Carrie Chapman Catt (Carrie Lane at the time) retired from teaching after the end of the 1884 school year and married Leo Chapman, publisher and editor of the Mason City Republican newspaper, in February 1885. In the March 5 issue of The Republican, Catt’s name appeared in the masthead as co-editor of the paper with Chapman, and on March 19, the first installment of her new column, “Woman’s World,” was published. The Mason City Public Library has microfilm of every issue of The Republican from 1885 except one, and Catt’s column appears nearly weekly through early November. The Chapmans sold the newspaper in April 1886, and there are no extant copies of the paper from that year.
The following interesting item in regard to New York is given in Tid Bits:
In the extensive researches made by the author of a recently published work, entitled, “Cases of the Legislature’s Power over Suffrage” (Hamilton Wilcox, M.S., LL. B.), he found that the position of the General Election Law, passed in 1842, which prevented woman from voting had been repealed; and that there is now no law left to prevent a woman from voting who takes the oath required of a challenged person, or who can truthfully make it; or to punish her or the inspectors of election. The sole statutory provision which could possibly be thought to warrant punishing her is that which imposed a penalty for “knowingly voting without being qualified according to the laws,” and the laws now do not prescribe sex as a qualification. This provision really applies to persons who vote in districts where they do not live, or who are not American citizen, or are under the required age; and who, by fraud or by collusion with corrupt inspectors, vote without being challenged, and thus escape the penalties for false swearing. The qualifications required by the law for voting are specified only in the oath which a challenged person must take; and masculinity is not one of these. The right of women, recognized for ages, by the common law, and guarded by the State Constitution, to vote on the same terms with their brothers, has thus now no legal obstruction to its exercise. The author of the “Cases” advises the inspectors of elections throughout the State to take the votes of women who have the qualifications mentioned in the oath; and also advises every woman in the State who has these qualifications to offer her vote at the next election, and take the oath if necessary. He kindly offers to furnish all needful information and instructions to any woman or election officer. His address is No. 146 Broadway, New York. General Husted and other leading members endorsed his position in this matter also in the Assembly debate; and by his advice “Women’s Voting Bands” are forming in New York City and elsewhere. The “Woman-Suffrage bill”, for which a majority in the Assembly (though not quite enough) voted this year, was simply declaratory of the law as it now stands. Its failure to pass did not affect the rights of women under existing law.
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At the woman suffrage hearing before the Committee of the Massachusetts Legislature, on the 16th of February, 1885, Lucy Stone presented the following questions and answers which illustrate some phases of the movement for the equal legal and political rights of women in Massachusetts:
Question—Shall the men and women who are to obey the laws have a right to make them?
Answer—No. Only the men shall have that right.
Q.—But there must be laws which especially concern women. Who shall make those laws?
A.—Only men shall make them.
Q.—May not mothers help to make the laws that settle their legal relation to their children?
A.—They shall not.
Q.—May not married women help to make the laws that decide what share of the property acquired by a husband and wife during marriage shall belong to the wife?
A.—They shall not.
Q.— May not married women help to make the laws that decide how much of their property acquired before their marriage shall belong to their husbands after their death?
A.—Men shall decide that.
Q.—Who shall make the laws that decide how, and how much, a wife may will of her own property?
A.—The men.
Q.—Who shall make the laws that decide the rights married partners in case of divorce and alimony?
A.—Men.
Q.—Do married women own their own clothes?
A.—They do.
Q.—How long did it take to secure that right?
A.—Three years.
Q.—May a widow now be buried in the family lot?
A.—She may.
Q.—How long did it take to secure that right?
A.—Ten years.
Q.—Shall the men and women who pay taxes have a right to say how much they shall pay, who shall spend the money, and how it shall be spent?
A.—No. Only the men have this right.
Q.—May a wife will her personal property as freely as her husband may will his?
A.—No.
Q.—How much may she be free to will?
A.—One-half.
Q.—What must be done with it?
A.—She must do with it just what her husband gives her permission to do written in the will.
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What I should like to be sure of as a result of higher education for women—a result that will come to pass over my grave—is their recognition of the great amount of social unproductive labor which needs to be done by women, and which is now either not done at all, or done wretchedly. No good can come to women, more than to any class of male mortals, while each aims at doing the highest kind of work, which ought rather to be held in sanctity as what only the few can do well. I believe, and I want it to be well shown, that a more thorough education will tend to do away with the odious vulgarity of our notions about functions and employment, and to propagate the true gospel that the deepest disgrace is to insist on doing work for which we are unfit—to do any kind of work of badly.—George Eliot.
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The greatest demand of the age is better educated females—educated in all respects, their whole capabilities brought into activity, since the health, vigor, mental and moral power of the next general at least, will depend on their condition more than all other influences combined—“each after its kind”. The sickly mother will rear a sickly child though that feebleness may not at first be manifest. The peevish mother—so during the most important period of her earthly life—will produce peevishness in her offspring. The groveling, low, sensual, intemperate and vicious woman becomes just to that extent the mother of just such children as the future will demonstrate. If these are facts, therefore it is a matter of vital importance that our girls shall be thoroughly educated to become wives and mothers. If she is to become the mother of the race, it is her right and the duty which society owes her, to have every possible facility to become the highest type of such a mother—healthy and wise.
While our boys are trained for the trades, for farming, for the professions, etc., it is as needful that the girls shall be made intelligent in general, and that some occupation shall be selected as a means of support, that they may not feel that they are but parasites in society; that they were simply made to be married at about twenty years of age and then to be supported, pets to be fondled—as long as they may seem pets—finely attired and harmless dolls,. That most will be married is hoped; and yet some will remain single, and as such, it is but fair to them that they shall be able in some way to secure an honest living, to respect themselves. To bring them up (or let them come up), to feel that they are too good to work in any department of industry, too good to be useful, is to rob them of self-respect, of true womanhood; nay, more, it teaches them selfishness, to disrespect the mother. Every daughter—if the mother discharges her whole duty—will be taught to be useful, first in the kitchen, in the nursery, in the sitting-room, at least if she has any idea of ever having the care of a family. If not, she needs training in some of the trades, that she need not remain a hanger-on, a practical pauper. Men and women alike are placed in this world for labor, usefulness,--labor of body or mind, or both.—Woman’s Work.
Notes About Women
—Miss Mary B. Willard, editor of the Union Signal, will take a years’ vacation which will be spend in Europe.
—Miss M. A. Rooks has been postmistress at Monroe, Ga., since April 27, 1865, and during all this time she has not lost half a day out of the office.
—Rebecca Nourse, who was hanged as a witch at Salem in 1692, not withstanding her repeated affirmation of her innocence, has had a monument just erected by her descendants. On one side of it is the legend concerning her, and on the other, these lines of Whittier:
“O Christian martyr, who for truth could die,
When all about thee owned the hideous lie,
The world redeemed from superstition’s sway
Is breathing freer for they sake to-day.”
—Mrs. Sartoris, it is said, will make a short visit to England this fall, after which she will come back to this country with her children for the purpose of educating and bringing them up as Americans. It was the wish of General Grant that the children should be so educated. Besides this, Mrs. Sartoris is anxious to be with her mother for some time at least, and Mrs. Grant also wished to have her children about her.
Chapman, Carrie Lane. 1885. “Woman’s World.” Mason City Republican, August 27.
PDF version, courtesy of Mason City Public Library
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