Matilda Joslyn Gage: Suffragist and Activist

Matilda Joslyn Gage

• Gage was an American suffragist, author, and lecturer known for her outspoken views on women's rights and Native American societies.
• She staked out polling places in 1880 to make sure women weren't turned away.
• She served as president of the National Woman Suffrage Association.
• Her anti-suffrage views were debated and she used history, philosophy, religion, and literature to support her arguments.
• She lived in central New York, close to Native American communities, which influenced her views on equality.
• She admired the Iroquois tribes, particularly their system of fair government.
• As president of the National Woman Suffrage Association, she wrote about the Iroquois for the New York Evening Post in 1875.
• Her goal was to raise awareness and influence change.
• In 1893, the Mohawk nation adopted her into the Wolf Clan, giving her the name Ka-ron-ien-ha-wi.
• As a member of the clan, she could vote on tribal matters, including the naming of the tribal chief.
• She was denied voting rights in the local school board election in 1871, but was later able to vote within her adopted nation.
• She owned and edited The National Citizen and Ballot Box, a suffrage newspaper from 1878-1881.
• The motto of the newspaper was "The Pen Is Mightier Than the Sword".
• In 1893, she published “Woman, Church, and State” where she argued that Christian leaders plotted to suppress the women.
• Her son-in-law, L. Frank Baum, wrote The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, which featured women in nontraditional roles.
• New York State granted women the right to vote for school board members in 1880, but in 1893, New York took away this right.
• Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage wrote a three-volume monumental book, History of Woman Suffrage, documenting the movement up to 1885.
• Additional volumes were added later by Ida Husted Harper and other women who were part of the National American Woman Suffrage Association.
• Matilda's words continue to inspire with the quote, "The soul must assert its own supremacy or die!"

Isabella Beecher Hooker

• Isabella Beecher Hooker served as a pioneer woman lawyer and suffragist.
• She achieved a significant victory in 1877, securing the right for married women to own property in Connecticut.
• Throughout the years until 1901,Isabella persistently presented suffrage bills to the Connecticut General Assembly.
• She didn't reunite with other suffrage groups until 1890, despite starting the process earlier.
• In 1893, Isabella convinced several U.S. senators to support a limited national suffrage proposal to improve the lives of women.
• In 1882, Isabella Hooker successfully argued before the Connecticut Supreme Court for women's admission to the state bar.
• Mary Hall, her apprentice, became the first woman to practice law in Connecticut.
• Beecher's father didn't prioritize educating girls, but Beecher yearned for learning.
• There were concerns family frictions related to Isabella's perspectives to women's roles in society.
• Due to suspicions regarding Isabella's brother Henry's extramarital affair and the resulting scandal, a family rift arose.
• Her father, a preacher, didn't prioritize educating girls, but she learned and read with her husband.
• Isabella's belief in Spiritualism—which involved the communication with spirits—worried some family members.
• Though there were concerns with Isabella the family reconciling with her before her death.
• In 1871, she presided over a convention, urging people to recognize that the Constitution defines "people," which already gave women the right to vote by implicitly including them.

Anna

• The first time Anna spoke to a large audience, she was so terrified she fainted, but she returned to finish her speech.
• In 1870, seeking additional income, she moved in with her sister in Michigan, working as a seamstress.
• She was inspired by a sermon of a female Universalist preacher, who encouraged her to return to school.
• By 1871, she became recognized as one of the first female preachers in the Methodist Church at 24 years old.
• Her preaching was impactful, described as "a lighted match applied to gunpowder."
• In 1873, Anna pursued a more formal education, earning a doctorate in medicine from three institutions, Michigan, Boston (x2).
• As a pastor, she had observed women in vulnerable situations in their homes and workplaces, enduring underpayment, abuse, and ridicule, and felt that equal rights for women were crucial.
• “Democracy demanded equality, " stated Anna.
• In 1885, she left her church position to preach women's suffrage, finding it was the one true cause to advocate for.
• In 1888, Anna begun working with Susan B. Anthony, traveling extensively to gain support for women's suffrage.

Lucy Burns' Life

• Burns was unjustly treated in prison.
• She went on a hunger strike to demand political prisoner status, but was brutally force-fed.
• The Night of Terror (November 14-15, 1917): police brutally attacked and arrested 31 picketers. Sufragettes were beaten, dragged, and thrown into cells.
• The horrors of the treatment encouraged support.
• Burns organized watchfires in a park by the Whitehouse, where copies of Wilson’s speeches were set ablaze to display disapproval.
• She burned an effigy of the President.
• She was jailed six times.
• Paul commended her courage as "a thousand times more valiant than I".
• The suffragment act was passed in 1920, and Burns was emotionally and physically drained when she decided to pass the baton.
• She retired from public view and focused on raising her niece.

Julia Howe

• Samuel Howe, Julia's husband, was a controlling figure.
• Their marriage was difficult and strained. -She wrote poetry, publishing it anonymously under the title Passion-Flowers.
• Julia joined the suffrage movement at age 50.
• In 1869, she co-founded the American Woman Suffrage Association with Lucy Stone.
• This splinter group that advocated for African American men to receive the vote, even if women had to wait.
• She edited The Woman's Journal, a newspaper founded by Lucy Stone.
• Julia was active in women's clubs and organizations in New England.
• Women writers were often discouraged by male disapproval.
• Writers often published anonymously or under pen names.
• Some people in her circle thought that suffrage movement threatened the "character of a true woman."
• Suffragists were criticized as "crude and un-Christian," lacking male escorts.
• Julia's unhappy marriage ended with Howe's death in 1876.
• After he died, Julia discovered that he had squandered most of her inheritance.

Stanton

• She experienced disagreements with Anthony.
• Divisions arised within the civil war, with some prioritizing war and others suffrage.
• In National Women Suffrage Association, she opposed the 15th amendment.
• Varying tactics were adopted (lobbying state/ federal amendment and picketing)
• Racism was apparent with Stanton.
• She spoke our against race in order to receive her goals, by proving women need to vote regardless of race.
• In 1866, she ran for congress.
• She was a role model for her followers.

Nina

• In Nina's part of the country, girls could marry at age fifteen.
• As a Hispanic woman married to an Anglo man, she faced disapproval.
• To separate from disapproval, she divorced and bought a Homestead.
• She was a strong, influential Hispanic woman of the 1900s, breaking free from the status quo to run an Insurance company.
• New Mexico denied women the right to vote in 1912 and, contacted by Paul, she joined the suffrage campaign.
• Despite the support that Hispanic culture provided for the respect of women, the fact remained that society was still, in many aspects a man's world politically.