...Competing associations formed. One, the National Woman Suffrage Assn., led by [Elizabeth Cady] Stanton and [Susan B.] Anthony, opposed ratification of the 15th Amendment because it included suffrage only for black men. A second, the American Woman Suffrage Assn., led by Stone and others, supported the 15th Amendment, as a "positive move toward universal suffrage." More than two decades passed before the two factions were reconciled into one organization with unified objectives — the National American Woman Suffrage Assn. — which ultimately became what we know now as the League of Women Voters. Once the 15th Amendment became law, the national momentum for women's suffrage stalled even as greater attention was focused on the issue, often in the form of opposition from luminaries such as Harvard President Charles William Eliot (ironic given that Harvard's president is now a woman). Stone's call to action never wavered, however, and she continued to find new allies, in part through the Woman's Journal. Reading about Stone's life is an illuminating experience. McMillen's is a well-told biography that does much to right the narrative of the history that Stone helped to shape. A remarkable woman in a remarkable time, her gaze was trained always on the future. When she died, Stone whispered to her daughter, "Make the world better." As we go to the polls in 2016 and vote, perhaps for the nation's first woman president, we would do well to remember Lucy Stone and all that she fought for.
Full review at http://www.latimes.com/books/la-ca-jc-sally-mcmillen-20150315-story.html
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