History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III

This is history written by the people making it. Volume III covers 1876-1885, a crucial decade when the surviving pioneers of the suffrage movement realized an urgent truth: if they did not record their own story now, it would be lost forever. The book opens at the 1876 centennial of American independence, when the nation celebrated liberty while half its people remained voiceless in democracy. The National Woman Suffrage Association seized this moment of national self-examination to demand equality, and this volume captures every convention, protest, and legislative battle that followed. What makes this document extraordinary is its voice. Here are the actual recollections of Lucretia Mott, Clarina I.H. Nichols, and Ernestine Rose, preserved by their own hands alongside Stanton, Anthony, Gage, and Harper. These are not historians writing about the movement from a distance. These are the activists themselves, still in the fight, documenting the struggle as they wage it. The result is a primary source of tremendous immediacy and emotional power. It is a testament to what the authors called 'the most momentous reform that has yet been launched on the world' and an indispensable record of the women who launched it.