The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2): Including Public Addresses, Her Own Letters and Many From Her Contemporaries During Fifty YearsHarper, Ida Husted
History
The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2): Including Public Addresses, Her Own Letters and Many From Her Contemporaries During Fifty Years
Harper, Ida Husted
Anthony, Susan B. (Susan Brownell), 1820-1906
Miss Anthony's own heart yearned to return, but the workers were so few
in Kansas and so many in the Eastern States. that she scarcely knew
where the call of duty was strongest. At the close of the war her mind
grasped at once the full import of the momentous questions which would
demand settlement and she felt the necessity of placing herself in
touch with those who would be most powerful in moulding public
sentiment. The threatened division in the Abolitionist ranks and the
reported determination of Mr. Garrison to disband the Anti-Slavery
Society, filled her with dismay and she sent back the strongest
protests she could put into words:
How can any one hold that Congress has no right to demand negro
suffrage in the returning rebel States because it is not already
established in all the loyal ones? What would have been said of
Abolitionists ten or twenty years ago, had they preached to the
people that Congress had no right to vote against admitting a new
State with slavery, because it was not already abolished in all the
old States? It is perfectly astounding, this seeming eagerness of
so many of our old friends to cover up and apologize for the
glaring hate toward the equal recognition of the manhood of the
black race. Well, you will be in New York to witness, perhaps, the
disbanding of the Anti-Slavery Society--and I shall be away out
here, waiting anxiously to catch the first glimpse of the spirit of
the meeting. But Phillips will be glorious and genial to the end.
All through this struggle he has stood up against the tide, one of
the few to hold the nation to its vital work--its one necessity,
moral as military--absolute justice and equality for the black man.
I wish every ear in this country might listen to his word.
A letter from Mr. Phillips said: "Thank you for your kind note. I see
you understand the lay of the land and no words are necessary between
you and me. Your points we have talked over. If Garrison should resign,
we incline to Purvis for president for many, many reasons. We (Hovey
Committee) shall aid in keeping our Standard floating till the enemy
comes down." All the letters received by Miss Anthony during May and
June were filled with the story of the dissension in the Anti-Slavery
Society.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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