Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 4.djvu/854

 umns to suffrage articles. Mrs. Chapman Catt and Miss Mary G. Hay, national organizer, were present, and the former gave an address to a large and sympathetic assemblage. She was likewise greeted with good audiences at seven other towns, among them Jackson, the capital, where she spoke in the House of Representatives. A work conference was held at Flora in September of this year.

The W. S. A. has not attempted any legislative work, other than the one effort made in 1900 to secure a bill providing for a woman physician at the State Hospital for the Insane. This was introduced and championed in the Senate by R. B. Campbell (to whom the association is also indebted for the compilation of a valuable pamphlet on The Legal Status of Mississippi Women). It passed that body almost unanimously, but did not reach the House.

The measure which provided for the State Industrial Institute and College for Women (white) was the conception of Mrs. Annie Coleman Peyton, the bill itself being framed by her brother, Judge S. R. Coleman, a legislator and a leading attorney. It was sent to the Legislature as early as 1877, but was not at that time even considered. Mrs. Peyton continued her agitation in its behalf and succeeded in having it introduced in 1880 and in 1882, but it was twice defeated. By the time the Legislature convened in 1884, however, its author had enlisted the sympathy of so many of the prominent men and women of the State that the bill was passed at that session. Wiley P. Nash and Mac C. Martin were its earnest champions on the floor of the House; while Col. J. L. Power, the present Secretary of State, Major Jonas, of the Aberdeen Examiner, and Mrs. Olive A. Hastings were among the ablest coadjutors of Mrs. Peyton.

In 1900 the suffrage association petitioned Gov. A. H. Longino to appoint one woman on the board of this institution, which is wholly for women, but he refused on the ground that it would be unconstitutional.

In 1880 the Legislature abrogated the Common Law as to its provisions for wives, being a pioneer among the Southern States to take such action. It declared:

The Legislature shall never create any distinction between the