Debate on Woman Suffrage in the Senate of the United States, - 2d Session, 49th Congress, December 8, 1886, and January 25, 1887 by Various
page 180 of 234 (76%)
page 180 of 234 (76%)
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When a political change was made and Governor Robinson came in,
Dr. Wallace was ousted for political purposes. It almost broke the hearts of some of the women who had sons, daughters, or husbands there. They determined at once to try to seek some redress and have him reinstated. It was impossible. He was out, and what could we do? I do not know that we could reach a case like that; but such cases have stirred the women of the whole land, for the reason that when they try to do good, or want to help in the cause of humanity, they are combated so bitterly and persistently. I leave it to older and abler women, who have labored in this cause so long, to prove whether it is or is not constitutional to give the ballot to women. A gentleman said to me a few days ago, "These women want to marry." I am married; I am a mother; and in our home the sons and brothers are all standing like a wall of steel at my back. I have cast aside every prejudice of the past. They lie like rotted hulks behind me. After the fever of 1878, when our constitutional convention was going to convene, broke the agony and grief of my own heart, for one of my children died, and took part in the suffrage movement in Louisiana, with the wife of Chief-Justice Merrick, Mrs. Sarah A. Dorsey, and Mrs. Harriet Keatinge, of New York, the niece of Mr. Lozier. These three ladies aided me faithfully and ably. When they found we would be received, I went before the convention. I went to Lieutenant-Governor Wiltz, and asked him if he would present or consider a petition which I wished to bring before the convention. He read the petition. One clause of our State law is that no woman |
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