Frances Watkins Harper

Frances Watkins Harper was born free in the slave state of Maryland in 1825. As a young woman, she became deeply involved in the abolitionist movement. She worked for the Underground Railroad, delivered antislavery speeches throughout the North, published abolitionist poetry, and contributed articles to abolitionist newspapers. She also wrote fiction. Her most noteworthy fictional work was Iola Leroy, a novel published in 1892. After the Civil War, Harper became involved in a number of reform movements, including the effort to secure equal political rights and economic opportunities for women. Harper delivered this speech on the role of African American women in post–Civil War American society to the Women's Congress in 1877. It was later published as "Coloured Women in America" in the January 1878 issue of Englishwoman's Review.

The women as a class...