Anthony honorary president, which was done with applause and she
observed informally: "You have moved me up higher. I always did stand
by Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and my name always was after hers, and I am
glad to be there again."

The press notices said of the new officer:

Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, the newly-elected president of the
National Suffrage Association, is a young and handsome woman with
a charming personality, and is one of the most eloquent and
logical speakers upon the public platform. For the past five
years she has been lecturer and organizer for the association,
where she has shown rare executive ability and earnestness of
purpose.

She has traveled from east to west and from north to south many
times, lectured in nearly every city in the Union and has been
associated with every important victory that equal suffrage has
won of late years. She was in Colorado during the amendment
campaign, and the women attribute their success to her more than
to any other person from outside the State. She was in Idaho,
where all four political parties put suffrage planks into their
platforms and the amendment carried. She went before the
Louisiana constitutional convention, by the earnest invitation of
New Orleans women, and it gave tax-paying women the right to vote
upon all questions submitted to the tax-payers.

It had been known for several years that Mrs. Chapman Catt was Miss
Anthony's choice as her successor; she was considered the
best-equipped woman in the association for the position, and the vote
of the delegates showed how nearly unanimous was her election. The
Rev. Anna Howard Shaw, who for a number of years had been
vice-president-at-large, could have had Miss Anthony's sanction and
the unanimous vote of the convention if she would have consented to
accept the office.

Mrs. Chapman Catt opened the next day's meeting by saying:

A surprise was promised as part of this afternoon's program and a
pleasant duty now falls to me. It is to present Miss Anthony with
the spirit of a gift, for the gift itself is not here. Suffrage
people from all over the world go to see Miss Anthony at her home
in Rochester, N. Y., and consequently the carpets of the parlor
and sitting-room are getting a little worn. When she goes home
she will find two beautiful Smyrna rugs fitting the floors of