In 1890 the division of the American suffrage movement between Anthony and Stanton’s NWSA and Blackwell and Stone’s AWSA ended when Stone’s only daughter, Alice Stone Blackwell, successfully formed a new organization, the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA). As its name implied, this new organization was to be an equal merger of the two rival organizations. NAWSA’s first two presidents were the NWSA leaders Stanton (1890–1892) and Anthony (1892–1900). In practice, however, NAWSA reflected the views of the more conservative AWSA. For example, NAWSA quickly dropped other feminist issues, such as divorce reform, women’s property rights, and the legalization of prostitution, which the NWSA had pursued as part of a collection of women’s rights issues. Instead, NAWSA adopted AWSA’s approach of concentrating solely on women’s suffrage.

NAWSA also made the decision to stop holding its...