Report of the International Council of Women (see also inscribed copy).
THE RECORD OF A HISTORIC MEETING
[Meetings]. National Woman Suffrage Association. Report of the International Council of Women, assembled by the National Woman Suffrage Association, Washington, D.C., U.S. of America, March 25 to April 1, 1888... Washington, D.C.: National Woman Suffrage Association, 1888.
Tall, thick 8vo; frontispiece illustration of Lucretia Mott, edges foxed, original tissue guard present; preliminaries and some pages a tad yellowed; most edges foxed and soiled; library sticker on front endpaper; stray pencil notes on rear blanks; red cloth, stamped in gilt; a used copy: covers and spine soiled, rubbed, hinges tender.
First edition; a massive (471) and detailed record of the proceedings of the 1888 meeting of the International Council of Women, convened by the National Woman Suffrage Association in celebration of the fortieth anniversary of the first Seneca Falls convention. Includes reports and speeches by nearly every living suffragist figure, including Anna Shaw, Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Julia Ward Howe, Lucy Stone, Antoinette Blackwell, etc. (Also includes addresses by such illustrious allies as Frederick Douglass and Henry Blackwell.)
In addition to its weighty (in all senses) content, this volume is especially significant because of its context. From 1866 on the suffrage movement was split apart by bitter disagreements over whether black or woman suffrage should take priority. In 1869 the premiere suffragist organization, the American Equal Rights Association, folded and two new groups emerged: the National Woman Suffrage Association (led by Stanton and Anthony) and the American Woman Suffrage Association (led by Lucy Stone and her husband Henry Blackwell). These groups represented the two polar factions in the ongoing “who’s first” debate, with the latter being friendlier to a broader vision of voting rights than the former.
The 1888 meeting was called in an attempt to unify the two groups, and, as this volume demonstrates, representatives of each addressed the convention. The effort was successful: just two years later, in 1890, the two groups merged into the newly formed National American Woman Suffrage Association, with Stanton the president and Stone chair of the executive committee.
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