Elizabeth Cady Stanton: Reminiscences |
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Part 7: Mobs from Buffalo to Albany |
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In the winter of 1861, just after the election of Lincoln, the Abolitionists decided to hold a series of Conventions in the chief cities of the North. All their available speakers were pledged for active service. The Republican party, having absorbed the political Abolitionists within its ranks by its declared hostility to the extension of slavery, had come into power with overwhelming majorities; hence the Garrisonian Abolitionists, opposed to all compromises, felt this was the opportune moment to rouse the people to the necessity of holding that party to its declared principles, and pushing it, if possible, a step or two forward. I was invited to accompany Miss Anthony and Beriah Green to a few points in Central New York. But we soon found, by the concerted action of Republicans all over the country, the Conventions were broken up at every point. This furnished one occasion on which Republicans and Democrats could work harmoniously together, and they made common cause against the Abolitionists. The John Brown raid the year before had intimidated Northern politicians as much as Southern slaveholders, and the general feeling was that the discussion of the question at the North should be altogether suppressed. From Buffalo to Albany our experience was the same, varied only by the fertile resources of the actors and their surroundings. Thirty years of education had somewhat changed the character of Northern mobs. They no longer dragged men through the streets with ropes round their necks, nor broke up women's prayer-meetings; they no longer threw eggs and brickbats at the apostles of reform, nor dipped them in barrels of tar and feathers; they simply crowded the halls, and with laughing, groaning, clapping, and cheering, effectually interrupted the proceedings. Thus we passed the two days we had advertised for a Convention in St. James' Hall, Buffalo. As we paid for the Hall, the mob enjoyed themselves at our expense in more ways than one. At the appointed time every session we took our places on the platform, making at various intervals of silence renewed efforts to speak. Not succeeding, we sat and conversed with each other and many friends who crowded the platform and ante-rooms. Thus among ourselves we had a pleasant reception and a discussion of many phases of the question that brought us together. The mob not only vouchsafed to us the privilege of talking to our friends without interruption, but delegations of their own came behind the scenes from time to time, to discuss with us the right of free speech and the constitutionality of slavery. These Buffalo rowdies were headed by ex-Justice Hingon, aided by younger members of the Fillmore and Seymour families and the Chief of Police and fifty subordinates, who were admitted to the hall free for the express purpose of protecting our right of free speech, which in defiance of the Mayor's orders, they did not make the slightest effort to do. At Lockport there was a feeble attempt in the same direction. At Albion neither hall, church, nor school-house could be obtained, so we held small meetings in the dining-room of the hotel. At Rochester, Corinthian Hall was packed long before the hour advertised. This was a delicately appreciative jocose mob. At this point Aaron Powell joined us. As he had just risen from a bed of sickness, looking pale and emaciated, he slowly mounted the platform. The mob at once took in his look of exhaustion, and as he seated himself they gave an audible, simultaneous sigh, as if to say, What a relief it is to be seated! So completely did the tender manifestation reflect Mr. Powell's apparent condition, that the whole audience burst into a roar of laughter. Here, too, all attempts to speak were futile. At Port Byron a generous sprinkling of cayenne pepper on the stove, soon cut short all constitutional arguments and paeans to liberty. And so it was all the way to Albany. The whole State was aflame with the mob spirit, and from Boston and various points in other States, the same news reached us. As the Legislature was in session, and we were advertised in Albany, a radical member sarcastically moved "that as Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony were about to move on Albany, the militia be ordered out for the protection of the city." Happily, Albany could then boast a democratic Mayor, a man of courage and conscience, who said the right of free speech should never be trodden underfoot where he had the power to prevent it. And grandly did that one determined man maintain order in his jurisdiction. Through all the sessions of the Convention Mayor Thatcher sat on the platform, his police stationed in different parts of the Hall and outside the building, to disperse the crowd as fast as collected. If a man or boy hissed or made the slightest interruption, he was immediately ejected. And not only did the Mayor preserve order in the meetings, but with a company of armed police, he escorted us every time to and from the Delavan House. The last night Gerrit Smith addressed the mob from the steps of the hotel, after which they gave him three cheers, and dispersed in good order. When proposing for the Mayor a vote of thanks at the close of the Convention, Mr. Smith expressed his fears that it had been a severe ordeal for him to listen to these prolonged anti-slavery discussions, he smiled, and said: "I have really been deeply interested and instructed. I rather congratulate myself that a Convention of this character has at last come in the line of my business, otherwise I should have probably remained in ignorance of many important facts and opinions I now understand and appreciate." Next page > Chapter 8: A Fugitive Mother and Child > Page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 from Chapter XIII, "Reminiscences," The History of Woman Suffrage (ed. Elizabeth Cady Stanton), Vol. 1 (New York: Fowler & Wells, 1881). |
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Summary: A section of the original text by Elizabeth Cady Stanton about the early days of the woman suffrage movement, including the meeting of Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, their early struggles for women's rights, opposition to their work and the experiment with fashion innovation called the Bloomer Costume.
