BLACKWELL FAMILY
Lucy Stone

Boston Globe, editorBoston, Feb. 17, 1893
To the Editor of the Boston Globe:-
The bill for municipal suffrage for women
which will come up for discussion in the Legislature
will give to women; if it pass, the right to vote on
all questions of city and town interests. For instance,
if it is proposed in any town to get a water-supply, a
part of the cost and of the benefit will come to women,
and they be entitled to vote on it. If a schoolhouse
is to be put in a healthy condition, women will be able
to vote on that. If roads are to be opened or vacated,
or taxes levied, or libraries established, or [?]
chosen, or parks provided and laid out, - these are
among the things on which women would be entitled
to vote. Hitherto women have been taxed for all
these things, while they have been denied a vote
on them. Hereafter, if the bill pass, the fair thing will
be done, and everyone who has helped the fair thing
will be glad he has done so.
     Lucy Stone
  
Liberty for Women.
Lucy Stone Writes Concerning the Laws of Massachusetts and Their Relation to Those of Her Sex. 
To the Editor of the Globe:
     The leading editorial in your issue of this morning, in support of home rule in Ireland, says:
     "The Tories must once more be compelled to understand, however much it may be against their will, that when freedom is at stake in any land every friend of freedom in every other land can be counted upon to range himself squarely and decidedly on the side of liberty."
     As I read this sentence I thought of the women of this country, especially those of Massachusetts, who, from a position of absolute disfranchisement, have for more than 40 years petitioned in vain for rights of which Irishmen in Ireland vote on the same terms that Englishmen, Scotchmen and Welshmen do.
     But this right is denied to Massachusetts women. Irishmen in Ireland vote for members of Parliament, and are themselves elected to that body. But no Massachusetts woman can vote for members of the Legislature, or be herself elected to that body.
     The Irish members of the Massachusetts Legislature always vote nearly solid against any shred of political rights for women. At the same time they call eagerly for home rule for Ireland. Do they regard the rights of Massachusetts women as the Tories regard home rule?
     No married mother in Massachusetts has a legal right to her child. A wife can make a valid will of only a fraction of her property. A husband may borrow all her money and give her a note for it, but the law allows him to borrow and not to pay her a cent. No woman has a jury trial by her peers.
     A widow may stay only 40 days in the house of her deceased husband without paying rent. Have Irishmen in Ireland, whatever their wrongs, grievances like these of women in Massachusetts?
     Only 10 days ago the Massachusetts Legislature rejected a bill which provided in substance that when a married woman owned or hired a tenement she might own the money she made by taking boarders or lodgers when her husband contributed nothing to the expenses, but lived there sponging upon her earnings. The bill provided that under such circumstances, when "in the opinion of the court his misconduct would justify her in separating from him, she should be considered as for justifiable cause actually living apart from him," so far as her right to the money received from her boarders was concerned. The members of the Massachusetts Legislature, who, at this session, had voted that women here should have no vote for the men who will levy on their property and spend their money, voted also to reject this bill, which was meant to protect an unfortunate wife.
     In view of these facts at our State House, it seems bad to see it stated that "when freedom is at stake in any land, the friend of freedom in every other land may be counted upon to range himself squarely and decidedly on the side of liberty."
     It is noticeable, too, that several of the persons announced to speak at this home rule meeting tonight are well-known opponents of equal rights for women.
                                                                                                         Lucy Stone.
     Dorchester, April 17.of six weeks imprisonment for
of court, and sentenced the dowager duchess
to pay a fine of L250.
     The dowager duchess was awaiting the
disposition of the case in the barristers'
consulting room. 
     Her solicitor had been prepared for the
result, and had a carriage in waiting.
     Accompanied by her solicitors she was
driven at once to Holloway jail, where she
was taken in and lodged as a first-class
offender.

ACTION DEFERRED

Ship Owners Will Consider Mundella's
Compromise Proposition

Hull, April 17.- The committee of the
Shipowner's Federation which has in
charge the interests of the shipowners in the
struggle going on with the striking dock
laborers, spent several hours today considering
the proposals for the settlement of
the strike, which were prepared yesterday
by the Rt. Hon. A.J. Mundella, president of
the board of trade: Charles Wilson, M.P.,
one of the owners of  the Wilson line;
Joseph Havelock Wilson,  M.P. president
of the Sailors' and Firemen's Union, and
John Burns, M.P.
     The proposals embodied a proposition that
the members of the union and the free
laborers now in Hull, who are independent
of the union, should work together, and
that no more free laborers should be imported
while negotiations for a settlement
of the strike were in progress .

    These proposals were to be submitted
both to Shipowner's Federation and to
the representatives of the union men on
strike.
     The committee of the Shipowners' Federation,
after prolonged deliberation, arrived
at the resolution to submit the proposals,
with certain amendments suggested by the
committee, to the executive committee of
the Shipowners' Federation at the meeting
of the latter in London tomorrow.
     The leaders of the union men on strike
held a private conference this afternoon regarding
the proposals.

Dundee Whalers Return

London, April 18.- News has reached
Dundee that the three Dundee whalers
which went to the Antarctic ocean last
autumn are returning unsuccessful, as far
as whaling is concerned, but that they
found an enormous number of fur seals.
One vessel alone is said to have 60,000
skins on board.  It is reported that the skippers
prevented the scientists who accompanied
the expedition from taking observations
in order to preserve the secrets of the
whereabouts of the sealing grounds.

Death of Capt. Vankerckhoven

BRUSSELS, April 18 - A despatch to the
Independance Belge from the Congo reports
that Capt. Vankerckhoven, the famous 
military officer of the Congo Free State, is
dead, his death having been caused by an
accident.  Capt. Vankerckhoven was recently
reported to be in the Nile region
with a force of Congo State soldiers, and
considerable excitement was caused in
England by the report that he had encroached
on the sphere of British influence.

Hebrews to be Expelled.
London, April 18. - The  Russian-Hebrew