In 1844, Rhode Island had passed property laws for married women. In 1848- 9 Connecticut and Texas, as well as New York, did so, apparently uninfluenced by anything except their "sense of justice." In 1850-'52 Alabama and Maine passed such laws. In 1853 New Hampshire, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Iowa changed their laws in this respect. They moved forward in this reform, as did the other States, before there was even a beginning of Suffrage agitation in them. In 1847, Mrs. C. J. II. Nichols, who afterward became a Suffrage worker, addressed to the voters of Vermont a series of editorials setting forth the property disabilities of women. In October of that year, Hon. Larkin Mead, moved, he said, by her presentation, introduced a bill into the Senate, which, becoming a law, secured to the wife real estate owned by her at marriage, or acquired by gift, devise, or inheritance during marriage, with the rents, issues, and profits, as against any debts of the husband; but to make a sale or conveyance of either her realty or its use valid, it must be the joint act of husband and wife. She might by last will and testament dispose of her lands, tenements, hereditaments, and any interest therein descendable to her heirs, as if "sole." Mrs. Nichols says that in 1852 she drew up a petition signed by more than two hundred business men and tax-paying widows, asking the Legislature to make women voters in school matters. Mrs. Nichols's report is clear, sound, definite, and she seems to have been of real service, and to have won what she sought. She says, "Up to 1850 I had not taken position for suffrage, although I had shown the absurdity of regarding it as unwomanly." She appears to have done a great deal of clever as well as earnest and spirited talking in the West, after she had "taken position for suffrage," and she reports that, when she removed to Kansas, her claims were for "equal educational rights and privileges in all the schools and institutions of learning fostered or controlled by the State." "An equal right in all matters pertaining to the organization and conduct of the common schools." "Recognition of the mother's equal right with the father to the control and custody of their mutual offspring." "Protection in person, property, and earnings for married women and widows, the same as for men." The first three were fully granted, the fourth was changed as to "personal service." In her pleading for "political rights," she was associated with John O. Wattles, and the amendment they proposed was defeated in the Legislature.