Volume IV Part 76 (1/2)

GEORGIA.[220]

The first woman suffrage a.s.sociation of Georgia was organized in July, 1890, by Miss H. Augusta Howard and her sister, Miss Claudia Hope Howard (Maxwell). For some time the members.h.i.+p was composed only of these two, their mother, Mrs. Anne Jane Lindsay Howard, and other relatives, all residents of Columbus. Mr. and Mrs. D. M. Allen of Douglasville were the first outside the Howard family to encourage and support the infant organization. In 1892 Mrs. Kate Mallette Hardwick and Mrs. Mary L. McLendon became members, and served for several years as auditor and vice-president.

The Atlanta a.s.sociation was organized in the Marietta Street M. E.

Church, March 21, 1894, by Mrs. McLendon and Mrs. Margaret Chandler; perfected in the Unitarian Church on March 28, and begun with a members.h.i.+p of forty men and women.

In the latter part of 1895, Miss Howard and Mrs. Maxwell, who had served continuously as president, secretary and treasurer of the State a.s.sociation, resigned their offices; and Mrs. Frances Cater Swift was elected president; Mrs. U. O. Robertson, secretary; Miss Adelaide Wilson, treasurer.

In 1896 Mrs. McLendon was made president; Mrs. S. L. Ober Allen and Mrs. Ala Holmes Cheney, vice-presidents; Dr. L. D. Morse, corresponding secretary; Mrs. Gertrude C. Thomas, recording secretary; Miss Sarah A. Gresham, treasurer.

The annual convention of the National a.s.sociation, which was held in the opera house in Atlanta the first week of February, 1895, gave a new impetus to the movement in Georgia.[221] Men and women throughout the State felt its widespreading influence. Many ancient Southern prejudices received a death-blow when those who harbored them saw what manner of women had espoused this. .h.i.therto unpopular cause.[222]

All the Atlanta papers extended a cordial greeting to the convention and devoted columns of s.p.a.ce to biographical sketches, reports of meetings, etc., but the _Sunny South_, edited by Col. Henry Clay Fairman, was the only one which editorially indorsed the suffrage movement. The business manager of the Atlanta _Const.i.tution_, William A. Hemphill, and his wife, tendered a large reception to the members of the convention.

F. H. Richardson, editor of the Atlanta _Journal_, the largest evening paper in the State, was converted to a belief in woman suffrage at this time, and is now an honorary member of the organization. As a part of his work, he has made an earnest and long-continued effort to have women placed on the school board.[223]

The Woman's Board of the Cotton States and International Exposition, soon to be held in Atlanta, were so impressed by the _personnel_ of this convention that an official invitation was extended for them to hold a Suffrage Day on Oct. 17, 1895, in the Woman's Congress a.s.sembly Hall. This was accepted by Miss Anthony on behalf of the National a.s.sociation, and under the guiding hand of Mrs. Rachel Foster Avery, its corresponding secretary, Suffrage Day was one of the very best of the many days celebrated during the Woman's Congress. The State a.s.sociation also fitted up a booth in the Liberal Arts Building and large quant.i.ties of literature were distributed by Mrs. H. M. Tripp, who kindly took charge.

The first State convention was held in Atlanta, Nov. 28, 29, 1899. The following resolution, offered in the Legislature by Representative Martin V. Calvin, was adopted: ”The use of the Hall of the House of Representatives is hereby granted to Mrs. Virginia D. Young of South Carolina, Miss Frances A. Griffin of Alabama, and Mrs. Isabella Webb Parks of Georgia, on the 28th inst., for the purpose of delivering lectures on the scope of the elective franchise.”[224]

The first evening session was held in the State capitol. Mrs.

McLendon, the president, called the meeting to order. The address of welcome for Georgia was made by Mrs. Thomas; for Atlanta, by its president, Mrs. Swift; Miss Gresham responded to both. Mrs. Young, Miss Griffin, Mrs. Maxwell and Mrs. Parks delivered addresses to a large and interested audience.[225]

LEGISLATIVE ACTION AND LAWS: In 1888 the Hon. Augustus Dupont applied to the Legislature for a city charter for the town of Dupont, and sought to secure suffrage to all persons, male or female, owning property in the corporation, but failed.

In 1895 the Atlanta a.s.sociation presented two bills to the Legislature--one to raise the ”age of protection” for girls from 10 to 18 years; the other, drawn by Charles A. Reid, a member of the society and an able lawyer, to take the necessary measures for granting equal legal and political rights to women. Neither was reported from the committees.

In 1897 Representative Martin V. Calvin introduced a bill to make a woman eligible to serve on the staff of physicians at the State insane asylum, but it failed to pa.s.s.

In 1898 an effort was made to secure a bill providing police matrons in every city of 10,000 or more inhabitants, and one to exempt the property of women from taxation until they should be permitted to vote. Both failed.

Miss Frances A. Griffin appeared for the Georgia W. S. A. at the convention of the State Federation of Labor, held in Augusta in April, 1900, and in response to her address it called on its members to demand a change in the United States Const.i.tution which should secure the legal and political equality of women. A strong suffrage plank was added to the platform of the federation, and Miss Griffin was invited by it to address the Legislature in the interest of the Child Labor Bill, which it had championed so unsuccessfully for a number of years.

One result of the State suffrage convention held in Atlanta in 1899, was that the following pet.i.tions were ordered to be circulated and returned for presentation to the legislative committees in the fall of 1900:

1. That the University of Georgia be opened to women.

2. That women be members of the boards of education.

3. That women physicians be placed on the staff of the State insane asylum.

4. That women be made eligible to the office of president of the State Normal and Industrial College for Girls.

5. That the ”age of protection” for girls be raised from 10 to 18 years.

6. That girls of eighteen be permitted to enter the textile department of the State Technological School.

Four bills were considered by the Legislature of 1900 in which the women of the State were deeply interested. All failed, and many of them now see that Legislatures, like juries, should be composed of an equal number of men and women to secure exact justice for both.