ned efforts would
more effectually aid in relieving the oppression of our suffering
fellow-creatures. For this purpose a Committee was appointed to
draft a Constitution, and to propose such measures as would be
likely to promote the Abolition of Slavery, and to elevate the
people of color from their present degraded situation to the full
enjoyment of their rights, and to increased usefulness in
society.

At a meeting held 12th mo. 14th, the Committee appointed on the
9th submitted a form of Constitution, which was read and adopted.
After its adoption, the following persons signed their names:
Lucretia Mott, Esther Moore, Mary Ann Jackson, Margaretta Forten,
Sarah Louisa Forten, Grace Douglass, Mary Sleeper, Rebecca
Hitchins, Mary Clement, A. C. Eckstein, Mary Wood, Leah Fell,
Sidney Ann Lewis, Catherine McDermott, Susan M. Shaw, Lydia
White, Sarah McCrummell, Hetty Burr. The Society then proceeded
to the choice of officers for the ensuing year; when the
following persons were elected: Esther Moore, Presiding Officer;
Margaretta Forten, Recording Secretary; Lucretia Mott,
Corresponding Secretary; Anna Bunting, Treasurer; Lydia White,
Librarian.

The Annual Reports of the first two years of this Society are not
extant; but from its third, we learn that in each of those years
the Society memorialized Congress, praying for the abolition of
slavery in the District of Columbia and the Territories of the
United States. In the second year of its existence, it appointed
a Standing Committee for the purpose of visiting the schools for
colored children in this city, and aiding them in any practicable
way. In the third year it appointed a Committee "to make
arrangements for the establishment of a course of scientific
lectures, which our colored friends were particularly invited to
attend." The phraseology of this statement implies that white
persons were not to be excluded from these lectures, and
indicates a clear-sighted purpose, on the part of the Society, to
bear its testimony against distinctions founded on color. In this
year it published an Address to the Women of Pennsylvania,
calling their attention to the claims of the slave, and urging
them to sign petitions for his emancipation. Mrs. Elizabeth
Heyrick's well-known pamphlet, entitl