. Johns, all of Kansas. The Hon. Charles B. Waite of Chicago prepared by request an exhaustive legal opinion on The Power of the Legislature of Michigan in Reference to Municipal Suffrage. The Judiciary Committee—John V. B. Goodrich, Russell R. Pealer, Byron S. Waite, Norris J. Brown, Oliver S. Smith, Thomas C. Taylor, James A. Randall—gave a unanimous report in favor of the bill, which included this opinion and the Kansas reports. Senator Thomas W. Palmer, who had been appointed Minister to Spain, went to Lansing on the very eve of leaving this country and, in an address to the joint Houses of the Legislature, made a strong plea for the measure.
As the day fixed for the consideration of the bill approached, the suffrage committee found itself confronted by an arrangement, quietly made by the opponents, to have an address delivered in Representative Hall by a Mrs. Mary Livermore, who had been holding parlor meetings in Detroit for pay and speaking against woman suffrage; and the false report was industriously circulated that this was the great suffragist of like name, who had discarded her lifelong convictions and gone over to the enemy.