, Susan B.
Anthony, of _The Revolution_, Charlotte B. Wilbour of New York
city, and others. Every woman interested for her personal freedom
should attend this convention, and by her presence, influence and
money, aid the movement for the restoration of the rights of her
sex.

Mrs. ELIZABETH B. PHELPS,
_Vice-President for the State of New York_.
MATILDA JOSLYN GAGE, _Advisory Counsel_.

The opening session of the convention was held in the spacious
parlors of Congress Hall the audience composed chiefly of
fashionable ladies[201] from all parts of the country, who listened
with evident interest and purchased the tracts intended for
distribution. The remaining sessions were held in Hawthorn Hall,
Matilda Joslyn Gage presiding. A series of spirited resolutions was
adopted, also a plan of organization presented by Charlotte B.
Wilbour, for a State association.[202] Many able speakers[203] were
present. The formation of this society was the result of a very
general agitation in different localities on several vital
questions in the preceding year:

_First_--On taxation. Women being large property holders, had felt
the pressure during the war, especially of the tax on incomes, and
had resolved on resistance: Accordingly, large meetings[204] were
called at various points, in 1868. While women of wealth were
organizing to resist taxation, the working women[205] were uniting
to defend their earnings, and secure better wages. It seemed for a
few months as if they were in a chronic condition of rebellion. But
after many vain struggles for redress in the iron teeth of the law,
and equally vain appeals to have unjust laws amended, the women
learned the hopelessness of all efforts made by disfranchised
classes.

_Second_--On prostitution. For the first time in the history of the
government, a bill was presented in the New York legislature, in
1868, proposing to license prostitution. This showed the
degradation of woman's position as no other act of legislation
could have done, and although the editors of _The Revolution_ were
the only women who publicly opposed the bill (which they did both
before the committee of the legislature, and in their journal), yet
there was in the minds of many, a deep undercurrent of resistance
to the odious provisions of that bill. Horace Greeley, too, in his
editorials in the New York _Tribune_, denounced the proposition in
such unmeasured terms