twelve years since, a woman of a neighboring town, whose husband had forsaken her, hired a man to carry her furniture in a wagon to her native place, with her family, which consisted of her husband's mother, herself, and six children, the eldest of which was but twelve years old. On her arrival there, she had only food enough for one meal, and nine-pence left. During the summer, in consequence of hardships and deprivations, she was taken violently sick, being deprived of her reason for several weeks. Her husband had not, as yet, appeared to offer her the least assistance, although apprised of her situation. But, being an uncommonly mean man, he had sold her furniture, piece by piece, and reduced her to penury, so that nothing but the aid of her friends and her own exertions, saved her and her family from the alms-house.
Says the law to this heroic woman, "What, though your property is squandered, your health and spirits broken, and you have six small children, besides yourself and your husband's mother to support! After five years of incessant toil in humility and degradation, why should not your lord and master intrude his loathsome person, like a blood-sucker upon your vitals, never offering you any assistance; and should your precarious life be protracted to that extent of time, for twenty dollars you can buy a divorce from bed and board, and have your property secured to you. Such, Madam, is your high privilege. Complain then not to us, lest instead of alleviating your sufferings, we strengthen the cords that already bind you."
The moral courage of the "Hero of the Battle-field" would shrink in horror from scenes like these; but such is the fate of woman, to whom God grant no future "hell."
In case a man receives a trifle from a departed friend or any other source, the wife's signature is not required. Recently a poor man left his daughter twenty dollars, of which her husband allowed her ten, retaining the remainder for acknowledging its receipt. It was probably the only ten dollars the woman ever received, except for her own exertions, which were constantly required to supply the necessities of her family, her husband being very intemperate and abusive, often pulling her by the ears so as to cause the blood to flow freely.
No bodily pain, however intense, can compare with the mental suffering which we witness and experience, and which would long since have filled our Insane Asylums to overflowing, were it not for the unceasing drudgery to which we are subjected, in order to save ourselves and families from starvation.
Often does the drunkard bestow upon his wife from one to a dozen children to rear and support until old enough to render her a little assistance, when they are compelled to seek service in order to clothe themselves decently, and often are their earnings, with those of their mother, appropriated to pay for rum, tobacco, gambling, and other vices. "Say not that we exaggerate these evils; neither tongue nor pen can do it!" says the unfortunate wife of a man whose moral character, so far as she knew, was unimpeachable, but who proved to be an insufferable tyrant, depriving her of the necessaries of life, and often ordering her out of the house which her friends provided for them to live in, using the most abusive epithets which ingenuity, or the want of it, could suggest. Intemperance degraded the character of the man with whom she lived as long as apprehensions for the safety of her life would warrant; from the fact that her health was rapidly failing under the severity and deprivation to which she was subjected, and the repeated threats of violence to her own life and that of her friends. "But one step farther and you drive us to desperation! Sooner would I pour out my heart's blood, drop by drop, than suffer again what I have hitherto experienced, or that my female friends should suffer as I have done, and I know that many of them do. Yet, neither sacrifice, sympathy, argument, or influence can avail us anything under existing circumstances."
Such an appeal from helpless, down-trodden humanity, though it were made to a council of the most benighted North American savages, would not pass unheeded. Shall it be made in vain to you?
To many of us death would be a luxury compared to what we suffer in consequence of the abusive treatment we receive from unprincipled men, which existing laws sanction and encourage by their indiscriminate severity, and with which we are told "it would be difficult to meddle on account of their sacredness and sublimity." The idea is sufficiently ludicrous to excite the risibility of the most grave. Though the sublime and the ridiculous may be too nearly allied for females to distinguish the difference, unjust inequality is to them far more contemptible than sacred, having thus far been ungraciously subjected to it. Well may we be called "the weaker sex" if the error in judgment is ours, although we have intellect and energy enough not to respect the circumstances under which we are placed, nor the powers which would designedly inflict such injustice upon us.
Debased indeed would a man consider himself to employ a woman to plead his cause, with a woman for judge and twelve women for jurors. How much less degraded are women when exposed to a similar assembly of men, who have for them neither interest, sympathy, nor respect, subjected as they are to insolent questions and the uncharitable remarks of an indifferent multitude.
It is urged that women are ignorant of the laws. They are sufficiently enlightened to comprehend the meaning of justice—a far more important thing—which admits of neither improvement nor modification, but is applicable to every emergency. With the perceptibility that some can boast, it would require but a short time for them to enact laws sufficient to govern themselves, which is all that the most aspiring can covet; convinced as they are that, as in families, so likewise in government, the mild, indulgent parent who would consult the greatest good of the greatest number, is rewarded with agreeable and honorable children; while the one who is unjust, partial, and severe, is proportionably recompensed for his indiscretion.
In regard to unjust imprisonment we are told, "It is of too rare occurrence to require legal enactments." How many a devoted wife, mother, and child can tell a far different story. Who of us or our children is secure from false accusation and imprisonment, or, perhaps, an ignominious death upon the gallows, to screen some miserable villain from justice? Witnesses, lawyers, judges, jurors, and executioners are paid for depriving innocent persons of their time, liberty, health, and reputation, which, to many, is dearer than life, while the guilty one escapes, and society, when too late, laments the sad catastrophe. The life-blood of many a victim demands not only justice for the guilty, but protection for the innocent.
FIRST NATIONAL CONVENTION IN WORCESTER,
October 23d and 24th, 1850.
The Conventions in New York and Ohio, though not extensively advertised, nor planned with much deliberation, for in both cases they were hastily decided upon, yet their novelty attracted much attention, and drew large audiences. Those who had long seen and felt woman's wrongs, were now for the first time inspired with the hope that something might be done for their redress by organized action. When Massachusetts decided to call a convention, the initiative steps were well considered, as there were many men and women in that State trained in the anti-slavery school, skilled in managing conventions, who were also interested in woman's enfranchisement. But to the energy and earnestness of Paulina Wright Davis, more than to any other one person, we may justly accord the success of the first Conventions in Massachusetts.
In describing the preliminary arrangements in a report read in the second decade meeting in New York in 1870, she says:
"In May, 1850, a few women in Boston attending an Anti-Slavery meeting, proposed that all who felt interested in a plan for a National Woman's Rights Convention, should consult in the ante-room. Of the nine who went out into that dark, dingy room, a committee of seven were chosen to do the work. Worcester was the place selected, and the 23d and 24th of October the appointed time. However, the work soon devolved upon one person.40 Illness hindered one, duty to a brother another, duty to the slave a third, professional engagements a fourth, the fear of bringing the gray hairs of a father to the grave prevented another from serving; but the pledge was made, and could not be withdrawn.
"The call was prepared, an argument in itself, and sent
