The History of Woman Suffrage Volume V Part 61

(2) The full use of the publicity department of the National American Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation until May 1, 1920.

(3) The remainder for the use of the league during the year.

Following the convention Mrs. Catt conducted a School of Political Education in the Auditorium of Recital Hall, in Chicago, February 19-24. Its aim was to train women already equipped with competent knowledge of civil government and political science to teach new voters the ideals of American Citizenship, the processes of registering and casting a vote, the methods of making nominations and platforms, the nature of political parties and the best ways of using a vote to get what they want and to effect the general welfare of the people. Mrs. Catt urged each State to hold a similar State school to be followed by others in every election district, to carry the message to every woman that good citizens not only register and vote but know how to do so and why they do it; to set a standard of good citizenship with an "irreducible minimum" of qualifications below which no person can fall and lay claim to the t.i.tle good citizen. It was planned to give certificates of endors.e.m.e.nt to those who pa.s.sed 75 per cent. in the examinations at the close.

A widespread demand arose for Citizenship Schools, requests coming even from women who were indifferent or opposed to suffrage but who, now that the vote was a.s.sured, were anxious to make good and intelligent use of the ballot. Under the direction of Mrs. Gellhorn, vice-chairman of the National League of Women Voters and chairman of Organization, twenty-seven field directors were employed and schools held in thirty-five States. Missouri had 102 schools, Nebraska 30, Ohio 35. In sixteen States, the State universities cooperated with the League of Women Voters in their citizenship work. Those of Iowa and Virginia employed in their extension departments directors of citizenship schools, who, responding to calls, went to various localities and conducted courses in citizenship. That of Missouri put in a required course for every freshman, with five hours' credit. A normal training school was conducted in St. Louis in August and a correspondence course of twelve lessons was issued and used by forty-two States. In many cases these schools made a thorough study of the fundamental principles of government.

In compliance with the instruction of the convention the Board of Directors of the League of Women Voters at its post-convention meeting in Chicago selected from the program recommended by the standing committees the issues to be presented to the Resolution Committees of the political parties with a request that they be adopted as planks in the national platforms. Two of the Federal measures endorsed by the League in Chicago--the bill for the Women's Bureau in the Department of Labor and the Retirement Bill for Superannuated Public Employees--were pa.s.sed by Congress the following June and became law.

Twelve others were grouped into six planks and later condensed into a single paragraph as follows:

"We urge Federal cooperation with the States in the protection of infant life through infancy and maternity care; the prohibition of child labor and adequate appropriation for the Children's Bureau; a Federal Department of Education; joint Federal and State aid for the removal of illiteracy and increase of teachers' salaries; instruction in citizenship for both native and foreign born; increased Federal support for vocational training in home economics and Federal regulation of the marketing and distribution of food; full representation of women on all commissions dealing with women's work and women's interests; the establishment of a joint Federal and State employment service with women's departments under the direction of technically qualified women; a recla.s.sification of the Federal Civil Service free from discrimination on account of s.e.x; continuance of appropriations for public education in s.e.x hygiene; Federal legislation which shall insure that American-born women resident in the United States but married to aliens shall retain American citizenship and that the same process of naturalization shall be required of alien women as is required of alien men."

Deputations from the Board of Directors of the League of Women Voters presented this program to the Resolutions Committee of the Republican party at its convention in Chicago; to that of the Democratic party in San Francisco, and to the convention of the Farmer Labor party and the Committee of Forty-eight held jointly in Chicago. The last named included the following planks: Abolition of employment of children under 16 years of age; a Federal Department of Education; Public ownership and operation of stock yards, large abattoirs, cold-storage and terminal warehouses; equal pay for equal work. Five of the planks were included in the Republican platform: Prohibition of child labor throughout the United States; instruction in citizenship for the youth of the land; increased Federal support for vocational training in home economics; equal pay for equal work; independent citizenship for married women. The Democratic Resolutions Committee incorporated in its platform all of the requests made by the League of Women Voters except a Federal Department of Education. The Socialist Party held its convention before the planks were sent out. The Prohibition Party adopted the full program of the League of Women Voters.

One of the important steps taken in 1920 by the League of Women Voters in support of its social welfare program was the presenting of these platform planks to the Presidential candidates of the two major parties for their approval. Its representatives with a deputation went to Marion, O., the home of Senator Harding, Republican candidate, October 1 and to Dayton, O., the home of Governor c.o.x, Democratic candidate, the following day. Each promised a.s.sistance in the event of his election.

At the call of Mrs. Park, chairman of the league, delegates representing national organizations which collectively numbered about 10,000,000 women, met in Washington on November 22. These included the National League of Women Voters, General Federation of Women's Clubs, National Council of Women, the Women's Christian Temperance Union, National Women's Trade Union League, National Consumers' League, National Congress of Mothers and Parent-Teachers' a.s.sociations, a.s.sociation of Collegiate Alumnae, American Home Economics a.s.sociation, National Federation of Business and Professional Women's Clubs. They formed a Woman's Joint Congressional Committee and endorsed the largest constructive, legislative program ever adopted. It was arranged that all organizations might partic.i.p.ate to the limit of their specific field of work and purposes and at the same time all possibility was eliminated of any being involved in supporting a measure or a principle outside of its scope or contrary to its opinions.

FOOTNOTES:

[146] The History is indebted for this chapter to Mrs. Nettie Rogers Shuler, corresponding secretary of the National American Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation.

CHAPTER XXIII.

WOMAN SUFFRAGE IN NATIONAL PRESIDENTIAL CONVENTIONS.[147]

The courage and patience of the woman suffrage leaders in their long struggle for the ballot is nowhere more strongly evidenced than in their continued appeals to the national political conventions to recognize in their platforms woman's right to the franchise. These distinguished women were received with an indifference that was insulting until far into the 20th century. To two parties, the Prohibition and the Socialist, it was never necessary to appeal. The Prohibition party was organized in 1872 and from that time always advocated woman suffrage in its national platform except in 1896, when it had only a single plank, but this was supplemented by resolutions favoring equal suffrage. The Socialist party, which came into existence in 1901, declared for woman suffrage at the start and thereafter made it a part of its active propaganda. All the minor parties as a rule put planks for woman suffrage in their platforms.[148]

Before the conventions in 1904 the board of the National American Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation secured full lists of delegates and alternates of the two dominant parties--667 Republicans and 723 Democratic delegates; 495 Republican alternates and 384 Democratic, a total of 2,269. To each a letter was sent directing his attention to a memorial enclosed, signed by the officers of the a.s.sociation, an urgent request for the insertion in the platform of the following resolution: "Resolved, That we favor the submission by Congress to the various State Legislatures of an amendment to the Federal Const.i.tution forbidding the disfranchis.e.m.e.nt of United States citizens on account of s.e.x."

The Republican convention met in Chicago June 21-23. The committee appointed by the National a.s.sociation consisted of Mrs. Harriet Taylor Upton and Miss Elizabeth J. Hauser of Ohio, its treasurer and headquarters secretary, and Mrs. Catharine Waugh McCulloch of Chicago, a former officer, who arranged the hearing. The beautiful rooms of the Chicago Woman's Club were placed at their disposal, where they kept open house, a.s.sisted by Mrs. Gertrude Blackwelder, president of the Chicago Political League, Mrs. Ellen M. Henrotin and other prominent club women. Mrs. McCulloch went to the Auditorium Annex to ask the Committee on Resolutions for a hearing. Senator Hopkins of Illinois presented her to Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, the chairman, and the choice was given her of having it immediately or the next morning. She chose the nearest hour and a little later returned with her committee.

Mrs. McCulloch introduced the speakers and made the closing argument.

Mrs. Upton, the Rev. Celia Parker Woolley and the Rev. Olympia Brown addressed the committee. They were generously applauded, the suffrage plank was referred to a sub-committee and buried.

The Democratic convention was held in St. Louis July 6-9 and Mrs.

Priscilla D. Hackstaff, an officer of the New York Suffrage a.s.sociation, secured a hearing before the Resolutions Committee. Mrs.

Louise L. Werth of St. Louis and Miss Kate M. Gordon of Louisiana joined her on the opening day of the convention and at 8 o'clock the evening of the 7th they appeared before the committee. Mrs. Hackstaff argued on the ground of abstract justice and Miss Gordon from the standpoint of expediency. The committee listened attentively and were liberal with applause but the resolution never was heard from.

Undaunted by a failure which began in 1868 and had continued ever since, the suffragists made their plans for 1908. The Republican convention was again held in Chicago, June 16-20, and a committee of eminent women presented the suffrage resolution--Miss Jane Addams, Mrs. Henrotin, the Rev. Caroline Bartlett Crane, Miss Harriet Grim, Mrs. Blackwelder and Mrs. Harriot Stanton Blatch. They were heard politely but not the slightest attention was paid to their request.

Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labor, tried to secure the adoption of a plank pledging the Republican party to support a Federal Woman Suffrage Amendment but also was ignored.

When the Democratic party met in national convention in Denver July 7-11, all the delegates and alternates received an appeal which read: "You are respectfully requested by the National American Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation to place the following plank in your platform: 'Resolved, That we favor the extension of the elective franchise to the women of the United States by the States upon the same qualifications as it is accorded to men.' We ask this in order that our Government may live up to the principles upon which it was founded and in order that the women in the homes and the industries may have equal power with men to influence conditions affecting these respective spheres of action. In making this demand for justice our a.s.sociation calls your attention to the fact that more than 5,000,000 women who are occupied in the industries of the United States are helpless to legislate upon the hours, conditions and remuneration for their labor. We call your attention to the fact that through the commercialized trend of legislation the children of our nation are being sacrificed to a veritable Juggernaut--cheap labor--while this same trend is wasting our mineral land and water resources, imperiling thereby the inheritance of future generations. We call your attention to the moral conditions menacing the youth of our country. Justice and expediency demand that women be granted equal power with men to mould the conditions directly affecting the industries, the resources and the homes of the nation. We therefore appeal to the Democratic convention a.s.sembled to name national standard bearers and to determine national policies, to adopt in its platform a declaration favoring the extension of the franchise to the women of the United States."

This appeal was signed by Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, president, Kate M.

Gordon, Rachel Foster Avery, Alice Stone Blackwell, Harriet Taylor Upton, Laura Clay and Mary S. Sperry, national officers. It received no consideration whatever, but, although the suffragists did not know it, this was the last year when the two powerful political parties of the country could stand with a united front hostile to all progressive movements. There was shortly to be brought to the a.s.sistance of such movements strong forces which could not be resisted.

Early in 1912 President William Howard Taft and U. S. Senator Robert M. La Follette announced their intention of trying to secure the Republican nomination for the presidency and the press of the country took up the burning question, "Will Roosevelt be a candidate for a third term?" On February 25 he announced his candidacy and from then until the date of the Republican national convention the public interest was intense. The convention met in Chicago, June 16-20. Miss Jane Addams, vice-president of the National American Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation, had arranged with a number of women to appear at a few hours' notice before the Resolutions Committee but she could not give even that, as she learned at 8:30 p.m. on the 19th that the committee would meet at 9:30 in the Congress Hotel and she must appear at that time. There was hastily mustered into service a small but distinguished group of suffragists consisting of Mrs. Joseph T. Bowen and Miss Mary Bartelme of Chicago; Professor Sophonisba Breckinridge of Kentucky; Mrs. B. B. Mumford of Richmond, Va.; Miss Lillian D. Wald and Mrs. Simkovitch of New York City; Miss Helen Todd of California; Professor Freund of the Chicago University Law Faculty and a few others. At ten o'clock the suffragists were admitted to the committee room and greeted cordially by Governor Hadley of Missouri and courteously by the chairman, Charles W. Fairbanks. Miss Addams was told that she might have five minutes (later extended to seven) and present one speaker. She introduced Mrs. Bowen, president of the Juvenile Protective a.s.sociation, who spoke earnestly four minutes, leaving Miss Addams three to make the final plea. There were confusion and noise in the room and the attention of the committee was distracted. The platform contained no reference to woman suffrage.

Senator LaFollette presented his own platform to the convention in which was a plank favoring the extension of suffrage to women but it went down to defeat. Two days later the convention amid great excitement nominated President Taft by a vote of 561 while Colonel Roosevelt's vote was only 107. Directly after the convention adjourned the delegates who favored Roosevelt a.s.sembled at Orchestra Hall and nominated him in the name of the new Progressive party, Miss Addams seconding the nomination.

Soon after Colonel Roosevelt announced his candidacy he was visited by Judge "Ben" Lindsey of Denver, a representative of the progressive element in politics, who pointed out to him the great a.s.sistance it would be to his campaign for him to come out for woman suffrage.

Roosevelt, who was an astute politician, saw the advantage of enlisting the help of women, who through their large organizations had become a strong factor in public life. Judge Lindsay therefore was authorized to announce that he would favor a woman suffrage plank in the Progressive platform and Roosevelt confirmed it. This caused wide excitement and the suffragists throughout the country began to rally under the Roosevelt banner. He had always been theoretically in favor but with many reservations and during his two terms as President he had refused all appeals to endorse it in any way. When he went to Chicago to the first convention of the Progressive party August 5 he carried with him the draft of the platform and in it was a plank favoring woman suffrage but calling for a nation-wide referendum of the question to women themselves!

When this plank was submitted to the Resolutions Committee, on which were such suffragists as Miss Addams, Judge Lindsay and U. S. Senator Albert J. Beveridge, they vetoed it at once. It had already been issued to the press in printed form and telegrams recalling it had to be sent far and wide. The plank presented by the Resolutions Committee and unanimously adopted by the convention read as follows: "The Progressive party, believing that no people can justly claim to be a true democracy which denies political rights on account of s.e.x, pledges itself to the task of securing equal suffrage to men and women alike."

Many States sent women delegates and they were cordially welcomed. The convention was marked by a deep, almost religious zeal, the delegates breaking frequently into the singing of hymns of which Onward Christian Soldiers was a favorite. Women took a prominent part in the proceedings and woman suffrage was made one of the leading features.

Senator Beveridge referred to it at length in his speech, saying: "Because women as much as men are a part of our economic and social life, women as much as men should have the voting power to solve all economic and social problems. Votes are theirs as a matter of natural right alone; votes should be theirs as a matter of political wisdom also."

Later in a glowing tribute Mr. Roosevelt said: "It is idle to argue whether women can play their part in politics because in this convention we have seen the accomplished fact, and, moreover, the women who have actively partic.i.p.ated in this work of launching the new party represent all that we are most proud to a.s.sociate with American womanhood. My earnest hope is to see the Progressive party in all its State and local divisions recognize this fact precisely as it has been recognized at the national convention.... Workingwomen have the same need to combine for protection that workingmen have; the ballot is as necessary for one cla.s.s as for the other; we do not believe that with the two s.e.xes there is ident.i.ty of function but we do believe that there should be equality of right and therefore we favor woman suffrage." The Progressive party in State after State followed the lead of the convention and women were welcomed into its deliberations.

From this time woman suffrage was one of the dominant political issues throughout the country.

The Democratic National Convention met in Baltimore June 25-July 3.

The Baltimore suffragists applied on Thursday for a hearing before the Resolutions Committee for Dr. Anna Howard Shaw and were informed that the hearings had ended on Wednesday. Urged by the women the chairman, John W. Kern of Indiana, finally consented to give a hearing that day, although he said he had turned away hundreds of men who wanted hearings, and he allotted five minutes to it. Mrs. W. J. Brown of Baltimore, Mrs. Lawrence Lewis of Philadelphia and several others went with Dr. Shaw but after a long wait only Mrs. Lewis and she were admitted. With a strong, logical speech Dr. Shaw presented the following resolution and asked that it be made a plank in the platform:

Whereas, The fundamental idea of a democracy is self-government, the right of citizens to choose their own representatives, to enact the laws by which they are governed, and whereas, this right can be secured only by the exercise of the suffrage, therefore,

Resolved, That the ballot in the hand of every qualified citizen const.i.tutes the true political status of the people and to deprive one-half of the people of the use of the ballot is to deny the first principle of a democratic government.

The committee was courteous and listened with marked attention, William Jennings Bryan among them, but took no action on the resolution.[149]

The convention nominated Woodrow Wilson, who had answered a question from a chairman of the New York Woman Suffrage Party the preceding winter, while Governor of New Jersey: "I can only say that my mind is in the midst of the debate which it involves. I do not feel that I am ready to utter my confident judgment as yet about it. I am honestly trying to work my way toward a just conclusion." President Taft had written in answer to a letter of inquiry from the secretary of the Men's Suffrage League of New York: "I am willing to wait until there shall be a substantial, not unanimous, but a substantial call from that s.e.x before the suffrage is extended."

As the result of the year's political work a summing up in December, 1912, showed a woman suffrage plank in the national platforms of the Progressive, Socialist and Prohibition parties; a plank in the platform of every party in New York State and in that of one or more parties in many States. The Progressive party with woman suffrage as one of its cardinal principles had polled 4,119,507 votes. Kansas, Oregon and Arizona by popular vote had been added to the number of the equal suffrage States. In 1914 these were increased by Montana and Nevada, making eleven where women voted on the same terms as men. In 1913 Illinois granted a large amount of suffrage including a vote for Presidential electors. In 1915 President Wilson and all his Cabinet, except Secretary Lansing; Speaker Champ Clark and Mr. Bryan publicly endorsed suffrage for women. Const.i.tutional amendments were defeated in four eastern States but they polled 1,234,470 favorable votes.

By 1916, the year of the Presidential nominating conventions, there had been so vast an advance of public sentiment that the official board of the National American Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation was encouraged to believe that its effort of nearly fifty years to obtain woman suffrage planks in the national platforms of the Republican and Democratic parties would be successful. Its president, Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, in the letters sent to the delegates, who were circularized three times, called attention to the great gains and the existing status of the movement, adapting the appeal to each party.

Under her direction, as a preliminary to the conventions, favorable opinions were obtained from many leading men who were to attend them, similar to the following: Representative John M. Nelson of the House Judiciary Committee said: "The endors.e.m.e.nt of equal suffrage by either of the two great parties would do more at this time to simplify the question than any other one thing. It seems to me that in directing their efforts toward securing this endors.e.m.e.nt its advocates have exhibited sound practical judgment and admirable political ac.u.men." "I am in favor of an endors.e.m.e.nt in the Republican platform of the principle of equal suffrage," said Senator Borah, a Republican delegate. "I have no doubt there will be a plank offered to that effect and it will receive my active support." U. S. Senator Owen on the floor of the Senate declared: "This demand ought to be made by men as well as by thinking, progressive women. I hope that all parties will in the national conventions give their approval to this larger measure of liberty to the better half of the human race." The suffragists began preparations for two striking demonstrations during the conventions.

The Republican convention took place in Chicago June 7-10. On the 6th a ma.s.s meeting was held under the auspices of the a.s.sociation at the Princess Theater. Speeches by Mrs. Catt and others roused the audience to great enthusiasm and the following resolution was adopted: "We, women from every State, gathered in national a.s.sembly, come to you in the name of justice, liberty and equality to ask you to incorporate in your platform a declaration favoring the extension of suffrage to the only remaining cla.s.s of unenfranchised citizens, the women of our nation, and to urge you to give its protecting power and prestige to the final struggle of women for political liberty. We are not asking your endors.e.m.e.nt of an untried theory but your recognition of a fact.

The men of eleven States and Alaska have already fully enfranchised their women and Illinois has granted a large degree of suffrage, including the Presidential vote. The women of five States have gained the vote since 1912, your last convention, and have party affiliations yet to make."

A parade of 25,000 women had been planned to show the strength of the movement. A cold, heavy rain upset these plans but on June 7, 5,500 women (the others believing the demonstration would not be given) braved the storm, gathered in Grant Park and marched to the Coliseum, where the Republican Resolutions Committee was meeting. The Chicago _Herald_ in describing that march said: "Over their heads surged a vast sea of umbrellas extending two miles down the street; under their feet swirled rivulets of water. Wind tore at their clothes and rain drenched their faces but unhesitatingly they marched in unbroken formation. Never before in the history of this city, probably of the world, has there been so impressive a demonstration of consecration to a cause." The first division reached the convention hall before five o'clock. The committee had given a hearing to the suffragists and was listening to the "antis." Just as Mrs. A. J. George of Brookline, Ma.s.s., was a.s.serting, "there is no widespread demand for woman suffrage" hundreds of drenched and dripping women began to pour into the hall, each woman's condition bearing silent witness to the strength of her wish for the vote. Thousands of converts were made among those who witnessed the courage and devotion of the women in facing this storm.

The hearing took place before a sub-committee of the Resolutions Committee and instead of seven minutes being allotted to it, as in 1912, representatives of the National American Woman Suffrage a.s.sociation had half an hour, the National a.s.sociation Opposed to Woman Suffrage the next half hour and the Congressional Union a final half hour. Mrs. Catt, Mrs. Abbie A. Krebs of California, Mrs. Ellis Meredith of Colorado, Mrs. Grace Wilbur Trout of Illinois and Mrs.

Frank M. Roessing of Pennsylvania spoke for the National Suffrage a.s.sociation. They asked for the following resolution: "The Republican party reaffirming its faith in government of the people, by the people and for the people, as a measure of justice to one-half the adult people of this country, favors the extension of the suffrage to women." The speakers for the Congressional Union were Miss Anne Martin, Mrs. Harriot Stanton Blatch and Mrs. Sara Bard Field and they asked for an endors.e.m.e.nt of the Federal Suffrage Amendment. The "antis" were represented by their national president, Mrs. Arthur M.

Dodge, and national secretary, Miss Minnie Bronson; Miss Alice Hill Chittenden, New York State president, and Mrs. George. They asked that there should be no mention of woman suffrage.

The sub-committee reported against the adoption of a suffrage plank, the vote standing five to four--Senators Lodge, Wadsworth, Oliver, and Charles Hopkins Clark, editor of the Hartford (Conn.) _Courant_, and former Representative Howland of Ohio opposed; Senators Borah, Sutherland and Fall and Representative Madden of Illinois in favor.

The question was then taken up in the full Committee on Resolutions.

Senators Borah and Smoot led a vigorous fight for a plank; Senator Marion Butler of North Carolina headed the opposition. The strongest possible influence was brought to bear against it by the party leaders, Senators W. Murray Crane and Henry Cabot Lodge of Ma.s.sachusetts; Boies Penrose of Pennsylvania and James W. Wadsworth, Jr., of New York and Speaker Cannon of Illinois. Nevertheless it was carried by 26 to 21. Within a half hour defeat was again threatened when seven absent members of the committee came and asked for a reconsideration. After repeated parleys it was reconsidered and emerged as the last plank in the platform. The final vote was 35 to 11 but it was the result of a compromise, for it read: "The Republican party, reaffirming its faith in government of the people, by the people and for the people, as a measure of justice to one-half the adult people of this country, favors the extension of the suffrage to women but recognizes the right of each State to settle this question for itself"!

For the first time this party declared for the doctrine of State's rights, which was the chief obstacle in the way of the Federal Amendment, the goal of the National a.s.sociation for nearly fifty years. Mrs. Catt knew that it would be utterly useless to ask for a plank favoring this amendment and so she asked simply for a clear-cut endors.e.m.e.nt of the principle of woman suffrage. This was secured, after women had been appealing to national Republican conventions since 1868, and although it was weakened by the qualifying declaration, she realized that an immense gain had been made. By the press throughout the country the adoption of the plank was hailed as "a victory of supreme importance," and as guaranteeing a suffrage plank in the Democratic national platform, which could not have been obtained without it. It was adopted by the convention without opposition and with great enthusiasm.

The Democratic convention met in St. Louis June 14-16. The first day the suffragists staged their "walkless parade," which the press poetically called "the golden lane," as the 6,000 white-robed women who formed a continuous lane from the convention headquarters in the Jefferson Hotel to the Coliseum where the convention was held carried yellow parasols and wore yellow satin sashes. They gave resplendent color to the aisle through which hundreds of delegates walked to their political councils. On the steps of the Art Museum the suffragists presented a striking tableau showing Liberty, a symbolic figure effectively garbed, surrounded by three groups of women, those in black typifying the non-suffrage States; those in gray representing the partial suffrage States; those in red, white and blue the States where political equality prevailed. The suffragists had now no difficulty in obtaining a hearing and plenty of time. Representatives of the National American a.s.sociation, the National Woman's Party, the Southern States Woman Suffrage Conference and the National a.s.sociation Opposed to Woman Suffrage appeared before the sub-committee of the Resolutions Committee.