Francis Jackson Garrison, William Lloyd Garrison, 1805-1879; the story of his life told by his children: volume 2

[369] States, in which it was insinuated, rather than expressed, that¹ membership would be limited to gentlemen. Professor Adam and myself waited on the Committee, stating our surprise that, all having been requested to come early, no one had been invited to sit with the Committee, and protesting against their assumption of power to settle the terms of membership. They heard us very kindly about fifteen minutes. We were then, on the motion of J. Sturge, politely requested to retire and leave them to deliberate on what we had said.

In this state of things the Convention met, amid earnest requests to us on all sides to avoid outraging English feeling and bringing division into so noble a body. Reverend divines thought it [their] duty to intercede with us personally, and eminent abolitionists painted in glowing colors the ruin which impended. All persisted in giving an exclusively English character to the meeting, and interpreting the terms of their invitation by English usages; while we allowed this would be right had we come to an English meeting, but wholly refused to have a World's Convention measured by an English yardstick.

In speaking to his motion, Mr. Phillips said that several² ladies from Massachusetts had been refused admission to the Convention, and were naturally aggrieved. The call embraced the friends of abolition everywhere. The Massachusetts and American Societies had admitted women to an equal share in their deliberations. Their delegates had, under the call, a right to a place in the Convention. Cries of No, no! greeted this assertion. Professor Adam thereupon declared that if women had no right there he had none: his credentials were from the same persons and the same Society. George Stacey, an influential Quaker, explained that the system in England was uniform, in business matters, to exclude women unless announced as associated. Dr. John Bowring said the custom was more honored in the breach than in the observance: ‘What! American women coming to England as the representatives of the anti-slavery associations, not to be welcomed among them? What! are they not to be welcomed with honor, not to be put in the seats of dignity?’ He could not doubt the adoption of