Volume I Part 66 (1/2)

Mrs. NICHOLS said: As widow, too, the law bears heavily on woman.

If her children have property, she is adjudged unworthy of their guardians.h.i.+p; and although the decree of G.o.d has made her the true and natural guardian of her children, she is obliged to pay from her scanty means to be const.i.tuted so by law.

I have conversed with judges and legislators, and tried to learn a reason for these things, but failed to find it. A n.o.ble man once gave me what he probably thought was a good one. ”Women,” he said to me, ”can not earn as much as men!” We say they should be allowed to earn as much. They have the ability, and the means should not be shut out from them. I have heard of another man who held woman's industrial ability at a low rate. ”His wife,” he said, ”had never been able to do anything but attend to her children.” ”How many have you?” he was asked; and the answer was, ”Nine.” Nine children to attend to! nine children cared for! and she could do nothing more, the wife of this most reasonable man.

Now, which is of more importance to the community, the property which that reasonable husband made, or the nine children whom that mother brought, with affectionate and tender toil, through the perils of infancy and youth, until they were men and women?

Which was of more importance to this land, the property which the father of George Was.h.i.+ngton ama.s.sed, or the George Was.h.i.+ngton whom a n.o.ble mother gave to his country? The name of Was.h.i.+ngton, his glorious deeds, and the enduring benefits he secured for us, still remain, and will long after the estates of Was.h.i.+ngton have pa.s.sed from his name forever!

In the State of Vermont, a wife sought a divorce from her husband on the ground of his intemperance. They were persons moving among our highest circles--wealthy people; and the wife knew that she could, through the aid of her friends and relations, with the influence and sympathy of the community, obtain a divorce and a support for her children. That father carried away into Canada one child, a little girl, and paid three hundred dollars to a low, vile Frenchman, that he might keep her from her mother and friends. Three times her almost heart-broken mother went in search of her; twice in vain, but the third time she was found.

So badly had the poor child been treated in the vile hands in which her father had placed her, that, when recovered, she was almost insensible; and when, by her mother's nursing care, her intelligence was at length restored, her joy at seeing her mother was so violent, that it was feared its excess might prove fatal.

The case came into court, and the judge decided that the two daughters should be given to their mother, but that the custody of the son should be given to the father. She was acquitted of the least impropriety or indiscretion; yet, though the obscenity and profanity of her husband in his own family was shocking, and it was in the last degree painful to that high-minded woman to see her son brought up under the charge of such a man, the law decided that the unworthy father was the more proper guardian for the boy!

In the Green Mountain State a great many sermons have lately been preached on the text, ”Wives, submit yourselves to your husbands.” The remaining words, ”in the Lord,” are generally omitted; so that the text is made to appear like an injunction that the wives should submit to their husbands, whether they were in the Lord or in the devil. And the best of all is, that we are told that if we would be submissive, we could change our husbands from devils into angels.

Mrs. MOTT: I now introduce to the Convention Frances Dana Gage, of St. Louis, Mo., better known as ”Aunt f.a.n.n.y,” the poet.

Mrs. GAGE said: This morning, when I was leaving my boarding-house, some one said to me, ”So you are ready armed and equipped to go and fight the men.” I was sorry, truly sorry, to hear the words--they fell heavily on my heart. I have no fight with men. I am a daughter, a sister, a wife, and a mother, and in all these relations I live in harmony with man. Neither I, nor any of the sisters with whom I am united in this movement, have any quarrel with men. What is it that we oppose? What do we seek to overturn? The bad laws and customs of society. These are our only enemies, and against these alone is our hostility directed; although they be ”hallowed by time,” we seek to eradicate them, because the day for which they were suited, if such ever existed, is long since gone by. The men, we may suppose, are above and beyond the laws, and we a.s.sail the laws only.

There is one law which I do not remember having heard any of my sisters touch upon, that is the Law of Wills, as far as it relates to married women, and as far as it allows a husband (which it fully does), along with his power to determine the lot of his wife while he is alive, also to control her when he is dead. Would any gentleman like to have that law reversed? Let me read to you a will after that odd fas.h.i.+on. It will fall on your ears, gentlemen, with as loud a tone of injustice as it does on mine:

WILL OF BRIDGET SMITH.--In the name of G.o.d, amen. I, Bridget Smith, being weak in body, though sound in mind, blessed be G.o.d for the same, do make and declare this my last will and testament. Item first: I give my soul to G.o.d, and my body to the earth, from which it came. Item second: I give to my beloved husband, John Smith, Sen., my Bible, and forty acres of wild land which I own in Bear Marsh, Ill, for the term of his natural life, when it shall descend to our son, John Smith, Jr. Item third: I give and bequeath to my daughter, Tabitha, my farm, house, outhouse, barns, and all the stock on said farm, situated in Pleasant Valley, and which said farm consists of 160 acres. I also give to my said daughter Tabitha, the wagons, carriages, harnesses, carts, plows, and all other property that shall be on said farm at the time of my death. Item fourth: I give to my son, John Smith, Jr., my family horse, my buggy, harness, and saddle, and also eighty acres of wild land which I own in the State of Iowa, for which I have a patent. Item fifth: I give to my beloved husband, John Smith, Sen., the use of the house in which we live, together with my bed, so long as he shall live, or remain my widower; but in case he shall die, or get married, then it is my will that my house and bed shall descend to my said daughter, Tabitha. Recommending my said husband to her care, whom I make the sole executrix of this my last will and testament, hereby revoking all others.

Signed, sealed, and proclaimed this ---- day of ----, 1853, in the presence of John Doe and Richard Roe.

BRIDGET SMITH.

Would any of you like such power as that to be placed in our hands? Yet, is it not as fair that married women should dispose of their property, as that married men should dispose of theirs?

It is true, the power thus given to husbands is not always used to the detriment of women, and this is frequently urged in support of the law. But I reply, that law is made for extreme cases; and while any such statutes remain on the books, no good man will cease to exert himself for their removal. I ask the right to vote, not because it would create antagonism, but because it would create harmony. I want to do away with antagonism by removing oppression, for where oppression exists, there antagonism must exist also.

ERNESTINE L. ROSE: In allusion to the law respecting wills, I wish to say that, according to the Revised Statutes of our State, a married woman has not a right to make a will. The law says that wills may be made by all persons, except idiots, persons of unsound mind, married women, and infants. Mark well, all but idiots, lunatics, married women, and infants. Male infants ought to consider it quite an insult to be placed in the same category with married women. No, a married woman has no right to bequeath a dollar of the property, no matter how much she may have brought into the marriage, or acc.u.mulated in it. Not a dollar to a friend, a relative, or even to her own child, to keep him from starving. And this is the law in the nineteenth century, in the enlightened United States, under a Republic that declares all men to be free and equal.

LUCY STONE: Just one word. I think Mrs. Rose is a little mistaken; I wish to correct her by saying that of some States in--

Mrs. ROSE: I did not say this was the universal law; I said it was the law in the State of New York.

LUCY STONE: I was not paying close attention, and must have been mistaken. In Ma.s.sachusetts the law makes a married woman's will valid in two cases: the first is, where the consent of her husband is written on the will; the second, where she wills all she has to her husband, in which case his written consent is not deemed requisite.

Dr. HARRIOT K. HUNT spoke on the fruitful theme of taxation without representation! and read her annual protest[120] to the authorities of Boston against being compelled to submit to that injustice. She said: I wish to vote, that women may have, by law, an equal right with men in property. In October, 1851, I went to pay my taxes in Boston. Going into the a.s.sessor's office, I saw a tall, thin, weak, stupid-looking Irish boy. It was near election time, and I looked at him scrutinizingly. He held in his hand a doc.u.ment, which, I found on inquiry, was one of naturalization; and this hopeful son of Erin was made a citizen of the United States, and he could have a voice in determining the destinies of this mighty nation, while thousands of intellectual women, daughters of the soil, no matter how intelligent, how respectable, or what amount of taxes they paid, were forced to be dumb!

Now, I am glad to pay my taxes, am glad that my profession enables me to pay them; but I would like very much to have a voice in directing what is to be done with the money I pay. I meditated on what I had seen, and, in 1852, when paying my taxes, I took to the Treasurer's office my protest.

The case of the Hon. Mrs. Norton before the English courts, then attracting much attention, was a fair exemplification of the injustice of the law to married women.

LUCY STONE said: I have before me, in a newspaper, a case which shows strongly the necessity for woman's legislating for herself.

I mean the case of the Hon. Mrs. Norton, which lately transpired in a court in London, and which fully proves that it is never right for one cla.s.s to legislate for another. There are, probably, few here who have not been made better and wiser by the beautiful things which have fallen from the pen of that lady. In 1836 her husband obtained a separation from her on the charge of infidelity. Eighteen years of a blameless life since, and the conviction every pure mind must feel, that nothing impure could ever dwell in a mind such as her productions show hers to be, will fully relieve her of any suspicion that she ever was guilty of acts justifying that charge. She was a woman of transcendent abilities; and her works brought her in 1,000 a year--sometimes more, sometimes less. This her husband procured to be paid over to himself, by securing the profits of her copyrights; and this husband allowed her only 400 a year! and, at last, refused to pay her even this sum; so that, for her necessary expenses, she was obliged to go into debt, and her debtors brought a suit against her husband, which was taken into court. In the court she stood before her husband's lawyer, and said to him: ”If you are afraid of what I may say, beware how you ask me questions!”

Wealth and power were against her, and the lawyer _did_ ask questions which wrung from her what she had concealed for seventeen long years, and the world at last knew how her husband had kept the money she earned by her pen. She stood in court, and said: ”I do not ask for rights; I have no rights, I have only wrongs. I will go abroad, and live with my son.” Her husband had proposed to take her children from her, but she said: ”I would rather starve than give them up.” And for a time she did starve.

I will read for you her poem of ”Twilight,” and you will all see what kind of woman has been so wronged, and has so suffered.

That woman, gifted, n.o.ble, and wealthy, with such great yearnings in her soul, whose heart was so bound up in her children, was thus robbed not only of her own rights, but also of theirs. Men!