y afternoon she spoke at a temperance
meeting in this city, to a large audience that manifested every
evidence of approval although she advocated woman suffrage. These were
the first addresses on woman's enfranchisement given in the State.

No regularly constituted State suffrage convention ever has been held,
but at the close of the annual Woman's Christian Temperance Union
convention it is customary for the members of this body who favor the
ballot for woman to meet and elect the usual officers for that branch
of the work.

For fifteen years before her death in 1899, Mrs. Clara A. McDiarmid
was a leader, was president of the association and represented the
State at the national conventions. Dr. Ida J. Brooks is an earnest
worker, and valuable assistance has been given by Mrs. Fannie L. Chunn
and Mrs. Bernie Babcock.

In 1896 Mrs. Lida A. Meriwether of Tennessee gave twelve lectures
under the auspices of the National Association. Miss Frances A.
Griffin of Alabama also spoke here on this subject.

Not even this brief history of the suffrage movement would be complete
without a mention of the _Woman's Chronicle_, established in 1888 by
Catherine Campbell Cunningham, Mary Burt Brooks and Haryot Holt
Cahoon. Mrs. Brooks was principal of the Forest Grove School, and Miss
Cunningham a teacher in the public schools of Little Rock, but every
week for five years this bright, newsy paper appeared on time. It was
devoted to the general interests of women, with a strong advocacy of
their enfranchisement. During the General Assembly it was laid each
Saturday morning on the desk of every legislator. Charles E.
Cunningham encouraged and sustained his daughter in her work.

LEGISLATIVE ACTION AND LAWS: The only bill for woman suffrage was that
championed in the Senate by J. P. H. Russ, in 1891, "An act to give
white women the right to vote and hold office, and all other rights
the same as are accorded to male citizens." This unconstitutional
measure passed third reading, but it is not surprising that it
received only four affirmative votes; fourteen voted against it and
fourteen refrained from voting.

In 1895 the law recognizing insanity after marriage as a ground for
divorce was repealed.

This year a law was passed requiring the councils of all first-class
cities to elect a police matron to look after woman prisoners.

Dower exists but not curtesy, unless the wife dies intestate and there
has been issue born alive. If th