One hundred and ninety years ago, a great woman from Adams was born, and now her birthplace has been made into a museum. Susan B. Anthony, tireless advocate for the right of women to vote, was born Feb. 15, 1820. Probably most people, even in her hometown, are unaware of just what a remarkable woman she was. A visit to the new Susan B. Anthony Birthplace Museum will help introduce you to her life and work.
Susan B. Anthony's early political work involved the temperance movement. Women whose husbands were habitual drunkards had virtually no options to escape from abuse because divorce laws decreed that the father would get custody of the children and all the property, even that which had belonged to the woman prior to marriage. Anthony quickly realized the difficulty in changing laws regarding temperance, marriage, divorce and child custody, and that women would never be able to change their lot in life without first getting the right to vote. Thus began her life's work: suffrage for women.
She worked to end slavery, which she saw as degrading not only to the slave, but also to the slave holder and the free laborer. She saw in it a parallel with women and their children being property of their husbands. In fact, the work of Susan's life had one common theme: "I have known nothing the last 30 years save the struggle for human rights," she said in 1883.
Susan was certainly the epitome of political incorrectness in her day and thus became the target of unfair
Rather than be deterred, Elizabeth Cady Stanton reminded Anthony, "We should be thankful, Susan, for the ridicule and abuse on which we have been fed."
In its exhibits of her life, the Susan B. Anthony Birthplace Museum is striving to present a full account, without censorship. There are exhibits on the house restoration, Quaker life, Susan's childhood, her father's store, a timeline of Susan's life, temperance, abolition, opposition to "Restellism" (Madame Restelle was the notorious abortionist of that era), suffrage and anti-suffrage -- and finally winning the vote with "The Susan B. Anthony Amendment," also known as the 19th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.
The fact that the birthplace was purchased and restored by a pro-life feminist, who intends to present early suffragists' ideas about abortion, without censorship, seems to offend some pro-choice feminists today. Some claim that it's unfair to say she opposed abortion and say that she would be on the pro-choice side today. However, the museum is presenting historical evidence, not editorializing on what anyone's position would be today. The birthplace has one of the largest collections of The Revolution, the newspaper founded by and belonging to Susan, and quotes by suffrage leaders from this newspaper are used in the opposition-to-abortion exhibit.
In the entire 125 issues of her newspaper, there were 121 articles, letters and editorials commenting on abortion, most of them directly critical. None of them can be construed as positive. Unlike other newspaper publishers of her day, it was Anthony's policy to refuse ads for medicines or practices that induced abortion.
The historical revisionism and censorship attempted by some today is selectively applied. For example, slavery today is universally condemned. But our slave-holding founding fathers do not get a "pass" from public historians today. Likewise, a person's position on the abortion issue today should not lead one to ignore, censor or revise historical facts.
Some say today's theories of overpopulation and individualism, and her struggle against 19th-century conservatives, would make her favor abortion rights today. Others say her opposition to one group of people owning another group, like slaves and women being owned by or at the mercy of a more dominant group, would lead her to oppose unborn children from also being owned as property, to be disposed of through abortion. The exhibit allows everyone to draw his/her own conclusions.
As for the residents of Adams, let us finally celebrate the restoration of the home of the most notable woman in American history. In July of 1897, the Anthony family held a reunion in Adams. Carrie Chapman Catt, who attended with other suffragists, said this:
"There is no citizen of this great nation who would not be delighted with the privilege of visiting these Berkshire hills, famed for their beauty, but it is not because of this that most of us have made this pilgrimage to Adams ... We have come to Adams because it is the birthplace of the greatest woman of our time. She perceived a great truth and the world did not agree with her. It reviled her for the belief she has propounded, but in this century she never renounced that belief, but thundered back ... that the time will come when women shall be free ... when they shall have every right, every privilege, every liberty which any man enjoys. We today are making the first pilgrimage to the birthplace of Susan B. Anthony, but I prophesy that in another quarter of a century there will be many pilgrimages hither, and no child will be so illiterate as not to know that in this county it was the greatest of American women was born."
She was only about 100 years off, but let us hope Mrs. Catt's prediction of pilgrimages to the birthplace comes true.
Robin J. Loughman of Adams is a volunteer with the Susan B. Anthony Birthplace Museum. The museum will be open for a "sneak preview" the week of Feb. 15, with an official opening in May.
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