at women
representing the best intellect and the highest morality of our
country, should come here in their grand old age and ask men for
that which is theirs by right. Is it not time that this
aristocracy of sex should be overthrown? Several of the senators
were so moved by the speeches that they personally expressed
their thanks, and one who has long been friendly, said the
speeches were far above the average committee-hearings on any
subject. We might well have replied that the reason is because
all the speakers feel what they say and know that the question is
one of vital importance.

In securing these hearings before this special committee of the
Senate the friends feel they have reached a milestone in the
progress of their reform. To secure the attention for four hours
of seven representative men of the United States, must have more
effect than would a hundred times that amount of time and labor
expended upon their constituents. If one of these senators, for
instance, should become convinced of the justice of woman's claim
to the ballot, his constituency would begin to look upon that
question with respect, whereas it would take years to bring that
same constituency up to the position where they could elect such
a representative. To convince the representatives is to sound the
keynote, and it is for this reason that these hearings before the
Senate committee are of such paramount importance to the suffrage
cause.

At the close of the hearing Mrs. Robinson presented each member
of the committee with her little volume, "Massachusetts in the
Woman Suffrage Movement."

January 23 the House Committee on Rules[87] gave a hearing to Mrs.
Jane Graham Jones of Chicago, Mrs. May Wright Sewall and Miss
Anthony. During this congress the question of admitting the
territory of Dakota as a State was discussed in the Senate. Our
committee stood ready to oppose it unless the word "male" were
stricken from the proposed constitution.

Immediately after this most of the speakers went[88] to
Philadelphia where Rachel Foster had made arrangements for a
two-days convention. Rev. Charles G. Ames gave the address of
welcome.

He told of his conversion to woman suffrage from the time when he
believed women and men were ordained to be unequal, just as in
nature the mountain is different