,
with one semi-annual conference at Saco. Miss Susan B. Anthony,
president of the National Association, was present at the first of
these and afterwards addressed a public meeting in Portland.

In addition to these conventions, in May, 1900, a series of public
meetings in the interest of further organization was held at Old
Orchard, Saco, Waterville, Hampden, Winthrop, Monmouth, Cornish and
Portland, arranged by the president and addressed by Miss Diana
Hirschler, a practicing lawyer of Boston.

The second week of August, 1900, was celebrated in Maine as "Old Home
Week," and from the 7th to the 11th the State association kept "open
house" in Portland to old and new friends alike. The register shows a
record of 232 names, with fourteen States represented, from California
to Maine.

On August 24, the association again made a new departure by holding a
Suffrage Day at Ocean Park, Old Orchard, this being the first time
Maine suffragists had appeared on the regular platform of any summer
assembly in the State. The national president, Mrs. Carrie Chapman
Catt, was in attendance and the day was a memorable one.

Since 1898 the press department has taken on new life under the
management of Mrs. Sarah G. Crosby, and has grown from a circulation
of six to eighty newspapers containing suffrage matter.

New clubs have been formed at Old Orchard and Skowhegan. A regular
system of bi-monthly meetings of the executive committee has been
instituted, the business there transacted being reported to the
various clubs, thus keeping the mother in touch with her
children.[297]

LEGISLATIVE ACTION AND LAWS: There have been several hearings before
legislative committees in the interest of a reformatory prison for
women, together with repeated petitions for a matron of the State
prison, so far with negative results.

In all changes of laws in favor of women much work has been done by
themselves. They have been instrumental also in securing the passage
of laws against obscene literature, cigarettes and immoral kinetoscope
exhibitions. They have opposed and prevented the appointment of a
conspicuously immoral man as Judge; have prevented the pardon of
notoriously vile women in some marked cases, and have secured police
matrons in several of the large cities, also matrons of almshouses.

In 1887 a petition was presented to the Legislature asking for a
constitutional amendment in favor of woman suffrage. "The significant
vote" was upon