CHAPTER LVI.
NEW YORK.[1]
The State of New York, home of Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, may be justly described as the great battleground for the rights of women, a title which will not be denied by any who have read the preceding three volumes of this History. The first Woman's Rights Convention in the world was called at Seneca Falls in 1848.[2] New York was also a pioneer in beginning a reform of the old English Common Law, so barbarous in its treatment of women. And yet, with all the splendid work which has been done, the State has been slow indeed in granting absolute justice. At the commencement of the new century, however, the legal and educational rights of women are very generally conceded, but their political rights are still largely denied. Except during the Civil War, there has not been a year since 1851 when one or more conventions have not been held to demand these rights, and when a committee of women has not visited the Legislature to secure the necessary action. A State association was formed in 1869.
The convention of 1884 met in the Common Council Chamber at Albany, March 11, 12, with the usual large attendance of delegates from all parts of the State, and the evening sessions so crowded that an overflow meeting was held in Geological Hall. Mrs. Lillie Devereux Blake, the president, was in the chair and addresses were made by Mesdames Matilda Joslyn Gage, Mary Seymour Howell, Caroline Gilkey Rogers and Henrica Iliohan; and by Mrs. Abigail Scott Duniway of Oregon, Mrs. Elizabeth Boynton Harbert of Illinois and Mrs. Helen M. Gougar of In-
- ↑ The History is indebted for the material for this chapter to Mrs. Mariana Wright Chapman of Brooklyn, Mrs. Jean Brooks Greenleaf of Rochester, and Mrs. Lillie Devereux Blake of New York, the presidents of the State Woman Suffrage Association during the Past twenty years.
- ↑ See History of Woman Suffrage, Vol. I, p. 67.
