Massachusetts in the Woman Suffrage Movement: A General, Political, Legal and Legislative History from 1774, to 1881

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Roberts Brothers, 1883 - 265 pages
Harriet Hanson was a Lowell mill operative in the 1830s and 1840s when she wrote "Loom and Spindle." In 1848, she married William Stevens Robinson, editor of the "Lowell Courier." After the Civil War both Harriet and her husband became steadfast supporters of woman suffrage. This book by Robinson deals with the woman suffrage campaign in Massachusetts from 1774 to 1881. The writing is rather dry, but it includes a very good 88-page appendix containing a detailed description of the Lowell Mill; accounts of various attempts by women to gain limited access to voting rights; and statistical information on women's employment.

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Page 6 - And, by the way, in the new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make, I desire you would remember the ladies and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands. Remember, all men would be tyrants if they could.
Page 70 - The republican party is mindful of its obligations to the loyal women of America for their noble devotion to the cause of freedom. Their admission to wider fields of usefulness is viewed with satisfaction , and the honest demand of any class of citizens for additional rights should be treated with respectful consideration.
Page 184 - Though Somnus in Homer be sent to rouse up Agamemnon, I find no such effects in these drowsy approaches of sleep. To keep our eyes open longer were but to act our antipodes. The huntsmen are up in America, and they are already past their first sleep in Persia.
Page 217 - ... the legislative department shall never exercise the executive and judicial powers, or either of them; the executive shall never exercise the legislative and judicial powers, or either of them; the judicial shall never exercise the legislative and executive powers, or either of them; to the end that it may be a government of laws and not of men.
Page 253 - The true republic — men, their rights and nothing more; women, their rights and nothing less.
Page 236 - ... to impose and levy proportional and reasonable assessments, rates, and taxes, upon all the inhabitants of, and persons resident, and estates lying, within the said Commonwealth; and also to impose and levy reasonable duties and excises, upon any produce, goods, wares, merchandise, and commodities whatsoever, brought into, produced, manufactured, or being within the same...
Page 189 - My idea is that whatever is morally right for a man to do is morally right for a woman to do.
Page 21 - Lives, too, which bear none of these names have yielded tones of no less significance. The candlestick set in a low place has given light as faithfully where it was needed as that upon the hill. In close alleys, in dismal nooks, the Word has been read as distinctly as when shown by angels to holy men in the dark prison. Those who till a spot of earth scarcely larger than is wanted for a grave have deserved that the sun should shine upon its sod till violets answer. So great has been...
Page 192 - Secondly, nearly all these young ladies subscribe to circulating libraries. Thirdly, they have got up among themselves a periodical called The Lowell Offering, "A repository of original articles, written exclusively by females actively employed in the mills...
Page 238 - Allen, 539, 571, in which it is declared "that a trust to secure the passage of laws granting women, whether married or unmarried, the right to vote, to hold office, to hold, manage, and devise property, and all other civil rights enjoyed by men.

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