Susan was convinced that the annual national convention should always be held in Washington, where Congress could see and feel the growing strength and influence of the movement. Her "girls," on the other hand, wanted to take their conventions to different parts of the country to widen their influence. Not as certain as Susan that work for a federal amendment must come first, many of them contended that a few more states won for woman suffrage would best help the cause at this time. The southern women, now active, were firm believers in states' rights and supported state work.[406] Susan's experience had taught her the impracticability of direct appeal to the voters in the states, now that foreign-born men in increasing numbers were arrayed against votes for women. In spite of her arguments and her pleas, the National American Association voted in 1894 to hold conventions in different parts of the country in alternate years. Disappointed, but trying her best graciously to follow the will of the majority, she traveled to Atlanta and to Des Moines for the conventions of 1895 and 1897. Nor did the younger women welcome the messages which Mrs. Stanton, at Susan's insistence, sent to every convention. Susan herself often wished her good friend would stick more closely to woman suffrage instead of introducing extraneous subjects, such as "Educated Suffrage," "The Matriarchate," or "Women and the Church," but nevertheless she proudly read her papers to successive conventions. Insisting that the conventions were too academic, Mrs. Stanton urged Susan to inject more vitality into them by broadening their platform. Susan, however, had come to the conclusion that concentration on woman suffrage was imperative in order to unite all women under one banner and build up numbers which Congressmen were bound to respect. With this her "girls" agreed 100 per cent. While all of them were convinced suffragists, they were divided on other issues, and few of them were wholehearted feminists, as were Susan and Mrs. Stanton. * * * * * With the publication of _The Woman's Bible_ in 1895, Mrs. Stanton almost upset the applecart, stirring up heated controversy in the National American Woman Suffrage Association. _The Woman's Bible_ was a keen and sometimes biting commentary on passages in the Bible relating to women. It questioned the traditional interpretation which for centuries has fastened the stigma of inferiority upon women, and pointed out that the female as well as the male was created in the image of God. To those who regarded every word of the Bible as inspired by God, _The Woman's Bible_ was heresy, and both the clergy and the press stirred up a storm of protest against it. Suffragists were condemned for compiling a new Bible and were obliged to explain again and again that _The Woman's Bible_ expressed Mrs. Stanton's personal views and not those of the movement.