Photo: Thomas Kurmeier / Moment / Getty Images
BOSTON (State House News Service) - Cape Cod lawmakers want to install a permanent memorial in the State House honoring Mercy Otis Warren, a writer and patriot from Barnstable whose work was influential during the American Revolution.
The memorial would be a gift from Cape Cod artist David Lewis, according to legislation from Rep. Kip Diggs of Barnstable and Sen. Julian Cyr of Truro (H 3013).
Cyr said Warren was a leading voice of the Anti-Federalist movement as the country was founded, and she worked to include the Bill of Rights into the U.S. Constitution. In 1805, she became one the first women to have a nonfiction book published in America, "History of the Rise, Progress and Termination of the American Revolution," according to the National Women's History Museum.
Honoring Warren -- whom Cyr noted gained "extraordinary" recognition from her contemporaries, particularly as a woman during the colonial time period -- is "long overdue" on Beacon Hill, he said at a legislative committee hearing Wednesday. A bronze statue of Warren, sculpted by Lewis, has been on the lawn of the Barnstable County Superior Courthouse for more than two decades, according to the county website.
"I often remark when I'm leaving the State House, especially late at night, and I'm walking through the hall of the second floor or the third floor, 'How many now long deceased white old men -- presumably straight but not all of them -- are on our walls?'" Cyr told the Joint Committee on State Administration and Regulatory Oversight. "It's time to have some long deceased women and other people represented here in the State House."
The bill was reported favorably out of committee last session. The House ordered it to a third reading but took no further action on it.
Diggs said the latest proposal is endorsed by the Massachusetts Caucus of Women Legislators and eight members of the Cape Cod legislative delegation.
Written By Alison Kuznitz/SHNS
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