Blackwell Family Henry B. Blackwell speechesAddress of Henry B Blackwell We elderly people are asked for reminiscences as [a] "pioneer workers" for Woman Suffrage. [But] No one [now] living is a pioneer. Two hundred and fifty years ago, Margaret Brent of Maryland petitioned the Legislature for the right to vote. She was the pioneer. In 1776 "all inhabitants worth £50" were made voters in New Jersey and women voted for 31 years in that state. In its election law of 1790 we find the words "he or she" and "his or her ballot," defining the qualifications of voters. Only when the property qualification was abolished, in 1807, was the right to vote restricted to white male citizens. But it has been my good fortune to be associated early in life with women obliged to rely on their own efforts. Within a month of moving to the West in 1838 my father died, leaving his wife and nine children unprovided for, among strangers. My mother and sisters organized a school and sent me to college. In 1842 my sister Elizabeth resolved to study medicine. After 4 years strenuous effort she obtained a diploma in 1846, and opened the medical profession to women. My sister Emily followed her example. In 1847 Miss Lucy Stone graduated from Oberlin College and began a series of addresses [to lecture] on the social, [&] industrial, legal, [&] political, and religious disabilities of women. These lectures drew crowded audiences, and won thousands of converts from Maine to Missouri. About the same time Miss Antoinette L. Brown, a classmate of Lucy Stone at Oberlin, studied theology, and was ordained as pastor of an orthodox congregational society in South Butler, N. York. In 1850 my sisters Marian and Ellen were members of the first National Woman's Rights Convention, at Worcester, Mass., which, reported by Mrs John Stuart Mill in the Edinburgh Review, started the agitation for woman suffrage in Great Britain. In 1853 I attended and made my maiden speech at a convention in Cleveland, Ohio, which resulted in the formation of [the] Ohio Woman Suffrage Association. Here I met Lucy Stone, Mrs Tracy Cutler, Frances D. Gage, William Lloyd Garrison, Abby Kelley, Stephen Foster, Parker Pillsbury, and other reformers. The meeting was called by Mrs. Caroline M. Severance. In 1856 I had the good fortune to become the husband of Lucy Stone, and in 1857 my brother married Rev. Antoinette L. Brown, the first ordained woman minister. So, for more than 50 years I have [had the] been intimately connected with this movement, which has given dignity and charm to my active business life. In 1865 we were working [active] members of the National Equal Rights Association, and sought vainly to secure suffrage for women in the reconstruction of the Union. In 1867 my wife addressed the Legislature of New Jersey, and in 1867 we went together to Kansas and there, with Gov. Charles Robinson, [and] Samuel Wood, and others, formed the Kansas Woman Suffrage Association and held a series of meetings in every organized county of the state. In 1869 the territories of Wyoming and Utah conferred full suffrage on women, and the British Parliament extended municipal suffrage to women. In that year, after extensive correspondence throughout the country, was organized at Cleveland the American Woman Suffrage Association, composed of delegates from State Societies which has held its annual meetings in an unbroken series to the present time. In 1879 the Womans Journal was established in Boston and has appeared every Saturday for 33 years. In 1876 Colorado adopted a state constitution providing for the submission of woman suffrage at any time by the Legislature, which resulted in its adoption in 1893. Wyoming, after 25 years trial as a territory incorporated woman suffrage in its State Constitution. Utah and Idaho did the same in 1897. Today women have school suffrage in 24 states, municipal suffrage in Kansas, taxpayer's suffrage in Montana, New York and Louisiana. More than a million American citizens in four states with an area of 300,000 square miles, are living under full woman suffrage, with eight U.S. Senators and nine representatives in the National House, who number women among their constituents. But these wonderful successes are but a part of far more fundamental work achieved during the past fifty years. We have revolutionized the social status of women. We have won for them the priceless privilege of free speech, we have secured for married women, in almost every state, the control of their persons, property and earnings [& have]. In nine states we have secured for mothers an equal custody and control of their minor children, have opened to women [their] hundreds of industrial avocations, have opened gained them entrance to [them the] colleges and universities and professional schools, have won for them the position of teachers in our public schools, have secured for them admission to the professions of law, medicine, [and] theology, [have] and journalism. Women are already organized into Federations of [women's] clubs, National Councils of Women, National Women's Christian Temperance Unions, and innumerable forms of beneficent public activity. [Now, as we earlier workers] Nor is this movement confined to our own country. In Canada, Australia, New Zealand, England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales, in Norway and France, women are voting. The example of New Jersey in 1776 is spreading throughout the world. Woman's Equality is fast becoming the watchword of Civilization.Henry B. BlackwellWOMAN SUFFRAGE A POLITICAL REFORM. -BY- HENRY B. BLACKWELL. The opponents of Impartial Suffrage assert that Woman's Participation in Government is contrary to nature and to history. We maintain, on the contrary, that it is in strict accordance with both. The following propositions may be stated as political axions: 1. Political Progress, historically viewed, consists in the successive extension of Suffrage to classes hitherto disfranchised. 2. The enlargement of Woman's sphere of activity and the recognition of her Equal rights mark and measure the Progress of Civilization. In a state of barbarism, where men subsist mainly by hunting or pasturage, Progress is impossible; war is chronic, and women are enslaved. The Indian squaw has no rights that the red man is bound to respect. Even under a despotism women are secluded in harems. and polygamy prevails. But Civilization and Woman's Rights go hand in hand; neither can advance without the other. When Mankind emerge from barbarism, the earliest and rudest form of government is Despotism. Now what is Despotism? It is a political society wherein only one man (or, as often happens, one woman,) is endowed with absolute political power. It seems to be an instinct among savages, since any government is better than none, to attach themselves with unquestioning fidelity to some vigorous leader, and to place unlimited power in his hands. But human nature cannot safely be thus trusted. Absolute power always corrupts its possessor. Invariably the trust is abused. The protector of society becomes its oppressor. The despot and his satellites monopolize the prizes of life, and the mass of mankind remain degraded and enslaved. But the despot can only rule by employing subordinates. Ere long these subordinates combine against him. They wring from his reluctant hands certain permanent privileges for themselves and their children. And thus Despotism always ultimates in the second great historical form of government, to wit, an Aristocracy of Birth. Now what is an Aristocracy of Birth? It is a political society wherein a certain number of men and women of the first families are endowed with political power. Half civilized communities are thus ranged under the banners of their feudal superiors, who exact unquestioning obedience. These great families in their turn become demoralized by power. They become the victims of their own unbridled passions, and waste the substance of the people in military conflicts. But still the circle of intelligence widens. the luxury of the nobility stimulates commerce and manufactures. Wealth accumulates. The merchants and manufacturers, in their turn, combine against the nobles. entrenched in their walled cities they extort municipal privileges. By degrees the Aristocracy of Birth gives place to the more numerous Aristocracy of Wealth, or in other words to a political society wherein a great many rich men and women exercise political power. This is the third great step in the political progress of nations. The circle continues to widen. The sons and daughters of rich men become demoralized; the children of poor men take their places. Primogeniture and Land Monopoly give place to a more general equality of social conditions. At this critical moment America is discovered and colonized. Upon the virgin soil of the new continent, Humanity takes a new departure. When the American Revolution ended, our national Independence was achieved. But aristocratic privileges still lingered in our institutions. Republican Government, even in our present restricted sense of the term, did not yet exist. In almost every State, Suffrage was limited by property qualifications. Even in States like Massachusetts, where such qualifications did not before exist, the Federalists hastened to impose them. It was still only "a rich man's government". But scarcely were the guns of the Revolution silent when the Democratic Party, under Jefferson, assailed the property qualifications for voting. The watchword of the Democracy2 WOMAN SUFFRAGE A POLITICAL REFORM [?cy] in 1800, was "a white man's government" instead of a government of men of property. In a single generation they expelled the Federalists from power in State and Nation, swept away property qualifications, and conferred Suffrage upon all free men of European race. For the first time in history, farmers, mechanics and laborers voted. The barriers of class exclusiveness were broken down. Attracted by the grand ideal of liberty, a tide of immigration poured in from Europe, and the Great Republic was organized upon a wider application of the principle of "the consent of the governed." But power demoralized the Democratic Party. The great vested interest of Slavery became supreme. It arrayed itself against Free Labor, and attempted to destroy the Union. The Civil War followed. Slavery went down. The South was reconstructed by the Republican party on the basis of "Manhood Suffrage". This principle has been imbedded in the Federal Constitution by the passage of the Fifteenth Amendment. Today every man is a sovereign; only women are subjects. The political aristocracies of Birth, of Wealth, and of Race are forever overthrown, and our government has passed into the hands of an Aristocracy of Sex. But scarcely has this new Revolution been achieved when a new movement is manifest in society. As the Democracy demanded Suffrage for poor white men, and as the Republicans demanded Suffrage for colored men, so the New Party demand Suffrage for the women of America. The demand is sustained by the same arguments, is founded upon the same principles, and is destined to achieve a similar victory. For whenever any class of men have been enabled by force of circumstances to attain the higher level of political responsibility and self-government, they have always instinctively sought to place women at their side. In Monarchies women have been Rulers; Semiramis in Babylon, Zenobia in Palmvra, Cleopatra in Egypt, Isabella in Spain, Christina in Sweden, Maria Theresa in Austria, Catherine in Russia, Elizabeth in England. In Aristocracies of Birth women have inherited titles; they have exercised feudal jurisdiction; they have led armies to victory; women who are born nobles in their own right sit and vote in the Diet of Austria. In Aristocracies of Wealth women share the pursuits and enjoy the privileges of their class. In Holland, the best governed nation in Europe, women vote upon the same property qualifications as men; in Great Britain, a rich man's government, women vote upon a property qualification in parochial and municipal elections, and exert a great and growing political influence; they vote, as stockholders of the East India Company and of the Bank of England. Are American women alone unworthy of political responsibilities? Are American men afraid to trust their own wives and sisters and daughters with the complete duty and dignity of citizenship? It is impossible. In the State, as in the Church there will eventually be neither Jew nor Greek, neither bond nor free, neither male nor female, but we shall all become one in the perfect unity of Christian Civilization. The eternal and ineradicable distinction of sex is one principal reason why women, in a representative government, should be directly represented, since they constitute one entire half of the body politic. If lawyers alone cannot safely be trusted to make laws for mechanics, if merchants alone cannot legislate for farmers, if white men alone cannot do justice to the negroes, if every well defined class in society is entitled to its own authoritative expression - surely women, who are the wives and sisters and mothers of men, should give expression to the domestic interests from the feminine point of view. If mere differences of education, habit, race and interest make class legislation dangerous, how much more partial and imperfect must be the legislation of one-half of the community, where the other half, in addition to such differences, differ organically also. If a blacksmith cannot fairly represent a physician, how much less can a man represent a woman! The opponents of Woman Suffrage can only successfully oppose this argument by showing that Suffrage is a purely masculine function. If so, it is right that men should monopolize it, but not otherwise. Or, if Suffrage were a purely feminine function, then it would be right that women should monopolize it, but not otherwise. But Suffragists maintain that Suffrage is a human function, and that it demands for its exercise functions common to both sexes. So far is it is now colored and controlled by one sex, it is one-sided and partial. The participation of both sexes is needed, each to protect itself and to neutralize the special bias of the other. What is Suffrage? The authoritative expression of an opinion; rational choice in reference to principles, measures and men. Are women capable of forming an opinion? Have they the capacity of rational choice? Have they interests to be affected by legislation; rights to protect; wrongs to remedy? If so, women ought to vote as citizens, just as they now vote as stockholders in the Bank of England and in railroad or manufacturing corporations. Without going into minute particulars, or inquiring whether the mental peculiarities of women are due to nature or to circumstances, all Suffragists recognize these peculiarities, and assert that they are precisely the qualities which our government lacks, and for the want of which it is not now truly representative. In the long run, the average qualities and characteristics of the voting constituency always make themselves felt, and get represented in the government. Laws against vices that are fashionable and popular are seldom enforced. For instance; a certain ward in New York City has, for years, sent to Congress as its representative, with substantial unanimity, a well known gambler and prize-fighter. Gambling and prize fighting are contrary to law. His constituents know this, and know him. But he is the man of their choice. They like him, because he is a gambler and a prize- fighter. Such a man is the natural leader and representative of a constituency of roughs. Now we all know the aggressive and positive qualities in which men surpass women. But, in order to estimate fairly the effect that the voting of women will have upon the character of legislation, let us consider what are the qualities in which women are superior to men? WOMAN SUFFRAGE A POLITICAL REFORM. 3 Every one will admit that women are less under the control of the physical appetites and passions; that they are less belligerent and pugnacious; that they are more gentle, sympathetic, and humane; that they are more peaceable, temperate, chaste, prudent and economical. And these are precisely the qualities in which our government is deficient. War is the greatest scourge that afflicts humanity. It was to prevent private war that Government was first instituted. So long as Suffrage was exercised only by fighting men, war was the rule, and peace the exception. And so long as men alone vote, the belligerent element will continue to preponderate. Fourteen out of every fifteen dollars of the duties and taxes collected by the General Government are spent in defraying past and present war expenses. When men and women vote, all citizens will be represented, and the true balance of human nature will be restored. Woman Suffrage means Permanent Peace between Individuals and Nations. Intemperance and Licentiousness are, next to War, the chief curses of civilized society. But, Bishop Simpson has well said that the vices of our great cities can never be controlled until women vote. Temperance statistics assert that one-half of all men occasionally use intoxicating liquor as a beverage, but that only one woman in forty uses liquor. The worst evils of Intemperance fall upon the wives and children of inebriates. The drunkard's wife will not vote with the drunkard. Woman Suffrage may not mean Prohibition, but it certainly does mean a higher respect for Temperance and Sobriety. Women are vitally interested in the permanence and sanctity of Marriage. Unless utterly abandoned they recoil from sensuality. The women of St. Louis, after a long and arduous struggle, have procured the repeal of the infamous City Ordinance, enacted by men alone, which licensed houses of prostitution. When women vote, these dens of infamy will be everywhere broken up. Woman Suffrage means Social Purity. Being inferior to men in muscular strength, women find it more difficult to earn money. They are, therefore, necessarily more economical in their expenditures. The low wages of women are partly the result of unjust legislation, but voting will not wholly do away with this disparity of earnings, or with Woman's consequent habit of economy. Therefore Woman Suffrage means Financial Retrenchment and a more economical scale of State and National expenditures. Women are more influenced by moral and religious considerations than are men. In the State Prison of Connecticut, at Wethersfield, there are 228 male convicts; only two female convicts. Even the comparatively few crimes committed by women are usually such as affect themselves most directly; those committed by men are usually crimes of violence, which most directly affect the lives and property of others. More than two thirds of all the Church members of America are women. This higher average standard of religion and morals is precisely what is needed in Politics. All admit that some change in our political system is needed. The growing corruption of public life is admitted and deplored by both parties. Low as is the average standard of private morals, the standard of political ethics is confessedly far lower. Every year matters seem to grow worse. Our laws and law-makers do not fairly represent the public sentiment of the community. This deterioration evidently proceeds in part from the introduction into our political system of great bodies of ignorant men. For half a century a flood of immigrants has poured into our seaports — Irishmen, Germans, Norwegians, Welsh, English, Canadian French and Chinese. These people, mostly peasants and artisans, have not represented the average intelligence of their respective nationalities. But they have suddenly transformed our villages into cities and our wildernesses into farms. These men, numbering millions, never voted at home. But here, for the first time, they have been gifted with the ballot, often before they could read our newspapers or speak our language. In our Southern States a still more sudden change has taken place. Eight hundred thousand ignorant plantation slaves have been enfranchised and made voters in a single year. The result, in many localities, is a political revolution. In South Carolina, for instance, the white voters are said to number 40,000, the black voters 90,000. Another great series of influences, which has lately come into play, aggravates the downward tendency. War always demoralizes; and the great war of 1861 has demoralized the nation. A national debt tends to enrich the wealthy and pauperize the poor; and the legacy of the war was a national debt of three thousand million dollars. A depreciated currency stimulates speculation and converts even legitimate business into gambling; and our currency has been and continues to be depreciated. A protective tariff builds up huge manufacturing monopolies, and aggregates population in squalid masses, dependent upon their daily labor for a precarious sustenance; and a protective tariff is imposed. Thus, within a single generation, the New World is brought face to face with many of the terrible, unsolved problems which threaten the life of European Civilization. Now what shall we do about it? How shall we cope with these stern facts? How shall we redeem the future of the Great Republic? Only by enlisting all the virtue, all the intelligence, all the patriotism of the nation in a struggle with the vice, and ignorance and selfishness of the nation. In short, only by enlisting the interest of the whole American People in political questions, to a greater extent than ever before. We must somehow arouse the Community to habitual thought and action on political topics. Fortunately it is the permanent interest of most people to have good laws, economical administration, and honest public servants. When office holders steal, their constituents have to foot the bills. To secure a just verdict we must first secure an impartial jury. Such a jury, only an extended Suffrage can supply. And the greatest of all political problems is how best to enlist public interest in the intelligent criticism of public affairs. "The price of liberty is eternal vigilance." While absorbed in a struggle with Southern slavery we have become ourselves insensibly enslaved. Today our government is Republican only in form. In every ward, in every town we are governed by cliques of trading politicians through the machinery of parties.4 WOMAN SUFFRAGE A POLITICAL REFORM The nominations are made by less then five per cent. of the voters, assembled in the primary meetings. Now who are the men that compose these primaries? Go and see. The "managers" are there; men who have axes to grind. Their followers are there; men who are the "slaves of the ring." The floating population are there; men who lounge on sidewalks and haunt saloons and "drop in" as a pastime. When the meeting is called to order, a ticket, usually distributed on printed slips, is nominated by acclamation. In ten minutes the caucus is adjourned. This ticket was carefully prepared, in advance of the caucus, by a little, self-constituted clique of politicians, in a private parlor or bar-room, from which the public are jealously excluded. Half a dozen men, known only to their immediate followers, have settled the nominations for 5000 voters. But suppose men of public spirit attend the primary meeting, and protest against this caucus behind the caucus, this wheel within the wheel? They are contemptuously silenced. They are powerless. "The ring" has money and offices at its command. When election day comes, only from thirty to sixty per cent of the qualified voters vote. In many localities less than sixty per cent of the voters took part even in the last Presidential election; in other words, only sixty men out of a hundred cared enough whether Grant or Greeley should be the next President to go to the polls. It may be said that if our present political evils are so largely the result of male ignorance manipulated by cunning, the addition of an equal number of still more ignorant female voters will only make bad manners worse. But in the first place our female population is much more largely native American, and to that extent is more generally educated. To prove this we need only refer to the statistics of immigration, which show a very great and constant preponderance of male immigrants. This preponderance reaches its maximum in the case of the Chinese who are, almost without exception, males. In the second place the grossly ignorant and vicious class are everywhere the minority. If, by Woman Suffrage, we should double the votes of this class, we should also double the votes of the intelligent majority and thereby largely diminish the relative political power of ignorance, and largely increase the relative political power of intelligence. Thus, if 2000 out of 5000 voters are ignorant, there is an intelligent majority of 2000, and the danger is reduced one-half. And in the third place our chief danger has been shown to lie not in ignorance but in indifference, and this indifference will be vastly lessened when political ideas and interests are brought into the domestic circle and made a subject of family consideration. To call our present political system "A government of the people" is absurd. The only remedy is to attract the people to the primary meetings in sufficient numbers to check and overawe the "rings." To reform politics we must first reform the caucases. To-day the men of intellect and character do not, as a rule attend them. Such men are too busy and too much absorbed in social engagements. They go with their wives and sisters to church- meetings, concerts, lectures, and social parties. They associate with ladies at home and abroad. These women expect their society and would feel disappointed at their absence. The presence of such men in political meetings can be secured in only one way, viz: by enlisting the social sympathy and co-operation of women in such meetings. When the women go the men will go. Men of refinement will take little interest in the practical work of politics so long as women are excluded. Because, society is civilized, while politics are still semi-barbarous. Women are in society; women are the life of our churches and schools, of our charities and reforms; they should be the life of our politics also. "What God has joined let not man put asunder." But until men and women go together to the primary meetings these meetings will continue small in numbers, sordid in tone, poor in character and corrupt in management. Real political reform must begin by a reform in our caucus system. And in order to reform the caucus we must open its doors to men and women. In Impartial Suffrage irrespective of sex lies the only salvation of American politics. When, therefore, a great State like Michigan, exceptionally prosperous, exceptionally intelligent, exceptionally well circumstanced for testing this broader application of the principles of representative government, proposes to establish Impartial Suffrage for women, this proposition deserves the sympathy and support of every friend of enlightened liberty and political reform. In view of the necessity of radical political reform, let all honest men bid it God speed! Instead of conjuring up phantoms of terror or suggesting forebodings of disaster, let us all give the movement a generous support, and await the results of the great experiment with friendly and hopeful cordiality! The Woman Suffrage Reform has not been undertaken one day too soon. Already, in the Eastern and Middle States, where women exceed men in numbers and where manufactures and commerce have largely taken the place of agriculture, the condition of working women is deplorable. it grows daily more so. Manners and morals deteriorate, because so many unprotected women are driven to the wall. They are thrown upon their own resources, yet are deprived of the exercise of equal legal and political rights, and so are unable to combine, like other classes of laborers, for mutual protection. The police too often abuse their power over a class that is powerless to redress its grievances at the polls. The chivalrous respect for Woman, which should inspire every true American heart, is visibly diminishing in the centers of wealth and population. We turn for help to the broad prairies and rich valleys where men and women call no landlord master. Let the Great West, still agricultural and independent, come to our rescue against the corrupt combinations of trading politicians. By establishing Impartial Suffrage, let us check the despotism of monopolies, restore the supremacy of morals in public and private life, and redeem the future of the Great American Republic. Woman's Journal office, 3 Tremont Place, Boston. 1 Woman Suffrage a Political Reform [To the Editor of The Nation] In a recent article entitled "Woman Suffrage in Michigan", the New York Nation suggested various difficulties and disorders which may possibly arise if women are allowed to vote, and intimates that the advocates of Impartial Suffrage have not sufficiently recognized the essential differences of Sex. [Permit me to] I will therefore state some [reasons] grounds for believing that Woman Suffrage will result in a radical political reform. The eternal and ineradicable distinction of Sex is one principal reason why [ground upon which Suffragists claim] [that] women, in a representative government, should be directly represented, since they constitute one entire half of the body politic. If lawyers alone cannot safely be trusted to make laws for mechanics, if farmers alone cannot legislate for merchants, if the Southern whites cannot do justice to the negroes, if every well defined class in Society is entitled to its own authoritative expression - surely women, who are the wives and sisters and mothers of men, should give expression to the domestic interests from the feminine point of view. If mere differences of education, habit, race and interest make class legislation dangerous, how much more partial and imperfect must be the legislation of one half of the community where the other half, in addition to such differences, differ organically also. If a blacksmith cannot fairly represent a physician, how much less can a 2 2 man represent a woman! The opponents of Woman Suffrage can only successfully oppose this argument by showing that Suffrage is a purely masculine function. If so, it is right that men should monopolize it, but not otherwise. Or, if Suffrage were a purely feminine function, then it would be right that women should monopolize it, but not otherwise. But Suffragists maintain that Suffrage is a human function, and that it demands for its exercise functions common to both sexes. So far as it is now colored and controlled by one sex it is one-sided and partial. The participation of both sexes is needed, each to neutralize the sexual bias of the other. What is Suffrage? The authoritative expression of an opinion; rational choice in reference to principles, measures and men. Are women capable of forming an opinion? Have they the capacity of rational choice? Have they interests to be affected by legislation; rights to protect; wrongs to remedy? If so, women ought to vote as citizens, just as they now vote as stockholders in the Bank of England and in [or if] railroad or manufacturing corporations. Without going into minute particulars or enquiring whether the mental peculiarities of women are due to nature or to circumstances, all Suffragists [we] recognize these peculiarities, and assert that they are precisely the qualities which our government 3 lacks, and for the want of which it is not now truly representative. All admit that some change in our political system is needed. The growing corruption of public life is admitted and deplored by the Nation. Low as is the average standard of private morals, the standard of political ethics is confessedly far lower. Every year matters seem to grown worse. Our laws and lawmakers do not fairly represent the public sentiment of the Community. This deterioration evidently proceeds in part form the introduction into our political system of great bodies of ignorant men. For half a century a flood of immigrants has poured into our Seaports - Irishmen, Germans, Norwegians, Welsh, English, Canadian French and Chinese. These people, mostly peasants and artisans, have not represented the average intelligence of their respective nationalities. But they have suddenly transformed our villages into cities and our wildernesses into farms. These men, numbering millions, never voted at home. But here, for the first time, they have been gifted with the ballot, often before they could read our newspapers or speak our language. In our Southern States a still more sudden change has taken place. Eight hundred thousand ignorant Plantation slaves have been enfranchised and made voters in a single year. The result, in many localities, is a political revolution. In South Carolina, for instance, the white voters are said to number 40000, the black voters 90000. Now if this vast number of ignorant voters, North and South, were equally mingled in the two great parties and led by the intelligent majority, the evil would be less than it is. But unfortunately the more ignorant class is largely segregated and organized, as Democrats in the North and as Republicans in the South, under shrewd but unscrupulous leaders. Another great series of influences, which has lately come into play, aggravates the downward tendency. War always demoralizes; and the great war of 1861 has demoralized the nation. A National Debt [always] tends to enrich the wealthy and pauperize the poor; and the legacy of the war was a national debt of three thousand million dollars. A depreciated currency stimulates speculation and converts even legitimate business into gambling; and our currency has been and continues to be depreciated. A protective tariff builds up huge manufacturing monopolies and aggregates population in squalid masses, dependant upon their daily labor for a precarious sustenance; 5 and a protective tariff is imposed. Thus, within a single generation, the new world is brought face to face with many of the terrible, unsolved problems which threaten the life of European civilization. Now what shall we do about it? How shall we cope with these stern facts? How shall we redeem the future of the great Republic? Only by enlisting all the virtue, all the intelligence, all the patriotism of the nation in a struggle with the vice, and ignorance, and selfishness of the nation. In short, only by enlisting the interest of the whole American people in political questions to a greater extent than ever before. We must somehow arouse the community to habitual thought and action on political topics. Fortunately it is the permanent interest of most people to have good laws, economical administration, and honest public servants. When office holders steal, their constituents have to foot the bills. To secure a just verdict we must first secure an impartial jury. Such a jury only an extended Suffrage can supply. [Therefore] And the greatest of all political problems is how best to enlist public interest in the intelligent criticism of public affairs? "The price of liberty is eternal vigilance." While absorbed in a struggle with Southern slavery we have ourselves become insensibly enslaved. Today our government is republican only in form. In every ward, in every town, we are governed by cliques of trading politicians through the machinery of parties. The nominations 6 are made by less than five percent of the voters, assembled in the primary meetings. Now who are the men that compose the primaries? Go and see. The "managers" are there; men who have axes to grind. Their tools are there; men who are "the slaves of the ring." The floating population are there; the men who lounge on sidewalks and haunt saloons "drop in" as a pastime. When the meeting is called to order a ticket, usually distributed on printed slips, is "nominated by acclamation." In ten minutes the caucus is adjourned. This ticket was carefully prepared [made], in advance of the caucus, by a little, self-constituted clique of politicians, in a private parlor or barroom from which the public are jealously excluded. Half a dozen men, known only to their immediate followers, have settled the nominations for 5000 voters! But suppose men of the public spirit attend the primary meeting, and protest against this caucus behind the caucus, this wheel within the wheel? They are contemptuously silenced. They are powerless. "The ring" has money and offices at its command. When election day comes, only from 30 to 60 percent of the qualified voters vote. In many localities less than 60 percent of the voters took part even in the last Presidential election; in other words, only sixty men out of a hundred cared enough whether Grant or Greeley should be the next President to go to the polls.It may be said that if our present political evils are so largely the result of male ignorance manipulated by cunning, the addition of an equal number of still more ignorant female voters will only make matters worse. But in the first place our female population is much more largely mature American, or in other words is more generally educated. To prove this we need only refer to the statistics of immigration which show a very great and constant preponderance of male ignorance. This preponderance reaches its maximum in the case of Chinese who are almost without exception males. In the second place the grossly ignorant and vicious class are everywhere the minority. Even if by women sufferage we should double the votes of this class, we shall also double the votes of the intelligent majority and thereby largely increase the relative political power of intelligence. Thus if 2000 out of 5000 voters are dangerous there is only an intelligent majority of 1000; but if 4000 out of 10000 voters are dangerous there is an intelligent majority of 2000 and the danger is reduced one half. And in the third place our chief danger has been shown to be not in ignorance but in indifference and this indifference will be nastily lettered when political ideas and interests are brought into the domestic circle and made a subject of family consideration. To call our present political system "a government of the people" is absurd. The only remedy to to attract the people of the primary meeting in sufficient numbers to check and overawe the "_avgs_". To reform politics, we must first reform the caucuses. Today the men of intellect and character do not, as a rule attend them. Such men too busy and too much absorbed in social engagements. They go with their wives and sisters to church meetings, concerts, lectures, and social parties. They associate with ladies at home and abroad. These women expect their society and would feel disappointed at their absence. The presents of such men in political meetings can be secured in only one way; by enlisting the social sympathy and cooperation of women in such meetings. When the women go the men will go. Men of refinement will take little interest in the practical work of politics so long as women are excluded. Because society is civilized while politics are still semi-barbarous. Women are in society; women are the life of our churches and schools; of our charities and reforms; they should be the life of our politics also. "What God has journed let not man put asunder". But until men and women go together to the primary meetings these meetings will continue small in numbers, sordid in tone, poor in character and corrupt in management. Real political reform must begin by a reform in our caucus system. And in order to reform that caucus we must open it's doors to men and women. In impartial suffrage, irrespective of sex lies the only solution of American politics. 9 When, therefore, a great State like Michigan, exceptionally prosperous, exceptionally intelligent, exceptionally well circumstanced for testing this broader application of the principles of representative government, proposes to establish Impartial Suffrage for women, this proposition deserves the sympathy and support of every friend of enlightened liberty and political reform. In view of the necessity of radical political reform, will not the Nahon bid it God-speed? Instead of conjuring up phantoms of terror and suggesting forebodings of disaster will it not [let us] give the movement a generous support, and await the results of the great experiment with friendly and hopeful cordiatlity? H B B W.S. of Polit ReformHenry B. Blackwell Speech municipal suffrage for women 1st page missing2 Much of the town money is spent on the care of paupers, mostly [composed of] poor women and children. If women helped elect those who have charge of these [women and children] they would be better cared for. [If women had charge of them they would be better cared for,] And if it is essential to a better administration of the paupers fund that women should have that charge, why should not women help select the guardians of the poor? Already, in all our religious organizations women are being set apart to administer important church business officially. We only ask that our town in its secular capacity may do what the citizens already do individually and in a religious capacity. A majority of all the intelligent and skillful women of my town desire the Suffrage. Let me state a fact in proof of this statement. There is but one church in my own part of the town. In the Women's Sewing Circle of that church I have ascertained that two thirds wish to vote. Of the remaining one third all but three or four say they are willing the right should be granted. On behalf of these women I ask for Suffrage. The effect of our petition, if granted, would be first such an improvement as would take place if hitherto as in oriental countries our women have been excluded from the church, and in the streets [our women had been excluded] and now for the first time [they] were permitted to go to these places. Henceforth the women of our town would go to the town meeting with their husbands and brothers as they now go with them elsewhere. Their presence would tone up our school system; they would help take charge of it. On an average our women are better qualified to do this than are our men, first as our men are better qualified to carry on a shoe shop than are our women. In the case of our charities a similar improvement would follow -- more quiet but equally real. It would consist in a greater sense of comfort when those who give and those who receive are better related. The poor people would be better and more economically cared for. The interests of Temperance would surely be promoted. The women of my town are not drunkards, but some of them are sufferers by the intemperance of men. They desire to vote so that they may bring their political as well as moral force to bear against the evils of intemperance. On this account more than anything else they entreat and I entreat you to grant this petition. We limit ourselves to our own town and to those matters which our town has a right to do. The men of Abington ask you to allow the women of Abington to vote upon those questions which concern the town of Abington alone. Wendell Phillips said: I think it is no self-conceit which says that Massachusetts, as a community, has always been the first, or among the first, to avail herself of any light in regard to political affairs. It has been our object to lead in all 3 movements for the social and civil improvement of the Age. We come to ask this legislature to follow in the footsteps of its processors not to be laggard, but to do as our fathers have done; to exercise the keenest insight, to take the broadest outlook for the benefit of those who shall come after us. We ask you to advance a step in the practical recognition of rights -- that is all. We do not ask you to grant, give, allow, concede anything -- you cannot give anything to women that is not hers of right already. We ask you to recognize an element hitherto neglected, to atone for an injustice, to right a wrong. This right of Suffrage inheres in me; I don't owe it to a grant; if taken from me it would be a wrong. It is so with women. Look at the condition of the sexes. Contrast the past with the present. See the strides which written fifty years have been made in opening doors for Woman. Take [think of] literature; when then there was one woman poet, writer of fiction, or essayist, [now] there are now authors equal in number and in genius to the men. Take Journalism; we used to think it a profession exclusively for men. Women now are on the staff of all of our leading papers. Take Public Speech: women are on every lyceum platform; indeed here in the scale man almost kicks the beam. Today the influence of Woman as a speaker is as great as his. Take [Law: she already practices the profession in many courts.] the Law as it concerns the status of a married woman. What a revolution! She may trade, she may contract, she may collect her own wages, she may make a will. our statutes [almost] have become almost ignorant of distinctions of sex. Take our schools; four fifths of the teachers women. College doors begin to open. In Europe it is the same. Take war even: when the gun is fired at Sumpter woman raises the hospital supplies; the quartermaster's department passes largely into the hands of women. Sex vanishes even in War. Take Trade, once exclusively masculine; now, here and there, women touch business [commercial] affairs and are felt in commercial channels all over the country. In England women vote in Town-elections, in School affairs; everywhere except for members of Parliament. We are not in front of the tendency of the Age; we are only abreast of it. Take the professions: women have stormed the medical professions. they are at the door of the legal profession; they appear in the pulpit; women touch the very steps of the State House. We only ask you to recognize this tendency, to move with this great current of civilization. De Tocqueville has painted a terrific picture of the drift of modern society toward Democracy. Civilization began4 in Asia -- the woman a piece of property, nothing more. Moving Westward - she becomes an ornament of society, [then] something more than property a being possessed of personal and property rights. She is educated. We invent a system of trusteeship, almost wholly to circumvent the law, in her behalf. Every father wants his daughter to have something Here in Massachusetts we sweep away the legal sham and let the wife own the property. In France Woman called Society into existence. Canning once said "I call a new world into existence to rectify the injustice of the old." The whole drift of civilization is toward Woman Suffrage. What races dominate the world today? Not the Oriental, not the Latin, but the Northern, the German, and English. Tacitus says that the Northern races acknowledged the rights of Woman. Now either this Northern has been helped forward by woman, or else the best and most progressive race has seen fit to help her forward. Take either horn of the dilemma it is the same wherever you touch the question; in each case she is recognized, she does help govern. After forty years agitation in Massachusetts, when the great world-current runs this way, are we unreasonable to say to a Massachusetts legislature -- submit a Constitutional Amendment and let try it before the people. Let us see whether Massachusetts is ready for it, or not. Nobody has ever refuted the argument of Mr. Bowditch, or ever can: that government rests on our theory, upon the consent of the governed. You cannot make any exception which does not bear equally on the whole mass of citizens, and which an individual cannot surmount if he will. You say "a certain amount of education": all can attain it. This is not an urgent one. But you cannot prescribe a qualification which no one can remove. The Nation wiped out a distinction of race in citizenship which its victim could not change. It clutched the opportunity to abolish it. Now everybody admits that to say a black man shall not vote is unjust. We began by saying, here in Massachusetts, [that] "only a member of an orthodox shall vote--" But men cannot control their belief. Then we said "a voter must own a certain amount of property." The public mind threw off these inconsistencies. One step after another we have advanced. Now sex alone is left us as an insurmountable barrier. Either leave this out also, or say to Europe "Our fathers made a mistake. Their philosophy was wrong. Even then we should say with Europe we will make a moderate property qualification, easily attainable; a moderate education qualification, easily reached; but an insurmountable qualification of sex, either on the European or American theory no argument can justify. We can bring reasons why the Declaration of Independence should never have been written. But accepting that, the sex line is as inconsistent as the Negro line. The negro line has disappeared, the sex line will 5 follow. This is the broadest western of the Age. The purity, the peace, the success of [modern society] American [ins] [institutions] are all involved in our reform. Europe can [say tuday] truly say, the at in two respects our government is today a failure. One is the regulation of a great city, and thus is an era of great cities. [New York has been] [for years in the hands of a gang of thieves.] Sir Robert Peel once said in the British Parliament "Universal Suffrage has never yet governed a great city" It is true. New York has been for years in the hands of a gang of thieves. Its piety, wealth, talent, intellect, all waked up to the fact ten years ago. [Syng?], and Astor, and [Olou] Booth and O Connor all combined to arrest the thieves and get back the money. It was a rebellion against the municipal authorities. After ten years they have not got back a dollar and, within three months, have captured one man. What an evidence of weakness. What a revelation of the corruption of municipal life. The other day Tilden said: I can be elected if Morrisey, O Brien, and Kelley combine and give me the city of New York." Who are these three men? Nor Shakespeare, nor Milton, but the leaders of the corrupt political element which always abides a great city where half a million men and a thousand million dollars are aggregated. I once said that "no mayor of an American city can be elected except by the consent of dangerous classes. A mayor wrote me that his case was an exception. I replied: "May I print your letter?" He answered "No!" Another Mayor wrote: "I was elected without such consent, but my Board of Aldermen squelched me within thirty days." But our grow faster than the country; they treble while population doubles. We need a new element - where shall we find it but in Woman Take our legislatures: I propose to speak respectfully of legislature (laughter) But wealth perpetuated and organized in corporate controls them. Our system of incorporated wealth would have driven Jefferson crazy. These Companies have no children or grandchildren to divide or scatter their power. This had [?] against many marshalled and led by the ablest educated brains of the State. God tells us that if there is any element of mind or heart or conscience not yet enlisted we must call it in, that the next Century may have the best possible chances of success in the terrible battle it will have to fight against Monopoly. Our fathers said: "Clear the ground, give every opportunity. Some say, if, in higher education, in the relation of the sexes, in the reputation of the home, there is any new force the hour demands it of us. Did Jefferson create a good government? What is its evidence9 Another City treble country doubles- Cities need new element- Legislatures- wealth perpetualed & organized rule them incorporated wealth wd have driven Jefferson crazy- they have no children no grandchildren- This F/all fights against this led by the ablest brains educated- God tells us if there is any element of west heart or conscience call it in that the next century may have the best chances of success. Our fathers said- in their exper clear the ground, give it every oppy of success. If in higher education, the weakness of the sexes- then the hour demands of us. Did Jeff create a good gvot? What evidences ? The truth & purity of the people who grow up under it- Hunbolt- If we can not keep it is an evidence of failure- We have not created the men- We want- Sam Adams never saw a million men with thousands who dont know where the next- meal came from - Col Scott with 300 million dollars in his hand- Woman suffrage is a right, a necessity- an absolute need- watch human race always & everywhere- where man subjects woman lit must be expurgated - Dickens & Tennyson have clear page he wrote for women- mothers- sisters every modern movement that has lifted woman has lifted society- colleges open doors society enthrones her what would church be without women. Could nt raise ministers salary- In Worlds Temp Con we asked where are our helpers? In the galleries, banished from the floor- Where is the reason? to drive out women? The Hark says If she goes into the street & lifts her veil society will perish- She goes to [?] O Europe & America say let her go free- As a petitioner I ask the legis to let women vote but as a student of this Cent year who hopes for a group of republics free from despots sword - with serene confidence that self govt is the example I claim of woman that she shall vote. I have worked for temperance for 40 years- we are blocked- I look at your statute book - womanhood is crippling capital is gaining I want something as a make weight - I dont claim woman as better than man- God's principle is that the family is the hope- man & woman interactive may bring their political as well as moral force against the evils of intemperance - more than for anything else they control & I entreat the leg. to grant their petition - we limit ourselves for what a town can do - To ask for our own town - we limit ourselves to our own town - & do not desire for others - Wendell Phillips - I think it is no self conceit which says that Man has always been the first or among the first to avail herself of new light in regard to polit affairs - It has been our object to lead in all movements for the social & [?] improvement of the age - we come to ask the legis. to follow in the steps of its predecessors - not to be laggard but to do as its fathers have done - the keenest might the modest outlook for the benefit of society - we ask you to advance a step in the recognition of rights - I dont ask grant, give, allow - you must give any thing to Woman- We ask you to recognize a neglected element - to atone for a cry, to right a wrong. This right [?] in me. I dont owe it to a grant. If taken from me it would be a wrong - So with women - Look at the cond. of the sexes - see the stride which for 50 years has been made in opening doors for Woman - Think of literature - one poet, writer of fiction, essayist - now in equal number & genlly with men. Journalism - you used to think exclusively for man. Womennow are on the staff of all our leading papers - Public speech - Lyceum platform - The scale of the man almost kicks the beam - Today the influence of woman is as great - Take the Law - she may trade - she may collect her wages, may make a will - Our statutes almost ind of sex - Schools 4/5 teachers - College doors open in Europe the same - In War General Sumpter - woman raises hospital supplies - The quartermasters dept 2/3 women - Sex vanishing even in war - Trade - here & there women - touch Comm channels - all over the country - In England women vote in town elections. We are not in front of the testimony of life. We are only abreast of it - Professional - women have stormed the medical. is at the don of the legal - I show you women touch the very steps of the State House We only ask you to Tocgreville has painted his terrific picture of the raft toward democracy - Civilization begins in Asia - woman a [pae?] of property a mother -nothing more - Westward an ornament in society & something more property with personal rights - Educate - Invent ostern of Citizen ship almost wholly to circumvent the law - Goethe wants his daughter to have something - Then on Mais we sweep away the shame & let her own it - In France she calls society into existence. Canning said Call the old world. The [?] whole drift of civilization what races dominate - Not the Latin but the Northern German & English - Tactus says the Northern race acknowleded women Boston Fred Hunckley 25 [A M N Plad] (Lynn) Geo. W Cook 281863 Blackwell, Henry B. Rough draft of an appeal for Emancipation[*Rough Draft of an appeal for Emancipation Oct/63*] Fellow citizens An organized ass. of slaveholders styling itself the Confed Gov. is waging war upon the U. S. solely for the perpetuation & aggrandisement of slavery [[V?] will accept of no terms but] the dissolution of It demands [the] dissolution of the Union - In every state where [thes] slavery is predominant the slaveholding Rebellion has been [is] temporarily triumphant. In five slave holding states containing a large non slaveholding population vis in Maryland, Delaware, Kentucky Missouri and Tennessee the Federal authority is [maintained] restored in spite of the sympathies & preferences of the slave holders of those states by the efforts of the free laborers aided by the military power of the United States- These five so called loyal [slav] states are claimed by the Confederates because they retain slavery and in case of a permanent dissolution would on that account gravitate irresistibly to them - Every advocate & friend of slavery in the free states is also an open or secret friend of the Rebels - while Every advocate of Emancipation in the slave states is [a friend] on the side of the Union- With scarcely [enough] any exceptions so closely are the lines now drawn that with scarcely an exception, a man's politics can be inferred from his estimate of slavery- No statesman can honestly shut his eyes to permanent and inevitable facts - The Northern abolitionist and the Southern slaveholder can never again enter into harmonious political affiliation - If [no] Union is restored - it can only be on the one or the other basis - We have then three alternatives A Union of Free States " " " slave " or A Dissolution of the Union into Northern Republic & a Southern Confederacy- The people of the free states have pronouncedAn appeal by the Woman's National Loyal League The [?] citizens of the United States Two years ago An organized association of slaveholders [styling itself] [the Confederate Government has [?] solely by the] styled Secessionists [determined to perpetuate and aggravation the] [Institution of slavery has [?] the South] repudiated the Constitution [of the United States] the Union of our fathers. They with unexampled unanimity against the dissolution of the Union - No party in the North [No seniorty] not even the faction known as Copperheads venture to face the practical difficulties & permament collisions of a of a peace which would be no peace but chronic warfare - No party in the North can so far ignore the Christian civilization of the 19 Century & the public sentiment of the civ world as sensible to propose to suppress the conscience smother the sympathies of man to fetter the press & silence free [the] speech altogether Yet nothing less would suffice to [prothe] the irritated susceptibilities of the petty despots of the Plantation - The habits opinions & prejidices of the two sections are utterly irreconcileable while On the contrary all the pecuniary interests of the Border States will then run parallel with those of the North & we shall be as united people as far and as fast as our arms extend - The remark of this measure will be a a republic without stain or division [prepared to] with a guaranty of perpetual peace in the sublime justice of its foundation- What will be the pecuniary cost of the measure The number of slaves in these five states are probably about half a million- of those one half are held by opers & notorious traitors entitled of course to no compensation - If payment is made for the other half at $300 each in Gov Bonds - it would involve an issue of 78 million of Dollars which would be about equivalent to the present expenditures of the War for a single month We repeat it - A sum equal to one month's War expenses will wipe the stigma of slavery away forever from our National Escutcheon, will settle [forever] beyond contingency the the future destiny of these five loyal border states & will destroy utterly forever that unholy alliance of border state slaveholders & Northern Democrats which has prolonged the war to the present hour by dividing the Counsels & paralyzing the energies of the Nation - and will enlist at once & forever in the agency of the Union the sympathies of the whole [?] world Let every American citizen therefore urge upon the coming Congress the duty of appropriating this property in man to public as within the loyal States wherever it exists & by making such compensation to loyal slaveholders as the case may require smooth the difficulty of a transition to a better system - But it is asked what shall be done with the Slaves? We answer - leave to settle that question for themselves - With tobacco at 25 & cotton at 90 cents per lb., they will not find it difficult to obtain a fair day's wage for a fair day's work - The necessity of Emancipation is imminent, the period critical the duty evident - Should the Proslavery Democracy require for an instant the ascendency and the opportunity may be indefinitely postponed by disgraceful and heinous compromises proclaimed by a political consciption & under seven for the [???said] of forced women [*Lette us pluck from the [ultra?] danger the flower safely For in all time & in all human story The path of duty is the way to glory -when the ground of contention is removed by the abolition of the Institution which is the source of controversy - Again - It [has been [forward] considered necessary [in order] to make progress by the United States Government to enlist the enslaved] one third of the population of the rebel states are negro slaves - These people worked while their masters fought. As a war measures it has proved necessary to enlist them in our favor & to detach them from their masters by a proclamation of Emancipation - As a result we have steadily gained & are still gaining ground- while many thousand colored troops are deploying the utmost valor and devotion to our cause. - The interventions of Europe has been thereby prevented and the whole fabric of Southern Society is rapidly falling to pieces - This proclamation can never be recalled - Slavery therefore is already abolished in the Rebel States- It only remains to get rid of it in the five so-called loyal states still unendinglly slave holding - Our security consistency & honor all require that this should be done speedily - To induce Congress to act is now our first object & most imperative duty - Can it be done Constitutionally? by the Fed Gov.? We answer - It can be done under the clause which provides that no private property shall be taken by Gov for public use without fair compensation - The inevitable inference is that with compensation private property may be taken by Gov. whenever, in its judgement, the public good requires it - Slaves are held under State Laws only as private property - & as such may be taken - Consider for a moment the practical advantages of thus [taking of] terminating slavery at once & forever within the Loyal States - Our political house no longer divided in itself will stand in the strength of homogenous institutions based upon the rights of Human Nature - The Southern Confederacy will no longer devise to appropriate these States which will have ceased to represent their ideas - There will be no strong pecuniary interest in these States plotting with Northern Traitors & Southern Rebels to subvert the Union. Appeal for Emancipation in Border States Oct 63unless the ground of contention is removed by the abolition, of the Institution which is the source of controversy -- Again - it [has been considered necessary in order to make progress] [by the United States Government to enlist the enslaved] one third of the population of the rebel states are negro slaves - These people worked while their masters fought [&t.] As a war measure it has proved necessary to enlist them in our favor & to detach them from their masters by a proclamation of Emancipation -- As a result we have steadily gained & are still gaining ground -- while many thousand colored troops are displaying the utmost valor & devotion to our cause. -- The intervention of Europe has been thereby prevented & the whole fabric of Southern Society is rapidly falling to pieces -- This proclamation can never be recalled - Slavery therefore is already abolished in the Rebel States -- It only remains to get rid of it in the five so called Loyal States still [?] slave holding --Our security consistency & honor all require that this should be done speedily -- To induce Congress to act is now our first object & most [essential] imperative duty- - [*Appeal for Emancipating in Border States Oct/64*] Can it be done Constitutionally? by the fed gov? We answer -- It can be done under the clause which provides that no private property should be taken by Gov for public use without fair compensation-- The inevitable inference is that with compensation private property may be taken by Gov. whenever, in its judgement, the public good requires it -- Slaves are held under state laws as private property -- & as such may be taken -- Consider for a moment the practical advantages of thus [taking &] terminating slavery at once forever within the loyal states -- Our political house no longer divided in itself will stand in the strength of homogenous institutions based upon the rights of Human Nature -- The Southern Confederacy will no longer desire to appropriate these states which will have ceased to represent their ideas-- There will be no strong pecuniary interest in these States plotting with Northern Traitors & Southern Rebels to subvert the Union.1863 Henry B. Blackwell Oct. Appeal for Emancipation in Border States [The most important & essential] Fellow Citizens The Woman's National Loyal League [ask for] invite your cooperation in urging [?] the coming Congress to pass an act of universal emancipating [all persons held to involuntary Service in] throughout the United States with compensating loyal owners in the loyal states . [To do this will be to conform] as well as to sustain the President's proclamation which operates only upon the Rebel States. [& in addition to] We deem it essential to our success put an [end to] immediate termination [destroy] slavery in the so called loyal Border States. [We] for the following reasons To secure the loyalty of the Border States by making it the interest of the slaveholders to be or appear loyal in order to obtain the compensation. To [destroy Northern] unite the North by destroying the present alliance [with] between Northern Copperheads & Border State politicians [for] which is continually plotting [a] new [?] compromises for the preservation of the slave power. To restrict the area [of territory] in dispute [by] with the confederates, who seek only a Union of slave states & will no longer [claim] desire the five border states when they have ceased to hold slaves. To make foreign intervention impossible by putting the War upon on entirely anti-slavery basis. [Set us considerable]Rough Dft of Summary of reasons for Emancipation in the Border States about Oct/63