For whatever her eldest son thought about her sanity, his mother following such an unconventional public path was anathema indeed. That he didn’t like it was completely unsurprising. Mothers were for cooking and crying to; they were not supposed to have lives of their own…
But while Toffy was attempting to curtail Elizabeth’s activities, lobbying both grandfather and father to get her into “proper keeping,” the woman at the center of his campaign had no intention of stopping.
“The more freedom I have,” Elizabeth wrote, “the more I want.”18
Elizabeth hit the road. In railroad cars, country villages, towns, and cities across Illinois, she pitched her unprinted book. She paid her way using some of the capital she was raising, meaning she needed to sell yet more tickets. She sold to soldiers, judges at the Supreme Court in Ottawa, and even Mayor Sherman in Chicago.
“Mrs. Packard, you shall have my protection; and I can also assure you the protection of my counsel,” the mayor promised once she’d outlined her case, having boldly called on him at his office. “If you get into trouble, apply to us, and we will give you all the help the laws will allow.”19
But the laws allowed no help. Elizabeth educated him on coverture.
“I must say,” he said, shocked, “I never before knew that anyone under our government was so utterly defenceless as you are. Your case ought to be known…our laws changed.”20
As she sold her books, Elizabeth noticed something striking. Her personal story had a terrific impact. It was so easy for men to dismiss women’s rights, but when someone who was a victim of those unjust laws stood before them, testifying to the truth of what had happened to her, it was harder by far to ignore the issues or protest no change was needed. As living proof married women were vulnerable, she forced people to face the difficult realities and inspired their support—not only financially but politically too.
Because, still married as she was to Theophilus, the reality was that he could at any time stop the publication of her book or steal the earnings she hoped to make from it, even seize Elizabeth herself and send her to an asylum. All of that was still possible with the laws as they currently stood.
Which was perhaps why, when the Packards’ divorce case finally came to court in April 1864, it didn’t turn out as either party expected.
Theophilus did not return for it. His counsel appeared on his behalf—to oppose it vehemently. The minister may have wished to be rid of his wife, but he did not want the social or spiritual stigma of being divorced. He was prepared to fight her every step of the way.
But Elizabeth simply abandoned the case. By that point, she’d set her sights much higher than merely freeing herself from Theophilus’s power. A divorce would be a private battle; it might help her but would help no one else. But if she could persuade people that legal reform was necessary, then not just one woman but thousands could be saved.
Back in January, she’d been given a binary choice by her lawyers, the latter option really just a joke. “The only way I could secure any rights at all,” she’d been told, “was either by a divorce, or by getting the laws changed.”21
Now, Elizabeth said fiercely, “I chose the latter.”22
“I don’t want another sister in America, to suffer as much as I have.”23
But if legal reform was her ambition, she needed to construct a strong campaign. And what could be more compelling than a woman in peril? From her limited time on the road, she already appreciated how much more powerful her political arguments would be if she remained legally tied to Theophilus.
“Being in the position of a married woman,” she explained, “I was in eminent [sic] danger of being wronged still further, unless [the politicians] helped me, by a law, that would help all other married women.”24
Her marital status made the danger ever-present. It added pressure to the politicians: a loaded gun against her head that could kill her lest they acted. And even though it meant she was still at risk, she was willing to take that chance.
She dropped the divorce proceedings.
In May 1864, a newly ambitious Elizabeth returned to Chicago. She handed over to her printer her precious $700 （about $11,500） that she’d raised entirely through her own efforts. And then, at long last, she held in her hands a finished copy of her book. It was not The Great Drama but the second book she’d squirreled away from McFarland while in the asylum: The Exposure.
Really, it was an anthology of her asylum writing, her secret journal excepted. It included her defense from October 1860, her statement before the trustees from September 1862, accounts of dreams she’d had, letters she’d written… Her Kankakee lawyer, Stephen Moore, had penned an account of her trial, and this, too, featured. Yet with her legal campaign foremost in her mind, Elizabeth concluded the book with what was perhaps its most important piece: an impassioned “Appeal to the Government for Protection.”