Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 3.djvu/870

 

 St. Anna's Asylum, Managed by Women — Constitutional Convention, 1879 —  Women Petition —  Clara Merrick Guthrie —  Petition Referred to Committee on Suffrage —  A Hearing Granted —  Mrs. Keating  — Mrs. Saxon —  Mrs. Merrick —  Col. John M. Sandige —  Efforts of the Women all in Vain —  Action in 1885 —  Gov. McEnery  — The Daily Picayune —  Women as Members of the School-Board — Physiology in the Schools — Miss Eliza Rudolph — Mrs. E. J. Nicholson — Judge Merrick's Digest of Laws — Texas — Arkansas — Mississippi — Sarah A. Dorsey.

has furnished the following interesting facts from her native State, for which we feel ourselves deeply indebted: Like the children of one family the States have a common resemblance, but they are various in character as in geographical outline. In Louisiana the Anglo-American finds himself side-by-side with inhabitants of French or Spanish descent, and in many of the country parishes the African freedmen outnumber all the rest. St. Anna's Asylum in New Orleans is controlled and managed by a board of directors composed entirely of women. Among the inmates in 1878 was a German woman who had resided in the institution for many years. Finding herself in ill-health and fearing the approach of the end, she confided to the ladies of the board that she had a thousand dollars in bank which she wished to bequeath to the home where she had been provided for and sheltered so long. At her earnest request a will was drawn up in accordance with her wishes, and signed by members of the board who were present as witnesses. Shortly after, the woman died and her will was submitted to the proper authority for admission to probate. When the ladies were duly informed that the will was null and void, they naturally asked why, and were told that under Louisiana law women were not lawful witnesses to a will. Had they only called in the old darkey wood-sawyer, doing a day's work in the asylum yard, and had him affix his mark to the paper, the money would have accrued to the asylum; as it was, it went to the State. Early in 1879, when a convention to make a new State constitution, in_put, out_put), in_put, out_put)