Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 3.djvu/666

666 tinued to do most efficient service to the present. During the summer of 1879, Mrs. Minor refused to pay the tax assessed against her:

, Mo., August 26, 1879.

Hon., President Board of Assessors: I honestly believe and conscientiously make oath that I have not one dollars' worth of property subject to taxation. The principle upon which this government rests is representation before taxation. My property is denied representation, and therefore can not be taxable. The law which you quote as applicable to me in your notice to make my tax return is in direct conflict with section 30 of the bill of rights of the constitution of the State which declares, "No person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property, without due process of law," And that surely cannot be due process of law wherein one of the parties only is law-maker, judge, jury and executioner, and the other stands silenced, denied the power either of assent or dissent, a condition of "involuntary slavery" so clearly prohibited in section 31 of the same article, as well as in the Constitution of the United States, that no legislation or judicial prejudice can ignore it. I trust you will believe it is from no disrespect to you that I continue to refuse to become a party to this injustice by making a return of property to your honorable body, as clearly the duties of a citizen can only be exacted where rights and privileges are equally accorded.

Respectfully,

Again, in February, 1881, Mrs. Minor made an able argument before the legislative committee on constitutional amendments in support of the petition for the enfranchisement of the women of the State. Her pivotal point was, "By whatever tenure you, as one-half of the people, hold it, we, the other half, claim it by the same." And again in December of the same year at a meeting of the Knights and Ladies of the Father Matthew Debating Club, at which the subject was, "Is the woman's rights movement to be encouraged?" Patrick Long, Daniel O'Connel Tracy, Richard D. Kerwen, spoke in the affirmative; several gentlemen and two ladies in opposition, when Mrs. Minor, who was in the audience, was called out amid great applause, to which she responded in an able speech, showing that the best temperance weapon in the hands of woman is the ballot.

Of the initial steps taken for the elevation of women in the little village of Oregon, Mrs. Annie R. Irvine writes:

The Woman's Union, an independent literary club, designed to improve the mental, moral, and physical condition of women, held its first meeting in Oregon, Holt county, on the evening of January 6, 1872, at the residence of Dr. Asher Goslin. Temporary officers were elected, and a committee appointed to prepare by-laws for the government of the club. Six ladies were present. The succeeding meetings grew in interest, and took strong hold upon the minds of all classes, from the fact that hitherto no outlet had been found for the energies of our women outside the circle of home and church. During the first two years of its existence, the Woman's Union had to bear in a small way, many of the sneers and taunts attending more pretentious organizations, but luckily, when the novelty wore off, we were allowed to pursue the quiet tenor of our way, with an occasional slur at the "strong-minded" tendency of