The History of Woman Suffrage Volume IV Part 81

[240] During these years various suffrage bills were introduced by other organizations. The school board of Winnetka had one to give women a right to vote on all matters relating to schools; the W. C. T.

U. one for a const.i.tutional amendment; and members of the Legislature occasionally on their own responsibility introduced bills.

[241] In 1891 an anti-suffrage pet.i.tion, signed by twelve persons, aroused some interest on account of its novelty. In later Legislatures their pet.i.tions do not seem to have appeared, but some of those twelve signers can be found composing the Chicago Anti Suffrage Society of the present day.

[242] In April, 1891, fifteen women of Lombard voted at the munic.i.p.al election under a special charter which gave the franchise to citizens over twenty-one years of age. The judges were about to refuse the votes, but Miss Ellen A. Martin, of the law firm of Perry & Martin in Chicago, argued the legal points so conclusively that they were accepted. No one has contested that election, and the women have established their right to vote.

[243] Although Dr. Smith was defeated she was really the first woman who served as trustee of the State University, for Gov. John P.

Altgeld appointed her to fill a member's unexpired term and she took her seat one month before Mrs. Flower, serving eighteen months. At the next election her name was again placed on the Democratic ticket, which was again defeated.

[244] They continued to hold delegate conventions every two years to nominate a woman for trustee, until the Primary Election Law, recently pa.s.sed, provided that delegates to nominating conventions must be elected at the polls.

[245] During the Legislature of 1873 a Joint Special Committee was appointed to revise the laws. Through the heroic efforts of Miles B.

Castle in the Senate and Judge James B. Bradwell in the House, with the a.s.sistance of the veteran law professor and reviser of statutes, the Hon. Harvey B. Hurd, a most liberal legislation for women, in all directions possible at that time, was secured.

[246] See History Woman Suffrage, Vol. II, p. 601.

[247] Mrs. Sewall's report will be found in most public libraries. A graphic account of this Congress is contained in the Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony, Chap. XLI. See also present volume of this History, Chap XIV.

CHAPTER x.x.xVIII.

INDIANA.[248]

The earliest woman suffrage society in Indiana was formed in Dublin only three years after that first memorable convention at Seneca Falls, N. Y., in 1848, and annual meetings were held until the beginning of the Civil War, and resumed after its close.

That of 1884 took place December 9, 10, in the Methodist Church at Kokomo with delegates present from a number of cities. The resolutions included one of sorrow over the deaths of Frances Dana Gage, a pioneer suffragist, and Laura Giddings Julian, daughter of Joshua R. Giddings and wife of George W. Julian, M. C., both staunch advocates of the enfranchis.e.m.e.nt of women, as she herself had been. Dr. Mary F. Thomas, who had joined in the call for the first meeting in 1851, was re-elected president and the Hon. William Dudley Foulke made vice-president-at-large. Among the speakers were the Reverends Frazier, Hudson and McCune, Dr. Gifford and Judge Pollard.

The annual meeting of 1885 was held at Warsaw, October 22, 23, and welcomed by Mayor Royse. On account of the advanced age of Dr. Thomas her resignation was accepted and Mrs. Mary S. Armstrong elected president. Henry B. Blackwell and Lucy Stone were present throughout the sessions.

The State convention of 1886 met in Richmond, November 8, 9, in the Eighth Street Friends' Meeting House and was welcomed by the Mayor.

Addresses were made by Mr. Blackwell, Mrs. Stone, Mrs. Zerelda G.

Wallace, Dr. Thomas, Mr. Foulke, Mrs. Mary E. Haggart, Mrs. Armstrong, Mrs. Mattie Stewart Charles, Sylvester Johnson and others.

In 1887 the convention took place at La Porte, December 1, 2, and was addressed by Mr. Foulke, Professor Hailman and Mrs. Eudora F. Hailman, the Rev. Mr. Grant, General Packard, Mrs. J. W. Ridgway, Mrs.

Rhenton, Sylva.n.u.s Grover and others. Mr. Foulke was elected president and Mrs. Haggart vice-president-at-large.[249]

Up to this time these annual meetings had been convened under the auspices of the American Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation. In 1878 a strong society had been organized in Indianapolis with Mrs. Zerelda G.

Wallace, president, Mrs. May Wright Sewall, secretary, and 175 members. It had held numerous meetings and done a large amount of legislative and political work, but had made no State or national alliances. In May, 1887, however, it called a convention, which met in Plymouth Congregational Church, and with the a.s.sistance of Miss Susan B. Anthony a State organization was effected, auxiliary to the National Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation. The officers elected were: President, Mrs. Helen M. Gougar; vice-president-at-large, Mrs.

Wallace; secretary, Mrs. Ida Husted Harper; treasurer, Mrs. Juliette K. Wood; chairman executive committee, Mrs. Sewall; superintendent of press, Miss Mary E. Cardwill.

In November, under the management of this board, two days' conventions were held in each of the congressional districts of the State, at Evansville, Vincennes, Bloomington, Kokomo, Logansport, Wabash, Lafayette, South Bend, Fort Wayne, Muncie, Madison, New Albany and Terre Haute. The speakers were Miss Anthony, Mrs. Wallace, Mrs. Sewall and Mrs. Gougar, the meetings being arranged by Mrs. Harper. They were well attended, a great deal of suffrage sentiment was aroused and a balance was left in the treasury.

The annual convention took place at Indianapolis in the Grand Opera House, May 15, 16, 1888, with delegates present from every congressional district. Among the speakers were Mr. Foulke, Mrs. Annie Jenness Miller and Miss Anthony. The board of officers was re-elected.

The third convention met at Rushville, Oct. 10, 11, 1889. Miss Anthony was in attendance. By previous arrangement delegates from the American branch were present and, with unanimous consent, a union of two bodies into one State organization was effected. Although receiving a majority vote, Mrs. Sewall, Miss Cardwill and Mrs. Harper, for personal reasons, refused longer to serve. The election finally resulted: President, Mrs. Gougar; vice-president-at-large, Mrs.

Wallace; secretary, Mrs. Caroline C. Hodgin; treasurer, Mrs. Hattie E.

Merrill; chairman executive committee, Mrs. E. M. Seward; superintendent of press, Mrs. Georgia Wright. A resolution was adopted mourning the death of Dr. Mary F. Thomas.

State meetings were held for several years afterward, but the records of them are not available.

In 1899, the State a.s.sociation having been apparently defunct for a long time, a conference of the officers of the National a.s.sociation was called to meet in Indianapolis, at the earnest request of Mrs. Sewall and a committee. There were present on December 7, 8, Miss Anthony, president, the Rev. Anna Howard Shaw, vice-president-at-large, Mrs. Harriet Taylor Upton, treasurer, Miss Laura Clay and Mrs. Catharine Waugh McCulloch, auditors, and Mrs.

Carrie Chapman Catt, chairman of the organization committee. Mrs.

Sewall gave two receptions to enable the people of the city to greet them; a large one was given by Mrs. Lucy McDowell Milburn, wife of the Rev. Joseph A. Milburn, of the Second Presbyterian Church; and a luncheon at the handsome residence of Mrs. Alice Wheeler Peirce by the committee.

Business meetings were held at the Denison Hotel. The evening meetings, in Plymouth Church, were large and enthusiastic. A new State a.s.sociation was formed and also a new local club for Indianapolis, while the staunch and steadfast old societies of Kokomo and Tipton were aroused to new activity.[250]

At the State meeting in Indianapolis in November, 1900, the old board of officers was re-elected, except that Mrs. Mary Shank was made vice-president and Mrs. Ethel B. McMullen, treasurer.

A very considerable sentiment in favor of woman suffrage exists throughout the State and many well-known individuals advocate it, among them U. S. Senator Albert J. Beveridge and most of the Congressional delegation, State officials, judges, clergymen and prominent members of the women's clubs, but there is so slight an organization that little opportunity is afforded for public expression or action.

From 1884 down to the present women have appeared many times in person and by pet.i.tion before county and State conventions of the different political parties, asking for a recognition in their platforms of the right of women to the suffrage. Although these efforts have met with no response from the Democratic party, and none from the Republican in State meetings, a few county conventions have adopted planks to this effect. In 1889 the Greenback and the United Labor State Conventions unequivocally indorsed the franchise for women. In 1892 the Populist and the Prohibition State platforms contained declarations for woman suffrage. In 1894 the Populists again adopted the plank. Similar action was taken by the Social Democratic Party in 1900. Among those appearing before these bodies are found the names of Mrs. Sewall, Mrs.

Gougar, Mrs. Haggart, Mrs. Pauline T. Merritt, Miss Flora Hardin, Mrs.

Florence M. Adkinson, Mrs. Augusta Cooper Bristol and Mrs. Harper.

During the past sixteen years a number of women have sat as delegates in the State conventions of the Greenback, Prohibition, Populist, Socialist and Labor parties. Women have shown great interest in politics for many years, crowding the galleries at the State conventions and forming at least one-half of the audiences at the campaign rallies. Among those who have canva.s.sed the State in national campaigns are the noted orators, Miss Anna E. d.i.c.kinson, and Mrs.

Nellie Holbrook Blinn of California, for the Republican party; Mrs.

Mary E. Lease and Mrs. Annie L. Diggs, both of Kansas, for the Populist; Miss Cynthia Cleveland for the Democratic, and Mrs. Helen M.

Gougar for the Republican, Prohibition and Populist.

LEGISLATIVE ACTION AND LAWS: It is most difficult to look up the history of legislation on any subject in Indiana. The original bills are not printed but are presented in writing, stowed away in pigeon-holes and thenceforth referred to only by number, with perhaps a fragment of their t.i.tles. After several women, deeply interested in the question, had attempted to make a list of the suffrage bills during the last sixteen years and had given up in despair, they appealed to one of the best lawyers in the State, who is a firm believer in the enfranchis.e.m.e.nt of women. He responded that no accurate report could be made without first going through all the pigeon-holes and over all the journals of the two Houses during that period, which would require weeks of time and great expense. As very few of these bills ever were reported from the committees, it seemed unnecessary to undertake their resurrection for the purposes of this History.

The Indiana Legislature meets biennially and there is seldom a session in which bills are not presented for munic.i.p.al or full suffrage. In 1893 bills were before this body asking for the Munic.i.p.al ballot, and newspaper accounts speak of Mrs. Zerelda G. Wallace, Mrs. Mary S.

Armstrong and Mrs. Laura G. Schofield as working industriously for their pa.s.sage.

In 1895 Judge George B. Cardwill introduced two bills without request, one for an amendment to the const.i.tution striking out the word "male;"

the other to amend the law so as to make it obligatory to have one woman on the school board of every city. The women made no effort to secure consideration of these bills, and they lay dormant in committee.

It never has been thought worth while to make the struggle for School Suffrage, as Indianapolis is the only city which elects its school board. In the others this is appointed by the Common Council.

On Feb. 5, 1897, Miss Susan B. Anthony, who was visiting Mrs. Sewall, addressed the Legislature in joint session asking it to recommend to Congress the pa.s.sage of a Sixteenth Amendment to the Federal Const.i.tution enfranchising women.

In 1898, under the auspices of Mrs. M. A. Tompkins, State superintendent of franchise for the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, an active and systematic canva.s.s was begun to secure from the Legislature the submission of an amendment to the State const.i.tution to strike out the word "male." She was a.s.sisted by members of her organization in every county; short, convincing articles were prepared for the newspapers, pet.i.tions circulated and 30,000 names of men and women obtained.

Accompanied by these a joint resolution was presented to the Legislature of 1899--in the Senate by O. Z. Hubbell, in the House by Quincy A. Blankins.h.i.+p, and both labored strenuously for its pa.s.sage.

The Senate Bill was referred to the Committee on Revision of Laws, Frederick A. Joss, chairman, and the House Bill to the Judiciary Committee, Silas A. Canada, chairman. They granted hearings, were addressed by Miss Marie Brehm of Chicago, national superintendent of franchise for the W. C. T. U., and reported the bill favorably. It pa.s.sed the Senate by unanimous vote, January 25. The members of the House had been personally interviewed by Mrs. Tompkins and Miss Brehm, and two-thirds of them were pledged to vote for the measure.

The law provides that not more than two bills for amending the State const.i.tution can be before the Legislature at one time, and, as two preceded this one, Speaker Littleton, who was opposed to it, ruled it out of order and would not permit it to be considered. The same condition existed in the Senate but that body deemed its action perfectly legal, as all which could be done was to submit the bill to the next Legislature. Thus all the work of nearly two years was lost.[251]

In 1899 a number of Factory Inspection Laws were pa.s.sed, some of them especially intended to protect women. While these serve their purpose in one way they may defeat it in another, as those, for instance, limiting the work of women to ten hours a day and prohibiting their employment at night in any manufacturing concern, when no such restrictions are imposed on men, which often is to their advantage with employers. Seats for women employes, suitable toilet-rooms and a full hour for the noonday meal are commendable features of these new laws.

Through the efforts of Robert Dale Owen and a few other broad-minded men, when the const.i.tution of Indiana was revised in 1851 the laws for women were made more liberal than those of most other States at that period, although conservative compared to present standards. Unjust discriminations have been abolished from time to time since then, until now, in a very large degree, the laws bear equally upon husband and wife. Some distinctions, however, still exist, as is shown by the introduction of bills in almost every Legislature "to remove the existing disabilities of married women."

Dower and curtesy are abolished. If a husband die, with or without a will, one-third of his real estate descends to the widow in fee simple, free from all demands of creditors; provided, however, that where the real estate exceeds in value $10,000, the widow shall have one-fourth only, and where it exceeds $20,000, one-fifth only as against creditors. If a husband die without a will and leave a widow and one child, the real estate is divided equally between them; the personal estate is divided equally if there are not more than two children; if there are more than two the widow still has one-third. If a man has children living by a former marriage and none by a subsequent marriage, the widow can have only a life interest in her share of his estate. If a wife die, with or without a will, one-third of her real and personal estate descends to the widower, regardless of its value, but subject to its proportion of her debts contracted before marriage. If a husband or wife die without a will, leaving no child, but father or mother, one or both, three-fourths of the entire estate goes to the widow or widower, unless it does not exceed $1,000, in which case it all goes to the widow or widower. If there are neither children, father nor mother, the entire estate goes to the widow or widower.

The husband is liable for the wife's debts incurred before marriage to the extent of any property received by him through her. He is not liable for his wife's contracts with respect to her separate property, business or labor, or for torts committed by her.