Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 6.djvu/308

294 HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE association, was vigorously debated and voted down by 99 to 30. Municipal suffrage for women taxpayers, asked for by individ- uals, was defeated without a roll call. 1909. At the hearing on February 23 the Boston Herald, which was not in favor of equal suffrage, estimated that 2,000 women besieged the State House. They crowded the corridors and the large portico until two great overflow meetings were held in the open air at either end of the broad stairway leading up to the entrance. Later the overflow meeting moved on to the Common. The huge crowd of women made a deep impression and was largely featured in the press, which said that nothing like it had ever been seen in Boston. 1 The hearing was conducted for the petitioners by Mrs. Crowley and for the "antis" by Mr. Saunders. He was so impressed by the crowd that his usual sneering and jeering manner was wholly changed. The suffrage speakers were Dr. Shaw, John F. Tobin, president of the Boot and Shoe Workers' Union; Rabbi Charles Fleischer, Miss Jose- phine Casey, secretary of the Women's Trade Union League; Henry Abrahams of the Central Labor Union ; Miss Rose Bren- nan of Fall River, Miss Blackwell, Miss Eleanor Rendell of England, Winfield Tuck and Mrs. Belle Davis. Mrs. Gorham Dana, Professor Sedgwick and Mrs. George spoke for the "antis." Mrs. Julia Ward Howe and Ex-Governor Bates, who were to have spoken for suffrage, could not get into the room. 2 The constitutional amendment was debated March 23. The gal- leries were reserved for women, yet many were turned away. The vote stood 171 noes to 54 ayes, including n pairs. 1910. The hearing February 23 on a constitutional amend- ment was unusually impressive. It was held in the evening to enable women busy by day to attend. In the past two or three members of the Legislature not on the committee had sometimes 1 The suggestion to get out a record-breaking crowd was made by Representative Norman H. White of Brookline, the first man for some years to lead a serious fight in the Legislature for woman suffrage. The work of getting it out was engineered by Mrs. Crowley, Mrs. Page and Mrs. Mary Ware Dennett, who also arranged the great procession at the hearing of the following year. J Among the speakers at the overflow meetings on the steps were the Misses Rendell and Costello, Miss Foley, Mrs. George F. Lowell, Mr. Blackwell, Mrs. Fitzgerald, John Golden and Franklin H. Wentworth. At the overflow meeting on the Common Mrs. Fitzgerald presided and Dr. Shaw was the chief speaker. A great meeting in Faneuil Hall had been addressed by Dr. Shaw and others the night before.