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[Illustration: Susan B. Anthony. (Signed: Affectionately Yours Susan B. Anthony)]


  THE HISTORY

  OF

  WOMAN SUFFRAGE


  EDITED BY


  SUSAN B. ANTHONY &
      IDA HUSTED HARPER


  ILLUSTRATED WITH COPPERPLATE AND PHOTOGRAVURE
  ENGRAVINGS


  _IN FOUR VOLUMES_


  VOL. IV.


  1883-1900


  "PERFECT EQUALITY OF RIGHTS FOR WOMAN, CIVIL, LEGAL
  AND POLITICAL"


  SUSAN B. ANTHONY
  17 MADISON STREET, ROCHESTER, N. Y.


  COPYRIGHT, 1902, BY SUSAN B. ANTHONY


  THE HOLLENBECK PRESS
  INDIANAPOLIS




* * * * Make me respect my material so much that I dare not slight my
work. Help me to deal very honestly with words and with people,
because they are both alive. Show me that, as in a river, so in
writing, clearness is the best quality, and a little that is pure is
worth more than much that is mixed. Teach me to see the local color
without being blind to the inner light. Give me an ideal that will
stand the strain of weaving into human stuff on the loom of the real.
Keep me from caring more for books than for folks, for art than for
life. Steady me to do my full stint of work as well as I can, and when
that is done, stop me, pay me what wages thou wilt, and help me to say
from a quiet heart a grateful Amen.

                                             HENRY VAN <DW18>.




PREFACE


After the movement for woman suffrage, which commenced about the
middle of the nineteenth century, had continued for twenty-five years,
the feeling became strongly impressed upon its active promoters, Miss
Susan B. Anthony and Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, that the records
connected with it should be secured to posterity. With Miss Anthony,
indeed, the idea had been ever present, and from the beginning she had
carefully preserved as far as possible the letters, speeches and
newspaper clippings, accounts of conventions and legislative and
congressional reports. By 1876 they were convinced through various
circumstances that the time had come for writing the history. So
little did they foresee the magnitude which this labor would assume
that they made a mutual agreement to accept no engagements for four
months, expecting to finish it within that time, as they contemplated
nothing more than a small volume, probably a pamphlet of a few hundred
pages. Miss Anthony packed in trunks and boxes the accumulations of
the years and shipped them to Mrs. Stanton's home in Tenafly, N. J.,
where the two women went cheerfully to work.

Mrs. Stanton was the matchless writer, Miss Anthony the collector of
material, the searcher of statistics, the business manager, the keen
critic, the detector of omissions, chronological flaws and
discrepancies in statement such as are unavoidable even with the most
careful historian. On many occasions they called to their aid for
historical facts Mrs. Matilda Joslyn Gage, one of the most logical,
scientific and fearless writers of her day. To Mrs. Gage Vol. I of the
History of Woman Suffrage is wholly indebted for the first two
chapters--Preceding Causes and Woman in Newspapers, and for the last
chapter--Woman, Church and State, which she later amplified in a book;
and Vol. II for the first chapter--Woman's Patriotism in the Civil
War.

When the allotted time had expired the work had far exceeded its
original limits and yet seemed hardly begun. Its authors were amazed
at the amount of history which already had been made and still more
deeply impressed with the desirability of preserving the story of the
early struggle, but both were in the regular employ of lecture bureaus
and henceforth could give only vacations to the task. They were
entirely without the assistance of stenographers and typewriters, who
at the present day relieve brain workers of so large a part of the
physical strain. A labor which was to consume four months eventually
extended through ten years and was not completed until the closing
days of 1885. The pamphlet of a few hundred pages had expanded into
three great volumes of 1,000 pages each, and enough material remained
unused to fill another.[1]

It was almost wholly due to Miss Anthony's clear foresight and
painstaking habits that the materials were gathered and preserved
during all the years, and it was entirely owing to her unequaled
determination and persistence that the History was written. The demand
for Mrs. Stanton on the platform and the cares of a large family made
this vast amount of writing a most heroic effort, and one which
doubtless she would have been tempted to evade had it not been for the
relentless mentor at her side, helping to bear her burdens and
overcome the obstacles, and continually pointing out the necessity
that the history of this movement for the emancipation of women should
be recorded, in justice to those who carried it forward and as an
inspiration to the workers of the future. And so together, for a long
decade, these two great souls toiled in the solitude of home just as
together they fought in the open field, not for personal gain or
glory, but for the sake of a cause to which they had consecrated their
lives. Had it not been for their patient and unselfish labor the story
of the hard conditions under which the pioneers struggled to lift
woman out of her subjection, the bitterness of the prejudice, the
cruelty of the persecution, never would have been told. In all the
years that have passed no one else has attempted to tell it, and
should any one desire to do so it is doubtful if, even at this early
date, enough of the records could be found for the most superficial
account. In not a library can the student who wishes to trace this
movement to its beginning obtain the necessary data except in these
three volumes, which will become still more valuable as the years go
by and it nears success.

Miss Anthony began this work in 1876 without a dollar in hand for its
publication. She never had the money in advance for any of her
undertakings, but she went forward and accomplished them, and when the
people saw that they were good they usually repaid the amount she had
advanced from her own small store. In this case she resolved to use
the whole of it and all she could earn in the future rather than not
publish the History. Mrs. Elizabeth Thompson, of New York, a generous
patron of good works, gave her the first $1,000 in 1880, but this did
not cover the expenses that had been actually incurred thus far in its
preparation. She was in nowise discouraged, however, but kept steadily
on during every moment which could be spared by Mrs. Stanton and
herself, absolutely confident that in some way the necessary funds
would be obtained. Her strong faith was justified, for the first week
of 1882 came a notice from Wendell Phillips that Mrs. Eliza Jackson
Eddy, of Boston, had left her a large legacy to be used according to
her own judgment "for the advancement of woman's cause." Litigation by
an indirect heir deprived her of this money for over three years, but
in April, 1885, she received $24,125.

The first volume of the History had been issued in May, 1881, and the
second in April, 1882. In June, 1885, Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony
set resolutely to work and labored without ceasing until the next
November, when the third volume was sent to the publishers. With the
bequest Miss Anthony paid the debts that had been incurred, replaced
her own fund, of which every dollar had been used, and brought out
this last volume. All were published at a time when paper and other
materials were at a high price. The fine steel engravings alone cost
$5,000. On account of the engagements of the editors it was necessary
to employ proofreaders and indexers, and because of the many years
over which the work had stretched an immense number of changes had to
be made in composition, so that a large part of the legacy was
consumed.

The money which Miss Anthony now had enabled her to carry out her
long-cherished project to put this History free of charge in the
public libraries. It was thus placed in twelve hundred in the United
States and Europe. Mrs. Stanton and Mrs. Gage, who had contributed
their services without price, naturally felt that it should be sold
instead of given away, and in order to have a perfectly free hand she
purchased their rights. In addition to the libraries, she has given it
to hundreds of schools and to countless individuals, writers,
speakers, etc., whom she thought it would enable to do better work for
the franchise. For seventeen years she has paid storage on the volumes
and the stereotype plates. During this time there has been some demand
for the books from those who were able and willing to pay, but much
the largest part of the labor and money expended were a direct
donation to the cause of woman suffrage.

From the time the last volume was finished it was Miss Anthony's
intention, if she should live twenty years longer, to issue a fourth
containing the history which would be made during that period, and for
this purpose she still preserved the records. As the century drew near
a close, bringing with it the end of her four-score years, the desire
grew still stronger to put into permanent shape the continued story of
a contest which already had extended far beyond the extreme limits
imagined when she dedicated to it the full power of her young
womanhood with its wealth of dauntless courage and unfailing hope. She
resigned the presidency of the National Association in February, 1900,
which marked her eightieth birthday, in order that she might carry out
this project and one or two others of especial importance. Among her
birthday gifts she received $1,000 from friends in all parts of the
country, and this sum she resolved to apply to the contemplated
volume. One of the other objects which she had in view was the
collecting of a large fund to be invested and the income used in work
for the enfranchisement of women. Already about $3,000 had been
subscribed.

By the time the first half year had passed, nature exacted tribute for
six decades of unceasing and unparalleled toil, and it became evident
that the idea of gathering a reserve fund would have to be abandoned.
The donors of the $3,000 were consulted and all gave cordial assent to
have their portion applied to the publication of the fourth volume of
the History. The largest amount, $1,000, had been contributed by Mrs.
Pauline Agassiz Shaw, of Boston. Dr