Volume IV Part 59 (2/2)
The necessity for matrons at police stations and jails, and for women physicians in all inst.i.tutions where women and children are confined, is too evident to need any argument in its favor, and yet it is only within the past ten years that they have been thus employed to any extent and even now they are found in only a small fraction of such inst.i.tutions. The objection to these matrons on the part of the police force has been strenuous, and yet, almost without exception, after they have gained a foothold, the police officers testify that they do not understand how the department got on without them. It ought to be equally evident that there should be women on the boards of all inst.i.tutions which care for women and children, but, although in most instances these positions have no salary, there is the most violent opposition to giving women a place, and the concession has had to be wrung from Legislatures in the few States where it has been obtained.
The right of women and their value to school offices is now partly conceded in about half the States. Women librarians also have met with some favor. As to offices in general, most of which carry either salary or patronage or both, they will continue to be regarded as belonging entirely to voters and as perquisites of party managers with which to reward political service, although all of them are proportionately supported by women tax-payers.
As regards Occupations, the census of 1900 shows 3,230,642 women engaged in wage-earning employments, exclusive of domestic service, and the question of their admittance to practically all such may be regarded as settled, but it has not been gained without a contest.
Women, however, are still barred from the best-paying positions and are usually compelled to accept unequal wages for equal work. This is partly due to disfranchis.e.m.e.nt and partly to economic causes and can be remedied only by time. In many of the States of which it is said, ”No profession is forbidden to women,” the test has not been made, and until some woman attempts to be a minister, physician, lawyer or notary public it can not be known whether she will encounter a statutory prohibition.
The department of Education presents the most satisfactory condition.
The battle for co-education, which means simply a chance for women to have the best advantages which exist, has been bitterly fought. A guerilla warfare is still maintained against it, but the contest is so nearly finished as to warrant no fears as to the future. Every State University but those of Georgia, Louisiana, North Carolina and Virginia, is open to women on exactly the same terms as to men (with the exception of some departments of Pennsylvania). They have full admission to Chicago and Leland Stanford Universities, two of the largest in the United States. They may enter the post-graduate department of Yale and receive its degrees. Harvard and Princeton are still entirely closed to them, as are a number of the smaller of the old, established Eastern universities, but this is largely compensated by the great Woman's Colleges of the East--Bryn Mawr, Wellesley, Smith and Va.s.sar--which accommodate nearly 4,000 students. The Medical Department of Johns Hopkins, and Medical, Theological, Law and Dental Colleges in all parts of the country, admit women to their full courses. This is true also of Agricultural Colleges and of Technical Inst.i.tutes such as Drexel and Pratt. There is now no lack of opportunity for them to obtain the highest education, either along the line of general culture or specialized work.[157]
The details of the following chapters will show that the civil, legal, industrial and educational rights of women are so far secured as to give full a.s.surance that they will be absolute in the near future. The political rights are further off, for reasons which are presented in the introduction to this volume, but the yielding of all the others is proof sufficient that the spirit of our inst.i.tutions will eventually find its fullest expression in perfect equality of rights for all the people.
FOOTNOTES:
[151] The names of newspapers which have supported this cause are not given, partly for these reasons and partly because on this question they reflect simply the personal views of the editors, and a change of management may cause a complete reversal of their att.i.tude toward woman suffrage.
[152] A reading of these chapters will show that the suffrage societies have started many progressive movements and then turned them over to other organizations of women, believing they would thrive better if freed from the effects of the prejudice against woman suffrage and everything connected with it.
[153] Notwithstanding these efforts, the very statutes which are intended to be fair to women are continually found to be defective, and whenever any doubt arises as to their construction the Common Law must prevail, which in all cases is unjust to women. An example of this kind will be found in the chapter on New York, showing that it was held in 1901 that a wife's wages belonged to her husband, although it was supposed that these had been secured to her beyond all question by a special statute of 1860.
[154] For abstract of the Common Law in regard to women see History of Woman Suffrage, Vol. III, p. 961.
[155] A few of the States were formed under the Spanish or French code instead of the English Common Law, but neither was more favorable to women.
[156] No mention is made of women postmasters as these are found in all States. The first were appointed by President Grant during his first term of office, 1868-1872.
[157] In the various States under the head of Education, Roman Catholic colleges and universities are not considered, as they are nowhere co-educational.
The public school statistics are taken from the reports for 1898-9 of the U. S. Commissioner of Education.
CHAPTER XXV.
ALABAMA.[158]
Actual work for woman suffrage in Alabama began in 1890, at the time the const.i.tutional convention of Mississippi was in session. The editor of the New Decatur _Advertiser_ opened his columns to all matter on the question and thus aroused local interest, which in 1892 culminated in the formation in that town of the first suffrage club in the State, with seven charter members. The women who thus faced a most conservative public sentiment were Mesdames Harvey Lewis, F. E.
Jenkins, E. G. Robb, A. R. Rose, B. E. Moore, Lucy A. Gould and Ellen Stephens Hildreth.
Before the close of the year a second club was formed in Verbena by Miss Frances A. Griffin, who has since become noted as a public speaker for this cause. Others were soon established through the efforts of Mesdames Minnie Hardy Gist, Bessie Vaughn, M. C. Arter, W.
J. Sibert and Miss B. M. Haley.
In 1892 and 1893 the _Woman's Column_, published in Boston, was sent by the National a.s.sociation to 1,500 teachers, ministers, school superintendents, editors, legislators and other prominent people, the names being furnished by Mrs. Hildreth. A State organization was effected in 1893, with Mrs. Hildreth, president, and Miss Griffin, secretary.
In 1895 Miss Susan B. Anthony, president of the National a.s.sociation, and Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, chairman of its organization committee, who were making a southern tour, were asked by the New Decatur Club to include that city in their itinerary. They were also invited by Mrs.
Alberta Taylor to address her society at Huntsville. These visits of the great leader and her eloquent a.s.sistant aroused much interest, but the financial depression prevented active work.
Mrs. Virginia Clay Clopton was elected State president in 1896; Mrs.
Annie D. Shelby, Mrs. Milton Hume and Mrs. Taylor were made vice-presidents; Mrs. Laura McCullough and Mrs. Amelia Dilliard, recording secretaries; Mrs. Hildreth, corresponding secretary; and Mrs. E. E. Greenleaf, treasurer. Mrs. Clopton represented the a.s.sociation at the Tennessee Centennial in 1898. Opposition is so great that it has been deemed wise to do nothing more than distribute literature and present the arguments in the press.
A State convention was held at Huntsville, Oct. 1, 1900, Mrs. Taylor presiding. Mrs. Clopton being obliged to resign, Miss Griffin was made president. Mrs. Hume and Mrs. Robert Cunningham were chosen vice-presidents; Mrs. Greenleaf, treasurer; Miss Julia Tutweiler, State organizer.
LEGISLATIVE ACTION AND LAWS: In January, 1893, through the influence of the suffrage a.s.sociation, Senator J. W. Inzer presented a bill to amend the State const.i.tution so as to permit women to vote on munic.i.p.al questions and prohibitory liquor enactments. It never was reported from the Judiciary Committee.
In 1895, at the desire of the New Decatur Club, Representative Osceola Kyle introduced a bill raising the ”age of protection” for girls from ten to fourteen years, and a similar one was offered for the Woman's Christian Temperance Union. Although these efforts were not successful then, public attention was drawn to the subject, and at the next session, in 1897, the age was raised to fourteen years with a penalty of death or imprisonment for not less than ten years in the penitentiary.
<script>