The venerable Lucretia Mott presided, and Senator Pomeroy opened the convention with an eloquent speech, January 19, 1869. A feature of this occasion was the appearance of several young colored orators, speaking in opposition to suffrage for women and denouncing them for jeopardizing the black man's claim to the ballot by insisting upon their own. One of them, George Downing, standing by the side of Lucretia Mott, declared that God intended the male should dominate the female everywhere! Another was a son of Robert Purvis, who was earnestly and publicly rebuked by his father. Edward M. Davis, son-in-law of Lucretia Mott, also condemned the women for their temerity and severely criticised the resolutions, which demanded the same political rights for women as for negro men. Miss Anthony called on Senator Harlan, of Iowa, chairman of the District committee, who readily granted the women a hearing which took place January 26, when she and Mrs. Stanton gave their arguments. This was the first congressional hearing ever granted to present the question of woman suffrage. An appeal was sent to Congress praying that women should be recognized in the next amendment. In her letter to the Philadelphia Press, Grace Greenwood thus described the leading spirits of the convention: Near Lucretia Mott sat her sister, Martha Wright, a woman of strong, constant character and rare intellectual culture; Mrs. Cady Stanton, of impressive and beautiful appearance, in the rich prime of an active, generous and healthful life; Miss Susan B. Anthony, looking all she is, a keen, energetic, uncompromising, unconquerable, passionately earnest woman; Clara Barton, whose name is dear to soldiers and blessed in thousands of homes to which the soldiers shall return no more--a brave, benignant-looking woman.... Miss Anthony followed in a strain not only cheerful, but exultant--reviewing the advance of the cause from its first despised beginning to its present position, where, she alleged, it commanded the attention of the world. She spoke in her usual pungent, vehement style, hitting the nail on the head every time, and driving it in up to the head. Indeed, it seems to me, that while Lucretia Mott may be said to be the soul of this movement, and Mrs. Stanton the mind, the "swift, keen intelligence," Miss Anthony, alert, aggressive and indefatigable, is its nervous energy--its propulsive force.... To see the three chief figures of this great movement sitting upon a stage in joint council, like the three Fates of a new dispensation--dignity and the ever-acceptable grace of scholarly earnestness, intelligence and beneficence making them prominent--is assurance that the women of our country, bereft of defenders or injured by false ones, have advocates equal to the great demands of their cause. [Autograph: Yours affectionately Grace Greenwood]