a matter of sentiment, it is not a matter of chivalry. There is no place
for knighthood, or any of its laws, or any other of the principles that
dominated the contests of the knights of old. If it were a matter of
knighthood there is not a man on this floor that would deem it necessary
to bring a lance into this body. All would be peace and quiet.

There are none that would hail with more joy and gladness the women of
the Church to a seat in this body than those of us who now, under the
circumstances, oppose their coming in.

It is not either a matter of progressive legislation regarding the
franchise of colored men, or of anybody else in the country. It is a
question of law, Methodist law, and Methodist law alone.

Now, so far as the intention is concerned of those who made the law, I
do not see how those who have kept themselves conversant with the
history of lay delegation can for a moment claim that it was even the
most remote intention of those who introduced lay delegation into the
General Conference to bring in the women, and for us to transfer the
field now toward women, in view of their magnificent work in the last
ten or fifteen years, back to twenty years, is to commit an anachronism
that would be fatal to all just interpretation of law.

I myself was in the very first meeting that was ever called to initiate
the movement that at last brought in lay delegation. I voted for it; I
wrote for it; I spoke for it in the General Conference and in the Annual
Conferences. I was a member of the first lay committee, or Committee on
Lay Delegation, that was appointed here by the General Conference in
1868. And during all these various processes of discussion, so far as I
know, the thought was never suggested that under it women would come in