A leading feature was the address of the Hon. Frederick C. Howe of Cleveland, O., The City for the People. He reviewed the mismanagement and political corruption of the large cities, "controlled by great financial interests and yet filled with eager, energetic people, struggling to organize a good democratic movement of humanity focused on a democratic ideal." In voicing the hope for the future he said:
The Hon. Rudolph Blankenburg, Philadelphia's noted reformer, who was to speak on Municipal Regeneration, was detained at home and his wife, Mrs. Lucretia L. Blankenburg, president of the Pennsylvania Suffrage Association, told of the big campaign of the preceding autumn for better government in that city and the important part women had in it and said: '"The men claimed that the women helped them a great deal but when the day came for the jubilation after the election, not a woman was invited to sit on the platform or to take part in the jubilee, except in the audience. In one of our suburbs the successful people gave a banquet and they did condescend to invite the women who had helped them win the election to sit in the gallery after the banquet and hear the speeches.... We are to have an election very soon and when I left home to come to this convention our city party was holding meetings in churches and halls and parlors and the chairman of the committee chided me for deserting my 'home