It was no small thing for her to take up this burden. The Doctor, although a believer in equal suffrage, was strongly opposed to her taking any active part in public life. He felt as Grandfather Howe had felt forty years before when his son Sam spoke in public for the sake of Greece; it jarred on his traditions. Others of the family also deplored the new departure, and her personal friends almost with one accord held up hands of horror or deprecation. These things were inexpressibly painful to her; she loved approbation; the society and sympathy of "kent folk," whose traditions corresponded with her own; but her hand was on the plough; there was no turning back.
Suffrage worked her hard. The following year the New England Woman Suffrage Association issued a call for the formation of a national body; the names signed were Lucy Stone, Caroline M. Severance, Julia Ward Howe, T. W. Higginson, and G. H. Vibbert. Representatives from twenty-one States assembled in Cleveland, November 24, 1869, and formed the American Woman Suffrage Association. There was already a "National Woman Suffrage Association," formed a few months earlier; the new organization differed from the other in some points of policy, notably in the fact that men as well as women were recognized among the leaders. Colonel Higginson was its president at one time, Henry Ward Beecher, Bishop Gilbert Haven, and Dudley Foulke at others. The New England Woman's Club also admitted men to membership: it was a point our mother had much at heart. She held that the Quaker organization was the best, with its separate meetings of men and women, supplemented by a joint session of both. She always insisted upon the salutary influence that men and women exercise upon one another.
"The two sexes police each other," she often said. She always maintained the importance of their united action in matters of public as of private interest. She was essentially a humanist in contradistinction to a feminist.
She worked for the American Association during the twenty-one years of its separate existence, first as foreign corresponding secretary, afterward as president, and in various other capacities. When, in 1890, the two societies united to form the National American Woman Suffrage Association, she became and continued through life one of the vice-presidents of that body. From the first, she was recognized as an invaluable leader. The years of philosophical study had made her mind supple, alert, quick to grasp and to respond, even as the study of languages brought her the gift of ready speech and pure diction. Her long practice in singing had given her voice strength, sweetness, and carrying power; above all, she was a natural orator, and speaking was a joy to her. The first time she ever made a speech in public was to a group of soldiers of the Army of the Potomac on the occasion of a visit to Washington during the war. She had driven out to visit the camp outside the Capital. Colonel William B. Greene disconcerted her very much by saying, "Mrs. Howe, you must speak to my men."