n established the first
newspaper in the Maryland colony one hundred and nineteen years
ago, doing the colony printing; and that Mary R. Goddard not only
published a paper, writing able editorials, but was also the first
postmaster after the revolution. And from the following item it
would seem that the first woman to claim her right to vote must be
credited to Maryland:

At the regular meeting of the Maryland Historical Society in
Baltimore, December, 1885, Hon. J. L. Thomas read a paper on
"Margaret Brent, the first woman in America to claim the right
to vote." She lived at St. Mary's city on the river of the same
name two hundred and forty years ago, and was related to Lord
Baltimore. She was the heir of Leonard Calvert, Lord Baltimore's
brother and agent, and as such she claimed not only control of
all rents, etc., of Lord Baltimore, but also the right to two
votes in the assembly as the representative of both Calvert and
Baltimore. The first claim the courts upheld, but the second was
rejected.

On March 20, 1872, Hon. Stevenson Archer made an exhaustive speech
on the floor of the House of Representatives, entitled, "Woman
Suffrage not to be tolerated, although advocated by the Republican
candidate for vice-presidency." The speech was against Senator
Wilson's bill to enfranchise the women of the territories. The
honorable representative from Maryland may have been moved to enter
his protest against woman's enfranchisement by the fact that the
women of his State had in convention assembled early in the same
month made a public demand for their political rights:

The Havre de Grace _Republican_ says that the convention of the
Maryland Equal Rights Association, held in Raine's Hall,
Baltimore, last week, was a grand success. Mrs. Lavina C.
Dundore, president of the association, presided over the
convention with dignity and grace. Many prominent and able
champions of the cause were present and delivered eloquent and
telling addresses in favor of woman's enfranchisement, which were
listened to with marked attention by the large audiences in
attendance. The friends of the cause in Maryland feel much
gratified at this exhibition of the rapidly increasing interest
in the movement.

Meetings had been held in Baltimore during the years of 1870-71,
and lectures given by Lucy Stone, Julia Ward Howe, Susan B.
Ant