As bearing simply upon the question whether there is a demand by a respectable number of people to be heard on this issue, I desire to read one or two documents in my possession. I offer in this connection, in addition to the innumerable petitions which have been placed before the Senate and before the other House, the petition of the Women's Christian Temperance Union. I take it that no Senator will raise the question whether this organization be or be not composed of the very élite of the women of America. At least two hundred thousand of the Christian women of this country are represented in this organization. It is national in its character and scope; it is international, and it exists in every State and in every Territory of the Union. By their officers, Miss Frances E. Willard, the president; Mrs. Caroline B. Buell, corresponding secretary; Mrs. Mary A. Woodbridge, recording secretary; Mrs. L.M.N. Stevens, assistant recording secretary; Miss Esther Pugh, treasurer; Mrs. Zerelda G. Wallace, superintendent of department of franchise, and Mrs. Henrietta B. Wall, secretary of department of franchise, they bring this petition to the Senate. It has been indorsed by the action of the body at large. They say:
Believing that governments can be just only when deriving their powers from the consent of the governed, and that in a government professing to be a government of the people, all the people of a mature age should have a voice, and that all class-legislation and unjust discrimination against the rights and privileges of any citizen is fraught with danger to the republic, and inasmuch as the ballot in popular governments is a most potent element in all moral and social reforms:
We, therefore, on behalf of the hundreds of thousands of Christian women engaged in philanthropic effort, pray you to use your influence, and vote for the passage of a sixteenth amendment to the Constitution of the United States, prohibiting the disfranchisement of any citizen on the ground of sex.
I have also just received, in addition to other matter before the Senate, the petition of the Indianapolis Suffrage Association, or of that department of the Women's Christian Temperance Union which has the control of the discussion and management of the operations of the union with reference to the suffrage. I shall not take the time of the Senate to read it. The letter transmitting the petition is as follows:
INDIANAPOLIS, IND., January 12, 1886.
DEAR SIR: I have sent the inclosed petitions and arguments to every member on the Committee on Woman Suffrage, hoping if they are read they may have some influence in securing a favorable report for the passage of a sixteenth amendment, giving the ballot to women.
Will you urge upon the members of the committee the importance of their perusal?
Respectfully,
MRS. Z.G. WALLACE, Sup't Dep't for Franchise of N.W.C.T.U.
Hon. H.W. BLAIR.
I will add in this connection a letter lately received by myself, written by a lady who may not be so distinguished in the annals of the country, yet, at the same time, she has attained to such a position in the society where she lives that she holds the office of postmaster by the sanction of the Government, and has held it for many years. She seems, as other ladies have seemed, to possess the capacity to perform the duties of this governmental office, so far as I know, to universal satisfaction. At all events, it is the truth that no woman, so far as I have ever heard, holding the office of postmaster, and no woman who has ever held the position of clerk under the Government, or who has ever discharged in State or in Nation any executive or administrative function, has as yet been a defaulter, or been guilty of any misconduct or malversation in office, or contributed anything by her own conduct to the disgrace of the appointing or creating official power. This woman says:
NEW LONDON, WIS., January 18, 1887.
Hon. H.W. BLAIR, Washington, D.C.:
DEAR SIR: Thank you for the address you sent; also for your kindness in remembering us poor mortals who can scarcely get a hearing in such an august body as the Senate of these United States, though I have reason to believe we furnished the men to fill those seats.
There is something supremely ridiculous in the attitude of a man who tells you women are angelic in their nature; that it is his veneration for the high and lofty position they occupy which hopes to keep them forever from the dirty vortex of politics, and then to see him glower at her because she wishes politics were not so dirty, and believes the mother element, by all that makes humanity to her doubly sacred, is just what is needed for its purification.
We have become tired of hearing and reiterating the same old theories and are pleased that you branched out in a new direction, and your argument contains so much which is new and fresh.
We do care for this inestimable boon which one-half the people of this Republic have seized, and are claiming that God gave it to them and are working very zealously to help God keep it for them. (We will remember the Joshua who leads us out of bondage.)
I used to think the Prohibition party would be our Moses, but that has only gone so far as to say, "You boost us upon a high and mighty pedestal, and when we see our way clear to pull you after us we will venture to do so; but you can not expect it while we run any risk of becoming unpopular thereby."
Liberty stands a goddess upon the very dome of our Capitol, Liberty's lamp shines far out into the darkness, a beacon to the oppressed, a dazzling ray of hope to serf and bondsmen of other climes, yet here a sword unforbidden is piercing the heart of the mother whose son believes God has made us to differ so that he can go astray and return. But, alas, he does not return.
Help us to stand upon the same political footing with our brother; this will open both his and our eyes and compel him to stand upon the same moral footing with us. Only this can usher in millenium's dawn.
This letter is signed, by Hannah E. Patchin, postmaster at New London, Wis.
As bearing upon the extent of this agitation, I have many other letters of the same character and numerous arguments by women upon this subject, but I can not ask the attention of the Senate to them, for what I most of all want is a vote. I desire a record upon this question. However, I ought to read this letter, which is dated Salina, Kans., December 13, 1886. The writer is Mrs. Laura M. Johns. She is connected with the suffrage movement in that State, and as bearing upon the extent of this movement and as illustrative not only of the condition of the question in Kansas, but very largely throughout the country, perhaps, especially throughout the northern part of the country, I read this and leave others of like character, as they are, because we have not the time:
I am deeply interested in the fate of the now pending resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States, conferring upon women the exercise of the suffrage. The right is theirs now.
I see, in speaking to that resolution on December 8 in the Senate, that you refer to Miss Anthony's experiences in the October campaign in Kansas as evidence in part of the growth of interest in this movement, and of sentiment favorable to it, and I am writing now just to tell you about it.
When I planned and arranged for those eleven conventions in eleven fine cities of this State, I thought I knew that the people of Kansas felt a strong interest in the question of woman suffrage; but when with Miss Anthony and others I saw immense audiences of Kansas people receive the gospel of equal suffrage with enthusiasm, saw them sitting uncomfortably crowded, or standing to listen for hours to arguments in favor of suffrage for women: saw the organization of strong and ably officered local, county, and district associations of the best and "brainiest" men and women in our first cities for the perpetuation of woman suffrage teachings; saw people of the highest social, professional, and business position give time, money and influence, to this cause; saw Miss Anthony's life work honored and her fêted and most highly commended, I concluded that I had before known but half of the interest and favorable sentiment in Kansas on this question. These meetings were very largely attended, and by all classes, and by people of all shades of religious and political belief. The representative people of the labor party were there, ministers, lawyers, all professions, and all trades.
No audiences could have been more thoroughly representative of the people; and as we held one (and more) convention in each Congressional district in the State, we certainly had, from the votes of those audiences in eleven cities, a truthful expression of the feeling of the people of the State of Kansas on this question. Many of the friends of the cause here are very willing to risk our fate to the popular vote.
In our conventions Miss Anthony was in the habit of putting the following questions to vote:
"Are you in favor of equal suffrage for women?"
"Do you desire that your Senators, INGALLS and PLUMB, and your seven Congressmen shall vote for the sixteenth amendment to the Federal Constitution?" and
"Do you desire your Legislature to extend municipal suffrage to women?"
In response there always came a rousing "yes," except when the vote was a rising one, and then the house rose in a solid body. Miss Anthony's call for the negative vote was answered by silence.
Petitions for municipal suffrage in Kansas are rolling up enormously. People sign them now who refused to do so last year. I tell you it is catching. Many people here are disgusted with our asking for such a modicum as municipal suffrage, and say they would rather sign a petition asking for the submission of an amendment to our State constitution giving us State suffrage. We have speakers now at work all over the State, their audiences and reception are enthusiastic, and their most radical utterances in favor of woman are the most kindly received and gain them the most applause.
And further to the same effect. I shall offer nothing more of that kind, but I have come in possession of some data bearing upon the question of the intellect of woman. The real objection seems to me to he that she does not know enough to vote; that it is the ignorant ballot that is dangerous; but that is a subject which of course I have no time to go into. However, I have some data collected very recently, and at my request, by a most intelligent gentleman of the State of Maine. Either of the Senators from that State will bear witness as to the high character of this gentleman, Mr. Jordan. He sent the data to me a few days ago. They show the relative standing of the two sexes in the high schools in the State of Maine where they are being educated together, and in one of the colleges of that State: