n opposition to the general sentiment of the
convention, which was mainly Republican. Miss Anna Dickinson,
having a lyceum engagement in Chicago, was present at one of the
sessions, and had quite a spirited encounter with Robert Laird
Collier. As she appeared on the platform at the close of some
remarks by that gentleman, loud calls were made for her, when she
came forward and spoke as follows:

MRS. PRESIDENT, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: It is impossible for
me to continue in my seat after so kind and cordial a call
from this house, and I thank you for the pleasant and
friendly feeling you have shown. I have but a word to say. I
had gone out of the room, not because of the discussion, but
because it was too warm and the atmosphere so stifling, when
I was recalled by hearing something to this effect: "That
there had not been a single logical argument used on this
platform in behalf of woman suffrage; that woman is
abundantly represented by some man of her family; that when
a woman lifts herself up in opposition against her husband,
she lifts herself up, if I properly and rightly understood
the declaration, against God; that the inspired assertion is
that the husband is the head of the wife." Oh! but Mr.
Collier forgot to say the husband is the head of the wife as
Christ is the head of the church. In my observation, and it
has not been a limited one, though I confess I am not an
unprejudiced observer, I have never yet discovered a man who
is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church.
Furthermore, he announces that these women, being
represented by men, if they lift themselves up in opposition
to their husbands, lose that womanly and feminine element
which is so admirable and pure and beautiful, and nothing
can preserve them from the contamination of politics. Woman
is to lift herself against God if she lifts herself against
her husband, and woman is abundantly represented by this
same husband, or by some man in her own family. There are a
multitude of women who have no husbands [laughter]. There
are a multitude of women who never will have any husbands
[renewed laughter]. There are a grea