CHAPTER LI.. Colorado.

COLORADO.

Great American Desert--Organized as a Territory, February 28, 1860--Gov. McCook's Message Recommending Woman Suffrage, 1870--Adverse Legislation--Hon. Amos Steck--Admitted to the Union, 1876--Constitutional Convention--Efforts to Strike Out the Word "Male"--Convention to Discuss Woman Suffrage--School Suffrage Accorded--State Association Formed, Alida C. Avery, President--Proposition for Full Suffrage Submitted to the Popular Vote--A Vigorous Campaign--Mrs. Campbell and Mrs. Patterson of Denver--Opposition by the Clergy--Their Arguments Ably Answered--D. M. Richards--The Amendment Lost--The Rocky Mountain News.

That our English readers may appreciate the Herculean labors that the advocates of suffrage undertake in this country in canvassing a State, they must consider the vast territory to be traveled over, in stages and open wagons where railroads are scarce. Colorado, for example, covers an area of 104,500 square miles. It is divided by the Rocky Mountains running north and south, with two hundred lofty peaks rising thirteen thousand feet above the level of the sea, and some still higher. To reach the voters in the little mining towns a hundred miles apart, over mountains such as these, involves hardships that only those who have made the journeys can understand. But there is some compensation in the variety, beauty and grandeur of the scenery, with its richly wooded valleys, vast parks and snow-capped mountains. It is the region for those awake to the sublime in nature to reverently worship some of her grandest works that no poet can describe nor artist paint. Here, too, the eternal struggle for liberty goes on, for the human soul can never be attuned to harmony with its surroundings, especially the grand and glorious, until the birthright of justice and equality is secured to all.

For a history of the early efforts made in the Centennial State to secure equal rights for women, we are indebted to Mrs. Mary G. Campbell and Mrs. Katharine G. Patterson, two sisters who have been actively interested in the suffrage movement in Colorado, as follows:

In 1848, while those immortal women whose names will be found on many another page of the volume in which this chapter is included, were asking in the convention at Seneca Falls, N. Y., that their equal membership in the human family might be admitted by their husbands, fathers and sons, Colorado, unnamed and unthought of, was still asleep with her head above the clouds. Only two mountain-tops in all the-world were nearer heaven than hers, and they, in far Thibet, had seen the very beginnings of the race which, after six thousand years, had not yet penetrated Colorado. Islanded in a cruel brown ocean of sand, she hid her treasures of gold and silver in her virgin bosom and dreamed, unstirred by any echoes of civilization. When she woke at last it was to the sound of an anvil chorus--to the ring of the mallet and drill, and the hoarse voices of men greedy only for gold.

In 1858, when the Ninth National Convention of women to demand their legal rights was in session in New York, there were only three white women in the now rich and beautiful city of Denver. Still another ten years of wild border life, of fierce vicissitudes, of unwritten tragedies enacted in forest and mine, and Colorado was organized into a territory with a population of 5,000 women and 25,000 men.

The first effort for suffrage was made in 1870, during the fifth session of the legislative assembly, soon after General Edward McCook was sent out by President Grant to fill the gubernatorial chair. In his message to the legislature, he promptly recommended to the attention of its members the question of suffrage for woman:

Before dismissing the subject of franchise, I desire to call your attention to one question connected with it, which you may deem of sufficient importance to demand some consideration at your hands before the close of the session. Our higher civilization has recognized woman's equality with man in all respects save one--suffrage. It has been said that no great reform was ever made without passing through three stages--ridicule, argument, and adoption. It rests with you to say whether Colorado will accept this reform in its first stage, as our sister territory of Wyoming has done, or in the last; whether she will be a leader or a follower; for the logic of a progressive civilization leads to the inevitable result of a universal suffrage.

This was the first gun of the campaign, and summoned to the field various contending forces, armed with ridicule, argument, or an optimistic diplomacy, urging an immediate surrender of the ground claimed. Bills favoring the enfranchisement of women were discussed both in the Territorial Council Chamber and in the lower House of the legislature. The subject was taken up by the press and the people, and not escaping its meed of ridicule, was seriously dealt with by both friend and enemy. Perhaps the western champions of woman's recognition as an intelligent part of the body politic were brought to understand the full meaning of her disabilities by their own experiences as territorial minors. Certain it is that the high spirit of the citizens of Colorado chafed intolerably under the temporary limitations of accustomed rights of sovereign manhood. The federal government, in the capacity of regent, sent to these territorial wards their officers and governors and fixed the rate of their taxation without full representation. These wards were indeed empowered, as were the people of their sister territories, to elect a delegate to the national congress, whose opinions upon territorial matters were allowed expression in that body, but who could no more enforce there his convictions upon important measures, by a vote, than could the most intelligent woman of this territory upon the question of his election to represent her interests.

In the Colorado papers of those days of territorial tutelage, there appeared repeatedly most impatient protests against these humiliating conditions of citizenship. With the attainment of statehood in 1876 there came to the men of Colorado a restoration of their full rights as citizens of the Republic. According to the proscriptive usage, the humiliating conditions of citizenship without the ballot, remained to the women of the Centennial State; and those of their reënfranchised brothers who had felt most keenly their own unaccustomed restrictions, were without doubt the foremost advocates of the movement to secure the full recognition of women's rights.

The majority of the territorial legislative assembly of 1870 was unexpectedly Democratic, and almost as unexpected was the favor promptly shown by the Democratic members to the passage of the bill proposing woman suffrage. The measure was indeed characterized by the opposing Republicans, as "the great Democratic reform," and for weeks seemed destined to triumph through Democratic votes, in spite of the frivolous and serious opposition of the Republican minority, and the few Democratic members who deserted what then seemed the party policy upon this question. The pleas urged in advocacy of the new movement, as well as the protests urged against it, were substantially the same as were used in the East at that stage of the question. Accompanying them were the extravagancies of hope and fear incident to the early consideration of every suggested change in a long-accepted social order. An impossible Utopia was promised on the one hand no less confidently than was predicted upon the other a dire iconoclasm of the sacred shrine of long-adored ideals, as a consequence of simply granting to intelligent women a privilege justly their due. Both the derision and the adverse reasoning of the alarmists were well met by fearless friends, in Council and House. Bills looking to the removal of woman's disabilities were referred in each to a select committee for consideration, on January 19. The majority report to the House through the chairman of its special committee, M. DeFrance, was an able advocacy of the measure under consideration, while the adverse recommendation of the Council committee was accompanied by an excellent report by Hon. Amos Steck, setting forth clearly the reasons of the minority for their favorable views. After hearing the reports, both Houses went into committee of the whole for a free discussion upon the question.

"The criterion of civilization, physical force," "Strength as the measure of right,"--as recent writers have defined the divine right of might--seemed the basis of reasoning with those who claimed that woman should not be given the ballot because she might not carry the sword. Dark pictures were drawn of possible women as electors plunging their country into wars, from whose consequences they would themselves suffer nothing. By the more hopeful it was urged that the mighty heart, the moral force of humanity, as represented in womanhood, and united with clear womanly intelligence, would prove a greater power in all State interests than sword or bayonet.

The strongest speaker in the legislature upon the subject of suffrage--President Hinsdale of the Council--was, unfortunately, a bitter enemy of the proposed reform. Yet some of his most forcible utterances made in committee of the whole, were excellent arguments in favor of, rather than against the measure. Excellent arguments in favor of the bill in question were made by leading members of the House--Messrs. Lea, Shepard and DeFrance. By invitation of the legislature, that body was addressed by a prominent member of the Denver bar, Mr. Willard Teller, the brother of one of our U. S. senators. The hall was filled by an interested audience to hear Mr. Teller's address, which was a strong presentation of the principles upon which rest the claims of American citizens to universal suffrage.

Outside the assembly halls, Governor McCook and his beautiful, accomplished, and gracefully aggressive wife, strongly favored the affirmative of the question at issue, while Willard Teller, D. M. Richards and other distinguished men and women of the territory were active friends during the contest. In the press, the measure had a most influential support in the Daily Colorado Tribune, a well-conducted Denver journal, edited by Mr. R. W. Woodbury. Space in its columns was given to well-written articles by contributors interested in the success of the cause, and many able editorials appeared, embodying strong arguments in favor of the reform, or answering the opposing bitterness and frivolity of its contemporary the Rocky Mountain News. The interest in the proposed innovation was indeed quite general throughout the territory, but wherever the subject was discussed, in the legislative halls, in private conversation, editorial column, or correspondence of the press, the grounds argumentatively traversed were the same highways and byways of reason and absurdity which have been so often since gone over.

There was perhaps one lion in the way of establishing universal suffrage in the West, which the eastern advocates did not fear. It was said that our intelligent women could not be allowed to vote, whatever the principles upon which the right might be claimed, because in that case, the poor, degraded Chinese women who might reach our shores, would also be admitted to the voting list, and what then would become of our proud, Caucasian civilization? Whether it was the thought of the poor Mongolian slave at the polls, or some other equally terrifying vision of a yearly visit of American women to the centre of some voting precinct, the majority of the Colorado legislative assembly of 1870, in spite of all the free discussion of the campaign of that year, decided adversely. In the latter days of the session, the bill having taken the form of a proposition to submit the question at issue to the already qualified voters of the territory, was lost in the council chamber by a majority of one, and in the House by a two-thirds majority, leaving to the defeated friends of the reform as their only reward, a consciousness of strength gained in the contest.

A few years more made Denver a city beautiful for habitation, made Colorado a garden, filled that goodly land with capable men, and intelligent, spirited women. Statehood had been talked of, but lost, and then men began to say: "The one hundredth birthday of our American independence is so near, let us make this a centennial State; let the entrance into the Union be announced by the same bells that shall ring in our national anniversary." And so it was decreed. Mindful of 1776--mindful too, of the second declaration made by the women at the first equal rights convention in 1848, the friends of equality in Colorado determined to gird themselves for a supreme effort in anticipation of the constitution that was to be framed for the new State to be.

A notice was published asking all persons favorable to suffrage for women, to convene in Denver, January 10, to take measures to secure the recognition of woman's equality under the pending constitution. In pursuance to this call, a large and eager audience filled Unity Church long before the hour appointed for the meeting. A number of the orthodox clergy were present. The Rev. Mrs. Wilkes of Colorado Springs, opened the exercises with prayer. Mrs. Margaret W. Campbell of Massachusetts was then introduced, and said: "This convention was called to present woman's claims to the ballot, from her own stand-point, and to take such measures to secure the recognition of her equality in the constitution of Colorado, as the friends gathered from different parts of the territory may think proper. We do not ask that women shall take the places of men, or usurp authority over them; we only ask that the principles upon which our government is founded shall be applied to women.

Rev. Mrs. Wilkes made an especial point of the fact that in Colorado Springs women owned one-third of the taxable property, and yet were obliged (at the recent spring election) to see the bonds for furnishing a supply of pure water, voted down because women had no voice in the matter. This had been a serious mistake, as the physicians of the place had pronounced the present supply impure and unwholesome. She referred to the fears of many that the constitution, freighted with woman suffrage, might sink, when it would else be buoyant, and begged her hearers not to fear such a burden would endanger it. The convention continued through two days with enthusiastic speeches from Mr. D. M. Richards and Rev. Mr. Wright, who preferred to be introduced as the nephew of Dr. Harriot K. Hunt of Boston. Letters were read from Lucy Stone and Judge Kingman, and an extract from the message of Governor Thayer of Wyoming, in which he declared the results of woman suffrage in that territory to have been beneficial and its influence favorable to the best interests of the community. A territorial society was formed with an efficient board of officers; resolutions, duly discussed, were adopted, and the meeting closed with a carefully-prepared address by Dr. Avery, the newly-elected president of the territorial association.

The committee appointed to wait upon the constitutional convention were received courteously by that body, and listened to with respectful attention. One would have thought the gentlemen to whom the arguments and appeals of such women were addressed would have found it in their hearts to make some reply, even while disclaiming the official character of their act; but they preserved a decorous and non-committal, if not incurious silence, and the ladies withdrew. The press said, the morning after their visit: "The gentlemen were all interested and amused by the errand of the ladies." The morning following, the constitutional convention was memorialized by the Suffrage Association of Missouri, and was also presented with a petition signed by a thousand citizens of Colorado, asking that in the new constitution no distinction be made on account of sex. This was only the beginning. Petitions came in afterwards, numerously signed, and were intended to have the force of a sort of ante-election vote.

Denver presented an interesting social aspect at this time. It was as if the precursive tremor of a moral earthquake had been felt, and people, only half awake, did not know whether to seek safety in the house, or outside of it. Women especially were perplexed and inquiring, and it was observed that those in favor of asking a recognition of their rights in the new State, were the intelligent and leading ladies of the city. The wives of ministers, of congressmen, of judges, the prominent members of Shakespeare clubs, reading circles, the directors of charitable institutions,--these were the ones who first ranged themselves on the side of equal rights, clearly proving that the man was right who pointed out the danger of allowing women to learn the alphabet.

When February 15 came, it was a momentous day for Colorado. The report of the Committee on Suffrage and Elections was to come up for final action. As a matter of fact there were two reports; that of the minority was signed by two members of the committee, Judge Bromwell, whose breadth and scholarship were apparent in his able report, and a Mexican named Agapita Vigil, a legislator from Southern Colorado where Spanish is the dominant tongue. Mr. Vigil spoke no English, and was one of those representatives for whose sake an interpreter was maintained during the session of the convention.

Ladies were present in large numbers. Some of the gentlemen celebrated the occasion by an unusual spruceness of attire, and others by being sober enough to attend to business. The report with three-fifths of the signatures, after setting forth that the subject had had careful consideration, went on to state the qualifications of voters, namely, that all should be male citizens, with one exception, and that was, that women might vote for school district officers.

Mr. A. K. Yount of Boulder, spoke in favor of the motion to strike out the word "male" in section 1: "That every male person over the age of 21 years, possessing the necessary qualifications, shall be entitled to vote," etc. He called attention to the large number of petitions which had been sent in, asking for this, and to the fact that not a single remonstrance had been received. He believed the essential principles of human freedom were involved in this demand, and he insisted that justice required that women should help to make the laws by which they are governed. The amendment was lost by a vote of 24 to 8.

Mr. Storm offered an amendment that women be permitted to vote for, and hold the office of, county superintendent of schools. This also was lost. The only other section of the report which had any present interest to women, was the one reading: