Selected Writings of Victoria Woodhull: Suffrage, Free Love, and Eugenics

Chapter Eight: Correspondence between the Victoria League and Victoria C. Woodhull: The First Candidate for the Next Presidency

ChapterEight Correspondence between the Victoria League and Victoria C. Woodhull The First Candidate for the Next Presidency The precise origins and membership of the Victoria League remain mysterious; Lois Beachy Underhill claims Woodhull actually wrote the July 4 letter that is attributed to her supporters (The Woman Who Ran for President, 164). Whatever its origins, the Victoria League soon evolved into the Equal Rights Party. the letter of nomination New York, July 4, 1871 Mrs. Victoria C. Woodhull: Madam—Anumberofyourfellow-citizens,bothmenandwomen, haveformedthemselvesintoaworkingcommittee,borrowingitstitle from your name, and calling itself the Victoria League. Ourobjectistoformanewnationalpoliticalorganization,composed oftheprogressiveelementsintheexistingRepublicanandDemocratic parties, together with the Women of the Republic, who have been hitherto disfranchised, but to whom the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments of the Constitution, properly interpreted, guarantee, equally with men, the right of suffrage. This new political organization will be called the Equal Rights Party, and its platform will consist solely and only of a declaration of | 41 correspondence between league and woodhull the equal civil and political rights of all American citizens, without distinction of sex. We shall ask Congress at its next session to pass an act, founded on this interpretation of the Constitution, protecting women in the immediate exercise of the elective franchise in all parts of the United States,subjectonlytothesamerestrictionsandregulationswhichare imposed by local laws on other classes of citizens. Weshallurgeallwomenwhopossessthepoliticalqualificationsof other citizens, in the respective States in which they reside, to assume and exercise the right of suffrage without further hesitation or delay. We ask you to become the standard-bearer of this idea before the people and for this purpose nominate you as our candidate for President of the United States, to be voted for in 1872 by the combined suffrages of both sexes. If our plans merit your approval, and our nomination meet your acceptance, we trust that you will take occasion in your reply to this letter, to express your views in full concerning the political rights of women under the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments. Offering to you, Madam, the assurance of our great esteem, and harboring in our minds the cheerful prescience of victory which your name inspires, we remain, Cordially yours, The Victoria League the letter of acceptance New York, July 20, 1871 Fellows Citizens of the Victoria League: I beg you not to regard my delay in replying to your flattering invitation to become the candidate of the Equal Rights party for the Presidency as evincing indifference onmy part.The delay has, in fact, beenoccasionedbyjusttheoppositecause;thestateofmingledemotion , anxiety and reflection into which the serious proposition from a responsiblesourcethatIshouldacceptsuchanominationhasthrown 42 | correspondence between league and woodhull me. It is true that I have, now nearly a year ago, announced myself as a candidate for the high office in question, but that was rather for the merepurposeofliftingabanner,ofprovokingagitationandforgiving emphasistoanopinion,andarallyingpointforthegreatunorganized party of progress. Butthecaseisnowdifferent.Thingshaveprogressedtoanastonishing degree during this year past. I may have been qualified to raise an excitement, to inaugurate a definite movement, to seize an outpost, andeven,perhaps,toprojectaprogramme.ButdoesitfollowthatIam theproperpersontobecomethepermanent“standardbearer,”asyou phrase it, of a great political party, and actually to guide the State. Littleasthepublicthinkit,awomanwhoisnownominatedmaybe electednextyear.Lesschangeofopinionthanhasoccurredalready,in the same direction, will place her in the White House. The American people are generous and noble, and when their hearts are touched theyaresusceptibleofagrandenthusiasm.Theyarealso—the menof the nation I mean now—capable of a gallantry toward my sex, which wouldrivalthedevotionoftheageofchivalry.Theyarealsoessentially just; and when the thought shall really come home to them, with the cogency of conviction, that they have,throughthoughtlessness,been all along acting unjustly to their mothersandwivesanddaughters,by depriving them of political rights, itmay happen that there will come up a great swelling-tide of reactionary sentiment which will make a sudden revolution. IfeelthatIknowthatjusttherightwomantotouchtherightchord of the public sympathy and confidence—if the right woman could be found—wouldarousesuchatempestofpopularityasthecountryhas neverseen,andasaconsequenceshouldridetriumphantlyonthetide of a joyous popular tumult to the supreme political position. Just at this moment, also, the two great political parties of the past are positively without any issue. General Washington’s popularity extinguished for the moment all partizan opposition, and made of the whole nation one grand fraternizing party. The advent of the first woman to the Presidential chair may be the occasion of the next great national fraternization—of the jubilee of the whole people; and this | 43 correspondence between league and woodhull grand event may be, and, to say more, to my prophetic vision, is, at this very moment, actually impending. Itispossible,therefore,thatifIamyourcandidate,Imaybeelected. Andthequestionrecurs,amIthewoman,amongallthenoblewomen...