a conspicuous place there—the scissors that cut the immortal cartridges made by the women on that eventful day, and the ancient flag that the fingers of some of the mothers of the Revolution had made. Though the Concord women were not permitted to share the centennial honors, they were not deprived of the privilege of paying their part of the expenses incident to the occasion. To meet these, an increased tax-rate was assessed upon all the property owners in the town; and, since one-fifth of the town tax of Concord is paid by women, it will be seen what was their share in the great centennial celebration of 1876.
The knowledge of the proceedings at Concord added new zest to the spirit of the three conventions, and the events of the day were used by the speakers to point the moral of the woman's rights question. Lucy Stone made one of her most effective and eloquent speeches upon this subject. She said:
Fellow Citizen (I had almost said fellow subjects): What we need is that women should feel their mean position; when that happens, they will soon make an effort to get out of it. Everything is possible to him that wills. All that is needed for the success of the cause of woman suffrage is to have women know that they want to vote. Concord and Lexington got into a fight about the centennial, and Concord voted $10,000 for the celebration in order to eclipse Lexington. One-fifth of the tax of Concord is paid by the women, yet not one of these women dared to go to the town hall and cast her vote upon that subject. This is exactly the same thing which took place one hundred years ago—taxation without representation, against which the men of Concord then rebelled. If I were an inhabitant of Concord, I would let my house be sold over my head and my clothes off my back and be hanged by the neck before I would pay a cent of it! Men of Melrose, Concord and Malden, why persecute us? Would you like to be a slave? Would you like to be disfranchised? Would you like to be bound to respect the laws which you cannot make? There are 15,000,000 of women whom the government denies legal rights.
It might be supposed that a spot upon which the battle for freedom and independence was first begun would always be the vantage ground of questions relating to personal liberty. But such is not the fact. Concord was never an anti-slavery town, though some of its best citizens took active part in all the abolition movements. When the time came that women were allowed to vote for school committees, the same intolerant spirit which ignored and shut them out of the centennial celebration was again manifested toward them—not only by the leading magnates, but also by the petty officials of the town. Some of them have from
