The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) by Ida Husted Harper

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While Miss Anthony continued for many years to cherish this idea of a
distinctively woman's paper, the daily press grew more and more
liberal, devoting larger space to the interests of women every year,
and she became of the opinion that possibly the most effective work
might be accomplished through this medium. She held, however, that
there should be one woman upon each paper whose special business it
should be to look after this department, and who should be permitted to
discuss not only the "woman question" but all others from a woman's
standpoint. As newspapers are now managed, the readers have only man's
views of all the vital issues attracting public attention. Woman
occupies a subordinate position and must write on all subjects in a
spirit which will be acceptable to the masculine head of the paper; so
the public gets in reality his thought and not hers. She had come to
see, also, that the newspaper work should be a leading and distinctive
feature of the National Association to a far greater extent than
hitherto had been attempted, and which, until of late years, had not
been possible. No man or woman ever had a higher opinion of the
influence of the press, which she considered the most powerful agency
in the world for good or for evil.

In the summer of 1879, Miss Anthony received from her friend, A.
Bronson Alcott, a complimentary ticket for three seasons of lectures at
the Concord School of Philosophy; but the living questions of the day
were too pressing for her to withdraw to this classic and sequestered
retreat, outside the busy and practical world.

[Autograph: A. Bronson Alcott]

During the decade from 1870 to 1880, there was a large accession of
valuable workers to the cause of woman suffrage and many new friends
came into Miss Anthony's life. Among these were May Wright Sewall; the
sisters, Julia and Rachel Foster; Clara B. Colby; Zerelda G. Wallace;
Frances E. Willard; J. Ellen Foster; the wife and three talented
daughters of Cassius M. Clay, Mary B., Laura and Sallie Clay Bennett;
M. Louise Thomas; Elizabeth Boynton Harbert and others, who became her
devoted adherents and fellow-workers, and whose homes and hospitality
she enjoyed during all the years which followed.

At the close of her lecture season in 1879 she was able to spend
Christmas and New Year's at her own home for the first time in many
years; but she left on January 2 to fill engagements, reaching
Washington on the eve of the National Convention, which assembled at
Lincoln Hall, January 21, 1880. As Mrs. Stanton was absent, Miss
Anthony presided over the sessions. During this meeting, 250 new
petitions for a Sixteenth Amendment, signed by over 12,000 women, were
sent to Congress, besides over 300 petitions from individual women
praying for a removal of their political disabilities. These were
presented by sixty-five different representatives. Hon. T.W. Ferry, of
Michigan, in the Senate, and Hon. George B. Loring, of Massachusetts,
in the House, introduced a resolution for a Sixteenth Amendment. This
with all the petitions was referred to the judiciary committees, each
of which granted a hearing of two hours to the ladies. Among the
delegates who addressed them was Julia Smith Parker, of Glastonbury,
Conn., at that time over eighty years old, who with her sister Abby
annually resisted the payment of taxes because they were denied
representation, and whose property was in consequence annually seized
and sold. Mrs. Zerelda G. Wallace, the mother so beautifully pictured
in Ben Hur, addressed a congressional committee for the first time, and
among the other speakers were Mrs. Gage, Mrs. Blake, Miss Couzins, Mrs.
Emma Mont McRae, of Indiana, and Mrs. Elizabeth Lyle Saxon, of
Louisiana. It was at this hearing that Senator Edmunds complimented
Miss Anthony by saying, "Most speeches on this question are platform
oratory; yours is argument." Through the influence of Hon. E.G. Lapham,
all these addresses were printed in pamphlet form.

During this convention Miss Anthony was the guest of Mrs. Spofford,
whose husband was proprietor of the Riggs House. The place of hostess,
which had been so beautifully filled by Mrs. Sargent, was assumed at
once by Mrs. Spofford, a lady of culture and position. For twelve years
a suite of rooms was set apart for Miss Anthony in this commodious
hotel whenever she was at the capital, whether for days or for months,
and she received every possible courtesy and attention, without price.
Miss Anthony wrote her many times: "You can not begin to know what a
blessing your home is to me, or how grateful I am to you for its
comfort and luxury. You are indeed Mrs. Sargent's successor in love and
hospitality, and my hope is always to deserve them."

After a brilliant reception at the Riggs House to the delegates, Miss
Anthony left for Philadelphia, in company with the venerable Julia
Smith Parker, and went to Roadside, the suburban home of Lucretia Mott,
"where," she writes, "it was a wonderful sight to see the two
octogenarians talking together, so bright and wide awake to the
questions of the present." She never again saw Lucretia Mott or heard
her sweet voice.

[Illustration HW: Jane H. Spofford]

The health of Miss Anthony's mother was now so precarious that she did
not dare go far from home and a course of lectures was arranged for her
through Pennsylvania by Rachel Foster, a young girl of wealth and
distinction, who was growing much interested in the cause of woman and
very devoted to Miss Anthony personally. Frequent trips were made to
the home in Rochester through the inclement weather, and toward the
last of March she saw that the end was near and did not go away. The
beloved mother fell asleep on the morning of April 3, 1880, the two
remaining daughters by her side. She was in her eighty-seventh year,
her long life had been passed entirely within the immediate circle of
home, but her interest in outside matters was strong. The husband and
children, in whatever work they were engaged, felt always the
encouragement of her sanction and sympathy. Her ambition was centered
in them, their happiness and success were her own; she was content to
be the home-keeper, to have the house swept and garnished and the
bountiful table ready for their return, finding a rich reward in their
unceasing love and appreciation. She was extremely fond of reading, had
read the Bible from cover to cover many times, and could give the exact
location and wording of many texts of Scripture. She enjoyed history,
was familiar with the works of Dickens and Scott and knew by heart The
Lady of the Lake. In old age, when memory failed, she lived among
historical personages and characters in books and would speak of them
as persons she had known in her youth. As the four children gathered
about the still form and looked lovingly upon the placid face, they
could not remember that she ever had spoken an unkind word. And so,
with tenderness and affection, they laid her to rest by the side of the
husband whose memory she had so faithfully cherished for eighteen
years.

A month later Miss Anthony again set forth on the weary round, leaving
her sister Mary in the lonely house with two young nieces, Lucy and
Louise, whose education she was superintending. Just before going she
wrote to Rachel Foster: "Yes, the past three weeks are all a
dream--such constant watching and care and anxiety for so many years
all taken away from us! But my mother, like my father, if she could
speak would bid us 'go forward' to greater and better work. She never
asked me to stop at home when she was living, not even after she became
feeble, but always said, 'Go and do all the good you can;' and I know
my highest regard for her and for my father and sisters gone before
will be shown by my best and noblest doing."

[Footnote 94: In 1874, when a bill was pending to establish the
Territory of Pembina, Senator Sargent wished to so amend it as to
incorporate woman suffrage. After he had finished a matchless argument,
in which he was supported by Senators Stewart, of Nevada, and
Carpenter, of Wisconsin, Senator Morton made one of those grand
speeches for which he was famous. He based his demands for woman
suffrage on the Declaration of Independence, whose principles, he
declared, did not apply to man alone but to the human family; and he
demonstrated that no man or woman could "consent" to a government
except through a vote.

For Sargent's and Morton's speeches see History of Woman Suffrage, Vol.
II, pp. 546 and 549.]

[Footnote 95: For full text see History of Woman Suffrage, Vol. III, p.
138.]

[Footnote 96: Miss Anthony lectured in Terre Haute under the auspices
of the young men's Occidental Literary Club, Eugene V. Debs, president
and one of its founders.]