insist now, more and more, upon women being taken
into the Radical party. The Democracy acknowledge their right to
equality with negroes and Coolies and Comanches--not much of an
acknowledgment, by the way, but something in the way of progress, and
far ahead of the Radicals. The last number of _The Revolution_ is
irresistible in argument against the Negro Suffrage Radicals, who will
not give women equal rights with negroes.

CHAPTER XXII.

NATIONAL CONVENTIONS--1869.

First Convention in Washington--First hearing before
Congress--Delegates Invited from Every State--Senator Pomeroy, of
Kansas--Debate between Colored Men and Women--Grace Greenwood's
Graphic Description--What the Members of the Convention Saw and
Heard in Washington--Robert Purvis--A Western Trip--Conventions
in Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Louis, Springfield and
Madison--Editorial Correspondence in _The
Revolution_--Anniversaries in New York and Brooklyn--Conventions
in Newport and Saratoga.

In the Autumn of 1868 a call[111] was issued for the first Woman
Suffrage Convention ever held in Washington. It was a period of
intense excitement, as many important measures of reconstruction were
under consideration. The XIV Amendment was ratified, the XV was still
pending, and several bills were before Congress on the suffrage
question. Petitions and protests against all amendments to the
Constitution regulating suffrage on the basis of sex were being sent
in by thousands in charge of the Washington Association, of which
Josephine S. Griffing was President. A large number of persons from
every part of the Union were crowding into the Capital. Many
Southerners being present to whom the demand for woman suffrage was
new, the arguments were listened to with interest, while the tracts
and documents were eagerly purchased and distributed among their
friends at home. All these things combined to make this Convention
most enthusiastic and influential, not only in its immediate effect on
those present, but from the highly complimentary reports of the press
scattered over the nation. We find a brief summing up of the
Convention in letters to _The Revolution_.

EDITORIAL CORRESPONDENCE.

WASHINGTON, JANUARY 22, 1869.

DEAR REVOLUTION:--The first National Woman's Suffrage Convention
ever held in Washington, closed on Wednesday night. There were
representati