The National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA) was formed on May 15, 1869, to work for
women's suffrage in the United States
In the 1700's to early 1800's New Jersey did allow Women the right to vote before the passing of the 19th Amendment, but in 1807 the state restricted the right to vote to "...tax-paying, white male citizens..."
Women's legal right to vote w ...
. Its main leaders were
Susan B. Anthony
Susan B. Anthony (born Susan Anthony; February 15, 1820 – March 13, 1906) was an American social reformer and women's rights activist who played a pivotal role in the women's suffrage movement. Born into a Quaker family committed to s ...
and
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Elizabeth Cady Stanton (November 12, 1815 – October 26, 1902) was an American writer and activist who was a leader of the women's rights movement in the U.S. during the mid- to late-19th century. She was the main force behind the 1848 Seneca ...
. It was created after the women's rights movement split over the proposed
Fifteenth Amendment to the U. S. Constitution, which would in effect extend voting rights to black men. One wing of the movement supported the amendment while the other, the wing that formed the NWSA, opposed it, insisting that voting rights be extended to all women and all African Americans at the same time.
The NWSA worked primarily at the federal level in its campaign for women's right to vote. In the early 1870s, it encouraged women to attempt to vote and to file lawsuits if prevented, arguing that the constitution implicitly
enfranchised women through its guarantees of equal protection for all citizens. Many women attempted to vote, notably Susan B. Anthony, who was arrested and found guilty in a
widely publicized trial. After the Supreme Court ruled that the constitution did not implicitly enfranchise women, the NWSA worked for an amendment that would do so explicitly.
The NWSA and its leaders also worked on related projects, such as a history of the women's suffrage movement and the establishment of the
International Council of Women
The International Council of Women (ICW) is a women's rights organization working across national boundaries for the common cause of advocating human rights for women. In March and April 1888, women leaders came together in Washington, D.C., with ...
, which is still active. The split in the suffrage movement was healed in 1890, when the NWSA merged with its rival, the
American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA) to form the
National American Woman Suffrage Association
The National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) was an organization formed on February 18, 1890, to advocate in favor of women's suffrage in the United States. It was created by the merger of two existing organizations, the National ...
under the leadership of Anthony and Stanton.
Background
Women's suffrage in the U.S. emerged as a significant issue in the mid-1800s. A key event was the first women's rights convention, the
Seneca Falls Convention
The Seneca Falls Convention was the first women's rights convention. It advertised itself as "a convention to discuss the social, civil, and religious condition and rights of woman".Wellman, 2004, p. 189 Held in the Wesleyan Methodist Church ...
in 1848, which was initiated by
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Elizabeth Cady Stanton (November 12, 1815 – October 26, 1902) was an American writer and activist who was a leader of the women's rights movement in the U.S. during the mid- to late-19th century. She was the main force behind the 1848 Seneca ...
. Women's right to vote was endorsed at the convention only after a vigorous debate about an idea that was controversial even within the women's movement. Soon after the convention, however, it became a central tenet of the movement.
In 1851, Stanton and
Susan B. Anthony
Susan B. Anthony (born Susan Anthony; February 15, 1820 – March 13, 1906) was an American social reformer and women's rights activist who played a pivotal role in the women's suffrage movement. Born into a Quaker family committed to s ...
formed a decades-long partnership that became important to the women's rights movement and to the future National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA). For the next several years, they worked together for the abolition of slavery and for women's rights.
In 1866, Anthony and Stanton organized the Eleventh
National Women's Rights Convention
The National Women's Rights Convention was an annual series of meetings that increased the visibility of the early women's rights movement in the United States. First held in 1850 in Worcester, Massachusetts, the National Women's Rights Convention ...
, the first since the
Civil War
A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country).
The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...
began.
The convention voted to transform itself into the
American Equal Rights Association
The American Equal Rights Association (AERA) was formed in 1866 in the United States. According to its constitution, its purpose was "to secure Equal Rights to all American citizens, especially the right of suffrage, irrespective of race, color o ...
(AERA), whose purpose was to campaign for the equal rights of all citizens, especially the right of suffrage. Its members consisted mainly of activists in the women's rights and abolitionist movements, and its leadership included such prominent activists as
Lucretia Mott
Lucretia Mott (''née'' Coffin; January 3, 1793 – November 11, 1880) was an American Quaker, abolitionist, women's rights activist, and social reformer. She had formed the idea of reforming the position of women in society when she was amongs ...
,
Lucy Stone
Lucy Stone (August 13, 1818 – October 18, 1893) was an American orator, abolitionist and suffragist who was a vocal advocate for and organizer promoting rights for women. In 1847, Stone became the first woman from Massachusetts to earn a colle ...
and
Frederick Douglass
Frederick Douglass (born Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey, February 1817 or 1818 – February 20, 1895) was an American social reformer, abolitionist, orator, writer, and statesman. After escaping from slavery in Maryland, he became ...
.
Over time, the AERA members whose primary interest was women's suffrage began to divide into two wings. One wing, whose leading figure was Lucy Stone, was willing for black men to achieve suffrage first, as the
abolitionist movement
Abolitionism, or the abolitionist movement, is the movement to end slavery. In Western Europe and the Americas, abolitionism was a historic movement that sought to end the Atlantic slave trade and liberate the enslaved people.
The British ...
insisted, and wanted to maintain close ties with the Republican Party. The other, whose leading figures were Stanton and Anthony, wanted women and black men be enfranchised at the same time and worked toward a politically independent women's movement that would no longer be dependent on abolitionists for financial and other resources. In 1868, Anthony and Stanton began publishing ''
The Revolution'', a weekly women's rights newspaper in New York City that became an important tool for supporting their wing of the movement.
The dispute became increasingly bitter after the
Fifteenth Amendment to the
U.S. Constitution
The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the United States of America. It superseded the Articles of Confederation, the nation's first constitution, in 1789. Originally comprising seven articles, it delineates the natio ...
was introduced, which would prohibit the denial of suffrage because of race. Stanton and Anthony opposed the amendment, which would have the effect of enfranchising black men, insisting that all women and all African Americans should be enfranchised at the same time. Stanton argued in the pages of ''The Revolution'', sometimes using racially condescending language, that by
enfranchising almost all men while excluding all women, the amendment would give constitutional authority to the idea that men were superior to women, creating an "aristocracy of sex".
Lucy Stone supported the amendment while arguing that suffrage for women would be more beneficial to the country than suffrage for black men.
Formation of the National Woman Suffrage Association
The AERA essentially collapsed after an acrimonious convention in 1869, and two rival women's suffrage organizations were created in its wake. The National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA) was created on May 15, 1869, two days after what turned out to be the AERA's last convention, with Anthony and Stanton as its primary leaders. The
American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA) was formed in November 1869, with
Lucy Stone
Lucy Stone (August 13, 1818 – October 18, 1893) was an American orator, abolitionist and suffragist who was a vocal advocate for and organizer promoting rights for women. In 1847, Stone became the first woman from Massachusetts to earn a colle ...
as its primary leader. The AWSA was initially larger and better funded, but Stanton and Anthony were more widely known as leaders of the women's suffrage movement and were more influential in setting its direction.
![Constitution_and_officers_of_the_National_Woman_Suffrage_Association-1876](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2b/Constitution_and_officers_of_the_National_Woman_Suffrage_Association-1876.jpg)
Membership of the NWSA came partly from activists in organizations that Anthony and Stanton had created. One of those was the
Women's Loyal National League
The Women's Loyal National League, also known as the Woman's National Loyal League and other variations of that name, was formed on May 14, 1863, to campaign for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would abolish slavery. It was organized b ...
, whose 5000 members had by 1864 completed a petition drive, the largest in the nation's history, in support of an amendment to abolish slavery. Another was the
Working Women's Association
The Working Women's Association (WWA) was formed in New York City on September 17, 1868 in the offices of ''The Revolution'', a women's rights newspaper established earlier that year by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony. Its stated purp ...
, which began as an organization of wage-earning women but evolved into one consisting almost entirely of journalists, doctors and other middle-class working women. Its members formed the core of the New York City segment of the NWSA, where the NWSA was headquartered.
Comparison to AWSA
Even after the Fifteenth Amendment was ratified in 1870, differences between the two organizations remained.
The NWSA worked mostly at the federal level, focusing on a constitutional amendment to achieve women's suffrage, while the AWSA worked toward the same goal mostly at the state level. The NWSA's meetings were open to everyone, but the AWSA allowed only delegates from recognized state organizations to vote at its meetings, although any member could attend and speak. The NWSA initially dealt with several women's issues, such as divorce reform and
equal pay for women
Equal pay for equal work is the concept of labour rights that individuals in the same workplace be given equal pay. It is most commonly used in the context of sexual discrimination, in relation to the gender pay gap. Equal pay relates to the ful ...
, while the AWSA focused almost exclusively on suffrage. The AWSA's membership included both women and men, and its first president was a man,
Henry Ward Beecher
Henry Ward Beecher (June 24, 1813 – March 8, 1887) was an American Congregationalist clergyman, social reformer, and speaker, known for his support of the Abolitionism, abolition of slavery, his emphasis on God's love, and his 1875 adultery ...
.
[McMillen (2008), p. 177] Stanton had originally proposed that the NWSA's membership be limited to women, but her proposal was not accepted. In practice, however, the overwhelming majority of the NWSA members and officers were women. The NWSA held its conventions in Washington in accordance with its strategy of working primarily at the federal level, while the AWSA, working mainly at the state level, met in various cities across the country.
The author of a study of African American women in the suffrage movement lists nine who participated in the AWSA during the 1870s and six who participated in the NWSA.
Early years
Many suffragists were appalled by the split and insisted on reunification.
Theodore Tilton
Theodore Tilton (October 2, 1835 – May 29, 1907) was an American newspaper editor, poet and abolitionist. He was born in New York City to Silas Tilton and Eusebia Tilton (same surname). On his twentieth birthday, October 2, 1855, he married ...
, a newspaper editor and women's rights advocate, initiated a petition drive calling for an end to the split. In April 1870, he convened a meeting of members of both organizations in an attempt to merge the two groups. Anthony opposed the idea of merger, as did her rival Lucy Stone. The NWSA sent three official representatives to the meeting who reported that their organization would agree to a merger only if the new organization agreed to work toward a Sixteenth Amendment to
enfranchise
Suffrage, political franchise, or simply franchise, is the right to vote in public, political elections and referendums (although the term is sometimes used for any right to vote). In some languages, and occasionally in English, the right to v ...
women. Lucy Stone and two other AWSA members who were present as unofficial representatives of their organization left the meeting at that point. Those remaining, including some non-affiliated activists, formed a new organization, the Union Woman Suffrage Association (UWSA) with Tilton as president and a Sixteenth Amendment as its central goal. Soon afterward, the executive committee of the moribund AERA met and voted, over Stone's objection, to merge into the UWSA. The next month, the NWSA itself merged into the UWSA, which essentially became the NWSA under a new name.
![Napoleon_Sarony_-_Elizabeth_Cady_Stanton_and_Susan_B](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bb/Napoleon_Sarony_-_Elizabeth_Cady_Stanton_and_Susan_B._Anthony_-_Google_Art_Project-cropped.jpg)
In May 1870, Anthony was forced to sell ''The Revolution'' because of mounting debts, thereby losing the NWSA's primary media voice. The NWSA afterwards depended on smaller periodicals, such as ''The National Citizen and Ballot Box'', edited by
Matilda Joslyn Gage
Matilda Joslyn Gage (March 24, 1826 – March 18, 1898) was an American writer and activist. She is mainly known for her contributions to women's suffrage in the United States (i.e. the right to vote) but she also campaigned for Native Ameri ...
, and ''
The Woman's Tribune
''The Woman's Tribune'' was an American newspaper founded in Beatrice, Nebraska, by women's suffrage activist Clara Bewick Colby. In print from 1883 to 1909, and published in Beatrice and in Washington, D.C., the newspaper connected radical femini ...
'', edited by
Clara Bewick Colby
Clara Dorothy Bewick Colby (1 August 1846 – 7 September 1916) was a British-American lecturer, newspaper publisher and correspondent, women's rights activist, and suffragist leader. Born in England, she immigrated to the US, where she attended ...
, to represent its viewpoint.
The NWSA benefited from the extensive lecture tours that Stanton and Anthony undertook, which brought new recruits into the organization and strengthened it at the local, state and national levels. Their journeys during that period covered a distance that was unmatched by any other reformer or politician. From 1869 to 1879, Stanton traveled eight months of the year on the lecture circuit, usually delivering one lecture per day, two on Sundays. In one year alone, Anthony traveled 13,000 miles and gave at least 170 lectures.
The NWSA did not have a national office, its mailing address being simply that of one of the officers. Anthony and Stanton did not receive a salary from the organization, supporting themselves with the money they earned by lecturing. In Anthony's case, the money flowed the other way, with her lecture fees helping to fund the organization after she had paid ''The Revolution's'' debts.
The fact that Anthony was unmarried gave her a legal advantage in building the organization. A married woman at that time had the legal status of
''feme covert'', which, among other things, excluded her from signing contracts (she had to convince her husband to sign for her). As Anthony had no husband, she had the legal status of a
''feme sole'', enabling her to sign contracts for convention halls and printed materials.
New Departure
In 1869,
Virginia Minor
Virginia Louisa Minor (March 27, 1824 – August 14, 1894) was an American women's suffrage activist. She is best remembered as the plaintiff in '' Minor v. Happersett'', an 1875 United States Supreme Court case in which Minor unsuccessfully arg ...
, a member of the NWSA, and her husband Francis developed the idea that achieving women's suffrage did not require a Sixteenth Amendment. Their approach, which became known as the New Departure, was based on the belief that women were already implicitly enfranchised by the U.S. Constitution. Their strategy relied heavily on the
Fourteenth Amendment, which says, "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States … nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
![Victoria_Woodhull_speaking_before_a_congressional_committee_in_1871](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/55/Victoria_Woodhull_speaking_before_a_congressional_committee_in_1871.jpg)
In January 1871, the UWSA delayed the opening session of its annual convention in Washington so its members could hear the historic address to the House Judiciary Committee by
Victoria Woodhull
Victoria Claflin Woodhull, later Victoria Woodhull Martin (September 23, 1838 – June 9, 1927), was an American leader of the women's suffrage movement who ran for President of the United States in the 1872 election. While many historians ...
, the first woman to speak before a Congressional body. A stockbroker with wealthy backers but little previous connection to the women's movement, she presented a modified version of the New Departure strategy. Instead of asking the courts to rule that the Constitution implicitly enfranchised women, she asked Congress to pass a declaratory act to accomplish the same goal. The committee did not accept her proposal.
Woodhull was invited to give the same speech to the UWSA's afternoon session and was greeted there with enthusiasm.
Woodhull's reputation as a women's suffrage leader continued to rise afterwards. Both Stanton and Anthony eagerly supported her at first, although Anthony became increasingly wary of her. At the UWSA's 1872 convention, Woodhull attempted to commandeer the organization, urging its delegates to meet the next day in a different hall to form a new political party with herself as its candidate for president of the United States. In the chaotic situation that followed, Anthony shouted that the UWSA would meet the next day as usual and abruptly adjourned the session. The UWSA did meet the next day as planned, although with fewer participants because most of them had gone to the Woodhull event instead. The UWSA voted to transform itself at this meeting into a reconstituted NWSA with Anthony as president.
[Tetrault (2014), pp. 61–65]
Later that year, Woodhull published details of an affair between
Elizabeth Tilton
Elizabeth Monroe Richards Tilton (May 28, 1834 – April 13, 1897) was an American suffragist, a founder of the Brooklyn Woman's Club, and a poetry editor of '' The Revolution'', the newspaper of the National Woman Suffrage Association, founded ...
, wife of
Theodore Tilton
Theodore Tilton (October 2, 1835 – May 29, 1907) was an American newspaper editor, poet and abolitionist. He was born in New York City to Silas Tilton and Eusebia Tilton (same surname). On his twentieth birthday, October 2, 1855, he married ...
, a prominent NWSA ally, and Reverend
Henry Ward Beecher
Henry Ward Beecher (June 24, 1813 – March 8, 1887) was an American Congregationalist clergyman, social reformer, and speaker, known for his support of the Abolitionism, abolition of slavery, his emphasis on God's love, and his 1875 adultery ...
, the first president of the AWSA, seriously damaging the reputation of the entire women's movement.
[ Woodhull did not play a significant role in the women's suffrage movement afterwards.
]
In 1871 the NWSA officially adopted the New Departure strategy, encouraging women to attempt to vote and to file lawsuits if denied that right. Soon hundreds of women tried to vote in dozens of localities.
Challenging the denial of voting rights
In 1872, Susan B. Anthony convinced some election officials to allow her to vote in that year's presidential elections, for which she was arrested and found guilty in a widely publicized trial. The judge at the trial was Justice Ward Hunt
Ward Hunt (June 14, 1810 – March 24, 1886) was an American jurist and politician. He was Chief Judge of the New York Court of Appeals from 1868 to 1869, and an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court from 1872 to 1882.
Early life
Hunt was ...
, who had recently been appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court
A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...
and who conducted the trial as part of the federal circuit court system at that time.
The trial, '' United States v. Susan B. Anthony'', was closely followed by the national press. Following a rule of common law
In law, common law (also known as judicial precedent, judge-made law, or case law) is the body of law created by judges and similar quasi-judicial tribunals by virtue of being stated in written opinions."The common law is not a brooding omnipresen ...
at that time which prevented criminal defendants in federal courts from testifying, Hunt refused to allow Anthony to speak until the verdict had been delivered. At the end of the trial, Justice Hunt delivered his opinion, which he had put in writing, and directed the jury to deliver a guilty verdict.
When he asked Anthony if she had anything to say, she responded with "the most famous speech in the history of the agitation for woman suffrage", according to Ann D. Gordon, a historian of the women's movement.
Repeatedly ignoring the judge's order to stop talking and sit down, she castigated him for denying her a trial by jury, but said that even if he had allowed the jury to discuss the case, she still would have been denied a trial by a jury of her peers because women were not allowed to be jurors.[Gordon (2005)]
p. 46
/ref>
The Supreme Court ruled in 1875 in ''Minor v. Happersett
''Minor v. Happersett'', 88 U.S. (21 Wall.) 162 (1875), is a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that, while women are no less citizens than men are, citizenship does not confer a right to vote, and therefore state laws barri ...
'' that "the Constitution of the United States does not confer the right of suffrage upon anyone".
The NWSA was obliged to return to the far more difficult strategy of achieving suffrage by constitutional amendment. In 1878, Senator Aaron A. Sargent, who was married to NWSA treasurer Ellen Clark Sargent
Ellen Clark Sargent (Massachusetts, 1826–1911) was an active American women's suffragist. She was influential in advocacy for the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which sought to give women the right to vote.
Early life ...
, introduced into Congress the women's suffrage amendment that more than forty years later would become the Nineteenth Amendment to the U. S. Constitution. Its text is identical to that of the Fifteenth Amendment except that it prohibits the denial of suffrage because of sex rather than race.
Centennial of the Declaration of Independence
On July 4, 1876, The United States celebrated its 100th anniversary with a ceremony in Philadelphia at Independence Hall
Independence Hall is a historic civic building in Philadelphia, where both the United States Declaration of Independence and the United States Constitution were debated and adopted by America's Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Fa ...
, where the Declaration of Independence
A declaration of independence or declaration of statehood or proclamation of independence is an assertion by a polity in a defined territory that it is independent and constitutes a state. Such places are usually declared from part or all of the ...
was approved on July 4, 1776. In preparation for the event, the NWSA established headquarters nearby and began drawing up "articles of impeachment" against the country's male "Political Sovereigns". NWSA officers asked permission to present a Declaration of Rights for Women at the official celebration, but they were refused. Despite the lack of permission, five women, headed by Anthony, walked onto the platform during the ceremony and handed their Declaration to Senator Thomas Ferry who was the acting Vice President of the United States, and the official in charge of the celebration. As they left, they handed out copies to the crowd. Stepping onto an unoccupied bandstand outside the hall, Anthony read the Declaration to a large crowd and invited everyone to a NWSA convention at the nearby Unitarian church to hear Stanton, Lucretia Mott
Lucretia Mott (''née'' Coffin; January 3, 1793 – November 11, 1880) was an American Quaker, abolitionist, women's rights activist, and social reformer. She had formed the idea of reforming the position of women in society when she was amongs ...
and other speakers.
The Declaration was signed by Susan B. Anthony and these other leading members of the NWSA: Lucretia Mott
Lucretia Mott (''née'' Coffin; January 3, 1793 – November 11, 1880) was an American Quaker, abolitionist, women's rights activist, and social reformer. She had formed the idea of reforming the position of women in society when she was amongs ...
, Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Elizabeth Cady Stanton (November 12, 1815 – October 26, 1902) was an American writer and activist who was a leader of the women's rights movement in the U.S. during the mid- to late-19th century. She was the main force behind the 1848 Seneca ...
, Paulina Wright Davis, Ernestine L. Rose
Ernestine Louise Rose (January 13, 1810 – August 4, 1892) was a suffragist, abolitionist, and freethinker who has been called the “first Jewish feminist.” Her career spanned from the 1830s to the 1870s, making her a contemporary to the mor ...
, Clarina I. H. Nichols, Mary Ann McClintock, Amy Post
Amy Kirby Post (December 20, 1802 – January 29, 1889) was an activist who was central to several important social causes of the 19th century, including the abolition of slavery and women's rights. Post's upbringing in Quakerism shaped her belie ...
, Sarah Pugh
Sarah Pugh (6 October 1800 – 1 August 1884) was an American abolitionist, activist, suffragist
Suffrage, political franchise, or simply franchise, is the right to vote in public, political elections and referendums (although the term is ...
, Matilda Joslyn Gage
Matilda Joslyn Gage (March 24, 1826 – March 18, 1898) was an American writer and activist. She is mainly known for her contributions to women's suffrage in the United States (i.e. the right to vote) but she also campaigned for Native Ameri ...
, Clemence Sophia Harned Lozier, Olympia Brown
Olympia Brown (January 5, 1835 – October 23, 1926) was an American minister and suffragist. She was the first woman to be ordained as clergy with the consent of her denomination. Brown was also an articulate advocate for women's rights and one ...
, Mathilde Franziska Anneke
Mathilde Franziska Anneke (née Giesler; April 3, 1817 – November 25, 1884) was a German writer, feminist, and radical democrat who participated in the Revolutions of 1848–1849. In late 1849, she moved to the United States, where she campaign ...
, Mathilde F. Wendt, Adelaide Thomson, Laura de Force Gordon, Ellen Clark Sargent
Ellen Clark Sargent (Massachusetts, 1826–1911) was an active American women's suffragist. She was influential in advocacy for the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which sought to give women the right to vote.
Early life ...
, Virginia L. Minor, Sara Andrews Spencer, Lillie Devereux Blake
Lillie Devereux Blake (pen name, Tiger Lily; August 12, 1833 – December 30, 1913) was an American woman suffragist, reformer, and writer, born in Raleigh, North Carolina, and educated in New Haven, Connecticut. In her early years, Blake wrote se ...
, Phoebe Couzins
Phoebe Wilson Couzins (September 8, 1842 – December 6, 1913) was one of the first female lawyers in the United States. She was the second woman to serve as a licensed attorney in Missouri and the third or fourth to be a licensed attorney in t ...
, Jane Graham Jones, Abigail Scott Duniway, Belva A. Lockwood
Belva Ann Bennett Lockwood (October 24, 1830 – May 19, 1917) was an American lawyer, politician, educator, and author who was active in the women's rights and women's suffrage movements. She was one of the first women lawyers in the United Sta ...
.
Lucretia Mott, former president of the AERA, was listed first among those who signed the Declaration and was a vice president of the NWSA. According to Sally Gregory McMillen, a historian of the women's movement during this period, Lucretia Mott "avoided taking sides" in the split in the women's movement, providing support to both sides.
''History of Woman Suffrage''
In 1876, Anthony and Stanton began working on the ''History of Woman Suffrage
''History of Woman Suffrage'' is a book that was produced by Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Matilda Joslyn Gage and Ida Husted Harper. Published in six volumes from 1881 to 1922, it is a history of the women's suffrage movement, prima ...
''. Originally envisioned as a modest publication that could be produced quickly, the history evolved into a six-volume work of more than 5700 pages written over a period of 41 years, preserving a rich history that otherwise might have been lost. The first three volumes, which cover the movement up to 1885, were produced primarily by Anthony and Stanton. Anthony handled the production details while Stanton wrote most of the text. Matilda Joslyn Gage
Matilda Joslyn Gage (March 24, 1826 – March 18, 1898) was an American writer and activist. She is mainly known for her contributions to women's suffrage in the United States (i.e. the right to vote) but she also campaigned for Native Ameri ...
, another leading member of the NWSA, wrote three chapters of the first volume but was forced to abandon the project afterwards because of the illness of her husband. After Stanton's death, Anthony published Volume 4 with the help of Ida Husted Harper
Ida Husted Harper (February 18, 1851 – March 14, 1931) was an American author, journalist, columnist, and suffragist, as well as the author of a three-volume biography of suffrage leader Susan B. Anthony at Anthony's request. Harper also c ...
. After Anthony's death, Harper completed the last two volumes, bringing history up to 1920.
Stanton and Anthony had encouraged their rival Lucy Stone
Lucy Stone (August 13, 1818 – October 18, 1893) was an American orator, abolitionist and suffragist who was a vocal advocate for and organizer promoting rights for women. In 1847, Stone became the first woman from Massachusetts to earn a colle ...
to assist with the work, or at least to send material that could be used by someone else to write the history of her wing of the movement, but she refused to cooperate in any way. Stanton's daughter Harriot Stanton Blatch
Harriot Eaton Blatch ( Stanton; January 20, 1856–November 20, 1940) was an American writer and suffragist. She was the daughter of pioneering women's rights activist Elizabeth Cady Stanton.
Biography
Harriot Eaton Stanton was born, the sixt ...
, wrote the 120-page chapter on Stone and the AWSA, which appears in Volume 2.
Even so, the ''History of Woman Suffrage'' places Stanton, Anthony and the NWSA at the center of the movement's history and marginalizes the role of Stone and the AWSA.
International Council of Women
Anthony traveled to Europe in 1883, linking up with Stanton, who had arrived a few months earlier to visit her daughter, whose husband was British. Over a period of nine months, they met with leaders of various European women's movements and began laying the foundation for an international women's organization.
The NWSA agreed to host the founding congress of the organization that Stanton and Anthony were working toward. The first congress of the International Council of Women
The International Council of Women (ICW) is a women's rights organization working across national boundaries for the common cause of advocating human rights for women. In March and April 1888, women leaders came together in Washington, D.C., with ...
(ICW) met in Washington in 1888 with delegates from fifty-three women's organizations in nine countries. The delegates represented various organizations, including suffrage associations, professional groups, literary clubs, temperance unions, labor leagues and missionary societies. The AWSA participated in the congress. The ICW convention brought increased publicity and respectability to the women's movement, especially when President Grover Cleveland
Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837June 24, 1908) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 22nd and 24th president of the United States from 1885 to 1889 and from 1893 to 1897. Cleveland is the only president in American ...
honored the delegates by inviting them to a reception at the White House
The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in 1800. ...
.
Still active, ICW is associated with the United Nations.
Reunification of the movement
Lucy Stone initiated the reunification of the rival suffrage organizations. She was seventy years old and in declining health, and the AWSA was losing strength. Anthony, by contrast, was by that point, "among the senior political figures in the United States", according to a prominent historian of women's history. Stanton, a popular speaker and a prolific writer of articles for newspapers and magazines, was also well known.
The AWSA's annual meeting in November 1877 passed a resolution authorizing Stone to confer with Anthony about the possibility of a merger. The proposal did not generate significant controversy within the AWSA. There was strong opposition within the NWSA, however. Ida Husted Harper
Ida Husted Harper (February 18, 1851 – March 14, 1931) was an American author, journalist, columnist, and suffragist, as well as the author of a three-volume biography of suffrage leader Susan B. Anthony at Anthony's request. Harper also c ...
, Anthony's co-worker and biographer, said the NWSA meetings that dealt with this issue "were the most stormy in the history of the association." Matilda Joslyn Gage
Matilda Joslyn Gage (March 24, 1826 – March 18, 1898) was an American writer and activist. She is mainly known for her contributions to women's suffrage in the United States (i.e. the right to vote) but she also campaigned for Native Ameri ...
, an opponent of the merger, formed a competing organization called the Woman's National Liberal Union, but it did not attract a significant following, and plans for merger proceeded.
The NWSA and the AWSA met in a joint convention in Washington and formed the National American Woman Suffrage Association
The National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) was an organization formed on February 18, 1890, to advocate in favor of women's suffrage in the United States. It was created by the merger of two existing organizations, the National ...
(NAWSA) on February 18, 1890. At Anthony's insistence, Stanton agreed to accept its presidency. This was largely a symbolic move; the day after she was elected president, Stanton sailed to her daughter's home in England, where she stayed for eighteen months, leaving Anthony effectively in charge. Stone was elected chair of the executive committee.
The NAWSA developed into the nation's largest voluntary organization, with two million members. After women's suffrage was achieved in 1920 by the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the NAWSA transformed itself into the League of Women Voters
The League of Women Voters (LWV or the League) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan political organization in the United States. Founded in 1920, its ongoing major activities include registering voters, providing voter information, and advocating for vot ...
, which is still active.
Some leading members other than Anthony and Stanton
File: Virginia Louisa Minor.jpg, Virginia Minor
Virginia Louisa Minor (March 27, 1824 – August 14, 1894) was an American women's suffrage activist. She is best remembered as the plaintiff in '' Minor v. Happersett'', an 1875 United States Supreme Court case in which Minor unsuccessfully arg ...
, co-developer of the NWSA's New Departure strategy
File: ErnestineRose.jpg, Ernestine Rose
Ernestine Louise Rose (January 13, 1810 – August 4, 1892) was a suffragist, abolitionist, and freethinker who has been called the “first Jewish feminist.” Her career spanned from the 1830s to the 1870s, making her a contemporary to the more ...
, pioneer worker for women's rights, member of first NWSA executive committee.
File: MatildaJoslynGage.jpeg, Matilda Joslyn Gage
Matilda Joslyn Gage (March 24, 1826 – March 18, 1898) was an American writer and activist. She is mainly known for her contributions to women's suffrage in the United States (i.e. the right to vote) but she also campaigned for Native Ameri ...
, president of the NWSA 1875–86, co-author of ''History of Woman Suffrage
''History of Woman Suffrage'' is a book that was produced by Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Matilda Joslyn Gage and Ida Husted Harper. Published in six volumes from 1881 to 1922, it is a history of the women's suffrage movement, prima ...
'', author of ''Woman, Church and State''
File:Face detail, Olympia Brown (cropped).jpg, Olympia Brown
Olympia Brown (January 5, 1835 – October 23, 1926) was an American minister and suffragist. She was the first woman to be ordained as clergy with the consent of her denomination. Brown was also an articulate advocate for women's rights and one ...
, first woman ordained as clergy with the consent of her denomination
File: Paulina Kellogg Wright Davis.jpg, Paulina Kellogg Wright Davis
Paulina Wright Davis ( Kellogg; August 7, 1813 – August 24, 1876) was an American abolitionist, suffragist, and educator. She was one of the founders of the New England Woman Suffrage Association.
Early life
Davis was born in Bloomfield, N ...
, main organizer of the first National Women's Rights Convention
The National Women's Rights Convention was an annual series of meetings that increased the visibility of the early women's rights movement in the United States. First held in 1850 in Worcester, Massachusetts, the National Women's Rights Convention ...
,[McMIllen, p. 106] author of ''The History of the National Woman's Rights Movement''
See also
*List of suffragists and suffragettes
This list of suffragists and suffragettes includes noted individuals active in the worldwide women's suffrage movement who have campaigned or strongly advocated for women's suffrage, the organisations which they formed or joined, and the public ...
*List of women's rights activists
This article is a list of notable women's rights activists, arranged alphabetically by modern country names and by the names of the persons listed.
Afghanistan
* Amina Azimi – disabled women's rights advocate
* Hasina Jalal – women's empowerm ...
*Timeline of women's suffrage
Women's suffrage
Women's suffrage is the right of women to vote in elections. Beginning in the start of the 18th century, some people sought to change voting laws to allow women to vote. Liberal political parties would go on to grant ...
*Timeline of women's suffrage in the United States
This timeline highlights milestones in women's suffrage in the United States, particularly the right of women to vote in elections at federal and state levels.
1780s
180px, Susan B. Anthony, 1870
1789: The Constitution of the United S ...
* Women's suffrage organizations
References
Bibliography
* Anthony, Susan B.; Harper, Ida Husted (1902)
''History of Woman Suffrage'', Vol. 4
Rollenbeck Press, Indianapolis, Indiana.
* Barry, Kathleen (1988)
''Susan B. Anthony: A Biography of a Singular Feminist''
New York: Ballantine Books. .
* Buhle, Mari Jo; Buhle, Paul editors (1978)
''The Concise History of Woman Suffrage.''
University of Illinois. .
* DuBois, Ellen Carol (1978).
''Feminism and Suffrage: The Emergence of an Independent Women's Movement in America, 1848–1869.''
Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. .
* DuBois, Ellen Carol (1998).
''Woman Suffrage and Women's Rights''
New York: New York University Press. .
* Dudden, Faye E., (2011)
''Fighting Chance: The Struggle over Woman Suffrage and Black Suffrage in Reconstruction America''
New York: Oxford University Press. .
* Flexner, Eleanor (1959)
''Century of Struggle''
Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press. .
* Gordon, Ann D., ed. (2000).
''The Selected Papers of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony: Against an aristocracy of sex, 1866 to 1873''
Vol. 2 of 6. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press. .
* Gordon, Ann D., ed. (2003).
''The Selected Papers of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony: National protection for national citizens, 1873 to 1880''
Vol. 3 of 6. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press. .
*
* Griffith, Elisabeth (1985). ''In Her Own Right: The Life of Elizabeth Cady Stanton.'' Oxford University Press; New York, NY.
* McMillen, Sally Gregory (2008)
''Seneca Falls and the origins of the women's rights movement.''
Oxford University Press.
* Rakow, Lana F. and Kramarae, Cheris, editors (2001)
''The Revolution in Words: Righting Women 1868–1871''
New York: Routledge. .
*
* Sherr, Lynn (1995).
''Failure Is Impossible: Susan B. Anthony in Her Own Words''
New York: Random House.
* Stanton, Elizabeth Cady; Anthony, Susan B.; Gage, Matilda Joslyn (1887)
''History of Woman Suffrage'', Volume 2
Rochester, NY: Susan B. Anthony (Charles Mann printer).
*
* Venet, Wendy Hamand (1991)
''Neither Ballots nor Bullets: Women Abolitionists and the Civil War''
Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virginia. .
* Ward, Geoffrey C., with essays by Martha Saxton, Ann D. Gordon and Ellen Carol DuBois (1999).
''Not for Ourselves Alone: The Story of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony''
New York: Alfred Knopf.
External links
* Th
Constitution of the National Woman Suffrage Association
at the Library of Congress
* Th
Declaration of Rights of the Women of the United States - July 4, 1876
presented at the official celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence
A declaration of independence or declaration of statehood or proclamation of independence is an assertion by a polity in a defined territory that it is independent and constitutes a state. Such places are usually declared from part or all of the ...
, from the Carrie Chapman Catt Center for Women and Politics at Iowa State University
{{authority control
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Liberal feminist organizations
Feminist organizations in the United States
First-wave feminism
History of women's rights in the United States
Organizations established in 1869
Susan B. Anthony
Women's suffrage advocacy groups in the United States
1869 establishments in New York (state)