[389] In the work for other bills Mrs. Howell was assisted by Miss Kate Stoneman, New York's first woman lawyer, Mrs. Sarah A. Le Boeuf, Mrs. Joan Cole and Miss Winnie, all of Albany. George Rogers Howell, assistant and also State librarian, aided his wife in every way. As a State officer for many years he had strong influence and it always was used for woman's political freedom. During these years Mrs. Howell, as president of the Albany Political Equality Club, conducted many public meetings in the Senate Chamber of the historic old Capitol building until it was torn down. Legislators and State officers came each Tuesday night to hear the suffrage speeches.
[390] In 1860, after ten years of persistent effort by Mrs. Stanton, Miss Anthony and other pioneer workers, who had gathered up thousands of petitions and besieged the Legislature, session after session, a law was secured giving father and mother joint guardianship. In 1862, so quietly that the women were not aware of it, the Legislature repealed this law and again vested the guardianship solely in the father. Although repeated efforts were afterwards made to have the mother's right restored, this was not done for thirty years.
[391] Senator Parker is a brother of Mrs. J. V. L. Pruyn, who organized the first anti-suffrage society in the State, at Albany.
[392] In Senator Brown's own city of Watertown, over 50 per cent. of the women had just voted to bond the city for a new High School, the press giving them full credit for it, but he persistently opposed this bill.
[393] It was not supposed that this right could be questioned, but in 1901, in New York City, a woman who was supporting her children by washing while her husband was in the hospital, was thrown from a trolley car with her baby in her arms and injured so that she could not work. She brought suit against the Street Railway Company before a municipal court, and was awarded $147.50. The company appealed to the Supreme Court and Justice David Leaventritt reversed the decision, saying in his opinion, "At Common Law the husband was absolutely entitled to the earnings of his wife, and neither the Enabling Act of 1860 nor the broader one of 1864 has affected the right, unless the service and earnings were rendered and received expressly upon her sole and separate account." Afterwards in explanation he said that the woman had not made it clear in her suit that she was working for herself and not performing service for her husband.
In 1902 a law was passed securing absolutely to married women their own earnings and the right to sue for damages by loss of wages in case of personal injury.
[394] In 1901 an attempt was made to correct this evil, and a ridiculous law was passed and duly signed by Governor Odell providing that a couple may become husband and wife by signing an agreement before witnesses, but in order to make this legal it must be recorded within six months. If at the end of this time it has not been recorded both are free to marry somebody else. If the fourteen year old wife should not know of this legal requirement she may find herself abandoned without redress.
[395] This decision covers many pages with hair-splitting definitions, tracing the laws governing School Commissioners back to 1843, and summing up with the following unintentional satire.
"The Constitution, in Article 2, Section 1, prescribes the qualifications of voters 'for all officers that now are or hereafter may be elected by the people,' and confines the franchise specifically to 'male citizens.' The office of School Commissioner was one thereafter made 'elective by the people,' through the operation of the alternative given by Article 10, Section 2, which provides that 'all officers whose offices may hereafter be created by law shall be elected by the people or appointed as the Legislature may direct.' That is, in such cases, it may choose between election and appointment and in the latter event may dictate the authority and mode of appointment. The Legislature chose that the office should be elective, and, becoming such, it fell within the scope and terms of the constitutional provisions applicable to elections by the people."
[396] By the charters of the third class cities of Auburn, Geneva, Hornellsville, Jamestown, Norwich, Union Springs and Watertown women have School Suffrage on the same terms as men. The city of Kingston is divided into several common and union free school districts and women are authorized to vote.