ed by
the Governor and Miss Maddox was admitted to the bar.

CHAPTER XLV.

MASSACHUSETTS.[303]

The first suffrage convention ever held which assumed a national
character by inviting representatives from other States took place in
Worcester, Mass., Oct. 23, 24, 1850.[304]

The New England Woman Suffrage Association was formed at Boston in
November, 1868, with Mrs. Julia Ward Howe as president; and the
Massachusetts Association was organized in the same city Jan. 28,
1870, of which also Mrs. Howe was elected president. In 1871 Henry B.
Blackwell, editor of the _Woman's Journal_, was made corresponding
secretary of both associations and has filled the office of the latter
continuously, of the former twenty-two years.

From those years until the present each of these bodies has held an
annual meeting in Boston and they have almost invariably been
addressed by men and women of State, of national and of international
reputation. They have met in various churches and halls, but of late
years the historic old Faneuil Hall has been selected. The State
association meets in the winter and the New England association during
Anniversary Week in May, when there are business sessions with reports
from the various States, public meetings and a great festival or
banquet. The last is attended by hundreds of people, all the tickets
are frequently sold weeks in advance, and with its prominent
after-dinner speakers it has long been an attractive feature.[305]

The annual meeting of 1884 was held January 22, 23, presided over by
William I. Bowditch, who had succeeded the Rev. Dr. James Freeman
Clarke as president in 1878. A number of fine addresses were given and
the official board was unanimously re-elected.[306] Mr. Bowditch's
opening address was afterwards widely circulated as a tract, The
Forgotten Woman in Massachusetts.

It was voted that a fund should be raised to organize local suffrage
associations or leagues throughout the State, and that, as soon as
$2,500 was in hand, an agent should be put in the field. Mr. Bowditch,
Miss Louisa M. Alcott, John L. Whiting and Henry H. Faxon each
subscribed $100 on the spot; $800 was raised at the meeting and more
than $2,500 within four months.

This year, in the death of Wendell Phillips, the cause of equal rights
lost one of its earliest and noblest supporters. On February 28 an
impressive memorial service was held in Boston. Mrs. Howe presided and
the other speakers were W